scholarly journals Silence, Guilt and Insidious Trauma in Auden’s Early Poems

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristina Pividori

  Silence, Guilt and Insidious Trauma in Auden’s Early Poems   The title of the book of poems published in 1941, The Double Man, defines much of W.H. Auden’s life, constantly driven by a sense of duality and paradox. The double functions as a complex, subtle phenomenon in Auden’s case: It highlights an unresolvable tension between his private and public persona. The search for a compromise between personal wishes and social duties is a recurring theme in Auden’s later works but appears with particular intensity in the poems of his youth, resulting in a complex entanglement in which the poet’s identity is often (traumatically) negotiated. Since Auden’s life extended throughout most of the 20th-century—he was born in 1907, in York, and died in Vienna in 1973—his work provides a useful lens through which to examine some of the events that would change the world in unprecedented ways. For much of his career, he was worried about the impact his homosexuality would have on his attempt to fashion himself as a public poet, as the risk of public scandal and even imprisonment was high in Britain and the US until the late 1960s, and the issue of his homosexuality remains one of the most significant contexts for the study of Auden and of the ways he imagined himself. The impossibility of coming out in the 1920s, when he was an adolescent, posed a heavy burden on him and determined to a great extent his future identity and thus his way of life as a whole. Until now, however, the question of how Auden’s earlier poetic output, that is the 1922-1927 poems, has been “marked and structured and indeed necessitated and propelled by the historical shapes of homophobia, for instance, by the contingencies and geographies of the highly permeable closet” (Sedgwick 165), has remained largely overlooked, and much uncertainty still exists about the extent to which the poet’s “coming out” experience circulated in the vicinity of trauma and was marked by it.

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Rosa Linde ◽  
Carlos Eduardo Siqueira

Zika virus infection during pregnancy is a cause of congenital brain abnormalities. Its consequences to pregnancies has made governments, national and international agencies issue advices and recommendations to women. There is a clear need to investigate how the Zika outbreak affects the decisions that women take concerning their lives and the life of their families, as well as how women are psychologically and emotionally dealing with the outbreak. We conducted a qualitative study to address the impact of the Zika epidemic on the family life of women living in Brazil, Puerto Rico, and the US, who were affected by it to shed light on the social repercussions of Zika. Women were recruited through the snowball sampling technique and data was collected through semi-structured interviews. We describe the effects in mental health and the coping strategies that women use to deal with the Zika epidemic. Zika is taking a heavy toll on women’s emotional well-being. They are coping with feelings of fear, helplessness, and uncertainty by taking drastic precautions to avoid infection that affect all areas of their lives. Coping strategies pose obstacles in professional life, lead to social isolation, including from family and partner, and threaten the emotional and physical well-being of women. Our findings suggest that the impacts of the Zika epidemic on women may be universal and global. Zika infection is a silent and heavy burden on women’s shoulders.


2020 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 1364-1390
Author(s):  
Zoran Nedeljković

The author has given a socio-cultural interpretation of the phenomenon of laughter in the film "The Joker" (Todd, Phillips, 2019) as an individual as well as a social phenomenon of Western civilization. He considers the difference between the concepts of utopia, dystopia and utopistics as a possible solution to the problem that would avoid an optimistic and pessimistic view of the future of humanity. The author seeks a civilization parallel between the fictional world of film and the cultural elements of today. The necrophilic atmosphere of Gotham City is strikingly reminiscent of the spiritual lethargy that characterizes the postmodern metropolises of the 21st century. The fate of the film's protagonist could afflict any individual on our planet if they came to the realization that they are a personality, that they have created themselves, and that on their own spiritual skin they have felt the misunderstanding of others who do not wish to stand out from the crowd. The author notes that many protesters against the governing structures of the oligarchy of states around the world have identified themselves in their protest with the Joker, an anti-hero who in a century of tolerance defends with laughter when he feels that his existence is threatened. In this film, the Joker is the personification of a diseased society. Todd Philips' work is an attempt to draw attention to the fact that the stratification of the human community can lead to the breakdown of social relations, however much the governing establishment's media seek to entertain and laugh at masses of proletarians and homeless people without a cultural identity through entertainment shows. The impact of the film, as a work of art, was visible immediately after its broadcast in public. The failed clown Joker could not cure himself with laughter because his laughing was "crying upside down" out of despair that was contrary to the hope of a man who could seek the meaning of his life in two Christian virtues: faith and love. However, the author of this text offers a solution by reminding of the way of life of a specific person, which would save the world from moral panic. He introduces us to a man with an accomplished existence of being a clown and a university professor at the same time - E. Kiphard (1923-2010), who lived to help fellow men with a mission to treat people with laughter rather than to defend them with the Joker's unnatural and contagious laughter of an anti-utopian resident.


Author(s):  
Grzegorz Zając

The economic crises of the 21st century have severely damaged the world economy. The first big crisis began in 2008 with the bankruptcy of one of the largest banks in the US, the Lehman Brothers Bank. The next crisis mainly affected Europe and was associated with the disclosure by the Greek government in 2009 of the dire state of public finances and huge monetary embezzlement. This crisis had a negative impact on many European countries belonging to the euro zone, as well as on many other countries outside this area, indirectly reducing investment or limiting international trade. Another crisis is related to the coronavirus pandemic announced at the beginning of 2020. At that time, most countries in the world have made a "lockdown" of the economy for many weeks. Various sectors of the economy were restricted or completely shut down almost overnight, seriously affecting societies


Author(s):  
Howell E. Jackson ◽  
Jeffery Y. Zhang

This chapter examines the impact of private and public enforcement of securities regulation on the development of capital markets. After a review of the literature, it considers empirical findings related to private and public enforcement as measured by formal indices and resources, with particular emphasis on the link between enforcement intensity and technical measures of financial market performance. It then analyses the impact of cross-border flows of capital, valuation effects, and cross-listing decisions by corporate issuers before turning to a discussion of whether countries that dedicate more resources to regulatory reform behave differently in some areas of market activities. It also explores the enforcement of banking regulation and its relationship to financial stability and concludes by focusing on direct and indirect, resource-based evidence on the efficacy of the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s enforcement actions.


2015 ◽  
Vol 59 (11) ◽  
pp. 31-37
Author(s):  
N. Arbatova

The Euro-Atlantic relations after the end of the Cold war have been strongly influenced by the impact of three interrelated crises: the existential crisis of NATO, the world economic and financial crisis, and the crisis in the Russia-West relations. The end of bipolarity has changed the threat environment and revealed how different alliance members formulate their threat perception and foreign policy interests. Europe stopped to be the US foreign policy priority. The US pivot to Asia has raised European concerns about American commitments to collective defense. The removal of the threat of a global conflict resulted in the EU initiatives aimed at promoting integration in the field of common security and defense policy (CSDP). Even though the US has officially welcomed a stronger European pillar in NATO, it has become concerned about new approaches that could divide transatlantic partnership and take resources away from military cooperation. At the same time the unilateralist preferences of the Bush administration generated deep political divisions between the United States and the European Union. The world economic and financial crisis contributed to a dangerous gulf between American and European defense spending. The US has complained about the tendency of the alliance’s European members to skimp on defense spending and take advantage of America’s security shield to free ride. In the absence of a clear external threat NATO tried to draft new missions, which were found in NATO’s expansion to the post-Communist space and Alliance’s out of area operations. But these new missions could not answer the main question about NATO’s post-bipolar identity. Moreover, the Kosovo operation of NATO in 1999 fueled Russia’s concerns about NATO’s intentions in the post-Soviet space. The creeping crisis in the Russia-West relations resulted in the Caucasus and Ukrainian conflicts that provided kind of glue to transatlantic relations but did not return them to the old pattern. There can be several representing possible futures lying ahead. But under any scenario EU will be faced with a necessity to shoulder more of the burden of their own security.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 1444
Author(s):  
Jungran Cho ◽  
Emma Kyoungseo Hong ◽  
Jeongho Yoo ◽  
Inkyo Cheong

Various risks and uncertainties are strengthening the downside of the global economy. This paper aims to estimate the impact of the US–China conflict and the World Trade Organization (WTO) Appellate Body’s shutdown on global logistics demand and to show the seriousness of the situation. Existing literature studies on protectionism or the US–China trade conflict were considered, with a focus on the effects of specific issues or impact on bilateral relations. No research has quantitatively considered the adverse effects of the Appellate Body’s shutdown. In this situation, questions can be raised whether the current global shipping logistics system can be sustainable or not. This paper attempts to estimate the shrinking demand for shipping logistics due to global protectionism. Using a dynamic general equilibrium model and trade-cargo-container conversion methodology, which differentiates this paper from previous studies, the paper suggests that the combination of tariffs and NTBs can severely reduce international trade and the demand for maritime logistics services. Depending on the scenario, port cargo is expected to decrease by 3.95 to 6.9 trillion tons, which can be half of the global cargo. Based on these estimates, this paper suggests that a catastrophe could occur in global trade order as well as global maritime logistics. Finally, underlining that the international trade order should not be severely damaged, this paper proposes that countries around the world should seriously discuss this issue at the 12th WTO Trade Ministers’ Meeting in Kazakhstan in June 2020.


Author(s):  
Amalendu Bhunia ◽  
Devrim Yaman

This paper examines the relationship between asset volatility and leverage for the three largest economies (based on purchasing power parity) in the world; US, China, and India. Collectively, these economies represent Int$56,269 billion of economic power, making it important to understand the relationship among these economies that provide valuable investment opportunities for investors. We focus on a volatile period in economic history starting in 1997 when the Asian financial crisis began. Using autoregressive models, we find that Chinese stock markets have the highest volatility among the three stock markets while the US stock market has the highest average returns. The Chinese market is less efficient than the US and Indian stock markets since the impact of new information takes longer to be reflected in stock prices. Our results show that the unconditional correlation among these stock markets is significant and positive although the correlation values are low in magnitude. We also find that past market volatility is a good indicator of future market volatility in our sample. The results show that positive stock market returns result in lower volatility compared to negative stock market returns. These results demonstrate that the largest economies of the world are highly integrated and investors should consider volatility and leverage besides returns when investing in these countries.


2012 ◽  
Vol 222 ◽  
pp. F2-F2

World growth is expected to remain below trend at 3.1 per cent in 2012 and 3.4 per cent in 2013.The Euro Area is forecast to contract by 0.5 per cent this year and grow only marginally next year with unemployment reaching ‘depression-era’ rates in some periphery economies. The US is likely to grow by 2 per cent in each year.Growth in Brazil, Russia, India and China will be below long-term potential next year, although ‘hard-landings’ will be avoided; the impact on advanced economies will be offset by a large gain in competitiveness.Debt to GDP ratios in OECD countries will, on average, be higher in 2014 than at present.


2008 ◽  
Vol 205 ◽  
pp. 8-13
Author(s):  
Ray Barrell

In interesting times several things may happen simultaneously, and they may have connected roots. The financial turmoil that developed initially in the US banking sector had its roots in financial innovation that had made available cheap finance and increased demand for housing. This wave of low cost finance had spread to Europe, and house prices rose in a correlated way. The increase in demand in the world economy that resulted from strong growth in lending and high asset values helped raise output growth outside the OECD, and this in turn put upward pressure on oil prices. Markets sometimes work slowly, and the effects of the increase in demand on prices appear to be coming through just as the asset bubble is collapsing. The sequence of events was not inevitable, as low personal sector saving in the US and the UK as well as elsewhere could have been offset by tighter fiscal policy, and better prudential regulation of lenders would also definitely have helped. The desire to move financial regulation from the central bank, as in the UK, may have been for good, competition based, reasons, but it has meant that financial sector oversight has not taken account of the macroeconomic implications of a wave of lending that rested on risky financial innovation and therefore it has not properly addressed the issue of systemic risk (see Barrell and Davis, 2005). The resulting financial turmoil has meant that banks have made losses, and have been unable to trust each other's solvency when making deals. As a result three month interbank rates have risen well above central bank intervention rates, as can be seen in figure 1.


Author(s):  
Olha Y. Kravchuk ◽  
Volodymyr I. Zabolotnyuk ◽  
Yuliia V. Kobets ◽  
Oksana I. Lypchuk ◽  
Ivanna I. Lomaka

The article examines the impact of the coalition approach in US policy on integration processes in Europe in the post-bipolar era. The aim of this article was to identify the peculiarities of the political situation in the world after a period of escalation of the nuclear conflict. It involved an analysis of sources in the field of coalition approach research in the United States, as well as a comparison of its impact on the political situation and European Union law. The author concluded that there is a lack of proper research in the field of the impact of the coalition approach in US policy in the post-bipolar era, and its impact on integration processes in Europe. Comparing the experience of the EU and the US, it was determined that the awareness of nuclear danger affected the development of a coalition approach in US policy. The study resulted in the identified specifics of the EU’s security policy under the influence of the US coalition approach, where the need to ensure stability and armed security is crucial. Prospects for further research include identifying US influence on Eastern countries.


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