This work challenges the assumption that Wittgenstein’s comments about the word “philosophy” are always either normative or descriptive. In the introduction, I demonstrate that some apparent inconsistencies of Wittgenstein’s programmatic remarks can only be resolved if we reject this distinction. Although the distinction is not central to any major interpretation of Wittgenstein’s work, rejecting it will have significant implications regarding his relation to the history of philosophy. My central task is to demonstrate that Wittgenstein’s view of the history of philosophy does not imply a strict distinction between the historical concept of philosophy and Wittgenstein’s method. The core of my argument revolves around the Remarks on Frazer's Golden Bough. In this text, Wittgenstein compares magic with metaphysics and then proceeds to attack Frazer’s exceedingly critical analysis of primitive religions. I argue that Wittgenstein’s later use of the word “metaphysic” indicates that his criticism of past philosophers is not radical enough to justify a strict distinction between his philosophical program and the history of philosophy. In order to confirm the conclusions I have drawn from Wittgenstein’s use of the word “metaphysics,” I studied two conversations Wittgenstein had about Heidegger. I read Wittgenstein’s comments about Heidegger as a sign of the blurring distinction between his own program and more traditional conceptions of philosophy.

No description available.

Den här studien undersöker konsumtionskritiken i Karin Boyes debutroman Astarte från 1931. Romanen gestaltar det framväxande konsumtionssamhället i Stockholm i början av 1900-talet. Genom olika tidsmarkörer som film från Hollywood och jazz kontextualiseras berättelsen i sin tid.  Under 30-talet debatterade Berthold Brecht och Georg Lukács modernismens roll i den marxistiska litteraturen. Studien om Astarte tar avstamp i den debatten och visar hur Astarte blir konsumtionskritisk utifrån Brechts begrepp alienations-effekten. Romanen är modernistisk till sin form; genom olika berättartekniska grepp bryter Boye upp identifikationen med romankaraktärerna vilket skapar ett avstånd till texten. Titeln är namnet på en antik gudinna som förekommer som skyltdocka i romanen. Skyltdockan påverkar karaktärerna genom ett spel av blickar. Gudinnans roll som skyltdocka analyseras utifrån konsumtionskritiska perspektiv, vilket synliggör hur varuhusen exploaterar religiösa myter. Karaktärerna påverkas av olika komersiella intressen vilket reifierar dem till ting. Den moderna staden porträtteras emellertid som en plats för ytlig narcisism där människor strömlinjeformas till tomma skyltdockor. Genom att visa på konsumtionskritiska drag i Astarte synliggörs Boyes roll i den svenska modernismen. Studien visar även hur äldre marxistisk teori kan tillämpas för ny förståelse idag.

This thesis examines a range of folkloric customs and beliefs that play a pivotal role in Hardy's fiction: overlooking, sympathetic magic, hag-riding, tree ‘totemism', skimmington-riding, bonfire nights, mumming, May Day celebrations, Midsummer divination, and the ‘Portland Custom'. For each of these, it offers a background survey bringing the customs or beliefs forward in time into Victorian Dorset, and examines how they have been represented in written texts – in literature, newspapers, county histories, folklore books, the work of the Folklore Society, archival documents, and letters – in the context of Hardy's repeated insistence on the authenticity of his own accounts of these traditions. In doing so, the thesis both explores Hardy's work, primarily his prose fiction, as a means to understand the ‘folklore' (a word coined in the decade of Hardy's birth) of southwestern England, and at the same time reconsiders the novels in the light of the folkloric elements. The thesis also argues that Hardy treats folklore in dynamic ways that open up more questions and tensions than many of his contemporaries chose to recognise. Hardy portrays folkloric custom and belief from the perspective of one who has lived and moved within ‘folk culture', but he also distances himself (or his narrators) by commenting on folkloric material in contemporary anthropological terms that serve to destabilize a fixed (author)itative narrative voice. The interplay between the two perspectives, coupled with Hardy's commitment to showing folk culture in flux, demonstrates his continuing resistance to what he viewed as the reductive ways of thinking about folklore adopted by prominent folklorists (and personal friends) such as Edward Clodd, Andrew Lang, and James Frazer. This thesis seeks to explore these tensions and to show how Hardy's efforts to resist what he described as ‘excellently neat' answers open up wider cultural questions about the nature of belief, progress, and change.

Author's name: Magdalena Hošková School: Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Arts Department: Institute of Linguistics and Finno-Ugric Studies Title: Spells as a Part of Finnish Folklore Supervisor: Mgr. Jan Dlask, Ph.D. Number of pages: 77 Key words: spell, Finnish spells, Finnish folklore, Kalevala, Finnish mythology, tietäjä, shaman, prayer, healing magic, homoeopathic magic, John Abercromby, James Frazer, neoshamanism, neopaganism This thesis deals with spells as a part of Finnish folklore. It depicts the circumstances of the spells' genesis, as well as their structural features and different purposes of their use. It is considered that most spells were created during the era of late paganism and early Christianity. This is true not only of Finland but also of Europe in general. The thesis also analyses the role of the shaman as the spiritual leader of Finnish people living in the era before the spells' creation and thereafter analyses the role of the shaman's successor: the tietäjä, the charmer who created spells and used them to help people in his community. So the tietäjä used his spells for the same purpose as his predecessor, the shaman, used trance states, which he entered via drumming, chanting and dancing. In the trance state, he talked to animal spirits and ancestors' spirits and...