Desposeídos y perversos. Una relectura de “El cobrador” de Rubem Fonseca / Dispossessed and Wicked. A Rereading of “El Cobrador” by Rubem Fonseca

Resumen: El artículo aborda “El cobrador” de Rubem Fonseca. Se pretende demostrar que este relato evidencia la materialidad del malestar de los grupos subalternos, ante la exclusión que experimentan por parte de los grupos de poder en Brasil. Lo interesante de este texto no estriba sencillamente en el reclamo y la búsqueda de igualdad, sino en elaborar una ética que tiene como fundamento la venganza y la rapiña, sustentadas en una promesa incumplida: la repartición equitativa de los bienes (materiales y simbólicos). Asimismo, se desea probar que este cuento denuncia como falsa la imagen de un Brasil en armonía social y presenta, por el contrario, un país sesgado por la violencia, en el que los marginales ya no están dispuestos a seguir soportando más las desigualdades sociales. De otro lado, también se sostiene que este texto muestra la emergencia de un sujeto excluido, pero entendido como un exceso propio del capitalismo tardío, un sujeto perverso y violento.Palabras clave: Rubem Fonseca; “El cobrador”; capitalismo tardío; violencia; perversiónAbstract: The article analyzes “El cobrador”, by Rubem Fonseca. It is intended to show that this story evidences the materiality of the discomfort of subordinate groups, in the face of the exclusion they experience from power groups in Brazil. What is interesting about this text does not simply lie in the claim and the search for equality, but in elaborating an ethic that is based on revenge and robbery, supported by an unfulfilled promise: the equitable distribution of goods (material and symbolic). Likewise, we want to prove that this story denounces as false the image of a Brazil in social harmony and presents, on the contrary, a country biased by violence, in which the marginalized are no longer willing to continue to endure social inequalities. On the other hand, it is also argued that this text shows the emergence of an excluded subject, but understood as an excess typical of late capitalism, a perverse and violent subject, a product of the demands to which contemporary society invites and, at the same time, demands to be an integral part.Keywords: Rubem Fonseca; “El cobrador”; late capitalism; violence; perversion.

A Review on the Cultural Characteristics of Mentalization and Relations with Psychological Symptoms

Mentalization is the ability to surmise the mental states such as thoughts, wishes, intentions, needs and feelings behind one’s own and others’ behaviors. Mentalization has been an important concept in understanding personality development and psychopathology in recent years. However, the cultural factors that affect mentalization is an understudied area, which has also not been investigated in Turkey. In this review, the development of the concept of mentalization will be explored comparing individualistic and collectivistic cultures. The specific mentalization characteristics that may emerge in Turkey are discussed. With this aim, the concept of mentalization, its development and the kinds of mentalization impairments that emerge in psychopathology are discussed. Afterwards, the effects of culture on mentalization are discussed with reference to recent empirical literature. Specifically, the effects of cultural context on the development of theory mind, affective and cognitive mentalization, self and other-focused mentalization, explicit and implicit mentalization are explored. The reviewed studies suggest that in collectivistic cultures, individuals tend to others’ mental states and socially accepted objective norms more than their own internal states and refrain from strong emotions such as anger that may disrupt the social harmony. Moreover implicit mentalization is less affected by culture. Based on the reviewed studies, culturally sensitive suggestions are provided regarding how to conduct mentalization assessments and practices. Keywords: Mentalization, culture, individualism, collectivism, psychotherapy

Ubhauli and Udhuali: Application of Symbolic Ecology and Ecological Symbolism in Kirat-Rai in Eastern Nepal

The aim of this article is to explore how the Ubhauli and Udhauli are functioning as a mechanism to maintain the socio-cultural and economic-ecological balance between populations and resources with the help of symbolic and ecological perspectives These great and holy festivals of KiratRais through which they can understand symbolic ecology and ecological symbolism in Kirat world through which Kirat can easily understand the nature, ecology and culture for their adaptation. Ubhauli and Udhauli festivals offer the social harmony, solidarity, integration through the socialization and such entertainment; works as mechanism of conflict resolution in socio-cultural, religious, ecological, economically, linguistically etc. to cope with the existing environmental, cultural and social problems of the Kirat world. The festivals Ubhauli and Udhauli are celebrated twice in a year. April and November are the celebrating months which appear through seasonal changes that help to bring society in order through repetitions and re-beginnings.

Analysis of Agricultural and Rural Work in Changyi City.

Agriculture is the basic industry of economic and social development, and agricultural and rural work is an important work related to the safety of food rations, increasing farmers' income, improving living environment, inheriting Chinese culture and promoting social harmony and stability. Focusing on the agricultural and rural work in Changyi City, this paper systematically introduces the experience of agricultural and rural work in Changyi from four aspects: industrial "quality improvement", environmental "optimization", cultural "inheritance" and governance "standardization". And the future development of agricultural and rural work is prospected.

Krausism in Spain Beyond Philosophy: Religious Tolerance, Social Harmony, Political Reformism and Modern Pedagogy

Krause's philosophy had a deep and long influence in Spain, where krausism went beyond academia to turn their ideas into reality by means of different associations and institutions. The reception of krausean thought took place in a really hostile context, especially due to the rejection by intransigent Catholicism that vilified Spanish krausism in terms of Religion, morals, politics and education. Despite that fact, krausism proved to be very influential in social theory, politics and education from the second half of the 19th century to the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936. This work is a summary presentation, a revisitation and an updated account of the history of krausism in Spain (with some references to Latin America) focusing on íts practical dimension.

Lineage Solidarity and Rhetorical Resonance: Village Strategies to Retain Primary Schools in Rural China

As the state has shifted its priorities towards social harmony and poverty alleviation, this study finds rhetorical resonance, combined with strong lineage solidarity, as an emerging strategy for villages to compete for government resources and investments. By articulating grassroots needs as being in line with local cadres’ performance goals, villages have successfully converted their needs into development proposals and mobilized lineage solidarity to persuade local cadres of the feasibility of such proposals. Drawing on three villages’ school-saving efforts in Fujian province, our fieldwork illustrates how one village retained its school by mobilizing lineage solidarity and converting education into a “model” village project to boost cultural tourism. Others failed to do so and lost their schools. Under the target-based cadre management system, the bottom-up competition for government support is largely shaped by the villages’ pre-existing development and resource structures, which may maximize management efficiency but may also reinforce socioeconomic inequalities between villages.

Students’ Impoliteness Strategy During Online Learning in ‎Covid-19 Pandemic

Politeness is a societal norm and a special strategy applied by humans to facilitate and ‎maintain the sustainability of their social relationships. The opposite condition of the concept ‎of politeness is impoliteness. If politeness maintains the continuity of human social relations, ‎then impoliteness can cause disturbances, misunderstandings, and damage to social relations ‎that affect the ideal conditions of social harmony. This study aims to explain the impoliteness ‎strategies used by MTS Ma'arif Andong students in online learning through the WhatsApp ‎application. The research method used in this research is descriptive qualitative research ‎method. The data is the speech of students' impoliteness via WhatsApp. The data source of ‎this research is a document in the form of a screenshot of a class WhatsApp group ‎conversation. Data triangulation was used to test the validity of the data in this study. Data ‎analysis is done by interpreting the data that has been collected. The results of the study ‎found eight impolite speeches that matched the impoliteness strategy by Culpeper (2005). ‎From the five impoliteness strategies, four impoliteness strategies were found that match the ‎data, namely bald on record impoliteness, positive impoliteness, negative impoliteness, and ‎sarcasm or mock politeness.‎

Rectifying Language? Snarl Words and Politically Incorrect Language

Confucius was asked what he would do if he were a governor. He said he would rectify the names to make words correspond to reality. In this study, we wish to approach the problem of language changes that led to the emergence of concepts such as snarl words and purr words, as stated by S. I. Hayakawa, to refer to highly connotative language or politically correct and incorrect language. Can language be correct or incorrect politically? Should we ban words just because we perceive them as threatening social harmony? Should language be rectified and by whom? Or should we agree with Confucius, who believed that names, i.e. words should be used appropriately in the sense that if names are not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. What is correct in language and what is not? Can language be outlawed at all? Have words changed so drastically or has the surrounding reality changed? Should we use language correctly or appropriately? Can the shaping of new nomenclatures and decreeing words as undesirable or imposing meaning changes induce social harmony, or such attempts will only lead to a pandemic of euphemisms and nothing more? We try to look into the ways in which words are doomed for being politically, socially (or perhaps emotionally?) incorrect. We gather a corpus of such banned words and/or meanings and analyse the ways their perception has changed over the past years.

Immoral Intentions vs. Accidental Actions: Age Differences in Endorsements of Anger and Disgust

Given that older adults value social harmony and selectively avoid negativity (Carstensen & Mikels, 2005), we investigated whether older and younger adults differentially react to scenarios in which someone intends to harm others compared to someone who accidentally harms others. Younger (n = 112, M = 26.23) and older (n = 113, M = 66.42) adults read 8 scenarios in which a perpetrator intentionally acts to harm someone else but is unsuccessful (Desire condition) or a perpetrator accidentally harms someone else (Consequence condition; Giner-Sorolla & Chapman, 2017). Endorsements of anger and disgust toward the perpetrators were measured on 7-point scales (1 = Not at all, 7 = Extremely). Emotion endorsements were submitted to 2 (age) x 2 (condition) ANOVAs. Anger (M = 4.81, SD = 1.58) and disgust (M = 4.82, SD = 1.54) endorsements were higher in the Desire relative to Consequence condition (M = 2.64, SD = 1.33; M = 2.49, SD = 1.29, respectively), F(2, 221) = 124.03, p < .001; F(2, 221) = 156.31, p < .001, respectively. Moreover, older (M = 5.17, SD = 1.61) relative to younger (M = 4.45, SD = 1.37) adults were disproportionately disgusted in the Desire condition, t(102) = 2.45, p = .016, but no age differences emerged in the Consequence condition. Results indicate that older (relative to younger) adults are disproportionately disgusted when judging a person who intends to harm others. Older adults may respond more strongly than younger adults to malicious perpetrators, as they intentionally upset social harmony.

‘The Hope of Pessimism’

This chapter reads George Gissing’s Thyrza (1887) and Mary (Mrs Humphry) Ward’s Robert Elsmere (1888) in relation to the settlement movement of the 1880s. The chapter turns to the idealist philosophy of Green, which provided one of the most philosophically advanced articulations of welfarist thinking in this period. Echoing Green, Ward suggests that the success of her protagonist’s reformist plans depends on the workers’ ability to see them as integral to their personal flourishing: instead of appearing as an alien imposition on workers’ lives, these new institutions are shown to depend on entgegenkommende Lebensformen, i.e. forms of social life which lend substance to but also retain a degree of independence from the institutional structures that support them. Thyrza, by contrast, critically interrogates the belief that institutions can create social harmony from above—a scepticism which continues to haunt later engagements with state action in works by Carpenter, Wells, and Forster.