Magister Artium - MA / Through a literary analysis of two contemporary novels, J.M. Coetzee's Life & Times of Michael K (1983) and Cormac McCarthy's The Road (2006), in which a common concern seems to be an exploration of what it means to be human, the thesis seeks to explore the relationship between human consciousness and language. This dissertation considers the development of a conception of the human based on rationality, and which begins in the Italian Renaissance and gains momentum in the Enlightenment. This conception models the human as a stable knowable self. This is drawn in contrast to the novels, which figure the absence of a stable knowable self in the representation of their protagonists. The thesis thus interrogates language's capacity to provide definitional meanings of the ''human.'' On the other hand, although language's capacity to provide essential meanings is questioned, its abundant expressive forms give voice to the experience of human being. Drawing on a range of fields of enquiry, both philosophical, linguistic, and bio-ethical, this thesis seeks to explore the connection between human consciousness and the medium of language. It considers how the two novels in question play with the concept of language to produce or imagine other ways of thinking about human existence, and other ways of creating meaning to human existence through the representation of their novels.

While sorting through my experiences as a student teacher, my research question has shifted from “How can teacher education be improved?” to “How is teacher education represented?” I am interested in the juxtaposition of these two inquiries, and use them not to suggest pedagogical rules, but to draw attention to the kinds of spaces such a juxtaposition opens up. The shift in my research question is influenced by the discursive turn—the movement from social justice theories to poststructuralist theories, from theories based on experience to theories based on discourse. Questions of representation are the focus not only of poststructuralist theories but also of psychoanalytic theories, or theories of the unconscious, and both theories acknowledge that representations of reality are excessive: they contain more and less than that which they represent (Orner et al., 2005). The concept of excess enables me to make sense of moments in my teacher education program that could not be contained by dominant educational discourses of knowledge, reflection, and inclusion. The excessiveness of a teaching strategy called the Six Thinking Hats troubles the theory/practice binary in discourses of knowledge. The excessiveness of an assignment about philosophies of teaching, and a class discussion in response to the film Submission trouble the enlightenment/ignorance binary in discourses of reflection. And, the excessiveness of my attempt to question curricular content troubles the normal/exceptional binary in discourses of inclusion. I use excessive moments from my teacher education program to question existing discourses, and to suggest that we need to change the stories we tell ourselves about education (King, 2003). Our current educational discourses perpetuate histories of violence that we have inherited, and I suggest that social justice, poststructuralist, and psychoanalytic theories will enable us to more effectively heal from these inherited histories. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2007-12-04 16:19:40.676 / This work was funded in part by a Canadian Graduate Scholarship granted by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (766-2006-0775).

This study focuses on three young women in their final year of school using data gathered during a year-long process of individual conversational interviews, the contents of which were largely determined by their interests. Three themes arise from critical incidents during this year - the debutante ball, teenage pregnancy and dieting. These themes are used to focus wide ranging explorations of what it is to be a young woman at this particular time. The broader cultural production of discursive positions available to, and developed by, these young women as part of their identity formation is discussed. Methodological issues concerning power relationships between research participants are also the focus of critical attention. It is considered that young women's bodies and bodily practices are central to understanding the processes involved in their identity formation. It is in this context that the focus turns to bodies that matter. In contemporary Western cultures 'adolescent bodies' could be said to matter 'too much' in the sense that they are increasingly the focus for disciplinary practices in institutions such as schooling, the church, the family, health care, health promotion and the media. This disciplining is legitimised because adolescence is socially constructed as a 'becoming'. In this case it is a matter of 'becoming woman'; a sort of apprenticeship which allows for knowledgeable others to provide not only guidance and nurturance, but discipline. Using insights gained from feminist poststructuralist theory and cultural feminism this thesis argues that the discourses and practices generated within and across institutions, which are normalised by their institutional base, are gender differentiated. The focus is on young women's embodied subjectivity and how the discourses and practices they engage with and in work to construct an ideal feminine body-subject. The discursive production of a gendered identity has a considerable impact on young women's health and their health-related behaviours. This is explored specifically in the thesis in relation to sexuality and the cultural production of the 'ideal' female body. It is argued that health education and health promotion strategies which are designed to influence young women's health related behaviours, need to consider the forms of power, knowledge and desire produced through young women's active engagement with institutionalised discourses of identity if they are to have an ongoing impact

This study explores how heavily tattooed women with a history of childhood sexual abuse give meaning to their tattooing practices in view of the recent appropriation of tattooing by the mainstream. Embodied feminist poststructuralist theory revealed the ways that dominant discourses on gender, beauty, painful body modifications, and childhood sexual abuse intersect and interact in attempts to shape the identities of the participants. These intersections also reveal the participants’ resistance strategies and the process of identity transformation they engage in as they get tattoos. The constitution of identities through discourses offers alternative ways of seeing this population, challenging dominant discourses regarding female survivors of childhood sexual abuse tattooing practices. The research methodology used was a qualitative approach based on ‘interpretive interactionism.’ This approach makes visible and accessible to the reader, the problematic lived experiences of the participants through their narratives. The research methods involved several in-depth interviews with three heavily tattooed women who were survivors of childhood sexual abuse. The analysis involved interpreting the meanings participants gave to their tattooing practices in relation to how they construct their identities as they negotiate gender ideology, the tattoo renaissance, self-injury practices as related to tattooing, healing from childhood sexual abuse and oppressive beauty ideals. This study unearthed alternative ways of conceptualizing painful practices, female aesthetics, tattooing, women’s body reclamation projects, emotional trauma release, embodied domination, and bodily learning. It also offered insights into how the participants fragment their subjectivities and actively take over the authorship of their identities as they also try to positively influence their environments, challenge beauty norms and seek healing outside of traditional therapeutic environments.