Student Number : 0310050V - MA research report - School of Literature and Language Studies - Faculty of Humanities / The rationale of this work is a peripatetic exploration, both literally and intellectually: the form echoes the content. The creative work stands on its own, but the theoretical reflection contributes retrospectively to the work as part of this peripatetic process. The theoretical reflection picks up the theme, though more formally, in order to create one coherent project. I have aimed to create a dialogue between the theory and creative work on a road that goes both ways. If it appears that the section of theory devoted to the poets is disproportionately long compared to the rest of the work, this is because I discovered in the course of my exploration that poets seem more predisposed to wandering than others.

Des groupes de femmes et d'enfants mendient aux carrefours de la capitale iranienne. Ces individus sont systématiquement méprisés et appelés sous le terme vague et général de Kowli (bohémien, Tsigane), tandis qu'ils font partie d'un groupe ethnique et d'une communauté linguistique, méconnus entièrement par les Iraniens et les universitaires. Cette étude entame pour la première fois une recherche ethnographique de ce groupe "péripatétique", qui se nomme, Gorbat, voulant dire : le pays étranger, l'exile. Quelles sont les origines de cet ethnonyme et les modes de son appropriation par ce groupe ? Comment ce groupe survit-il culturellement ? Comment entretient-il ses frontières avec la société majoritaire et d'autres communautés minoritaires ? Cette étude s'est concentrée sur l'un des groupements de ce groupe ethnique, originaire de la ville de Babol au nord de l'Iran. Elle propose comme porte d'entrée à la vision du monde des Gorbat de Babol, l'analyse de la pratique d'aduri.Il s'agit d'une étape incontournable dans la vie de tous les jeunes gorbat de Babol.Cette étape consiste en le travail de la mendicité (aduri) pratiquée quotidiennement par tous les enfants, aux carrefours de Téhéran, et sous la surveillance d'au moins l'une des femmes de leur lignage. Cette pratique engage donc certains liens de parenté et met notamment en exergue la structure patrilinéaire du lignage gorbat. Elle révèle, à son tour, l'importance de cette structure dans l'imbrication identitaire de l'individu. La pratique d'aduri est décrite d'après le concept de Clifford Geertz ; « thick descriptions ». Chaque strate de signification menant à la production, l'aperception et l'interprétation du comportement significatif (ici l'aduri) est décrite et mise en examen. Cette analyse minutieuse ouvre la vision sur une lecture dramaturgique de la mendicité, à la manière de "social drama" de Victor Turner. La mendicité se réalisant dans une forme de rite et d'une manière dramaturgique, le cadre culturel et les symboles qui le constituent surgissent à un niveau visible de l'interaction sociale entre l'individu gorbat et l'individu non-gorbat. Ce phénomène s'impose comme un évènement central dans la vie sociale gorbat et la construction de l'identité communautaire de l'individu. Il est dès lors impossible d'observer la société gorbat, prise isolément. L'autre (le non-gorbat) y est constamment présent. Comme paradigme sociologique, et à la suite de la théorie d'"ethnic boundaries" de Fredrik Barth, cette étude suggère d'observer la société gorbat à travers les rapports qu'elle entretient avec le non-gorbat. Or, ces rapports ne s'expliquent pas seulement par l'économie, ni par la politique mais par le culturel. L'identité et l'altérité se jouent au niveau des interactions sociales de la vie quotidienne, donc en oscillation entre deux cadres moraux et deux systèmes de valeurs. C'est dans un va-et-vient entre deux sphères de construction et de déconstruction de sens que se dessinent ces rapports à soi et à l'autre. C'est au niveau intermédiaire entre les deux sphères qu'il est possible d'observer les points de divergence, ainsi que les sphères où le gorbat ne fait qu'un avec la société globale. / Groups of women and children beg regularly at intersections in the Iranian capital. These individuals are commonly despised and referred to as Kowli (Bohemian Gypsy), while they are part of an ethnic group and a linguistic community, completely ignored by the Iranians and scholars. This study introduces for the first time an ethnographic research of this "peripatetic" group named, Gorbat, meaning: the foreign country, the exile. What are the origins of this ethnonym ?How this group have come to take this name? How does he survive culturally? How does he keep its borders with the global society and other minorities? This study focuses on one of the agglomeration of this ethnic group, originally from the city of Babol in northern Iran. It offers a gateway to the world view of Gorbat of Babol, through the study of a relevant step in the life of every young Babolian Gorbat.This step consists of begging (aduri) practiced daily by all children, at the crossroads of Tehran, under the supervision of at least one of the women of their lineage. This practice therefore reveals certain kinship relations and highlights in particular the structure of the patrilineal lineage in the Gorbat community. It also reveals the importance of this structure in the embedded identity of the individual. The practice of aduri is described according to the concept of Clifford Geertz; "Thick descriptions". Each stratum of meaning leading to the production, perception and interpretation of significant behaviour (here aduri) is described and analysed. This meticulous analysis opens our vision to a dramatic view of begging, in the sense that Victor Turner employs this paradigm in "anthropology of performance". Begging is performed as a rite and produces a drama through which the cultural framework and symbols engaged become visible in the social interaction between the Gorbat and the non-gorbat. This phenomenon emerges as a central event in the social life of the Gorbat and the construction of the collective identity of the individual. It is therefore impossible to observe the Gorbat society in isolation.The other (non-gorbat) is constantly present. As sociological paradigm, and following the theory of "ethnic boundaries" by Fredrik Barth, this study suggests to observe the Gorbat society through its relations with the non-gorbat. However, these relations are not only based on economy nor on politics but on cultural features.The identity and otherness are defined through social interactions of everyday life, by oscillation between two moral frameworks and two value systems. It is through this back-and-forth between two spheres of construction and deconstruction of meaning that the definition of self and of the other emerges. This is at this intermediate level between the two spheres that it becomes possible to observe the points of divergence, but also the spheres where the Gorbat is unified with the global society.

This dissertation examines urban walking in Canada as it deviates from a largely male peripatetic tradition associated with the flâneur. This new incarnation of the walker—differentiated by gender, race, class, and/or sexual orientation—reshapes the urban imaginary and shifts the act of walking from what is generally theorized as an individualistic or simply transgressive act to a relational and transformative practice. While the walkers in this study are diverse, the majority of them are women: writers Dionne Brand, Daphne Marlatt, Régine Robin, Gail Scott, and Lisa Robertson and performance artists Kinga Araya, Stephanie Marshall, and Camille Turner all challenge the dualism inscribed by the dominant (masculine) gaze under the project of modernity that abstracts and objectifies the other. Yet, although sexual difference is often the first step toward rethinking identities and relationships to others and the city, it is not the last. I argue that poet Bud Osborn, the play The Postman, the projects Ogimaa Mikana, [murmur] and Walking With Our Sisters, and community initiatives such as Jane’s Walk, also invite all readers and pedestrians to question the equality, official history and inhabitability of Canadian cities. As these peripatetic works emphasize, how, where and why we choose to walk is a significant commentary on the nature of public space and democracy in contemporary urban Canada. This interdisciplinary study focuses on Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal, cities where there has been not only some of the greatest social and economic change in Canada under neoliberalism but also the greatest concentration of affective, peripatetic practices that react to these changes. The nineteenth-century flâneur’s pursuit of knowledge is no longer adequate to approach the everyday reality of the local and contingent effects of global capitalism. As these walkers reject an oversimplified and romanticized notion of belonging to a city or nation based on normative identity categories, they recognize the vulnerability of others and demand that cities be more than locations of precarity and economic growth. This dissertation critically engages diverse Canadian peripatetic perspectives notably absent in theories of urban walking and extends them in new directions. Although the topic of walking suggests an anthropocentrism that contradicts the turn to posthumanism in literary and cultural studies, the walkers in this study open the peripatetic up to non-anthropocentric notions as the autonomous subject of liberal individualism often associated with the male urban walking tradition is displaced by a new focus on the interdependent, affective relation of self and city and on attending to others, to the care of and responsibility for others and the city.

Démétrios de Phalère est un des exemples les plus remarquables dans l’Antiquité d’homme d’Etat-philosophe. Névers 355 au Phalère, l’ancien port d’Athènes, Démétrios, fils de Phanostratos, devint, grâce à sa formation au Lycée,un des meilleurs orateurs et philosophes de son temps et rédigea de très nombreux ouvrages : des traités philosophiques, des biographies historiques, un recueil des fables d’Esope, des traités sur la poésie homérique. Il entra en politique, en 324, à l’époque de l’affaire d’Harpale et en 322, il participa par la suite au règlement diplomatique de la guerre lamiaque et participa au gouvernement de Phocion instauré par Antipater. En 317/6, il fut nommé par Cassandre à la tête de la cité athénienne qu’il gouverna jusqu’en 307/6. Le régime démocratique fut peu modifié à l’exception de l’instauration d’un cens. Il tenta d’appliquer la politique aristotélicienne du « juste milieu »et renforça la centralisation. Bénéficiant d’un climat de prospérité et de paix, plusieurs réformes furent engagées :instauration de nom ophylakès ou « gardiens de la loi », de lois somptuaires et de gynéconomes, organisation d’un recensement de la population, création des homéristes au théâtre, mise en valeur des fêtes religieuses en particulier de celles en l’honneur de Dionysos. Au printemps 307, l'attaque de Démétrios Poliorcète mit un terme au gouvernement de Démétrios de Phalère : il dut s’enfuir à Thèbes où il resta pendant dix ans. Son arrivée à Alexandrie d’Egypte, en 297/6, marqua l’apogée de sa carrière. Premier conseiller de Ptolémée Ier, il participa à l’organisation du culte de Sérapis, et surtout, intervint directement dans la mise en place de la Bibliothèque du Musée d’Alexandrie et dans la traduction de la Loi juive, la Bible des Septante. Sa mort, causée par la morsure d’un aspic, se situe vraisemblablement vers 281/0, au début du règne de Ptolémée II. A une époque de transition entre les époques classique et hellénistique, toutes ses actions s’inscrivent dans un parcours de recherche philosophique voire même ésotérique. / Demetrius of Phalereus is one of the most remarkable examples of a Statesman-Philosopher in Antiquity. Bornca 355 BCE in Phalerum, the former port of Athens, Thanks to his training in the Lyceum, Demetrius, the son ofPhanostratos, became one of the best orators and philosophers of his time. He wrote many works: philosophicaltreatises, historical biographies, a collection of Aesop’s fables and treatises on Homeric poetry. He entered politics in324 at the time of the Harpalus affair and, in 322, subsequently participated in the diplomatic settlement of theLamian War and took part in the government of Phocion set up by Antipater. In 317/6, Cassander put him at the headof the Athenian city, which he governed until 307/6. The democratic regime underwent little change except for theinstitution of a census. He tried to enforce the Aristotelian policy of the “golden mean” and reinforced centralisation.Benefiting from a climate of prosperity and peace, he undertook several reforms, instituting the nomophylakes(“guardians of the law”), sumptuary laws and gynaeconomi, organising a population census, creating Homeristictheatrical performances and emphasising religious festivals, especially those in honour of Dionysos. In the spring of307/6, Demetrius Poliorcetes’ capture of Athens put en end to the government of Demetrius Phalereus who fled toThebes for ten years. His stay in Alexandria in Egypt starting in 297/6 marked the peak of his career. The firstcouncillor to Ptolemy I, he participated in organising the cult of Serapis, and especially, intervened directly in settingup the Mouseion or Library of Alexandria and in the translation of Jewish Law, the Septuagint. His death, probablyca 281/0 BCE, early in the reign of Ptolemy II, is said to have been caused by the bite of an aspic. At a time oftransition between the Classical and Hellenistic periods, all his actions were part of a quest for philosophical, evenesoteric, knowledge.

O objetivo desta pesquisa é estudar a memória cultural de Sólon de Atenas no texto “A Constituição dos Atenienses”, atribuído a Aristóteles. Esta obra realiza uma interpretação da poesia de Sólon e do seu contexto histórico através de uma investigação historiográfica da memória política de Atenas. A formação da memória cultural de Sólon nesta obra é um objeto privilegiado para abordar a memória da democracia, a concepção de regime democrático no contexto do séc. IV ateniense, e o estatuto do conhecimento histórico no contexto intelectual da escola aristotélica. / The aim of this research is to study the cultural memory of Solon of Athens on the text “The Athenians Constitution” ascribed to Aristotle. This source performs an interpretation of the Solon’s poetry and his historical context through a historiographical investigation about the political memory of Athens. The shaping of the cultural memory of Solon in this source is a privileged object to approach the memory of ancient democracy, the 4th century BC conception of democratic regime and the historical knowledge status on the context of the Aristotelian school.

O objetivo desta pesquisa é estudar a memória cultural de Sólon de Atenas no texto “A Constituição dos Atenienses”, atribuído a Aristóteles. Esta obra realiza uma interpretação da poesia de Sólon e do seu contexto histórico através de uma investigação historiográfica da memória política de Atenas. A formação da memória cultural de Sólon nesta obra é um objeto privilegiado para abordar a memória da democracia, a concepção de regime democrático no contexto do séc. IV ateniense, e o estatuto do conhecimento histórico no contexto intelectual da escola aristotélica. / The aim of this research is to study the cultural memory of Solon of Athens on the text “The Athenians Constitution” ascribed to Aristotle. This source performs an interpretation of the Solon’s poetry and his historical context through a historiographical investigation about the political memory of Athens. The shaping of the cultural memory of Solon in this source is a privileged object to approach the memory of ancient democracy, the 4th century BC conception of democratic regime and the historical knowledge status on the context of the Aristotelian school.

O objetivo desta pesquisa é estudar a memória cultural de Sólon de Atenas no texto “A Constituição dos Atenienses”, atribuído a Aristóteles. Esta obra realiza uma interpretação da poesia de Sólon e do seu contexto histórico através de uma investigação historiográfica da memória política de Atenas. A formação da memória cultural de Sólon nesta obra é um objeto privilegiado para abordar a memória da democracia, a concepção de regime democrático no contexto do séc. IV ateniense, e o estatuto do conhecimento histórico no contexto intelectual da escola aristotélica. / The aim of this research is to study the cultural memory of Solon of Athens on the text “The Athenians Constitution” ascribed to Aristotle. This source performs an interpretation of the Solon’s poetry and his historical context through a historiographical investigation about the political memory of Athens. The shaping of the cultural memory of Solon in this source is a privileged object to approach the memory of ancient democracy, the 4th century BC conception of democratic regime and the historical knowledge status on the context of the Aristotelian school.

The Karretjie People, or Cart People are a peripatetic community and are descendants of the KhoeKhoen and San, the earliest inhabitants of the Karoo region in South Africa. As a landless and disempowered community they are dependent upon others for food and other basic necessities specifically, and other resources generally. Compared to children in South Africa generally, the Karretjie children are in every sense of the most severely deprived. Their fathers are by and large sheep-shearers, often their only specialised skill, and which is primarily required only on demand and on an irregular and/or seasonal basis. The children’s mothers as keepers of the karretjie (cart) overnight shack, with other adult caretakers, are without predictable income for most of the year. The service that the adult men deliver to the farming community necessitates continuous spatial mobility and is made possible by a cart and donkeys, which also enable them to adapt to changing circumstances. High levels of spatial mobility as well as economic demands on individual domestic units result in inventive utilisation of scarce resources and entails, amongst others, in children oscillating between different karretjie (cart) units.

The Karretjie People, or Cart People are a peripatetic community and are descendants of the KhoeKhoen and San, the earliest inhabitants of the Karoo region in South Africa. As a landless and disempowered community they are dependent upon others for food and other basic necessities specifically, and other resources generally. Compared to children in South Africa generally, the Karretjie children are in every sense of the most severely deprived. Their fathers are by and large sheep-shearers, often their only specialised skill, and which is primarily required only on demand and on an irregular and/or seasonal basis. The children’s mothers as keepers of the karretjie (cart) overnight shack, with other adult caretakers, are without predictable income for most of the year. The service that the adult men deliver to the farming community necessitates continuous spatial mobility and is made possible by a cart and donkeys, which also enable them to adapt to changing circumstances. High levels of spatial mobility as well as economic demands on individual domestic units result in inventive utilisation of scarce resources and entails, amongst others, in children oscillating between different karretjie (cart) units.