This thesis seeks to define how Francis Barrett’s The Magus, Or Celestial Intelligencer is indicative of a transitional period (1800–1830) of English Magic. The intention and transmission of Barrett’s The Magus is linked to the revival of occultism and its use as a textbook for occult philosophy. This thesis provides a historical background preceding this revival. The aim of the thesis is to establish Barrett’s text as a hybrid interpretation of Renaissance magic for a modern audience. It is primarily by this hybridization that a series of feedback loops would begin to create the foundation for modern occultism. This study utilizes a careful study of primary sources, including a systematic examination of The Magus within its intellectual and social contexts.

Various Afrikaans novels published since the late 1980s have been described as “magical realism”. In this dissertation the possibility is explored whether this magical realism is a uniquely Afrikaans mode or if it can be seen as merely an imitation of a South American mode. The term “magical realism”, the background and function of magical realism and the literary connotations associated with the mode are discussed. Comparisons are made between magical realism and its function in the literature of Latin America and West Africa. The Afrikaans novels are compared to texts from Latin America andWest Africa, focussing on the aim and function of magical realism in these Afrikaans novels in order to determine the likelihood of the existence of a “unique” variation of magical realism in Afrikaans. The influence of traditional Afrikaans folktales and oral narratives is explored against the backdrop of magical realism. The study also concentrates on the role of magical realistic texts in exploring the past in a postcolonial situation. The study aims to make a contribution to the approach to a growing body of texts in Afrikaans that are associated with magical realism. The study also examines the possible role played by magical realistic texts in forming identity within the context of a fast changing social and political order in South Africa. / Prof. Willie Burger

Este trabalho pretende investigar algumas das relações que se estabelecem, no campo religioso brasileiro, entre umbanda e Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus (IURD). Para além do discurso demonizador neopentecostal, que classifica as religiões afrobrasileiras como \"coisa do diabo\", acredito haver diversas trocas simbólicas entre essas denominações que, a princípio, parecem tão distantes. A etnografia estará estruturada de forma a mostrar, inicialmente, o funcionamento interno desses dois sistemas religiosos - atentando para suas cosmologias e estruturas rituais. Em seguida, será abordado o intenso intercâmbio simbólico que se estabelece entre eles. Será dedicada especial atenção a determinados símbolos que são fundamentais para compreender o relacionamento dessas religiões: os exus e as pombagiras são os melhores exemplos. Finalmente, serão discutidas questões que poderiam ser consideradas mais \"espinhosas\" no que diz respeito ao relacionamento entre umbanda e IURD: notadamente, as polêmicas sobre a intolerância e o preconceito no campo religioso brasileiro. / This work intends to investigate some of the relations that have been established, in the Brazilian religious field, between Umbanda and the Universal Church of The Kingdoom of God. Beyond the neopentecostal accusations of devilishness, that set Afro-Brazilian religions as \"devil-like\", I believe there are some symbolic exchange between these two religions that, at first, seem so far apart. The ethnography is set in a way to display, initially, the internal working of these two religious systems - looking into their cosmologies and ritual structures. Then, the intense exchanges set between them will be approached. Specific attention will be given to particular symbols that are crucial to understand the relationship of these religions: the exus and the pombagiras are the best examples. Finally, some questions concerning the relationship between Umbanda and the Universal Church that could be considered more \"delicate\" will be discussed: the polemics about intolerance and prejudice in the field of religion in Brazil.

White mold (Sclerotinia sclerotiorum Lib. de Bary) is one of the most important diseases of common bean in the U.S. with seed yield losses up to 100%. White mold resistance is hard to incorporate into breeding materials because of low heritability, cumbersome screening methods, and few sources of resistance. A Multi-parent Advanced Generation Inter-Crosses population was created to develop resistant germplasm and map the genetics factors controlling the resistance. A seedling straw test method was used to identify resistant lines. Twenty genotypes were found to be resistant based on its response when inoculated with isolate 1980 of white mold. GWAS using quantitative, polynomial and binomial phenotypic distribution data, identified 30 genomic regions associated with resistance on Pv01, Pv02, Pv04, Pv05, Pv07, Pv08, Pv10 and Pv11. Cumulative R2 values were 57% for binomial distribution using 13 genomic intervals, 41% for polynomial using 8 intervals, and 40% for quantitative using 11 intervals.

This essay is an effort to write my thoughts and reflections on my art practice, focusing on the work to-be-realized for my solo show in March 2021 at Galleri Mejan in Stockholm. I’ve had the intention to complement and stabilize my imagined-artwork with my writing, only to realize such a task’s difficulty. Firstly, because language itself can be unstable. Secondly, fear of losing a quality in art that is unstable in its nature. The essay consists of three sections: In the first one, I tell how I think and feel through my art practice. I also propose making space for new knowledge: In my art practice, I lean on magical thinking to stimulate bodily movements.1 I think that we need to balance ourselves between rational thinking and other modes of thinking, and this in-between-space requires continuous negotiations of different kinds. In section two, I explain how I think of images and share how I process them through my work. Then I share stories of entangled images that I’m using as source images in my current work. In the third and last section, I delve into my deep desire to control images. I challenge told narratives and reflect on creative practices of destruction and reparation. / @ Galleri Mejan, Exercisplan 3, March 2021 Media: installation and a video projection. Materials: Clay, ceramic, plaster, linen, and mixed media.   The Making and Breaking of an Icon is a long-term project: I repeatedly destroy and repair a self-made ceramic sculpture. The faceless figure has multiple arms and hands that seem to be hugging or containing the body. At the moment of showing the work at Galleri Mejan, the sculpture was broken, and in process of reparation. Fragments of the sculpture were laying on the ground, I continued to glue them up during the show. A shelf placed up high in the same room displays 7 small plaster replicas of the same figure, but with the addition of a horned cap on their heads. one of the replicas is broken on the ground underneath the shelf. The mold reproducing the plaster pieces is shown by the corner and seems to be in the action of production.  By the entrance, a fetus-like ceramic sculpture is opening both arms. In the other room, the video work "Falling for the Narrative" is showing a performance I did earlier with the sculpture. In this performance, dressed in a self-made costume, I interact with the sculpture as a living thing: I project veneration and aggression on it. The costume that is made of linen, has carrier sacks sewed in the back, filled with rice and coins. the costume weighs around 4kgs. In the corner of the room, a pile of dust is formed on the ground.

The use of Liquid Crystal (LC) materials, mainly in display applications, has contributed to major advancement in liquid crystal science and technology. New and more complex phases of liquid crystals were developed to compete with conventional nematic LC displays. The challenge now is to manufacture high birefringence liquid crystal materials with low viscosity. LC is also used in many other applications, such as temperature sensors and photonics beam shaping in the form of spatial light modulators (SLM) and q-plates. The first objective of this thesis is to investigate the magic mirror effect using a SLM following Sir Michael Berry’s theory. Here, we demonstrated a simple way of producing the magic mirror effect using LC devices and aimed to use a micron-sized device to shape the phase and polarization of light with gentle phase variation. We were able to generate the magic mirror image intensity pattern, both experimentally and theoretically. This was done by computing and generating the desired phase pattern of an image on the SLM, then aligning light propagation through this phase pattern. The experimental and theoretical results showed good agreement when comparing the produced intensity patterns. In the second part of this thesis, we experimentally investigated the use of structured photons, created using q-plates, which is a birefringent liquid crystal cell of OAM and SAM coupling, in quantum key distribution (QKD) using the BB84 protocol through orbital angular momentum (OAM) maintaining optical fibres. Here, we were successful in generating a secure key between two parties with a quantum bit error rate of 8.6% which is below the security threshold of 11%. This work demonstrates the feasibility of using structured light in QKD through fibres to boost key rates and security.

No description available.

The goal of this project is to understand the realities of how magic was perceived during a Christianized Iceland, specifically during the medieval era when sagas and poems were recorded in Iceland. I accomplish this through literary analysis in conjunction with previous research on runic inscriptions and Old Norse mythology. I reveal that there is much more to be uncovered about the realities of paganism in medieval Iceland, and that the authors of Icelandic sagas had a large misunderstanding of pre-Christian paganism and magic. This argument is manifested through close readings of major Icelandic works, such as Hávamál, Volsunga saga, and Egils saga, coupled with other, minor works. In the first chapter, through understanding the usage of literary devices like metaphor and irony, I look at the inaccurate ways runes were portrayed in Hávamál and Egils saga as a means to separate Iceland from paganism while still retaining their cultural relevance. In chapter two, through the usage of queer theory, I elaborate on how characters in Hávamál, Egils saga, and Volsunga saga perpetuate negative stereotypes about practitioners of magic. Through these discoveries, this thesis calls into question the views of Icelandic saga writers as misunderstanding pagan magic, and further diversifies the discourse around medieval Icelandic literature as a whole. This project is done in hopes to educate Norse neo-pagans on the nuances surrounding the literature they hold so close to their pagan practices.

No description available.

No description available.