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Beyond the Humanist Ethics of Vegetarianism: The Carno-Phallogocentric Kernel of Animal Rights Discourses

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Swayamdipta Das

Currently an M.Phil Research Scholar in English Literature at the University of Calcutta. ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8551-5518. Email: swayamdiptadas22@gmail.com.

Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.05

Received May 31, 2016; Revised July 20, 2016; Accepted July 30, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

The paper would attempt to dwell into the wider philosophical and ontological implications of vegetarianism and in the process offer a deconstructive critique of the more physicalist currency of vegetarianism advocated by many animal rights activists, philosophers and writers like J.M. Coetzee. Taking up Jacques Derrida’s notion of Anthropocentric “Carno-Phallogocentrism” , the paper would argue how any parochial notion of vegetarianism (including those by J.M. Coetzee in Elizabeth Costello) actually reserves the kernel of a certain anthropomorphic Enlightenment humanism and thus partakes in a kind of epistemic violence upon the animal “other” even while it poses to speak on behalf of them. The trajectory of this paper would take up post-humanist thinkers like Heidegger and Emmanuel Levinas to trace the kernel of anthropocentric humanism even in the positing of the post-cartesian subject and attempt to locate an etymological anthropocentric inheritance of the same in the differential humanism of animal philosophers like J.M. Coetzee.

 

Keywords: Cultural Vegetarianism, Carno-Phallogocentrism, Conditional ethicality, animal rights, post-humanism.

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The Mute, the Stoic and the Rebel: Animals in the Works of Mikhail Bulgakov and Nabarun Bhattacharya

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Dibyakusum Ray

 Assistant Professor in the National Institute of Technology, Silchar. ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9537-3277. Email: dibyakusum776@gmail.com.

  Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.06

Received May 30, 2016; Revised July 20, 2016; Accepted July 30, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

This article attempts to trace the gradual ‘otherification’ of non-human entity, particularly animals, in Continental theory. This article would also explore how after presupposing the concept of subject as a human, with animals acting as “alive but no more” with no part in making judgments, Continental theory takes a turn. Levinas conceptualizes animals as “delightful” dociles facilitating human self-definition. Conversely, Derrida problematizes the multilayered man-animal/master-pet dialectics, as he points out the systematic exploitation of animals in society and artistic representation, as the animals are expected to be the mute receptacle of human vagaries—the perpetual ‘other’ who do not even speak or gaze back.  Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita and The Heart of a Dog, together with two of Nabarun Bhattacharya’s works would serve as specific case studies to analyze the evolution of animal imagery from meek placebos through stoic indifference into a force of dissent—ever irreconcilable to the ‘self’.

Keywords: animal studies, aesthetics, ethics, Levinas, Derrida, Bulgakov, Nabarun Bhattacharya

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Whither with the Will? : A Phenomenological Critique of Free Will, Ethicality and the Idea of the Animal

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Soham Ganguly

MPhil student of the English Department of the University of Calcutta. ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3928-5838. Email: sohamgg007@gmail.com

 Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.07

Received May 29, 2016; Revised July 24, 2016; Accepted July 30, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

Free will, which directly pertains to ethical choices, has for long been a point of contention in the spheres of philosophy and the sciences, the latter putting forth chiefly a naturalist account of it, a thinking apparatus which, permeated by evolutionary discourse, privileges the human organism over the non-human by virtue of, among other things, a fundamental epistemic capacity to form conceptions beyond only the ‘first-order’, concerns of the present. In counterpoint to such an account, this paper posits an alternative, phenomenological account of the human subject as well as the body, founded upon spatio-temporality, and examines its ramifications.

 Keywords: phenomenology, temporality, free will, ethicality, animal, naturalism

Planting the Eco-Humanities? Climate Change, Poetic Narratives, and Botanical Lives

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John Charles Ryan

Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of English and Cultural Studies at the University of Western Australia. ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5102-4561. Email: john.c.ryan@uwa.edu.au

  Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.08

Received May 15, 2016; Revised July 10, 2016; Accepted July 10, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

This essay offers an initial attempt to think through how some of the ideas emerging from the new field of “critical plant studies” (CPS) can elucidate, deepen, or challenge aspects of climate change discourse. Across the globe, the deleterious impacts of climate change on plants are increasingly documented by scientists. However, despite their fundamental role in the carbon cycle of the biosphere and the disruption of botanical communities in the wake of climate disturbance, plants occupy a marginal position in the narratives told about climate change. This assertion will be explored, substantiated, and expanded more concretely in reference to the “Keep It In the Ground Campaign” curated by the newspaper The Guardian in 2015. The stories circulating in the public imagination about climate change and that provoke debate, action, and reflection can be enhanced through the invigorated understandings of the vegetal world offered by the emerging field of critical plant studies (CPS).

Keywords: Critical Plant Studies, Ecopoetics, Climate Change Narratives, Activism.

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Creative Nature of the Ideal in Culture

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Viktor Ivanovich Polishchuk1, Zoya Yanovna Selitskaya2 & Grigory Viktorovich Silchenko3

 1Professor of the Department of Russian and Foreign Philology, Cultural Research and Methods of Teaching Them at Tyumen State University (branch in Ishim). Email: v.i.p.1945@mail.ru. 2Associate Professor of the Chair of Philology and Cultural Studies of the Ishim State Teachers Training Institute. 3Tyumen State University.

 Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.09

Received April 11, 2016; Revised July 07, 2016; Accepted July 10, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

 Abstract

The article deals with the notion of the “ideal”, its correlation with the notions of “idea”, “appearance”, “form”, “image”, “seeing”. The article analyses the contribution to the study made by the Russian philosophers Vladimir Solovyev and Evald Ilyenkov. The authors of the article argue that although they define the ideal differently, both thinkers identify it with the purpose of societal development, culture and history. The article reveals the mutual linkage of such notions as the ideal, the idol and the visibility. The fundamental problem of the discussion lies in determining the source of the ideal. The article uses the rules of deductive and inductive logic, the required analytical procedures, as well as diachronic, comparative-historical, hermeneutic and phenomenological methods. The authors come to the following relevant conclusions: firstly, the ideal has a dual nature, which accounts for a tendency to identify it with the idol; secondly, childhood experience is the essential source of the ideal.

Keywords: culture, history, ideal, structure of ideal, idea, idol, appearance, visibility, creation, propensity for the past.

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What is Performance Studies?

Richard Schechner Tisch School of the Arts, New York University  Download PDF Version Because performance studies is so broad-ranging and

The Convulsive Beauty of Cosmic Being: Where Science, Spirituality, and Poetry Collide

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Michael Wayne Friedman

MFA in Creative Writing from Queens University of Charlotte. ORCID: Orchid.org/0000-0001-9759-4498. Email: michaelwaynefriedman@gmail.com

Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.10

Received May 22, 2016; Revised July 10, 2016; Accepted July 10, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

Gerard Manley Hopkins saw intense spiritual connections with nature and was able to integrate these connections into his work. Modernist poets were fascinated by, and often times appalled by, quantum theories about the building blocks of the universe. Their main goal was to create poetry that was grounded, present, and unadulterated by imprecise romantic notions. In distilling language down to its smallest units of meaning, either particulate images or wave?like structures devoid of subjects and objects, Modernists discovered that the objective correlative could only be achieved with a mixture of both forms (Albright, 1997). Contemporary poet Andrew Joron shares the multidimensional view of the Modernists and the intense spiritual connections of Hopkins, and describes such transitional awakenings as a “convulsive beauty of cosmic being” (Joron, 2008). This article explores the ways poets have used science and nature to infuse energy into their work.

Keywords: poetry, quantum physics, quantum poetics, science, spirituality

Prospects of Further Evolution of Culturology

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Anna Iosifovna S?herbakova1, Larisa Sergeevna Zorilova2, Natalia Ivanovna Anufrieva3, Alexander Vladlenovich Kamenets4 & Elizaveta Olegovna Zinchenko5

1Professor, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and socio-cultural activities, Head of the Department of Sociology and Philosophy of Culture Russian State Social University, Moscow, Russia. 2Professor, by Dean of Faculty of Musical Arts has, Moscow State Institute, of Culture. Email: zorilova@mail.ru. 3,4,5Russian state social university, Moscow, Russia

Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.11

Received May 22, 2016; Revised July 10, 2016; Accepted July 10, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

The article deals with the definition of subject matter and scientific status of culturology. It provides comparative analysis of cultural studies at home and abroad and traces back scientific evolution of culturology as well as of sociocultural anthropology which is a more broadly used notion in foreign studies. Highlighting the main modern doctrines and historical theoretic foundations of culture studies the paper focuses on contribution of Leslie White who articulated key research problems of culturology. His innovative conception of cultural science and its further evolution was later embraced by Russian school of culturology. Recognizing high potential of Russian national culture as substance for further cultural studies the article outlines potential ways of formation of culturology in Russia and tries to find its place in the global context while maintaining traditions of studying culture as a social phenomenon. Cultural values, its spiritual and moral foundations which appear to be ignored by related social sciences are put forward as one of the main research subjects. Analysis of differences in Russian and Western approaches to substance and essence of cultural studies stresses the need to specify scientific perception of culturology by modern scholars.

Key words: culture, science, spirituality, sociocultural anthropology, subject, subject matter, society, positivism, values, mentality, methodology.

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What is Performance Studies?

Richard Schechner Tisch School of the Arts, New York University  Download PDF Version Because performance studies is so broad-ranging and

Freud’s Imaginative Work: Moses and Monotheism and the Non-European Other

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Jeremy De Chavez

Associate Professor, Vice Chair, Department of Literature, College of Liberal Arts, De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines. ORCID: Orchid.org/0000-0003-0320-372X. Email: jeremy.dechavez@dlsu.edu.ph

 Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.12

Received April 13, 2016; Revised July 01, 2016; Accepted July 07, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

This essay tracks and maps out the ideas that informed the writing of Sigmund Freud’s final opus, the highly speculative and putatively historical text Moses and Monotheism. Contrary to interpretations of Moses and Monotheism as a work that critiques Jewishness as it outlines Freud’s theories on culture and religion, this essay suggests that Freud, in fact, attempts to defend Judaism by isolating what he believes is its quality that attracts hate—its monotheism—and by then ascribing that quality to the non-European other. In Freud’s work the non-European other is an exploitable resource that Freud uses to support and corroborate his theories with little concern at arriving at a genuine understanding of those cultures. Freud’s imaginative reconfiguration of the non-European other for his own purposes, what this essay refers to as his imaginative work, animates much of his writings on culture and as this essay suggests, results from Freud’s uneasy understanding of his own Jewish origins.

Keywords: Freud, Moses and Monotheism, Said, Totem and Taboo

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The Double Position of Waiting for Godot

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Ali Taghizadeh1 & Gholamhossein Mahmoud Soltani2

 1Assistant Professor at the English Department of Razi University of Kermanshah, Iran.ORCID: Orchid.org/0000-0003-3820-1468. Email: altaghee@zedat.fu-berlin.de. 2PhD Candidate in English, Razi University,Iran. Email: gm.sultani@gmail.com

Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.13

Received March 27, 2016; Revised July 24, 2016; Accepted July 07, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

 Abstract

No way can one exaggerate the unique position possessed by Samuel Beckett and his seminal play Waiting for Godot on the stage and in the dramaturgy alike. Undoubtedly, nestled in the core of this work lies some working which has bestowed it with such roaring success. Beckett’s play is an embodiment of the idea that binary oppositions are not more than conventions which therefore can be subverted to allow a wide gamut of unprivileged voices to find a leeway. Waiting for Godot is full of ambiguities and binary oppositions, just to name the extreme one, the concept of “waiting” and the implicit binary of “substance/form.  Therefore, it can be read as a dramatization of how it neatly pits such hierarchies against the deconstructionist suspicion of the accepted binary items present in the Western philosophical tradition. Considering how much affinity Derrida himself has seen with Beckett, Waiting for Godot is a ground conducive to the concepts of deconstruction to be practiced.

 Key Words: Deconstruction, Duality Ambiguity, Substance, Form, Incubation

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An Investigation of Inaction in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot: A Literary Darwinian Perspective

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Bahareh Merhabi1 & Amrollah Abjadian2

1PhD Candidate in English Literature, Shiraz University, Iran.Email: Baharmehrabi22@gmail.com.2Amrollah Abjadian is Professor, English Literature Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran.

 Volume 8, Number 3, 2016 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v8n3.14

Received May 25, 2016; Revised July 21, 2016; Accepted July 30, 2016; Published August 18, 2016

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to develop a literary Darwinian reading of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. The attributes of human nature defined by Joseph Carroll are discussed with regard to characters’ inaction. Waiting for Godot stages the unstable and uncertain status of modern man, suffering lack of communication. Constructive elements of human nature such as the acts towards survival, romance and nurture are discussed in order to delineate the inactive pattern of characters’ behaviors in Waiting for Godot. It becomes clear that lack of action in Vladimir and Estragon pinpoints the fall and paralysis of human nature as defined by the literary Darwinists. This article demonstrates that, as a result of uncertainty, anxiety and other disastrous consequences of the Second World War, the attributes of human nature, along with the agency as the power for committed action, as defined by the Literary Darwinists, are forgotten, paralyzed or ignored. Man is staged as a creature incapable of agency that is reduced to inaction because of the post-war catastrophic situation.

 

Keywords: Waiting for Godot, Literary Darwinism, Joseph Carroll, Human Nature, Inaction.

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