In this essay I have tried to describe the rich tradition of thoughts about the afterlife in Judaism. The first part contains litterary studies and the second part is based on interviews with religious representatives. The first part is a description of the progress of thought in history around the issue afterlife. The sources reveal a vast amount of intellectual work on the issue. I have tried to follow the path of thought, and how it developed, so that the reader can see how one thought leads to the other but also how each period’s way of thinking is influnced by its context. The picture is not homogenetic. Troughout Jewish history there has been a permisive attitude against the impulse of saying the opposite of the general wiew, and to include the counterparts view in the texts that was saved for the future. Despite this, there have been influences from important philosophers, changes in history (enlightenment and holocaust) and both common attitudes and prejudicism, that has taken the issue afterlife off the agenda in judaism. It is – up until this day – not unusual that a rabbi, confronted with the question what jews beleive about life after death, can answer: - ”We have no beleif in the afterlife. We are a this-worldly religion.” When I started my work on this essay I talked with a friend who had heard a christian priest talk about what they knew about the Jewish views on the afterlife, and their conclusion was that the jews didn’t have any view on the afterlife.” This essay proves that they are wrong, although I met restraint. Having read a lot about the vast tradition about afterlife ideas through history, it was astonishing and surprising to get the answer, ”we don’t have a view about the afterlife, from one of the representatives. The second part of the essay tries to answer the question wether there is a conciousness about the vast and rich tradition of though about the afterlife, or not. Despite the restraint, the interviewed representatives revealed a great deal of knowledge, even of the parts in the tradition that they deny. My hope and ambition with this essay is that reading it will guide the reader inside the Jewish way of thinking, more than answering the question what will happen after I die. If I manage to show the reader my fascination of the combination between playfulness and deep seriousity in Jewish thinking; I have succeded. / I denna uppsats så har jag försökt beskriva den rika och varierade tradition av tankar rörande livet efter detta inom judendomen. Dess första del är en litterär studie och dess andra baserar sig på tre intervjuer av religiösa representater. Den första delen innehåller en beskrivning av tankens utveckling genom historien, vad gäller ämnet livet efter detta. Källorna som tar upp ämnet, visar upp en stor mängd fascinerande intellektuellt och konstnärligt arbete. Jag har försökt följa tankens väg och hur den utvecklats, så att läsaren kan se hur en tanke lett till en annan och hur varje periods tänkande är influerat av sin kontext. Bilden är inte homogen. I judisk historia så har det alltid funnits en tillåtande attityd till impulsen att säga det motsatta till den allmänna åsikten, och att inkludera dessa i Texterna som sedan sparades för framtiden. Trots detta, så har influenser ifrån viktiga filosofer, förändringar i historien (upplysningen och holocaust) och både vanliga attityder och fördomar, satt ämnet livet efter detta utanför agendan. Det är inte ovanligt att en rabbin – till dags dato – som får frågan vad judar tror om livet efter döden,svarar: - ”Vi har ingen syn på livet efter döden. Vi är en livets religion.” När jag började jobba med denna uppsats, sa en vän till mig att en kristen präst sagt samma sak: - ”Judar har ingen syn på livet efter detta.” Denna uppsats visar att de har fel, men jag mötte ett märkligt motstånd. Efter att ha läst massor om den rika tradition av föreställningar om livet efter detta inom judendomen, så var det en smula chockerande och överraskande att få svaret ”vi har ingen syn på livet efter döden”, när jag beskrev min uppgift för ett av intervjuobjekten. Den andra delen av uppsatsen försöker besvara frågan huruvida det finns en medvetenhet om den rika och djupa tradition rörande föreställningar om livet efter detta, eller inte. Trots motståndet, visade de intervjuade upp en stor kunskap även om delar av traditionen som de förnekade. Mitt hopp och min ambition med denna uppsats är att den som läser den skall känna sig guidad in i judiskt sätt att tänka, mer än att få svar på vad som kommer att hända efter döden. Om jag lyckas visa läsaren min egen fascination av kombinationen mellan lekfullhet och djupt allvar i judiskt tänkande; då har jag lyckats.

Reading Augustine’s letters as a collection proves useful for understanding his theory in practice of the significance of others—the moral status of love for others—particularly since the conditions of the letter (absence, writing) engender expressions of lack and desire for the other. With Augustine, this desire is frequently in tension with his Neoplatonic and Christian philosophical commitments which valorise the Creator over the creature, universally-directed love over private love, and the soul over the body. Following these tensions between theory and practice chronologically through the letters shows his changing responses to the significance of the other, in terms of their bodily presence and their individual interior experience. Moreover, Augustine’s developing theory of the afterlife as a place of continued embodiment and the fulfilment of intimacy corresponds to and models Augustine’s responses to absence and longing in this life. / Graduate

Where does the soul go after death? This question is based on my ‘fear of ghosts’ and became the starting point of my degree project, which most obviously stems from our fear of the unknown.   In the age of technology, many people claim that they are atheists and think that everything has or will have a physical explanation. But the fact is that definitions of reality are always provisional. We can only have an imaginary concept of this mysterious land and open up to all possibilities of the afterlife. This project include ideas from mesmerism and use substitutes to represent paranormal ectoplasm in order to materialise immaterial ghosts. The installation represents scientific experiments by including laboratory features. I intend to discuss contemporary attitudes to the afterlife.

This thesis explores the afterlife of Raymond Carver in relation to a number of important writers and artists that claim Carver as an influence and who are working within countries or cultures that have recently made, or are in the process of making, the transition from embedded liberalism to neoliberalism. This project argues that while Carver's influence has been conventionally limited to what critic A.O. Scott calls 'a briefly fashionable school of experimental fiction', in recent years his writing has come to represent a 'return' to a more 'real' form of literature, one that, his advocates would argue, is more 'authentic' than other kinds of recent writing. Carver's 'authenticity' is closely tied to the idea that his fiction is a response to his own working-class experience and is seen to be more broadly synecdochic of the socioeconomic struggles faced by many other Americans during this period. Given the cultural and aesthetic differences between Carver's life and work, and those studied in the main chapters of this thesis - Jay McInerney, Haruki Murakami and Alejandro González Iñárritu - I argue that Carver's afterlife is best viewed as being a social phenomenon, born out of the social relations, historical circumstances and economic forms that resulted from the US's move to neoliberalism in the late-1970s. My introduction historicizes this transition and argues that while Carver may have struggled to make productive sense of his socioeconomic circumstance, it affected his life in very pointed and particular ways, trapping him between the conventional American dream of individual freedom and equal opportunity and the reality of inequality and social immobility. For those who claim Carver as an influence, his fiction represents a zone where the difference between hegemonic narratives and lived experience is explored and embodies a model of how to negotiate, for better or worse, the complex and shifting foundations of this recent political transition. My introduction then continues to argue that of equal importance to Carver's afterlife is the fact that, in his late-writing in particular, Carver's work represents a 'retreat' from the shortterm, competition-based notions of neoliberal labour towards a non-incorporated residual alternative that has particular artisanal tenets associated with craftsmanship. Carver's texts operate beyond their initial cultural and historical moment by becoming distinctive sites of resistance to the hegemonic norms of late-capitalism. In this way, I argue, Carver's 'authenticity' combines with a consolatory craftsmanship to become a coping mechanism that offers other writers and artists working in neoliberalism a way of navigating a world which seems to exceed the frame of conceptual mapping. By working through a series of short case studies on Stuart Evers, Denis Johnson and Ray Lawrence, and then moving on to more detailed explorations in my three central chapters, this thesis will consider how this is the case in relation to a number of important artists who claim Carver as an influence. Chapter one utilises my archival research to historicize the relationship between Carver and McInerney and argues that Carver's pedagogy pushed McInerney towards the idea that the writing process is connected to residual narratives of American craft. It also contends that many of the orthodox ideas that Carver held about literature proved particularly enabling for McInerney's novel Brightness Falls, which, through parody and satire, signals a retreat from postmodern experimentation towards a more 'Carveresque' realism. Chapter two similarly chronicles Carver's relationship with Murakami and argues that, for Murakami, Carver's fiction is an important example of writing that explores the difference between hegemonic narratives and lived experience. The chapter moves on to argue that what some critics view as Carver's reformed post-alcoholic fiction helped facilitate Murakami's own unorthodox spiritual response to the twin tragedies of the Kobe earthquake and Tokyo gas attack in 1995. Chapter three proceeds on slightly different lines in that it considers Iñárritu's Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) and argues that while Iñárritu uses Carver as the foundation for his film, the film is particularly interesting because it is, itself, a study of Carver's afterlife. My final chapter suggests that while there is merit in viewing Carver as an 'authentic' artist (a kind of model for negotiating neoliberal culture), the totality of that solution is more ambivalent than his advocates might initially suggest.

This thesis argues that all literature is subject to ‘afterlife,’ a continual process of translation. From this starting point, this thesis seeks to answer two questions. Firstly, how texts demonstrate this continual translation; secondly, how texts should be read if they are understood as constantly within translation. To answer these questions, this thesis seeks to develop a model of textuality that holds afterlife as central, and a model of reading based on this concept of textuality. Chapter One explores how following through the implications of Walter Benjamin’s and Jacques Derrida’s usages of the term ‘afterlife’ in their writings on translation, language and history necessarily implies a model of textuality. The model of reading that this thesis seeks to develop focuses on language and history, as Benjamin and Derrida define these as the parameters within which translation takes place. This study emphasises textuality itself as a third parameter. Chapter One also describes how, following Benjamin and Derrida, language and history are conceived as inescapable, repressive systems. This, paradoxically, allows for the concept of ‘messianicity’ – the idea that all language, and every historical event, has the potential to herald an escape from language or history. By definition, because language and history are all-encompassing, this potential cannot be enacted, and remains potential. An innovation of this thesis is to understand textuality itself as having ‘messianic potential’; all texts have the potential to escape textuality and afterlife, by reaching a point where they could no longer be translated. Understanding texts as having messianic potential, but always being subject to afterlife, is the basis of the model of reading described at the end of this chapter. Due to the ways Benjamin and Derrida suggest we recognise messianic potential, texts are read with a dual focus on their singularity and their connections to other texts. This is achieved through the ‘text-in-afterlife,’ a concept this thesis develops that understands texts as inextricable from the texts they translate and the texts that translate them. Chapters Two, Three and Four test and complicate this model of reading in response to texts by James Joyce, Aimé Césaire and Jorge Luis Borges. Concepts of textuality and reading are therefore developed throughout the thesis. The three key texts are read with focus on their individual relationships with language, history and textuality, and their connections to the texts they translate. Critics have linked Joyce’s Ulysses to multiple other texts, making it seem exceptional. However, the concept of messianicity shows that Ulysses is important precisely because it is not exceptional. Césaire’s Une Tempête demonstrates how a text can interact with several translations of ‘the same’ text simultaneously, and also that, although language and history are structured by colonialism and are inescapable, there is a huge potential for translation within these terms. Borges’ ‘Pierre Menard, Autor del Quijote’ demonstrates the form of texts’ continual translation in afterlife by describing a text that is verbally identical to the text it ‘translates,’ yet is nevertheless different in ‘meaning’ from its original. Borges’ fiction also highlights the endless potential for translation that is inherent to all texts. Through four chapters, this thesis develops a model of textuality that understands literature as defined by an almost endless potential for translation. The value of reading texts in the terms of ‘afterlife’ is to emphasise literature’s immense potential: all texts are continually translated in relation to language, history and textuality, and continually reveal further texts.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:32:25Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2007-11-08Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:23:43Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 silva_fl_dr_assis.pdf: 752471 bytes, checksum: 63eb95e52fb341344da073bb428107d2 (MD5) / A crença na existência da vida após a morte é uma das mais fundamentais da humanidade. Ao longo da história, várias representações desse além foram difundidas pelas mais diversas religiões. A modernidade fez pensar que tal crença fosse típica apenas das sociedades mergulhadas no religioso e que a sociedade contemporânea tivesse reduzido o além a uma metáfora qualquer. Não foi isso que aconteceu. Apesar de o céu ter se tornado profano, lugar para a ciência, o céu religioso sobrevive. Para demonstrar isto, analisamos as representações espíritas do além, principalmente a partir da obra “Nosso Lar”, de Francisco Cândido Xavier. A pesquisa se inicia com a constatação da transformação do céu sagrado em céu profano, na visão de Allan Kardec sobre o mundo dos mortos, e concluímos ela ser menos estruturada que a versão brasileira. Em seguida, reafirmamos o que outros estudiosos já haviam percebido: o Espiritismo brasileiro enfatizou muito mais o aspecto religioso da doutrina, reproduzindo em forma de conflito entre grupos, a contradição básica formulada pela proposta de Kardec de conciliar religião e ciência. Assim, defendemos que houve desde o início da sua história, a assimilação de elementos do universo católico, propiciando uma doutrina bem familiar à cultura brasileira, o que colaborou para a legitimação do Espiritismo no Brasil. Essa característica é bem visível nas narrações e descrições do além contidas nas obras de Chico Xavier, o que lhe garantiu a identificação com público a quem esses livros se destinam. / The existence of life after death is one of the most fundamental beliefs of mankind. Throughout history, many representations of afterlife got spread by many different religions. Modern times made us believe that such belief was typical only of very religious societies and that contemporary society had reduced the concept of afterlife to a mere metaphor. That was not what happened. Although heaven has become profane and a subject for science, religious heaven survives. To demonstrate this, we analyze afterlife representations used by Spiritists, based mainly on the work “The Astral City”, from Francisco Cândido Xavier. We verify the transformation of sacred heaven into profane heaven, using the vision of Allan Kardec about the world of the dead, and concluded that this vision is less structured than the Brazilian version. Following that, we reaffirm what other studies had already found: Brazilian Spiritism has emphasized the religious aspect of the doctrine a lot more, reproducing the basic contradiction formulated by Kardec’s proposal of conciliating religion and science in the shape of conflicts between groups. Therefore, we defend that Spiritism in Brazil, since the beginning, assimilated elements of the catholic universe, resulting in a quite familiar doctrine to Brazilian culture which collaborated to its legitimization in the country. This characteristic is quite visible in the narratives and descriptions of afterlife in the works of Chico Xavier, which guaranteed an identification of the public towards his books.

The ancient Maya afterlife is a rich and voluminous topic. Unfortunately, much of the material currently utilized for interpretations about the ancient Maya comes from publications written after contact by the Spanish or from artifacts with no context, likely looted items. Both sources of information can be problematic and can skew interpretations. Cosmological tales documented after the Spanish invasion show evidence of the religious conversion that was underway. Noncontextual artifacts are often altered in order to make them more marketable. An example of an iconographic theme that is incorporated into the surviving media of the ancient Maya, but that is not mentioned in ethnographically-recorded myths or represented in the iconography from most noncontextual objects, are the "travelers": a group of gods, humans, and animals who occupy a unique niche in the ancient Maya cosmology. This group of figures is depicted journeying from one level or realm of the universe to another by using objects argued to bridge more than one plane of existence at a time. They travel by holding onto or riding objects familiar to the ancient Maya that held other-world or afterlife symbolic significance and that are connected to events related to birth, death, and leadership. This group of figures (the "travelers"), represented across time and space and on wide ranging media, provides insight and broadens what is currently understood about the ancient Maya view of life and death by indicating a persistent belief in the ability to move from one realm to another in the afterlife.

No description available.

No / Cannibals, burials, vampires, human sacrifice, bog people ¿ throughout history our ancestors have responded to death in numerous ways. The past has left us numerous relics of these encounters between the dead and those they leave behind: accounts of sacrifices in early histories, rituals that have stood the test of time, bodies discovered in caves and bogs, remains revealed by archaeological digs. Through these insights into the past, Tim Taylor pieces together evidence of how our ancestors created their universe and asks how we have dealt with the idea of the end and slowly come to create not only a sense of the afterlife but also the soul.

The thesis delves into the concept of digital afterlife and its potential impact on the relationship between the deceased and the bereaved. Here the study explores the notion of being digitally immortal to stay in touch with the people left behind. It uses speculative design to envision future technologies that could enable digital resurrection, allowing individuals to interact with virtual representations of their loved ones. A participatory design workshop using speculation as a thought experiment was organized to create artefacts using a generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) program. These ideas and digital artefacts were set in the preferred future using the “what if” narrative to discard the aspect of feasibility and help participants visualize contexts and scenarios as well as open critical discussions. The study reveals various forms of digital afterlife, from realistic avatars in VR environments to abstract representations, and the importance of presence and immersion in creating a sense of connection with the deceased. Additionally, it discusses the tension between control and autonomy, as bereaved individuals seek to maintain power over the digital presence of loved ones, while also empathizing with the rights and autonomy of the deceased within the virtual realm. The speculative design approach facilitates critical discussions on the potential societal impact of digital afterlife technologies, highlighting the importance of responsible design and regulation. Finally, in accordance with the posthumanism lens, the complexity observed by the entanglement of the digital and the virtual realm has been demonstrated.