Search results for " Fiction"

Producing social mobility. Class and Travel in the Romanian Novel 1901-1932

2020

The present article addresses the Romanian novelistic production between 1901 and 1932 in the attempt of identifying a series of patterns regarding the protagonists’ social mobility. Starting with the most mentioned destinations throughout the novels, I analyse how and why the different social classes travel and try to determine the landmarks between which they dispute their physical presence, on the one hand, and their aspirations, on the other. On this basis, the second part of the article conducts a quantitative analysis of the major means of transport in the period – the train, the tramway, the coach/carriage, the automobile, the aeroplane, the ship, and the waggon – and attempts to pin…

Evaluating a Future Remote Control Environment with an Experience-Driven Science Fiction Prototype

2015

The case study presented in this paper aimed at discovering opportunities for ambient intelligence and new interaction methods for a future remote crane-operating environment. The theoretical objective was to carry out an experience-driven research project in an industrial work context, and the practical objective was to create and evaluate a future oriented science fiction prototype. The work was carried out in close co-operation with an industrial partner who was a domain expert in the field of crane industry. The aim was to focus on clearly defined user experience goals to which the industrial partner committed. The consequent immediate objective was to focus on two explicit experiences …

Myth Migrations and Bodily Inscriptions in Michèle Roberts’s Subversive Fiction

2009

La llamada inscripción de Adoniram y el cementerio judío de Sagunto

1995

At the end of the 15th century a Hebrew inscription on a gravestone found in Sagunto, having been wrongly read, was attributed to Adoniram, a tax collector of Solomon. The discovery aroused a long and excited discussion; many scholars denied its authenticity affirming that it was a literary fiction. But a wrong reading does not imply an epigraphic forgery. In this article the author brings new manuscript sources which confirm the authenticity of the find and show which was the place of the Jewish cemetery in Sagunto. He also tries to reconstruct the original text of the inscription. A finales del siglo XV se encontró en Sagunto una inscripción hebrea sobre una lápida que, por una lectura er…

“C’est la vie, c’est la narration”: The Reader in Christine Brooke-Rose’s Textermination and David Lodge’s Small World

2016

Abstract This article considers two metafictional academic novels from the reader’s point of view. It argues that this critical vantage point is suggested (if not imposed) by the fictional texts themselves. The theoretical texts informing this reading pertain either to reader response or to theories of metafiction, in an attempt to uncover conceptual commonalities between the two. Apart from a thematic focus on academic conferences as pilgrimages and the advocacy of reading as an ethically valuable activity, the two novels also share a propensity for intertextuality, a blurring of the boundaries between fictional and critical discourse, as well as a questioning of the borderline between fic…

Audiovisual constructs of Paralympic Games : scalarity and camera angle

2014

This research will analyze the variables differentiating between the audiovisual television of the XIII edition of the Paralympic Games and the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, held in Beijing from the 7th of September to the 17th, 2008. This study will serve as a methodological basis for similar future research. By means of a qualitative and quantitative methodology, this study also focuses on determining if TV representations of Paralympic sportspersons favour their social integration or if, on the contrary, lead to higher stigmatization.

Japāņu detektīvromānu žanrs: Nacionālās identitātes attēlojums Edogava Ranpō darbos (1884-1965)

2021

Bachelor thesis “Japanese Detective Fiction Genre: Representation of National Identity in the Works of Edogawa Ranpō (1984-1965)” reveals the question of how Japanese detective fiction, being one of the most popular genres in 20th century’s Japan, depicted the realities of the inter-war period with the help of writer and critic Edogawa Ranpō. The history of Japanese detective literature dates back to the late 19th century, within the time of general modernization. Until that period, most people lived in tiny cities, worked and communicated in restrained circles, knowing each person personally. But with the rise in industrial enterprises, more and more people have started moving to cities su…

« L’art de la diplomatie dans Kaamelott », in BASIRE Yann, CIAUDO Alexandre, MOSBRUCKER Anne-Laure (eds.), Kaamelott. La légende juridique, Presses U…

2023

Under Our Eye: Margaret Atwood's Variation on the Panopticon in "The Heart Goes Last"

2020

In her dystopian dark comedy The Heart Goes Last (2015), Margaret Atwood openly refers to Jeremy Bentham’s concept of the Panopticon. The future world depicted in her novel is filled with violence and deprived of both human bonds and hope. Hence, being contained, monitored and — after Foucault — disciplined and punished appears to be the characters’ last resort. Surveillance tempts both sexes as it is politically correct and universal, and it does not privilege one group of people over the other. The article discusses the dystopian vision of the near future as created by Atwood in her 2015 novel, with direct references to the conception of the Panopticon, both in its original meaning propos…

Social networks and robot companions: Technology, ethics, and science fiction

2019

Information technologies have become part of our everyday lives and are increasingly acting as intermediaries in our workplaces and personal relationships or even substituting them. This growing interaction with machines poses several questions about which we have no previous experience, nor can we reliably predict how they will influence the evolution of society. This has led to the convergence of technoscience and humanities in an ethical debate that is starting to bear fruit, not only with the setting of regulations and standards, but also with educational initiatives in university teaching, professional improvement, and the conformation of public opinion. Interestingly, science fiction …