暢銷書是人們學習愛情資訊的重要管道，其內含有小說、散文與劇本等文類。它們不僅提供多樣的愛情論述，更是讀者吸收、學習愛情經驗的重要摹本。能夠出版暢銷書的作家們具備強烈的社會影響力與能見度，因此暢銷書反映了社會大眾的愛情觀念，同時也提供人們在愛情生活中該如何自處與面對愛情的生活倫理與準則。本研究亟欲透過暢銷書的研究來理解社會的主流愛情觀念，並從中分析出各種愛情困境的行動導引，最後將之統整並與社會理論家對話。為了研究愛情類的暢銷書，本研究以TPI暢銷排行榜(2004/1~2013/8)的資料作為取樣對象，並以暢銷度為首要考量後挑選適合書籍進行研究。根據研究發現，暢銷作家在許多方面與社會理論家看法一致。然而，暢銷作家比理論家專注於個人於愛情中所遭遇的困境，以及愛情困境所能實行的解決方案。愛情類暢銷書的論述呈現高度理性化、自我反思、自我實現等正向積極的現代性特徵，其中「愛自己」的論述更是它們對現代愛情的主要看法。對暢銷書而言，「愛自己」顯然是避免「浪漫愛陷阱」的最佳方式。暢銷書透過「愛自己」的論述將愛情理性化，並且從自我出發，重新建構正向積極的愛情心態。正是這種積極向上的論述重新建立起讀者對愛情的希望，並且成為讀者持續相信、進入愛情的重要原因。 / Bestselling books serve as the very way of getting love information. It contains novel, essay and drama kinds of literatures. They supply various love discourse to help readers to absorb and learn love experiences as such. Those who can publish best seller books are authors with strong social influence and visibility, therefore, books of these authors have the capacity of reflecting love ideas of general public and giving instructions for readers to deal love matters with ethical principles. The goal of the study is to use the best seller books to understand main stream ideas of love, summarizing instructions of hurdles in love and, finally, compile them into a compact form to discuss with theorists. In order to research best seller books of love, we choose the ranking list of best seller books in TPI (Taiwan Publisher Information) website as a target population to sample from, and using the degree of selling as the main sampling factor to select proper samples to research on. Based on our research findings, bestselling authors share same opinions with theorists in many aspects, however, bestselling authors are more focusing on personal struggles in love and the solutions that one can take to deal with. The discourse of best seller books present positive and active modernity portrait, for examples: highly rationalization, self-reflexivity and self-realization. Among these features, “Love Thyself”is the main concept of their way to perceive modern love. For best seller books, “Love Thyself”seems to be the best way to avoid “Traps of Romance” as such. Through the ideas of self-loving, best seller books is able to rationalize love with discourse and start from the point of self to re-construct positive and active mentality. It is from this positive and active discourse that readers can re-establish their hope to love and convince themselves to continually believe or enter into the sphere of love. Keywords: Best Selling Books, Sociology of Love, Reflexivity, Self-Love, Hope.

Over the course of four sections this PhD examines the ways in which the Aristotelian, Stoic and Epicurean philosophers portray bodily activity. In particular, it argues that their claims regarding bodies' natural tendency to preserve themselves, and seek out the goods capable of promoting their well-being, came to influence Hobbes's and Spinoza's later accounts of natural, animal and social behaviour. The first section presents the ancient accounts of natural and animal bodily tendencies and explores the specific ways in which the Aristotelian, Stoic and Epicurean views on animal desires came to complement and diverge from each other. After investigating the perceived links between natural philosophy, psychology and ethics, the section proceeds to consider how the ancients used this 'unified' view of nature to guide their accounts of the soul's primary appetites and desires. Also examined is the extent to which civil society is portrayed as a means of securing the individual against others, and how Aristotelian philia, Theophrastian oikeiotês and Stoic oikeiōsis came to stand in opposition to the fear-driven and compact-based accounts of social formation favoured by the Epicureans. The second section considers how the ancient accounts of impulsive behaviour and social formation were received and diffused via new editions of ancient texts, eclectic readings of Aristotle, and the attempts of Neostoic and Neoepicurean authors to update and systematise those philosophies from the late sixteenth century onwards. The particular treatments of Hellenistic thought by authors such as Justus Lipsius, Hugo Grotius and Pierre Gassendi are considered in detail and are placed within the context of the growing trend to use Stoic and Epicurean thought to replace the authority of Aristotle in the areas of science, psychology, and politics. The final two sections are devoted respectively to considering the ways in which Hobbes and Spinoza encountered the Hellenistic accounts of bodies and demonstrating how these earlier accounts came to feature in each of their own discussions of bodily tendencies. Engaging with a wide range of their texts, each section develops the many nuances and contours that emerged as both writers developed and fine-tuned their accounts of bodily actions. This reveals the many ways in which the ancient accounts of self-preservation helped to unify large aspects of Hobbes's and Spinoza's own philosophical corpus, while equally showing how a well-developed account of bodily tendencies might challenge the scholastic worldview and expand further the boundaries of the so-called 'New Science'.

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This diploma thesis is based on the final works of Michel Foucault (Courage of truth, Fearless peech) and it focuses on how the truth and truth-telling as an activity effects self- formation of the individual, namely self-formation of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, which is recorded in his autobiografical works (Confession of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Dialoges: Rousseau, Judge of Jean-Jacques, Reveries of a Solitery Walker). In my thesis, I have tried to decide as which true-telling person he could be considered (prophet, sage, teacher, parrhesiastes or cynic). In order to achieve that, I drew from his other philosophical works and secondary literature (Discurses, Essay on the Origin of languages, Emile or On Education, The Social Contract, Letter to M. D'Alembert on Spectacles, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Transparency and Obstruction) and I was looking for evidence of his true nature and thoughts, which I put into context of his work Confessions afterwards. Keywords: Truth, courage of truth, parrhesia, parrhesiastes, cynic, self-love, false meaning about oneself, heart, passion, imagination, human nature, social inequalities.

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The beauty industry has been booming in the last few years, generating immense profits as it now translates into an Internet global beauty culture in its own right that finally made room for women of color. As research barely mentions African women and their diasporas, this study aims to critically analyze the dynamic of this North American-dominated Internet beauty culture celebrating non-white women, looking at how it impacts African women and their diasporas and participates in affirming a global woman of color through commodity capitalism.  Based on discourse analysis of multiple actors in the industry using popular culture sources, I then conducted a critical feminist autoethnography of my beauty journey, put in perspective with the results of decolonial interviews with African and African diaspora women recruited online. I asked about their relationship with the beauty industry and their opinions on some arguments I made. Self and collective analysis demonstrated the emergence of an African diasporic hybrid beauty culture, empowering women to feel like actors of change.