scholarly journals Murakami on the Shore: beyond the dialogue between Japan and the West

2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. e51791
Author(s):  
Michele Eduarda Brasil de Sá
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The West ◽  
Final Draft ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Postdoctoral Research ◽  
East And West ◽  
East West ◽  
The Way

 The novel Kafka on the Shore is one of the most enigmatic works of contemporary writer Haruki Murakami. Since its very release, critics and scholars have been sharing their impressions and interpretations on various aspects of the book, one of them being the abundant references to Western elements (myths, songs, writers, icons and so forth). The present paper is the final draft of the postdoctoral research ‘Murakami on the shore: the dialogue with the West in the construction of the novel’, developed from July 2015 to June 2016. It aims at rethinking (as well as questioning) the way the study of the relation between Japan and the West can be addressed in the novel. The research, conducted as a bibliographical investigation, used key concepts like cultural identity (Hall, 2006) and border-blurring (Auestad, 2008). It defies the tendency of studying cosmopolitan authors like Haruki Murakami from the perspective of East-West duality, and defends that such analysis ought to consider East and West as complementary, almost inextricable, not regarding them as opposite or impermeable, and never as a limitation to the author himself.

Control Orientations in the East and West

2019 ◽  
pp. 509-537
Author(s):  
Susumu Yamaguchi ◽  
Takafumi Sawaumi
Keyword(s):  
Well Being ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Primary Control ◽  
Secondary Control ◽  
The West ◽  
Value System ◽  
North Americans ◽  
East And West ◽  
Western View ◽  
East West

Individuals exercise control over themselves, others, and environment. According to a seminal work by Weisz, Rothbaum, and Blackburn, which represents a Western view, people in the West prefer to control others or environment to make their life more comfortable (primary control), whereas people in the East prefer to control themselves to fit into environment (secondary control). This chapter critically examines the Western conceptualization of control. Then an alternative view based on Asian value system is presented. According to this view, East–West differences exist not in the target of control (oneself vs. others or environment) but in how people attempt to control others and their environment. The authors present empirical evidence to support the alternative view and propose a framework to understand individuals’ seeking for psychological well-being in the East and West. Westerners (especially North Americans) prefer to control the environment so that they can feel autonomous, whereas Easterners (especially Japanese) care more about consequences of control in terms of interpersonal harmony.

scholarly journals PECULIARITIES OF THE CHRONOTOPE THROUGH THE PRISM OF IDENTITY PROBLEM OF THE URBAN NOVEL CHARACTER

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaya Semih
Keyword(s):  
The Novel ◽  
Closed Space ◽  
Main Principle ◽  
Eternal Return ◽  
Identity Problem ◽  
The West ◽  
Temporal Space ◽  
Urban Novel ◽  
The World ◽  
East West

The article analyses the chronotope of the novel by Orhan Pamuk Silent House through the prism of identity problem. The purpose of the article is to establish a connection of this problem to the peculiarities of the interpretation of the chronotope (which is a result of analysis of the opposites capital-country and East-West. The urban issue of the Silent House grounds on the eschatological paradigm and the cyclic concept of the world, the concept of eternal return; this attests a postmodernist understanding of the categories of time and space. Hence, the composition of the novel is a peculiar spatial and temporal mosaic and narrative polyphony. In the temporal space of the Silent House the spatial (home and provincial town) and temporal (past and present) images, motive of travel (real and metaphysical in the form of memories), of the travelers acquire the semantics of existential metamorphosis that lead to moral and spiritual initiation. And the closed space of the novel — the house of Mrs. Fatma and the provincial Turkish town — appears as a special topos-gerontope, the main principle of which is a freezing of the time. In this way Pamuk realizes typical for his works problems of relations between the West and the East and self-identification.

scholarly journals The Concept of ‘Home’ in Palestinian Diaspora Fiction: A Critical Study of Randa Jarrar’s Fiction

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 13
Author(s):  
Jameel Ahmed Alghaberi
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Female Body ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
Critical Study ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Counter Narrative ◽  
Creative Space ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way

The paper discusses the concepts of ‘home’, ‘cultural identity’, and ‘transnationalism’ in Randa Jarrar’s fiction. Being a diasporic Palestinian American, Randa Jarrar in her debut novel A Map of Home presents a particular view of ‘homeland’ and of what ‘historic Palestine’ means to her. The attempt in this paper is to critically analyze her fiction and to highlight the issues that she tackles as a writer of Palestinian origin. The paper also explores the way Randa Jarrar approaches the concept of ‘home’, and an examination of the relationship between Palestinian diasporas and their homeland-Palestine is presented. There is much wandering that Randa Jarrar is experimenting with in rather a creative space, and there is also a counter-narrative ideology embedded in the novel, a way to resist the stereotypes that have fixed the Middle Eastern female body as propagated in Orientalist discourse. 

scholarly journals Perepresentasian Liyan Dalam Novel Ushfur Min Ash-Sharq Karya Tawfiq Al-Hakim

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 191
Author(s):  
Hendra Apriyono
Keyword(s):  
Travel Literature ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Colonial Discourse ◽  
The West ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
East And West ◽  
The One ◽  
Western Hegemony

This research is motivated by the imbalance of relations between East and West in Arabic travel literature. The inequality is caused by the representation of the superior (West) and the inferior (East) which is constantly being produced. The novel Uṣfur min al-Syarq by Taufiq al-Hakim as one of Arabic travel literature is considered to offer a different view from other Arabic travel literature by proposing the value of equality between East and West. This research is expected to be able to resolve the problem of inequality in relations between East and West as represented in Arabic travel literature. This research uses another representation strategy from Carl Thompson's travel literary concept which consists of colonial, neo-colonial, and post-colonial strategies. The results of this study found that the representations of the others made by al-Hakim which were dominated by the use of colonial and post-colonial strategies showed that the author occupied two opposing positions. On the one hand, al-Hakim is still trapped in colonial discourse and on the other hand, al-Hakim is not entirely successful in bringing the post-colonial travel agenda to escape from Western hegemony. The equality proposed by al-Hakim regarding the East is inseparable from Western assistance. To realize the equality of the East and the West, al-Hakim used the superiority of the West to face the West in order to defend the East.

scholarly journals DISCRIMINATION, ASSIMILATION, and CULTURAL IDENTITY in TAHAR BEN JELLOUN'S LEAVING TANGIER

2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 25
Author(s):  
Derya Emir
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Colonial History ◽  
Tahar Ben Jelloun ◽  
Life Conditions ◽  
History Of ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Cost

In today's multicultural countries, cultural diversity, hybridity, assimilation, and cultural identity are key issues. By focusing on the problem of immigration and its inevitable traumatic results on the migrants, Tahar Ben Jelloun's Leaving Tangier fully presents Azel (the protagonist) and his acquaintances' search for identity in terms of history, religion, nationality and cultural identity. Tahar Ben Jelloun's Leaving Tangier is the story of a Moroccan brother and sister who are burning with the desire to migrate to Spain in order to attain better life. The accomplishment of their dreams actualizes at the cost of some compromises and sacrifices that end with the protagonists' physical, emotional failure, and annihilation. The winner of Prix Goncourt for La Nuit Sacrée (The Sacred Night) in 1987, a Moroccan novelist Tahar Ben Jelloun is one of the most prolific and important writers of the recent years. As a novelist and critic, Ben Jelloun artfully combines the fact and fiction, past and present, East and West in his works. in this respect, he creates multidimensional writings that can be read and interpreted from several perspectives. Tahar Ben Jelloun's Leaving Tangier (2006) presents the issues of "wounded childhood," "solitude," "displacement," and "alienation" both individually and collectively in the colonial history of Tangier. This study focuses on the issues of discrimination, assimilation, and cultural identity, experienced by the characters in the novel, resulting from the immigration of individuals from their homelands to Europe in order to find better life conditions.

Archival Documents of v. F. Odoevsky as a Key to Understanding of the Novel “Russian Nights”

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 64-74
Author(s):  
Ilya A. Kachkov ◽  
Natalya V. Prashсheruk
Keyword(s):  
Social Issues ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Single System ◽  
German Philosophy ◽  
The West ◽  
The Social ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Exact Definition

This article examines the archival documents — letters, drafts, and treaties of V. F. Odoevsky — related to his novel “Russian Nights” and dated around its publication. Odoevsky had not only preceded the writing of his novel in separate articles, but also in his numerous works, providing an insight to the content and form of his work. The reconstruction of these explanations goes together with the understanding and recognition of “Russian Nights” as a phenomenon in the unity of its problems, values, and artistic aspects. This study aims to analyze archival materials that could serve as the basis for such a reconstruction. The comprehension of a number of key concepts from the novel “Russian Nights” was made possible thanks to the connections and assessments revealed in Odoevsky’s manuscripts. They centered around the influence of German philosophy on the mood of society during that era, as well as the interaction of science, art, faith, and love. In his drafts, Odoevsky revealed in detail the nature of the social issues and relations between Russia and the West. He searched for an exact definition of skepticism and independently analyzed the image of Faust. This article shows how the collection of these archival documents complement each other, forming a single system. With this approach, the novel “Russian Nights” becomes just one of the elements of this system, leading to the general conclusion that without compiling and studying the rest of these elements, the pursuit for understanding the philosophical and artistic ideology of Odoevsky turns practically impossible.

“Ontological and Epistemological” Discourse of Cultural Identity: Making an Orientalist in V. S. Naipaul's Half a Life

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (6) ◽  
pp. 1200
Author(s):  
Fazel Asadi Amjad ◽  
Ghamereddin Badirdast
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Educational System ◽  
Postcolonial Studies ◽  
Cultural Discourse ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The West ◽  
The Impact

The impact of colonial educational system or colonial cultural discourse on the cultural identity of the colonized is a prominent theme of postcolonial studies. According to Said Orientalism as a discourse recognizes an "ontological and epistemological" distinction between the East and the West. Consequently, for Said anyone who thinks, works and acts based on the existence of such a distinction is an orientalist. This paper argues that V. S. Naipaul’s Half a life illustrates the workings of this imaginary distinction that European cultural discourse finds between the Orient and the Occident on the formation of the cultural identity of the colonized people as they become subject to colonial cultural discourse. In Half a Life we observe Willie, the anti-hero of the novel, gradually losing his faith in the ingredients of his own cultural identity replacing them with the material served in the menu of colonial educational system to adopt himself with the requirements of being a colonial individual living on scholarship in the metropolitan London.

scholarly journals Utopias and “Normality”: 1968 Revisited Fifty Years On

Slavic Review ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 77 (4) ◽  
pp. 890-896
Author(s):  
Jacques Rupnik
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
International Crisis ◽  
Prague Spring ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
East West ◽  
The Way

The Prague Spring of 1968 did not provoke a major international crisis but at most an “incident” in the making of east-west detente. Yet it deserves to be revisited for three reasons of lasting significance for Europe. First, the Prague Spring revived, beyond the contemporary writings on Czech “democratic exceptionalism,” the European debate about the relationship between socialism and democracy. Second, it was often interpreted as part of an international generational revolt against the establishments, yet it also revealed sharp contrasts between east and west. Can the misunderstandings and different legacies of 1968 in Paris and Prague be enlightening for trans-European dialogue (or lack of) after 1989? Third, Czechoslovakia in 1968 represented the most far-reaching blueprint for reforming the system within the Soviet sphere. Its crushing prevented reform in eastern Europe and Moscow. Although it provided inspiration for Gorbachev's belated, botched attempt to save the system, this was twenty years too late, thus paving the way for its implosion in 1989.

scholarly journals Introduction

Focaal ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 2009 (53) ◽  
pp. 3-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill Owczarzak
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
Science Studies ◽  
Special Section ◽  
Postcolonial Studies ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
East And West ◽  
East West

The introduction to this special section explores the ways in which postcolonial studies contribute a deeper understanding of postsocialist change in Central and Eastern Europe. Since the collapse of socialism, anthropological and other social science studies of Eastern Europe have highlighted deep divides between “East” and “West” and drawn attention to the ways in which socialist practices persist into the postsocialist period. We seek to move beyond discourses of the East/West divide by examining the postsocialist context through the lens of postcolonial studies. We look at four aspects of postcolonial studies and explore their relevance for understanding postsocialist Eastern Europe: orientalism, nation and identity, hybridity, and voice. These themes are particular salient from the perspective of gender and sexuality, key concepts through which both postcolonialism and postsocialism can be understood. We thus pay particular attention to the exchange of ideas between East/West, local/global, and national/international arenas.

scholarly journals Negotiation of Cultural Identities in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 2780-2782
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Sense Of Belonging ◽  
Positive Attitude ◽  
Cultural Identities ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The West ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Minor Characters ◽  
Nigerian Literature ◽  
Global World

The Nigerian literature illuminates on the experiences of migration which makes a person oscillate between two different places. The novel describes the formative process of Ifelmu and Obinze who fall in love in Nigeria and migrate to the west ,and they ultimately reunite in Nigeria after fifteen long years .The article explores the negotiation of cultural identity in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel the Americanah (2013). The Protagonist and other minor characters questions identity, sense of belonging and they try being as positive models through a negative stereotypical society. The characters undergo a redemptive process through migration as they encounter problem with Race, Language and Hair which culturally connects them to the roots. The article attempts to showcase how culture gets fragmented in the global world where the notion of identity becomes an ever changing factor. As the characters undergo changes because of the convoluted identity they struggle to thrive in their hardships. The article also attempts to focus on how negative attitudes and approaches reminds them of their past and develops a positive attitude enabling them to create an identity for themselves in a diasporic society

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