The Main Character of the Book of Esther: The Contribution of the Textual Divisions and the Assigned Titles of the Book of Esther to Uncovering Its Protagonist

2021 ◽  
pp. 030908922110322
Author(s):  
Gregory Goswell
Keyword(s):  
Jewish People ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Early Readers ◽  
Hebrew Version

Scrutiny of the traditional textual divisions of the Hebrew version of the book of Esther—the sedarim, the Hebrew paragraphs and the Latin chapters – throws light on whom some ancient readers thought was the main character (protagonist) of the book. The sedarim appear to favour Mordecai’s role over Esther’s in the events narrated, whereas the positioning of the Hebrew paragraph breaks apportions attention more evenly between Esther and Mordecai, who each sought the welfare of the Jewish people. The chapter divisions show an interest in all three leading characters namely, Esther, Mordecai and Ahasuerus. In terms of assigned titles, the book was given the alternate names of Esther and Ahasuerus. It is plain, therefore, that early readers did not come to a settled conclusion as to who is the main character; however, it is clear that the role of Ahasuerus cannot be ignored and that the Persian king must be a candidate for the main character of the book.

The imagination, the conscious, and the unconscious in Jean Cocteau’s La Belle et la Bête

Semiotica ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Dalvesco
Keyword(s):  
Main Character ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
Sign Relations ◽  
Semiotic Theory

AbstractCharles S. Peirce’s and Sigmund Freud’s theories may be used to interpret Jean Cocteau’s film La Belle et la Bête (1946). This film has a specific set of codes which connote its filmic language. Cocteau uses fetishistic objects as symbols and icons to reflect the psychological meaning of the film’s narrative. Peirce’s icons and symbols include the connection a person may make through the conventions and expressions of language a person links with the object or idea being observed. Peirce’s semiotic theory functions as a theory of communication. His theory refocuses on culture. Freud’s theories can be linked with ideas produced by Peirce in forming sign relations with the interpretation of the film and the role of imagination in the film. Especially important are Freud’s ideas of repression, conscious and unconscious as they relate to Cocteau’s filmic narrative and the film’s main character Belle.

Exodus

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (11) ◽  
pp. 37-51
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Hart ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Short Story ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Deep Space ◽  
Traditional Foods ◽  
Religious Ceremony ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Archeological Evidence ◽  
Historical Basis ◽  
The Right

What makes a "religious" holiday? Does the combination of ritual, culture, and family custom all merge together to create "religion?" Does it even matter if the historical basis for religious stories are false? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the spaceship computer AI wakes up a family in deep space hibernation to give them time to prepare for, and celebrate, Passover. There are many situations unique to being in space that must be overcome; determining the right time period when taking into consideration time dilation, not to mention missing ingredients for traditional foods. Also, they are short two people of the requisite ten and ask the computer AI to "convert" and serve the role of two additional Jewish people. Awkwardly, the computer reminds them that some of their traditional stories are not supported by archeological evidence. This all begs important questions about the complicated weaving of history, faith, culture, and family custom in religious ceremony.

When girls draw the sword: Dansō, cross-dressing and gender subversion in Japanese shōjo manga

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marta Fanasca
Keyword(s):  
Japanese Society ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Gender Performances ◽  
Cross Dressing ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Shojo Manga ◽  
Gender Subversion

This article focuses on the representation of FtM cross-dresser characters in Japanese shōjo manga and their gender performances. The first cross-dresser heroine in manga is Sapphire, the main character from 1953s Ribon no kishi. Following this first example, similar characters have continued to appear in shōjo manga, obtaining very positive responses from the audience. While they are seen as rebellious characters challenging stereotypical views on gender in the Japanese society, the narratives where they appear do not always fully explore this aspect. The aim of this article is to investigate the role of cross-dresser heroines in manga as a tool to reinforce the sociocultural patriarchal status quo and as a different gender embodiment outside stereotyped femininity. It argues that the possibility for those characters to occupy powerful positions and succeed is related to masculinity, symbolized by the sword, stressing how ultimately their revolutionary potential is weakened and limited.

scholarly journals Sport and British Jewish identity

2020 ◽  
pp. 101269022095862
Author(s):  
Jon Dart
Keyword(s):  
South Asian ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Minority Communities ◽  
Sports Clubs ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Sports Activities

This article examines the relationship between sport and Jewish identity. The experiences of Jewish people have rarely been considered in previous sport-related research which has typically focused on ‘Black’ and South Asian individuals, sports clubs, and organisations. Drawing on data generated from interviews ( n = 20) and focus groups ( n = 2) with individuals based in one British city, this article explores how their Jewish identity was informed, and shaped by, different sports activities and spaces. This study’s participants were quick to correct the idea that sport was alien to Jewish culture and did not accept the stereotype that ‘Jews don’t play sport’. The limited historical research on sport and Jewish people and the ongoing debates around Jewish identity are noted before exploring the role of religion and the suggestion that Jewish participation in sport is affected by the Shabbat (sabbath). Participants discussed how sports clubs acted as spaces for the expression and re/affirmation of their Jewish identity, before they reflected on the threats posed to the wider Jewish community by secularism, assimilation, and antisemitism. The article concludes by discussing how the sporting experiences of the study’s British Jewish participants compare with the experiences of individuals from other ethnic minority communities.

scholarly journals On the role of Susanna in Susanna: A Greimassian contribution

2014 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dickh M. Kanonge ◽  
Pierre J. Jordaan
Keyword(s):  
Jewish People ◽  
Convincing Evidence ◽  
Suitable Method ◽  
Levels Of Analysis ◽  
Main Role ◽  
Central Action ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Level Of Analysis

This article addresses the highly disputed distribution of roles in the story of Susanna. Susanna consists of a number of actors of whom only a few such as Susanna, the two elders, the Jewish people and Daniel are directly related to the central action of the story. With regard to roles of these actors in the story however, a question arises: ‘who is the subject of the story of Susanna?’ Most scholars question the attribution of the role of subject to Susanna.Their contention however, has not yet been sustained by convincing evidence stemming from the use of a suitable method.  This study attempts to fill this gap by using the Greimassian approach to narratives, as refined by Everaert-Desmedt. The approach comprises three levels of analysis: the figurative, the narrative and the thematic. The contribution focuses only on the narrative level of analysis, particularly on the actantial model because the main role of this structure is to reveal different functions of actors called here actants. It is the contention here that following the actantial model of the Greimassian approach of analysis Susanna emerges as the subject of the aim concern of the story.

scholarly journals STUDYING THE ARTISTIC DETAIL (based on Donna Tartt’s novel «The Goldfinch»)

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (192) ◽  
pp. 80-84
Author(s):  
Olha Kozii ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Adult Male ◽  
Defense Mechanisms ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
Part D ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Critical Situation

«The Goldfinch» is a story of a boy and later an adult male Theodore Decker who accidentally obtains a masterpiece. The writer, as a surgeon, separates one second of expectation from the other, detail from detail. The reader is presented not just a frightened child but deep sorrow of the loss of the whole world. In the second chapter of the first part D. Tartt reveals herself as a skillful psychologist, skillfully accustoms herself to the inner state of the main character, with him she travels through the memories, tracks associative relationships he makes. The writer brilliantly follows all defense mechanisms of a man who is faced with the inevitability. The author uses gradation way of describing while stringing visual and auditory details, retards artistic time. The writing of D. Tartt is characterized by the unique skill in the detail describing. The role of artistic detail in the process of inner state depicting is investigated. The author touches upon the problem of the depicting of critical situation in the novel. The attention is paid to the writer’s skills in showing main character’s feelings, memoirs, thoughts, associative relations and human nocifensor in critical situations. It is admitted that in case of such temporal and space detail the most suitable way of analysis is «in succession to the author». Thus, in the novel The Goldfinch D.Tartt declares herself a talented master of words, subtle psychologist and philosopher. As a surgeon, the writer separates one second of expectation from the other, detail from detail. Therefore, the reader can observe not just a frightened child but deep sorrow of the loss of the whole world. This is achieved by the skillful combination of visual and auditory details that create convex emotionally saturated images filled with heartbeat of life. The author dowers the main character – both a teenager and an adult man – with the ability to see deep philosophical maxims in small details, to decipher the message from the artist, to understand the dialectical interpenetration of life and death. Because of such careful author's treatment to the artistic time and space the most appropriate way to study seems to be the analysis «in succession to the author».

scholarly journals THE 1951 DIPLOMATIC GIFT: THE ROLE OF A GERMAN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY HANUKKAH LAMP IN ISRAELI-AMERICAN RELATIONS

ARTis ON ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 67-77
Author(s):  
Shir Kochavi
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
The United States ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
The Gift ◽  
History Of

A diplomatic gift in the form of a Hanukkah Lamp, given to President Harry Truman by the Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion in 1951 was selected for this occasion by museum personnel from the Bezalel Museum in Jerusalem and the Jewish Museum in New York. Based on primary sources found in archives in Israel and in the United States, this case study investigates the process of objects exchange between two museums, orchestrated on the basis of an existing collegial relationship, and illustrates how the Hanukkah Lamp becomes more than itself and signifies both the history of the Jewish people and the mutual obligations between the two nations. Drawing on the theories of Marcel Mauss, Arjun Appadurai, and Igor Kopytoff on the notion of the gift, the article highlights the layers of meanings attributed to a gifted object.

scholarly journals May He Speedily Come: the role of the Messiah in Haredi and Hardal Judaism

1970 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 243-263
Author(s):  
Mia Anderssén-Löf
Keyword(s):  
Jewish People

This article studies the understanding of redemption in general, and in particular the role of the Messiah in redemption as it is expressed by representatives of two Jewish perspectives: the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) and the Hardal (nationalist ultra-Orthodox). Although both perspectives see the shift from exile to redemption as an event which is brought about by God, both also see ways to accelerate or decelerate that event. Both have developed a strategy according to their respective interpretations of how the shift from exile to redemption will appear. To the Haredim, the solution calls for the Jewish people to repent, live piously and wait for the Messiah to emerge; to the Hardalim, the solution calls for the Jewish people to abandon the passive approach and engage in the process of redemption, which has already begun even though the Messiah delays. Hence, both present a strategy for expediting the End, and can thus be considered messianic.

scholarly journals Attentional control predicts pronominalization irrespective of competing referents

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Madeleine Long ◽  
Hannah Rohde ◽  
Michelle Oraa Ali ◽  
Paula Rubio-Fernandez
Keyword(s):  
Attentional Control ◽  
Accurate Assessment ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Alternative Account ◽  
Attentional Capacity ◽  
Attention Switching ◽  
Attentional Resources ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Referential Choice

Two story-continuation experiments replicate a well-known effect whereby speakers use fewer pronouns to refer to the main character of a story when an additional character is present in the scene/discourse. This effect arises even when characters are different sex/gender and a pronoun would be unambiguous, a finding originally attributed to competition for attentional resources in the speaker’s representation of the discourse (Arnold & Griffin, 2007). However earlier work did not explicitly test this account. Here we investigate the role of inhibition and attention switching on referential choice across one- and two-characters scenes in 200 participants aged 19-82. Attentional capacity did not predict pronominalization differences across scenes. Instead, our results lend support to an alternative account whereby lower pronominal use in two-character scenes reflects participants’ accurate assessment that the subject is more likely to be the topic when no additional character is present.

scholarly journals PERAN KITAB KUNING DALAM PEMBENTUKAN PEMIKIRAN PENDIDIKAN ISLAM DAN KARAKTER SANTRI PADA PESANTREN TRADISIONAL

QATHRUNÂ ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 103
Author(s):  
Ahmad Farhanudin ◽  
Muhajir Muhajir
Keyword(s):  
Sampling Technique ◽  
Boarding School ◽  
Boarding Schools ◽  
Islamic Education ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Snowball Sampling ◽  
Research Subjects ◽  
Sociological Approaches ◽  
Research Type

The objectives of this study are 1) To determine the role of the yellow book on the formation of Islamic education thought in traditional Islamic boarding schools. 2) To find out the role of the yellow book in forming the character of students in traditional Islamic boarding schools. This research is a descriptive qualitative research type, and through the Education and Sociological approaches. The research location was conducted in two Islamic boarding schools, namely Bany Syafi'I Cilegon and Madarijul 'Ulum Serang. In this study the research subjects were Kiai, Ustadz / Ustadzah, board of pesantren, and santriwan / santriwati of Islamic boarding school. The research subjects used purposive sampling technique, namely determining the source of the data obtained with certain considerations and snowball sampling, namely determining the sample from a small amount to become large. When the research was carried out on August 1, 2019 to October 25, 2019 for 3 months. The role of the yellow book in shaping the character of students in the Bany Syafi'i and Madarijul 'Ulum Islamic boarding schools is still visible in terms of santri obedience to their teachers, ta'dziman wa takriman attitude towards their knowledge and also towards their environment, all of which can be assessed and formed from the results Uswatun Hasanah's attitude is a teacher / kiai. And also the role of the yellow book in shaping the character of students can obey and obey a student in accordance with what is taught by a teacher, with the demands of the book ta'limul muta'alim as the main reference and provision of the main character of the students in the Islamic boarding school, so that with good character it will create good personality and discipline too.  

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