In the 1880s, capitalism as a social and economic system integrated new geographic areas of the American continent. The construction of the Duluth & Iron Range Railroad (D&IR), financed by a group of Philadelphia investors led by Charlemagne Tower and later owned by the US Steel was part of this emerging political economy based on the exploitation of human and material resources. Migrant labor was in demand as it came cheap and, generally, floated between various construction-sites on the “frontier” of capitalism. The Swedish immigrants were one part of this group of “floaters” during the late 1800s and made up a significant part of the force that constructed and worked on the D&IR between the 1880s and the 1920s. This book deals with power relations between groups based on class and ethnic differences by analyzing the relationship between the Anglo-American bourgeois establishment and the Swedish and other immigrant workers and their children on the D&IR and in the railroad town of Two Harbors, Minnesota. The Anglo-American bourgeois hegemony in Minnesota, to a large extent, dictated the conditions under which Swedish immigrants and others toiled and were allowed access to American society. I have therefore analyzed the structural subordination and gradual integration of workers and, in particular, immigrant workers, in an emerging class society. The book also deals with the political and the cultural opposition to Anglo-American bourgeois hegemony that emerged in Two Harbors and that constructed a radical public sphere during the 1910s. In this process, new group identities based on class and ethnicity emerged in the working class neighborhoods in the wake of the capitalist expansion and exploitation, and as a result of worker agency. Building on traditions of political insurgency an alliance of immigrant workers, particularly Swedes, Anglo skilled workers and parts of the local petty bourgeoisie rose to a position of political and cultural power in the local community. This coalition was held together by the language of class that became the basis of a local multi-ethnic working class identity laying claim to its own version of Americanism. The period of preparedness leading up to the Great War, the war itself, and its aftermath, produced a reaction from the Anglo American bourgeoisie which resulted in a profound change in the public sphere as a coalition between “meliorist middle class reformers”, represented primarily by the YMCA and local church leaders and the D&IR and its program of welfare capitalism launched a broad program to counter socialism locally, and to forge new social bonds that would cut across class lines and ethnic boundaries. By this process, the ethnic working class in Two Harbors was offered entry into American society by acquiring citizenship and by their inclusion in a broader civic community undifferentiated by class. But this could only be realized by the workers’ adoption of an Anglo-American national identity based on identification with corporate interests, a new local solidarity that cut across class lines and a white racial identity that diminished the significance of ethnic boundaries. By these means the Swedish immigrants, or at least a portion of them, became Americans on terms established by the D&IR and its class allies.

Cette thèse défend l’idée que plusieurs auteurs modernistes ont utilisé des concepts centraux à la croyance religieuse traditionnelle afin de préconiser le changement social. Au lieu de soutenir l'hypothèse de la sécularisation, qui prétend que les modernistes ont rejeté la religion en faveur d'une laïcité non contestée, j'argumente en faveur de ce que j'appelle « la spiritualité moderniste, » qui décrie une continuité intégrale des concepts spirituels dans l'agitation de la période moderniste qui a déstabilisée les institutions qui avait auparavant jeté les bases de la société Occidentale. En me basant sur les écrit de Sigmund Freud, William James et Émile Durkheim concernant les fins poursuivis par la religion, je développe cinq concepts centraux de la croyance religieuse que les modernistes ont cherché à resignifier, à savoir la rédemption, la communauté, la sacralité, le spectre, et la liturgie, et, dans chaque cas, j'ai montré comment ces catégories ont été réinterprétées pour traiter des questions considérées comme essentielles au début du vingtième siècle, à savoir ce que l’on identifie aujourd’hui comme le féminisme, l'écologie, la biopolitique, les crises, et le rôle du poète. Le chapitre I se concentre sur la rédemption par le féminin telle qu’on la trouve dans le recueil de vers de H.D. portant sur la Seconde Guerre mondiale, Trilogy (1944-1946), qui projette un certain espoir grâce à un mélange synchrétique de Christianisme, de mythes anciens, d’astrologie, et de psychologie. Mon deuxième chapitre discute de The Grapes of Wrath (1939) de John Steinbeck, qui élargit le rôle de la communauté en avançant une écologie universelle qui concevoit tous les gens comme étant intimement liés entre eux et avec le monde. Le chapitre III traite de la notion du sacré dans The Light in August (1932) de Willam Faulkner et Nightwood (1936) de Djuna Barnes, qui préconisent une foi privatisée qui accentue l'illégitimité des concepts de sacralité et de pollution en élevant des individus qui sont marginalisés biopolitiquement. Le chapitre IV cherche à comprendre le retour des morts, et je soutiens que le topos a été utilisé par les modernistes comme un symbole de crises sociales; le chapitre enquête d'abord sur “The Jolly Corner” (1908) de Henry James, que j'ai lu comme la séquence rêvée d'un homme faisant face à son propre spectre, Ulysses (1922) de James Joyce, où Stephen Dedalus est hanté de façon répétée par le spectre de sa mère, et Mrs. Dalloway (1925) de Virginia Woolf, qui se concentre sur le motif caché de la Fête des Morts. Ma cinquième section traite de la liturgie, la langue poétique utilisée pour les rites religieux, dans la première poésie de Wallace Stevens, qui conçoit le rôle du poète comme une vocation de l'imagination. / This dissertation argues that many modernist writers used concepts central to traditional religious belief in order to urge social change. Against the secularization hypothesis, which posits that the modernists fully jettisoned religion in favour of an unquestioned secularism, I argue for what I term “modernist spirituality,” which identifies an integral continuance of spiritual concepts within the dire turmoil of the modernist period that destabilized the institutions such as an established organized religion that had previously formed the foundations of Western society. Hence, in each of my dissertation chapters, I have looked outside of organized religion to literature to find that spiritual impulse. Building upon the purposes of religion as defined by Sigmund Freud, William James, and Émile Durkheim, I name five concepts central to religious belief that the modernists sought to resignify, namely redemption, community, sacredness, the spectre, and liturgy, and, in each case, I have shown how these categories were reinterpreted to treat issues considered vital in the early twentieth century that would now be identified under the categories of feminism, ecology, biopolitics, crisis, and the role of the poet. The first function of spiritual belief addresses the intertwining of redemption and humanity’s actions within history, and for this reason, Chapter I focuses on redemption through the feminine as seen in H.D.’s book of World War II verse, Trilogy (1944-1946), which offers hope through a syncretistic blend of Christianity, ancient myths, goddess traditions, astrology, and psychology. My second chapter discusses John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath (1939), which enlarges the role of community by positing a universal ecology of holiness that sees all people as connected with one another and with the land. Chapter III treats the notion of the sacred in William Faulkner’s Light in August (1932) and Djuna Barnes’ Nightwood (1936), both of which urge a privatized faith that emphasizes the illegitimacy of concepts of sacredness and pollution by elevating individuals who are marginalized biopolitically. Chapter IV seeks to comprehend the return of the dead in dreams or in visions, and I argue that the topos was used by modernists as a symbol of social crisis; the chapter first investigates Henry James’ “The Jolly Corner” (1908), which I read as a dream sequence of a man facing his own ghost, James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922), wherein Stephen Dedalus is haunted repeatedly by the ghost of his mother, and Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway (1925), which is textually ordered by the hidden motif of the Day of the Dead. My fifth section is an epilogue that treats liturgy, the poetic language used for religious rituals, in the early poetry of Wallace Stevens, who revisions the role of the poet as a vocation of the imagination.

Magister Library and Information Studies - MLIS / Although Resource Description and Access (RDA) has been discussed extensively amongst the ranks of cataloguers internationally, no research on the perceptions of South African cataloguers was available at the time of this research. The aim of this study was to determine how well RDA was faring during the study's timeframe, to give a detailed description regarding cataloguer perceptions within a higher education setting in South Africa. Furthermore, to determine whether the implementation of RDA has overcome most of the limitations that AACR2 had within a digital environment, to identify advantages and/or perceived limitations of RDA as well as to assist cataloguers to adopt and implement the new standard effectively. The study employed a qualitative research design assisted by a phenomenological philosophy to gain insight into how cataloguers experienced the implementation and adoption of RDA by means of two concurrent web-based questionnaires. The study concluded that higher education cataloguing professionals residing in the Western Cape were decidedly positive towards the new cataloguing standard. Although there were some initial reservations, they were overcome to such an extent that ultimately no real limitations were identified, and that RDA has indeed overcome most of the limitations displayed by AACR2. Many advantages of RDA were identified, and participants expressed excitement about the future capabilities of RDA as it continues toward a link-data milieu, making library metadata more easily available. As this research has revealed a distinctly positive attitude from cataloguers' two main matters for future research remains, being: ? Why South African participants in this study voiced almost no perceived limitations to RDA as a cataloguing standard. Future research might be able to relay information regarding this trend, especially in the light that it was not a global phenomenon. ? A deeper look might have to be taken at how participants' experienced RDA training as this phenomenon might be closely linked to the reasons why the participants did not mention more limitations.

Blair sent British troops to join U.S. forces in the invasion of Iraq in 2003 at great political cost to himself. What motivated him to take this step? Sources for this work include: autobiographies and biographies of individuals close to Blair; journal and newspaper articles and monographs on this topic; Prime Minister's speeches and press conferences. Part one is comprised of five chapters including the Introduction; Blair's years at school; Blair's early political career; and From Parliament to Prime Minister. Part two includes four chapters that analyze motivating factors such as, Anglo-American Relations; Blair's personality, faith, and his relationship with Gordon Brown; and finally, Blair's perception of Britain's Manifest Destiny. All of these factors played a role in Blair's decision.

This thesis deals with Czechoslovak Beat Festivals which were held in the years 1967, 1968 and 1971. The work presents a musical atmosphere which prevailed in Czechoslovakia in the days of their birth and depicts the conditions in which our musicians built their first bands and started with their own music production. Emphasis is placed on Western musical models whose influence on Czechoslovak artists and authors is undeniable. The paper is processed using oral history on the basis of which interviews with co- organizers, journalists, musicians and spectators were recorded. Their findings and impressions are integrated into the information drawn from historical materials and literature. Therefore, they serve as a supplement to known information and bring a new and sometimes unexpected view of events nearly fifty years ago. Key words Czechoslovak Beat Festival, beat and "big beat", Anglo-American music, The Beatles, rhythm & blues, oral history.

This dissertation examines dog and idiot tropes—and, specifically, the conflation thereof—in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury (1929), John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men (1937), and Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, Or The Evening Redness in the West (1985). In addition to illustrating the key roles the idiot/dog figure plays in canonical works of twentieth-century U.S. fiction, it argues that this conflation is too often presumed to signify denigration (i.e. a social, political, and ethical exclusion) and degeneration (i.e. a biological threat). Around the turn of the century, the idiot/dog emerges as an aesthetic figure in conjunction with contemporaneous practices of dog breeding and eugenics, as well as co-extensive discourses of national progress and racial purity. In this context, literary idiot/dogs can be read as enciphering a violent historical subtext. Yet, rather than simply condemn this figure as a dehumanizing stereotype, this dissertation challenges such a reductive approach on the grounds that it risks reproducing a hermeneutic that is both ableist and speciesist. A new approach is proposed: reading for the tropological confusion of idiocy and caninity and the destabilizing affective and epistemological effects this poses for liberal subjectivity. Reading for tropological confusion in the fictions of Faulkner, Steinbeck, and McCarthy not only develops new interpretations of three canonical works; it unlocks the idiot/dog figure as a site of textual excess. In so doing, this dissertation makes original contributions to twentieth-century U.S. fiction scholarship, Disability Studies, Animal Studies, and biopolitical theory. The idiot/dog figure’s in/determination—a paradoxical embodiment of humanized canine animality and animalized human mental disability—catalyzes hermeneutic and affective uncertainties. Ultimately, both impinge upon questions of readers’ own abilities to: (i) fully parse the fictions idiot/dogs appear in, and (ii) self-reflexively understand themselves as autonomous, human(e) subjects. Each chapter carefully elaborates this figure’s centrality to the textual operations of, respectively, The Sound and the Fury, Of Mice and Men, and Blood Meridian in terms of their narrative and meta-narrative dimensions; this reveals under-examined continuities. By arguing for idiot/dogs’ disruptive potentials (i.e. affective, epistemological, and ethical), this dissertation bridges and extends previous Disability Studies and Animal Studies interventions that link literary representations to social and material contexts. Also, it further intervenes in these subfields by elaborating the biopolitical reasons for and ramifications of the idiot/dog figure’s emergence in twentieth-century Anglo-American fiction. Each chapter outlines how and why idiot/dog figures constitute a means for harmonizing readers’ experiences, thoughts, desires, and feelings with the normative U.S. social and symbolic order—a national order that hinges on recognitions and denials of human subjectivity, as well as on the production of subjectivity in which fiction is implicated. Ultimately, by closely analyzing literary idiot/dog figures, this dissertation contributes a biopolitical critique of the ontological production and governability of readerly subjects themselves. / Graduate / 2021-09-05

The problem of the present investigation may be briefly stated as follows: To make a comparison of the physical development, motor capacities, and strength of the Spanish-American and Anglo-American boys of the El Paso High School, El Paso, Texas.

Although organised Marxist organisations did not emerge in Nigeria until the mid-1940s, leftist ideology had been prevalent among nationalist and labour leaders since the late 1920s. Both official documents and oral histories indicate deep-rooted support for leftism in Nigeria and anxiety among British colonial officials that this support threatened the Colonial Office's own timetable for gradual decolonisation. This study analyses the development of leftist ideology and attempts to establish a nationwide leftist organisation in colonial and post-independent Nigeria. The role of the Zikist movement is retold in light of new evidence, while other leftist organisations are salvaged from the footnotes of Nigeria nationalist history. More importantly, the adaptability of Marxist-Leninist ideology to colonial reality by the different leftist groups in Nigeria is emphasized. The reaction of Anglo-American officials in Lagos and the metropolis towards the Communist Party of Great Britain and other leftist organisations' sponsorship of Marxist groups in Nigeria are discussed. Lastly, the continuity between the departing colonial power and the Balewa administration is addressed to juxtapose the linkage between the two governments. The study thus provides a lucid explanation for the failure of leftist ideology and organisations in Nigeria during the twentieth century. In this eight-chapter thesis I consistently argue, based on official documents from England, Nigeria, and the United States, that the role of Marxists and Soviet Cold War interests in colonial territories are relevant to nationalism and decolonisation in Nigeria; that the issue is not to determine or measure whether or not Anglo-American policies are direct response to Soviet interests; that there are political, economic, and diplomatic policies carried out as part of the transfer of power process; and that the success of these is partly a result of collaboration with local subaltern leaders and official resolve to institutionalise imperial preferences before independence on October 1, 1960. / History / D.Litt. et Phil. (History)

The United Kingdom's postwar economic recovery and the usefulness of Marshall Plan aid depended heavily on a rapid increase in exports by the country's manufacturing industries. American aid administrators, however, shocked to discover the British industry's inability to respond to the country's urgent need, insisted on aggressive action to improve productivity. In partial response, a joint venture, called the Anglo-American Council on Productivity (AACP), arranged for sixty-six teams involving nearly one thousand people to visit U.S. factories and bring back productivity improvement ideas. Analyses of team recommendations, and a brief review of the country's industrial history, offer compelling insights into the problems of relative industrial decline. This dissertation attempts to assess the reasons for British industry's inability to respond to the country's economic emergency or to maintain its competitive position faced with the challenge of newer industrializing countries.

In this thesis, I examine three works of modern German fantasy fiction for young adults, their common grounding in the Romantic aesthetic framework and in particular the Romantic notion of creativity, and the implication of their unique fantasy fiction paradigm in our modern day. The novels are Michael Ende’s The Neverending Story (1979), Inkheart (2003) by Cornelia Funke and The City of Dreaming Books (2006) by Walter Moers. They represent a Germany-specific narrative paradigm which can be seen in the protagonist readers’ transformation from mere readers into storymakers/storytellers, and in the conflict between a book-loving hero and antagonists who are against literature. The protagonists embody the Romantic notion of creativity that involves the sublimation of a poet’s crisis into an exploration of the self. The mundane is infused with fantasy, thereby elevating reality to an idealised state. These Romantic storytelling readers act as tricksters, a fairy tale archetype that shares similarities with the figure of the Romantic poet. I employ the theoretical frameworks of German Romanticism, Frankfurt School critical theory, and postmodern models, including those by Deleuze and Guattari. I argue for a modern version of the trickster archetype which explains how a complacent, passive reader becomes an active storyteller. / Graduate