On June 28, 1914, the Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand was assassinated at Sarajevo. Less than five weeks after his death, the century of peace, which had been interrupted by only eighteen months of open warfare involving major European powers, came abruptly to an end. The searing flames of World War I engulfed the whole of Europe and burned away the last shreds of that complacency which had veiled for all but a few malcontents the forces of die integration which threatened the very existence of Western culture. The October Revolution in Russia, the political and economic collapse of Central Europe, the world-wide depression of the thirties, the rise of Mussolini and Hitler, the brutalities of Buchenwald and Dachau, and, finally, World War II all are but symptoms of a crisis in civilization which continues in the stresses and strains of a poet- war period in which we witness the gradual transformation of the social and economic structures of Western culture, and in which our democratic way of life le pitted against the total militaries of Red * period in which the atom bomb in ghastly reality and to into start terror.

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Thesis (MA (Afrikaans and Dutch))--University of Stellenbosch, 2006. / In fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master in Afrikaans Creative Writing, the following has been submitted: (i) an assignment, titled Postcolonial Correspondence: resistance against or alliance with Colonialism, taking the form of an essay on the problematic surrounding the representation of the Other in postcolonial discourse; (ii) a volume of short prose, titled Tweespoor, wherein a representation of general human experiences within recognizable South African milieus was attempted.

To many people love is special, sacred even. Love plays a countless number of roles for a countless number of people. Contemporary ideas about love, however, are more in alignment with the philosophies of Aristotle, and not of Plato. Aristotle held that love could exist as many people see it today – wishing well for others purely for their own sake. But Plato disagreed. Plato claimed that love was a way by which one could better themselves and become wiser. In this thesis, I explain Plato’s theory of love put forth in the Symposium. I also explore the textual evidence for the selfish nature of Plato’s love.

It is widely known that at least three of the major world religions—Christianity, Islam, and (more controversially) Judaism—embrace the theory of bodily resurrection, or an event in which a person or people are brought back to embodied life after death. But is this theory compatible with materialism, or the philosophical doctrine that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications? In other words, if my “self” is identical with and nothing more than my body, could my unique and particular “self” come to exist again on Earth after my death? This thesis examines theories of compatibility from ancient times to the present day.

In this thesis, I answer the gamer's dilemma or the inability to find a moral distinction between virtual pedophilia and virtual murder. I expand virtual pedophilia to virtual rape to address increasing rates of sexual harassment and assault in virtual reality. In this thesis, I 1) explain what occurs when one engages in virtual rape; 2) identify relevant moral differences between physical rape and virtual rape; 3) challenge the existing relationship between committing harm and wrong in the case of rape; and 4) argue that virtual rape is morally reprehensible due to the agent’s intention to utilize a person as a mere tool for pleasure.

Rhetorical agency is an ideologically contentious facet within communication and rhetorical research. While its importance in scholarship can be traced back to early works by Kenneth Burke and Pierre Bourdieu, debate continues regarding the source of agency, how it is enacted in rhetorical application and communication, and who/what can claim responsibility for the communication practices one may utilize in enacting their respective levels of agency. Thus, the ways in which the rhetoric of popular, influential individuals/antecedents affects the rhetorical agency and invention practices of those without significant levels of influence must be examined. American Christianity, in particular the culture created through heavy use of televised and web-media (televangelism), provides an excellent context to examine this subject. The present thesis discusses relevant literature to the topics of rhetorical agency, invention, and antecedents, as well as American Christianity, televangelism, and the changes that have occurred in religious rhetoric within the culture. Additionally, results indicate a high propensity towards rhetorical agency influenced through the themes of identity, adaptation, and audience sensitivity, and encourage pastors to focus on the identity and context through which their agency is manifested.

Whether the weakness of the evidence for God’s existence is not a sign that God is hidden, but rather a revelation that God does not exist is the question I will explore in this paper. I will investigate whether the absence of sufficient evidence for God constitutes evidence of his absence. Since it is not clear a-priori that God would be more clearly revealed to humans, reasons must be provided to show the degree of clarity and level of accessibility one would expect to find if God exists and remains hidden.

In this paper, we explore mystical experiences and knowledge through the application of Miranda Fricker's framework of epistemic injustice. Focusing on experiences in which the usual division between Self and Other temporarily dissolves (brought about spontaneously, through contemplative or religious practice, or through the ingestion of psychedelics), we examine the knowledge gained from these experiences in its multiple forms and discuss how the mystic, when attempting to share the knowledge she has gained, may face challenges to effective testimonial exchange which constitute testimonial injustices. Similarly, due to a cultural privileging of the rational and objective, we imagine how the mystic’s interlocutor in an exchange may lack the necessary epistemic resources to understand an account of the mystic’s experience and its epistemic fruits as knowledge, thus subjecting the mystic to a hermeneutical injustice. Exploring the possibility of an anti-mystical bias, we present a new realm for the application of Miranda Fricker’s concepts.

The paper aims to examine the nature of the relationship between beauty and the city. I examined this relationship by first providing a summary of relevant philosophers and their thoughts concerning aesthetics. Second, I compared their thoughts to my own creating my own abstract framework. Third, I implemented my abstract framework through the lens of architecture. This art form is the most organic to study the relationship of beauty within the city because it merges elements characteristic of one’s being like political discourse with the longing for some type of excitement or stimulation which might transfigure one’s self to a higher understanding, something that can only be achieved by experiencing beauty. In other words, buildings and the spaces around them drive the way in which humans interact with each other and their surroundings. I found that the beautiful is desirable and at a point becomes essential to a person’s happiness. To achieve a sense of beauty within the city, the ruling class must possess practical wisdom. A type of knowledge that allows them to pursue the appropriate and promote a kind of creativity that not only respects tradition but also aims to unveil some new form of experience.