Showing papers in "Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities in 2021"
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on the strategies of reconstructing communicative space between the author and reader as well as forecasting the emotional impact on the reader through transforming textual reality.
Abstract: The article focuses on the strategies of reconstructing communicative space between the author and reader as well as forecasting the emotional impact on the reader through transforming textual reality. The emotiogenic characteristics of fictional discourse provide the emotional perception of literary texts since emotions are central to the experience of literary narrative fiction. Such a perception is made possible by the identification, comprehension, and interpretation of the emotionally significant textual components of different types. The authors of the article have classified them as the following: graphical and visual, punctuation, and semantic-stylistic ones. These means, found in the postmodern novels by Salman Rushdie, Tahereh Mafi, Marina Lewycka, Kazuo Ishiguro, Alexandar Hemon, and Stephen King, have been analysed to explicate the character of the phenomenon of emotiogenic fictional narratives. The emotiogenic means in the selected novels are exploited by the writers of different ethnic affiliations that can be resulted from their multicultural experience. The superimposition of some means is explained by their semantic relationship. The article tests a hypothesis that the cognitive architecture of the emotiogenic means is determined by an emotional situation reflected in a literary text that appears to be a special code through which readers interpret their emotional and evaluative meanings. The indicators of the text’s emotionality occur to be signs of the textual representation of emotional knowledge. This study contributes to the investigation of the emotiogenic means of creating communicative space which are considered those discursive expressive elements that affect the perception of textual reality.
10 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors propose to look at the territorial rights of the Mapuche with an interdisciplinary approach and focus on developing the conceptual framework of Mapuches cosmovision of land and territory.
Abstract: The indigenous population of Latin America has been suffering from a sense of alienation since the arrival of Columbus in 1492 who referred to this land as “Nuevo Mundo”. There is a long history of environmental exploitation in Chile which has severely strained the relationship amongst the Mapuche community, the State and private entities (hydroelectric and timber industry). Although this conflict seems to be economicproductive associated with land, wherein land attains a “tangible material good”, in the Mapuche cosmovision, land (Mapu means land in Mapudungun, the language of Mapuche) acquires a connotation of “intangible material and immaterial good”. There is a profound imperceptible connection between nature and Mapuche and their traditions and culture are strongly rooted in the land. The industrial expansion has promoted a series of negative externalities like habitat fragmentation, loss of native forest, biodiversity reduction, water availability, etc. These affect the “idiosyncrasy” of this community (Mapuche-Nature relationship) and loss of their land could represent an identity loss. The Chilean indigenous policy appears to be inadequate and fail to recognize the socio-cultural and territorial rights for all indigenous peoples, including Mapuche, given the multidimensionality of the land under the indigenous cosmovision. The sociopolitical measures imposed by the Chilean government until now to make their life “modern” boomeranged alienating them further from society. This paper proposes to look at the territorial rights of the Mapuche with an interdisciplinary approach and focuses on developing the conceptual framework of Mapuche cosmovision of land and territory. The study follows a brief analysis of the historical context of the territorial conflict between the Chilean State and the Mapuche people and how the implementation of national and international normative framework on indigenous rights has not been effective in resolving this territorial conflict. The study tries to synthesize and talks about integrating the Mapuche land cosmovision in the sociopolitical discourse and be considered while formulating any land policy involving Mapuche and other indigenous peoples inhabiting in Chile in future. The discussions and analysis have been carried out through a comprehensive literature review and integrate an interdisciplinary approach to look at this issue, both from the philosophical perspective and from the socio-political policy framework of government.
9 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the artistic status of bio-artworks has been defined by strengthening its artistic status through two distinct approaches: the first is based on the acceptance that the concept of Bio-art includes both the terms "art" and "bio" that could stand for Biology, Biotechnology, and Bioethics.
Abstract: This paper aims to define Bio-art by strengthening its artistic status through two distinct approaches. The first is based on the acceptance that the concept of Bio-art includes both the term “art” and the term “bio” that could stand for Biology, Biotechnology, and Bioethics. It is argued that despite its direct connection to scientific research, Bio-art is only partly linked to the methods of the pure science of Biology, while it stands closer to the technoscience of Biotechnology. However, while bio-artists often use scientific methods and techniques, they eventually focus on bioethical questions. To amplify the artistic status of bio-artworks, we claim that they are kinds of visual “enthymemes”, a term used by Aristotle to define incomplete rhetoric syllogisms linking all recipients to common questions. Our second approach is developed around Levinson’s intentional-historical theory, showing that Bio-art belongs to the evolutionary narrative of art and artistic intentions. We allege interconnections of distinct features of bio-artworks with artworks of different eras that in the context of a retrospective view are to be understood as having paved the way for the emergence of Bioart.
9 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors show how the different tools for spreading the English language divided the nation into two, supporting the divide and rule policy of the British, which is still effective in the so-called united, equal, and democratic India.
Abstract: Famous Irish political scientist and historian, Benedict Anderson, in his book, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism has described nations as imagined communities. Stephen May, the British novelist, playwright, and TV writer, has viewed that language is used as a political tool to strengthen the imagined community of a nation-state. Eventually, many countries have been named after the language predominantly used in a particular country. But during the colonial expansion that the linguistic identity of a colonised nation like India and its people has been transformed in different ways. With the English Education Act, 1835 Lord Bentinck defeated the Orientalists and promoted English education in India. Consequently, different missionaries like Joshua Marshman, William Carey, William Ward, and Alexander Duff, who principally used English education to preach Christianity among the Indians, and British officials like Charles Grant, Lord Macaulay, William Hazlitt, and also some higher-class Indians like Raja Rammohan Roy, Keshab Chandra Sen, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay supported the Anglicist view and tried to spread the English education in India. Different English schools like Dharmatala Academy were built and in the curriculum of different universities, the writings of different English authors like Francis Bacon, William Shakespeare, John Milton, Joseph Addison, Alexander Pope were included. Many higher-class Indians became more interested in English study losing their interest in vernacular education. Vijay Agnew in her autobiography, Where I Come From, and Madhu Kishor in her article “The Dominance of Angreziyat in Our Education” have accused English education of making them unaware and ignorant of the Indian culture and writings. In this way, the higher-class English educated Indians have created one English nation within the Hindustan. Even the translation of different Indian classical texts into English like Sir William Jone’s translation of Abhjnanasakuntalam in 1789 and Sir Charles Wilkins’ translation of Bhagabadgita in 1784 has also paved the way for forming a different identity. In this context, the present paper aims to show how the different tools for spreading the English language divided the nation into two, supporting the divide and rule policy of the British, which is still effective in the so-called united, equal, and democratic India.
8 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a psycho-historical approach was used to analyze the representational character of the 1998 Indonesian sorcerer massacre as depicted in the work of fiction, and the results showed that there was no authentic evidence to support the accusation that the person who was killed was actually a sorcerer.
Abstract: After the collapse of the New Order government, in the 1998-1999, hundreds of people who were considered to be sorcerers were killed, especially in Banyuwangi. In the obscurity, Intan Andaru has narrated these events into her work. Her novel, Perempuan Bersampur Merah (Woman in Red Scarf), tells massacre story form the voiceless accused sorcerer’s point of view. This article aims to discuss the representational character of the 1998 Indonesian sorcerer massacre as depicted in the work of fiction. This research uses a psycho-historical approach. The data collection technique was done by using a note-taking technique. The analysis technique is carried out by the stages of presenting data, reducing data, and drawing conclusions. The results showed that there was no authentic evidence to support the accusation that the person who was killed was actually a sorcerer. As a result, cultural trauma is an important part of the psychological suffering experienced by the victim's family. This trauma cannot be erased because the stigmata as a descendant of a sorcerer will always be attached to the victim's family. This novel revives the social and cultural memorial structure of the 1998 Indonesian massacre in the form of individual aesthetic mediation to activate historical memory.
8 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors have analyzed the narrative structure of Indian singing reality television show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa to identify the representation of national identity and found that the cultural expressions reveal the notion of identity through representation of 'ordinary' people and emphasis on performances.
Abstract: This paper aims to understand the narrative structure of Indian singing reality television show to identify the representation of national identity. By focusing on the “Sa Re Ga Ma Pa” show format, this paper has followed the work of Vladimir Propp to examine the cultural expressions with the sequential development of the narrative plot. The convergent parallel mixed method has been using to collect quantitative and qualitative data. While using the Likert scale, the reliability of the questionnaire has been calculated and reported Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for internal consistency reliability. The quantitative data has gathered from 205 respondents and 99 episodes aired from 2017 to 2019 have analysed in qualitative data, which is followed by data analysis through IBM SPSS Statistics. By analysing the quantitative and qualitative data this paper finds that the cultural expressions reveal the notion of national identity through the representation of ‘ordinary’ people and emphasis on performances by focusing on the structured format of Indian reality television. The paper indicates the ways where the viewers of the society can connect with cultural expressions through the genre of reality television.
7 citations
TL;DR: Werner Bergengruen (d. 1964) was one of the most popular German authors from ca. 1930 to at least 1970, but his reputation has faded a lot, and there are only a few scholars who are still engaged with his works.
Abstract: Werner Bergengruen (d. 1964) was one of the most popular German authors from ca. 1930 to at least 1970, but his reputation has faded a lot, and there are only a few scholars who are still engaged with his works. In his collection of novels, Der Tod von Reval, however, Bergengruen developed a fascinating range of literary reflections on death as people in this Baltic city (Reval, today Tallinn) had experienced it throughout their history. Drawing extensively from medieval and early modern legendary accounts, this author translated in a highly meaningful manner the fundamental experience of death into an existentialist process profoundly informed by humanist values.
7 citations
TL;DR: The authors examines the various representations of female identity in Murdoch's The Unicorn and argues that the obsessive pursuit of perfection in a female figure as well as the disruption of the boundaries of victim and victimizer in this novel serve to problematize the cultural tendency to understand individuals in terms of stereotypes.
Abstract: This study examines the various representations of female identity in Murdoch's The Unicorn. The analysis of the novel revolves around the character of Hannah who is the center of everyone's obsessive gaze. She is described both as an angel and a monster, a victim and a victimizer. Her victimization is aggravated by her passive submission to the will of her victimizers. This simultaneous presence of contradictory features in one character problematizes the notion of perceiving female identity in terms of binaries. As a typical Gothic heroine, Hannah is trapped within cultural assumptions about women. She passively and yet subversively plays the roles projected on her by the contradictory desires of other characters. It will be argued that the obsessive pursuit of perfection in a female figure as well as the disruption of the boundaries of victim and victimizer in this novel serve to problematize the cultural tendency to understand individuals in terms of stereotypes. Therefore, this study aims to illustrate how Murdoch has used an enigmatic female character to challenge the readers' disposition to perceive characters in terms of gender stereotypes.
7 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors extend scholarly reading of the contributions of Michael Soi's politics paintings to social debates as a means of deepening our understanding of the complex relationship between art and politics.
Abstract: The purpose of this study is to extend scholarly reading of the contributions of Michael Soi’s politics paintings to social debates as a means of deepening our understanding of the complex relationship between art and politics. Thus, this study assesses relevant variables indicating how Soi’s selected paintings are effectively his means of projecting his views about his experiences, expectations, dreams, fears and reservations concerning his society’s socio-political realities. In an attempt at analyzing the functionality and aesthetic significances of Soi’s paintings, this study discusses relevant perspectives from individuals on politics paintings particularly how they can propel meaningful debates. Therefore, to gather relevant information on people’s responses to this kind of painting, we utilized viewer response approach and follow-up interviews. More so, we applied interpretive analysis in assessing the paintings (as metaphors depicting social realities), the collated responses (as means of espousing more on the concepts of cognitive process mechanisms), and relevant literature (as a means of assessing the trajectories of scholarly views on this subject). In the end, we observe that Soi’s politics paintings are efficacious medium of communication and that each individual viewer of these paintings produces responses that are similar or dissimilar but not exact because their subsisting ideological, political and philosophical inclinations are not exactly the same.
6 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a study of war memorial sites in the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir is presented, where the authors take the position that memory is simultaneously a material and immaterial phenomenon and these cannot be detached from affective and visceral human bonds and their roles in re-formulations in space and place.
Abstract: The paper through iconographic and spatial dynamics, critically engages with the performative aspect of the select war memorial sites in the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir. While the interdisciplinary study of war memorials in relation to memory and commemorative politics have been studied, its materialistic aesthetics informed through spatial and affective contours remains a burgeoning field of enquiry if not an unexampled one. The study is premised on the photographic field work of the sites envisioned through the cultural geography of war memorials. In approaching war memorial sites as a landscape of memory, we take the position that memory is simultaneously a material and immaterial phenomenon and these cannot be detached from affective and visceral human bonds and their roles in (re-)formulations in space and place. The materialistic aesthetics of memorymemorial continuum are ideated through spatial and affective contours, which, in turn, inform the predominant and everyday experience of grief and bereavement, both imagined and lived. The study dominantly attests its claims through Foucault’s concept of ‘heterotopia’ in relation to commemorative sites. The heterotopic tensions of multiple experiences and belongings are unpacked through both tangible and affective domains ranging from dominant public commemorative sites to parks and shopping complexes.
5 citations
TL;DR: The authors examines the oral history narratives of individuals who migrated from East Pakistan in the wake of the 1947 Partition and shows that however much the nation-state attempts to frame a particular brand of nationalism, variants of ethnocultural nationalism do exist, demonstrating the diverse subjectivities embodied by the refugees/narrators.
Abstract: The paper intends to study the figure of the refugee in post-Partition West Bengal by critically examining the oral history narratives of individuals who migrated from East Pakistan in the wake of the 1947 Partition. It underscores the value and relevance of narrativity in the representation of factual history, the motivation and manifestation of which make history subjective, interpretive and contingent on the refugee’s narrative. The narrative act presents the refugees’ transition from, what may be called, figurative to socio-material subjects who interrupt and derange the nationalising exercise of the nation-state. The multivalent understanding of refugees makes the nation-state suffer from an anxiety of incompleteness (Appadurai 2006). The paper extends the idea of incompleteness by showing that however much the nation-state attempts to frame a particular brand of nationalism, variants of ethnocultural nationalism do exist, demonstrating the diverse subjectivities embodied by the refugees/narrators. Such ethnocultural nationalism can be read as alternative forms of self-assertion deeply etched in the social memory of the refugees.
TL;DR: The authors reinterpreted the witches of Macbeth from a feminist perspective, and analyzed their character from a Feminist perspective, exploring their trauma and identifying their mischief as a source of rebellion.
Abstract: This paper attempts to re-interpret the witches of Macbeth from a Feminist perspective. Both critics as well as the ordinary readers mostly receive them in a negative light. Doing so, they overlook the fact that women like these witches are relegated to the margins and share a history of being discriminated and vulnerable to attacks. Within the text, they are humiliated as the ‘weird others’ and compared to ‘bubbles’ on earth. To this date, people have the tendency to marginalize and discriminate women who posit their individuality in their socially reclusive lifestyle. While analyzing their character from a Feminist perspective, the paper will explore their trauma and identify their mischief as a source of rebellion. By making such an alternative reading of the text, the work aims to create a ‘shock-effect’ among people who continue to discriminate such marginalized women.
TL;DR: This paper attempted a re-reading of the particular texts to identify how Italy saw India, while illustrating through their history of publication the transformation that these narratives underwent later in order to objectify India in the West through the lens of Orientalism in their manner of representation.
Abstract: Fifteenth-century Italian travel narratives on India by Nicolò dei Conti and Gerolamo di Santo Stefano present a detailed account of the India they visited, following the narrative tradition of the Italian Marco Polo. These narratives of the Renaissance were published as descriptive authorial texts of travellers to the East. Their importance was due to the authors’ detailed first-hand experiences of the societies and cultures that they encountered, as well as the various trade centres of the period. These narratives were utilised by merchants, explorers, and Jesuits for a variety of purposes. The narratives of Nicolò dei Conti and Gerolamo di Santo Stefano thus became indispensable tools that were later distorted through numerous translations to suit the politics of Orientalism for the emerging colonial enterprises. In my paper, I have attempted a re-reading of the particular texts to identify how Italy saw India, while illustrating through their history of publication the transformation that these narratives underwent later in order to objectify India in the West through the lens of Orientalism in their manner of representation.
TL;DR: In this paper, Ondaatje's Warlight (2018) contains nostalgic elements of strangeness and cartography, and the case of Rachel's illness, namely her epileptic seizures, is explored as an instance that drives her impetus for active forgetting and eventual convalescence.
Abstract: Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight (2018), his latest novel to-date, contains nostalgic elements of strangeness and cartography. In this paper, I short-circuit such themes with health under medical humanities, which heeds a Nietzschean counsel of close reading in literature. To do so, I explore the case of Rachel’s illness, namely her epileptic seizures, as an instance that drives her impetus for active forgetting and eventual convalescence. A close hermeneutical reading of the novel can reveal that both of Nietzsche’s ideas on active forgetting and convalescence provide traction in terms of what this paper constructs as Rachel’s pathography or narration of illness. Shifting the focus from the main narrator, Nathaniel, I argue that it is not the novel’s reliance on memory but the subplot events of Nathaniel’s sister and her epilepsy that form a substantial case of medical or health humanities.
TL;DR: The authors explored the cognitive and pragmatic potential of leveraging phraseological intensifiers in English political discourse and found that the use of such intensifiers significantly outperformed in the degree of pragmatic suggestion in political discourse.
Abstract: The present paper reports on a study that aims to explore the cognitive and pragmatic potential of leveraging phraseological intensifiers in English political discourse. The authors argue that the phraseological intensifiers of political discourse could not be discussed without any contribution to the extra-linguistic context. Therefore, the present study works with a cognitive linguistic explanation of the phraseological intensifiers used by English politicians and journalists as well as performed pragmatic impact that aimed to foster the relevant conceptualization process. The suggestion of phraseological intensifiers depends on context linguistic meaning in the employed by the authors cognitive-pragmatic paradigm. This paper also denotes a wide range of relative to intensity categories, which should be distinguished from it. Such an analysis allows the authors to account for the wide distribution of intensifiers and their co-occurrence with categories that do not encode degree variables. The results of the study show that phraseological intensifiers significantly outperformed in the degree of pragmatic suggestion in political discourse and made use of them in a more appropriate way.
TL;DR: The study affirms that NLP strategies could be quite efficacious in making the students procure the skills that are indispensable in workplaces effortlessly.
Abstract: From the long years ago, education have been trying a proper way to improving the skills of English. Educators tried several methodologies in English to choose the better one. This paper brings out the effect of teaching Receptive skills by implementing NLP (NeuroLinguistic Programming) in second language as English. NeuroLinguistic Programming is one of the methods to catch up the English by giving focus on the brain anatomy. Brain anatomy can motive the creativity as well as the skills of using language. It also exist the role of Neuro Linguistic Programming in teaching the Receptive skills of English, which could make the students to improve the Receptive skills such as listening and reading. The study, in short, affirms that NLP strategies could be quite efficacious in making the students procure the skills that are indispensable in workplaces effortlessly. As it involves teaching a reading comprehension course by NLP concepts and techniques, the approach used in this study is experimental. In addition, the experimental method involves pre-and post-tests conducted before and after the course by the control group (40 students) and the experimental group (40 students). The students of the experimental community are chosen from the secondary school students. After the NLP experimentation, it was revealed from the study that there was a significant difference in the level of the experimental group in pre and post-test.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors of The Little Stranger (2009) used Gaston Bachelard's spatial criticism elaborated in his The Poetics of Space (1958) and the concept of heterotopia by Foucault for the interpretation of the narrative.
Abstract: The English Country House happens to be one of the most iconic topoi in English literary studies. Since narratologists have long privileged time over space, narrative space remained a relatively unexplored territory until the twentieth century, which intensified the interest in the house as the thematic fulcrum of literary works. British novelist Sarah Waters’s first venture into the realm of the sub-genre of English Country House fiction, The Little Stranger (2009) is a befitting discourse that appropriates the poetics of manorial space. Hundreds Hall, the Warwickshire seat of the Ayreses, encapsulates many roles as the epicentre of the story and as a powerful symbol of the gradual decay of English aristocracy in the post-World War II Britain. The article will try to incorporate Gaston Bachelard’s spatial criticism elaborated in his The Poetics of Space (1958) and the concept of heterotopia by Foucault for the interpretation/ (s) of the narrative. The study seeks to locate Bachelard’s bourgeoisie points of view, which the author subverts by portraying the rise of the proletariat. The focus of the article is to highlight the ingenuity of Waters’s creative process, which resorts to the genre of English Country House fiction to capture the condition of British aristocrats in a time of crises.
TL;DR: The main purpose of the study is to prove that nonverbal signs are used to convey a confidential message to show that in international communication there is a change in the semantics of nonverbal actions depending on the culture and individual knowledge of each nation.
Abstract: The article is devoted to the study of the national cognitive nature, the hidden essence of non-verbal techniques. The main purpose of the study is to prove that nonverbal signs are used to convey a confidential message to show that in international communication there is a change in the semantics of nonverbal actions depending on the culture and individual knowledge of each nation. Methods: In human life, in parallel with verbal communication, an experiment was conducted on nonverbal techniques, sometimes used in pure form to convey a secret and hidden message. The article presents an analysis based on a statistical method compared with some kinemes used in a common language. In the studies on non-verbal techniques, it is noted that they perform a crucial function in the relations between people. In this article, in the course of analyzing the nature of nonverbal techniques, we characterized some kinemes used depending on the worldview of the Kazakh people and concluded that their background is directly related to the mystery. Application of the study: The results, the materials, and the conclusions of the work can be used in the history of language, sociolinguistics, and paralinguistic studies, and allow researchers of gesture semantics to explore nonverbal techniques from a new perspective. Scientists-linguists, psychologists have created many works related to the definition of human nature, character, and the place of nonverbal techniques in the speech act. However, it was not said that auxiliary means located outside the language will be used to transmit confidential, non-public information. In this work, we stopped at the place of nonverbal methods of transmitting confidential, hidden information and analyzed the functions in a confidential communication.
TL;DR: The purpose of the article is to identify the specifics of the Kazakh anatomical linguocultural code by analyzing certain sacred concepts, verbalized in the names of skeleton, bones, some inner organs, as well as to define the degree of their sacredness, preserved in the modern Kazakh language.
Abstract: The article examines the Kazakh people’s linguocultural anatomical code, which has developed due to nomadic culture over the centuries and reflected their beliefs, rituals, rites, and traditions. The linguocultural code is viewed as a secondary modeling semiotic system, or as a connotative semiotics. Certain anatomical concepts, i.e. body parts, bones, and internal organs serve as the cultural code’s elements. Culturally conditioned sacral significance, tracing to pagan magic, myths, and legends, is revealed in their lexical and phraseological representations in the connotative meaning. Thus, the article analyzes such concepts as 12 (on eki) múshe, jauyryn, ókpe. 12 (on eki) múshe serves as the basic concept of the Kazakh anatomical code, defining views on human and animals’ anatomy, the role and functions of certain anatomical concepts in spiritual, religious, and ritual-rite culture. A high degree of sacredness of the named concepts, depending on the level of linguistic unit total number and cultural sacred meaning units, was identified as well. Thus, the purpose of our article is to identify the specifics of the Kazakh anatomical linguocultural code by analyzing certain sacred concepts, verbalized in the names of skeleton, bones, some inner organs, as well as to define the degree of their sacredness, preserved in the modern Kazakh language. We have developed the methodology for studying these concepts, based on the secondary semiotic sign analysis, i.e. lexical and phraseological verbal units and their semantics: denotative and connotative, and defined certain concepts’ sacredness degree.
TL;DR: This paper showed that translation is a product of the translator, not the original author, drawing on Quine's notion that reference between two languages is inscrutable and by extension translation between texts is in principle indeterminate.
Abstract: The present study aimed at sparking a discussion as to translation evaluation which is traditionally based on determinism. Translators usually translate what the author has written or what the author has said, based on the ostensible referential correspondence between words and meanings exerted by internal and external authorities without questioning these ostensible authoritieswhether these authorities are in the forms of bilingual dictionaries or the translators’ knowledge and experience. However, translation process, unlike language, can be based on indeterminacy which is a part of epistemological scepticism. This study, drawing on Quine’ notion that reference between two languages is inscrutable and by extension translation between texts is in principle indeterminate, aims at showing that what we call translation is, in fact, a product of the translator, not the original author. As corpora of the study, To Be or Not To Be Soliloquy by Shakespeare, A short poem by the Turkish poet Nazım Hikmet, a perfume advertisement and some excerpts from the book Heart of Darkness and their translations were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. The results have shown that every translation is one of the infinite possible meanings of the original text.
TL;DR: This paper explored the singing and dancing of pey, a dual spirit (benevolent and malevolent) found in the folktales from Kaṟisial Kadi (the area around Tuticorin district in southern Tamil Nadu, India) as embodying aesthetics of excess.
Abstract: The article explores the singing and dancing of pey, a dual spirit (benevolent and malevolent) found in the folktales from Kaṟisial Kādu (the area around Tuticorin district in southern Tamil Nadu, India) as embodying aesthetics of excess. The tales have been collected by Ki. Rajanarayanan in Naṭupuṟa Katai Kalañiyaṃ (repository of folktales). Although a dual spirit, pey belongs to the sacred in Kaṟisial Kādu. The divine world of Kaṟisial Kādu populated by folk deities conceptualizes sacred differently from the scriptural religion and its pantheon of pan-Indian deities. This divide in the divine world becomes apparent in an aesthetic that characterizes the singing and dancing of the pey in these stories. As a response to and a manifestation of an excess it disturbs composure and does not fit into the controlled and transcendental aesthetics of Nāṭyaśāstra. The paper studies this deviant aesthetics associated with the singing and dancing of pey and its function in Kaṟisial Kādu through the lens of the Nietzchean category of the Dionysian.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors highlight the role of young adult narratives in spreading social awareness and interprets the classic Indian young adult novel Moon Mountain by Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay.
Abstract: A better physical environment is quintessential for a comfortable life; this conscious of environment has been one of the post-world-war effects. The predominance of colonialism is accompanied by exploitation of forest and environment. Since then, land is nothing more than a resource that conferred wealth and materials for the colonizers. The depletion of forest for agriculture and urban development is a historical phenomenon. It is then aggravated by industrial revolution and colonization. The legacies of colonialism have influenced the mindset of the colonized. Recently, the scarcity of the resources and climate change are the rising concerns of the world. This is mainly because of the humans’ insensitivity towards nature and literature plays an effective role in spreading the need for being eco-conscious. This article highlights the role of young adult narratives in spreading social awareness and interprets the classic Indian young adult novel Moon Mountain by Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay, which has symbolic references offering ecological insights. The journey of the protagonist through the African continent is critiqued to highlight the enfeeble consciousness about the natural ecology of an individual who seizes material development. This study partly brings out how the colonial legacies continues to influence the contemporary environmental challenges, and discusses the literary relationships between nature and youth influence readers’ attitudes towards the contemporary anxieties such as climate change and related environmental crises.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on how a digital reader negotiates his/her position inside the digital text by decoding the programmer's/author's encoded plot, which makes it a challenging task for the reader to connect the affordances of a digital text.
Abstract: A digital performer has to negotiate with different kinds of affordances inside the space of a digital text. The Nightingale’s Playground (2010), a digital fiction authored by Andy Campbell and Judi Alston offers the reader/player with four versions of the text centering on the protagonist Carl Robertson who tries hard to search for his lost school friend Alex Nightingale. The online texts (‘Consensus Trance’, ‘Fieldwork Book’) and the gaming version of the digital fiction (‘Consensus Trance II’) offer the reader different decisional platforms. This makes it a challenging task for the reader to connect the affordances of the digital text. At the same time, the offline pdf version of the digital fiction hints at Carl being affected by a psychological disorder. The paper shall focus on how a digital reader negotiates his/her position inside the digital text by decoding the programmer’s/author’s encoded plot.
TL;DR: In this paper, a survey of 250 young brides and prospective brides of upper-caste, middle-class background in urban Kolkata was conducted to understand the limitations of freedom of choice for women in pre-marital arranged marriage negotiations.
Abstract: Indian society, when viewed from a Foucauldian feminist perspective offers a curious and unique example of societal scrutiny over its members. This overt exercise of power influences individual behaviour, attitudes and has a profound influence on decision making. In this context, this paper argues, within an empirical framework, the limitations of freedom of choice for women in pre-marital arranged marriage negotiations. Women find themselves coercively thrust into uneasy situations of objectification, forced to mould themselves to fit into hegemonic patriarchal parameters. They are lambasted if they fail to fulfil the required expectations. Based on a survey of 250 young brides and prospective brides of upper-caste, middle-class background in urban Kolkata, I argue that the pre-marital negotiations in arranged marriages systematically subjugate the women. Faced with societal and familial pressure, the women often find themselves marginalised and subjugated in the process of arranged marriage.
TL;DR: In this article, an exploratory research conducted to investigate how the 21st century ESL teacher can nurture the development of competencies and character qualities through language development tasks delivered using digital tools.
Abstract: 21st century skills framework proposed by the World Economic Forum (2015) suggests that the development of foundational literacies, competencies and character qualities in students can help them function as responsible and productive global citizens. However, most educational systems focus only on developing foundational literacies like reading and writing, numeracy, scientific literacy, etc. This paper describes an exploratory research conducted to investigate how the 21st century ESL teacher can nurture the development of competencies and character qualities through language development tasks delivered using digital tools. The paper is based on the premise that since character qualities are both social and individualistic in nature, they are ideally delivered through collaborative events and acquired best through self-reflection. Reporting from an ESL teacher’s perspective, the paper elucidates how participating in the communication, collaboration, critical thinking and creativity activities mediated through web 2.0 tools can facilitate the acquisition of character qualities like curiosity, persistence, adaptability, social and cultural awareness, etc. It was found that certain features of web 2.0 tools like participatory environments, asynchronicity and ease of use for creating content offered students multiple opportunities for meaningful, sustained and reflective conversations. Using observational data, the researcher identifies the acquisition of character qualities and the development of competencies in students through these conversations.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyze Al-Atiq's use of alienation as a consequence of modernity and consumerism in Saudi Arabia and examine Al-atiq's disappointment with modernity as a culture of alienation in its celebration of appearance and superficiality.
Abstract: The second half of the twentieth century Saudi Arabia witnessed an extraordinary economic boom that resulted from the oil production. The new wealth changed people’s life and instead of the old and impoverished life, there started a new one of unimaginable riches and wealth. This sudden metamorphosis has had negative psychological impacts such as alienation and estrangement on Saudis who, unexpectedly, found themselves in an entirely new world. Fahd Al-Atiq’s novel Life on Hold depicts this economic transformation and its impact on the life of Saudi people. The aim of this paper is to analyze Al-Atiq’s usage of alienation as a consequence of modernity and consumerism in Saudi Arabia. The paper examines Al-Atiq’s disappointment with modernity as a culture of alienation in its celebration of appearance and superficiality which necessitates the need to look beyond the surface.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that the female identity is crucial to the narrative functioning of the various plots of Subramaniyapuram, and that the film's ultimate narrative desires are in affirmation of masculine supremacy, hegemonic masculinity, and the women as femme fatales.
Abstract: Tamil Cinema is “one of India’s largest, most prolific and increasingly significant cinemas” (Velayutham 2008, pp.1-2). Madurai genre in Tamil films is popularly known as 3M films (Murder, Mayhem and Madurai) (Damodaran Gorringe 2017, p.9). Subramaniyapuram (Sasikumar, 2008) is a Madurai film that attained cult status in both the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala since its release in 2008. A collection of essays on Subramaniyapuram edited by anthropologist Anand Pandian was published in 2013, a rare honour to be bestowed on a Tamil film in recent times. Significantly, the film’s problematic gender narrative—especially the entangled relation between the romantic plot and the masculine “plots”—is not the central subject of exploration of any of the essays in this edited collection, nor has it been discussed in depth in any critical discourse on the film so far. In this article, using Laura Mulvey’s theoretical lens as a point of departure, I argue that the female identity is crucial to the narrative functioning of the various plots of Subramaniyapuram. The film’s ultimate narrative desires, I illustrate, are in affirmation of masculine supremacy, hegemonic masculinity, and the women as femme fatales.
TL;DR: In this paper, the House of Many Gods, a novel written by Kiana Davenport, is viewed as a possible area of intersection between globalization and environmental/eco-criticism, where the primacy of locality within American environmental discourse hinders the acceptance of global theory under the assumption that embracing the global will lead into the erasure of the local.
Abstract: This study positions the House of Many Gods, a novel written by Kiana Davenport as a possible area of intersection between globalization and environmental/eco-criticism. The primacy of locality within American environmental discourse hinders the acceptance of global theory under the assumption that embracing the global will lead into the erasure of the local altogether. In her book, Sense of Place and Sense of Planet (2008) Ursula K Heise asserts that what she considers as sense of place is incomplete without considering ourselves as a part of a global ecosystem, which she considers as sense of planet. The reading of the House of Many Gods contextualizes sense of place and sense of planet through the perspective of Ana, in which she complements her adherence of Native Hawai’ian epistemology of place with a broader outlook of environmental crisis. A global outlook of perceiving environmentalism also aligns with Transnational American Studies which perceives America from an internationalist perspective. The paper concludes that sense of place and sense of planet provides a possible intersectionality of conceptualizing local discourse of place within a global outlook of environmentalism.
TL;DR: Chigozie Obioma as mentioned in this paper is a novelist of Nigerian origin who has published two novels so far, one of which is The Fishermen, a novel that foregrounds the problems that plague postcolonial Nigeria.
Abstract: Chigozie Obioma is a novelist of Nigerian origin who has published two novels so far. He has been hailed as an ‘heir to Chinua Achebe’ the master African novelist. The comparison of Obioma with Achebe is obvious because both of them belong to the same tribe, but what is more important is that Obioma seems to carry from the point where Achebe left. In his debut novel The Fishermen, Obioma foregrounds the problems that plague postcolonial Nigeria. In the novel, he confirms that whatever Achebe prophesied about the future of Nigeria has come true. Like his illustrious predecessor, he is critical of colonial institutions that have decimated the national culture of Nigeria. The paper is a study of Obioma’s novel The Fishermen.
TL;DR: This paper attempts to explore how the diseased body is caught in a complex network of contesting ideas and beliefs in early modern England.
Abstract: Understanding of disease is not merely confined to the pathological perception of the somatic symptoms. Instead, a society’s understanding and management of disease may necessarily also take recourse to ideas referring outside and beyond the human body. The explanation of the plague in early modern England, an era marked by the rapid recurrence of the epidemic, is a notable event in this regard. The plague-ridden body of the early modern times is located in a state of pre-medicalization of the human body, and in the absence of a medicalized narrative, the understanding of the epidemic is not based on the somatic paradigm. The incipient state of the medical study precipitates the ground for understanding the epidemic in the light of religious discourse. From a reading of Thomas Nashe’s “A Litany in a Time of Plague” and Thomas Dekker’s London Looke Backe it can be deciphered that the plague-infected body is perceived as a site of divine justice. In interpreting the epidemic as vengeful God’s rage inflicted upon the sinful humanity, the early modern explanation disembodies the diseased body from its somatic dimension. In doing so it resurfaces the problematic dichotomies of body and soul, medical science and religion. In taking cognizance of the fact that the understanding of a disease is largely determined by the socio-cultural ‘constructs’ of the disease, this paper, through a reading of the above-mentioned works, attempts to explore how the diseased body is caught in a complex network of contesting ideas and beliefs in early modern England.