This study investigates movement as a phenomenon of constituting directedness in the Canadian writer Rudy Wiebe’s Mennonite novels. In Peace Shall Destroy Many (1962), in The Blue Mountains of China (1970), and in Sweeter Than All the World (2001), the phenomenon of movement is complexly at work as a decisive factor on numerous levels of constitution. Employing the concept of phenomenological directedness, the study elucidates phenomena central to the kinetic-kinaesthetic materiality of the three works. Focusing on textual nuances of kinaesthetic accentuation, the investigation highlights ways in which directedness shapes subjectivity rather than vice versa. Kinetic reality emerges as something torn between distance as a separating interval and distance as a remote intimacy manifesting an elision of the span between source-point and terminus. Such discrepancy shapes a sense of existential inconsecutiveness, in which an intriguing diminishment of feeling is a heightening of the affective life. This state of affairs is frequently aligned with faith as world-withdrawal. The wandering of persecuted believers is a theological process that at any given time can reduce itself to an external, purely geographic enterprise, thus becoming a substitute for faith. Nevertheless, the phenomenon of perpetual travel has the capacity to produce an overarching bonding-affect at the constituting heart of a community whose kinetic life is inseparable from the movement of regeneration.

Generic transformation of the castaway novel is made evident by the various ways in which the narrative boundaries that separate fiction from reality and history, the past from the present, and the rational from the irrational, are reconfigured in Umberto Eco’s The Island of the Day Before (1994), J.M. Coetzee’s Foe (1986) and Yann Martel’s Life of Pi (2002). The dissolution of boundaries reflects the dominant shift that has occurred in the castaway novel from the 18th century literary context to the present postmodern, postcolonial context. In this regard, the narrative utilizes various narratological strategies, the most significant being intertextuality, metafiction, historiographical metafiction, allegory, irony, and the carnivalesque. These narratological strategies rewrite, revise, and recontextualize those generic conventions that perpetuated the culture of masculinity and conquest that defines colonialism and the traditional castaway novel epitomized by Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719). From a postcolonial perspective, the castaway’s state of being reflects on the condition of the colonized as well as the colonizer: his/her experience of displacement is similar to colonized peoples’ separation from their cultural, spiritual and personal identities; simultaneously, processes of appropriation, adaptation and control of space resemble colonization, thereby revealing the constructed nature of colonial space. As such, space is fundamental to individual orientation and social adaptation and consequently, metaphorically and metonymically linked to identity. In the selected postmodernist and postcolonial texts, the movement from the position of castaway to colonist as originally manifested in Robinson Crusoe is therefore reinterpreted and recontextualized. The postmodernist and postcolonial contexts resist fixed and one-dimensional representations of identity, as well as the appropriation and domination of space, that characterize shipwreck literature from pre-colonial and colonial periods. Rationalist notions of history, reality and truth as empirically definable concepts are also contested. The castaway identity is often characterized by feelings of physical and spiritual displacement and estrangement that can be paralleled to postmodernist themes of existential confusion and anxiety. / Thesis (PhD (English))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

In this dissertation I argue that invisible characters, as they appear in Paul Auster’s novels, serve a very specific function within the interpretative framework of a text and that they should be considered to play a functional role, in order to arrive at a more holistic interpretation of the text and a more accurate analysis of said texts. I argue that Auster knowingly includes these characters in his novels as part of his narrative technique, in order for them to serve specific functions and to contribute to the structure of postmodern fiction. I make use of a contextualized close reading of five of Auster’s novels and attempt a hermeneutic interpretation of these novels to arrive at a hermeneutic circle when combining these novels into an integrated whole, individual, work of fiction. Certain parallels can be drawn between Auster’s various novels and these parallels contribute to the various motifs and themes found throughout his work. The importance of space in Auster’s novels is also highlighted with emphasis on liminality which serves as an instigator for transgression to occur between different fictive worlds. / Thesis (MA (English))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

Generic transformation of the castaway novel is made evident by the various ways in which the narrative boundaries that separate fiction from reality and history, the past from the present, and the rational from the irrational, are reconfigured in Umberto Eco’s The Island of the Day Before (1994), J.M. Coetzee’s Foe (1986) and Yann Martel’s Life of Pi (2002). The dissolution of boundaries reflects the dominant shift that has occurred in the castaway novel from the 18th century literary context to the present postmodern, postcolonial context. In this regard, the narrative utilizes various narratological strategies, the most significant being intertextuality, metafiction, historiographical metafiction, allegory, irony, and the carnivalesque. These narratological strategies rewrite, revise, and recontextualize those generic conventions that perpetuated the culture of masculinity and conquest that defines colonialism and the traditional castaway novel epitomized by Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719). From a postcolonial perspective, the castaway’s state of being reflects on the condition of the colonized as well as the colonizer: his/her experience of displacement is similar to colonized peoples’ separation from their cultural, spiritual and personal identities; simultaneously, processes of appropriation, adaptation and control of space resemble colonization, thereby revealing the constructed nature of colonial space. As such, space is fundamental to individual orientation and social adaptation and consequently, metaphorically and metonymically linked to identity. In the selected postmodernist and postcolonial texts, the movement from the position of castaway to colonist as originally manifested in Robinson Crusoe is therefore reinterpreted and recontextualized. The postmodernist and postcolonial contexts resist fixed and one-dimensional representations of identity, as well as the appropriation and domination of space, that characterize shipwreck literature from pre-colonial and colonial periods. Rationalist notions of history, reality and truth as empirically definable concepts are also contested. The castaway identity is often characterized by feelings of physical and spiritual displacement and estrangement that can be paralleled to postmodernist themes of existential confusion and anxiety. / Thesis (PhD (English))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

In this dissertation I argue that invisible characters, as they appear in Paul Auster’s novels, serve a very specific function within the interpretative framework of a text and that they should be considered to play a functional role, in order to arrive at a more holistic interpretation of the text and a more accurate analysis of said texts. I argue that Auster knowingly includes these characters in his novels as part of his narrative technique, in order for them to serve specific functions and to contribute to the structure of postmodern fiction. I make use of a contextualized close reading of five of Auster’s novels and attempt a hermeneutic interpretation of these novels to arrive at a hermeneutic circle when combining these novels into an integrated whole, individual, work of fiction. Certain parallels can be drawn between Auster’s various novels and these parallels contribute to the various motifs and themes found throughout his work. The importance of space in Auster’s novels is also highlighted with emphasis on liminality which serves as an instigator for transgression to occur between different fictive worlds. / Thesis (MA (English))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

Made available in DSpace on 2011-05-04T12:36:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2009 / El objetivo de este trabajo fue aproximarnos a la coyuntura y actores del Sistema Nacional de Salud en Ecuador para desvendar los dilemas del movimiento de reforma vigente en el sector durante el periodo 2005-2008 bajo la perspectiva de experiencias paradigmáticas en América Latina: el modelo de reforma adoptado por Colombia y por Brasil. Para la elaboración de este estudio, se tomó como referencial teórico el trabajode Theodoulou y Cahn 10 sobre los procesos políticos y de Ikenberry 11, acerca del proceso de difusión de las agendas. Se propuso, además, una complementariedad de técnicas que involucraron revisión bibliográfica de las reformas de salud en Ecuador, de indicadores cualitativos de salud y la realización de entrevistas semi-estructuradas, lo que posibilitó la construcción de algunas categorías analíticas que permitieron establecer los indicadores a ser utilizados en la descripción de los tres sistemas de salud. Encontramos a lo largo del trabajo que en Ecuador una disputa permanente entre las agendas políticas de los dos modelos de organización de sistema de salud, por un lado la focalización con creación de paquetes básicos y por otra, la universalización descentralizada. Identificamos, además, que en el país, la baja capacidad de inclusión del sistema, así como la débil estructura institucional, por la fuerte presencia del corporativismo, dificultan el establecimiento de marcos referenciales consistentes y legítimos para el sector salud. El dilema de la actual agenda se basa en la búsqueda de negociaciones y consensos sobre los límites políticos, económicos y estructurales del Sistema Nacional de Salud de una forma democrática y participativa que considere las verdaderas demandas del sector. / The present work’s aim is an approach to the different scenarios and actors involved with the National Health System in Ecuador. The purpose is to figure out the dilemmas of the current reform movement in the healthcare sector during the 2005-2008 period,under the paradigmatic perspective of other experiences in Latin America, bringing special attention to model reforms adopted by Colombia and Brazil. As grounds for this investigation, Theodoulou’s and Cahn’s 10 theoretical work on political processes were taken under consideration. Ikenberry’s 11 work was also taken into account 11. Their proposals addressed the process of agenda dissemination. The present work also proposes complementary techniques involving literature review regarding healthcare reforms in Ecuador, qualitative health indicators and the realization of semi-structured interviews, which enabled the construction of analytical categories, later used as indicators to describe the three systems. As reviewed throughout this work, a dispute between the political agendas of both models of organizing healthcare system came into evidence in Ecuador, focusing on one hand in the creation of basic packages and a decentralized universal health care system. Moreover, we identified low capacity within the system a weak institutional structure, mainly due to the strong presence of corporatism, and the ongoing obstruction of legitimate and consistent reference frames for the healthcare sector. The main issue of the current agenda is based on negotiations and the search for consensus on political, economic and structural aspects of the healthcare system in a democratic and participatory manner that considers the real demand of the public health sector.

Ce travail a pour objectif l’analyse de l’influence du cinéma dans la littérature hispano-américaine. L’hypothèse centrale est que dès que le cinéma, par essence un art de masse, a commencé à gagner sa place dans le système des arts, il a influencé la façon dont les écrivains représentent la réalité. L’enthousiasme que le cinéma a réveillé chez de nombreux écrivains latino-américains depuis le début, et la pénurie d’études critiques à ce sujet, font de l’Amérique Latine un terrain très fécond pour mener à bien nos recherches. Notre travail est structuré en trois parties. Dans la première nous introduisons la problématique qui nous intéresse avec une attention spéciale aux travaux de sémiologie et de narratologie élaborés à partir des années soixante. Nous reprenons la séparation structuraliste entre « histoire » et « narration » pour distinguer deux niveaux d’emprunt différents, que nous analysons séparément dans la deuxième et la troisième partie.Dans la deuxième, nous considérons le concept d’influence depuis une perspective intertextuelle, en regardant comment certains récits littéraires ont assimilé des histoires racontées précédemment par le cinéma, les intégrant sous la forme de l’ « insertion » ou à travers un processus de « réécriture ».Dans la troisième partie nous étudions l’influence cinématographique depuis une perspective intermédiale, c'est-à-dire en analysant des cas où le cinéma est évoqué dans sa spécificité médiatique. Dans ces cas, l’emprunt n’a pas lieu au niveau de l’histoire, mais à celui de la narration et les auteurs tentent de reproduire à l’écrit une série de procédés narratifs utilisés à l’écran. / This work aims to analyze the influence of cinema on Latin American literature. The central hypothesis is that as soon as cinema, by essence a mass art form, started to win its place in the system of the arts, it influenced the way writers represent reality. The enthusiasm that cinema awoke in many Latin American writers since the beginning, and the lack of critical studies on the subject, make Latin America a very fertile ground for our research. Our work is separated in three sections. First, we introduce the issue at hand, paying special attention to semiology and narratology works starting from the 1960’s. We use the structuralist separation between “story” and “narration” to establish two different levels of borrowing, which we analyze separately in the second and third sections.In the second section, we consider the concept of influence from an intertextual perspective, observing how certain literary texts have assimilated stories previously told by cinema, integrating them under the form of insertion or through a process of rewriting.In the third section we study cinematographic influence from an intermedial perspective, by analyzing cases in which cinema is considered in its specificity as a medium. In these cases, borrowing doesn’t take place at the level of the story, but at that of the narration and the authors attempt to reproduce in writing a series of narrative methods used for the screen.

Actuellement, la majorité des équipements électroniques prenant place dans nos véhicules s'interconnectent encore par des liens câblés. Or, l'établissement d'un réseau sans fil permet de remplacer ces liens existants. Afin de permettre cette connectivité et pour répondre aux exigences futures, une solution qui accepte suffisamment de débit doit être développée. Parmi les solutions actuelles possibles, l'Ultra-Large Bande est le candidat idéal. De manière générale, cette Thèse se consacre à l'étude de la propagation à l'intérieur d'une voiture. Afin d'évaluer les performances de ce type de système à l'intérieur d'un véhicule, un modèle de canal pouvant reproduire avec fidélité la propagation intra-véhiculaire est nécessaire. De par la similarité entre les environnements, le modèle de canal proposé est basé sur la théorie des chambres réverbérantes. Compte tenu des faibles dimensions de l'environnement et de la proximité des antennes par rapport aux passagers, l'idée est de réduire l'énergie absorbée par ces derniers tout en maximisant celle-ci à la position d'un récepteur visé. Parmi les solutions possibles, le retournement temporel apparait comme une technique idéale pour répondre à ces objectifs. Cette technique permet en effet de focaliser temporellement et spatialement le signal électromagnétique au niveau du récepteur. Dans cette Thèse, une évaluation des performances du RT à l'intérieure d'une voiture est proposée. Cette étude nous a amenés à porter notre attention sur les propriétés spatiales de l'énergie totale portée par un signal utilisant le retournement temporel et, de ce fait, nous proposons un nouveau formalisme de la distribution spatiale de cette énergie. / Current vehicles still use wired links to interconnect the embedded electronic equipment. However, advances in wireless technologies permit to replace these links with wireless personal area networks. To enable this connectivity and to meet the future requirements, a solution that provides sufficient data rate must be developed. One technological candidate that can be used to meet the data rate requirements is Ultra-Wide Band. This thesis investigates the ultra-wideband propagation environment in intra-vehicular environments. In order to evaluate the performances of UWB inside a vehicle, channel models that accurately reproduce the intra-vehicular propagation characteristics are required. Because of obvious similarities, the proposed model is based on reverberation chamber theory. Given the small size of the environment and the proximity of the antennas to the passengers, one goal of intra-vehicular communications is to reduce the energy absorbed by the passengers while maximizing the energy at the position of the intended receiver. Among the possible solutions, Time Reversal appears to be the ideal technique to meet this objective. Time Reversal permits to spatially and temporally focus the electromagnetic signal at the receiver. In this thesis, a performance evaluation of Time Reversal inside a car is proposed. Moreover, a model of the spatial properties of the total energy of a signal using Time Reversal is proposed. / Doctorat en Sciences de l'ingénieur / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Uppsatsen syftar till att studera intertextualiteten i Bjarne Moelvs Helgas offer – dagboksroman om ett brott och Hjalmar Söderbergs Doktor Glas. Tyngden i analysen ligger på Moelvs roman, under det att Doktor Glas tjänar som belysande jämförelsematerial. Analysen består av tre delar där den textuella strukturen, perspektivet och berättarstrukturen undersöks. Resultaten visar att romanerna uppvisar flera stilistiska likheter men även tydliga skillnader när det gäller jagberättarens framställning. Moelv distanserar sig från det kvinnliga berättarjaget genom att begränsa henne till en iakttagare. Detta ger uttryck för en framställning som konstrueras ur ett genussystem där manliga normer slår igenom i representationer av kvinnor.

This thesis offers a model for the underlying architecture of the narrative reality in science-fiction works by Philip K. Dick, arguing that Dick's fictional worlds are grounded in the pervasive metamorphosis - the overarching perception of the shifting - of the narrative fabric operating under the conditions of non-rationality and non-reality. The hyphenated coinages conveniently stand for the paradigms of the reality and mental configurations in PKD subverting the seemingly natural dichotomizing oppositions and hierarchies of the real/unreal and the rational/irrational. Bringing in Gilles Deleuze's ontology of difference, this thesis explains the non-rationality and non-reality of Dick's worlds in Deleuzian terms as, firstly, inducing the perception of fictional reality as realizing the innate potential of being by the perpetual becoming of being in multiplicity and, secondly, engendering - in the vein of Deleuzian simulacra - the impossibility of apprehending and categorizing fictional reality unequivocally. The thesis considers and evaluates the underlying assumptions and claims common to various approaches to the subject of reality in PKD's fictions in order to provide the essential context for the following development of the theoretical basis for non-rationality and non-reality shifting....