Resilient Cyborgs

Extrapolation ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 247-268
Author(s):  
María Ferrández-Sanmiguel
Keyword(s):  
Digital Technology ◽  
Living Conditions ◽  
Trauma Studies ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Critical Space ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
The Relationship

This article reads Pat Cadigan’s Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning novel Synners (1991) from the perspectives of trauma studies and posthumanism to analyze the representation of the cyborged (post)human in cyberspace. My main focus is Cadigan’s depiction of a posttraumatic world whose living conditions invite escape, and how this depiction emphasizes the fact that escape through technological transcendence is not an option, and neither is the rejection of technology altogether. Despite this bleak scenario, the novel leaves some room for optimism in the figuration of a posthuman form of resilience, inspiring reflection about future forms of engagement with technology. As this article attempts to prove, Synners uses the tropes of the cyborg and cyberspace to explore the implications of subjectivity and embodiment within technoscience. In so doing, the novel opens a critical space for interrogation of the relationship between trauma, the posthuman body, and digital technology.

scholarly journals Der Fremde Im Königreich Der Dänen. Das Wort, Der Diskurs Und Die Fremdheit in Bronisław Świderskis Roman Słowa Obcego

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-38
Author(s):  
Piotr de Bończa Bukowski
Keyword(s):  
Social Problem ◽  
Modern Literature ◽  
Individual Experience ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Language Discourse ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract The prose work of the Polish exile writer Bronisław Świderski, who has been living in Denmark since 1970, explores strangeness – an important topic of modern literature. Świderski addresses strangeness not only as an individual experience, but also as a social problem. In this article, I would like to take a closer look at the analysis of foreignness and the psyche of an immigrant in Świderski’s award-winning novel Słowa obcego (1998). From many problems addressed in the novel, which are directly or indirectly connected with strangeness, I want to take out one aspect. At this point I will be interested in the relationship between language (discourse) and strangeness.

scholarly journals Authenticity – An Important Property for Artistic Documents?

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Roswitha Skare
Keyword(s):  
Political Institutions ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Original Work ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Work Of Art ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
The Relationship

The notion of authenticity seems to have grown more and more important for artistic documents during the last decades. Critics are using the term as a kind of distinction; an authentic novel or film is a good novel or film. Authenticity in these cases does not mean questioning the novel or film as an original work of art; rather, what is meant by authenticity is the relationship between reality and the content of a novel or film, assuming possible mimesis in terms of a mirror-like relationship. The highly acclaimed and award-winning film Das Leben der Anderen (The lives of others) can be considered one of the most successful recent German films about the GDR. Many critics focused on the film’s authenticity and thus the film’s truthful representation of life in the GDR. In this paper I would like to claim that this happens because of how the producers are using elements of the paratext in convincing us that what we watch is real, is authentic. By focusing on aspects like the producer’s research, the personal experience and memory of producer and actors, and last but not least the approval by leading intellectuals and political institutions, the message of authenticity is broadcasted in an effective way.

The role and relationship of mindreading and social attunement in HRI – position statements of interdisciplinary researchers. Workshop HRI'20

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Wykowska ◽  
Jairo Pérez-Osorio ◽  
Stefan Kopp
Keyword(s):  
Mental States ◽  
Human Robot Interaction ◽  
Human Interaction ◽  
Artificial Agents ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Robot Interaction ◽  
Novel Coronavirus ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

This booklet is a collection of the position statements accepted for the HRI’20 conference workshop “Social Cognition for HRI: Exploring the relationship between mindreading and social attunement in human-robot interaction” (Wykowska, Perez-Osorio & Kopp, 2020). Unfortunately, due to the rapid unfolding of the novel coronavirus at the beginning of the present year, the conference and consequently our workshop, were canceled. On the light of these events, we decided to put together the positions statements accepted for the workshop. The contributions collected in these pages highlight the role of attribution of mental states to artificial agents in human-robot interaction, and precisely the quality and presence of social attunement mechanisms that are known to make human interaction smooth, efficient, and robust. These papers also accentuate the importance of the multidisciplinary approach to advance the understanding of the factors and the consequences of social interactions with artificial agents.

Oleanolic Acid Derived from Plants: Synthesis and Pharmacological Properties of A-ring Modified Derivatives

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (9) ◽  
pp. 1084-1101
Author(s):  
Tingjuan Wu ◽  
Xu Yao ◽  
Guan Wang ◽  
Xiaohe Liu ◽  
Hongfei Chen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drug Design ◽  
Oleanolic Acid ◽  
Water Solubility ◽  
Future Application ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Pharmacological Effects ◽  
Framework Structure ◽  
Design And Synthesis ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Relationship

Background: Oleanolic Acid (OA) is a ubiquitous product of triterpenoid compounds. Due to its inexpensive availability, unique bioactivities, pharmacological effects and non-toxic properties, OA has attracted tremendous interest in the field of drug design and synthesis. Furthermore, many OA derivatives have been developed for ameliorating the poor water solubility and bioavailability. Objective: Over the past few decades, various modifications of the OA framework structure have led to the observation of enhancement in bioactivity. Herein, we focused on the synthesis and medicinal performance of OA derivatives modified on A-ring. Moreover, we clarified the relationship between structures and activities of OA derivatives with different functional groups in A-ring. The future application of OA in the field of drug design and development also was discussed and inferred. Conclusion: This review concluded the novel achievements that could add paramount information to the further study of OA-based drugs.

The Novel of Sensibility in the 1780s

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Caroline Franklin
Keyword(s):  
John Locke ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Francis Hutcheson ◽  
Literary Movement ◽  
Epistolary Novels ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter studies the novels of sensibility in the 1780s. The philosophy of John Locke, Anthony Ashley Cooper, third Earl of Shaftesbury, Adam Smith, and Francis Hutcheson had influenced the first wave of epistolary novels of sensibility beginning in the 1740s. These explored the interaction between emotion and reason in producing moral actions. Response to stimuli was minutely examined, especially the relationship between the psychological and physiological manifestations of feelings. Later in the century, and, in particular during the late 1780s when the novel enjoyed a surge in popularity, the capacity for fine feeling became increasingly valued for its own sake rather than moralized. Ultimately, sensibility should be seen as a long-lasting literary movement rather than an ephemeral fashion. It put paternal authority and conventional modes of masculinity under question.

Mary Barton

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Gaskell
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Elizabeth Gaskell ◽  
Class Conflict ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Deep Sympathy ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Class Community

‘It's the masters as has wrought this woe; it's the masters as should pay for it.’ Set in Manchester in the 1840s - a period of industrial unrest and extreme deprivation - Mary Barton depicts the effects of economic and physical hardship upon the city's working-class community. Paralleling the novel's treatment of the relationship between masters and men, the suffering of the poor, and the workmen's angry response, is the story of Mary herself: a factory-worker's daughter who attracts the attentions of the mill-owner's son, she becomes caught up in the violence of class conflict when a brutal murder forces her to confront her true feelings and allegiances. Mary Barton was praised by contemporary critics for its vivid realism, its convincing characters and its deep sympathy with the poor, and it still has the power to engage and move readers today. This edition reproduces the last edition of the novel supervised by Elizabeth Gaskell and includes her husband's two lectures on the Lancashire dialect.

Police Records

2019 ◽  
pp. 797-819
Author(s):  
Cristina Vatulescu
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Detective Fiction ◽  
Media History ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Police Records ◽  
History Of ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter approaches police records as a genre that gains from being considered in its relationships with other genres of writing. In particular, we will follow its long-standing relationship to detective fiction, the novel, and biography. Going further, the chapter emphasizes the intermedia character of police records not just in our time but also throughout their existence, indeed from their very origins. This approach opens to a more inclusive media history of police files. We will start with an analysis of the seminal late nineteenth-century French manuals prescribing the writing of a police file, the famous Bertillon-method manuals. We will then track their influence following their adoption nationally and internationally, with particular attention to the politics of their adoption in the colonies. We will also touch briefly on the relationship of early policing to other disciplines, such as anthropology and statistics, before moving to a closer look at its intersections with photography and literature.

Revisiting the Question of the Novel/Nation

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 76-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elliott Colla
Keyword(s):  
Arabic Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Original Contribution ◽  
Palestinian Literature ◽  
The Relationship

In this essay, Arabic literature specialist and Arabic-English translator Elliott Colla explores the relationship between the novel and the nation, and reviews Bashir Abu-Manneh's ambitious and original contribution to the study of Palestinian literature.

On Antigone’s Suffering

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 214-231
Author(s):  
Ankhi Mukherjee
Keyword(s):  
Young Woman ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Personal Loss ◽  
The Relationship

Examining the contestation of interpretations around this work, I argue that the proliferation of exegetical material on Sophocles’s Antigone is related to a noncomprehension of the human motives behind her transgressive action. Did she ever love, and is there any suffering in her piety? If she didn’t love (her brother), could she have suffered? I read the play alongside Kamila Shamsie’s postcolonial rewriting of it in Home Fire to elaborate on the relationship between personal loss and collective (and communal) suffering, particularly as it is focalized in the novel by the figure of a young woman who is both a bereaved twin and a vengeful fury.

scholarly journals Individual quality of life and the environment – towards a concept of livable areas for persons with disabilities in Poland

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Izabela Grabowska ◽  
Radosław Antczak ◽  
Jan Zwierzchowski ◽  
Tomasz Panek
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Environmental Conditions ◽  
Basic Research ◽  
Research Problem ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
Living Conditions ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Background The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities [1] highlights the need to create proper socioeconomic and political conditions for persons with disabilities, with a special focus on their immediate living conditions. According to the Convention, these conditions should be built to ensure that persons with disabilities have the potential to enjoy a high quality of life (QoL), and this principle is reflected in the notion of livable areas. The crucial aspect of this framework is the relationship between the individual QoL and the environment, broadly understood as the socioeconomic as well as the technical conditions in which persons with disabilities function. Methods The basic research problem was to assess the relationship between individual QoL for the population with disabilities as a dependent variable and livability indicators as independent variables, controlling for individual characteristics. The study used a dataset from the EU-SILC (European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions) survey carried out in 2015 in Poland. The research concept involved several steps. First, we created a variable measuring the QoL for the entire population with disabilities. To measure the multidimensional QoL, we used Sen’s capability approach as a general concept, which was operationalized by the MIMIC (multiple indicators multiple causes) model. In the second step, we identified the livability indicators available in the official statistics, and merged them with survey data. Finally, in the last step, we ran the regression analysis. We also checked the data for the nested structure. Results We confirmed that the general environmental conditions, focused on creating livable areas, played a significant role in shaping the QoL of persons with disabilities; i.e., we found that the higher the level of the local Human Development Index, the higher the quality of life of the individuals living in this area. This relationship held even after controlling for the demographic characteristics of the respondents. Moreover, we found that in addition to the general environmental conditions, the conditions created especially for persons with disabilities (i.e., services for this group and support for their living conditions) affected the QoL of these individuals. Conclusions The results illustrate the need to strengthen policies aimed at promoting the QoL of persons with disabilities by creating access to community assets and services that can contribute to improving the life chances of this population.

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