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The End Of The Nobel Era And The Reconstruction Of The World Republic Of Letters, Guohua Zhu, Yonghua Tang

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In their article "The End of the Nobel Era and the Reconstruction of the World Republic of Letters" Guohua Zhu and Yonghua Tang critically examine mechanisms of cultural hegemony associated with the Nobel Prize in Literature from a neocolonial lens. Borrowing from Casanova's idea of the "World Republic of Letters" and its attentiveness to geopolitics, the essay proceeds to reconstruct the dialectical relations between the nation and the world. It does so, in the first place, by documenting and analyzing the process of negotiation and bargaining entailed in the construction of global cultural hegemony and thereby examine the functions and …

Resistance To Neocolonialism In Contemporary Chinese Literary Theory, Zeng Jun

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article "Resistance to Neocolonialism in Contemporary Chinese Literary Theory" Jun ZENG claims that the introduction of Western Literary Theory in the past forty years of China's reform and opening up was carried out under the background of neo-colonialism. "Western imagination" in the discourse of contemporary Chinese literary theory was an important aspect of the strategy of cultural resistance under the overwhelming influence of Western neocolonialism. Contemporary Chinese literary theory no longer simply regards Western literary theory in the twentieth century as a bourgeois literary ideology; instead, it adopts a "de-ideological" attitude to return to the issues of literature, …

Mo Yan’S Reception In China And A Reflection On The Postcolonial Discourse, Binghui Song

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article "Mo Yan's Reception in China and a Reflection on the Postcolonial Discourse" Binghui Song argue that the controversial style and themes of Mo Yan's works are necessitated by the interconnected yet different contexts of China and the rest of the world, only by means of which Mo Yan can let his voice be heard. As one of the most excellent and unique contemporary Chinese writers, Mo Yan has exerted extensive influence on Chinese readers, and his works have also caused various controversies over the past 30 years. His winning of the Nobel Prize in Literature, rather than …

Restaging World Literature In The Age Of Neoliberalism/Neocolonialism, Shaobo Xie

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article "Restaging World Literature in the Age of Neoliberal­ism/Neocolonia­­lism" Shaobo Xie argues that Goethe's notion of world literature spells a genuine universalism that contributes to resistance to neoliberal imperialism. In the age of neocolonial­ism/ne­oliberalism all conduct, and all spheres of human life are framed and measured by economic terms and metrics and neoliberalism both as a govern­ing rationality and as an economic policy is penetrating into every part of the world. The politics that is really heter­ogeneous or external to the rule of neoliberal capitalism in the neocolonial global present consists in thinking towards new possibilities of organizing …

"The Politics Of Literature In Michel Foucault: Veridiction, Fiction And Desire", Azucena G. Blanco

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This article is based on two hypotheses. The first is that in the later Foucault we would find a reformulation of the status that literature had occupied in his work and the development of a politics of literature (already developed in “Sujetos irregulares: ficción y política en el Sade de Michel Foucault”). The second considers that fiction and desire are inseparably joined, which leads me to analyse the logic of Sade as logic of desire in the lectures that Foucault gave on the author at the University of Buffalo (1970). A reading of both aspects together needs to be …

Processes Of Subjectivation: The Biopolitics And Politics Of Literature In The Later Foucault, Azucena G. Blanco

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

The last few years saw the publication of the lectures given by Michel Foucault at the Collège de France from 1970-71 until the year of his death, 1984. In May 2015, Éditions du Seuil published Théories et institutions pénales (1971-1972), which is the last volume of the series. Knowledge of these published lectures has led to a return to the French thinker’s work and to a transformation of the studies on subjectivity and politics both in literary theory and philosophy. The study of his work, in particular of his later theoretical production and of its reception, is therefore necessary and …

Bibliography: Life, Illness And Disabilities In Life Writing And Medical Narratives, I-Chun Wang, Jonathan Hart, Cindy Chopoidalo, David Porter, Shu-Hua Chung

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

No abstract provided.

Landscapes Of Illness, Politics Of Segregation And Discourse Of Empathy In The 19th Century Leprosy Narratives Of Hawaii, I-Chun Wang

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Leprosy is one of the oldest known human diseases, recognized throughout the world. Leprosy causes serious damage to the nervous system, often resulting in deformity in the absence of an effective treatment; sufferers were often left at the mercy of its natural process or were segregated from others due to the fear of contagion. The places ravaged by leprosy became lands of fear. Modern science has shown that leprosy bacilli have a high rate of infectivity but a rather low rate of pathogenicity, and above ninety percent of people are equipped with immunity to leprosy. Leper colonies as described in …

Disability, Victorian Biopolitics And Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray, Hiu Wai Wong

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article “Disability, Victorian Biopolitics and Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray,” Hiu Wai Wong discusses The Picture of Dorian Gray as Oscar Wilde’s life writing of the androgynous beauty. Extending his praise of Lord Alfred Douglas in De Profundis, Wilde’s descriptions of Dorian as the androgyne can be read as the demonstration of Michel Foucault’s techniques of the self. She argues that the androgynous beauty can be a strategy of bodily practice that overthrows the Victorian biopolitics which enforces a rigid gender role. Moreover, she explores the notion of camp and Judith Butler’s theory of performance to explain the …

More Migrants With Nowhere To Go?, Mary E. Theis

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In "More Migrants with Nowhere to Go?” Mary Theis reframes the stories of the Tai Dam and discusses this group of people, who migrated from Vietnam and Laos to Thailand and then to Iowa in 1975 after the wars in Southeast Asia when they virtually had nowhere to go. It is based on interviews with some of the 1,200 Tai Dam who were invited by Governor Robert Ray to resettle in Des Moines, Iowa, and nearby cities. The stories are contextualized by research on U.S. policies on immigration and the current precarious fates of other migrants in the United States …

Albert Camus' Social, Cultural And Political Migrations, Benaouda Lebdai Pr

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article “Albert Camus’ social, cultural and political migrations,” Benaouda LEBDAI analyses Albert Camus’ posthumous autofiction The First man, a fascinating self-representation and self -telling. Found after his deadly car accident, the manuscript adds a tragic dimension to the disguised autobiography. This paper demonstrates Camus’ capacity to migrate from one world to another, looks into the reasons behind such attitudes and stresses the significance of an outstanding life account within the on-going debate between France and Algeria about his political stands during colonial Algeria. His vision of the indigenous people, the Algerians, and of the future of colonial Algeria, …

Illness, Disability, And Ethical Life Writing, G Thomas Couser

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In his article “Illness, Disability, and Ethical Life Writing,” G. Thomas Couser discusses illness and disability as related to ethical Life Writing. Since the issues came to his attention in the early 1990s, narratives of illness and disability have continued to proliferate in the US. And today, even as psychiatry moves away from narrative therapy toward drug therapy, narrative competence is being emphasized in the treatment of non-mental illness. Whether inside or outside the clinic, narratives of illness and disability can be in and of themselves restorative, if not healing. And yet, the production of such narratives is not without …

Introduction To Voices Of Life, Illness And Disabilities In Life Writing And Medical Narratives, I-Chun Wang, Jonathan Locke Hart

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Life writing is a narrative and discourse on the self from social, psychological and biographical perspectives. This special issue includes eleven essays addressing recurrent themes in life writing such as migration, medical narratives and cultural memories. Through voices of life, illness, suffering, disabilities and death, the authors not only question a traditional sense of self but also provoke further debates on human values and facets of identity formation.

Selected Bibliography For The Study Of Belief In Contemporary Global Capitalism, Fu-Jen Chen, Su-Lin Yu

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

No abstract provided.

A Sinful Reaction To Capitalist Ethics In No Quiero Quedarme Sola Y Vacía (2006), Celina Bortolotto

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article “A Sinful Reaction to Capitalist Ethics in No quiero quedarme sola y vacía (2006)” Celina Bortolotto analyzes how Lozada’s characterization of the main character, La Loca, questions the ideals of free agency offered by consumerist capitalism and the urban gay male ideal under the promise of a liberating gay lifestyle in a social context defined by identity politics. The novel is a fictionalized autobiographical account of Puerto Rican author Angel Lozada’s misadventures in the early 2000s gay scene in New York. This essay plays with the punitive sense of the word “capital” in the seven capital sins …

Changez/Cengiz's Changing Beliefs In The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Valerie Kennedy

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article, “Changez/Cengiz's Changing Beliefs in The Reluctant Fundamentalist” Valerie Kennedy analyzes the interrelation of individual subjectivity and global capitalism and the conflict between two belief systems in Mohsin Hamid’s novel. These are, first, a neoliberal system that sees individuals as rationally self-interested, mobile, economic units, and, second, a system based on a humanist definition of individuals as defined by nation, family, and tradition. Changez, the novel’s protagonist, initially endorses the first, but later rejects it for the second, due to his growing awareness of the impact on Pakistan of American geopolitics after 9/11. The essay also examines …

Introduction To Belief In Contemporary Global Capitalism, Fu-Jen Chen

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This special issue addresses the broad and complex nexus among three topics: belief, subjectivity, and contemporary global capitalism. It explores the intersection of material practices, ideational dimensions, and the subjective dynamics of global capitalism. The interdisciplinary contributions in this special issue come from authors in Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, South Korea, Turkey, and the United States. And the articles gathered in this issue are to explore a wide range of topics, varying from entrepreneurship and digital capitalism to neoliberalism and postfeminism; from fundamentalism and terrorism to Protestantism and contemporary homosexual identity; from body and ableism to mind and New Age …

The Documentality Of Memory In The Post-Truth Era, Claire Scopsi

Proceedings from the Document Academy

This article analyzes the documentality of memories in order to ground further consideration of memory for historical research in the post-truth era. The article compares discussions of the document in document theory to those in French historical epistemology in order to establish what is a reliable documentary source. Formerly, reliability was rooted in the paradigm of truth and the authenticity guaranteed by institutions and scientists. In today's post-truth era, these foundations are questioned. This article suggests that we consider the production of historical narratives as a design process, and that we evaluate the truthfulness of a source according to three …

Personal Geography, Floating Identities And Inter-Asian Migration In Stories By Migrant Workers In Taiwan, I-Chun Wang

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article "Personal Geography, floating Identities and Inter-Asian Migration in Stories by Migrant Workers in Taiwan," I-Chun Wang discusses narratives by migrant workers with the purpose of looking into their personal geographies, their possibilities of integration, their floating identities and their dreams of settlement and possible success. This paper stresses the stories of migration show not only common human values, shared across cultures and creolization, but also sad stories of human-rights violations, injustices, discrimination, and even human trafficking. In these fictional stories or witness literature, cross-cultural conflicts, cultural in-betweenness and cultural hybridity are intertwined with the migrants’ ways to …

The Bumpy Highway To Freedom: U.S. Reconstruction And The Freedmen's Bureau, Jennifer Ann Sobnosky

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

After studying the Civil War and the Reconstruction era in depth, I was required to choose one aspect of the Reconstruction era and write a historiography based on it. I researched how historians studied and interpreted the role of the Freedmen's Bureau, which was an agency established immediately after the end of the Civil War. I studied how these interpretations of the success of the Freedmen's Bureau's changed over time. I began by producing an annotated bibliography of the eight scholarly sources. I wrote three drafts and conferenced with my professor as well as the Write Place consultants. I revised …

A Literary Journey Back In Time, Hannah K. Heil

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

Before I began writing, I reflected on the effect literature has had on my life. I brainstormed different experiences in which I found literature to be very influential. I talked with various people including my parents and past teachers to ensure the accuracy of the various childhood stories I decided to write about. When it came time to put the final draft together, I focused on my various experiences with literature and the grand effect it has had on my life. I also incorporated why I value being a literate person today as a university student.

Editor's note: For this …

Rhetorical Analysis: Never Give Up, John Milliken

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

For this English 100 assignment, we were asked to write a rhetorical analysis of a speech of our choice. I knew I wanted to pick one that would be interesting to me. Prior to writing this paper, I had heard about the speech once before when watching a sports documentary. I knew the speech had a strong message at its core, but I did not know why it was so respected and liked by its audience. While writing this paper I had three drafts;, the first two drafts were peer edited. The second and third were also edited and graded …

Claiming Your Life And Education, Kelly E. Corkery

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

My essay is a rhetorical analysis of Adrienne Rich’s speech, “Claiming an Education." I chose Rich’s speech because a friend of mine told me that her introduction to college seminar at Penn State discussed the speech, and I found the speech to be very interesting. After choosing the speech, I completed two drafts, which were both edited in both a peer review and by my instructor, Professor Strain. After my first draft, I also had a writing conference with Professor Strain to refine my work more. After my second draft, I met with Professor Strain again to discuss submitting this …

Reconstruction In The Big Easy: The Changing Interpretations Of The Role Of Race During Reconstruction In New Orleans, Claire Sullivan

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

This historiography essay was the final assignment of my ASI 120 (Core Program) course at the University of Dayton. In preparation for the paper, I read A Short History of Reconstruction, 1863-1877 by Eric Foner. After reading and reflecting on Foner’s book, I decided I wanted to focus my topic on Reconstruction in New Orleans, with specific emphasis on racial issues and the New Orleans Riot. I chose this topic because it allowed me to further research a topic relating to social justice with respect to race relations, something I am very passionate about. I spent a great deal of …

The Ku Klux Klan's Reign Of Terror During Reconstruction: Effects, Motives, And Composition, Jack O'Donnell

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

The final project in the course ASI 120 was a historiography on American Reconstruction. The purpose of a historiography is to evaluate the ways in which historians' views of a certain topic have changed over time. I chose to evaluate and analyze historians' views of the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror during American Reconstruction, focusing specifically on interpretations of the Ku Klux Klan's effects, motives, and composition. To complete this assignment, I analyzed eight different sources written by historians throughout the twentieth century. After writing a summary of each source, I was tasked with choosing which source provided the …

Learning To Read Was Great, Alyssa T. Mims

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

This project was written with the intentions of telling the story of how I learned to read and the effects of my reading skills flourishing.

A Tale As Old As Time: Changing Interpretations Of Democratic And Republican Polarization During Reconstruction, Dawson J. Vandervort

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

This paper started in the beginning of the 2018 spring semester with the reading of Eric Foner's A Short History of Reconstruction. This book started with a historiography, which students modeled their own off of, and continued with an extremely detailed documentation of Reconstruction. After this my instructor had the class propose a topic and choose 15 relevant sources. Then the class chose 8 sources to create an annotated bibliography with. In March I began the writing process slowly and tediously, but competition with a friend created a positive and fun environment. As we worked, we read our papers to …

The Colfax Massacre: A Culmination Of Political And Racial Disparity, Lian F. Mitzian

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

I wrote this paper for the interdisciplinary humanities course The Development of Western Culture in a Global Context. My writing process consisted of first examining various primary and secondary sources on Southern Reconstruction and the Colfax Massacre. This gave me an understanding of how historians have come to understand the event throughout time. In my research, I found two categories of interpretations, which I then used to organize my ideas and develop my own understanding of the implications of the event.

"Declaration Of Conscience": A Rhetorical Analysis, Ashley M. Nihem

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

First, I did thorough research on Margaret Chase Smith and her involvement and position in politics. I also researched the Cold War and McCarthyism so that I could accurately and clearly give a background on Chase's speech. I then decided what parts of rhetoric were most and least prominent in Chase's speech and based the format of paper on that. I looked into these parts of rhetorical at different parts of the speech and analyzed how she used the rhetoric in accordance with language choices, and the effect that it had (or was meant to have) on her audience.

Educating Our Future: White Women Teachers And What They Contributed To The Reconstruction, Franchesca R. Hackworth

Line by Line: A Journal of Beginning Student Writing

The overall goal of this piece was to compose an essay conveying how different historiographers have varied in their views of a single moment within the Reconstruction period. Discovering the similarities and differences was intriguing and provided much to analyze. I specifically chose to review how historiographers have viewed the white women teachers — mostly Northerners — who traveled to the South during the Reconstruction period for the education of freedmen.

As this extensive process took hold, I knew the topic I chose was perfectly fit for me. I have a deep appreciation for education and all that it does …