scholarly journals Gender and Literature – Is Gender Gendered? Female Protagonists in Macbeth (1606), Thelma and Louise (1991) and A Doll’s House (1879) – Three Different Genres of Literature across Centuries

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 189-192
Author(s):  
Sumie Chan ◽  
Keyword(s):  
William Shakespeare ◽  
Gender Stereotypes ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Binary Opposition ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Close Textual Analysis ◽  
Self Discovery ◽  
Gendered Roles ◽  
Different Cultures ◽  
A Doll's House

This paper examines how men and women have been conventionally portrayed in gender stereotypes in various genres among different cultures through centuries in world literature, with reference to the classical Shakespearean play Macbeth (1606) by the British playwright William Shakespeare, the Hollywood road movie Thelma and Louise (1991) directed by Ridley Scott and A Doll’s House (1879) written by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen. The research will explore the common themes embodied by the notion of gender almost in all literature work in the world which include patriarchy and order, masculinity and femininity, fabrication of identities, and binary opposition with the close textual analysis of the process of self-discovery and empowerment by the female protagonists, Lady Macbeth in Macbeth, Thelma and Louise in Thelma and Louise and Nora in A Doll’s House through the eyes of the male authors, namely playwrights and film director. By comparing the fates of aforementioned female protagonists in the three endings, the actual autonomy that women can take the lead in their life or act outside the normalized gender binaries is further studied. With the analysis of the literary devices and the depiction of the female characters’ psychological change with the visualization of symbols and attires in the texts, the relationship between form and content is also investigated. There is also the discourse analysis on the use of gendered language through soliloquies and dialogues, implication of gender roles in society and culture and the consequences of these females in transcending the gendered roles.

scholarly journals Portrayal of smoking in Nigerian online videos: a medium for tobacco advertising and promotion?

2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Adegoke Oloruntoba Adelufosi ◽  
Olukayode Abayomi
Keyword(s):  
Tobacco Use ◽  
English Language ◽  
Home Video ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Home Videos ◽  
Search Terms ◽  
Cigarette Brand ◽  
Online Videos ◽  
Different Cultures ◽  
Specific Search

The Nigerian home video industry, popularly known as <em>Nollywood</em> is a booming industry, with increasing numbers of easily accessible online videos. The aim of this study was to analyse the contents of popular Nigerian online videos to determine the prevalence of smoking imageries and their public health implications. Using specific search terms, popular English language and indigenous Yoruba language, Nigerian home videos uploaded on <em>YouTube</em> in 2013 were identified and sorted based on their view counts. Data on smoking related scenes such as smoking incidents, context of tobacco use, depiction of cigarette brand, gender of smokers and film rating were collected. Of the 60 online videos whose contents were assessed in this study, 26 (43.3%) had scenes with cigarrete smoking imageries. The mean (SD) smoking incident was 2.7 (1.6), giving an average of one smoking incident for every 26 to 27 min of film. More than half (53.8%) of the films with tobacco use had high smoking imageries. An average of 2 characters per film smoked, mostly in association with acts of criminality or prostitution (57.7%) and alcohol use (57.7%). There were scenes of the main protagonists smoking in 73.1% of the films with scenes of female protagonists smoking (78.9%) more than the male protagonists (21.1%). Smoking imageries are common in popular Nigerian online movies. Given the wide reach of online videos, their potential to be viewed by people from different cultures and to negatively influence youngsters, it is important that smoking portrayals in online movies are controlled.

scholarly journals Cultural Transfer as New Methodology of Comparative Research on Cooperation of Cultures

2019 ◽  
pp. 71-81
Author(s):  
Halyna Syvachenko
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Comparative Studies ◽  
Cultural Theory ◽  
Binary Opposition ◽  
Cultural Transfer ◽  
Cultural Space ◽  
Priority Direction ◽  
History Of ◽  
Simultaneous Study ◽  
Different Cultures

A theory of cultural transfer was the branch of comparative literary criticism, although this theory declared its sharp opposition against the mentioned tradition of study. The comparative studies in humanities are based on the ideas of specificity of every culture, even when one deals with the influence of one culture on another. Instead of this approach, the theory of cultural transfer promotes not only a simultaneous study of several cultural and national spaces but also a research on disseminations and transformations that appear at any rapprochement between cultures both in an influential culture and in a perceiving one. Consequently, it is not the binary opposition that must be taken into account in cultural transfer but two cultures, one of which is necessarily comprehended as a culture-recipient, although the whole scheme is much more complicated. Any transition from one cultural space into another easily may cause some transformation. Other ‘new element’ in the theory of cultural transfer is positioning the study of a cultural space periphery, i. e. connections with alien cultural space that every culture necessarily supports, in a center. This approach demonstrates that any phenomenon, no matter how specifically national it may be, actually is a complicated alloy of different cultures and influences. The objects of cultural transfer include the history of translation. Another priority direction is a comparative study of the national forms of comparativism related to the history of intellectual and spiritual relations between different countries and nations. During the transfer from one cultural situation into another any object gets into another context and acquires a new meaning. As focus of attention of a theory and studies of translation was shifting to the context of creation, operation and perception of translations, the research on the translated texts increasingly crossed the boundaries of the related disciplines that enabled learning this context – sociology, comparative studies, economics, history, cultural studies. The scholars aim to indicate the ways of manipulating the readers via translation, to explicate interests and values brought with every translation, to show how it forms the culture-receiver and values of society. The most attention is paid to the issues of ideology, economy and politics, the problems of ethnic responsibility of the translator. The object of cultural translation studies is the text in the system of literary and extra-literary meanings within the initial and receiving cultures. Cultural theory of translation raises the question of cultural prestige of the selected texts and determines the basis of this selection, the principles of forming and changing their status. One may focus also on the role of the commentator as an intermediary between the translator of the text and the readers to whom the translator wants to make his way through.

scholarly journals Canned Adaptations and International Success of Turkish TV

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (17) ◽  
pp. 93
Author(s):  
Deniz Zorlu
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
South America ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
South Asia ◽  
Limited Range ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Recent Success ◽  
Close Textual Analysis ◽  
International Success

This article examines Turkish TV series’ recent success as canned programming primarily in newly developed and developing countries in Eastern Europe, the Balkans, the Middle East, South Asia, and South America through close textual analysis of a particularly popular Turkish adaptation, Bizim Hikaye (Our Story) (2017–2019) in comparison with its original, Shameless (2011–). I argue that Turkish series’ emphasis on nostalgic and melancholic narrative frames make them particularly appealing in these regions, as they deal with relatable circumstances of swift and traumatic changes under neoliberalism. However, female protagonists are allowed only a limited range of roles because of the reliance on nostalgia, thus, ultimately serving to re-legitimize patriarchal relations of domination.

scholarly journals A Comparative Study in the (myth of Pygmalion) between Bernard Shaw and Sadeq Hedayat

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Literature ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Latin Literature ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
The World ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Many ◽  
Bernard Shaw ◽  
Different Cultures ◽  
European Renaissance

In our time, not too long ago, the universities of the world have been fast to take care of the study of an innovative type of technical and human studies, called the science of "comparative literature". Comparative research studies have grown and flourished rapidly in response to the demands of both mental and artistic life. This shows the increasing awareness at both the modern national and the international levels in order to develop through connecting with the international intellectual, nental and artistic currents to nurture ethics and originality. Comparative studies show that the beginning of the comparative literature goes back to the time when the Latin literature was connected to the Greek literature and the comparative literature was shaped in the era of European Renaissance. Today, it is one of the most authentic sciences in universities, with complex branches, due to its being an inevitable result of increasing human awareness and the result of the great demand by the conscious public to benefit from the many human and cognitive aspects provided by the comparative literature through its connection with the heritage of the world literature and unity of the human spirit in its past and present. One of the most important factors of the prosperity of any civilization is the degree of contact with and benefit from other civilizations. Long time ago, different cultures were used to enrich each other, and the relationship between cultures took many forms such as imitation, translation, influencing others, as well as the exchange of information between cultures, in addition to intellectual and cultural invasion and domination. It is impossible to imagine that a particular culture evolved without any contact with other cultures. Instead, any isolated culture certainly suffered from deterioration.

scholarly journals Volkswagen Blues: Rebirth through communication

SURG Journal ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 8-10
Author(s):  
Andrea Portt
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
San Francisco ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Cultural Backgrounds ◽  
Landing Point ◽  
Oregon Trail ◽  
Self Discovery ◽  
The Many ◽  
Different Cultures

Jacques Poulin’s novel Volkswagen Blues traces the author Jack Waterman’s journey of self-discovery from Jacques Cartier’s landing point in Gaspé, south down the oyageurs’ route via the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi, and finally est along the pioneers’ Oregon Trail to San Francisco. Throughout the trip, Jack encounters figures from the many different cultural backgrounds and periods that were important in the creation of today’s multicultural and plurilingual North America. The narrator uses a mixture of languages throughout the novel to emphasize these different cultures and eras, and to call attention to the importance of language to human existence and society. Jack finds self-reconciliation by accepting his connection to others through contact with these other cultures and languages.

scholarly journals The Last Mother: From Enrico Pau’s L’accabadora (2015) to Valeria Golino’s Miele (2013)

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 85-95
Author(s):  
Bernadette Luciano
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
World War ◽  
Female Figure ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Physical Mobility ◽  
Care Giving ◽  
Spanish Word ◽  
The World ◽  
Self Discovery ◽  
Political Landscapes

L'accabadora, is a Sardinian term deriving from the Spanish word 'acabar' which means to finish or complete. It refers to a female figure in Sardinian popular tradition, 'the last mother', an angel of mercy who assists the terminally ill in leaving the world. In this paper I explore variations of this female figure in two contemporary films. Enrico Pau's film L'accabadora set in pre- and World War II Sardinia, revolves around a protagonist (Annetta) who is a direct descendant of this Sardinian tradition. The second film, Valerio Golino's Miele, proposes what might be considered a contemporary variant of the Sardinian folk figure. While the tabu subject of euthanasia certainly forms the backdrop to the films, what is foregrounded is the isolation and alienation of the female protagonists who carry out care-giving roles tied to death. Torn between the conviction that the tasks they perform as “last mothers” console or provide final moments of serenity to the dying and an intangible discomfort with their execution of the task, they remain seemingly haunted by their roles, exhibiting an unease that arises from societal discomfort with administering death and a profession that requires that they direct their care to the dying rather than to the living. The representation of the films’ protagonists, their framing and the construction of the journeys they undertake, turn both films into narratives of self-discovery, motivated by encounters with others and otherness, and visually configured by the physical mobility across transformed geo-political landscapes that is central to the films.

FALLING DOWN IN ORDER TO GROW UP: TWO WOMEN’S JOURNEYS FROM UN-DOMESTICATION TO DOMESTICATION IN FANTASY FICTION

Mousaion ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-91
Author(s):  
Deirdre Byrne ◽  
Mary-Anne Potter
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Binary Opposition ◽  
Specific Process ◽  
Fantasy Fiction ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Alice In Wonderland ◽  
Female Protagonist ◽  
Poststructuralist Theory ◽  
Looking Glass

AbstractIn this article, following the convention adopted in The annotated Alice (Gardner 2000), the authors refer to the combined volume of Lewis Carroll’s works – entitled Alice in Wonderland – which includes Alice’s adventures in Wonderland and Through the looking-glass – as ‘the Alice texts’. In the Alice texts, Alice is presented as a Victorian female protagonist who has to ‘fall down’ in order to ‘grow up’. This is also true of Yvaine in Neil Gaiman’s Victorian-based novel, Stardust (1999). Both protagonists experience ‘falling down’, which also carries the symbolic weight of being an act of submission – falling into a subordinate state. In looking at the significance of the opposing movements up and down as indicative of a specific process of female domestication, postmodern and poststructuralist theory explains how this binary opposition fulfils a specific didactic function in Victorian and Victorian-based fairy tale narratives. Historical approaches to Victorian society also demonstrate the submissive role assigned to women in Victorian society. While ‘un-domestication’ is rejected in favour of domestic submission in Carroll’s and Gaiman’s narratives, ‘un-domestication’ results in the liberation of their central female protagonists in the filmic revisionings, Alice in Wonderland (2010), directed by Tim Burton, and Stardust (2007), directed by Matthew Vaughn.

The World Is Her Oyster: Negotiating Contemporary White Womanhood in Hollywood’s Tourist Spaces

2018 ◽  
pp. 31-57
Author(s):  
Kendra Marston
Keyword(s):  
White Woman ◽  
Urban Environments ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
Spiritual Journey ◽  
Female Protagonists ◽  
Creative Writers ◽  
Neoliberal Capitalism ◽  
The Us ◽  
Self Discovery ◽  
White Womanhood

This chapter analyses Hollywood tourist romances Eat Pray Love and Under the Tuscan Sun as examples of texts in which the burdened white woman transcends her melancholic state as a result of travelling beyond US borders. The female protagonists in both films are creative writers who feel stifled by their urban environments and discover that the value systems they encounter outside the US allow them to feel creatively reinvigorated as well as liberated from societal dictates that declare true happiness to reside in marriage, upward mobility, and bodily discipline. In these films, the tourist zone must appear to exist independently of the globalising forces of neoliberal capitalism, with the heroines’ belief that they are divinely guided on a spiritual journey of self-discovery constituting a shift away from the secular ideologies of neoliberalism and postfeminism, while also operating as a form of white exceptionalism within the foreign space.

Introduction: Addressing the politics of fear. The challenge posed by pluralism to Europe

2011 ◽  
Vol 37 (4) ◽  
pp. 371-382 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giancarlo Bosetti
Keyword(s):  
Religious Communities ◽  
Intercultural Dialogue ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Binary Opposition ◽  
Current State ◽  
Constructive Dialogue ◽  
Politics Of Fear ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Fear Mongering ◽  
Different Cultures

The introduction to this issue is meant to address the ways in which turbulent immigration is challenging European democratic countries’ capacity to integrate the pluralism of cultures in light of the current state of economic instability, strong public debt, unemployment and an aging resident population. The Reset-Dialogues on Civilizations Association has organized its annual İstanbul Seminars in order to fill the need for constructive dialogue dedicated to increasing understanding and implementing social and political change. Turkey’s accession to the European Union represents in this light a challenge to our liberal views, which must become more open-minded in order to address adequately cultural and religious differences, Islam included. We must set ourselves the task of finding a new perspective so that we may defuse the populist radicalization, fear-mongering politicians and xenophobia that are emerging in many countries. Yet it is equally essential that we reconfigure and recontextualize the traditional secular battle for freedom from the dominance of the Christian majority away from a binary opposition to a plural dimension that takes into account other religious communities. After introducing the major challenges our seminars were organized to address, the introduction will summarize and explain the articulation of the contents of this issue in the following three parts: (1) realigning liberalism in the context of globalization (with contributions by Nilüfer Göle, Alain Touraine, Albena Azmanova, Stephen Macedo, Zygmunt Bauman); (2) different paths: towards modernity and democracy from within different cultures and religions (Fred Dallmayr, Sadik Al Azm, Irfan Ahmad, Ibrahim Kalin); and (3) philosophical presuppositions of intercultural dialogue and multiculturalism (Maeve Cooke, Sebastiano Maffettone, Volker Kaul).

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