Movies and meaning : studying audience, fiction film and existential matters

In what ways and under what circumstances can a movie be a resource for individuals and their thoughts about existential matters? This central research question has been investigated using a both quantitative and qualitative approach. First, a questionnaire was distributed amongst 179 Swedish students to provide a preliminary overview of film habits. The questionnaire was also used as a tool for selecting respondents to individual interviews. Second, focus group and individual interviews were conducted, with viewers choosing their favourite movie of all time. In the study socio-cognitive theory and a schema-based theoretical tool is adopted to analyze how different viewers make use of movies as cultural products in an interplay between culture and cognition in three contexts; a socio-historic process, a socio-cultural interaction with the world and inner psychological processes. The viewers in the study seem to be inspired by movies as a mediated cultural resource, promoting the development of a personal moral framework with references to values deeply fostered by a humanistic tradition. It is argued that these findings support theories discussing individualised meaning making, developing ‘self-expression values’ and ‘altruistic individualism’ in contemporary western society.

Vernacular meaning making : Examples of narrative impact in fiction film questioning the 'banal' notion in mediatization of religion theory

The outcome of an audience study supports theories stating that stories are a primary means by which we make sense of our experiences over time. Empirical examples of narrative impact are presented in which specific fiction film scenes condense spectators' lives, identities and beliefs. One conclusion is that spectators test the emotional realism of the narative for greater significance, connecting diegetic fiction experiences with their extra-diegetic world in their quest for meaning, self and identity. The 'banal' notion of the mediatization of religion theory is questioned as unsatisfactory in the theoretical context of individualized meaning-making processes. As a semantically negatively charged concept, it is problematic when analyzing empirical examples of spectators' use of fictional narratives, especially when trying to characterize the idiosyncratic and complex interplay between spectators' fiction emotions and their testing of mediated narratives in an exercise to find moral significance in extra-filmic life. Instead vernacular meaning-making is proposed.

The Björling 'Opera' : A children's Nursery Academy and an Italian Conservatory in Miniature

The aim in this chapter is to develop a deeper understanding about the informal Björling 'School' in Sweden. Contextually the example is related to the micro history of opera education contributing to the macro perspective illuminating a provincial example of the concept of domestic opera schooling. The specific focus was on Karl David Björling (1873-1926), the teaching parent of the Swedish tenor Jussi Björling (1911-1960) and his brothers Gösta and Olle.   The Björling family model of opera schooling belongs to the classical canon of domestic home education which was common during the epoch. The phenomenon is also within the field of opera singing an important reference to the historical context of the Nordic opera history of vocal education.   The uniqueness concerning the Björling School seems to be the rigorous and exceptionally early training. David Björling’s pedagogy was rooted in earlier German theories of musical upbringing. It's clear from his results that he was familiar with the neo-humanistic ideal on which reformed music education was based. Of a specific interest is the term Gesang als Unterricht as a concept for developing childrens musical and memorising capacities.   Conceptually the roots of the Björling model are in the eighteenth-century Romantic view of prodigies and their abilities. The extensive touring is connected to the promotion of wonder-children, and David Björling’s educational style to the conservative Master-pupil tradition.   David Björling's vocal ideal was a part of the contemporary debate about “The decadence of the singing art”, and seems to have its roots in an older Italian tradition. There are recurring similarities between his educational methods and the didactic principles of the Lamperti School: Enjoying a revival around the late 1800s and early 1900s, it has been called the natural or the national school. Nevertheless, through authentic experiences and gramophone recordings the Italian tenor Enrico Caruso became David Björling’s pedagogical role model.

Dialectics of Diaspora Space: a Study of Contemporary, Diasporic, South Asian Fiction

In light of these continuing debates concerning immigration, national identity and belonging, re-examinations of immigrant and ethnic communities, often referred to as ‘diaspora,’ have become increasingly popular and prudent. Khachig Tololian, editor of Diaspora magazine, calls diaspora “exemplary communities of the transnational moment.”5 In an increasingly globalized world, where labor, capital, and resources are passed fluidly from continent to continent, diaspora are created by relocation or displacement of immigrant workers and their descendents.6 For these unskilled, immigrant laborers, middle class immigrants, and the children of both groups, adaptation to the culture, society, and life in a new ‘host’ country can be difficult, to say the least. So, in response to a new cultural landscape and a tenuous sense belonging, as well as to maintain a connection with a shared past, citizens of the world’s numerous diaspora replicate linguistic, cultural, and social norms, creating their own “cultural space[s]” that mirror and often replace a past relationship to their land of origin, or ‘home’.

Bleeding: A Collection of Poetry and Short Fiction

Poetry Short Stories

Short fiction of Thomas Hardy: an exploration and assessment

Hardy's novels and poetry have received extensive criticism, in due proportion to their merit. Hardy's short stories, however, have been virtually excluded from the annals of Hardy criticism, even though Hardy wrote over forty short stories, several of which are truly outstanding. In part, the reason for this neglect is because of the neglected state of the short story in Victorian England. Short fiction, published mainly only in periodicals and never collected in volume form, was obscured to a large extent by the highly popular serial novel. This thesis examines Thomas Hardy's short stories in the context of both the Victorian period and the Victorian short story genre, and explores the ways in which Thomas Hardy improved upon and deviated from some of the common types of short fiction being written in his day.

Dwelling in possibility: aestheticizing identity in African American women's fiction

African American women writers define aesthetics through their negotiation of identity in the politicized loci of space, place and voice. In the balkanization of such issues of voice and space, we can see the ways that the emergent selfis embodied and aestheticized in literature. To do so creates a more tactile and "artfull" representation of the self rather than a representation of identity as a mere abstract concept. To use written language to express the self is to carry processes of selfdefinition for black women into the realm of creative production. For women, especially black women, who are a politically and socially compromised element of society, the written word is a way of expressing the politically and the socially critical voice that is suppressed in other forums of expression. Using theories on "writing in difference" as a skeleton key, this project seeks to outline some of the ways that black women writers use aesthetic elements in their art to express the potential for self-examination, discovery, and emancipation.