3. Applied Literature
Mohammad Ghaffary; Melika Ramzi
Abstract
The issue of “freedom” has been one of the core concepts in the history of literature and philosophy since classical times. This concept considerably contributes to the ongoing discussions of Iris Murdoch’s The Unicorn (first published in 1963). Unlike most of the previous studies of ...
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The issue of “freedom” has been one of the core concepts in the history of literature and philosophy since classical times. This concept considerably contributes to the ongoing discussions of Iris Murdoch’s The Unicorn (first published in 1963). Unlike most of the previous studies of the novel, whose central focus is on the transcendent, moral, or biographical readings of the text, the present study draws on Gilles Deleuze’s Poststructuralist philosophy to address the immanent aspect of freedom, as the main thematic concept in the novel, as well as such related notions as power, love, desire, and becoming to determine the degrees of freedom achieved by the major characters, Hannah Crean-Smith and Effingham Cooper. The main objective of the study, therefore, is to see whether or not the two main characters can ultimately find proper lines of flight. The findings suggest that although Hannah is encoded and territorialized in the Gaze castle, she ultimately turns into a body without organs (BwO). However, Effingham fails to become an active body in his interaction with Hannah. While Hannah undergoes an absolute positive deterritorialization through her death, Effingham obtains only a relative negative deterritorialization because returning to the “real” life constantly threatens a body’s force and renders an absolute form of freedom impossible.
3. Applied Literature
Mohammadreza Touzideh; Farshid Nowrouzi Roshnavand
Abstract
The ethical relation with the Other becomes of great significance in the postmodern ethos which considers the decentralization of subjectivity as one of its main philosophical and literary objectives. Emmanuel Levinas was one of the first philosophers who redefined the notion of ethics as a critical ...
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The ethical relation with the Other becomes of great significance in the postmodern ethos which considers the decentralization of subjectivity as one of its main philosophical and literary objectives. Emmanuel Levinas was one of the first philosophers who redefined the notion of ethics as a critical moment in which the subject’s encounter with the Other solely occurs through the use of ethical language, a mode of communication that essentially escapes any form of totalization in favor of the subject’s consciousness. Such an ethical meeting with the Other can be traced in Conrad Aiken’s short story “Silent Snow, Secret Snow,” which narrates the twelve-year-old protagonist’s encounter with the mysterious voice of snow. The results of the study show that the protagonist, once exposed to the speaking face of the Other, initiates an ethical conversation with it and, in so doing, loses his subjectivity to the ethical manifestation that the Other issues upon him.
3. Applied Literature
Taher Ben Khalifa
Abstract
This paper deals with the study of how racist ideologies are constructed in Crane’s “A Dark Brown Dog” using the CDA framework. Benefitting from the approaching between literature and linguistics, it focuses on the linguistic examination of the (re)construction of whiteness and blackness ...
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This paper deals with the study of how racist ideologies are constructed in Crane’s “A Dark Brown Dog” using the CDA framework. Benefitting from the approaching between literature and linguistics, it focuses on the linguistic examination of the (re)construction of whiteness and blackness based on the assumption that racism is: a social, a discursive, and an ideological construct. This tri-dimensional construct is treated within a theoretical triangulation ranging from cognition, society, and discourse. Based on the view of discourse as a process of coding and decoding of meaning, the text of this story is explored at various levels of language use: a) contextual analysis focuses on the study of how the depiction of the setting and the characters serves to draw the scene of racial inequality; b) textual analysis deals with the way narration contributes to the (re)production of racism; and c) identity analysis is devoted to the study of how racial identity evolves across generations. The results showed that: first, the representation of the characters highlights the binary structure of the southern American society marked by the inferiority of the blacks and the superiority of the whites. Second, the way actions and events are narrated reflects the unequal distribution of power between blacks and whites. The existing asymmetry of power is traced in the duality of punishment and obedience. Third, the racist ideologies and race relations evolve across generations depending on: the amalgamations happening at the family level, the evolution of society, and the evolution of its legislations.
