<p>Drawing on broader discussions that attempt to envision new ways of negotiating identity, nationalism and race in a post-colonial, post-apartheid South Africa, this thesis examines how whiteness is constructed and negotiated within the framework of literary-journalistic narratives. It is significant that so many established journalists have chosen a literary format, in which they use the structure, conventions, form and style of the novel, while clearly foregrounding their journalistic priorities, to re-imagine possibilities for narratives of identity and belonging for white South Africans. I argue that by working at the interstice of literature and journalism, writers are able to open new rhetorical spaces in which white South African identity can be interrogated.</p> <p><br /> This thesis examines the literary narratives of Rian Malan (My Traitor&rsquo / s Heart, 1991), Antjie Krog (Country of My Skull, 1998, and Begging to be Black, 2009), Kevin Bloom (Ways of Staying, 2009) and Jonny Steinberg (Midlands, 2002). These writers all seem to grapple with the recurring themes of &lsquo / history&rsquo / , &lsquo / narrative&rsquo / and &lsquo / identity&rsquo / , and in exploring the narratives of their personal and national history, they attempt to make sense of their current situation. The texts that this thesis examines exhibit an acute awareness of the necessity of bringing whiteness into conversation with &lsquo / other&rsquo / identities, and thus I explore both the ways in which that is attempted and the degree to which the texts succeed, in their respective projects. I also examine what literary genres offer these journalists in their engagement with issues of whiteness and white identity that conventional forms of journalism do not. These writers are challenging the conventions of genre &ndash / both literary and journalistic &ndash / during a period of social and political flux, and I argue that in attempting to limn new narrative forms, they are in fact outlining new possibilities for white identities and ways of belonging and speaking. However, a close reading of these literary-journalistic narratives reveals whiteness in post-apartheid South African to be a multifaceted and often contradictory construct and position. Despite the lingering privilege and structural advantage associated with whiteness, South African whiteness appears strongly characterised by a deep-seated anxiety that stems from a perpetual sense of &lsquo / un-belonging&rsquo / . However, while white skin remains a significant marker of identity, there does appear to be the possibility of moving beyond whiteness into positions of hybridity which offer interesting potential for &lsquo / becoming-other&rsquo / .</p>

<p>Drawing on broader discussions that attempt to envision new ways of negotiating identity, nationalism and race in a post-colonial, post-apartheid South Africa, this thesis examines how whiteness is constructed and negotiated within the framework of literary-journalistic narratives. It is significant that so many established journalists have chosen a literary format, in which they use the structure, conventions, form and style of the novel, while clearly foregrounding their journalistic priorities, to re-imagine possibilities for narratives of identity and belonging for white South Africans. I argue that by working at the interstice of literature and journalism, writers are able to open new rhetorical spaces in which white South African identity can be interrogated.</p> <p><br /> This thesis examines the literary narratives of Rian Malan (My Traitor&rsquo / s Heart, 1991), Antjie Krog (Country of My Skull, 1998, and Begging to be Black, 2009), Kevin Bloom (Ways of Staying, 2009) and Jonny Steinberg (Midlands, 2002). These writers all seem to grapple with the recurring themes of &lsquo / history&rsquo / , &lsquo / narrative&rsquo / and &lsquo / identity&rsquo / , and in exploring the narratives of their personal and national history, they attempt to make sense of their current situation. The texts that this thesis examines exhibit an acute awareness of the necessity of bringing whiteness into conversation with &lsquo / other&rsquo / identities, and thus I explore both the ways in which that is attempted and the degree to which the texts succeed, in their respective projects. I also examine what literary genres offer these journalists in their engagement with issues of whiteness and white identity that conventional forms of journalism do not. These writers are challenging the conventions of genre &ndash / both literary and journalistic &ndash / during a period of social and political flux, and I argue that in attempting to limn new narrative forms, they are in fact outlining new possibilities for white identities and ways of belonging and speaking. However, a close reading of these literary-journalistic narratives reveals whiteness in post-apartheid South African to be a multifaceted and often contradictory construct and position. Despite the lingering privilege and structural advantage associated with whiteness, South African whiteness appears strongly characterised by a deep-seated anxiety that stems from a perpetual sense of &lsquo / un-belonging&rsquo / . However, while white skin remains a significant marker of identity, there does appear to be the possibility of moving beyond whiteness into positions of hybridity which offer interesting potential for &lsquo / becoming-other&rsquo / .</p>

La thèse entend proposer un commentaire de la Chanson de Roland, fondé sur l'analyse minutieuse de toutes les variantes qui nous soient parvenues. Cette prise en considération de l'ensemble des versions françaises, rompant avec le dogme de la précellence du manuscrit d'Oxford, s'explique logiquement par la nature mouvante des œuvres médiévales, mais s'enracine aussi dans la conviction d'une texture mythique du poème de Roncevaux. Aussi le recours à la mythologie comparée constitue-t-il une ligne de force majeure du présent travail : s'inscrivant dans la tradition des études indo-européennes telles que Georges Dumézil a contribué à les fonder, la thèse propose une comparaison morphologique entre les mythes de Baldr et de Roland. Cet essai de mythologie comparée forme un premier temps dans l'analyse de la texture mythique du poème et peut être considéré comme autonome. Il s'articule cependant avec le travail de comparaison typologique qui lui succède. La thèse se propose en effet d'étudier la Chanson de Roland à la lumière de l'hypothèse victimaire élaborée par René Girard, qui permet de penser sous un jour nouveau l'esthétique et l'idéologie de la chanson de geste. De fait, la poétique de la répétition et l'art de la symétrie sont justiciables de la théorie du désir mimétique, tout comme la crise épique entretient des analogies étroites avec le modèle de la crise sacrificielle. C'est autour de la question anthropologique de la violence et de l'ambiguïté de la figure du guerrier mythique que ce travail réconcilie deux méthodes réputées incompatibles et pourtant complémentaires dans l'analyse qu'elles proposent de l'ambivalence des héros épiques. / This doctoral thesis intends to propose a commentary of the Chanson de Roland, based on a meticulous analysis of all the variants which have reached posterity. By paying close attention to the whole of French versions and by refusing to comment the sole manuscript of Oxford, as most of scholars do, we comply with the unsettled nature of medieval poetry and furthermore support the idea that the Chanson de Roland should be considered as a myth. The comparative mythology thus constitutes a main thrust of this work : in the tradition on Indo-european studies as founded by Georges Dumézil, we compare the myth of Roland to the myth of Balder, on a morphological level. The essay of comparative mythology is the first part of our commentary and could be regarded as self-reliant. However, it forms a single entity with the essay of typological comparison which follows. The thesis actually intends to interpret the poem in the light of the theory developed by René Girard, which allows to analyze the aesthetics and the ideology of the chanson de geste in a new light. The poetic of repetition and the art of symmetry are closely linked to the hypothesis of mimetic desire, just like the epic crisis is closely linked to the model of the sacrificial crisis. By studying the anthropological question of violence and the ambiguous figure of mythical warrior, this work combines two approaches, deemed to be irreconcilable and nevertheless complementary, in the sense that they interpret in the same way the ambivalence of epic heroes.

Le débat entre éthique de la sacralité de la vie et éthique de la qualité de la vie se trouve au centre des discours bioéthiques (en particulier ceux en langue anglaise) depuis une quarantaine d'années. La sacralité de la vie est généralement considérée comme une éthique ancienne dont les origines remonteraient aux traditions judéo-chrétienne et hippocratique. L'éthique de la qualité de la vie, quant à elle, est souvent présentée comme une éthique moderne, née consécutivement au développement scientifique et technique qui a marqué le domaine médical depuis soixante ans. La différence entre les deux éthiques consisterait alors dans le fait que chacune d'entre elles attribuerait une valeur distincte à la vie humaine. De là découleraient des considérations morales divergentes sur certaines pratiques : euthanasie, avortement, interruption des traitements, etc. L'abondance de la littérature sur le sujet et la récurrence de l'usage des deux expressions n'empêchent pas que la portée et la signification de ces éthiques restent confuses. Cela est particulièrement évident dans les débats publics, et notamment à l’occasion de cas fortement médiatisés. Qu'entend-on par vie (humaine) ? Par sacralité ? Et par qualité ? Même au sein des « camps » apparemment bien définis, ces questions ne reçoivent pas toujours la même réponse.La présente thèse s'interroge sur la pertinence de l'opposition plus haut présentée au moyen d'une approche généalogique et d'une méthode archéologique. Elle se questionne d'abord sur l'idée commune de la sacralité de la vie et en repère les provenances multiples et hétérogènes. Celles-ci sont ensuite relues en contexte, en s'intéressant aux conditions dans lesquelles l'expression a été mobilisée, ainsi qu'aux discours qui s'y sont opposés. Ce cadre permet de porter un regard neuf sur l'apparition du débat entre éthique de la sacralité de la vie et éthique de la qualité de la vie, ainsi que sur son émergence et sa reconfiguration au sein de la bioéthique. L'enjeu est ici de fournir de nouvelles clés pour penser autrement le débat contemporain. / The debate between the sanctity of life ethic and the quality of life ethic has been at the core of bioethical discussions (especially those in English) for forty years. It is generally considered that the sanctity of life is an ancient ethic which belongs to the Judeo-Christian and to the Hippocratic traditions. The quality of life, for its part, is commonly understood as a modern ethic which was born with the scientific and technological development of the medical field started sixty years ago. It is then stated that the difference between the sanctity of life ethic and the quality of life ethic depends on the value that each ethic assigns to human life. A moral judgment about subjects as abortion, euthanasia, the withholding and withdrawal of life support, and so on, is supposed to result from this value. The literature on the subject is abundant, and the expressions “sanctity of life” and quality of life” are often used, but the meaning and the scope of these ethics remain sometimes unclear. This fact becomes more evident in the public debates, especially in the well-known cases. What (human) life, sanctity (of life), and quality (of life) mean? These questions rarely receive the same answer.The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the validity of the opposition between the sanctity of life ethic and the quality of life ethic with a genealogical approach and an archaeological method. The common idea of the sanctity of life is, first, analyzed to find its multiple and heterogeneous “descents” [provenances]. These “descends”, then, are put into context, focusing on the conditions in which the expression “sanctity of life” was mobilized, and on the discourses that opposed to it. This framework, finally, allows to bring a fresh look at the advent of the debate between sanctity of life ethic and quality of life ethic, as well as at its emergence and reconfiguration in bioethics. The challenge is to provide new keys for thinking differently the contemporary debate.

Notre étude porte sur le développement du culte d’Hélène à l’époque carolingienne. Si la fin de l’antiquité et l’époque des royaumes barbares gardèrent le souvenir de la mère de Constantin, en particulier dans les sphères politiques, l’élaboration de sa légende fut progressive, connut plusieurs versions, parfois contradictoires et l’impératrice ne reçut pas de culte avant la deuxième moitié du IXe siècle. Bien que la ville de Rome se souvienne des bienfaits et des constructions de la sainte, ce n’est pas là que son culte fut fondé mais en Champagne. Il s’agit donc d’étudier comment l’époque carolingienne constitue un moment particulièrement favorable à la redécouverte de cette pieuse femme, proche du pouvoir. L’édition du dossier hagiographique produit à cette époque en Champagne par le moine Almanne d’Hautvillers constitue le point de départ de notre recherche tant ce texte semble central à la diffusion de ce nouveau culte. Il résume également l’ensemble des enjeux qui gravitent autour du personnage. Car les raisons d’évoquer Hélène sont nombreuses : culte de la Croix, modèle de sainteté féminine, définition du pouvoir impérial, pratique du queenship, questionnement sur l’authentification des reliques et leur déplacement, quête de légitimité ou de primauté. Le culte est ainsi réinterprété en fonction des besoins des régions qui se l’approprient, à Trèves, à Cologne ou encore en Angleterre. / Our study focuses on the development of the cult of Helena in the Carolingian period. If the end of antiquity and the time of the barbarian kingdoms kept the memory of the mother of Constantine, particularly in the political sphere, the development of her legend was progressive, it went through several versions, sometimes contradictory and the Empress received no worship before the second half of the ninth century. Although the city of Rome remembered the benefits and constructions of the saint, her cult wasn’t founded there but in Champagne. The point is to study how the Carolingian period was therefore a particularly favorable time to rediscover this pious woman, and her vicinity with power. Publishing the hagiographical works produced at that time in Champagne by the monk Almannus of Hautvillers is the starting point of our research since that text appears central to the spread of this new cult. It also summarizes all the issues that revolve around the character. For the reasons to mention Helena are numerous: worshipping the Cross, modeling feminine holiness, defining the imperial power, practicing queenship, questioning the authentication of relics and their displacement, seeking legitimacy or primacy. Worshipping Helena is thus reinterpreted according to the needs of the regions that appropriate her, in Trier, in Cologne or in England.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / Drawing on broader discussions that attempt to envision new ways of negotiating identity, nationalism and race in a post-colonial, post-apartheid South Africa, this thesis examines how whiteness is constructed and negotiated within the framework of literary-journalistic narratives. It is significant that so many established journalists have chosen a literary format, in which they use the structure, conventions, form and style of the novel, while clearly foregrounding their journalistic priorities, to re-imagine possibilities for narratives of identity and belonging for white South Africans. I argue that by working at the interstice of literature and journalism, writers are able to open new rhetorical spaces in which white South African identity can be interrogated. This thesis examines the literary narratives of Rian Malan (My Traitor’s Heart, 1991), Antjie Krog (Country of My Skull, 1998, and Begging to be Black, 2009), Kevin Bloom (Ways of Staying, 2009) and Jonny Steinberg (Midlands, 2002). These writers all seem to grapple with the recurring themes of 'history', 'narrative', 'dentity' and in exploring the narratives of their personal and national history, they attempt to make sense of their current situation. The texts that this thesis examines exhibit an acute awareness of the necessity of bringing whiteness into conversation with 'other' identities, and thus I explore both the ways in which that is attempted and the degree to which the texts succeed, in their respective projects. I also examine what literary genres offer these journalists in their engagement with issues of whiteness and white identity that conventional forms of journalism do not. These writers are challenging the conventions of genre - both literary and journalistic - during a period of social and political flux, and I argue that in attempting to limn new narrative forms, they are in fact outlining new possibilities for white identities and ways of belonging and speaking. However, a close reading of these literary-journalistic narratives reveals whiteness in post-apartheid South African to be a multifaceted and often contradictory construct and position. Despite the lingering privilege and structural advantage associated with whiteness, South African whiteness appears strongly characterised by a deep-seated anxiety that stems from a perpetual sense of ‘un-belonging’. However, while white skin remains a significant marker of identity, there does appear to be the possibility of moving beyond whiteness into positions of hybridity which offer interesting potential for ‘becoming-other’ / South Africa

La question du traitement de l’aléa affectant les contrats publics semble opposer de façon « incommensurable » les droits anglais et français. Si le droit français est doté de règles de droit objectif permettant, dans l’intérêt général, le traitement de l’aléa affectant les contrats publics sans accord des parties, rien de tel n’existe en droit anglais ou la règle de la force obligatoire commande l’intangibilité de l’accord initial. La comparaison anglo-française permet, grâce à cet antagonisme, de mettre en exergue les ressorts profonds du traitement de l’aléa affectant les contrats publics au travers de l’opposition théorique entre force obligatoire et intérêt public. Dans cette perspective, les règles générales permettant, en droit français, le traitement de l’aléa sans accord des parties apparaissent comme étant fondées sur une conception économique et téléologique du contrat et de sa force obligatoire, que l’on peut également identifier dans certains aspects du droit anglais des contrats. En outre, le mode de traitement de l’aléa priviligié en Angleterre aussi bien qu’en France est l’accord de volontés – initial ou subséquent. Néanmoins, les possibilités de modification du contrat en cours d’exécution sont drastiquement limitées par le droit de l’Union européenne. A l’inverse, les stipulations initiales qui tendent à ériger, du fait de la généralisation des clauses standardisées, un régime contractuel autonome de traitement de l’aléa, apparaissent désormais comme le mode incontournable d’adaptation des contrats publics en cours d’exécution. / The question of the treatment of uncertain/unforeseen events affecting public contracts seems to oppose in an immeasurable way English and French laws. While, in French law, general rules provide, in the public interest, the treatment of uncertain/unforeseen events affecting public contracts without the consent of the contractors, no such provisions exist in English law, where the sanctity and intangibility of contract prevails. Thank to this antagonism, the proposed comparison enables to highlight the deep motivations of the treatment of uncertain/unforeseen events affecting public contracts, through the theoretical opposition between sanctity of contract and public interest. In this respect, the general rules allowing, in French law, the treatment of the uncertain/unforeseen events without the consent of the parties appear to be based on an economic and teleological approach of the contract and its biding force. Surprisingly, the latter approach can also be noticed, in some respects, in the English law of contracts. Moreover, the priviledged mean to treat uncertain/unforeseen events in England as well as in France is the agreement of the parties – whether ex ante or ex post. Nonetheless, the possibilities of variating the contract in the course of its performance have been drastically limited by the European Union law. By contrast, the intial terms which tends to erect an autonomous regime of treatment of uncertain/unforeseen events through the spreading of standard terms appear to be the major and indispensable mean of adaptation of public contracts in the course of their performance.

Ce travail de thèse a pour objet l’historicité conflictuelle d’un objet qui n’a jamais vraiment été étudié d’un point de vue littéraire : la littérature hagiographique de l’époque moderne. En nous séparant de la lecture institutionnelle qui est souvent celle de la critique, nous voulons la dégager de son utilisation comme moyen de contextualisations historiques ou anthropologiques. Au sein des écrits de la période moderne, l’hagiographie n’est pas simplement l’ « autre discours » de l’historiographie, comme le disait Michel de Certeau. Au lendemain du concile de Trente, les biographies d’une candidate à la sainteté comme Jeanne de Chantal (1572-1641, canonisée en 1767) sont l’occasion de réfléchir sur ces nouveaux écrits, qui présentent des structures qui se stabilisent et des éléments topiques qui renvoient à une tradition d’écriture préexistante. Qui sont les auteurs de ces textes ? Dans quelles conditions les rédigent-ils et pour quel public ? Quels en sont les enjeux ? En pleine crise moderniste, la condamnation par la Congrégation de l’Index de la dernière Vie importante de la figure, la Sainte Chantal de Bremond (1912), sera notre point de vue : Bremond revendique paradoxalement une forme de nouveauté par un retour au XVIIe siècle, visible dans la filiation exhibée de son propre texte à celui de la première biographie, les Mémoires de Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy (1642). Ce geste construit alors, comme malgré lui, une histoire diachronique des Vies de Jeanne de Chantal, dont les mutations en font un « cas » de la littérature hagiographique française et permettent de voir qu’écrire la Vie d’un saint, c'est à chaque fois rejouer ce qu’est la sainteté. / The hagiographic literature from the Early Modern Period has never been studied as a plain literary issue. Departing from the institutional reading of a major part of the critics about hagiography, the hagiographic literature must be considered apart from its historical and anthropological contextualisations. Hagiography is not only the “other one” of historiography, as Michel de Certeau said. In the wake of the Trent Council, the biographies of a candidate to sanctity like Jeanne de Chantal (1572-1641, canonized in 1767) allow us to consider these new writings which show newly built structures and topical elements of a former writing tradition. Who wrote these texts? How have there been written? For whom? What were there main issues? Our point of view will be the last major Life of Jeanne de Chantal (1912), convicted by the Congregation of the Index, in the middle of the Modernist Crisis. The return to the first biography of the heroine, the Mémoires of Françoise-Madeleine de Chaugy (1642), is a paradoxical way for Bremond to claim the originality of his approach. A diachronic history of Jeanne de Chantal’s Lives can be seen through this operation. Their mutations make them a “case” of French hagiographical Literature: writing the Life of a saint is always defining what is sanctity again.

This dissertation examines from a Vattimian perspective the challenge that euthanasia and assisted suicide posed to the sanctity of life ethos in Canada from 1972–2005. Gianni Vattimo’s central themes—metaphysics (absolute values), “event of being” (lived experiences that call absolute values into question), and passive-reactive nihilism (the use of “masks” or “disguises” to prevent the dissolution of metaphysics)—are pivotal to understanding the way religious and secular beliefs are interwoven within ethical, medical, legal and political discourses in Canada. Vattimo’s philosophico-ethical approach was specifically chosen because as a theoretical tool, it helps to illuminate the presence, weakening, and resilience of metaphysics in discourses surrounding an intentionally hastened death. To demonstrate how Vattimo’s major themes apply empirically to the research, a social constructionist approach was adopted in the form of a discourse analysis. Particular emphasis was placed on an examination of the three most important cases of death and dying in Canada, namely, Nancy B., Sue Rodriguez and Robert Latimer. The bulk of the evidence suggests that when these “events of being” challenged the sanctity doctrine as the ultimate foundation for life-terminating decisions, ethical, medical, legal and political discourses converged to promote three normative positions or authorizing discourses used in the tradition of Christian ethics: (1) stewardship—the view that since life is a “loan from God,” sacred, and of infinite worth, death cannot be intentionally hastened (“nature must take its course”); (2) value in prolonged suffering—the view that since suffering possesses transcendent meaning or purpose, its prolongation is justified in individual circumstances; and (3) the “slippery slope”—the view that any weakening of the sanctity of life ethos inevitably harms or threatens the community. Generally speaking, religious and secular advocates of the sanctity of life ethos reacted similarly in cases involving an intentionally hastened death. In other words, both the religious and the secular embraced metaphysics (absolute values), condoned and rationalized the prolongation of suffering, and relied on the “slippery slope” as a “mask” to maintain the sanctity of human life as first principle. The research strongly suggests that Canada is still significantly indebted to Christian notions when it comes to discussions surrounding the decriminalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide.

“Holy Body, Wholly Other: Sanctity and Society in the Lives of Irish Saints” focuses on the ways in which Ireland’s hagiographers portrayed holy otherness in the Lives of their subjects, using the Latin vitae, the vernacular bethada and the Lives containing both languages that survive from the 600s through the end of the fourteenth century. This study considers three broad themes, namely the transition of a sanctified essence into a holy body and the resulting alteration of an otherwise mortal form into a wholly other, the saintly prosecution of vengeance against those who wrong the body Christian and the enactment of hagiographical healing to bring the community of the faithful back to full integrity. These themes are analyzed within the social and cultural context of medieval Ireland, and are particularly compared with the biblical, apocryphal, heroic and legal writings of the Irish Middle Ages. Depictions of male and female saints are also compared and contrasted, as are the shifts in such depictions that occur between Latin and Irish narratives. Throughout the Lives the language of the laws of church and society inform the saint’s portrait, firmly situating these holy men and women within the sphere of medieval Ireland. Elements of Irish sanctity are drawn from vernacular heroic saga, but the predominant influence upon the Lives of Ireland’s sanctified is a powerful combination of apocryphal and canonical scriptures, demonstrating that Irish holiness can only have emanated from heaven. This combination, moreover, differs between male and female saints and between Latin and Irish Lives; holy men are modeled very strongly upon both Old and New Testament figures, while lady saints are painted more in the hues of imitatio Christi. Further, Latin vitae follow patterns capable of speaking to both Irish and non-Irish audiences alike, while vernacular Lives observe models that needed to appeal only to the Irish themselves.