scholarly journals The Tragic Mulatta and Storytelling in Their Eyes Were Watching God

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 71-88
Author(s):  
Ana Belén Pérez García
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Zora Neale Hurston ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Female Identity ◽  
Female Character ◽  
Black Race ◽  
Antebellum Literature ◽  
Literary Character ◽  
White Person ◽  
Do So

The figure of the tragic mulatta placed its origin in antebellum literature and was extensively used in the literature of the nineteenth and twentieth century. Much has been written about this literary character in a time when the problem of miscegenation was at its highest point, and when studies established that races were inherently different, meaning that the black race was inferior to the white one. Many authors have made use of this trope for different purposes, and Zora Neale Hurston was one of them. In her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston creates Janie, a mulatta that a priori follows all the characteristics of this type of female character who, however, breaks away from most of them. She overcomes all stereotypes and prejudices, those imposed on her because of her condition of interracial offspring, and is able to take charge of her own life and challenge all these impositions feeling closer to her blackness and celebrating and empowering her female identity. In this vein, storytelling becomes the liberating force that helps her do so. It will become the tool that will enable her to ignore the need of passing as a white person and provide her with the opportunity to connect with her real identity and so feel free and happy, breaking with the tragic destiny of mulatta characters. Keywords: storytelling, tragic mulatta, blackness, Hurston.  

The Samarin Family and the Parish Question in the Russian Empire. 1860s–1910s

2019 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
pp. 235-246
Author(s):  
Alexey L. Beglov
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Public Discussion ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
Church Life ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
The Church ◽  
Do So

The article examines the contribution of the representatives of the Samarin family to the development of the Parish issue in the Russian Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The issue of expanding the rights of the laity in the sphere of parish self-government was one of the most debated problems of Church life in that period. The public discussion was initiated by D.F. Samarin (1827-1901). He formulated the “social concept” of the parish and parish reform, based on Slavophile views on society and the Church. In the beginning of the twentieth century his eldest son F.D. Samarin who was a member of the Special Council on the development the Orthodox parish project in 1907, and as such developed the Slavophile concept of the parish. In 1915, A.D. Samarin, who took up the position of the Chief Procurator of the Most Holy Synod, tried to make his contribution to the cause of the parish reforms, but he failed to do so due to his resignation.

Pragmatic Reconstruction in Jurisprudence: Features of a Realistic Legal Theory

2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-202
Author(s):  
Brian Z. Tamanaha
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Coercive Force ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Conceptual Analysis ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Planning System ◽  
Universal Feature ◽  
Moral Problems ◽  
Theory Of Law

A century ago the pragmatists called for reconstruction in philosophy. Philosophy at the time was occupied with conceptual analysis, abstractions, a priori analysis, and the pursuit of necessary, universal truths. Pragmatists argued that philosophy instead should center on the pressing problems of the day, which requires theorists to pay attention to social complexity, variation, change, power, consequences, and other concrete aspects of social life. The parallels between philosophy then and jurisprudence today are striking, as I show, calling for a pragmatism-informed theory of law within contemporary jurisprudence. In the wake of H.L.A. Hart’s mid-century turn to conceptual analysis, “during the course of the twentieth century, the boundaries of jurisprudential inquiry were progressively narrowed.”1 Jurisprudence today is dominated by legal philosophers engaged in conceptual analysis built on intuitions, seeking to identify essential features and timeless truths about law. In the pursuit of these objectives, they detach law from its social and historical moorings, they ignore variation and change, they drastically reduce law to a singular phenomenon—like a coercive planning system for difficult moral problems2—and they deny that coercive force is a universal feature of law, among other ways in which they depart from the reality of law; a few prominent jurisprudents even proffer arguments that invoke aliens or societies of angels.

Guarding the Public Interest: England's Coroners and Organ Transplants, 1960–1975

2015 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 926-946 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen MacDonald
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Public Interest ◽  
Spare Part ◽  
Organ Transplants ◽  
Legal Requirement ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Law ◽  
Do So

AbstractFrom the mid-twentieth century, England's coroners were crucial to the supply of organs to transplant, as much of this material was gleaned from the bodies of people who had been involved in accidents. In such situations the law required that a coroner's consent first be obtained lest removing the organs destroy evidence about the cause of the person's death. Surgeons challenged the legal requirement that they seek consent before taking organs, arguing that doing so hampered their quick access to bodies. Some coroners willingly cooperated with surgeons while others refused to do so, coming into conflict with particular transplanters whom they considered untrustworthy. This article examines how the phenomenon of “spare part” surgery challenged long-held conceptions of the coroner's role.

Notes and Queries

1901 ◽  
Vol 47 (197) ◽  
pp. 362-362
Keyword(s):  
A Priori ◽  
Lower Type ◽  
Sense Of Smell ◽  
Do So

Dr. W. Watson (Edinburgh) writes in reference to Dr. Ireland's study of Nietzsche, that Nietzsche's acute sense of smell is very characteristic. He regards it as a reversion to a lower type. But specially Dr. Watson says, “The weakness of his sexual instinct is childlike. He seems to have combined the intellect of a man with the morality of a child. Does such a combination often accompany non-developed sexual instincts? It ought to do so a priori.”

scholarly journals Vile Sovereigns in Bioethical Debate

2013 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Melinda Hall
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Michel Foucault ◽  
Human Enhancement ◽  
Reproductive Technology ◽  
The Body ◽  
Worth Living ◽  
Lecture Series ◽  
The Disabled ◽  
Bioethical Debate ◽  
Do So

<p>In this paper, I critically assess transhumanist philosophy and its influence in bioethics by turning to resources in the work of Michel Foucault. I begin by outlining transhumanism and drawing out some of the primary goals of transhumanist philosophy. In order to do so, I focus on the work of Nick Bostrom and Julian Savulescu, two prominent contributors to this thinking. I then move to explicate Foucault&rsquo;s work, in the early iterations of the <em>Abnormal</em> lecture series, on the concept of vile sovereignty. Foucault used the concept of vile sovereignty to critique psychiatric witnesses that had been utilized in mid twentieth-century French courts of law. Turning back to transhumanism, I analyze transhumanist discourse on the basis of Foucault&rsquo;s vile sovereignty. Transhumanists promote human enhancement in a way that rejects the body&mdash;especially the disabled body&mdash;and pose the question of what lives are worth living, as well as attempt to answer it. I conclude that because of the undeserved influence and ableism of transhumanism, it is important for feminist philosophers, philosophers of disability, and other disability scholars, who collide at the nexus of bioethical debate (especially with regard to reproductive technology and the body), to work together to intervene upon transhumanist discourse.&nbsp; &nbsp;</p><p>Keywords: bioethics; enhancement; Foucault; transhumanism; ableism</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

scholarly journals IX. On the structure and development of the liver

1849 ◽  
Vol 139 ◽  
pp. 109-137 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Royal Society ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Structural Features ◽  
Structure And Function ◽  
Conclusive Evidence ◽  
Interesting Paper ◽  
Biliary Ducts ◽  
And Function ◽  
Do So

In venturing to offer a second communication to the Royal Society respecting the structure of the liver, I feel the rather anxious to do so, that I may have an opportunity of correcting an error and supplying a deficiency which existed in my previous paper. In the following observations I purpose to present some account of the structure of the liver examined in the ascending series of animals, and also to describe the several stages of its evolution in the embryo; in this way I trust I may be able to exhibit the characteristic structural features of the organ as it exists in Man and the higher animals, and also to determine the true place which ought to be assigned to it in a classification of the various glandular organs occurring in the same. I am not aware that any detailed account of the structure of the liver has been recently published, except that by M. Natalis Guillot, which however, so far as I comprehend it, does not seem to be one that can be readily accepted; the idea that the minute biliary ducts and lymphatics originate together in a common net-work, is à priori improbable, and entirely opposed to conclusive evidence (as I think), which will be subsequently adduced. A very interesting paper on the structure and function of the liver has also appeared in the 4th volume of the Guy’s Hospital Reports, from the pen of Dr. Williams; to his labours I shall several times have occasion to refer, but it will be seen that I differ from him in several particulars, especially respecting the importance of the basement or limitary membrane.

Ethics of vaccine refusal

2021 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-107026
Author(s):  
Michael Kowalik
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Moral Obligation ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Free Agent ◽  
Vaccine Refusal ◽  
Vaccine Mandates ◽  
Ethical Norms ◽  
Mandatory Vaccination ◽  
Ethical Basis ◽  
Do So

Proponents of vaccine mandates typically claim that everyone who can be vaccinated has a moral or ethical obligation to do so for the sake of those who cannot be vaccinated, or in the interest of public health. I evaluate several previously undertheorised premises implicit to the ‘obligation to vaccinate’ type of arguments and show that the general conclusion is false: there is neither a moral obligation to vaccinate nor a sound ethical basis to mandate vaccination under any circumstances, even for hypothetical vaccines that are medically risk-free. Agent autonomy with respect to self-constitution has absolute normative priority over reduction or elimination of the associated risks to life. In practical terms, mandatory vaccination amounts to discrimination against healthy, innate biological characteristics, which goes against the established ethical norms and is also defeasible a priori.

Thanatopography

Dismantlings ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 139-159
Author(s):  
Matt Tierney
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Global Network ◽  
Ethical Codes ◽  
The World ◽  
Mutual Obligation ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Communal Responsibility ◽  
Do So

This chapter describes thanatopography as the drawing of a map of death, not the writing of a death. When new technologies respatialize the world, thanatopography teaches that they do so not because they construct a communicative network but instead because they build and distribute sites of machinic killing. In discussing Norbert Wiener's insistence on seeing the planet as a world of Belsen and Hiroshima, thanatopography pares back the presumed connection between technology and humanity, exposing something quite frightening underneath the network. A vision of the world that presumes no common similarities among people and peoples is a vertiginous vision that must see shared connections among extant technologies, not only telecommunication and computation but also war, racism, and dehumanizing labor. Communal responsibility and mutual obligation survive amid such technologies as ethical codes that negotiate difference rather than attempting to transcend it. But they also require a reckoning with very real legacies of twentieth-century machines. In place of the smooth-functioning global network, thanatopography offers a spatio-temporal figuration of mass death.

Reichenbach, Hans (1891–1953)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wesley C. Salmon
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Vienna Circle ◽  
Philosophy Of Physics ◽  
Theory Of Relativity ◽  
Sense Experience ◽  
Space And Time ◽  
The World ◽  
Synthetic A Priori ◽  
And Mathematics

Philosophy of science flourished in the twentieth century, partly as a result of extraordinary progress in the sciences themselves, but mainly because of the efforts of philosophers who were scientifically knowledgeable and who remained abreast of new scientific achievements. Hans Reichenbach was a pioneer in this philosophical development; he studied physics and mathematics in several of the great German scientific centres and later spent a number of years as a colleague of Einstein in Berlin. Early in his career he followed Kant, but later reacted against his philosophy, arguing that it was inconsistent with twentieth-century physics. Reichenbach was not only a philosopher of science, but also a scientific philosopher. He insisted that philosophy should adhere to the same standards of precision and rigour as the natural sciences. He unconditionally rejected speculative metaphysics and theology because their claims could not be substantiated either a priori, on the basis of logic and mathematics, or a posteriori, on the basis of sense-experience. In this respect he agreed with the logical positivists of the Vienna Circle, but because of other profound disagreements he was never actually a positivist. He was, instead, the leading member of the group of logical empiricists centred in Berlin. Although his writings span many subjects Reichenbach is best known for his work in two main areas: induction and probability, and the philosophy of space and time. In the former he developed a theory of probability and induction that contained his answer to Hume’s problem of the justification of induction. Because of his view that all our knowledge of the world is probabilistic, this work had fundamental epistemological significance. In philosophy of physics he offered epoch-making contributions to the foundations of the theory of relativity, undermining space and time as Kantian synthetic a priori categories.

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