Breeding Breaks Out

Rough Beasts ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 186-210
Author(s):  
Jack Fennell
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Central Tenet ◽  
The One

A central tenet of modern Western culture is the distinction between human and animal, particularly on psychological and cultural grounds: physical differences aside, we emphasise our difference from other species by defining self-awareness, motive, individuality and history as uniquely human traits – to be an animal is effectively to be an automaton. This denial of sapience to animals (or, at its most charitable extreme, the ascription of a kind of ‘diminished personhood’ to them) is fruitful ground for gothic and horror stories. On the one hand, to become or act like an animal is a kind of dissolution; on the other hand, an animal that behaves like a human provokes an unnerving, uncanny response. This chapter considers these aspects of animal-horror, alongside the unsettling phenomena of animal ‘vagrants’ and cryptids, to look at how authors have disrupted the boundaries between human and beast.

Nietzsche’s Therapy of Therapy

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marta Faustino
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Other ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
Basic Features

AbstractThis paper examines Nietzsche’s relation to the therapeutic philosophical tradition paradigmatically represented by the Hellenistic schools. On the one hand, given his project of rehabilitating Western culture and his understanding of the philosopher as a “physician of culture”, Nietzsche seems also to hold a therapeutic understanding of philosophy; on the other hand, he is extremely critical of any (philosophical, moral or religious) attempt to heal mankind. This paper does not aim to solve this tension but rather characterizes Nietzsche’s endeavor in this respect as a therapy of therapy. Through analysis of a) the basic features of the Hellenistic conception of philosophy, b) Nietzsche’s development of the analogy of the “philosophical physician”, c) his diagnosis of culture, and d) his criticism of previous therapists, I show that Nietzsche can be formally included in this tradition of thought, even if this inclusion has implications for the tradition itself. As I suggest, given the self-referentiality of Nietzsche’s therapy, his inclusion in this tradition might in fact simultaneously entail its own self-suppression.

The Role of the Learned Man in Government

1958 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 275-288 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul H. Nitze
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Past ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Future ◽  
The One

In the context of government, what do we mean by the phrase “a learned man”?* I take it we can mean a variety of things. On the one hand, we can have in mind the specialist, the expert, the man with an intensive and specialized background in a particular field of knowledge. On the other hand, we can have in mind the man with general wisdom, with that feeling for the past and the future which enriches a sense for the present, and with that appreciation for wider loyalties which deepens patriotism to one's country and finds bonds between it and Western culture and links with the universal aspirations of mankind.

scholarly journals Habermas, Rorty, and the Problem of Competent Interlocutors

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-246
Author(s):  
Claudio Cormick
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Truth Claim ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Ideal Speech Situation ◽  
Central Tenet ◽  
The One ◽  
Pragmatic Turn ◽  
Speech Situation ◽  
Argumentative Practice ◽  
The Way

In texts such as “Richard Rorty’s Pragmatic Turn” Jürgen Habermas defends a theory that associates, on the one hand, the truth-claim raised by a speaker for a proposition p with, on the other hand, the requirement that p be “defendable on the basis of good reasons […] at any time and against anybody”. This, as is known, has been the target of criticisms by Rorty, who−in spite of agreeing with Habermas on the central tenet that the way of evaluating our beliefs must be argumentative practice−declares that the only “ideal presupposed by discourse” is “that of being able to justify your beliefs to a competent audience”. We will consider two texts from 1971, -surprisingly neglected in most approaches to the debate-, in which Habermas did include such a “competence condition” to elucidate the notion of truth. We will discuss whether there are good reasons to relinquish such a condition and to refer, instead, only to the formal or procedural properties of argumentative exchanges, as Habermas does in presenting the notion of “ideal speech situation”. As we will try to argue, there are no such good reasons.

The Holocaust, Second-Generation Witness, and the Voluntary Covenant in American Judaism

1995 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan L. Berger
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Second Generation ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
American Popular Culture ◽  
American Judaism ◽  
Television Shows ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The One

Widespread discourse about the Holocaust entered American popular culture in the seventies in two main ways: a series of television shows that purportedly focused on the destruction of European Judaism and two books that dealt specifically with the children of survivors. The television miniseries, Gerald Green's Holocaust (1978), suited the national need for simplified history and melodrama. Moreover, given the American penchant for ethnic identifiers, Holocaust became known as the Jewish Roots. The networks soon aired other Holocaust programs, including Herman Wouk's far less commercially successful The Winds of War. The resultant Holocaust discourse was frequently poorly informed and historically naive. On the one hand, it reflected a tendency in Western culture to think that the Holocaust ended definitively in 1945. On the other hand, this discourse frequently neutralized the evil of nazism.

scholarly journals Magia, religión y mito. Harry Potter bajo el signo de la posmodernidad

2021 ◽  
pp. 31-47
Author(s):  
Domingo Sola Antequera ◽  
◽  
Irene C. Marcos Arteaga ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Harry Potter ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Narrative Patterns ◽  
The One

On the one hand, our aim with this paper is try to analyse how Harry Potter stories were built under postmodern narrative patterns in which J.K. Rowling is a late and elusive example. On the other hand, we reflect on how this creative literature process proposes the combination and reformulation of several references of the Western Culture: religious and mythical, artistic and all those related to popular tradition. All this was taken into account when the books metamorphosed into the successful movie saga.

scholarly journals Heidegger’s Twofold Treatment of Modern Technology

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomas Nemunas Mickevičius
Keyword(s):  
Synthetic Biology ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
Modern Technology ◽  
Ecological Crisis ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

In this article the twofoldness of Heidegger’s treatment of modern technology is presented. Firstly, it is shown that one can trace the line of thinking on modern technology from the earliest to the latest of Heidegger’s thinking periods. Though Heidegger claimed that it was firstly the task to understand the essence of modern technology that concerned him, it is still possible to discern basic trends of treatment or evaluation of modern technology in his thinking. On the one hand, the Heideggerian critique of modern technoscientific revelation of reality is presented: Heidegger stressed not only the negative practical consequences of technology as ecological crisis but also ontological ones as the disappearance of the experience of Being itself. The program of the overcoming of technology is presented as well as some examples of the alternatives. On the other hand, the positive or appropriative treatment of modern technology is presented. The fragmentary suggestions that it is precisely the modern technological revealing of reality that prepares the way for the authentic experience of Being are developed by connecting them with early Heidegger’s claim that it is the basic experience of production that forms the conceptual horizon of Western culture. The possibility that this line of Heideggerian thinking might help to understand and articulate such important phenomena of current technoscientific condition as synthetic biology is mentioned.

scholarly journals Postmodernisme: doelgerig of vrolike fuif? 'n Polisieroman en 'n moorddroom

Literator ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-72
Author(s):  
W. Burger
Keyword(s):  
Developing Country ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
Historiographic Metafiction ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

The incredulity towards metanarratives in the postmodernist era holds serious implications for historiography. Two "historiographic metafictional novels" (Hutcheon's term), one Flemish and one Afrikaans, are discussed in this article. There is a significant difference in the way these two texts react to ontological doubt. On the one hand there is a celebration of the loss of metanarratives in Het beleg van Laken (Walter van den Broeck). On the other hand this loss is used in a very serious way to undermine existing metanarratives in Kroniek uit die doofpot (John Miles). The joyous humour and celebration in Het beleg van Laken is absent in Kroniek uit die doofpot. It is concluded that some historiographic metafiction frivolously celebrates decentring and the incredulity towards metanarratives. In other historiographic metafiction ontological doubt manifests without humour or celebration and serves to undermine metanarratives. It might he true that the celebration belongs to a late capitalist Western culture whereas it is unsuitable for a developing country.

scholarly journals ON XENOPHOBIA IN SCIENCE FICTION

2019 ◽  
pp. 52-55
Author(s):  
S. E. Kuzeev
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Mass Culture ◽  
Emotional Experience ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Contemporary Science ◽  
The One

The article deals with how the notion of xenophobia is re-iterated in contemporary science fiction. First, the author provides a brief analysis of xenophobia as a cognitive phenomenon that is, on the one hand, built into the mass culture as an archetypal attitude and, on the other hand, symbolically disguised following the two prototypic scenarios-those of alienation and of appropriation. One of the central arguments of the article is that the quintessential sci-fi “alien” is based on the reinvented image of a Jew in the Western culture, while the narrative of “androids” draws on the historical and emotional experience of black slavery.

scholarly journals TWO POLES OF ETHNIC IDENTITY OF UNIVERSITY STUDENTS OF THE YAROSLAVL REGION

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 38-66
Author(s):  
Alexander S. Emelyanov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Identity ◽  
University Students ◽  
Local Population ◽  
The Other ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Central Russia ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
Former Ussr

This article examines the features of the types of ethnic identity of university students in the Yaroslavl region. The author points out the insufficient effectiveness of the current policy of fostering tolerance and interethnic friendship. The processes of globalization and leveling of the national self-awareness of ethnic groups taking place in the modern world, on the one hand, and the growing need to preserve ethnic culture, on the other hand, are to a certain extent manifested in the example of university youth in one of the regions of Central Russia. The study of the features of this problem was carried out by the author on the basis of a questionnaire survey of about 900 students using domestic methods. The research results are grouped into six types: ethnonihilism, ethnic indifference, positive ethnic identity, ethno-egoism, ethno-isolationism, ethnophanaticism. The geographical approach allows us to see some qualitative differences in relation to a number of the questions raised among students representing more than 40 peoples of Russia, the republics of the former USSR, foreign Asia, Africa, and foreign Europe. A certain emphasis is placed on identifying one of the negative manifestations in the youth environment - ethnofanaticism among Azerbaijani, Armenian, Kazakh, Russian, Tajik, and Turkmen students. The polarity of the studied phenomena of ethnonihilism and ethnophanaticism is compared, first of all, using the example of russian and tajik youth. Attention is drawn to the desire to preserve the foundations of life in an unchanged form with a noticeable role of Islam among tajik students. On the other hand, among the russian respondents, ethnicity is not so actualized, it is close to western cultural norms. In the context of the mosaic nature of the information space, contacts with multilingual peers receiving education at the universities of the Yaroslavl Upper Volga region, interethnic attitudes and stereotypes are consolidated for subsequent adulthood. The formation of a positive ethnic identity in the host of migrants with educational, labor goals of the local population is an urgent need.

Reading Metamorphosis in Ovid’s Metamorphoses

2020 ◽  
pp. 13-30
Author(s):  
Alessandro Barchiesi
Keyword(s):  
At Risk ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
The Other ◽  
Future Studies ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Greek Tradition ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

The influence of the Metamorphoses on Western culture is of such magnitude that the preceding tradition is at risk of vanishing from sight. Nonetheless, Ovid’s poem obviously stems from the Greek tradition. On many points, Ovid’s sources have been mapped and precursors pointed out. This chapter’s exposé turns the perspective in a most illuminating way: instead of looking for similarities, it uses the conclusions of previous research to define more closely what actually makes Ovid different from his precursors. In this way, the chapter is able to define a number of instances where Ovid on the one hand utilizes tradition, but on the other hand also transforms it and approaches metamorphosis in new ways. The instances the chapter maps span a wide register: state of origin and destination of the transformation, kinds, causes, and reversibility of metamorphosis, aetiological and genealogical functions, issues of continuity and communication, et cetera. Applying this perspective, the chapter paves the way for a number of new, future studies.

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