Surprised by Syntax: Reading the Latinity of Paradise Lost

Stanley Fish in his monumental study argued that the reader of Paradise Lost is “surprised by sin” as he or she in the course of engaging with the text falls, like Adam and Eve, into sin and error and is brought up short. Through a “programme of reader harassment” the experience of the fall is re-enacted in the process of reading, wherein lies the poem’s meaning. And reader response criticism was born. But if for Fish the twentieth-century reader is “surprised by sin,” might not the twenty-first century reader, an all too frequently Latinless reader, be surprised by syntax, a syntax which despite of (or maybe because of) its inherent Latinity and associated linguistic alterity functions as a seductively attractive other? The reader, like Eve, is indeed surprised: enchanted, bemused, seduced by the abundant classicism, by the formal Latinate rhetoric achieved by a Miltonic unison of “Voice and Verse” and also by the language of a Satanic tempter who is—in the pejorative sense of the Latin adjective bilinguis—“double-tongued, deceitful, treacherous.” It is hardly an accident that this adjective (with which Milton qualifies hellish betrayal in his Latin gunpowder epic) was typically applied to the forked tongue of a serpent. This study argues that key to the success of the double-tongued Miltonic serpens bilinguis, is his use and abuse of Latinate language and rhetoric. It posits the possible case that this is mirrored in the linguistic methodology of the poeta bilinguis, the geminus Miltonus? For if, like Eve, the twenty-first century reader of Paradise Lost is surprised by syntax, by the Miltonic use and the Satanic abuse of a Latinate voice, might not he or she also be surprised by the text’s bilingual speaking voice?

Plumas letradas en la Revista Latinidad (1939-1947) : el aporte de intelectuales locales en una publicación de la colectividad franco-argentina

Resumen: En el presente trabajo se analiza el aporte que un grupo de poetas, políticos e intelectuales argentinos en la revista Latinidad –creada por el impresor francés Mauricio Bouxin en 1920 y reeditada entre 1939 y 1947–, para dar cuenta de una posible apertura en la recepción de colaboraciones. Esto, en una variedad de sentidos: en cuanto a la nacionalidad y pertenencia de quienes escribían, su espectro ideológico y militancia, el posicionamiento en cuanto a la Segunda Guerra Mundial –tópico principal de la publicación– y, en cuanto a opiniones sobre política interna argentina. Plantearemos cómo la latinidad fue propuesta como un factor cohesionante, no sólo dentro de la propia comunidad francesa, sino en el contexto latinoamericano con el que pretendían estrechar lazos de identidad compartida, en el marco del conflicto bélico mundial.

El clasicismo en el País Vasco: Ramón de Basterra

[ES] Este trabajo analiza la obra del poeta y ensayista Ramón de Basterra (1888-1928), tratando de establecer las peculiaridades de su dimensión clasicista, en comparación con las líneas generales del clasicismo de la época. El clasicismo es visto como un componente fundamental de las ideologías conservadoras y del fascismo en el siglo XX. Se destacan las relaciones del autor con la intelectualidad vasca, especialmente bilbaína , y española. El conjunto de su obra, en particular La obra de Trajano (1921) y Las ubres luminosas (1923), representan una singular aportación a la historia del clasicismo, poco estudiado todavía en nuestro país. Para Basterra. La romanidad, la latinidad y la cristiandad como ejes de la misión civilizatoria de Occidente y su concepción esencialista y ahistórica de la raza y la nacionalidad españolas son elementos centrales de la obra basterriana. En la perspectiva de un análisis del fascismo que destaca el papel nuclear del culto a la romanidad, este autor podría ser definido como "protofascista".

Nationalisme et cosmopolitisme chez Alfredo Casella (1883-1947)

Cette thèse a été réalisée en cotutelle entre l'Université de Montréal et l'École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales de Paris, sous la direction de Michel Duchesneau (UdeM) et Esteban Buch (EHESS). La version intégrale de cette thèse est disponible uniquement pour consultation individuelle à la Bibliothèque de musique de l'Université de Montréal (http://www.bib.umontreal.ca/MU).

Colonialidade e insurgência : contribuições para uma pedagogia latino-americana

Este ensaio, baseado em pressupostos da obra de Paulo Freire, propõe-se a discutir a pedagogia latino-americana e a produção de conhecimento numa perspectiva de superação da colonialidade pedagógica. A primeira parte deste estudo se dedica a situar as práticas educativas de caráter emancipatório na América Latina no contexto pedagógico atual, em movimentos sociais e na universidade, buscando identificar algumas de suas principais marcas. Em seguida, detém-se na recuperação de elementos da memória em torno da idéia de colonialidade e a superação da mesma na e com a educação. Por fim, apresentam-se algumas contribuições do tensionamento entre a colonialidade e a insurgência para a pedagogia latino-americana: a) no diálogo horizontal entre conhecimentos em busca de metodologias próprias; b) como território de resistências ou movimento de lugares e tempos diversos; e, c) na busca da latinidade negada ou o aprender nas fronteiras. José Martí, Simón Rodríguez e os zapatistas são algumas referências na busca pela memória pedagógica latino-americana e interlocutores privilegiados na problematização desta pedagogia que se compreende um processo aberto, onde superar a colonialidade a partir das tensões produzidas nas insurgências pedagógicas significa antecipar, ensaiar, as possibilidades emancipadoras, endógenas e autênticas.

Examining ‘Latinidad’ in Latin America: race, ‘Latinidad’ and the decolonial option

This article provides a critical account of the idea of race, conceived of and derived from European colonisers in the New World. The paper argues that race became a crucial category to the colonising projects of the New World, and in particular in the distribution of power during colonialism. The paper further examines how the notion of Latinidad (Latinity), entrenched in the term Latin America, continued to enact a discourse of racial superiority/inferiority even after the battles for Independence had taken place. Employing the critical vocabulary and framework of Decolonial theory, the paper introduces key arguments against Western European universality, and calls for a re-reading of the processes that structure privilege across racial and ethnic lines.

O estudo atual do acervo dos manuscritos junto ao Archivum Generale Poetarum Latinorum Brasiliensium.

Conscientes da importância e validade das contribuições do Archivum Generale Poetarum Latinorum Brasiliensium, este artigo visa a relatar os resultados da pesquisa sobre Latinidade Brasileira (Literatura Brasileira de expressão latina). A cuidadosa coleta de material desse Instituto de pesquisa tem fornecido representativos dados que possibilitaram e possibilitam, ainda, trabalhos de investigação filológica, lingüística e literária.

O latim no contexto letrado do Brasil Colonial

O Grupo de Pesquisa A Escrita no Brasil Colonial estuda, ao longo dos últimos dez anos, documentos literários e não literários no contexto lusitano e brasileiro dos séculos XVI ao XVIII. Há muitos registros de textos escritos em latim, nessa época, que dialogam com os problemas da terra, da literatura, da religião, das atividades artesanais e que foram produzidos tanto tanto em manifestações coletivas, como as academias histórico-literárias, quanto individualmente, por autores que optaram por expor suas idéias nesse idioma. Apresentaremos, neste texto, alguns letrados do Brasil Colonial que recorreram ao latim como expressão literária.

Vestigios de latinidad clásica en reglas monásticas visigodas

Las reglas monásticas visigodas constituyen un corpus documental de importancia fundamental para el estudio del monacato primitivo en Hispania. Ellas reflejan, entre otros aspectos, la preocupación por los ideales de vida de su época, heredados en parte de diversos tratados clásicos, que expresaban, desde aspectos más profundos vinculados a la moral, hasta reglas más precisas relacionadas con el modo de comportamiento en sociedad. En la temprana Edad Media, esta preocupación fue retomada por las comunidades monásticas, rescatando elementos propios de las costumbres latinas tradicionales. En dicho contexto, este estudio se propone analizar la presencia de vestigios de latinidad clásica en las reglas monacales visigodas, las cuales sirvieron como receptáculo de aquellas tradiciones destinadas a regular los distintos aspectos de la vida del monje.

Les étrangers aux frontières de la France : étude de récits de migration (1870 à nos jours)

In this dissertation, I examine how migration narratives make an ambiguous contribution to the democratization of French national borders. National borders are essentially spaces of crises from which it is possible to study the constant evolution of national identity. Migration narratives, regardless of their ideological dimension, offer representations of the border and of the foreigner that result from a tension between the difficulty to think identity outside of the national frame and the questioning of such a strong tie between identity and the nation. At the border, identities are fundamentally unstable. The first part is focused on the north-eastern and the southern borders of France at the end of the 19th century. The French nationalist literature at the time, advocating for the return of Alsace-Lorraine to the Republic, is characterized by a tension between nationalism and regionalism. The ideology of latinity constitutes a second major feature of the discourse on French identity. Developed by Louis Bertrand, it claims that France can only be regenerated in Algeria. However, a gap between his fictional works and his essays reveals latinity as hybrid and heterogeneous. Borders are also polysemic, namely, they do have the same meaning for everyone. The second part of the dissertation focuses on the southern border of France from the 30s to the 90s. The study of films and novels demonstrate that former borders are still active, especially colonial borders. Finally, the third part of the dissertation addresses the representation of migrants who were trapped in the north of France, at the border of the Schengen area, from the 90s to 2009. Migration narratives bring attention to the totalitarian tendencies of the state, but they also struggle with the contradictions of the humanitarian discourse and the analogies made with previous immigration waves.

Aproximación a la doctrina y la terminología retórica de las figuras de dicción en la tratadística latina tardía

As early as the first century A.D. we can already find the first examples of what would be a long tradition of monographic works dedicated to figures: the authors of this group of treatises considered style as the most important aspect within the different disciplines of rhetoric. The works are especially common in the latter centuries of Latinity. Rutilius Lupus, rhetor of the first century A. D., composed the first of these treatises devoted exclusively to the figures; Schemata Dianoeas et Lexeos ex Graecis Gorgiae Versa. Due to the fragmentary condition of the manuscripts, important parts of this work have been lost, in which the theoretical justification for the studies of the figures by this author were most likely developed. Fortunately, the De figuris sententiarum et elocutionis by Aquila Romanus provides more information. Aquila Romanus probably lived at the end of the third century A.D. or the beginning of the fourth century A.D., and his work is based on the treatise of Alexander Numenius, a Greek author from the second century A.D. Aquila Romanus and Rutilius Lupus are the most important writers of treatises on figures in the Latin language, although many more treatises of these characteristics would be composed after them, works which were considered “minor”. One of these treatises is the De figuris Sententiarum et elocutionis by Julius Rufinianus, author from the fourth century A.D. Medieval manuscripts assign two other manuals to Julius Rufinianus : De schematis lexeos and De schematis dianoeas but this attribution is doubtlessly false. They are two small manuals of figures illustrated with numerous Virgilian examples. The next treatise of note is the anonymous Carmen de figuris vel schematibus, the most unusual treatise of figurative language. And finally, a brief figurist manual entitled Schemata dianoeas quae ad rhetores pertinent probably written in the fourth century A.D., shortly after Carmen de figuris...