Memory, Culture and Identity: A cultural reading of The Legends of Pensam

Located at the intersections of memory, culture and identity, this paper attempts a literary and cultural reading of Mamang Dai’s novel The Legends of Pensam (2006), an extraordinary piece of tribal narrative from the North‑Eastern part of India, imbued with the colours of its traditions and the flavours of its geography. This paper argues that literature, in particular tribal literature, has the potential to uncover the profound wealth and resources of an underrepresented culture and tradition camouflaged behind the curtains of mainstream cultures. This paper focuses on the robustness of literature in preserving a marginalized culture informed by the multiplicity of its rich cultural traditions, social beliefs, religious views, oral tradition, and colourful lifestyle. The study focuses on how a literary work can preserve and document the history, culture and identity of the Adi tribes, imbued with lore and myths from the memory of people defining their unique identities.

Gender and Memory in Cristina García's The Agüero Sisters

This paper discusses Cristina García’s 1997 novel The Agüero Sisters. Its aim is to outline some of the topics present in the novel through the lens of gender, and to contribute to an awareness of Hispanic American literature. Following a brief introduction, the paper discusses masculinity and femininity as present in the novel. Here the paper focuses on two motifs – the position of the human body in the novel, and memory; a link between these two motifs is suggested. Memory is central to the novel, and it appears in different variations throughout the text – nostalgia, intergenerational memory, or memory as an inherently unreliable process. While this paper does not exhaust the topic of memory, it attempts to point out a possible direction for further discussion.

Selected Bibliography of the Publications of Professor Stanislav J. Kavka

The paper presents a bibliography of the publications of Professor Stanislav Jindřich Kavka (1946 2015), a renowned Czech Anglicist and comparative linguist. The bibliography was compiled on the occasion of what would have been the year of his 75th birthday. It is meant to serve as a modest contribution to the history of English studies in Central Europe.

When Nature Triggers Trauma: Environmental Racism and Ecofeminism in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

This paper deals with the depiction of environmental racism, natural trauma and the woman/nature or woman/animal relationships in Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God. The main goal is to identify and critically evaluate the impacts of such depictions or relationships in the context of the systemic oppression of African American women and men in the United States of America. For this purpose, excerpts from throughout the novel are discussed with regard to their depiction of dehumanization, animalization, natural trauma, or the metaphor of the female body, with the emphasis on ecofeminist and ecocritical aspects in Hurston’s work

Where Is My Homeland?: The Pilgrimage of Marcela Sulak

This essay examines the literary output of Marcela Sulak, a Texas‑born Czech poet and academic now living and working in Tel Aviv, Israel. There is a focus not only on her recently published memoir, but on her poetry and her translations of two Czech classics (Mácha and Erben) into English. The primary interest of the essay is in exploring her search for identity, not only geographically, but also spiritually. Increased attention is paid to those aspects of her life and work connected with the Czech nation, history, culture and language.

The American Dreams and Nightmares of Polish Immigrants

This article focuses on the theme of the American Dream and its dark side in relation to Polish immigration to America. It attempts to explain various reasons behind Polish immigration based on the immigrants’ age and social status, as well as the unpleasant consequences of their decision to leave their homeland. The issues faced by Polish immigrants and Polish Americans can be better understood in the light of a brief outline of the sociopolitical situation in Poland. The aim of this article is to demonstrate the negative effects of immigrants’ belief in the American Dream and to shed light on the intergenerational identity of Polish Americans.