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Directions and Intellectual Bases of Ornament Criticism in Modern Architectural Literature

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Fatemeh Ahani & Iraj Etessam

Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

  Abstract

Following the publication of Adolf Loos’s famous article “Ornament and Crime” in 1908, arguments against ornaments reached an unprecedented level which led to its elimination from the majority of architectural practices in western countries during the first half of the 20 century. The ornamental approach, despite being severely criticized by postmodernist critics in 1960’s, never completely ceased to exist. In an attempt to discover the reasons behind the long-lasting presence of such a practice, this paper looks into different directions of ornament criticism in modern architectural literature. Modern critics condemned ornamentation by ascribing several defects such as deception, decadence, disutility, wastefulness, recession and lack of spontaneity. As a result of such associations, designers repress in themselves what they consider as defective and internalize anti-ornament beliefs of modernism in a form of self-control. This leads to the marginalization of ornament in architectural discussions and practices even after the demise of the modernist movement in architecture.

 Keywords: Architectural Ornament, Criticism, Repression, Naming, Defect Keep Reading

Exploring Identity and Individuality in Upamanyu Chatterjee’s English, August and Rupa Bajwa’s The Sari Shop

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KBS Krishna

Central University of Himachal Pradesh, Dharamshala

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract:

Identity becomes a problematic issue, especially in the modern era, where it clashes with individuality. The failure to fit into categories prescribed by societies leads to crisis of identity. This crisis is experienced by people of all classes. The article looks at two Indian novels in English – Upamanyu Chatterjee’s English, August and Rupa Bajwa’s The Sari Shop, where a civil servant and a shop attendant struggle to discover their identity in a world where divisions are watertight.

 Keywords: Identity, Individuality, Individualism, English August, The Sari Shop Keep Reading

“Dear Prudence” as an Interaction between East and West

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Robert Tindol

Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, China

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

One of the noteworthy songs to come out of the Beatles’ celebrated 1968 trip to India was “Dear Prudence”, authored by John Lennon. “Dear Prudence” is unique in its conjoining of Eastern sounds with a childlike Western theme, and as such it is particularly evident of the way in which Lennon in particular understood the possibilities of artistic hybrids involving the East and West. Moreover, the song can be analyzed by employing Homi Bhabha’s The Location of Culture as well as Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari’s Capitalism and Schizophrenia two-volume series. With such an interpretation in mind, the call for Prudence to “come out and play” involves the sharing of attention of newfound interest in the East with a continued grounding in the familiar West. This is a new “plateau” that does no violence to the past nor to any actor in the present, but instead leads to a peaceful new beginning.

Keywords: Beatles, Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus Keep Reading

Towards the Theory of Revalorization: Revolutionary Aesthetics in the Works of Olu Obafemi and Ahmed Yerima

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Yemi Atanda

Kwara State University, malete, Nigeria

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

This study focuses on the revolutionary aesthetics of Olu Obafemi and Ahmed Yerima in The New Dawn and Attahiru respectively. For Olu Obafemi, the aesthetics of his drama relies principally on Marxist ideology, while Ahmed Yerima’s dramaturgy is rooted in Hegelian critical theory.  The reason for the intellectual debate between the ‘idealist’ and the ‘materialist’ signifies the roots that anchor the dramatist oeuvre of the radical/social playwright and the critical/liberal playwright is purely ideological. The idealist situates everything on the praxis of consciousness and that ideas control the world, while the materialist says that man’s existence is on the primacy of matter as reflected in the works of the two playwrights and this ambivalence flourishes in the understanding of nature and life. The link between the  two ideological divides is that social realism and critical realism have their roots in revolutionary aesthetics. This revolutionary aesthetics of both the social realism and critical realism is what I term as dialectics of revolution. The import of these divides in the  body of African literature is that  man is at the epicentre of these debates. African playwrights may have to rely on history, culture, socio-political, and economic situations of their society in their dramaturgies, and some factors such as personal visions, periodic essence, ideology and  socio-economic and political realities may be considered by African critics as they evaluate African play-texts. Dialectics of revolution, therefore, is the dramatic search for a just society, it remains a veritable source of criticism in order to understand the inherent values in any given ideology. This study, therefore, projects that the application of dialectics of revolution developed in the theories of Revalorization for literary criticism will help to advance the course of humanity.

 Keywords: revolutionary aesthetics, realism, revalorization, African, Olu Obafemi, Ahmed Yerima Keep Reading

The Problem of ‘New’ Art Perception in the USSR: Case Study of Avant-Garde

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Artjom A. Fomenkov

Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod

Elizabeth A. Pakhomova

Volga state university of water transport

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

The article reveals the similarities in development of Soviet art in post-Revolutionary years and in the period of “defrosting” and “stagnation”. It was accepted, that this comparison is appropriate due to presence of similar aspects in the Soviet political system of the abovementioned chronological periods. The author demonstrates a great role of avant-garde art in the cultural life of the country in 1920-1930 and at the turn of 1950-1960. The specific character of Russian avant-garde, as the “Revolutionary” art, was revealed. It substantiated the idea about possible approval of the Soviet leadership in the sphere of “new” art (including rock-music) in the whole world in post-Stalin period due to competitive advantages, as compared to the USA and Great Britain. There were important factors—given the specificity of Soviet cultural policy that prevented the USSR from becoming the global leader in the sphere of new art. The negative aspects of Soviet socialist realism were denoted, even though partially, especially in advancement of the USSR’s positive image in the world. The conclusion is that there needs to be certain amount of freedom under the cultural policy of the state as a required condition for participation in cultural sphere.

 Keywords: art, culture, avant-garde, leadership, rock music, the left, the USSR, “defrosting” Keep Reading

The Problem of the Subject in Constructivist Philosophical Models: the Principles of Forming a Typology

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Veronika Olegovna Bogdanova & Sergey Valentinovich Borisov

Chelyabinsk State Pedagogical University, Russia

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

 

Abstract

This article is aimed at studying the succession and interinfluence of constructivist philosophical models in accordance with their historical traditions and the problem of the subject. The authors have defined three constructivist philosophical models: constructivist hylomorphism, constructivist eidetics and constructivist hermeneutics. The basic constructs of constructivist hylomorphism are a priori forms of consciousness which serve as preconditions of subjectivity. The foundation of constructivist eidetics is formed by the phenomena of consciousness which subjectify the world. Constructivist hermeneutics is based upon the means of communication which condition intersubjectivity.

Keywords: philosophy, subject, epistemology, cognition, constructivism, philosophism, typology, hylomorphism, eidetics, hermeneutics. Keep Reading

Existential aspect of Being: Interpreting J. P. Sartre’s Philosophy

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Ivan V. Kuzin, Alexander A. Drikker & Eugene A. Makovetsky

Saint Petersburg State University, Russia

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

The article discusses rationalistic and existential approaches to the problem of existence. The comparison of Sartre’s pre-reflective cogito and Descartes’ reflective cogito makes it possible to define how Sartre’s thought moves from the thing to consciousness and from consciousness to the thing. At the same time, in Being and Nothingness Sartre does not only define the existence of the thing in its passivity—which in many respects corresponds to Descartes’ philosophy, but also as an open orientation towards consciousness, the latter concept not being fully developed by him. This statement may be regarded as a hidden component of Sartre’s key thesis about the role of the Other in the verification of our existence. The most important factor in understanding this is the concept of the look. Detailed analysis of Sartre’s theses in Being and Nothingness enables us to demonstrate that the concept of the look makes it possible to consider the identity of being-in-itself and being-for-itself (consciousness).

Keywords: Sartre, rationalism, existentialism, thing, being, the look, existence, nothingness, consciousness, the Other Keep Reading

Writing Resistance: an Understanding of the Narratives of Empowerment in Toni Morrison’s A Mercy

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C.L. Shilaja

Sathyabama University

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

Language is the medium by which one’s psychological experiences, emotions and imaginations can be recreated in the minds of the reader or listener. Through ages language has been the vehicle with which humans have communicated ideas to each other. Language has not only the power to heal and to comfort but also to retrieve the suppressed experiences of an individual from the past.This paper seeks to discuss Toni Morrison’s novel A Mercy as a text that explores the common language uncommonly well in using it as a double edged sword. She subverts language in a rather complex play of words employing it as a powerful tool for the survival and continuance of existence for the voiceless. It becomes a means of identity construction as much as a tool of empowerment, for the marginalized to overcome their traumatic experiences.

Key words: Toni Morrison, Suppressed Self, trauma, identity, language Keep Reading

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Domesticating the “Other”: An Analysis of the Appropriation of Non-Humans by Humanistic Discourse in Herge’s The Adventures of Tintin

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Dipayan Mukherjee

Rabindra Bharati University, W.B., India

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract:

The humanistic narrative of Herge’s The Adventures of Tintin suppresses a politics of domination and domestication of the “Other” and this politics is a common thread which applies both in the context of the presentation of western civilization’s relation with non-western culture and human character’s relation with the non-human ones in the comic series. By analysis of some important non-human characters from The Adventures of Tintin, I shall explore the constant human attempt to bring the non-human within the humanistic discourse that is to domesticate them. Through such analytic procedure, I shall also try to figure out how a few animal characters resist the process of being humanized and the consequent harsh treatment that is meted out to them.

Keywords: non-humans, domestication, pets, animal rights, anthropocentricism Keep Reading

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The Art of Storytelling and the Role of Memory in Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories and Luka and the Fire of Life

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Soumava Maiti

Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan

Volume 8, Number 1, 2016 I Full Text PDF

Abstract

The focus of this study is mainly twofold – firstly to locate Salman Rushdie’s two children’s fiction namely Haroun and the Sea of Stories (1990) and Luka and the Fire of Life (2010) in the storytelling traditions of east and west and to understand Rushdie’s art of storytelling; and secondly to address the role of memory in this very act of storytelling and to analyze the metaphor of journey in that process of memorizing in these novels. This article seeks to analyze how memory in the form of ‘minimarrative’ can challenge the official version of story/ history and the concept of homogeneous empty ‘Time’ and how the gap between memory’s ‘private inside’ and ‘public outside’ might be bridged in the scope of these two novels.

 Keywords: storytelling, memory, journey, time, nation.

Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories (1990) and Luka and the Fire of Life (2010) celebrate the triumph of storytelling, literary imagination and memory over power and dogmatism. This study is an attempt to find answers to the following questions in the scope of the two children’s fiction by Salman Rushdie. Does memory influence only those who remember? Does it influence those who are remembered? Is the concept of memory static? Can it not change the bygone days? It is true, history or the past events directly or indirectly create our memory. Can memory create its own version of history? How can the shared memories of different social groups foster a sense of collectivity? Can memory serve the ethical purpose of a novel? I will seek to analyze in the process of remembrance how an individual and a community influence and complement each other.

In his essay “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History”, Michel Foucault defines genealogy as an analysis of descent opposed to the evolutionary model of history whose main force is in the search for origin: genealogy liberates what has been forgotten or lost in the continuum of history and what has been set aside as accidents or errors in the imposed order of historical necessity. The genealogical approach with its task of tracing “passing events in their dispersions” questions a “suprahistorical perspective” that assumes a “teleological movement of events in the homogenized form of time” (Rabinow, 1984, pp. 76-100). In this study I will seek to understand how characters like Haroun and Luka can resist the “teleological movement of events in the homogenized form of time”, symbolized by the figures like Khattam-Shud and Aalim.

In Haroun and Luka, Rushdie achieves the effect of “written orality” (Brenan, 1989, p. 139), in introducing Indian storytelling as it functions in the Kathasaritsagara, the largest available collection of tales in Sanskrit verse, written by Somadeva in the eleventh century. The Chinese box pattern of the Kathasaritsagara is metaphorically represented by the idea of ocean. Indeed the main plot of the Kathasaritsagara, the romantic adventures of Prince Narawahananda and his quest for the throne, is interspersed with many shorter tales which can be categorized as fables, anecdotes, religious sermons, gothic stories or romances; and several interlinked stories are narrated by the characters to clarify their arguments or to both instruct and amuse the listeners. The nonlinear mode of storytelling with the intertwining of multiple storylines is the oral one which is traditional in India and the Middle East. Like The Mahabharata, The Ramayana, Panchatantra, Jataka tales and The Thousand and One Nights they belong to the Indian tradition of cyclical, episodic, and digressive storytelling. The splitting of the name of the caliph of Baghdad, Haroun-al-Rashid, “into the names of father and son,” as Meenakhshi Mukherejee observes in her essay “Haroun and the Sea of Stories: Fantasy of Fable?” invokes “the cycle of tales that for Rushdie has long been a synecdoche for an inexhaustible storehouse of stories” (The Perishable Empire, 2013, p. 153). Among the many other countless sources one important source is the tales of Panchatantra. Haroun’s changing his turtle for his father’s peacock has a subtle reference to the tales of “bird and peacock” and “bird and turtle” in Panchatantra. The Water Genie Iff reminds us of the tale of The Arabian Nights which is abounded with Genies of all sorts, including the Water Genies. Salman Rushdie returns to the theme of The Conference of the Birds (written in the twelfth century by Farid-ud-Din Attar) in Haroun and the Sea of Stories, 15 years after the publication of his debut novel Grimus (1975), where he first made reference to Attar’s poetic masterpiece. In Attar’s poem the bird hoopoe, as figure of the sheikh who guides the Sufi adept along the path of righteousness, appears at the beginning of the poem to tell the birds about their king Simurg. In Salman Rushdie’s novel (1990) when the Water Genie asks Haroun to choose a bird to carry them to Kahani, Haroun chooses the hoopoe, the bird with a brain box with “memory cell” (p. 149) and the bird that “in old stories . . . leads all birds through many dangerous places to their ultimate goal” (p. 64).

The story of the novel Haroun and the Sea of Stories (1990) begins in an imaginary “country of Alifbay,” with “a sad city, the saddest of cities, a city so ruinously sad that it had forgotten its name” (p. 15) and ends happily with a policeman’s declaration of “We remembered the city’s name” (p. 208). Hence, here in this story there is a journey from forgetfulness to the restoration of memory. The narrative of the story starts with the identity crisis of a community as it forgets the city’s name and ends with the preservation of the lost identity by recalling the name. The name of the city is “Kahani” and “It means story” (p. 209). The novel tells the story of Haroun Khalifa and his father Rashid Khalifa and their adventure in Gup and Chup in search of Rashid’s lost talent of storytelling after Rashid’s wife Soraya’s disappearance with a clerk who despises stories as useless untruth. While Soraya finds Rashid’s impractical storytelling impossible to stand, Haroun on the other hand finds his father’s skill fascinating. In the practice of storytelling, the talent of the storyteller is celebrated: “Haroun often thought of his father as a juggler, because his stories were really lots of different tales juggled together, and Rashid kept them going in a sort of dizzy whirl, and never made a mistake” (p. 16). In his essay entitled “Between memory and history: Les lieux de memoire” Pierre Nora (1989) felt that memory should be captured through individual means, because “the less memory is experienced collectively, the more it will require individuals to become themselves memory individuals” (p. 16). Nora says that “memory . . . is affective and magical” (p. 8). Thus the memory-maker is a kind of magician who controls the affections of his/ her audience. I find Pierre Nora’s linking the concept of the memory-maker and magician quite interesting. Haroun and Luka often consider their father as a magician or juggler who controls the affection of his audience…Full Text PDF

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