Chapter 1 introduces the study by means of its aim, scope, methodology and terminology. It also hosts summaries of all the folktales that are analysed in this study. Chapter 2 is a study of parenthood and its portrayal in Zulu folktales. Motherhood and fatherhood will be scrutinised separately. Chapter 3 concentrates on girl characters as siblings, brides and companions to old men. Chapter 4 analyses boy characters as herd boys, villains, tricksters and companions to old women. Chapter 5 concentrates on the status of the Zulu folktale. The influence of urbanisation, gender, and the media will receive attention. The lessons that folktales teach will be noted. Chapter 6 concludes and summarises this study and hosts recommendations on the promotion of Zulu folktales / African Languages / M.A. (African Languages)

The setting for this study is Swedish film culture of the 1920s, which has been studied with a focus on representations of masculinity and gender relations according to four themes: 1) children and youth 2) fatherhood and love 3) sexuality and popularity 4) ethnicity and racial stereotyping.       The rise of new consumer culture in the first decades of the 20th century created turmoil between traditional and modern values, not least when it came to conceptions of gender. Studies on masculinity have often directed its efforts towards writing a history of ideals, bound by the concept of hegemonic masculinity; a concept that exclude women as insignificant for the social construction of masculinity. One ambition with this thesis has been to counter the long-lasting concept of hegemonic masculinity, and in the process, try to build a bridge between men and women studies.         One other ambition has been question the canonisation of the “Golden Age” of Swedish silent filmmaking by introducing the concept of “the pluralism of film”, and by using a vast material including: Swedish feature films, reviews, articles from fan magazines and trade paper, screen plays, censorship cards, official reports, etc; thereby circumventing the concept of film as “art” in order to focus on film as representation in a more reliably way.       One conclusion is the revelation of the diversity that surrounds social constructions of masculinity and gender relations in both film culture and society. In addition, Swedish film of the 20s hardly contained any male characters that upheld the hegemonic ideal, giving way to a more prominent presence of strong female characters, often in the shape of the New Woman. Women did as well have a great influence on the formation of masculinity. However, a notion of a Swedish normative masculinity became visible when contrasted with numerous racial stereotypes, such as malicious representations of Black people and Travellers. The emphasis on gender relations, rather than on ideals, has also contributed to a wider understanding of gender, where criteria such as generation, class, ethnicity and sexuality ought to be included.          When it comes to the canonisation of the “Golden Age”, a strong notion exists about the integrated use of nature in film narratives as being a Swedish national trait, when in fact this could be linked only to a few films. If one would point out a trait that permeates Swedish film of the 1920s, it would not be the use of nature, but instead the flagrant racism and xenophobia.

Chapter 1 introduces the study by means of its aim, scope, methodology and terminology. It also hosts summaries of all the folktales that are analysed in this study. Chapter 2 is a study of parenthood and its portrayal in Zulu folktales. Motherhood and fatherhood will be scrutinised separately. Chapter 3 concentrates on girl characters as siblings, brides and companions to old men. Chapter 4 analyses boy characters as herd boys, villains, tricksters and companions to old women. Chapter 5 concentrates on the status of the Zulu folktale. The influence of urbanisation, gender, and the media will receive attention. The lessons that folktales teach will be noted. Chapter 6 concludes and summarises this study and hosts recommendations on the promotion of Zulu folktales / African Languages / M.A. (African Languages)

The practice of paying non-household members to do the reproductive labour of looking after children has a long history. The nanny phenomenon is closely allied to colonialism where servants administered ruling class needs. In South Africa, nannies are most often historically disenfranchised, working class, black woman. Beginning with Freud’s self analytic considerations of his kinderfraü, through the post war British object-relations tradition, scholarly reflection and later empirical research, have at best been anecdotal or en passant. The present study specifically concerned white apartheid-era men’s memories and subsequent appropriation of the experiences of being cared for by a nanny. Having a theoretical home between narrative and psychoanalysis, it began with the assumption that as much as there are deeply rooted unconscious motives and conflicts, white apartheid-era men demonstrate identity strategies which are intensely local (situationally realised) and global (dependent on broader conditions of intelligibility). In-depth interviews with nine research participants extended Frosh et als’ (2002), Hollway’s (1989) and Hollway and Jefferson’s (1997; 2000; 2001) “free association narrative technique”. The data was analysed in its thematic and narrative aspects. Results revealed that nanny memories comprise two distinct kinds of stories, dubbed “remembered black hands” and “kaffir se plek” narratives. In “remembered black hands”, recollections were imbued with tenderness, love and care; these were heart-warming stories of what it was to be the object of nanny’s ministrations. In these accounts they affirmed the importance of nanny’s place in the home: be it in daily care, as an ally, a retreat, a player in the family drama, even imbricated in their childhood sexuality. In “kaffir se plek” narratives the protagonists were situated in social space, recognised and granted identity. There were canonical imperatives to accept that nanny’s personhood counted for nothing, that she was dispensable and that she had a distinct, lesser place in the social order. The co-existence of these competing stories signify her position at a rupture in the fabric of apartheid life. Participants’ resolutions to this anomaly entailed compromise formations, the specific forms of which were considered. Kristeva’s reconsideration of the diachronic relation of the Lacanian registers of Imaginary and the Symbolic in the light of abjection provided a developmental framework to understand how the little boy’s early intimacy could be transformed into his later assumption of his master’s mantle. Where the extant literature is willing to concede that nanny exists screened behind parental imagos, the present investigation takes this further suggesting that repression, screen memories and “eclipsing” (Hardin, 1985) are an inevitable means of accession to political subjectivity. Results suggest that for those who would have been cared for by a nanny there are traces of this experience to be found in memory, the unconscious and their very sense of self. Nanny’s continued existence in the minds of her charge takes various forms - as (usually fond) memories, a real relationship or as a symptom. / Thesis (PhD (Psychology))--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Psychology / unrestricted

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The thesis attempts to describe the life and work of Jiří Karásek ze Lvovic through an analysis of his lifestyle, i.e. the way in which he organized, embellished and individualized his life. Karásek sought to shape his existence as an artwork, in accordance with the inspirational concepts of the contemporary and antecedent thinkers and artists (e.g. Oscar Wilde, Walter Pater and Maurice Maeterlinck). He accented its integrity and orientation towards beauty. In accord with his aesthetic vision (and his literary work) Karásek conditioned beauty with sadness and pain and attempted to emphasize melancholic beauty, unity in disunion. For that purpose he would accentuate particularly the disintegrative, critical elements, evoking the impression of unsuccessful, self-destructive endeavor to reach life's high ideal. This corresponded with his tragic concept of the artist immolating himself for his Art. I approach Karásek's lifestyle through the use of the terms youth and (eternal) boyhood, which Karásek himself employed as symbols of mournfully beautiful existence in his literary work. I define a youth - in accordance with the romantic and symbolist interpretation - as a person at odds with reality (contemporary truths, customs and rules), a solitary, unique being, trying to construct a new world - only...