scholarly journals Hasya: Towards a Poetics of the Comic

Author(s):  
Jagannath Basu ◽  

Amidst a whole range of criticism and derision that laughter has received down the ages, the question still lingers: why “One daren’t even laugh any more”? The comic, according to Aristotle, is associated with the ridiculous or the ugly. It constitutes a deformity or an error and leans towards something which is mean. The comedy, on the other hand, is a form of low art consisting of what is base or inferior. This view of the comic and comedy has largely been accepted and forwarded by the West. They have looked down upon the comic with a one-dimensional view of derision and condemnation. As Lisa Trahair correctly states, “to comprehend the comic is to risk overlooking the structure of incomprehensibility that is crucial to its operation”. Although often considered as a synonym for humour or laughter, hâsya, on the other hand, is much more than that. Hâsya always enabled us to understand comic’s implications in the object world and vice versa. It is not only enigmatic but also esoteric in nature. Through a select study of VidûSaka (the deformed clown in Sanskrit theatre) and two poems— one a Sanskrit Muktaka and the other a Nind?-stuti, this paper intends to read the potentialities of hâsya as an-other laughter, not just as a mode of gay affirmation or subversion but as a mode of “free play” (ju), within the space that exists between the self and the other(s). This, however, by no means is an attempt to conceive hâsya only as a disruptive event with the intentions of the ‘Empire writing back’, rather a wish to hermeneutically comprehend the harmony of the comic within the dimensions of Indian aesthetics, so that the poetics of laughter can be retrieved and reclaimed.

Author(s):  
Stefan Krause ◽  
Markus Appel

Abstract. Two experiments examined the influence of stories on recipients’ self-perceptions. Extending prior theory and research, our focus was on assimilation effects (i.e., changes in self-perception in line with a protagonist’s traits) as well as on contrast effects (i.e., changes in self-perception in contrast to a protagonist’s traits). In Experiment 1 ( N = 113), implicit and explicit conscientiousness were assessed after participants read a story about either a diligent or a negligent student. Moderation analyses showed that highly transported participants and participants with lower counterarguing scores assimilate the depicted traits of a story protagonist, as indicated by explicit, self-reported conscientiousness ratings. Participants, who were more critical toward a story (i.e., higher counterarguing) and with a lower degree of transportation, showed contrast effects. In Experiment 2 ( N = 103), we manipulated transportation and counterarguing, but we could not identify an effect on participants’ self-ascribed level of conscientiousness. A mini meta-analysis across both experiments revealed significant positive overall associations between transportation and counterarguing on the one hand and story-consistent self-reported conscientiousness on the other hand.


2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 80-93
Author(s):  
Jort de Vreeze ◽  
Christina Matschke

Abstract. Not all group memberships are self-chosen. The current research examines whether assignments to non-preferred groups influence our relationship with the group and our preference for information about the ingroup. It was expected and found that, when people are assigned to non-preferred groups, they perceive the group as different to the self, experience negative emotions about the assignment and in turn disidentify with the group. On the other hand, when people are assigned to preferred groups, they perceive the group as similar to the self, experience positive emotions about the assignment and in turn identify with the group. Finally, disidentification increases a preference for negative information about the ingroup.


Author(s):  
Stacy Wolf

This chapter examines the eight female characters inCompany, what they do in the musical, and how they function in the show’s dramaturgy, and argues that they elicit the quintessential challenge of analyzing musical theater from a feminist perspective. On the one hand, the women tend to be stereotypically, even msogynistically portrayed. On the other hand, each character offers the actor a tremendous performance opportunity in portraying a complicated psychology, primarily communicated through richly expressive music and sophisticated lyrics. In this groundbreaking 1970 ensemble musical about a bachelor’s encounters with five married couples and three girlfriends, Sondheim’s female characters occupy a striking range of types within one show. From the bitter, acerbic, thrice-married Joanne to the reluctant bride-to-be Amy, and from the self-described “dumb” “stewardess” April to the free-spirited Marta,Company’s eight women are distillations of femininity, precisely sketched in the short, singular scenes in which they appear.


2009 ◽  
Vol 37 (6) ◽  
pp. 805-810
Author(s):  
Baoshan Zhang ◽  
Jun-Yan Zhao ◽  
Guoliang Yu

An examination was carried out of the influences of concealing academic achievement on self-esteem in an academically relevant social interaction based on the assumption that concealing socially devalued characteristics should influence individuals' self-esteem during social interactions. An interview paradigm called for school-aged adolescents who either were or were not low (academic) achievers to play the role of students who were or were not low achievers while answering academically relevant questions. The data suggest that the performance self-esteem of low achievers who played the role of good students was more positive than that of low achievers who played the role of low achievers. On the other hand, participants who played the role of good students had more positive performance self-esteem than did participants who played the role of low achievers.


Rhetorik ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jens Fischer

Abstract According to the self-image of lawyers, jurisprudence is a science: the premises in legal conclusions are truth-apt, as are the conclusions or judgements that follow from them, the cognition of true law is consequently regarded as their task. Against this background, a program that understands and analyzes law as the product of a rhetorical practice is confronted with fierce resistance. According to the research of analytical legal rhetoric, on the other hand, the evidence for a rhetorical imprint on law is overwhelming: starting with the logical status of legal inferences, to the peculiarities of judicial procedure, to the motivational situation of those involved in it, everywhere it becomes apparent that the image of strict truth-orientation inadequately describes the genesis of law. Following Aristotle, who assigned law to the field of phrónēsis and not to epistēmē, contemporary legal rhetoric research aims to draw a realistic picture of the genesis of law. Subdivided into the triad of logos, ethos, and pathos, it attempts to fully grasp the interrelationships involved. It becomes apparent that the rational or argumentative dimension is far from dominating in legal justifications. It is precisely at the neuralgic point, i.e., where arguments are opposed to each other, that the rhetor typically uses a rhetorical figure that links all levels of the triad: the restrictio.


2021 ◽  
pp. 64-73
Author(s):  
Irena DIMOVA

The proposed article examines two problems – the poetic formations (generations and groups) and the manifestations of "narcissism" in poetry. Two Slovak authors, representatives of different literary formations, are analyzed - Michal Habaj of the so-called Text Generation and Katarína Kucbelová of the ANesthetic Generation. Both their affiliation to these creative associations and the nature of the latter is discussed. In order to understand these literary phenomena, we use Karl Mannheim’s concept of generation and Michał Głowiński’s approach to literary groups. The interpretation of selected texts by the two poets is based on the view of contemporary culture as a "culture of narcissism" (Kr. Lash) and on the reflection on this concept, which we find in a literary-critical article by Katarína Kucbelová herself on Michal Habaj. Her reflection on the fragile boundary between narcissism as a theme and narcissism as deficiency of interpreted work we try to apply on her own poetry texts. The selected poems are from her poetry book “Duals” (Duály), which identifies her as part of the so-called ‘new sincerity’ in Slovak literature. In her texts, Katarína Kucbelová thematizes the closure of the lyrical self within its own existence, in which the presence of the other is allowed only as a concept or an idea. Michal Habaj's experimentalism in “Poems for Dead Girls” (Básne pre mŕtve dievčatá), on the other hand, "opens" his textual world, binds him to many discourses and distances him from the self.


2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (7) ◽  
pp. 2206-2209
Author(s):  
Nahit Özdayi

Aim: This paper aims to analyse the self-efficacies of coaches of different branches. Methods: This study, which was conducted by using coach self-efficacy scale, reached totally 192 volunteering coaches who lived in Çanakkale and Balıkesir. The data collected were then analysed on the SPSS programme. The kurtosis and skewness values were examined so as to check the distribution of the data, and consequently, the data were found to have normal distribution. Results: As a result, statistically significant differences were found between the coaches aged 28-32 and coaches aged 33-37 in their levels of self-efficacy in general and in the sub-factor of efficacy in impersonating. Accordingly, the coaches who were in 28-32 age group had higher self-efficacy and efficacy in impersonating than the ones who were in 33-37 age group. On the other hand, there were no statistically significant differences between the participants’ levels of self-efficacy according to gender, branch and professional experience. Conclusion: The coaches in the 28-32 age group were found to have higher self-efficacy and efficacy in impersonating than the coaches in the 33-37 age group on examining the results obtained. No differences were found between the participants in the other factors. Key Words: Self-efficacy, coaches, sport


1906 ◽  
Vol 3 (5) ◽  
pp. 206-216 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. B. Hill

The author, who has long been engaged on the Palæozoics of West Cornwall, divided the killas extending westward from Gerrans Bay into four groups that formed a natural sequence. Moreover, as they included definite Lower Silurian horizons, as characterized by the fossiliferous quartzite of Carne, these divisions were linked with the Lower Palæozoics. They consist of the Veryan, Portscatho, Falmouth, and Mylor groups. On the latest issues of the old Survey maps the area occupied by the first of these divisions is coloured as Silurian, and the region occupied by the remainder as Devonian. That colouring, however, was not adopted by De la Beche, who surveyed the region, nor was it the result of any subsequent survey of the area. In the original Geological Survey map of Cornwall the killas was separated by De la Beche into two divisions, viz., a grauwacke group and a carbonaceous series. Thus, the former lying below the Culm-measures was undifferentiated for the reason, as explained in his Report, that the progress of geology at that time only warranted the broadest generalizations. He moreover expressed the opinion that the terms Cambrian and Silurian should be restricted to the areas that gave rise to the prolonged researches of Murchison and Sedgwick, and deprecated the extension of that nomenclature to districts that had not received the same detailed investigations. In a later and undated issue of the map the grauwacke group is divided into Devonian and Silurian, presumably by the authority Sir Roderick Murchison. The Devonian colour was not only applied to fossiliferous strata in East and Mid Cornwall, but was extended over the unfossiliferous strata in the west. The Silurian tint, on the other hand, was restricted to a zone that had yielded organic remains. Murchison, however, was of opinion that the older zone extended far beyond those limits into the barren strata coloured as Devonian, and it is evident that the latter tint was adopted as a matter of convenience, as no re-examination of the area seems to have been undertaken. The known Silurian region was confined to the coastal belt between Chapel Point and Gerrans Bay, a boundary connecting those localities admitting of the ready isolation of that zone from the rest of the country. That such a broad generalization, however, was only regarded as provisional may be inferred from the absence of a line on the map between the two divisions. It will be seen, therefore, that the subdivision of the killas, as the result of the recent survey, neither invalidates the map published by De la Beche nor the subsequent conclusions of Murcliison. It has, on the other hand, not only brought their generalizations within more definite limits, but has carried the investigation a step farther by demonstrating the relations between the older and newer Palæozoics of Cornwall.


2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-24
Author(s):  
Akmal Hawi

The 19th century to the 20th century is a moment in which Muslims enter a new gate, the gate of renewal. This phase is often referred to as the century of modernism, a century where people are confronted with the fact that the West is far ahead of them. This situation made various responses emerging, various Islamic groups responded in different ways based on their Islamic nature. Some respond with accommodative stance and recognize that the people are indeed doomed and must follow the West in order to rise from the downturn. Others respond by rejecting anything coming from the West because they think it is outside of Islam. These circles believe Islam is the best and the people must return to the foundations of revelation, this circle is often called the revivalists. One of the figures who is an important figure in Islamic reform, Jamaluddin Al-Afghani, a reformer who has its own uniqueness, uniqueness, and mystery. Departing from the division of Islamic features above, Afghani occupies a unique position in responding to Western domination of Islam. On the one hand, Afghani is very moderate by accommodating ideas coming from the West, this is done to improve the decline of the ummah. On the other hand, however, Afghani appeared so loudly when it came to the question of nationality or on matters relating to Islam. As a result, Afghani traces his legs on two different sides, he is a modernist but also a fundamentalist. 


Sociologija ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 289-312
Author(s):  
Dragoljub Kaurin

This paper is centrally concerned with discussing critically and rethinking the theoretical concepts put forward by Oswald Spengler in Decline of the West and Arnold Toynbee in A Study of History. It focuses on the theoretical, heuristic and epistemological value of these theories in the era of renaissance of philosophic history in some quarters (see for example Graham, 2002) and cooperation between social sciences. Spengler is credited with the idea of historical cycles, rethinking of the progressivist view and discovering a radically different approach to the study of the human past, which is embodied in his idea of culture as the proper unit for historical and sociological study. However, some of his views proved to be intrinsically intellectually dubious, but on the whole, his was a major contribution to the study of social change. Arnold Toynbee on the other hand was more empirically and sociologically oriented, while Spengler?s views are more heavily philosophical. Toynbee partly developed his ideas rather consistently, but at the same time included many unclear and inaccurate points in his theory. Both authors can be rightfully considered to be classical authors in this field and both provided incentive for studies that cross-cut social sciences (philosophy, history, sociology). Moreover, Decline of the West and A Study of History are truly post-disciplinary works.


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