Subject of this paper is a mongolian novel called The Shaman's Story wrote by G. Ayurzana. After an introduction of the history of modern mongolian literature and a short description of the autor's life comes the first chapter about the way the shamanism of Buryats is described in the novel. By comparing parts of the novel and secondary literature I am trying to find, whether and if yes, to what amount is the novel's description close to actual reality. In the next chapter is explained the author's writing style, the structure of the novel and its dynamics. The enclosure includes original and translated transcription of an e-mail corespondation with the author and a czech translation of most of the legends that appear in the novel.

Korean folk religion is often mentioned in the publications of western Christian missionaries, who have carried out their missionary work in Korea and it has also become a popular research topic of Japanese researchers during the time of Japanese annexation of Korea (1910-1945). This thesis compares the contents of chosen publications from the first half of 20th century of western and Japanese authors that deal with Korean shamanism in hope of confirming or refute the hypothesis that Korean negative view of the Japanese research is caused not by the factual mistakes in said publications, but rather is due to the rivalry between both nations. Unfortunately, while absolute confirmation or refutation of the hypothesis was not possible, we can see a tendency of Korean academia to excuse the mistakes in publications of western authors due to their lack of knowledge of the Korean culture and on the other hand dismiss the Japanese research because of the authors' connection to the colonial government.

Korean folk religion is often mentioned in the publications of western Christian missionaries, who have carried out their missionary work in Korea and it has also become a popular research topic of Japanese researchers during the time of Japanese annexation of Korea (1910-1945). This thesis compares the contents of chosen publications from the first half of 20th century of western and Japanese authors that deal with Korean shamanism in hope of confirming or refute the hypothesis that Korean negative view of the Japanese research is caused not by the factual mistakes in said publications, but rather is due to the rivalry between both nations. Unfortunately, while absolute confirmation or refutation of the hypothesis was not possible, we can see a tendency of Korean academia to excuse the mistakes in publications of western authors due to their lack of knowledge of the Korean culture and on the other hand dismiss the Japanese research because of the authors' connection to the colonial government.

[pt] Esta tese explora a potência da noção de quase-acontecimento no campo dos estudos literários. Buscando tal noção na esfera do perspectivismo ameríndio, soma-se a investigações contemporâneas que, comprometidas com o imperativo de não presumir vantagem epistemológica nos encontros com os povos indígenas, vêm se interessando em pensar a experiência artística sob o impacto desses encontros. No universo ameríndio, o quase acontecer é um evento recorrentemente associado ao trânsito ontológico (viagens aos mundos dos mortos, dos espíritos, dos animais, das coisas etc.), sendo a quasidade um vetor crucial em narrativas míticas e práticas xamânicas. Em contraste com estados de fusão ou anulação, a experiência com a quasidade só pode se manifestar em termos suspensivos. A disposição para habitar, assim em suspensão, zonas de vizinhança entre mundos humanos e não humanos já foi muitas vezes evocada e convocada em conexão com a experiência artística em contextos ditos ocidentais: tomando parte nesse movimento, as reflexões de Deleuze e Guattari são, de modo geral, uma influência importante nos materiais etnofilosóficos aqui em foco, notadamente, os trabalhos de Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Tania Stolze Lima e Manuela Carneiro da Cunha. Dois aspectos do pensamento da dupla de filósofos franceses importam em especial para este estudo: por um lado, mais teórico, está a insistência no devir feiticeiro do artista; e, por outro lado, mais metodológico, está o caminho que abrem ao construir seu pensamento por meio da invenção de séries heterogêneas de intercessores. Compondo-se de um conjunto eclético de materiais poéticos capazes de perturbar certo modo ocidental de conceber a imaginação, esta tese dedica-se a investigar vínculos possíveis entre imaginação poética e quase acontecimento. Apresentando-se e discutindo-se modos singulares com que poéticas ameríndias e ocidentais mobilizam o quase acontecer, mostra-se que o diálogo com práticas interligadas da vida ameríndia abre caminhos férteis para (re)pensar e (re)viver a potência do corpo na imaginação e os vínculos entre práticas teórico-críticas e práticas artísticas. A tese reflete em sua própria escritura este último ponto: os exercícios de leitura aqui realizados fazem transbordar entre si minhas atividades como pesquisadora e como escritora. Por este viés e num recorte que bastará aos interesses deste estudo, tais exercícios respondem à natureza paradoxal das imagens xapiri na narrativa xamânica de David Kopenawa em A queda do céu; à atmosfera mítico-ritualística de contato dos Ikpeng e dos Yanomami com a morte; e ao desordenamento de corpos que infestam o mito Pu iito – práticas e poéticas ameríndias que ponho em fricção com as seguintes experiências artísticas ocidentais: os livros O imitador de vozes, de Thomas Bernhard e Amada, de Toni Morrison; o poema Qvasi , de Edimilson de Almeida Pereira; e o conto O sofredor do ver , de Maura Lopes Cançado. / [en] This thesis explores the potency of the notion of the quasi-event in the field of literary studies. By locating this notion within the sphere of Amerindian perspectivism, it makes use of contemporary investigations that, committed to the imperative of not assuming an epistemological advantage in encounters with indigenous peoples, have been interested in considering the artistic experience under the impact of these encounters. In the Amerindian universe, a quasi-event-taken is an event recurrently associated with ontological transit (i.e., trips to the worlds of the dead, spirits, animals, things etc.), in which quasidade is a crucial vector in mythical narratives and shamanic practices. In contrast to states of fusion and annulment, this experience with quasidade can only manifest itself in suspensive terms. The willingness to inhabit (thus in suspension) neighboring zones between human and non-human worlds has often been evoked and summoned in connection with the artistic experience in so-called Western contexts: taking part in such movement, the reflections of Deleuze and Guattari are, in general, important influences on the ethnophilosophical materials in focus, most notably the works of Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Tania Stolze Lima and Manuela Carneiro da Cunha. Moreover, two aspects of the French philosophers thinking are especially relevant to this study: on the one hand, a more theoretical approach is the insistence on the becoming sorcerer of the artist; and, on the other hand, more methodological, is the path they open when constructing their thinking through the invention of a heterogeneous series of intercessors. Composed of an eclectic set of poetic materials capable of disturbing a certain Western way of conceiving the imagination, this thesis investigates possible links between poetic imagination and quasi-event . Hence, introducing and discussing the unique ways in which Amerindian and Western poetics mobilize quasi-event-taken, it is shown that the dialogue with interconnected practices of Amerindian life clears the path for alternative ways to (re)think and (re)live the potency of the body in the imagination, as well as the links between theoretical-critical and artistic practices. This last matter is reflected in this work s writing process: the reading exercises carried out here make my activities as a researcher and as a writer to overflow with each other. By this bias and in a cut-off that will be enough for the interests of this study, such exercises respond to the paradoxical nature of xapiri images in David Kopenawa s shamanic narrative in A queda do céu; the mythical-ritualistic atmosphere of Ikpeng and Yanomami contact with death; and the disorder of bodies that infest the myth Pu iito – Amerindian practices and poetics that I put in friction with the following Western artistic experiences: the books O Imitador de Vozes, by Thomas Bernhard and Amada, by Toni Morrison; the poem Qvasi , by Edimilson de Almeida Pereira; and the short story O sofredor do ver , by Maura Lopes Cançado.

Parmi la multitude de manifestations de nature religieuse et spirituelle qui animent présentement la société occidentale contemporaine, une attire notre attention par son mode d’action et l’intérêt grandissant qu’elle exerce sur le public. Elle est mise en place, organisée et administrée par un nombre d’individus prétendant posséder des capacités spéciales, résultat d’une relation particulière entretenue avec un pouvoir qualifié par la plupart de spirituel. Ces personnages sont généralement nommés « médiums », mais peuvent aussi être appelés suivant le nom de leur pratique qu’ils développent. Ainsi, celui qui prétend pouvoir « voir » le passé et l’avenir d’une personne est appelé « voyant » et sa pratique est appelée la « voyance ». Celui qui se réclame de la capacité de guérir des maladies et d’identifier leur cause par un contact privilégié avec son pouvoir spirituel est appelé guérisseur et sa pratique est appelée guérison. Ceux qui peuvent se mettre en contact avec les âmes des personnes décédées, chasser des esprits qui tourmentent des individus ou hantent des maisons et des lieux sont appelés médiums ou « médiums exorcistes » et leur pratique est l’exorcisme. Nous regroupons toutes ces manifestations en termes de « pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies » vu la caractéristique sous-tendant son expression : elle se produit en dehors d’un cadre institutionnel . À la suite des entrevues menées auprès d’un certain nombre de médiums, clients et individus ayant entendu des récits d’expériences de séance médiumnique, nous nous proposons de comprendre la manière dont cet univers de pratiques fonctionne. Nous cherchons également à déterminer comment il est possible de parler de l’émergence d’une expression inédite de pratique médiumnique selon la modalité qui la structure et la manière dont elle approfondit sa dimension croyante et idéologique. Nous séparons notre travail en trois parties distinctes. Dans la première, nous nous proposons de survoler la pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies à partir des témoignages des médiums qui ont participé à notre étude. La seconde partie de notre travail révèle l’image de cette pratique à partir du point de vue des clients qui ont fait appel aux services des médiums et ceux qui sont entrés en contact avec des récits décrivant des expériences vécues en séance médiumnique. La troisième partie est vouée à l’analyse de la pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies. Nous concevons cette dernière en deux temps. Le premier fait la lecture de plusieurs expressions médiumniques réparties dans le temps et l’espace afin de cerner différentes constantes régissant ces manifestations. Nos conclusions se confrontent à celles sur la pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies. Dans un second temps, nous analysons la pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies à partir des données fournies par les trois groupes de personnes interviewées afin d’en comprendre le mode de fonctionnement. Nous concevons le fonctionnement de cette pratique en trois étapes qui seront analysées à l’aide des travaux de plusieurs auteurs. L’étape précédant la séance et le rôle qu’elle joue pour la pratique médiumnique est analysée sous l’angle de la réflexion de l’anthropologue Jeanne Favret-Saada. La séance médiumnique, son mode d’implémentation et son efficacité sont analysés grâce à la réflexion de l’anthropologue Marc-Antoine Berthod sur le travail des voyants. La dernière partie de la pratique médiumnique, l’après-séance, sera analysée à l’aide de la dynamique entre « croire » et « savoir », et entre « instituant » et « institué » telle qu’élaborée par le théologien philosophe et historien français Michel de Certeau. Notre étude nous permet d’arriver aux conclusions générales suivantes : la pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies n’est pas l’expression d’une valorisation institutionnelle. Elle est l’expression de manifestations individuelles mises en place par ses représentants médiums. Chaque étape qui la compose est représentée par une série des stratégies capables, par leurs actions concertées, d’assurer sa pérennité. L’acte de croire participe activement à chacune de ces étapes, mais d’une manière sélective selon le parcours de chaque client. La pratique médiumnique manifestée en marge des institutions établies incarne par ses spécificités une nouvelle expression du phénomène médiumnique. / Among the myriad forms of religious or spiritual practices stirring contemporary Western society right now, one attracts our attention by its mode of operation and mounting public interest in this phenomenon. It is set up, organized and managed by a number of individuals claiming to have special abilities due to their unique relationship with a power qualified by most as spiritual. These individuals are usually known as "mediums" but may also be referred to by the name of their particular practice. Someone who claims to be able to "see" a person's past and future is called a "psychic" and their practice is called "clairvoyance." A person who claims the ability to heal illnesses and identify their cause through a special contact with their spiritual power is called a healer and their practice, healing. Those who can make contact with the souls of the deceased, cast out spirits that torment individuals or haunt homes and places are called mediums or "exorcist mediums" and their practice is exorcism. We describe these practices as "a mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of established institutions" since they happen outside the institutional framework. Based on interviews with mediums, clients, and individuals who have heard accounts of mediumistic séances, we seek to more fully understand the approach employed by practitioners in this domain. We also hope to determine whether, based on its structural modality, we are seeing the emergence of a new expression of mediumistic practice, and how this reinforces the associated faith and ideology. Our work is grouped into three distinct parts. In the first part, we conduct an overview of mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of established institutions based on the personal accounts of mediums who are taking part in our study. The second part of the research portrays this practice from the perspective of clients who have requested the services of mediums and people who have heard stories describing others’ experiences of mediumistic séances. The third part consists in an analysis of mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of established institutions. This last part is conducted in two phases. In the first phase, we interpret various mediumistic practices as they occurred over time and place to identify any constants. Our conclusions are set against those concerning mediumistic practices conducted on the margins of the established institutions. In the second phase, we analyze mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of the established institutions based on data provided by our three groups of interviewees with a view to obtaining an understanding of its functioning. We conceive three stages of functioning and draw on the works of several authors to aid us in analyzing them. The stage preceding the session and the role it plays for mediumistic practice is analyzed from the perspective of the anthropologist Jeanne Favret-Saada. The mediumistic session, its implementation method and its effectiveness are analyzed using the anthropologist Marc-Antoine Berthod’s reflections on the work of psychics. For the last stage of the mediumistic practice, the after-session, our analysis refers to the dynamic between "believing" and "knowing" and between "instituting" and "instituted" as the French theologian-philosopher and historian Michel de Certeau elaborated. Our study leads us to the following general conclusions: mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of established institutions is not an expression of institutional valorization. It is the expression of individual manifestations enacted by its psychic representatives. Each stage of the process is represented by a series of strategies capable, through their concerted actions, of ensuring its continuity. The act of believing is an active element in each of these stages, but in a selective way, associated with the path of each client. Mediumistic practice conducted on the margins of established institutions embodies by its specificities a new expression of the mediumistic phenomenon.

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This thesis is an attempt to reflect on my own creative process and put it in relation to  critical ideas and artworks that deals with themes of apocalypse, ecology and political theory. By doing this I hope to examine the role of apocalyptic narratives in our society today and see how my own film relates to these ideas. By putting my artistic process and film in relation to a theoretical framework I hope to discover new perspectives on aesthetics and how to tell an apocalyptic story in our day and age and how this relates to documentary filmmaking and digital culture.  To engage with a critical perspective on the ecological questions regarding my work I am taking help from thinkers such as the finish art historian and media professor Jussi Parikka and his ideas about geology of media where the earth crust itself can be considered a mediating force. I am also introducing the concept of buen vivir presented by the post-colonial theorist Rolando Vásques to critically examine the documentary process in Sápmi. Furthermore, I explore the religious idea of the holy fool who appears in the film from a societal perspective by turning to the media theorist Byung- Chul Han. I also make us of the theologian Ola Sigurdsons ideas about the transcendental power of comedy to understand the more comical sides of my filmmaking.  By putting these theoretical ideas against my practice I try to find an expanded understanding of the apocalyptic film genre and how the artistic process relates to healing and transformation in times of societal and existential crisis.

This essay is more or less a very boring analog game in paper, which is trying to find the similitude between ART and CONSCIOUSNESS, as well as the boundaries of legality of taking over or stealing someone else's work. The dynamic of this game of mine starts by choosing a lecture of any research and change some keywords to create a new research. The format of this essay suggests an interaction and will need an interaction of the reader with the essay itself in order to add more concepts and could make it more personal and transform the main subject of this essay. It does not necessarily have to be an art topic, so it is very open to any personal interest. There are no rules of this game, you can change the subject, the actors, the author or try to change it back to the original lecture. Everything is possible; at the end the reader could acquire by signing this essay or theory. / [I examensarbetet ingår utställningen "YSO":] YSO explore metaphysical information in order to expand the idea of Art and consciousness, which experience and perception are both essential as a part of the information processing. Condensing this information to be able to exchange it on different states the Meta, Virtual and physical state. The formal aesthetic display of YSO is an interpretation of the different inputs objects or data that will or could construct an assumption with deliberate inputs through the senses to be able to interpret the correlation between Art and Consciousness. Material: Freezer, pick-up car, silicon form, water, wood, plastic sheet, tv, ice machine, media player and paint. Teknik: Installation/video/variable. Längd på video: 01:54:00. / <p>The video, essay and installation is a unit and represent different states of consciousness and non-physical matter's reality (nonphysical-matter Reality) and all of these contribute to the information.</p><p>Examensarbetet består av en skriftlig del och en gestaltande del. Alternativ titel anger namnet förden gestaltande delen. </p><p>The master work includes a written essay and a forming part. The alternative title is the name of the forming part.</p>

The Kyrgyz are a Mongolian, Turkic ethno-linguistic people group. The political and social changes of the post-soviet times have led to a great religious openness among the Kyrgyz. Within one decade the nunber of Kyrgyz Christians has grown from few dozens to over 3000. The intention of this work was to analyze the conversion process of the Kyrgyz converts to Christianity and to apply the results to further missiological activity. The religious background of the Kyrgyz, which is heavily influenced by Folk Islam, was presented in the first chapter of the paper. In the second chapter, interviews collected from Kyrgyz Christians were evaluated. The third chapter summarizes the most important findings of the work and makes them applicable for missionary work. The precise knowledge of the religious background of the Kyrgyz and intercultural communication that it is based upon it can essentially dismantle barriers for the acceptance of the gospel. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M. Th. (Missiology)

The reading of four contemporary novels, namely: Credo by Melvyn Bragg, The Catastrophist by Ronan Bennett, Everything You Need by A.L. Kennedy and American Gods by Neil Gaiman explores the prominent position of mythification and remythification in contemporary literature. The discussion of Bragg's novel examines the significance of Celtic mythology and folklore and to what extent it influenced Christian mythology on the British Isles and vice versa. The presentation of the transition from a cyclical, pagan to a linear, Christian belief system is analysed. My analysis of Bennett's novel supports the observation that political myth as myth transformed contains elements and qualities embodied by sacred myths and investigates the relevance of Johan Degenaar's observation that "[p]ostmodernism emphasises the fact that myth is an ambiguous phenomenon" and practices an attitude of "eternal vigilance" (1995: 47), as is evident in the main protagonist's dispassionate stance. My reading of Kennedy's novel explores the bond that myth creates between the artist and the audience and argues that the writer as myth creator fulfils a restorative function through the mythical and symbolic qualities embedded in literature. Gaiman's novel American Gods focuses on the function of meta/multi-mythology in contemporary literature (especially the fantasy genre) and on what these qualities reveal about a society and its concerns and values. The thesis contemplates how in each case the original myths were substituted, modulated or transfigured to be presented as metamyth or myth transformed. The analysis shows that myth can be used in various ways in literature: as the data or information that is recreated and transformed in the creative process to establish a common matrix of stories, symbols, images and motifs which represents a bond between the author and the reader in terms of the meaning-making process; to facilitate a spiritual enrichment in a demythologized world and for its restorative abilities. The study is confirmed by detailed mythical reference. / English Studies / (D. Litt. et Phil. (English))