Thèse (D. en sémiologie)--Université du Québec à Montréal, 2005. / En tête du titre: Université du Québec à Montréal. Bibliogr.: f. 276-303. Publié aussi en version électronique.

In this essay, Ralph C. Wood's religious-philosophical interpretation of LotR has been analyzed, with emphasis upon his conclusions about evil and sin in LotR. Some of Wood's claims about evil and sin in LotR have been applied upon the character Boromir, in order to show how sin is manifested as truth-transgression, pride, avarice, and misdirected love. A theoretical section is presented in order to define the concepts of sin, mimetic desire, and evil. The literary analysis focuses upon the character Boromir; the relevant works of literary scholas Ralph C. Wood and René Girard have been chosen as points of reference in this analysis. Attention is also given to an article by the historian Stephen Morillo, in the analysis of Norse pagan and Christian interpretations. It has been argued that a Christian reading of LotR, contrary to Morillo's standpoint, is possible.

Though Byron is known for his provocative denials of the importance of Shakespeare, his public derogations of the early modern playwright are in fact a pose that hides the respect he had for the playwright’s powerful poetic vision, a regard which is recorded most comprehensively in the Shakespearean references of Don Juan. Byron imitated Shakespeare by repeating and adapting the older poet’s observations on the imitative nature of desire and the structure of emulous ambition as a source of violence. His appropriations make his work part of the modern shift away from earlier European societies, wherein ritual means of mitigating desire’s potentially inimical impact on human communities were supplemented with an increased reliance on market mechanisms to defer the effects of emulation and resentment. Finding himself among the first modern celebrities, Byron deploys Shakespeare’s representations of desire to trace the processes that produced the arc of his own fame and notoriety. Drawing on his deep knowledge of Shakespeare, Byron’s poetic vision—in its observations on the contagious nature of desire—exhibits elements of Shakespeare’s own vivid depictions of imitation as a key conduit for his characters’ cupidity, ambitions, and violence. Exploring how he plays with and integrates these representations into his letters, journals, poetry, and plays, my dissertation investigates Byron’s intuitions on the nature of human desire by focusing on his engagement with one of literature’s greatest observers of human behaviour, Shakespeare.

This study examines how the désir triangulaire, first defined by the French sociologist andanthropologist René Girard in his essay Mensonge romantique et vérité romanesque (1961), ispresented in the novel Les inséparables (2020), written by the French author Simone deBeauvoir. The result of this study indicates a presence of desire in the four main relationshipsof the novel due to a désir triangulaire present between the parts of the relationship. Thepresence of the désir triangulaire results in relationships with the dynamic of three parties,even though the relationship only consists of two people.

<p>This dissertation compares the soteriologies of René Girard and Hans Urs von Balthasar as they engage and respond to the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche, and specifically, to Nietzsche’s critique of atonement theology. It examines a problematic shared by all three figures, one defined by the relationship between the violence and redemption. Chapter 1 traces the development of this problematic from Anselm through Luther and Calvin, and attends to the way changes in the metaphysical framework underlying the language of satisfaction led the Reformers to construe divine wrath in more strictly punitive terms. The subsequent chapters examine the responses offered by Nietzsche, Girard, and von Balthasar. Nietzsche argues that Christian priests used the event of Jesus’ violent crucifixion as a symbol to hold the weak in thrall; the Cross came to symbolize the threat of divine wrath and the hope of a quasi-magical salvation. Girard and von Balthasar each argue that Christian soteriology does not enslave Christians to a lie but orients all human beings to the truth. They also agree that the violence of the crucifixion is significant. But whereas Girard argues that the Christian doctrine of divine wrath is a residue of violent pagan religion and thus has no place in interpreting the meaning of the crucifixion, von Balthasar argues that this doctrine serves to highlight the unique quality of God’s re-ordering love. By analyzing and interpreting their responses to Nietzsche, this dissertation seeks to evaluate the contributions Girard and von Balthasar offer for a post-Nietzschean soteriology.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Le présent mémoire explore l'utilisation des oeuvres d'art par la publicité afin de mettre en relief la contradiction entre la gratuité de l'oeuvre d'art et l'intérêt marchand. Ce mémoire tente d'expliquer, à partir de la théorie de la médiation du désir de René Girard, l'instrumentalisation, et par là, la "dé-définition" des oeuvres d'art intégrées à la publicité dans un contexte capitaliste. / Québec Université Laval, Bibliothèque 2013

Ce mémoire se propose d'analyser la concordance entre l'illustration du désir humain et sa transformation en violence sociale dans les théories du désir mimétique et du mécanisme du Bouc émissaire, développées par René Girard dans ses oeuvres Mensonges Romantiques et Vérités Romanesques et Le Bouc Émissaire, et dans l'oeuvre de William Faulkner The Sound and the Fury. Ce mémoire soutient que la description du désir humain et son acheminement en crise sociale est très similaire chez les des deux auteurs. The Sound and the Fury, tout comme les oeuvres de René Girard, décrivent le désir humain comme un mécanisme triangulaire basé sur l'imitation du sujet à un model ou médiateur. Ils démontrent aussi que ces désirs peuvent créer des rivalités féroces qui peuvent induire à une violence irrépressible. Quand cette violence se multiplie par le nombre de rivaux acharnés, elle évolue en phénomène sociale : une crise que René Girard appelle Crise Mimétique et que William Faulkner reproduit dans la majorité de ces nouvelles et précisément dans The Sound and the Fury. Le mécanisme humain décrit pour l'évacuation spontanée de la violence est aussi remarquablement conforme dans l'effigie des deux auteurs. Les écrits des deux démontrent que pour évacuer leur agressivité, les sociétés la redirigent envers un ou des individus qu'ils considèrent comme inférieurs. Finalement, les deux auteurs analysent d'une manière très rapprochée les trois méthodes utilisées par l'homme pour contenir la violence. Ils présentent tout les deux les rituels comme une méthode qui a été longtemps efficace pour canaliser les tensions mais qui n'a plus sa place dans la société moderne et ce à cause du déclin religieux. Ils décrivent aussi tout les deux les méthodes compensatoires tels que les duels et les jugent inefficace et, en dernier lieu, ils considèrent tout les deux le système légal comme une méthode efficace pour l'interruption des cycles de vengeances mais pas pour l'évacuation de la violence.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Theatre, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 68-71).

Initiée par René Girard, la théorie mimétique suggère que l’égalité des conditions consacrée comme un droit exacerbe la rivalité entre semblables. Quand l’étiolement de la souveraineté étatique et la logique compétitive de l’économie marchande coïncident avec la prolifération de conflits aux enjeux planétaires, cette rivalité des égaux prend une valeur paradigmatique. L’ambition d’une anthropologie mimétique à traiter de l’époque contemporaine mieux que la philosophie politique idéaliste ou la science politique réaliste suppose une reformulation. Espérance de pallier une insuffisance d’être, le désir mimétique, ou désir d’être autre, aboutit à un résultat contradictoire, la déception de rester insuffisant, l’autre étant alors perçu à la fois comme modèle et obstacle. Pour les acteurs politiques, ce désir devient la revendication d’une égale puissance d’être, promesse faite autant par la citoyenneté, le droit des peuples à disposer d’eux-mêmes que la souveraineté des États sur leur territoire et leur population.En tant que modalité de la contention de la violence, le politique serait ainsi analysable par une « science des rapports humains », anthropologie englobante et non-disciplinaire adoptant un interdividualisme méthodologique. Sur fond de menaces inédites pour la pérennité de l’humanité, la réciprocité des rapports humains fait douter de la compatibilité entre projet égalitaire, quête d’identité et concorde sociale. Ces rapports questionnent également la prépondérance actuelle de la compétition dans les institutions, entre autres politiques, laquelle s’est imposée comme liant paradoxal du gouvernement représentatif et de l’économie de marché. / Conceived by René Girard, mimetic theory suggests that the equality of conditions, established as a right, exacerbates the rivalry between similar individuals or groups. When the withering away of state sovereignty and the competitive logic of the market economy overlap with the multiplication of conflicts, this rivalry of equals becomes a relevant paradigm.Mimetic anthropology’s ambition – to address contemporary issues better than either idealistic political philosophy or realistic political science –, demands nevertheless to be revisited. The hope to overcome a lack of being, mimetic desire, or one’s desire to become someone else ends up giving way to a contradictory outcome: the disappointment of remaining oneself, the other thereby being perceived as both one’s model and one’s obstacle. For political actors, this desire turns into the claim of the equal power to be, which the promise of citizenship, the right of peoples to self-determination and the state sovereignty over its people and its territory each exemplify. As a modality of the containment of violence, politics could then be analyzed by a non-disciplinary "science of human relationships", implementing a methodological interdividualism. Against the backdrop of unprecedented threats to the survival of humanity, the reciprocity of human relationships casts doubt on the compatibility between the egalitarian project, the quest for identity, and social harmony. These relationships also question the current predominance of competition in the institutions, including political institutions, which has become the paradoxical binding agent between representative governments and the market economy.

The main subject of the presented work is the question of power within the context of sociological theory, and in relation to the mechanism of psychological mimesis and the phenomenon of the sacred. Our starting point is René Girard's mimetic theory, which systematizes the relationship between the mechanism of psychological mimesis and the sacred - in the light of the phenomenon of violence. We, firstly, present Girard's mimetic theory, explicate its main concepts, and situate all into a broader context. Further, we critically examine Girard's theoretical scheme and come to the conclusion that his theoretical and conceptual framework calls for a revision, if it is to be utilized within the context of sociology and social theory. Consequently, we try to "sociologize" Girard's thinking. First, we position his line of thought into the wider sociological context, and then examine his theory in the light of thinking of two classical sociologists, Gabriel Tarde and Émile Durkheim. We then project this examination into a theoretical and conceptual synthesis on the basis of which we formulate our own conceptual scheme, which is based on the assumption of psychological mimesis as an anthropological constant, and which overcomes the main shortcomings of Girard's theoretical framework. On the basis of this...