This thesis examines the voice of female writers from the Maghreb in the 1980s and their efforts to change the status of women of their respective countries: Assia Djebar, Leïla Sebbar and Badia Hadj Nasser. These writers exchange silence for voices in French, the language of ex-colonizer. They managed to stage in their novels strong women protagonistes who fight for their emancipation. These characters know how to overcome the obstacles of the Maghreban patriarchal society, who impose on them religious and traditional prohibitions, to find their freedom. In their fight, these women regain their feminine body in a society that refuses them one to become, in the end, a full subject. Notre thèse traite la voix des écrivaines maghrébine dans les années 80 et leurs efforts pour changer le statut de la femme maghrébine: Assia Djebar, Leïla Sebbar et Badia Hadj Nasser. Du silence à la prise de parole dans la langue de l’Autre, qui est la langue française, les écrivaines maghrébines de cette époque ont réussi à mettre en scène dans leurs romans des femmes militantes qui visent leur émancipation. Ces femmes ont su dépasser les entraves de la société patriarcale qui les incarnent dans les interdis religieux et traditionnels pour retrouver leur liberté. Leur combat a été celui de reconquérir leur corps de femme dans une société qui leur refuse un afin de s’imposer et de s’affirmer en devenant un sujet à part entière.

Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for B.A. Honours degree in the Department of African Languages at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 1997. / Zonke izizwe zoMdabu lapha e-Afrika zinenkolo yazo Le nkolo ihambisana nemikhuba ethize. Inkolo yalezi zizwe isemthanjeni yempilo yabantu bakhona kangangoba akulula ukuhlukanisa usikompilo nenkolo yesizwe soMdabu. Imvamisa akekho umqambi walezi nkolo yize bekhona abaqambi bezizwe ezithile. Izizwe ziqiniseka ukuthi 1e nkolo zadatshu1wa nayo nguMdali. NamaZulu nawo anenkolo yawo ayilandelayo, yize-ke isithe ukudungeka idungwa impucuko yaseNtshonalanga ihambisana nenkolo yobuKrestu.

This thesis explores the politics and problematics of Asian American self-representation in popular cinema by focusing on film adaptations of Asian American texts. In the first chapter I consider the Chinese American director Wayne Wang's adaptations of Amy Tan's novel The Joy Luck Club (1989) and Louis Chu's novel Eat a Bowl of Tea ( 1961). Here I demonstrate how the representations of Asian Americans in the domain of popular cinema are "simplified" and constrained to universalizing tropes, such as "generational conflict," that negate the heterogeneous factors (i.e. culture, gender, class) that contribute to the making of Asian American subjectivity. As well, though I find that both films tend to de-problematize the United States as a context for the Asian American's assimilation, Eat a Bowl of Tea, in its historicizing efforts and cinematic flair, manages to posit a more ironic view towards the narrative of assimilation than Joy Luck does. In the second chapter I shift my discussion to David Henry Hwang's 1988 play M. Butterfly and its film adaptation by David Cronenberg. The opening (longer) section of this chapter explores Hwang's critiques of Western (American) discourses of sexism, racism, and imperialism in relation to Edward Said's and Judith Butler's theories of orientalism and gender performance respectively. When Hwang' s arguments are also understood in the context of Asian American history and contemporary debates over "identity" in the Asian American community, it is possible to see how his antiessentialist stance challenges all (Western and Asian) impositions of discursive power. The second section of this chapter compares the formal/performative construction of the play to that of the film version. Here I argue that Hwang' s utilization of Brechtian theatrical techniques corroborates his anti-essentialist political argument. Cronenberg's film, however, attempts to situate this critique within the traditions of realist cinema, and thereby significantly diminishes (and "simplifies") the Asian American perspective of the play. Taken collectively, these film adaptations, despite moments of opposition, attest to the ideological limitations that severely restrict the possibilities for complex Asian American self-representations in the realm of popular cinema. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

This thesis presents a critical overview of a supernatural being, the South Slavic vila, as she figures in the oral traditions of Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian peasants collected in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The thesis returns to the conceptual frame of older primary texts (here titled survey studies) used by comparative scholars and updates this work with the knowledge gleaned from a century of research and theory in the fields of folkloristics and historical anthropology. These materials are presented in a distributive frequency analysis model such as those often employed by the Historical-Geographic school of folklore research, but the study is built on a foundation informed by the insights of Milman Parry and Albert Lord’s researches into the diffusion of oral traditions. These traditions are further refined by focusing on the singers, storytellers and believers who used the vila in an emic manner balanced at a nexus point between artistic innovation and traditional dictates. The data is also further contextualized with a focus on the embedded nature of these cultural expressions and a clear portrait of the contexts surrounding their collection and publication in a wider cultural sphere. The aim of the thesis is to present a comprehensive description of the vila’s role in oral traditions to serve as a primary source for scholars doing comparative or interpretive work, as well as to provide a clearer picture of the contexts of the materials to refine such research. In doing so, this thesis produces a comprehensive method and model that can be applied to other supernatural beings, repatriates oral arts back to their original purveyors by undoing academic silencing of subaltern voices and returns critical context to inherited traditions once stripped of them by romantic academic theories. / Thesis / Candidate in Philosophy

Situées dans le contexte pluriculturel et interculturel de l'île de La Réunion, l'éducation et la transmission familiale de l'identité culturelle réunionnaise sont complexes et menacées. Le « refus » ou l'« appropriation » s'illustrent par de multiples facteurs. Le « refus » est généralement motivé par la pression moderniste et assimilatrice républicaine et mondiale représentant un tremplin vers la promotion sociale ; ce qui entraine l’abandon de valeurs considérées comme anciennes, et les plus souvent dévalorisées. La motivation du refus se réalise de même par des influences des origines ethniques de cette communauté créole réunionnaise, à plus ou moins faible capital symbolique, et peu sensibilisée à ses « racines », c'est-à-dire à une « cohérence symbolique ». L'« appropriation » de l'identité culturelle réunionnaise se trouve, quant à elle, motivée parfois par un certain militantisme des tendances socio-politico-économiques exclusivement centrées sur La Réunion, mais aussi la prise de conscience de la richesse culturelle réunionnaise, soit naturellement, soit face aux pertes dues à la mondialisation, soit après l'expérience du manque ou encore pour sentir son appartenance à un groupe, etc. Ces deux courants se dessinent en fonction des choix d'éducation et de transmission, inscrites au sein des familles. Une troisième voie, entre « refus » et « appropriation » semble s'imposer peu à peu : une voie vers un « tissage d'un nouveau métissage » ; un travail sur une appropriation consciente et intentionnelle d'une nouvelle fibre culturelle et identitaire, où seraient conciliées la richesse de l'identité culturelle créole réunionnaise et celle de l'identité française, du modernisme et de la mondialisation. / Located in the multicultural and intercultural context of island of La Réunion, education and transmission of family about cultural identity reunion are complex and threatened. The "refusal" or "ownership" is illustrated by multiple factors. The "refusal" is usually motivated by the pressure modernist republican assimilation and global representing a springboard to social advancement which leads to an abandonment of values considered old, and most often devalued. The reasons for the refusal is realized, in the same way, by ethnic and creole reunion community influences, more or less low symbolic capital, and little aware about its "roots", that is to say a "symbolic coherence ". The "ownership" of reunion cultural identity is on it, sometimes motivated by a militant of socio-politico-economic focus exclusively on La Réunion, but also awareness of the cultural wealth of Reunion, either naturally or face losses due to globalization, after the lack of experience or to feel they belong to a group, etc. These two trends are emerging based on the choices of education and transmission, registered within families. A third way between "refusal" and "ownership" seems to gradually impose : a path to a "weaving a new mixing" work on a conscious and intentional appropriation of a new cultural fiber and identity, where be reconciled the wealth of the cultural and the réunion creole identity, french identity, modernism and globalization.

Cette thèse a pour objectif de montrer que les valeurs de développement durable de l’ONU (liberté, égalité, solidarité, tolérance, respect de la nature et partage des responsabilités) existent dans les traditions gabonaises et sont donc bien plus anciennes que ce nouveau concept. Pour cela, trois hypothèses générales ont été testées à travers six études. La première hypothèse (Les valeurs de développement durable existent au sein des sociétés traditionnelles et rurales gabonaises et sont donc plus anciennes que le concept de développement durable) fait appel à deux études complémentaires basée sur l’analyse documentaire des premiers dictionnaires linguistiques Myènè (étude 1) et des entretiens menés avec trois orateurs traditionnels gabonais (étude 2). La deuxième hypothèse (Les populations rurales gabonaises portent des valeurs de développement durable au regard de leurs pratiques qui sont différentes de celles de l’ONU) s’appuie sur l’analyse documentaire d’ouvrages historiques gabonais (étude 3) et photographique du milieu rural actuel (étude 4). La troisième hypothèse (Les valeurs prioritaires pour les populations gabonaises sont différentes de celles de l’ONU) est explorée par une enquête par questionnaire menée auprès d’étudiants (étude 5) et de salariés (étude 6) gabonais. Les résultats obtenus aux différentes études et permettent de conclure que les valeurs de développement durable préconisées par l’ONU doivent se décliner en fonction des contextes culturels. Ainsi, en Afrique, et plus spécifiquement au Gabon, les valeurs en lien avec les pratiques traditionnelles qu’on peut considérer comme durables doivent être intégrées et articulées avec celles retenues par l’ONU afin d’y impulser un développement durable véritable. / The aim of this thesis is to show the UN’s sustainable development values (freedom, equality, solidarity, tolerance, respect of nature, responsibility sharing) exist in Gabon’s traditions and are thus much older than this recent concept. Three general hypotheses were tested in six studies. The first (Sustainable development values exist in traditional and rural Gabonese society and thus pre-date the concept of sustainable development) involved two complementary studies based on documentary analysis of the first Myènè linguistic dictionaries (study 1) and interviews with three traditional Gabonese orators (study 2). The second hypothesis (Rural Gabonese customs have sustainable development values that differ from those of the UN) is examined through documentary analysis of historical Gabonese works (study 3) and photographs of present-day rural Gabon (study 4). The third hypothesis (The priority values of the Gabonese people differ from those of the UN) is explored through a questionnaire completed by Gabonese students (study 5) and workers (study 6). The findings of the studies are discussed and lead to the conclusion that the sustainable development values recommended by the UN should be adapted to the cultural context. Thus, in Africa, and more specifically in Gabon, values linked to traditional practices that can be considered as sustainable should be incorporated and linked to those upheld by the UN in order to foster real sustainable development.

Cette thèse porte sur le droit des femmes et les enjeux d'une amélioration de leur statut juridique et social. L'analyse des textes qui gouvernent le droit des femmes, essentiellement issues de la Charia, Constitution et lois du pays, révèle la nécessité de codifier les lois. La place des femmes dans l'ordre juridique saoudien est étudiée à travers la force de la loi islamique au sein du corpus juridique et l'influence des droits de l'homme internationalement reconnue. Les droits matrimoniaux sont exposés puisque la place des femmes dans la famille permet de mieux comprendre le statut des femmes au sein de la société. De nombreux obstacles ont longtemps entravé les libertés des femmes, particulièrement le poids des traditions, mais un nouveau pouvoir au féminin s'est imposé surtout depuis la nouvelle vision de l'Arabie Saoudite de 2030. Le gouvernement, la société saoudienne et les entreprises ont ensemble un rôle à jouer pour rendre justice aux femmes. / This thesis focuses on Saudi women's rights and the challenges to improve their legal and social status within the Kingdom. The analysis of the legal texts that govern women's rights from the sole official Constitution of the country - Shariah Law- reveals the need to codify laws. Women's position in the Saudi legal system is researched through the influence of Islamic Law and the international standards of human rights. A woman's rights within the household is a relevant indicator to her placement within the ranks of society. Many obstacles have long hindered women's freedom, particularly customs ans traditions as compulsory to society upbringing. Nevertheless, a new form of female power has emerged since the establishment of the Saudi Vision 2030. Moreover, the public and private sectors, including the society, have a major role to undertake in ensuring justice for women.

Šiame magistro darbe: Pirmojoje dalyje atskleidžiamas krikščionybės požiūris į mirtį pagal Senąjį bei Naująjį Testamentus bei pagal naujausius Bažnyčios dokumentus. Aptariama kaip šis požiūris turėtų atsispindėti laidotuvių kontekste. Antrojoje darbo dalyje analizuojamas tradicinės bažnytinės laidotuvių apeiginės praktikos pagal Katalikų Bažnyčios dokumentus, apžvelgiami liaudies pamaldumo papročiai Lietuvoje nuo senųjų laikų iki mūsų dienų. Šioje dalyje taip pat tiriamos ir apibendrinamos laidotuvių tradicijos Vilniaus Šv. Pranciškaus Asyžiečio ir Švč. Mergelės Marijos Nekaltojo Prasidėjimo parapijose. Trečiojoje dalyje gvildenami krikščioniškosios mirties sampratos ir laidotuvių papročių panaudojimo ugdymo procese klausimai. Šioje darbo dalyje analizuojamos Bendrosios Katalikų tikybos programos mokyklai ir parapinės katechezės programos, pateikiamos kai kurios įžvalgos bei rekomendacijos, kaip kančios, mirties, laidotuvių, Vėlinių, amžinybės klausimus teikti katechezėje arba per tikybos pamokas. / The paper studies catholic funeral traditions in Lithuania in the light of the Scripture and of the teaching of the Church. The aim of the research is to show both the positive and the negative tendencies of popular piety in this respect and to define their educational meaning. The first part of the paper is devoted to a thotough analysis of Christian attitude towards death and dying. It provides references to the Old and New Testamentes, as well as to the newest Church documents. The second part provides the historical description of funeral traditions in Lithuania. It discusses their origin and their changes through the centuries. This part also includes a research on present funeral traditions as seen from the answers of twenty respondents from two parishes of Vilnius. The third part of the paper investigates into the school syllabi and parish catechesis programs. The task of this investigation is to see if the Christian attitude towards death and burial is property taught to children and adolescents. This part ends with several cathecetical recommendations. The paper concludes that funeral traditios in Lithuania especially in towns, are gradually losing their spirituality. Therefore, children and young people should be tought more opently about death and eternal life. Parish communities should pay more attention to preserving what is holy and sincere what can stimulate Christian hope, faith relationships and prayer. I have determined the correlations and disparities of... [to full text]

This dissertation is looking into the Czech and Moravian Christmas traditions in detail. The theoretical part provides a complete picture and characteristic of the Christmas period. The focus then turns to topics discussing the historical background, timelines, Christmas symbolic, sayings and mainly the Christmas traditions. The theory mostly draws on resources from expert literature, which is supplemented with information from other resources on the given topic. In the practical part, the author then analyzes the different ways of spending Christmas times in the Central Czech and South Moravian regions in depth. The course of the Christmas time was mapped by interviews with chosen respondents from contemporary Czech households. The adherence to or diversion from traditions, new trends and tendencies and the influence of commercialization on the Christmas holidays were given a higher importance. The closing chapter is dedicated to a comparison, whose main goal was to explain the eventual differences in adherence to Christmas traditions among sociocultural characteristics, mainly by the location.

À l’aube du XXe siècle, le metteur en scène russe Vsevolod Meyerhold nourrit une réflexion féconde sur le théâtre et plus particulièrement sur le jeu de l’acteur. La traduction en Europe occidentale des écrits de ce réformateur donne la possibilité au metteur en scène contemporain Eugenio Barba d’en revisiter la pensée et d’en reconsidérer l’héritage. Ainsi, notre étude se propose de montrer dans quelle mesure l’approche du jeu meyerholdien peut servir de référence pour les pratiques actuelles d’Eugenio Barba. Malgré les années qui les séparent, une mise en confrontation nous permettra de relever les points communs et les différences de leur démarche. Hommes érudits en culture théâtrale, ils n’ont de cesse de réinterroger le jeu, notamment par l’intérêt qu’ils accordent à diverses traditions, telle la commedia dell’arte, les masques ou encore les sources asiatiques. Nous analyserons comment chacun en puise les principes nécessaires en vue d’un enrichissement du jeu (voix, diction, mouvement, gestuel, corps). Il sera intéressant de saisir la portée d’un tel renouveau du jeu de l’acteur, et de voir dans quelle perspective celui-ci contribue à donner une identité à leur théâtre. / At the dawn of the 20th century, Russian stage director Vsevolod Meyerhold fruitfully reflected on theatre and particularly on acting. The translation of this reformer’s writings in Western Europe enabled contemporany stage director Eugenio Barba to revisit its depths and reconsider its heritage. Thus this thesis aims to show how the Meyerholdian approach to acting can be used as a reference for Eugenio Barba’s current practices. Despite the years that separate the two individuals, comparing them will allow us to identify the similarities and differences in their processes. These two theatre scholars have kept on questioning acting, especially through their interests in various traditions, such as commedia dell’arte, masks or other Asian sources. We will analyze how each of them used those sources to draw necessary principles to enrich acting (through movement, gesture, body, voice, diction). It will be interesting to understand the impact of such an acting revival and to see in which perspective it helps give an identity to their theatre.