scholarly journals Negative Hopes: Social Dynamics of Isolating and Passive Forms of Hope

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 188-196
Author(s):  
Sylvia Terpe

This article critically questions the popular idea of hope as a motivating emotion as well as the more specific idea of hope as engendering solidary ties. Both notions can be found in social movement research and will be introduced in the first section. The idea that hope is such an activating force that binds people together is challenged by reports of some survivors of Nazi concentration camps. In the second part I will turn to a selection from the writings of Tadeusz Borowski and Ruth Klüger, both of whom survived Auschwitz. They emphasize that it was (besides other factors) the prisoners’ hope that isolated them from each other and which prevented them from undertaking acts of resistance against their tormentors. In the third and main section a close reading of Friedrich Torberg's novel Vengeance is Mine will help to identify particular features of such numbing forms of hope. Although fictitious, this novel broadens our understanding of hope by revealing two social dynamics encouraging hopes that have isolating effects and that induce passivity. I will close with reflections on how these negative accounts of hope can be integrated into a general conception of hope. I suggest differentiating between two meanings of hope: the one refers to ideas of a better future, the other one to the ways by which such futures may be achieved. It is useful to distinguish these two meanings analytically in order to understand the empirically different forms of hope.

Author(s):  
Tzvi Langermann

This chapter focuses on part II, Chapter 24 of Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed, which discusses the incompatibility of the models used by professional astronomers with the basic tenets of the Aristotelian world-view. On the one hand, the epicycles and eccentrics employed by astronomers seem to violate the principle that the motion of the heavenly bodies be uniform, circular, and about a fixed centre. On the other hand, the results achieved through the use of these very devices are startlingly precise. This, Maimonides says, is the ‘true perplexity’. The chapter then looks at three aspects of this true perplexity. It also compares the views expressed in the Guide with the rules laid down in the third chapter of the ‘Laws Concerning the Basic Principles of the Torah’, which forms the first section of the Mishneh Torah. It is particularly concerned with two questions: did Maimonides consider the true configuration of the heavens to be inscrutable? And can a close reading of both texts offer any clues about this true configuration? Finally, the chapter considers the views of some of Maimonides’ followers on these questions.


2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (188) ◽  
pp. 487-494
Author(s):  
Daniel Mullis

In recent years, political and social conditions have changed dramatically. Many analyses help to capture these dynamics. However, they produce political pessimism: on the one hand there is the image of regression and on the other, a direct link is made between socio-economic decline and the rise of the far-right. To counter these aspects, this article argues that current political events are to be understood less as ‘regression’ but rather as a moment of movement and the return of deep political struggles. Referring to Jacques Ranciere’s political thought, the current conditions can be captured as the ‘end of post-democracy’. This approach changes the perspective on current social dynamics in a productive way. It allows for an emphasis on movement and the recognition of the windows of opportunity for emancipatory struggles.


Author(s):  
Patrick Colm Hogan

The introduction first sets out some preliminary definitions of sex, sexuality, and gender. It then turns from the sexual part of Sexual Identities to the identity part. A great deal of confusion results from failing to distinguish between identity in the sense of a category with which one identifies (categorial identity) and identity in the sense of a set of patterns that characterize one’s cognition, emotion, and behavior (practical identity). The second section gives a brief summary of this difference. The third and fourth sections sketch the relation of the book to social constructionism and queer theory, on the one hand, and evolutionary-cognitive approaches to sex, sexuality, and gender, on the other. The fifth section outlines the value of literature in not only illustrating, but advancing a research program in sex, sexuality, and gender identity. Finally, the introduction provides an overview of the chapters in this volume.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rochelle Lieber

A lively introduction to morphology, this textbook is intended for undergraduates with relatively little background in linguistics. It shows students how to find and analyze morphological data and presents them with basic concepts and terminology concerning the mental lexicon, inflection, derivation, morphological typology, productivity, and the interfaces between morphology and syntax on the one hand and phonology on the other. By the end of the text students are ready to understand morphological theory and how to support or refute theoretical proposals. Providing data from a wide variety of languages, the text includes hands-on activities designed to encourage students to gather and analyse their own data. The third edition has been thoroughly updated with new examples and exercises. Chapter 2 now includes an updated detailed introduction to using linguistic corpora, and there is a new final chapter covering several current theoretical frameworks.


2011 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sorin Baiasu

AbstractThe interpretation of Kant's Critical philosophy as a version of traditional idealism has a long history. In spite of Kant's and his commentators’ various attempts to distinguish between traditional and transcendental idealism, his philosophy continues to be construed as committed (whether explicitly or implicitly and whether consistently or inconsistently) to various features usually associated with the traditional idealist project. As a result, most often, the accusation is that his Critical philosophy makes too strong metaphysical and epistemological claims.In his The Revolutionary Kant, Graham Bird engages in a systematic and thorough evaluation of the traditionalist interpretation, as part of perhaps the most comprehensive and compelling defence of a revolutionary reading of Kant's thought. In the third part of this special issue, the exchanges between, on the one hand, Graham Bird and, on the other, Gary Banham, Gordon Brittan, Manfred Kuehn, Adrian Moore and Kenneth Westphal focus on specific aspects of Bird's interpretation of Kant's first Critique. More exactly, the emphasis is on specific aspects of Bird's interpretation of the Introduction, Analytic of Principles and Transcendental Dialectic of Kant's first Critique.The second part of the special issue is devoted to discussions of particular topics in Bird's construal of the remaining significant parts of the first Critique, namely, of the Transcendental Aesthetic and the Analytic of Concepts. Written by Sorin Baiasu and Michelle Grier, these articles examine specific issues in these two remaining parts of the Critique, from the perspective of the debate between the traditionalist and revolutionary interpretation. The special issue begins with an Introduction by the guest co-editors. This provides a summary of the exchanges between Bird and his critics, with a particular focus on the debates stemming from the differences between traditional and revolutionary interpretations of Kant.


2011 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 221-233 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manfred Kuehn

AbstractThe interpretation of Kant's Critical philosophy as a version of traditional idealism has a long history. In spite of Kant's and his commentators’ various attempts to distinguish between traditional and transcendental idealism, his philosophy continues to be construed as committed (whether explicitly or implicitly and whether consistently or inconsistently) to various features usually associated with the traditional idealist project. As a result, most often, the accusation is that his Critical philosophy makes too strong metaphysical and epistemological claims.In his The Revolutionary Kant, Graham Bird engages in a systematic and thorough evaluation of the traditionalist interpretation, as part of perhaps the most comprehensive and compelling defence of a revolutionary reading of Kant's thought. In the third part of this special issue, the exchanges between, on the one hand, Graham Bird and, on the other, Gary Banham, Gordon Brittan, Manfred Kuehn, Adrian Moore and Kenneth Westphal focus on specific aspects of Bird's interpretation of Kant's first Critique. More exactly, the emphasis is on specific aspects of Bird's interpretation of the Introduction, Analytic of Principles and Transcendental Dialectic of Kant's first Critique.The second part of the special issue is devoted to discussions of particular topics in Bird's construal of the remaining significant parts of the first Critique, namely, of the Transcendental Aesthetic and the Analytic of Concepts. Written by Sorin Baiasu and Michelle Grier, these articles examine specific issues in these two remaining parts of the Critique, from the perspective of the debate between the traditionalist and revolutionary interpretation. The special issue begins with an Introduction by the guest co-editors. This provides a summary of the exchanges between Bird and his critics, with a particular focus on the debates stemming from the differences between traditional and revolutionary interpretations of Kant.


Author(s):  
Stephan F. De Beer

This article reflects on the unfinished task of liberation – as expressed in issues of land – and drawing from the work of Franz Fanon and the Durban-based social movement Abahlali baseMjondolo. It locates its reflections in four specific sites of struggle in the City of Tshwane, and against the backdrop of the mission statement of the Faculty of Theology at the University of Pretoria, as well as the Capital Cities Research Project based in the same university. Reflecting on the ‘living death’ of millions of landless people on the one hand, and the privatisation of liberation on the other, it argues that a liberating praxis of engagement remains a necessity in order to break the violent silences that perpetuate exclusion.


Author(s):  
Victoria Yermilova ◽  
◽  
Natalia Stroiteleva ◽  
Zhanna Egorova ◽  
Ekaterina Vanina

Smoking and alcohol consumption is a growing trend among young people worldwide. The purpose of this study was to provide students with a comparative analysis of adherence to harmful habits (smoking and alcohol) on the one hand and the frequency of sports and academic performance on the other, taking into account gender differences. The research was conducted in 2019-2020 in 5 cities of Russia; the sample included 1500 people aged 18.4 ± 1.1 years, divided into three equal groups. The control (first) group had students who are not engaged in sports, and the second group comprised students practicing sports but not professionally. The third group was made up of student-athletes. All participants were surveyed to determine the frequency of adherence to harmful habits. In the control group, boys smoked 50% more often than girls (p ≤ 0.05), while in the third group, smoking among boys was registered 70 times less often (p ≤ 0.001). Alcohol consumption in controls was 0.5 times more likely among boys (p ≤ 0.05). Harmful habits affect young people's free time and reduce their academic performance and ability to practice sports.


Author(s):  
Emily Van Buskirk

This chapter undertakes a treatment of the rhetoric of personal pronouns in Ginzburg's writings on love and sexuality, drawing on Michael Lucey's study of the first person in twentieth-century French literature about love. It brings together questions of genre and narrative, on the one hand, and gender and sexuality, on the other. The chapter is divided into two sections, treating writings from two different periods on two kinds of love Ginzburg thought typical of intellectuals: in “First Love,” it discusses the unrequited and tragic love depicted in Ginzburg's teenage diaries (1920–23); in “Second Love,” it analyzes the love that is realized but in the end equally tragic, depicted in drafts related to Home and the World (1930s). The chapter examines the models the author sought in literary, psychological, and philosophical texts (Weininger, Kraft-Ebbing, Blok, Shklovsky, Oleinikov, Hemingway, and Proust).


Author(s):  
Aidan Forth

Guerrilla warfare during the South African (or Anglo-Boer) War presented a new context for the development of British camps. On the one hand, camps were a measure of military counterinsurgency that concentrated and detained scattered civilian populations suspected of aiding enemy insurgents. On the other hand, camps were measures of social control and sympathetic concern that organized shelter and humanitarian relief for refugees who had been displaced by scorched earth warfare and were congregating in overcrowded towns. Boer and African refugees presented a specter of social destitution and sanitary disarray familiar from Indian plague and famine operations. Like plague and famine camps, wartime concentration camps removed “uncivilized” and unhygienic populations from the center of towns and systematized ad hoc charitable arrangements by confining relief within demarcated boundaries. Although Boers were ostensibly Europeans respected for their vigor and courage, racialized discourses in the later phases of an asymmetric conflict denigrated them as uncivilized and even subhuman: such representations ultimately facilitated encampment.


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