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This thesis theorises an approach to cinematic suspense derived from a set of films that challenge the teleological and redemptive principles of traditional narrative. It is argued that such a challenge is drawn from the need to account for conditions of violence and suffering without recourse to the traditional grounds of redemption. They set out to question the symbols that underpin a faith in its possibilities. Such films counter these grounds with a form of perpetuated suspense that continually withholds resolution, stressing and destabilising both the terms of redemption and the affect of its aesthetic representations. Significantly, this thesis examines films from the years following 1989 that confront this central theme within conditions of historical hiatus and the disintegration of ideological certainties occurring in the wake of European communism. These films, by Kira Muratova, Béla Tarr, Artur Aristakisyan, Alexander Sokurov, Bruno Dumont, Roy Andersson, Ulrich Seidl and Gus Van Sant, present a world in which human beings are always already turned against themselves, placing them in the context of contemporary philosophical aporias that identify the human condition as enigmatic and resisting of itself. They suspend the symbolic structures associated with redemption in order to reconfigure contemporary film as a „realist‟ cinema at the threshold of the interpretative and reconciliatory economies implicit in the soteriological mythology of Western thought. Tracing Paul Ricoeur‟s schematic account of the symbols and myths of a „fallen‟ world, the thesis turns on Jean-Luc Nancy‟s subsequent critique of the insufficiency of myths to properly account for existence. In place of an hermeneutic recovery of the real and its meaning, Nancy‟s „realist‟ philosophy of „sense‟ and its application to the cinema offer an account that speaks less of conflicting narratives of redemption than a radical stripping away of its terms, suggesting that it is redemption from the normative terms of redemption that ultimately constitutes the proper question at the heart of these films.

Des analyses consacrées au vitalisme de Bichat, en 1963, à l’étude du bios cynique dans les toutes dernières leçons de son dernier cours au Collège de France, les références à la vie sont constantes dans l’œuvre de Michel Foucault. C’est dans le cadre du projet philosophico-politique d’un dépassement de l’humanisme moderne que la question de la vie fera irruption dans son œuvre. Notre thèse est désormais que le défi auquel sera confrontée la pensée foucaldienne, consistera à déplacer le centre de l’analyse de l’homme (en tant que fondement supposé des savoirs et des pouvoirs modernes) vers la vie (i.e., vers les savoirs et les pouvoirs qui l’investissent et la produisent), sans pour autant faire de celle-ci un nouveau fondement (que ce soit à la manière d’une philosophie naturaliste, d’une ontologie vitaliste ou d’une phénoménologie du vécu).C’est dans les travaux biopolitiques que la stratégie foucaldienne (contourner l’homme en passant par la vie) se déploie le plus clairement : l’homme y apparaît, en effet, non point en tant que fondement (comme dans les théories contractualistes, qui partent d’une certaine anthropologie afin d’en déduire une certaine politique), mais comme effet et enjeu d’un pouvoir ayant la vie pour but, objet et modèle.Or un tel déplacement n’implique-t-il pas une promotion de la vie au rang du fondement déserté par l’homme ? C’est, comme nous essayons de le montrer dans la deuxième partie de la thèse, le pas que franchissent, parfois, ces deux lectures en apparence antagoniques de l’œuvre foucaldienne que sont les interprétations d’orientation « naturaliste » d’une part (qui insistent surtout sur la « biologisation » de la politique moderne mise en lumière par Foucault) et, de l’autre, les lectures d’inspiration « vitaliste » (qui, à l’instar du commentaire deleuzien, invoquent plutôt l’idée d’une résistance possible aux biopouvoirs qui prendrait appui sur la puissance propre à cette même vie que le pouvoir cherche à investir).C’est dans les travaux archéologiques de Foucault que ces deux lectures de la biopolitique foucaldienne nous semblent trouver leur réfutation la plus flagrante, d’où le fait que la troisième section de notre travail leur soit entièrement consacrée. Foucault y établit en effet l’historicité foncière de cette vie biologique à laquelle seront ordonnés les dispositifs modernes de pouvoir. Par ailleurs, il prend bien soin de mettre en lumière ce qui compromet la prétendue positivité de ces savoirs sur la vie que sont la biologie et la médecine clinique. Il montre enfin à quel point la notion moderne – aussi bien biologique que métaphysique – de vie constitue le revers de la figure moderne de l’homme, de ses détermination empiriques mais aussi de ses prérogatives transcendantales. D’où, sans doute, le fait que son premier effort pour penser une issue possible au « cercle anthropologique » – centré autour de l’expérience littéraire – repose, non sur une revendication des puissances de la vie, mais sur une conceptualisation ontologique de la mort et de sa paradoxale fécondité.Il n’en reste pas moins qu’entre la fin des années 1970 et le début des années 1980, Foucault articulera bien une pensée de la résistance aux biopouvoirs avec une certaine problématisation de la vie. Or – décalage essentiel – il reconceptualisera aussitôt celle-ci à partir de la notion grecque de bios. L’hypothèse qui structure la quatrième partie de notre travail est alors que l’introduction du concept de bios répond au défi de redonner une certaine initiative à la vie (i.e., d’introduire une certaine distance entre celle-ci et la figure moderne, entièrement objectivée, naturalisée, médicalisée de l’homme normal), sans pour autant restaurer le sujet métaphysique ou phénoménologique, dont Foucault aura mené la critique dès le début des années 1960, ni basculer dans une métaphysique vitaliste – dont il aura montré qu’elle ne constitue que le revers de la figure moderne de l’homme. / From the analysis focused on Bichat’s vitalism, in 1963, to the study of the cynical bios in every last lesson of his last course at the Collège de France, the references to life are a constant in the work of Michel Foucault. The issue of life will appear in his work in the context of his philosophical and political project of going beyond modern humanism. From now on, our thesis will be that the challenge confronting Foucault’s thinking will consist in moving the center of the analysis from man (as the alleged foundation of modern knowledge and power) to life (that is, to the knowledge and power that produces and invests it, so as to what, in life, opposes some resistance to them), without turning life into a new foundation (whether the way of a naturalistic philosophy, a vitalist ontology or phenomenology of the vécu).It’s in the biopolitical works (on which the first part of our thesis is focused) where the Foucauldian strategy (getting around man through life) displays itself most clearly: man appears, indeed, not at all as foundation (as in the contract theories, which start with a certain anthropology in order to deduce a certain politics), but as an effect and a stake of a power that has life as goal, object and model. But wouldn’t such a move promote life to the status of a new foundation? It would, as we try to show in the second part of the thesis, the way that crosses sometimes these two seemingly conflicting readings of his work: “naturalistic” interpretations on one hand (which insist mainly on « biologisation » of modern politics, highlighted by Foucault) and, on the other hand, “vitalist” views (which following Deleuzian comments, invoke instead the idea of a possible resistance to biopowers which would rest on life’s own puissance).We think that these two readings of Foucault’s biopolitics find their highest refutation on Foucault’s archeological works. That’s why the third section of our work is completely devoted to them. Foucault, in fact, establishes here the historicity of biological life to which modern power devices will be closely related. Otherwise, he is careful to highlight what compromises the alleged positivity of knowledge. He also shows how the modern notion of life - both biological and metaphysical - is the reverse of man’s modern figure, of his empirical determinations but also of his transcendental prerogatives (that’s what we call “anthropological downturn” of life, which would find one of his endpoints on the phenomenological figure of the vécu). That is why, no doubt, his first effort to think of a possible outcome for the “anthropological circle” - centered on the literary experience- lays not on a argument in favor of the powers of life, but on an ontological conceptualization of death and his paradoxical fertility.It nevertheless remains true that, between the late ‘70s and the early ‘80s, Foucault will articulate a thought of resistance to biopowers with a certain problematization of life. Or – a critical shift – he will soon re-conceptualize it based on the Greek notion of bios. The hypothesis that structures the fourth part of our work is, then, that the introduction of the concept of bios addresses the challenge of restoring some initiative to life (i.e., to insert a certain distance between it and the common man’s modern figure, completely objectified, naturalized, medicalized), without therefore restoring a metaphysical or phenomenological subject (man as empirical-transcendental doublet, center and foundation of any experience, epistemological and practical), of which Foucault himself has been the led critic since the early ‘60s, or falling into a vitalist metaphysics – which he had revealed as only the reverse of men’s modern figure.

O objeto de estudo deste trabalho é o conceito de tradução e o papel central a ela atribuído no pensamento de Vilém Flusser e, em particular, em sua concepção de sociedade pós-histórica. A teoria linguística de Flusser, uma tentativa de conciliar a fenomenologia de Husserl e o existencialismo de Heidegger com a teoria da linguagem de Wittgenstein, define a língua como articuladora da realidade. Com base nessa teoria, Flusser concebe a tradução como uma das poucas possibilidades, senão a única, de superação dos horizontes da língua. As reflexões de Flusser sobre a sociedade tecnológica, consideradas pioneiras, são analisadas no esforço de identificar o lugar ocupado pela tradução no pensamento humano e em um mundo em que a história e a escrita estão perdendo espaço para as imagens tecnológicas. Destaca-se, nesse contexto, o papel fundamental atribuído por Flusser à tradução: o de criar pontes, não apenas entre línguas e culturas diferentes, mas entre os diversos ramos e modelos de conhecimento, articulando os diferentes sistemas simbólicos e permitindo a compreensão das diversas realidades. / The object of this dissertation is the concept of translation and the central role assigned to it in the thought of Vilém Flusser and, in particular, his conception of post-historical society. Flussers linguistic theory, an effort to conciliate Husserls phenomenology and Heidegger\'s existentialism with Wittgensteins philosophy of language, defines language as an articulator of realities. Based on this theory, Flusser sees translation as one of the few possibilities, if not the only one, of crossing the borders of language. Flusser\'s pioneering reflections on the technological society are analyzed here in an effort to identify the place occupied by translation in the human thought process and in a world where history and writing are losing ground to technological images. In this context, this work emphasizes the crucial role assigned by Flusser to translation: that of building bridges, not only between different languages and cultures, but also between different fields and models of knowledge, articulating the various symbolic systems and contributing to a greater understanding of the various realities.

O objeto de estudo deste trabalho é o conceito de tradução e o papel central a ela atribuído no pensamento de Vilém Flusser e, em particular, em sua concepção de sociedade pós-histórica. A teoria linguística de Flusser, uma tentativa de conciliar a fenomenologia de Husserl e o existencialismo de Heidegger com a teoria da linguagem de Wittgenstein, define a língua como articuladora da realidade. Com base nessa teoria, Flusser concebe a tradução como uma das poucas possibilidades, senão a única, de superação dos horizontes da língua. As reflexões de Flusser sobre a sociedade tecnológica, consideradas pioneiras, são analisadas no esforço de identificar o lugar ocupado pela tradução no pensamento humano e em um mundo em que a história e a escrita estão perdendo espaço para as imagens tecnológicas. Destaca-se, nesse contexto, o papel fundamental atribuído por Flusser à tradução: o de criar pontes, não apenas entre línguas e culturas diferentes, mas entre os diversos ramos e modelos de conhecimento, articulando os diferentes sistemas simbólicos e permitindo a compreensão das diversas realidades. / The object of this dissertation is the concept of translation and the central role assigned to it in the thought of Vilém Flusser and, in particular, his conception of post-historical society. Flussers linguistic theory, an effort to conciliate Husserls phenomenology and Heidegger\'s existentialism with Wittgensteins philosophy of language, defines language as an articulator of realities. Based on this theory, Flusser sees translation as one of the few possibilities, if not the only one, of crossing the borders of language. Flusser\'s pioneering reflections on the technological society are analyzed here in an effort to identify the place occupied by translation in the human thought process and in a world where history and writing are losing ground to technological images. In this context, this work emphasizes the crucial role assigned by Flusser to translation: that of building bridges, not only between different languages and cultures, but also between different fields and models of knowledge, articulating the various symbolic systems and contributing to a greater understanding of the various realities.

This dissertation concentrates on the interplay between politics and financial markets using various empirical tools applied on historical financial statistics. The first essay examines the effect of stock transaction taxation on trading activity and asset prices, specifically focusing on the case of early 20th century Sweden. The main finding is that the tax substantially reduced trading as well as the level of asset prices. In the second essay, modern ex post historical writing is contrasted with the ex ante views of contemporaries which are estimated from historical price data. The specific case study is the events around World War II related to the Nordic countries and Germany. The comparisons point out considerable differences between the assessments of historical events in the ex post and ex ante approaches. The third essay is an empirical study of price controls on asset price movements and how these controls affect asset returns. The study finds that the controls have large significant effects which even may influence estimates of the long-run equity premium. Altogether, this raises concerns about the use of century-long series of asset returns without correcting for the impact of institutional variation and market constraints. Finally, the fourth essay examines the growth effects of international financial liberalization and integration using a large country- industry sample from the 1980s. The main result is that industries highly dependent on external financing do not experience higher value added growth in countries with liberalized financial markets. Liberalization does, however, increase the growth rates of both output and firm creation among externally dependent industries. These results are consistent both with increased competition and increased outsourcing. / <p>Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 2003</p>

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / This thesis will look at the various images of the American Far West presented by the Saturday Evening Post during the 1920s under the editorship of George Horace Lorimer, and will examine his editorial strategy that promoted the Far West as a last land of opportunity while also recognizing and weighing in on the challenges of that region.