Spiritism in Brazil

1968 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 393-405 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald Warren

Spiritism is well on the way to becoming the most national of the religions practiced in Brazil. Yet apart from Christian clergymen, social scientists, and of course Spiritists themselves, few educated people pay much attention to its rapid and wide spread. Although they must see the sensational picture stories frequently appearing in magazines and on screens, they fail to realize that Brazil has become the acknowledged capital of the spiritualistic world in the West. At most they may know that Brazil's most famous mediums get invitations to travel abroad North of the equator and in the Far East a ready coterie awaits these mediums whose best-selling psychographed works find foreign publishers. Spiritist journals, however, play on news of their travels to work up nationalist pride in Brazil as “Heart of the World, Homeland of the Gospel.” That self-regarding expression is the title of a popular national history psychographed (dictated by the Spirit of a deceased person to a medium who writes it down in trance) in 1938. Since then Brazilian Spiritism has grown hugely in national ardor and in numbers.

1963 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 463-466
Author(s):  
E. G. R. Taylor

In 1518 a Spanish gentleman, just back from the West Indies, addressed a Summary of World Geography to his King. In the Dedication he pointed out that since the Pope's Line, which parted the Portuguese and Spanish spheres, ran through the mouth of the River Amazon, 28°W. of Ferro, all the World beyond 150°E. (i.e. 130°E. of Greenwich) lay open to exploitation by Spain. And according to the World Map of the day the area included Java, Japan, King Solomon's Ophir, and (best of all) the Spice Islands or Moluccas from which the Portuguese were already making fabulous fortunes. This gentleman was not the only person to speak to the young King on this matter. The captains and pilots who had opened up the Spice Islands for Portugal were dissatisfied with the rewards which their own King had given them, and a number of them offered their services and their special and secret knowledge to his rival. Ferdinand Magellan was one of them. From his experience in the Far East he was of the opinion that the Moluccas could be safely approached from the west, by way of the Great Ocean. And it should be emphasized that in suggesting this he had no romantic notions about becoming the first man to circumnavigate the globe. He put forward a business pro position which the Spanish King accepted. Immediately the most thorough preparations were set on foot. They included the making of new charts, new globes, new sea-quadrants and sea-astrolabes, by the best pilots and craftsmen of the day, of whom the most were Portuguese.


2001 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-88
Author(s):  
Chang Huai-Chen

As an Oriental, born and raised in Taiwan in strict conformity to the precepts of Buddhist and Confucian ethical patterns for human behaviour and who has spent most of her life in active business throughout the Far East, I would like to say in the first place that China’s contact with the West since the first half of the 19th century is a story full of disturbances. The slow process of adaptation and adjustment of China to the new situation created by Western aggressions was quite haphazard since China’s solid cultural self-consciousness made it underestimate the significance of the impact from the West, and particularly the impact emanating from the Anglo-Saxon part of the world.


2012 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chang Wan-Chen

Historically museums emerged in the West and were subsequently taken up by people in other regions of the world, including the Far East, where the museum was adopted with alacrity by Japanese and Chinese intellectuals. This article explores how China and Japan imagined museums when they first encountered them in the West. It sketches how intellectuals in these two nations began to conduct ‘musealization’, and suggests that the museum in China and Japan was a product of appropriation of Western formats that was, however, deeply influenced by traditional attitudes to cultural preservation and display.


2020 ◽  
Vol 68 ◽  
pp. 29-64
Author(s):  
N.S. Probatova ◽  

The paper summarizes information on chromosome numbers (CNs) of the Grass species (Poaceae) in the flora of Russian Federation, obtained on the original material, most part - from the Russian Far East (RFE). In some species the CNs are known in Russia or in the world only from RFE, in some – from one locality or few, or from one subregion of RFE. The grass species in RFE often occur in mountain regions and near seacoasts; some species are endemics, some were studied near the limits of their geographical distribution areas. The diversity of CNs, the special features of the CNs distribution in some grass groups are discussed. The alien species are abundant in RFE, and their CNs are also involved in the study. For karyologically polymorphous species further studies are needed.


2012 ◽  
Vol 46 ◽  
pp. 235-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
O. M. Afonina ◽  
V. Ya. Cherdantseva

Drummondia sinensis Mull. Hal. var. ussuriensis (Broth.) Vitt has been found in Sokhondinskiy State Nature Biosphere Reserve (Zabaikalsky Territory, Southern Siberia). Earlier it was known in Russia from the southern part of the Far East as well as in north-eastern part of China and North of Mongolia. The type variety of Drummondia sinensis occurs in eastern part of China, Japan and India. Description and illustration of D. sinensis var. ussuriensis based on the material collected in Russia are given, comparison with close taxa is provided, and the world distribution is dicussed.


2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 623-632
Author(s):  
Alexey Andreevich Arzamazov

The study of the manifold ethnocultural heritage of Russia is one of the paramount tasks, potentially the most important area of Russian humanities. At the same time, the literary traditions of the peoples of our country, representing a unique civilizational integrity, spiritual wealth, are of significant scientific interest. Focusing on the problems of the development of "minority" literature and the contexts of its updating, it must be emphasized that this is a complex and theoretically insufficiently comprehended artistic and aesthetic, ethnopsychological, linguistic phenomenon. It should be recognized that at present there is a need for fundamental comparative studies and the development of new approaches to the study of close and distant cultures, literature, and models of the world. The article discusses the realities of the development of a separate "minority" literature at the turn of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries on the example of poetic texts by the Nenets poet Prokopiy Yavtysy. A brief description of the main stages of the formation of the Nenets literature is given, a number of its key features that are important for heterogeneous typological, comparative studies are highlighted. P. Yavtysy’s work represents a set of artistic features and codes of expressiveness that are common to many literary traditions of the native minorities of the Far North, Siberia, and the Far East, and there are also separate stadial and typological correspondences with Finno-Ugric literature of Russia. The main poetic methods and contexts of Yavtysy’s poems are established, the most representative figurative and symbolic strata, plot and situational blocks are determined, the linguistic and poetic component is interpreted. The deep genetic connection of the poetic system of the Nenets author with the folklore and mythological ideas of the Nenets is emphasized. The question of the influence of socialist realism on the artistic rhetoric of P. Yavtysy is raised. In the article, a separate place is occupied by the problem of translating the works by the Nenets author into Russian.


2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 305-312
Author(s):  
Scott Sommers

John Saboe is one of the leading travel YouTubers on the internet, with dozens of podcasts dealing with a wide range of issues on travel throughout East Asia. His current work, The Far East Travels Podcast (https://fareasttravels.com/), receives thousands or even tens of thousands of views. He has been involved in broadcasting for most of his working life. Beginning in high school, John developed an interest spanning audio podcasts, digital podcasts and publishing a digital magazine, in addition to a background working in traditional radio and TV. He has taught at the Columbia Academy in Vancouver and currently runs training seminars in different aspects of internet broadcasting for customers all around the world.


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