Death of a Celebrity: Kobe Bryant and Post-Millennial Sensitivities

On Sunday, January 26, 2020, Kobe Bryant – a retired star of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball franchise – died suddenly and tragically in a helicopter crash. Following his death, Bryant was instantaneously mourned and celebrated as a basketball legend, an inspiration, a role model, a family man, and a Renaissance man; he was secularly and medially canonized. This study analyzes the secular canonization process and aims at extrapolating the post-Millennial element of the narratives of the tributes to Bryant. The article looks into how the reaction to the death of Bryant, who, although a Millennial himself, seemed to embody the post-Millennial image of post-Millennials (Generation Z) i.e., competitive, spontaneous, adventuresome, and curious, reflects the self-image of post-Millennials i.e., loyal, compassionate, thoughtful, open-minded, responsible, and determined.

A Journey Inside the Perception of the Self-Image - from the 15th Century Italian Portrait to the Glamorized Image on the Facebook

This article aims to present the philosophical perspective upon the birth of the idea of the individual and the consequences of the discovery of the self-image on the techniques of image reproduction from the Renaissance to the present day. The process of projecting the self-image into the public space acquires a special importance with the elaboration of the portrait technique in the Italian painting of the 15th century. Through Leonardo da Vinci's paintings, this technique of reproducing self-image reaches a certain perfection. Following the evolution of this kind of projections and reproductions of the self-image, it is found that there is an obvious tendency by which the individual tends to free himself from certain patterns, or rather canons, which a certain epoch imposes. This process manifested in the visual arts corresponds to a new philosophical perception of man opened by the works of Ficino and Pico della Mirandola. The assertion of a new type of dignity, correlated with the idea of the microcosm, of the Renaissance man will lead to an affirmation of his own personality and especially to an increase of the will to power reflected more and more in the works of art. With the resurgence of the Italian renaissance, artists and philosophers experienced a decline, but found a favorable space for their development at the court of Elizabeth I, Queen of England. The art of portraiture, but also the philosophy of renaissance survives and is even more flourishing at the court of this queen. But the most important moment of this renaissance is marked by Dutch art after its liberation from Spanish rule. From this moment on, the emancipation of the individual will occur on an unimaginable scale until then.

Albanian Schools in The Framework of The European Education Standards During 1920 - 1939

Since the beginning, the first Albanian school had the physiognomy of a school with a contemporary tendency. It is well known that the creators and founders were the Renaissance man, who praised and supported the ideas of the new pedagogy. This mindset set the Albanian school free from the mentality of didactic practices, which were commonly used by the old school. Over the years, Albanian education has tried to follow the footsteps of the European education. The object of this study is to recognize the attitude that Albanian school has held towards new pedagogical theories and developments of Western schools, as well as its tendency to embrace and adapt them to the political, economic, social and cultural situation of Albania. Here, I want to present this important phenomenon of the development of Albanian education and our pedagogical thought during the '20s and '30s of the 20th century. The purpose of this study is to give a scientific synthesis of the history of the development of education and pedagogical ideas in Albania, from 1920 until 1939. Within the limits allowed in a research paper, the reader can draw certain conclusions and experiences. If we look back and see how this progressive trend, turned into a movement that was becoming more powerful day by day and if we take a look at the past and all the other developments during 1920-1939, it is not difficult to understand that this trend would also appear in the Albanian school system. The basic legitimacy is that all dimensions of time - past, present and future are directly reflected in the fact that during all these years the Albanian education has tried to follow the footsteps of the European education. Received: 2 February 2021 / Accepted: 19 March 2021 / Published: 10 May 2021

Creative Approaches in Solution-Focused Teletherapy: A COVID-19 Renaissance Man

The impacts of COVID-19 may exacerbate existing client difficulties, propelling clients into simultaneous crises which impact multiple dimensions of daily life, while diminishing self-agency and hope. Expressive arts approaches, embedded in a traditional solution-focused teletherapy framework, were utilized in this clinical case study with a high functioning adult male as a portal to explore exceptions, personal resilience, and benefits of loss over time. This creative solution-focused approach provided the client with salient somatic, intellectual, and spiritual experiences which invited him to reframe crises as opportunities for growth and change, while inspiring a greater sense of hope and personal agency.

Military Ethics Education and the Changing Nature of Warfare

This article analyzes two traditional approaches to teaching military ethics, aspirational and functionalist approach, in light of the existing technological development in the military. Introduction of new technological solutions to waging warfare that involve dehumanization, such as unmanned aerial vehicles, as well as employment of different technological tools to enhance humans participating in war and to improve military efficiency (such as built-in AI algorithms), not only bring to the surfaces the obviously existing weakness and inadequacies of the two traditional approaches to military ethics education, which have been rendered suboptimal, but also raise new challenges. The paper argues that teaching military ethics solely from the two perspective does not meet the demands of the upcoming (perhaps even already ongoing) military technological revolution and that the future will demand a more profound and conceptual moral education of military personnel that will reassess the role of martial virtues, increase responsibility for killing in war (making war more “real” and riskless killing more “difficult”) and result in military professionals that resemble “a Renaissance man” in their philosophical outlook. Only by ensuring that all military professionals (in particular high-ranking officers) have been properly and adequately ethically educated, future armies, as well as entire societies, can actively aspire toward optimal armed forces structure, a more professional and efficient approach to military profession, and ultimately better and more responsible military personnel in total.

El Mago (de) Matthew Barney: Influencias Renacentistas en el Ciclo Cremaster

In this article we will try to offer a new interpretation of the video art work of the artist Matthew Barney (California, 1967) the Cremaster Cycle, approaching a more humanistic and less biological vision, the last one being the principal study aspect for the experts on Matthew Barney. We will focus on the character of the Magician, a key figure in the Cremaster Cycle. The Magician lighting the pass to a possible interpretation of the Cycle in Renaissance key, the magician character while being a personification of aesthetic- artistic interests of Matthew Barney is also an approximation to the ideal of the Renaissance man: philosopher, magician, healer. Alter-ego of Matthew Barney, the escape artist Harry Houdini represents (and through him all other magical branches) a possible link with the powerful magician Renaissance described by the philosopher Giordano Bruno (1548-1600), able to metamorphose, influence in the sensitivities of his objects, through self-knowledge and knowledge of the Divine.