Batman has become a fixture in the popular consciousness of America. Since his first publication in Detective Comics #27 in 1939, he has never ceased publication, appearing in multiple titles every month as well as successfully transitioning into other media such as film and television. A focused analysis of the character will reveal that Batman has achieved and maintained this cultural resonance for almost seventy years by virtue of attaining the status of a postmodern American mythology. In both theme and function, Batman has several direct connections to ancient mythology and has adapted that form into a distinctly American archetype. And as a popular cultural symbol, he has shown remarkable malleability to reflect the attitudes of his contemporary culture. An examination of Batman's enduring and changing characteristics will reveal insights into American values, culture and history during the twentieth and into the twenty-first centuries.

Considering the amount of media created around the zombie and the sustained interest in its role in our society, we can clearly see that a cultural phenomenon is underway, and it is important for us to question this phenomenon in order to gain some understanding of how and why its appeal has stretched so far. The zombie is somehow enthralling, and it is my opinion that this is in part because the zombie is a study of what it means to be human in the postmodern world. My main purpose here is not to ask why zombies are popular or why people are enthralled by horror films of any kind. Instead I wish to investigate what zombies mean to us in our culture and society. A study of this culture offers invaluable insight into our own contemporary Western society and culture, as the zombie provides a physical form, embodying our fears and anxieties into something that is sharable and valuable to an increasing number of people. I examine the zombie's origins within the American Gothic tradition and explore its role as a barometer for social anxieties, focusing on issues of religion in the second chapter. I step away from the traditional view of zombie origins embedded in the Haitian voodoo practice of zombification and its implied post-colonial issues, and instead focused on the zombie as a Western European and American invention, looking at its folkloric and literary heritage. I also take a new perspective of the zombie and its relation to religion in order to explore the profound way the zombie genre can address contemporary concerns. I finish the study with a chapter devoted to a close reading of the film Shaun of the Dead in order to show how the zombie genre has shifted in tone and purpose in the new millennium. What I hope to accomplish in this study is to facilitate a new perspective of the zombie, its origins, its uses and its role in contemporary culture and society, and I hope to contribute in some small way a deeper understanding of where the zombie came from and what it means to us in the 21st century.

It is the intent of this project to show that Marilynne Robinson's novel Gilead might be profitably read within the context of the rabbinical exegetical tradition of midrash. It examines Gilead as a midrashic retelling of the Abraham story in the Bible, and shows how reading it in this light illuminates some of the key theological and social concerns at play in the novel. Midrash offers a unique model for reading Gilead because it combines elements of intertextuality, narrative theology and formal exegesis. Since midrash provides the framework for such a reading of Gilead, the first chapter discusses some of the theoretical issues surrounding the practice of midrash. The second chapter traces elements of the Abraham story from Genesis as retold in Gilead. Finally, the third chapter discusses the theological and social implications of reading Gilead as a midrashic retelling of the biblical story, thereby revealing Robinson's theology which emphasizes the holiness of the everyday.

This thesis examines traditional Irish dance as a locus of cultural memory, inscribed on the body. The native people of Ireland experienced invasion and oppression for nearly a millennium, beginning with Viking invasions at the end of the 8th century and ending in the 1940s, when the British finally departed Ireland, now an independent country. During the years of English rule, the British imposed harsh laws and sought to eradicate all vestiges of Irish culture in an attempt to diminish Irish identity. Through the ages, the definition of what it means to be Irish has changed widely, frequently resulting in revolt against invaders and internal armed conflicts. Physical alterations of the Irish body also occurred, though in a more representational context than a literal one. Traditional Irish dance grappled with how to present the Irish body, endeavoring to use it in way that overcame the cultural traumas of invasion and suppression. When Ireland began reclaiming its identity in the twentieth century, it soon became clear that dance had been profoundly affected by the traumatic oppression. Interestingly, the emerging dance form that became codified as distinctively Irish dance both reflects the history of suppression and seems to repeat the oppression, as if the living body were caught up in traumatic repetition. Traumatic experiences have shaped the collective and individual Irish bodies, and dance performance highlights a culture that is continually repeating its oppressive past in an attempt to find a cure from that traumatic heritage. By examining the solo dance tradition, Irish dance becomes a fertile field for studying the qualities of an embodied dance form that, in this case, performs a cultural history marked by oppression and traumatic repetition. As developed under the Gaelic League and the Irish Dancing Commission, traditional Irish dance reflected a rather proscribed art form, meant to specifically embody certain qualities of "Irishness." Looking back to pre-invasion Ireland, they intended to display the distinct, pure Irish identity of the past; instead, they continued the pattern of control and suppression. However, Ireland and Irish dance have grown beyond those early structures of traumatic repetition. In 1994, Riverdance grabbed worldwide attention as it presented Irish dance in a new context, with movements that broke from proscribed forms and expressed a non-traumatic Irish identity. Riverdance and the ensuing global craze for Ireland demonstrate a cultural artifact that has successfully stepped from the past into the dynamic present. While still acknowledging and preserving its original roots, the traumas of the past have been healed through embodied representation.

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The purpose of this study was to discuss the factors the reading-classics motivation and influencing reading motivation of Children¡¦s reading-classics at home schooling. From the one-year pilot study, the Lin Family became my partners of this study through the activity to join the reading-classics. Thus, they were invited to be part of this study. By the interview guides with 17 reading motivation and my theoretical sensitivity, I evolved the intensive field and truly entered the everyday life of children¡¦s reading-classics at home schooling. The data were collected by observation, interviewing, and the documentation. Other people also input some important ideas during the traveling between Liouguei and Pindong. After the three-months exploration, the results showed that culture has effects on reading- classics and reading motivation. There were several important results listed as follows: 1. Modeling is the foundation to make the reading-classics and reading efficiency better. 2. Creating the classics environment has an impact on readers¡¦ choices of reading values. 3. Providing the simulation of reading-classics culture is the one of the resources to improve the curiosity of reading-classics and reading. 4. Realizing the cultural importance will increase the reading efficacy of reading-classics. 5. Classics Examinations have become the discipline of reading-classics efficacy and challenge. 6. Parents-children co-study and the sages culture help solving the reading problems. 7. Enjoying the reading-classics culture motivates the competition in reading-classics. Through the research tour, reading-classics at home schooling and culture are the key factors influencing Children¡¦s reading-classics and reading motivation at home schooling. After considering the limitation in this study, the interaction between researcher and reading-classics at home schooling, I hope that the study could provide some inputs giving the education of reading-classics some new ideas and improving the future research in this area.

Recent academic research has garnered considerable popular interest on the matter of whether the Pythia, the Oracle of Delphi, was high. Current findings aim to prove that vapors emitted from beneath the tripod on which the Pythia prophesied were intoxicating, thereby causing her frenzied state and statements. Contemporary scientists' intense interest in proving that the Pythia was not prophetic evokes the question of why the once widely accepted, now generally rejected, idea that a female body can serve as a vessel for the words of the immortal deity holds such significance for modern science. When this curiosity is considered in light of Julia Kristeva's writings on abjection, numerous possibilities are made available. At its simplest, examining the abjection of the Pythia could explain why the voice of modern science is so interested in the words of these ancient women. At best, to consider an active process of abjection nearly three millennia in the making provides an opportunity to expand understandings and interpretations of both the Pythia and her role in the world, past and present, and the abject and its role in abjection beyond literature and theory.

The aim of the present study is to examine how the legacy of Alexander was appropriated, altered and used in arguments in early Christian discourse (c. 200-600). There is an inventory of all the early Christian references to Alexander in Appendix 1. The structure of the thesis is conceived as an unequal triptych: it is divided into three parts with subdivisions into three chapters of varying lengths (Part III contains two chapters and the thesis conclusion). Each part is prefaced with a short description of its contents. Each chapter within those parts have a preliminary remark to introduce the principal subject area with a brief conclusion in the back of it. Part I explores the Alexander traditions of three geographical centres of the Christian world: Alexandria (Ch. 1), Jerusalem (Ch. 2) and Rome (Ch. 3). It shows how the Jewish tales from these cities, such as the Josephan tale about Alexander’s visit to Jerusalem, were used in a variety of diverging, often contradictory, ways. Part II turns to the writings of the apologists in the second and third centuries. It discusses three prevalent themes associated with Alexander: historiography (Ch. 4), divine honours (Ch. 5) and Greek philosophy (Ch. 6). Part III moves on to the central texts and Alexander themes in the fourth to sixth centuries. It focuses on his role in Christian chronicles, church histories and representations of their world (Ch. 7), and also the rhetorical use of the figure in Christian preaching and public speaking (Ch. 8). Taken together, these three parts form the overarching argument that Alexander did not only fill many diverse roles in Christian representations of the remote past, but also featured in contemporary discourse on Christian culture, identities and societies, as well as in arguments made on behalf of the Christian religion itself. Indeed, the Christians frequently juxtapose the figure with distinctively Christian features, such as the life of Jesus, the Apostles, the church, sacred cities and holy spaces. They incorporate him into discourses on peace, mercy, generosity and abstinence. In other words, they repeatedly made Alexander relevant for what they considered important and, thus, created their own distinct discourse on the figure.

A dramatic shift in tone in the final letter of J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur's Letters from an American Farmer reveals Farmer James' conflicting attitudes about an independent America. When the letters are juxtaposed with a Western myth of origin such as Virgil's Aeneid, it becomes clear that Crèvecoeur is forcing his narrating persona to repeat a pattern of civilization – destruction, renewal – on which all of Western civilization is based. The sudden pessimism that erupts in the penultimate "Distresses of a Frontier Man" is symptomatic of James' anxiety about the American Revolution and the resulting disruption in his bucolic way of life.

This thesis looks at how the Roman poet Lucan uses the character of Cato to elucidate his beliefs about Fortune and Stoicism. The traditional Stoic view of Fortune views it as a force for good that allows people to improve through hardship. Lucan portrays Fortune as a purely antagonistic force that actively seeks to harm the Roman people and corrupt even good individuals like Cato. Lucan's Fortune arranges events to place Cato in a situation where it is impossible to maintain his virtue. Rather than providing him an opportunity to improve in the civil war, Fortune makes it so that whatever choice Cato makes, he becomes guilty. Brutus' dialogue with Cato in Book 2 of Pharsalia illuminates the position that Cato is in. Brutus looks to Cato as the traditional Stoic exemplar that can forge a path for virtue in civil war. However, Cato admits that joining any side in the civil war would cause him to become guilty. Fortune's support of Caesar and its dominance over contemporary events has forced Cato into this situation. Cato's desert march in Book 9 continues to show Fortune's dominance over Cato by continually denying him opportunities to gain virtue for himself. Lucan's portrayal of Fortune shows his rejection of Stoic teaching about Fortune and the ultimate futility of trying to remain virtuous in a time of civil war.