Thematic Approach and Derivation of Subject Matter as an Avenue for Expression and Expressiveness in Painting: Analysis of Selected Paintings by Kenyan Contemporary Artists in Nairobi, Kenya

In painting, just like in other disciplines of art, a thematic approach is often applied by artists in their work because themes define all aspects of human endeavour. A thematic approach is also important in the derivation of subject matter that artists ultimately pursue in their work. It can be said that any painting that is executed can be compartmentalised to fit within a given thematic pattern. Artists often, but not always, actively consider the essence of the theme itself; at times, they instinctively or spontaneously express something on canvas. It is presumed that the ‘intent of the artist’, at any given time, is to depict or express some phenomenon that is derived from the intricacies of human endeavour, behavioural traits, experiential sources, or from an individual’s own emotions and feelings. Ideally, a subject matter emanates from a particular theme, but it is also generally acknowledged that artists do not always necessarily base their work on a theme as a springboard to their core intent, but that the theme ultimately emerges by implication. A theme is too broad to be compressed into a single pictorial composition and, hence, each theme is interpreted into a retinue of ideas by cohorts of artists. A theme, by its description, is also not explicit because it is a guiding or emanative factor; therefore, it is often implied. It would be unusual, however, that an artist fails to put in perspective his or her thematic foundation in describing the final piece of work because artworks always have some thematic connotation even if it is not deliberately intended by the artist. In this regard, there are some kinds of artworks that bear weighty thematic foundations and others that bear some form of useful thematic content embedded in their meaning. This paper seeks to determine the extent to which the concept of the thematic approach is used by artists to derive subject matter in their painting and whether their subsequent paintings are, therefore, theme-specific or are as a result of creative spontaneity. Further, it seeks to find out the nature of the subject matter, the artist’s motivation and inspiration and whether the resultant paintings are effective in rendering the intended visual message to the audience. A powerful theme is not necessarily a fundamental prerequisite for powerful artwork since artworks are rendered differently by different people, but a powerful artwork is often a good indicator of a potent theme. This paper also examines the stylistic approach, content and context applied by the artists in their paintings. The paintings featured in this paper are those done by some of the contemporary Kenyan artists working independently at different studio locations in Nairobi, Kenya. They were identified and interviewed by fourth-year students at Kenyatta University in their study of the local art scene as part of their wider development of individual painting styles.

Tłumaczka Aleksandra Olędzka-Frybesowa jako eseistka i poetka

This article presents the essays and poems of Aleksandra Olędzka-Frybesowa, who was a renowned translator from French and also English. In her essays, Olędzka-Frybesowa specialises in the Romanesque and Gothic architecture and sculpture of Western Europe as well as European painting from Medieval Ages onwards. She is also familiar with the art of South-East Europe. Her essays cover literary criticism devoted especially to poetry, with a particular interest in French and mystical poetry, as well as haiku, which was also her own artistic activity. The author of this article analyses Olędzka-Frybesowa’s ten volumes of poems, which follow a thematic pattern, especially the theme of wind (air). The analysis provides various insights into a variety of functions of this particular theme, from reality-based meanings to mystical and ethical features. This variety of funtions of the wind theme is supported by a particular melody of the poem and its abundant use of metaphors.

Examining Structure in Scientific Research Articles: A Study of Thematic Progression and Thematic Density

While scholars in the field of writing studies have examined scientific writing from multiple perspectives, interest in its thematic structure has been modest. Recent studies suggest that the themes in scientific writing tend to be anchored on one or a few points of departure. There has also been an attempt at quantification using the thematic-density index (TDI), although this has only been tested on abstracts. In this study, we investigated the thematic structure and TDIs of 30 research articles in biology. The results revealed a progressive thematic pattern in the introduction section, followed by an anchored development in the subsequent sections. The anchoring was realized by the pervasive use of the first-person pronoun “we.” The mean TDI was lowest in the introduction section (2.593) and highest in the results section (7.095). The results were consistent across the articles in the corpus, underscoring the uniform way in which the articles were thematically structured, and in turn suggesting a core thematic pattern for scientific research writing in general. Based on these findings, the authors suggest that future studies compare the thematic structure of the introduction section vis-à-vis the other sections, and investigate the possible factors resulting in such a structure.

“When your heart is touched, it’s not a decision”

This is a qualitative study of 17 Iranian Muslim converts to Christianity residing in Canada. The study asks how the sample narrativizes the meaning of religious conversion in their lives. Analysis reveals a six-fold thematic pattern, the underlying premise of which is the relationship between volition, cognition, and sensory experience (or religious emotion). There is a consensus among respondents that human knowledge is always limited, whatever the field of inquiry. In consequence, religious knowledge based on cognition alone proves to be an insufficient guide to matters of ultimate truth. It follows that conversion is frequently experienced and represented less as a rational choice than as a spontaneously gifted event in which cognition and volition are absorbed by what Azari and Birnbacher have so aptly expressed as a “[knowing] that feels like something.”

What kind of priming is most effective in the processing of relative clauses in context?

This paper examines the influence of different kinds of preceding contexts on the processing of Chinese relative clauses (RCs). We systematically compared the processing of RCs in a canonical, non-canonical, and “null” context. This paper is the first to systematically examine three accounts of priming (the thematic pattern priming account proposed by Lin (2014), in addition to both the verb phrase constituent priming account and the syntactic position sequence priming account proposed by Fedorenko, Piantadosi, and Gibson (2012)) in RC processing. Results showed discrepancies between predictions from each priming account and the actual results. None of the three priming accounts could sufficiently explain the results in Chinese. Alternative possible explanations were suggested, including: (1) having a context makes RC reading more natural and frequency effects less obvious; (2) the NPs inside the RCs are primed by the original thematic roles or grammatical functions of same NPs in the critical context sentence; (3) an interplay of all three different kinds of priming in the processing of RCs in context may occur.

Topical themes and thematic progression: the “picture” of research articles

Although much has been written about the features of academic writing, there is a lack of research attention on macro issues related to the development of ideas, particularly in the writing of research articles. A concept that is useful in investigating such issues is the Hallidayan notion of theme. However, the thematic structure of research articles has received only modest attention over the years. It is also rare for thematic diagrams to be used even though they can be helpful in clarifying the thematic structure of the text. In this exploratory study, the patterning of topical themes in research articles was investigated using a diagrammatic approach. Twenty biology-related research articles were divided into t-units and analyzed for topical themes. Thematic diagrams were generated for all the articles. The diagrams revealed a progressive thematic pattern in the introduction sections of all the articles. At the whole-text level, an anchored-development pattern was observed in the majority of the articles. These findings suggest that research articles at the macro level share similarities in their thematic structure. They also shed light on how authors achieve focus in the writing through the systematic use of clause-initial elements.

The Sovereignty of Wisdom: Boethius’ Consolation in the Light of Folklore

This article argues that Boethius’ Consolation can be read in a folklore key as an allegorical version of the Adventure of the Hero. The text has been the object of analysis often enough, but never, to the author’s knowledge, from the perspective proposed here. The article begins by discussing the shortcomings of certain critical positions regarding the identity of Philosophy. It then applies to the Consolation tools taken from the field of folklore studies—the narrative model proposed in Propp’s Morphology of the Folktale, and the thematic pattern of Sovereignty. Analysis in this light provides evidence that Philosophy is an embodiment of Sovereignty herself, a symbolic figure usually studied by Celtic and Scandinavian scholars, but one which demonstrably plays a key role in Classical literatures as well. This approach is shown to clarify several major aspects of Boethius’ text: the peculiar interplay of its metaphors, the role of Philosophy, the narrative structure within which she exists, and the significance of the various motifs and voice associated with her.

Discourse style and theme–rheme progression in biomedical research article discussions

This paper examines the Discussions of Spanish medical research articles and Spanish translations of comparable English-language texts in order to determine how far their discourse and theme–rheme patterns differ. Quantitative analysis revealed two discourse patterns. Spanish authors preferred a progressive style characterized by considerable initial background information, and a commentary opening with a statement of result and ending with the main claim. In contrast, most translations exhibited a retrogressive style with little or no background information, and the main claim located early or at the start. The Spanish texts showed a highly cohesive thematic pattern, most within-paragraph links being with the immediately preceding theme or rheme, whereas the translations, influenced by the source texts, contained comparatively more distant links, thus creating thematic ‘jumps’. Thematic progression was independent of discourse pattern. Qualitative analysis identified a number of strategies that can help translators align their texts with the target language norm for theme–rheme progression.