A ditadura militar brasileira começou em 1964 e terminou em 1985. Durante este período de 21 anos, ao mesmo tempo em que o país viu avanços econômicos, um grande número de brasileiros passaram por experiências traumatizantes de perseguição, torturas, exílios e muitas vezes o desaparecimento de conhecidos, amigos e familiares. Devido à censura, qualquer pessoa que tivesse uma posição comunista ou que pregasse contra o governo militar era perseguida. Por este motivo, muitos não tiveram a oportunidade de escrever ou até protestar as injustiças que sofreram do governo militar durante esta época. No entanto, depois da abertura “lenta e gradual” e da anistia, muitas das vítimas da ditadura começaram a se manifestar através da literatura, hoje chamada de “literatura de testemunho.” Através de narrações fortemente ligadas à sua memória, os sobreviventes fazem depoimentos e constróem o outro lado da história brasileira que foi escondido por anos e em que os responsáveis nunca foram punidos. Através da literatura de testemunho podemos ter acesso a uma outra versão da história que não pode ser apagada por conter depoimentos vivos de sobreviventes que foram guiados por suas memórias para escrever a verdade.

This thesis analyzes the linguistic attitudes of natives from Santiago, Chile regarding three linguistic phenomena present in Chilean Spanish of Santiago: the fricative realization of the Spanish /tʃ/, the assibilated realization of /tɾ/ and the use of the definite article before the first names of people. The social factors of age, sex and socioeconomic status are acknowledged as possible factors contributing to the linguistic attitudes of the 64 participants interviewed.

This thesis investigates the attitudes of the inhabitants of Agost towards Castilian and Valencian Catalan. Data were collected by means of a questionnaire distributed among a representative sample of Agostenses between April and June 2013 and analyzed according to three independent variables: sex, age and education. It was hypothesized that attitudes would covary with these variables and, in general, this proved to be the case.

This project is a transcription and translation of a 21-page annual letter written about the Cochinchina mission for the year 1619 by the Jesuit missionary João Rodrigues Girão. In 1619 the Cochinchina mission consisted of central and southern Vietnam. The two Jesuit residents at this time were located in the city of Faifo, in the province of Cacham, and Nuocman, in the province of Pulocamby. A semi-diplomatic and diplomatic transcription style is used for the transcription, with a dynamic-equivalent (sense-for-sense) style used for the translation.

While Asturian, a language spoken in Northwestern Spain, shows some similarities with Spanish, there is a morphological characteristic that the two languages do not share. Unlike Spanish, Asturian has not only morphemes dedicated to both the masculine (–u) and feminine (–a) genders in its adjectives, but there is also a morpheme that represents the neuter (–o). Related to this morphological characteristic, Asturian exhibits what is standardly called the mass neuter phenomenon. In order for the mass neuter to be present in a grammatically correct sentence in Asturian, certain criteria must be met. For instance, either a masculine or feminine mass noun can be followed by a neuter adjective, and this structure gives a generic interpretation reading. However, it is important to take into account that the same adjective can also agree in gender with the noun that precedes it, in which case the morphological neuter is ungrammatical and the interpretation becomes specific. There also exists a third possibility in which the adjective appears in a prenominal position, in which case the adjective must agree in gender, the interpretation must be specific, and the mass neuter is ruled out. Given the possibilities in gender agreement, specific or generic interpretation, and adjective placement, my study aims to better define the contexts in which the mass neuter in Asturian can and cannot appear in a grammatical sentence, and how the syntactic analysis proposed to account for to the placement of the adjective can shed light to explain the phenomenon under study.

Para hacer este estudio de los tipos y costumbres en los Sueños de Quevedo, he tomado la edición de Julio Cejador y Frauca, titulada Quevedo: Los Sueños. Esta edición es una de dos tomos en los Clásicos castellanos. Así, al pintar a los muchos tipos que hay en la obra, el explicar y mostrar la sátira de Quevedo, tengo que aludir mucho a Los Sueños. Hablo en estas páginas mías de oasi todos los tipos que satiriza Quevedo, pero ni incluyó a los herejes; y esto por varias razones. Primero, no son ellos tipos que podemos apreciar hoy, ni son tan interesantes como los tipos de la vida diaria. Además, al hablar de ellos, Quevedo cuenta la historia de varios herejes, y casi todos los nombres y los incidentes los sacó de varios libros acerca de los herejes que se habían publicado en aquellos tiempos cuando la cuestión era de muy gran importancia. Los tipos de oficiales, de trabajadores, de caballeros y de mujeres, y las costumbres que había entre este grupo me parecen interesantes y muy realistas, aunque muy exagerados en las pinturas de Quevedo.

This dissertation examines the four novels published to date by Milton Hatoum, a contemporary Lebanese-Brazilian author from the Amazon region. There are a great number of critical readings of his work that foreground the postmodern dissolution and fragmentation of the self, of human relationships, and also of national identity. In contrast to such approaches, I propose what I call a reading of hope. I argue that Hatoum is at the forefront of a shift in sensibility in Brazilian literature, one that simultaneously demonstrates certain aspects of postmodernism, but also breaks with other elements of it. In order to illustrate this issue, I analyze how Hatoum's characters forge personal identities, utilizing the mythological symbol of the uroboro (the snake that bites its own tail) as the organizing structure of my analysis. The uroboro has historically been used to represent circularity in the cycles of nature, communal and personal renewal, the return to origins, and self-reflection. In addition to circularity, the symbol has also been visually depicted as half black and half white, creating a duality that stresses interdependence rather than binary logic. With the above characteristics of circularity and duality in mind, the postmodern aspect that I analyze in Hatoum's work is its break with binary logic. First, I identify a variety of dualities extant in the novels, from language and silence to myth and reality, that instead of canceling each other out complement one another and emphasize identity's inherent ambiguity. Next, I analyze the rupture with postmodernism, which comes with Hatoum's characters' perpetual search for a more meaningful relationship with others, the environment, and themselves. As a consequence, the postmodern rootless and unstable characters give way to individuals that express more humane concerns (the recovery of the past as a value, self-reflection, and the search for familial bonds as well as for a connection with beauty and aesthetic pleasure through the arts). The symbol of the uroboro thus provides a graphic means of metaphorically representing not only the characters' identity as ambiguous and self-reflective, but also Hatoum's novels as simultaneously working within and breaking with postmodernism.

Medicine is a field of science that is always changing and promoting new ideas and innovations. Throughout history, medicine has been an important factor in the lives of people around the world since the beginning of civilizations. This study focused on the literature of medicine as it relates to the Spanish Golden Age period. By looking at the history and critical studies in medicine during sixteenth and seventeenth century Spain as well as during the pre-colonial period in America, this thesis overviews the effects and influences in regards to health and illness in Spain and the Americas during the Spanish Golden Age era.

The objective of this study is to concentrate on the topic of education in the Cervantine works, by examining the importance and significance from a global perspective using a 17th century text, Don Quixote of La Mancha, as part of the teachings in the 21st century classroom. In order to fulfill this objective, the following exegesis will consider specific episodes of Don Quixote and it will delve into the following questions: How do specific episodes reflect how education influences those surrounding Don Quixote? How do Don Quixote and his squire Sancho have a continuous learning process of what is considered real versus what should be considered ideal? How are Don Quixote's values reflected in the 21st century? How the text Don Quixote impacted the 21st century's education? In order to answer these questions, this study will include cultural aspects of the period and its historical and social context.

In this study, the interpretation of Don Quixote has been examined within the work of three artists: Honore Daumier, Salvador Dali, and Joan Pon9. Each artist has represented Don Quixote in a uniquely modern artistic style that questions the artistic discipline in itself, while using it to portray the concepts and ideology of modern times. While these interpretations may not portray Don Quixote in the parodic way its author intended him to be, they are not completely romantic versions of the hero either. Don Quixote, as shown through the eyes of these three artists, has escaped the constraints of the text and has become not the nobly suffering hero of the Romantics, but the internalized hero representative of man himself in an increasingly isolated and modern society. The recurring theme of alienation from the others is then presented in this study as three different visions of Don Quixote. The first chapter seeks to examine the traces of modernity within the portrait painting of Don Quixote done by Honore Daumier. By taking the first steps towards abstraction and expressionism, as well as presenting a solution of withdrawn indifference that begins to question the state reality, Daumier sets the foundation for the modern interpretation of Don Quixote. In the second chapter, Salvador Dall depicts a Surrealist Don Quixote, illustrating a version that has completely submitted himself to the internally-based and absolute surreality. Dali reconciles the opposing internal and external realities in the figure of Don Quixote. Finally, Don Quixote faces the interior battles of existence in the work of Joan Pony. This modern, isolated depiction of Don Quixote in front of the infinite unknown marks the final transition from the external internal dialectic to that of yo vs. yo mismo . The conclusion then summarizes and confirms Don Quixote's textual liberation translated into both a modern style and concept.