Global ETD Search

71	Narrative and the Reconfiguration of the Humanist Subject in Robbe-Grillet, Ballard, and Ligotti Acosta-Lewis, Zachary L 01 January 2016 (has links) This thesis examines the utility of the novels, short stories, critical writing, and generically indistinct work of Alain Robbe-Grillet, J.G. Ballard, and Thomas Ligotti in developing a critique of the contemporary manifestations of liberal humanist social, economic, and political subjectivities. To this end, the concurrence of formal fragmentation and sublime aesthetics in early Gothic fiction models the manner in which narrative structures can appropriate structural tropes of dominant institutions, critically reflecting ideological fracture. Read according to the assemblative approach outlined by Deleuze and Guattari, these authors serve as a productive and incisive response to the hegemony of capitalist territorialization with ontologically provocative critique. Alain Robbe-Grillet J.G. Ballard Thomas Ligotti Gothic Subjectivity Antihumanism Continental Philosophy Literature in English, British Isles Literature in English, North America Other English Language and Literature
72	Self-Referential Features in Sacred Texts Haase, Donald 28 June 2018 (has links) This thesis examines a specific type of instance that bridges the divide between seeing sacred texts as merely vehicles for content and as objects themselves: self-reference. Doing so yielded a heuristic system of categories of self-reference in sacred texts based on the way the text self-describes: Inlibration, Necessity, and Untranslatability. I provide examples of these self-referential features as found in various sacred texts: the Vedas, Āgamas, Papyrus of Ani, Torah, Quran, Sri Guru Granth Sahib, and the Book of Mormon. I then examine how different theories of sacredness interact with them. What do Durkheim, Otto, Freud, or Levinas say about these? How are their theories changed when confronted with sacred texts as objects as well as containers for content? I conclude by asserting that these self-referential features can be seen as ‘self-sacralizing’ in that they: match understandings of sacredness, speak for themselves, and do not occur in mundane texts. Hermeneutics Religious Literature Sacred Texts Scripture Translation Literacy Theory Religious Studies Textual Criticism Material Culture Comparative Literature Comparative Methodologies and Theories Continental Philosophy History of Religion Jewish Studies Other Anthropology Other Religion Reading and Language Rhetoric and Composition Sociology of Religion Theory and Philosophy Translation Studies
73	The Quantum Dialectic Kelley, Logan 15 May 2011 (has links) A philosophic account of quantum physics. The thesis is divided into two parts. Part I is dedicated to laying the groundwork of quantum physics, and explaining some of the primary difficulties. Subjects of interest will include the principle of locality, the quantum uncertainty principle, and Einstein's criterion for reality. Quantum dilemmas discussed include the double-slit experiment, observations of spin and polarization, EPR, and Bell's theorem. The first part will argue that mathematical-physical descriptions of the world fall short of explaining the experimental observations of quantum phenomenon. The problem, as will be argued, is framework of the physical descriptive schema. Part I includes in-depth discussions of mathematical principles. Part II will discuss the Copenhagen interpretation as put forth by its founders. The Copenhagen interpretation will be expressed as a paradox: The classical physical language cannot describe quantum phenomenon completely and with certainty, yet this language is the only possible method of articulating the physical world. The paradox of Copenhagen will segway into Kant's critique of metaphysics. Kant's understanding of causality, things-in-themselves, and a priori synthetic metaphysics. The thesis will end with a conclusion of the quantum paradox by juxtaposing anti-materialist Martin Heidegger with quantum founder Werner Heisenberg. Our conclusion will be primarily a discussion of how we understand the world, and specifically how our understanding of the world creates potential for truth. quantum physics philosophy heisenberg heidegger uncertainty principle kant Continental Philosophy Discrete Mathematics and Combinatorics Epistemology Logic and foundations of mathematics Metaphysics Other Physics Other Statistics and Probability Philosophy Philosophy of Language Philosophy of Science Quantum Physics
74	Emmanuel Lévinas' Barbarisms: Adventures of Eastern Talmudic Counter-Narratives Heterodoxly Encountering the South Slabodsky, Santiago 05 March 2012 (has links) This dissertation examines the scope and limitations of the re-appropriation of the term barbarism by modern Jewish intellectuals in conversation with Third World social movements. Emmanuel Lévinas is my paradigmatic example of this re-appropriation, as his Talmudic interpretations illuminate this process, and his work is located on the axis of the encounter between Jewish and decolonial thinking. I contend that Lévinas follows a classic line of modern European interpreters who expressed their discomfort with the description of the Jewish people as barbaric. While this discomfort can be traced within this orthodox interpretation of Lévinas, I argue that his particular solution for the problem can only be explained by a more heterodox exploration. Lévinas’ positive re-appropriation of the term is part of contextual conversations that he sustained with other peoples characterized as barbarians (i.e. Third World decolonial theorists). While this re-appropriation was originally conceived in order to establish an East-East revolutionary conversation between Eastern European rabbinical interpreters and other radical Eastern projects (i.e. Maghrebi Marxism) it became an East-South decolonial conversation between Jewish and Afro-Caribbean/Latino-American intellectuals. This conversation, however, ultimately challenges the apologetic Jewish re-appropriation of exteriority in the concert of multiple barbarians. I explore the limitations of Jewish thought to engage with this community and cross from an apologetic to a critical barbarism. This dissertation, in conclusion, seeks to make an original contribution in the interrelation between Jewish and post-colonial studies. I aim to do so by first, demonstrating that the Jewish return to classical sources is historically and conceptually a decolonial counter-narrative that was influenced by (and in turn influenced) Third World discourses; second, explaining the reasons and consequences of the persistence of Jewish imagery and influences in Third World decolonial theory; third, exploring the limits of Jewish thinking and the benefits of the expansion of Jewish apologetical dialogues into barbaric critical conversations. And finally, challenging most contemporary scholarship in modern Jewish philosophy, which holds that Jewish thought and the modern re-reading of its sources can only be understood in the context of Western consciousness. Jewish Studies Post-Colonial Theory Lévinas, Emmanuel Dussel, Enrique Jewish Philosophy Racial Theory Marxism Critical Theory Modern Thought and Culture Third World Social Movements Continental Philosophy Sociology of Knowledge Modern Rabbinics 0318 0631 0422
75	Worlds Ahead?: On the Dialectics of Cosmopolitanism and Postcapitalism Sculos, Bryant William 10 February 2017 (has links) This dissertation argues that the major theories of global justice (specifically within the cosmopolitan tradition) have missed an important aspect of capitalism in their attempts to deal with the most pernicious effects of the global economic system. This is not merely a left critique of cosmopolitanism (though it is certainly that as well), but its fundamental contribution is that it applies the insights of Frankfurt School Critical Theorist Theodor Adorno’s negative dialectics to offer an internal critique of cosmopolitanism. As it stands, much of the global justice and cosmopolitanism literature takes global capitalism as an unsurpassable and a foundationally unproblematic system, often ignoring completely the relationship between the psycho-socially conditioned ideological aspects of capitalism and the horizon of achievable politics and social development. Using the philosophies and social theories of Adorno and Erich Fromm, I argue that there is a crucial psycho-social dimension to capitalism, or capitalistic mentality—represented in and functionally reproduced by transnational capitalism—that undermines the political aspirations of normative theories of cosmopolitanism, on their own terms. The project concludes with an exploration of Marxist, neo-Marxist, and post-Marxist theories as a potential source of alternatives to address the flaws within cosmopolitanism with respect to its general acceptance and under-theorizing of capitalism. The conclusion reached here is that even these radical approaches fail to take into account the near-pervasive influence of capitalism on the minds of radicals and activists working for progressive change or simply reject the potentials contained in existing avenues for global political and economic change (something which the cosmopolitan theories explored in earlier chapters do not do). Based again on the work of Adorno and Fromm, this dissertation argues that the best path forward, practically and theoretically, is by engaging cosmopolitanism and neo-/post-Marxism productively around this concept of the capitalistic mentality, building towards a praxeological theory of postcapitalist cosmopolitanism framed by a negative dialectical resuscitation of the concepts of class struggle and unlimited democracy. This postcapitalist cosmopolitanism emphasizes non-exploitative economic and political relations, cooperation, compassion, sustainability, and a participatory-democratic civic culture. Critical Theory Cosmopolitanism Contemporary Political Theory Global Justice Marxism International Political Theory International Relations Theory Democratic Theory Psychoanalysis Social Psychology Political Economy Continental Philosophy Ethics and Political Philosophy International Relations Political Economy Political Science Political Theory Social Psychology Theory and Philosophy
76	The World in Singing Made: David Markson's "Wittgenstein's Mistress" Fajardo, Tiffany L 27 March 2015 (has links) In line with Wittgenstein's axiom that "what the solipsist means is quite correct; only it cannot be said, but makes itself manifest," this thesis aims to demonstrate how the gulf between analytic and continental philosophy can best be bridged through the mediation of art. The present thesis brings attention to Markson's work, lauded in the tradition of Faulkner, Joyce, and Lowry, as exemplary of the shift from modernity to postmodernity, wherein the human heart is not only in conflict with itself, but with the language out of which it is necessarily constituted. Markson limns the paradoxical condition of the subject severed from intersubjectivity, and affected not only by the grief of bereavement, which can be defined in Heideggarian terms as anxiety for the ontic negation of a being (i.e., death), but by loss, which I assert is the ontological ground for how Dasein encounters the nothing in anxiety proper. David Markson Wittgenstein's Mistress Heidegger Wittgenstein Maurice Blanchot Lord Byron modernism postmodernism metaphysics language loss grief subjectivity solipsism identity disaster anxiety American Literature Continental Philosophy Literature in English, North America Metaphysics Modern Literature Other Philosophy
77	Uncontainable Life : A Biophilosophy of Bioart / Otyglat liv : Biokonst och biofilosofi Radomska, Marietta January 2016 (has links) Uncontainable Life: A Biophilosophy of Bioart investigates the ways in which thinking through the contemporary hybrid artistico-scientific practices of bioart is a biophilosophical practice, one that contributes to a more nuanced understanding of life than we encounter in mainstream academic discourse. When examined from a Deleuzian feminist perspective and in dialogue with contemporary bioscience, bioartistic projects reveal the inadequacy of asking about life’s essence. They expose the enmeshment between the living and non-living, organic and inorganic, and, ultimately, life and death. Instead of examining the defining criteria of life, bioartistic practices explore and enact life as processual, differential, and always already uncontainable, thus transcending preconceived material and conceptual boundaries. In this way, this doctoral thesis concentrates on the ontology of life as it emerges through the selected bioartworks: “semi-living” sculptures created by The Tissue Culture and Art Project and the performance May the Horse Live in Me (2011) by L’Art Orienté Objet. The hope is that such an ontology can enable future conceptualisations of an ethico-politics that avoids the anthropocentric logic dominant in the humanities and social sciences. / Otyglat liv: Biokonst och biofilosofi undersöker hur biofilosofisk praktik och biokonst, alltså tänkande genom samtida hybrida konstnärliga-vetenskapliga praktiker, kan bidra till en mer nyanserad förståelse av liv än vad vi vanligtvis möter i akademiska diskurser. Med utgångspunkt i ett feministiskt deleuzianskt perspektiv, och i dialog med samtida biovetenskap, pekar biokonstnärliga projekt på det otillräckliga i att ställa frågor om livets innehåll. Projekten tydliggör istället hur det levande och det icke-levande, det organiska och oorganiska, precis som liv och död, är sammanflätade. Istället för att sätta upp fasta kriterier för liv undersöker och framställer biokonstnärliga praktiker liv som en differentiell process, i sig omöjlig att fastställa och därmed något otyglat, som överskrider uppsatta gränser mellan det materiella och föreställda. Följaktligen fokuserar föreliggande avhandling på livets ontologi så som den framträder i ett urval av biokonstnärliga arbeten: ”semi-levande” skulpturer skapade av The Tissue Culture and Art Project, samt performance-konstverket May the Horse Live in Me (2011) av L’Art Orienté Objet. Förhoppningen är att en sådan ontologi kan möjliggöra framtida begreppsliggöranden av en etisk politik som undviker den antropocentriska logik som dominerar humaniora och samhällsvetenskap idag. Bioart uncontainable life the non/living death continental philosophy feminist theory Deleuze and Guattari studies posthumanist feminism critical life studies animal studies gender bioscience biotechnology matter assemblage affect human/nonhuman relations. Biokonst otyglat liv the non/living död kontinental filosofi feministisk teori studier av Deleuze och Guattari posthumanistisk feminism kritiska livsstudier djurstudier genus biovetenskap bioteknologi materia assemblage affekt mänskliga/icke-mänskliga relationer
78	Ability and Abnormality West, Jessica 01 January 2016 (has links) This thesis addresses questions relating to perceptions of abilities and abnormalities found in everyday life. Abilities in this paper range from a total lack of ability to function in extreme disability to a level of ability expected by society to enhanced and radically enhanced abilities and their place in the realm of abnormality. We begin by establishing the differences between abilities and enhancements. Following this is a discussion regarding the ethical concerns of human enhancement. After this we turn to a discussion of abnormality and the social experience of abnormality. These discussions lead into establishing a basis for how many abilities are considered abnormal. This is then followed by a discussion that specifically addresses whether or not individuals who voluntarily undergo non-therapeutic enhancement may be subject to oppressive measures. Thesis University of North Florida UNF Dissertations Dissertations Academic -- UNF -- Philosophy philosophy bioethics biomedical ethics visibility ethics gene therapy genetics therapy therapeutic oppression discrimination violence enhancement Foucault Sandel Savulescu Miah Garland-Thomson Nussbaum ability disability disability studies human enhancement technology transhumanism science abnormality Continental Philosophy Ethics and Political Philosophy Feminist Philosophy Other Philosophy
79	Listening/Reading for Disremembered Voices: Additive Archival Representation and the Zong Massacre of 1781 Cartaya, Jorge E 27 March 2017 (has links) This thesis grapples with questions surrounding representation, mourning, and responsibility in relation to two literary representations of the ZONG massacre of 1781. These texts are M. NourbeSe Philip’s ZONG! and Fred D’Aguiar’s FEEDING THE GHOSTS. The only extant archival document—a record of the insurance dispute which ensued as a consequence of the massacre—does not represent the drowned as victims, nor can it represent the magnitude of the atrocity. As such, this thesis posits that the archival gaps or silences from which the captives’ voices are missing become spaces of possibility for additive representation. This thesis also examines the role voice and sound play in these literary texts and the deconstructive-ethical philosophies of Jean-Luc Nancy and Jacques Derrida. This thesis argues that these texts invoke the sonic materiality of voice in the service of responding to the disremembered dead through mourning and acknowledgment. English language and literature Middle Passage Zong massacre Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade M. NourbeSe Philip Fred D'Aguiar Toni Morrison Jean-Luc Nancy slavery archive ethics voice sound studies postcolonial deconstruction deconstructive ethics Caribbean Languages and Societies Comparative Literature Continental Philosophy Cultural History French and Francophone Literature
80	We Are Standing in the Nick of Time: Translative Relevance in Anne Carson's "Antigonick" Alonso, Michelle 29 March 2016 (has links) The complicated issues surrounding translation studies have seen growing attention in recent years from scholars and academics that want to make it a discipline and not a minor branch of another field, such as linguistics or comparative literature. Writ large with Antigonick, Carson showcases the recent Western push towards translation studies in the American academy. By offering up a text that is chaotic in its presentation, she bypasses the rigid idea of univocality. By giving the text discordant images, she betrays the failed efficacy of sign and signification, and by choosing a text to be performed and mutually participated in, she exceeds ideas of the individual subject as the site of authorship. Ultimately, Carson enacts a theory of translation that critically deconstructs translation itself. Antigonick Antigone Anne Carson Sophocles Bianca Stone Bertolt Brecht Jacques Derrida translation studies performance philoperformance philo-performance material culture postmodernism eros irony performativity American Literature American Material Culture Book and Paper Classical Literature and Philology Continental Philosophy Illustration Literature in English, North America Modern Literature Other Theatre and Performance Studies Performance Studies Translation Studies Women's Studies

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