scholarly journals Play a Trick and Get a Queen: “Divine Tricksters” in Ancient Korea (and Beyond)

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-189
Author(s):  
Maurizio Riotto

Abstract The issue of trickster in old Korean literature has yet to be discussed in a broadly comparative way in a scientific context. Using a structuralist approach, this article addresses the anthropological theme of the “divine trickster” in some stories from ancient Korea and the ancient West. In particular, by examining three famous episodes from Korean folklore alongside three cases from Western fantastic literature, this article investigates the strategies aimed at acquiring the feminine element as represented by high-ranking foreign women. Starting with the hunting mentality of prehistoric society, where man tries to prevail with intelligence over his prey, the article reviews literary episodes from different anthropological contexts (Indo-European societies, Semitic societies of the Near East, and ancient Korean society), underlining their similarities and differences, but always highlighting and emphasizing the presence of a divine trickster. Ultimately, together with the common denominator of the progressive masculinization of the various societies, we note a more passive role of women in the Korean stories, which appear to be of more recent codification than their Western counterparts, and therefore seem more inspired by cultural patterns of patriarchal orientation.

2020 ◽  
Vol nr specjalny 1(2020) ◽  
pp. 293-310
Author(s):  
Bernadetta Darska ◽  

In the present article I examine autobiographical works in which writers reveal their illnesses. I am interested not so much in the description of a given ailment, but rather in the embroilment resulting from being ill and from the persistent conflict between memory and forgetting. Becoming aware of the illness turns out to be a critical point, forcing the writers to re-evaluate their own lives. Consequently, memory and forgetting assume a new status. I also attempt to juxtapose the universal nature of being ill and the intimacy of this experience; I point out the similarities and differences involved in dealing with illnesses, the common denominator of which seems to be the necessity of confronting the limits of memory and the expansiveness of forgetting.


2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-109
Author(s):  
Piotr Urbanowicz

Summary In this text, I argue that there are numerous affinities between 19th century messianism and testimonies of UFO sightings, both of which I regarded as forms of secular millennialism. The common denominator for the comparison was Max Weber’s concept of “disenchantment of the world” in the wake of the Industrial Revolution which initiated the era of the dominance of rational thinking and technological progress. However, the period’s counterfactual narratives of enchantment did not repudiate technology as the source of all social and political evil—on the contrary, they variously redefined its function, imagining a possibility of a new world order. In this context, I analysed the social projects put forward by Polish Romantics in the first half of the 19th century, with emphasis on the role of technology as an agent of social change. Similarly, the imaginary technology described by UFO contactees often has a redemptive function and is supposed to bring solution to humanity’s most dangerous problems.


2017 ◽  
Vol 131 (10) ◽  
pp. 981-990 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jay C. Jha ◽  
Anna M.D. Watson ◽  
Geetha Mathew ◽  
Lisanne C. de Vos ◽  
Karin Jandeleit-Dahm

Oxidative stress is a consequence of up-regulation of pro-oxidant enzyme-induced reactive oxygen species (ROS) production and concomitant depletion of antioxidants. Elevated levels of ROS act as an intermediate and are the common denominator for various diseases including diabetes-associated macro-/micro-vascular complications and hypertension. A range of enzymes are capable of generating ROS, but the pro-oxidant enzyme family, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidases (NOXs), are the only enzymes known to be solely dedicated to ROS generation in the vascular tissues, kidney, aortas and eyes. While there is convincing evidence for a role of NOX1 in vascular and eye disease and for NOX4 in renal injury, the role of NOX5 in disease is less clear. Although NOX5 is highly up-regulated in humans in disease, it is absent in rodents. Thus, so far it has not been possible to study NOX5 in traditional mouse or rat models of disease. In the present review, we summarize and critically analyse the emerging evidence for a pathophysiological role of NOX5 in disease including the expression, regulation and molecular and cellular mechanisms which have been demonstrated to be involved in NOX5 activation.


Cephalalgia ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 5 (2_suppl) ◽  
pp. 93-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Parantainen ◽  
H Vapaatalo ◽  
E Hokkanen

Prostaglandins (PG), particularly PGE, may be linked to the pathophysiology of migraine in several important ways. PGE, may “simulate” a migraine attack in healthy volunteers. PGE may be elevated in patients with migraine. In animal experiments and in human infusions, PGEs cause vasodilation and hyperalgesia, both typical reactions of inflammation. The view that vascular headache is an “inflammatory reaction” allows the best concept concerning the local role of PGs and the effectiveness of PG-inhibitors in the treatment of migraine. The local role of PGs may provide a common denominator in several hormonal, neural and other influences on vessels. The common triggers of a migraine attack like menstruation, alcohol and stress influence the PG-system and even the dietary reactions, hormonal influences, sleep and reserpine have some connections with the PG-system. A local role for PGs does not diminish the importance of other pathophysiological mechanisms operating during an attack. On the contrary, PGs may fill in gaps in our understanding of how the overt pain of attacks is produced.


2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 236-240
Author(s):  
Elisabeta-Emilia Halmaghi ◽  
Dănuț Moşteanu

Abstract Water is essential to man’s life, nature and economy and has a fundamental role in the climate regulation cycle. It is a resource that is continually regenerating, but is at the same time finite and cannot be produced or replaced by other resources. Nothing is possible without water, this resource being the heart of human and economic development. That is why water is an essential factor for the existence of life and the development of human society. Rapid urbanization, the global demographic explosion and climate change have led to water quality degradation and have become acute pressures on water resources, which has led to concern for water protection. Water is the common denominator that links all areas of activity, and these actions have the role of encouraging a better understanding of the need for water use and management in a more responsible manner.


1999 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 373-398 ◽  
Author(s):  
Albertina Albors Llorens

The judgments of the Community judicature are often subject to intense scrutiny by the media and by academic writers. The European Court of Justice, in particular, is regularly accused of being by and large an “activist” court, namely a court that construes EC law in the light of the objective the judges are trying to pursue. In particular, it is argued that the European Court uses the teleological method of interpretation to enhance the effectiveness of Community law at the expense of the written legal texts. Several studies have been published on the supposed “activist” role of the European Court and as many (or more) have been written in defence of the Court. The common denominator of all these works is that they are selective.


2020 ◽  
pp. 107385842093903 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonio Oliviero ◽  
Fernando de Castro ◽  
Francesca Coperchini ◽  
Luca Chiovato ◽  
Mario Rotondi

COVID-19 is an ongoing viral pandemic that emerged from East Asia and quickly spread to the rest of the world. SARS-CoV-2 is the virus causing COVID-19. Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is definitely one of the main clinically relevant consequences in patients with COVID-19. Starting from the earliest reports of the COVID-19 pandemic, two peculiar neurological manifestations (namely, hyposmia/anosmia and dysgeusia) were reported in a relevant proportion of patients infected by SARS-CoV-2. At present, the physiopathologic mechanisms accounting for the onset of these symptoms are not yet clarified. CXCL10 is a pro-inflammatory chemokine with a well-established role in the COVID-19-related cytokine storm and in subsequent development of ARDS. CXCL10 is also known to be involved in coronavirus-induced demyelination. On these bases, a role for CXCL10 as the common denominator between pulmonary and olfactory dysfunctions could be envisaged. The aim of the present report will be to hypothesize a role for CXCL10 in COVID-19 olfactory dysfunctions. Previous evidences supporting our hypothesis, with special emphasis to the role of CXCL10 in coronavirus-induced demyelination, the anatomical and physiological peculiarity of the olfactory system, and the available data supporting their link during COVID-19 infections, will be overviewed.


2021 ◽  
Vol 564 (3) ◽  
pp. 22-28
Author(s):  
Maciej Cesarski

The aim of the article is to indicate the personal and institutional reasons for IGS’s pursuit of housing and settlement issues in the period 1920–2020. The facts presented in the article prove the important role of these premises in the activities of IGS. They indicate two distinct trends in housing and settlement research, often manifested in the achievements of the same researchers. The first is the „photographic” trend based on the method of induction, deciphering the housing and settlement issue with surveys of the questionnaire and memoirs, which constitute an important element of investigations into the living conditions of selected groups of the population. The second – the „process-structural” trend that tries to look in a more deductive and reductive way, confronting the past with scientific ideas about an unrecognizable future, especially the more distant one. An example of the possibilities inherent in the processes of convergence of the „photographic” and „process-structural” trends are studies of the housing situation of seniors extended to the problems of more distant in terms of spatial availability of infrastructure elements and the settlement structure that define the inhabited space. This requires further research with the common denominator of intergenerational justice


1970 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Colbow ◽  
A. Jmaeff ◽  
K. Yuen

For many crystals of cadmium sulfide, the photoconductivity spectrum contains a great deal of structure due to excitons. In particular, two types of spectra have been found: type I, wherein photoconductivity maxima correspond to absorption maxima, and type II, wherein photoconductivity minima correspond to absorption maxima. Various methods have been used to change one type of response into the other, among them, heat treatment, mechanical surface treatment, electron bombardment, and ultraviolet irradiation. The evidence presented in this paper supports the view that the common denominator in all these treatments is the change in the electric field near the surface. The surface field is a sensitive function of defect concentration, adsorbed oxygen, and free carrier concentration.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 190-202
Author(s):  
Saher Kadouri .

Management is a special career requiring special skills. To define management as a task with economic, humanitarian and temporal dimensions, it must be emphasized that management is a profession that differs from specialized professions. It is different from the profession of the engineer, the doctor, the accountant, the seller and the teacher. An individual's success in a job does not necessarily make him a successful individual as a manager. Dealing with people as subordinates, bosses, colleagues and clients, taking into account individual differences, requires the manager to have human skill as well as the technical skill associated with the nature of his work. Thinking about the future and preparing for it, and thinking about the particles and their relationship to the colleges requires intellectual skill, and that the appropriate mix of these skills varies according to the administrative level of the manager. While the technical and intellectual skills vary according to management levels, the common denominator among all these levels is human skill as management is the execution of business through other individuals.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document