Narrative and Identity

The research in question has documentary-bibliographical and descriptive content, since it is proposed to lift concepts, ideas and values related to the frequent use of the field of narrative, considering its notional complexity, its socio-cultural and epistemological content as well as the transformation process use to encompass other pressing objectives, such as those defined by life-writings. As a main theoretical reference, Brazilian and foreign authors are used to study the variable conceptualization of narratives, especially Cremilda Medina, Sinval Medina, Marie-Laure Ryan and Henry Jenkins. Other authors complete the explanatory notes for the closing of questions concerning the current stage of development of life-writings with the use of actual high-technological devices of distance information and communication. From a contemporary point of view, the narratives have been transformed over several expressive media such as orality, writing and digital. These some different ways have also been enriched the broad sense in order to tell historic reports or imaginary stories. Many narratological perspectives have been disseminated to understand the dynamics of the narratives in the modern world, from the profusion of high-technological communication and expression media, which revitalized and transfigured them in forms of genres increasingly elastic and complex. Transmediality, possible world theories and multiverse environments, among other terms, have been described as transdisciplinary approaches in order to understand the strategies of used speeches and languages. The life-writings, particularly, have emerged as not only a creation with the aim of entertaining, but with the proposal for encouraging the critical, humanizing, libertarian and solidary thinking.

Keywords: Narratives, Life-Writings, Transmediality, Multiverses, Possible World Theory

This study employs narrative in order to examine circumstances wherein identity constructs and self-image are reconstituted in the face of oppressive circumstances. The authors of this article, both art educa-tors/academics, explore the role of narrative processes at the intersection of an " art education of place " purposed to reinterpret extant lifeworlds and mediate premature identity foreclosures. Narrative methods open portals for the authors to express both the challenges and the merit of reconciling our identities as African American males and professional educators who navigate predominantly White institutions. In this article, we juxtapose two selected life episodes narrated in order to examine the spaces between iterations of our lifeworlds; our situational, relational, and oppositional responses to various oppressive conditions; and our navigation of the stigmas and stressors inherent therein. These stories and their analysis are presented as an exemplar of the mediation of contemporary identity and the potential of such mediations as a transgressive form of pedagogy and a significant redress to persistent popular culture mythologies about race and class.

“ WAYNE : You are exploring how self-referential a narrative can be before it disappears up, or down, its own orifice. Wayne's World's extreme close-ups * (see Glossary of Waynespeak p.11.) disappear down my throat, as if to show that by physically searching for linguistic signifiers, you lose the overview of signs and end up signifying nothing.
MIKE : All Wayne's World narratives are self-referential and cross- referential because this is the television aesthetic. “

Research on punk culture often falls prey to two main dilemmas. First, using a Marxist economic lens, the underlying implication is fieldwork reveals already known conceptions of class and culture. Second, an ageist bias exists in most popular music research, resulting in the continued equating of music and youth. Given punk is forty years old, researchers are calling for a reexamination of this combination. This ethnography examines punk culture in an inner city non-profit arts establishment. It probes how rituals and cultural narratives pervade and maintain the scene. Concepts such as carnival, jamming as an organizing process in the pit – and as an aesthetic moment – emerged through the research process. Finally, this ethnography engages questions about personal and communal narrative identity, and what it means to be an older fan in the punk rock scene.

First published in the American Chronicle, Buzzle and AfroArticles on 6th April 2010

Multiple divergent end point game
Consequently, when you have already ceased viewing the world through the eyes of an early 19th century Oromo, and you confidently become greatly assimilated into the global system, you will thoughtlessly tie yourself and your political group or association with the promises given to you by an American Congressman about Oromia’s liberation.

But, quite unhappily, another Oromo, who also believes frankly that he and his movement struggle for the benefit of their subjugated nation, will make a bond with the president of a small and marginalized country, who will be promising similar "delivery". As it happens, behind the American Congressman and the marginal president, there are people belonging in the same decision making center, who by practicing the multiple divergent end point game, ensure that unity will never take place among the Oromos.

If they are successful in their evil game, it is not due to any deficiency of the Oromo system or values, but to the earlier diffusion of the above described global system (an array of mindsets and attitudes). Certainly there are bribes, material goods, monies and other corruption techniques involved, but this matters little; if the same corruption techniques had been performed by representatives of two or more foreign powers before 150 years, the then targeted Oromo leaders would not have reacted in the way today react all the leaders of major Oromo movements.

This article analyzes the representations of non-white identities in an HBO's fantasy show "Game of Thrones" (GOT). By specifically focusing on hegemonic relations between white characters and characters of color, the research scrutinizes the rhetorical strategies through which non-whiteness is enacted in relation to white "natives" of the "Westeros." Authors show that the GOT employs orientalist discourse in constructing the world of Westeros and contrasts it with the exotic lands of Essos. Westeros is rich, white and located in the western hemisphere, while Essos is a scorched and mysterious land located in the East. By associating the show's major characters with Westeros and the casting of white actors, viewers are encouraged to identify with their complex struggles and to embrace their intricate characterizations. On the other hand, Essos' characters of color typically include marginalized characters such as slaves, servants, and pirate...

The transition of the United Arab Emirates from traditional communities to an urbanized, multicultural, globalized and post-traditional society has aroused the concern of many westerners as well as local Emiratis. This western apprehension has been traditionally articulated most vociferously by a special class of westerners – travel writers. For more than a century, ever since the first travels of western – mainly British – explorers into the deserts of Arabia and into the heart of Bedu culture, western travel writers have romanticized and admired the unique nomadic culture of the Bedu. The most notable and respected writer in this 'Arabist' tradition was the man who has been dubbed 'The Last Explorer' – Wilfred Thesiger. It was Thesiger who famously decried the transformation of his Arabia into a wealthy modernised nation state after the discovery and production of vast oil reserves in the 1940s and 1950s. 'His Arabia'! It is as if the U.A.E. and the other Gulf states were honour-bound to maintain their nomadic desert traditions merely for the nourishment of Thesiger's personal fantasies of traditional authenticity. This paper seeks to probe the legitimacy of Thesiger's hatred for the U.A.E.'s post-traditional identity and its loss of cultural and topographical authenticity. Does his extreme resentment of these changes on behalf of an 'authentic' Bedu identity merit consideration as an informed and valid response to the apparent conquest of the Emirates and Bedu traditions by the twin juggernauts of post-modernity and globalization? Does it have any relevance to contemporary debates about post-modern identity and post-traditional communities? In this paper I show that through his travel narratives and photography Thesiger has constructed representations of 'authentic' Bedu identity as a nostalgic reaction against the emerging post-imperial and post-traditional reality in the Arabian Gulf. I argue that ironically it is these same representations – tainted as they are with imperialist notions of racial hierarchy and exclusivity – which have been appropriated by the official cultural institutions of the United Arab Emirates in order to shore up its post-traditional national identity.

African American couples, both married and unmarried, are seeking therapy to
assist them as they struggle through difficulties to gain and maintain satisfying
relationships.  In my practice in South Dekalb, Georgia I have consulted with hundreds of
couples in pre-marital and marital therapeutic conversations for the past decade.  Most of
these couples are working class and middle class people from the stable subdivision
communities near Atlanta. 
Despite ideas about the reluctance of African Americans to seek therapy, I posit in
this chapter that when African American people are provided with a safe, culturally
familiar and affirming therapeutic environment that is clearly in the image and interest of
Black people, they will come to therapy.

This chapter examines the proliferation of the ‘homosexual novel’ in Britain in the 1950s. This mode of fiction has broadly been understood to have served first and foremost as a vehicle for arguments for the decriminalization of homosexual relations. I show that these books demand closer attention as their alignment with reformist logic is far from unambiguous. Indeed, I demonstrate how the decade’s homosexual novels variously sustain, evade and problematise the prevailing liberal discourse on homosexuality; I contend that they cannot therefore be recruited straightforwardly to a progressivist history of sexuality. Novels by authors such as Martyn Goff, Rodney Garland and Mary Renault are ambivalent about the principal paradigm for appraising homosexuality in the post-war period, the social problem. Meanwhile, the investment in comedic modes of authors such as Angus Wilson, Michael Nelson and Brigid Brophy helped to shape visions of homosexual life that differed from those produced by mainstream reformist agendas. Further, I argue that all of these works of fiction show a deep investment in pleasure – including pleasures that derive from disreputable narrative modes – which undermines appeals to the respectable, restrained homosexual subject that were central to reformist discourse.

AWEJ Volume.5 Number.2, 2014                                                                              Pp.236-243

The Influence of Arabic on Nigerian Literature: a study of selected works of Abubakar Imam in Hausa

Jamiu, Muhammad Yunusa
Department of Languages and Literary Studies (Arabic Unit)
College of Humanities, Management and Social Sciences
Kwara State University, MALETE


Abstract
The heritage of a people is, without doubt, the bedrock of their identity. The sheer size of the Northern part of Nigeria makes it a very important part of the country. This vast region has been having a common identity forged by literacy in the Arabic language. For many centuries before the coming of the imperialists, Arabic provided universal understanding among people of the Northern Nigeria. It was so important that even the imperial agents studied Arabic language in order to penetrate the culture of the people of the area they wanted to colonize. When the foreign power eventually succeeded in enthroning its own language as the official language, Arabic still remains very visible not only as a religious language but also as a springboard for literary endeavors in both local and foreign languages of the North. This paper therefore intends to study the influence of Arabic on the Nigerian Literature using Magana Jari Ce and Ruwan Bagaja  by the renown Hausa writer, late Alhaji Abubakar Imam, as a case study. The paper is divided into: introduction, short biography of Abubakar Imam, Arabic influence on selected stories, general analysis of the stories, conclusion and recommendation.
Keywords: heritage influence, identity, Arabic language, Nigerian literature.

In this article, the authors discuss friendship as a method of qualitative inquiry. After defining friendship and positing it as a kind of fieldwork, the methodological foundations of friendship as method are established (Tillmann-Healy, 2003). The purpose of this narrative woven autoethnographic study is to examine the role of friendship in describing disabling physical and attitudinal access barriers in a university setting. Friendship represents a critical analytic lens through which disabled/nondisabled individuals alike may examine their positions, understandings, regimes of practices, and particular knowledges. Friends —Mark and Dan — discuss their experiences of disablement and reflections on dis/ability. The authors draw from their experiences of friendship and disability in higher education and their allied identities to discuss and examine questions of access, disclosure, and inclusion.

This article describes two participatory theatre projects undertaken by Western Edge Youth Arts in Melbourne aimed at challenging racialization and fostering belonging among culturally diverse young people. Drawing from interview and archival data, we suggest that participatory theatre provided the young people the opportunity to share and reflect on their lived experiences and to re-present themselves, as well as gain resources for responding to the different issues associated with racialization. In the settings created, participants were able to disrupt taken for granted and common sense understandings of self and other and create new stories of identity and belonging. These disruptions into the symbolic context of social identity construction are important for personal and social change, including for decentring whiteness. However, participatory theatre is not a panacea, nor free of power relations. We discuss some of the challenges and limitations of the different projects.

ABSTRACT This article describes two participatory theater projects undertaken by Western Edge Youth Arts in Melbourne and aimed at challenging racialization and fostering belonging among culturally diverse young people. Drawing from interview and archival data, we suggest that participatory theater provided the young people the opportunity to share and reflect on their lived experiences and re-present themselves, as well as gain resources for responding to the different issues associated with racialization. In the settings created, participants were able to disrupt taken for granted and common sense understandings of self and other and create new stories of identity and belonging. These disruptions into the symbolic context of social identity construction are important for personal and social change, including for decentring whiteness. However, participatory theater is not a panacea, nor is it free of power relations. We discuss some of the challenges and limitations of the different projects.

Objectives: Sport and exercise psychology has recently expanded into how it can be utilized to enable social missions like activism. No research, however, has examined activist identities among disabled, elite athletes. This article is the first to engage with this new and complex issue by examining narratives of activism amongst elite athletes with impairment and their adoption/rejection of various activist identities. Methods: Thirty-six people were recruited using maximum variation and criterion-based purposive sampling strategies. Data was collected using interviews and fieldwork observations (e.g., observation and social media material). The large data set was rigorously analyzed using a narrative thematic analysis. Results: All participants adopted an athletic identity and an athletic activist identity. A small group also adopted a political activist identity that was concerned with challenging disablism. The athletes' reasons for adopting or eschewing activist identities are identified and connections made to organizational stressors, interpellation, feeling, emotional regulation, narrative, habitus, health and wellbeing. Also revealed is the impact that sporting retirement had on activist identity construction. Conclusions: The article makes a novel research contribution by revealing two different activist identities within the context of disability sport and what social functions each identity might serve. It also significantly develops knowledge by revealing various organizational stressors experienced by disabled athletes, the importance of embodied feelings and emotional regulation in activist identity construction, the damage that social oppression can have on wellbeing following sporting retirement, and the positive possibilities retiring may have for developing different identities. Practical suggestions are as well offered. Crown

What are the myths of Europe? This article provides the conceptual framework through which this question may be approached. It begins by defining myth in such a way as to distinguish it from other forms of political myths. From here, the relationship between mythical and historical narratives is analyzed via a study of how the main narrative cores through which Europeans have perceived themselves have worked in different periods and contexts as both. It concludes with a more detailed analysis of some of the icons that convey the myths of Europe.

The popular culture of Japan draws and consolidates fans from various geographical domains and multiple backgrounds. Its engagingly rich heredity and culture is much diverse and proliferates around comics (manga), games, animation (anime) and music. These various sub genres of Japan’s popular culture and the various terminologies associated with them and their audiences frame Western fandom. Cosplay (“costume play”) is a fan culture that has an active camaraderie where fans create their costumes which are inspired by fictional characters from comics, games, animation and music. Cosplay is a fine blend of both its origin terms: “costume” and “play” since a cosplayer portrays characteristics of both these words – dressing up as a fictional character and also enact the character’s life and situations with full realization that they are trying to capture the life of someone, temporarily, who does not exist in reality. In this process happens a blurring of reality, entry into the world of fiction, a creation of new identity through this narrative resulting in the birth of an entirely new persona which is supreme in itself. (Dorfman, 2007) According to Judith Butler, the practice of enacting various identities, genders and switching between them and trying new ones or performing multiple identities, like in Cosplay, allows individuals to redefine, discover, stretch and enhenhance their own sense of identity. Thus cosplayers slip in and out of identities by switching between costumes and perform their persona by enacting the “play”. Thus the concept of identity is in a constant influx where public and private realms merge creating a sense of fragmentation and decentered self giving rise to multiple conflicting identities.
This is a postmodern concept in all senses by creating a hyper-reality where there is a disruption of the dominance of high culture by popular culture formulating a hybrid culture. This signifies that we are living in the postmodern space of virtuality which defines hobbies and connections and we ourselves are unsure of our own structured identity defined by societal norms. In this technology driven age cosplay also allows a certain form of escapism and interaction with the physical world through conversion of hobbies from a screen-centric medium to a concrete physical world.

The concept of soft power occupies a prominent place in International Relations, foreign policy, and security studies. Primarily developed by Joseph S. Nye, the concept is typically drawn upon to emphasize the more intangible dimensions of power in a field long dominated by overtly material (i.e. military) power. Recently, some scholars have reframed soft power — specifically the key notion of attraction — as a narrative and linguistic process. This literature, however, has downplayed some of the other deep-seated underpinnings of soft power, which this article argues lie in the dynamics of affect. Building upon the International Relations affect and aesthetics literatures, this article develops the concept of soft power as rooted in the political dynamics of emotion and introduces the concept of affective investment. The attraction of soft power stems not only from its cultural influence or narrative construction, but more fundamentally from audiences’ affective investments in the images of identity that it produces. The empirical import of these ideas is offered in an analysis of the construction of American attraction in the war on terror.

With this dissertation I’ve attempted to encircle the idea of engagement—a term that's becoming more and more popular of late as public institutions attempt to frame how exactly they work with, for, or on, the public. In this work, I address four questions. What is engagement, institutionally speaking? How might institutions need to reconsider engagement? What is engagement for me? And ultimately, so what?
The short answer is that engagement is a story. It's a story we tell ourselves about how people (should) interact with one another to make the world as it is, the way it should be. That being said, there are many different stories of engagement that fit this rubric—from unjust wars to happy marriages. They develop different characters, different settings, and different meanings, and in the end these stories have different morals with different consequences. These differences matter.
With this dissertation I try to do away with some of the muddle between these different stories. I am not trying to do away with difference—just trying to give difference fair play. I also tell a very different story of engagement gleaned from my own experience and the experiences of a number of others in Tompkins County, NY. It's not the right story, it's just a different story that I think holds promise. Lastly, I discuss how all of these stories might change the way we think about our own work, and the work of institutions, in democratic society.
As you come to read further, you'll notice that I've framed this dissertation around choices we each have and make. I hope that framing facilitates further discussion around engagement. In that spirit, the dissertation has been fully published on a website that includes comment-ready text and enhanced multi-media. It's my intention that this website, and the interactive conversation it can allow, be an experiment in a type of public scholarship it seeks to promote. If you’d like to read the dissertation in that format, go to www.pokesalad.info/engagingstories. Ultimately, I hope our conversations might help me, and us, understand this idea of engagement in our daily lives.

One of the oldest written records of Serb migration to Hungary dates back to 1440 and refers to refugees who fled the Banat town of Kovin devastated by the Ottoman Turks, founding a new settlement of the same name on the Danube Island of Csepel (Hun. Ráckeve, Ser. Srpski Kovin; Ćirković 1982: 320). Although migration persisted from the Ottoman to the Hungarian territories – later Habsburg and Austro-Hungarian – two great waves have been particularly noted by historians. The First Serbian Migration led by the Orthodox Patriarch Arsenije III Čarnojević in 1690, also known as The Great Migration (Ser. Velika seoba), is thought to have been undertaken by about 30,000 Serbs,  perhaps more. The Second Serbian Migration occurred in 1737, again led by an Orthodox Patriarch, Arsenije IV Jovanović, (Ćorović 1989; Popović 1954; Veselinović 1993). Ever since, the number of people declaring themselves as ethnic Serbs in population censuses, or declaring Serbian to be their mother tongue, has varied, as has the territory of Hungary throughout its history.
Glancing at the census figures for the area of present-day Hungary, it is evident that the number of Serbian native language speakers decreased considerably throughout the 20th century. Since 1980, the numbers of those whose native language is Serbian and those whose nationality is Serbian have been approximately the same, the sign of a small, tightly-knit community.
What kind of space model is unfolded by the collective narratives of the Szigetcsép Serbs? Constructed as a catalogue of topographic mnemotopos, the narratives of origin reveal space conceptualised as a discrete series of strong places, i.e. the Danube, the Serbian villages near the Danube, the first, the second, and the third settlement of Szigetcsép. Remembering the Danube (connection to the motherland) and Serbian villages by the Danube (connection to the Serbian community in Hungary), the Szigetcsép Serbs provide a spatial framework for their micro-community (three settlements). In regard to the  settlements too, certain strong places or sites were singled out and remembered, most of them being in fact sacred sites (the church, the cross, etc.). Yet again, in the origin narratives the dynamic process of remembering and oblivion can be traced. The last thing the informants remembered about the first settlement – the furthest removed from them in time – was its physical locus, and this was preserved only vaguely in oral collective memory. This finding justifies the argument of Detelić (1992: 317) that in the process of cultural modelling the space is always attached to the "original" as its inseparable element. As for the collective identity of the Szigetcsép Serbs, it could be said that the semantics of physical continuity embodied in the space model dominate, absorb and emanate time semantics. Through the catalogue of settlements time takes on flesh, and becomes palpable and visible. 
However, in the collective narrative on the village area, space is conceptualised through binary oppositions, "own/alien", "our/their" (the Swabian/Catholic/Serbian part), and even through very archaic opposition  "sacred/profane" (the cross, the processions delineating and consecrating the Serbian part as the sacred one). Yet, the oppositions "friendly/hostile", "familiar/unfamiliar" are left out of this space concept. In the case of the Serbs in Hungary it is obvious that space marked as "own", "our", "sacred" was delineated primarily along the confessional principle.
As Mladenova (2004: 177) points out, four valuable elements constitute the basis for the various identity discourses: the people who participate in the events that take place in a certain territory over time. The values attributed to these four variables as well as the choice of events to be remembered will vary for different discourses even when they are rooted in the same set of reality. "This significance is determined by their being perceived as having some consequence for the present: we are what we are because this or that happened in our past" (Holy 1996: 117; cit. Mladenova 2004: 107). In that sense, the analysed discourse samples do not reflect real, everyday life as they are highly charged with emotion and ideological values. The memory of the migration route provides for the Szigetcsép Serbs a sense of community across time and space and supports the notion of "belonging" to the native Serbian ethnic group. On the other hand, if we compare these results with field research among the neighbouring South-Slav Catholics in the village of Tököl (unpublished field material by the author), we see that space model and migration route play almost no role in identity negotiation within this community.
The persistence of such an archaic space notion with many of its antiquated features among the Serbian peasantry in Hungary is certainly due to confessional differentiation in the multi-confessional environment of what was formerly Austro-Hungary, where the confessional mark in the Serbian case has been reflected and imprinted on the space, memory practice and identity discourse. As significant changes in socio-cultural settings take place throughout Europe, it remains to be seen how new forms of identity negotiations will expand among the younger and coming generations in a rural environment. In that sense it would be interesting to compare traditional and contemporary concepts of space among South-Slav Catholics, and the South-Slav and Romanian Orthodox living in the multi-ethnic environment of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Das Literaturverständnis Uwe Timms, das er seit den 1970er Jahren kontinuierlich weiterentwickelt hat, steht für die Überzeugung einer grundsätzlichen Angewiesenheit des Menschen auf sinnstiftendes Erzählen und der damit verbundenen Ausbildung von Geschichtsbildern und Identität(en). Die Verwurzelung von Timms Literatur in der narrativen Praxis des täglichen Lebens ist es, die nicht nur ein ganz spezifisches Merkmal seines Schreibens ausmacht, sondern gleichzeitig die Assoziation mit dem für diesen Beitrag zentralen Mythosbegriff nahe legt. Vom ersten Roman an verhandeln seine Werke  Themen der jüngsten deutschen Geschichte und bedienen sich dabei einer bezeichnenden Mischung von Fakten und Fiktion, die dem lebensweltlichen Prozess der Mythisierung von Geschichte erstaunlich nahe kommt.

Nesta dissertação, analiso o realismo, a narrativa, as representações e as marcas autorais em séries de TV com inspirações autobiográficas que recebem atenção por parte da indústria televisiva estadunidense e seu entorno discursivo. O interesse é entender como a identidade dos criadores dessas obras – que ocupam, também, os papéis de ator protagonista e showrunner – influencia o enredo das mesmas, por meio de características autobiográficas que são impressas nelas. Investigo como o fenômeno da autoficção começou a surgir no cenário da TV estadunidense, e quais tipos de formações discursivas do circuito midiático massivo, assim como valores e demandas socioculturais, catapultaram seu espraiamento nos streamings e nos canais de TV. Ressalto a diferença de autoria e foco temático entre as primeiras semi-autobiografias e as de 2010 em diante, propondo que o cerne voltado à esfera privada das narrativas mais contemporâneas as caracterizam como semi-autobiografias ultrapersonalistas. Verso, também, sobre como a indústria televisiva, os próprios autores das séries e os veículos de jornalismo e entretenimento online lançam mão desse caráter “semi-autobiográfico” com a intenção de legitimar essas obras. Analiso, então, as séries Better Things (2016-presente, FX) e Master of None (2015-presente Netflix), investigando suas estratégias narrativas, visões realistas e como elas trazem representações e discursos narrativos não-hegemônicos – que, por sua vez, estão atravessados pelas figuras de Pamela Adlon e Aziz Ansari: criadores e protagonistas dessas obras. Através da validação biográfica e do direito de narrar, promovo um debate sobre como Adlon e Ansari utilizam suas plataformas discursivas para contestar regimes de representação e como Better Things, especificamente, renega protocolos estruturais-narrativos altamente propagados pela indústria, reivindicando para si uma autonomia narrativa em sua retratação do cotidiano.

Palavras-chave: ficção seriada televisiva; autoficção; semi-autobiografia; realismo; autoria; representação.

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In this dissertation, I analyze the realism, the narrative, the representations, and the authorial marks in autobiographically inspired TV shows that receive attention from the American television industry and its discursive environment. The interest is to understand how the identity of the creators of these works - who also occupy the roles of lead actor and showrunner - influences the plot of the series, through the autobiographical characteristics that are imprinted on them. I investigate how the phenomenon of autofiction began to emerge in the American TV landscape, and what types of discursive formations of the mass media circuit, as well as sociocultural values and demands, catapulted its spread in streamings and TV channels. I highlight the difference in authorship and thematic focus between early semi-autobiographies and those from 2010 onwards, proposing that the strong inclination towards the private sphere of more contemporary narratives characterize them as ultrapersonalist semi-autobiographies. I also talk about how the television industry, the authors of the series themselves, and online journalism and entertainment vehicles use this "semi-autobiographical" character with the intention of legitimizing these works. I analyze, then, the series Better Things (2016-present, FX) and Master of None (2015-present Netflix), investigating their narrative strategies, realist visions, and how they bring non-hegemonic representations and narrative discourses - which, in turn, are crossed by the figures of Pamela Adlon and Aziz Ansari: creators and protagonists of these works. Through biographical validation and the right to narrate, I promote a debate on how Adlon and Ansari use their discursive platforms to contest regimes of representation and how Better Things, specifically, denies structural-narrative protocols highly propagated and adhered to by the industry, claiming for itself a narrative autonomy in its portrayal of everyday life.

Keywords: tv shows; autofiction; semi-autobiography; realism; authorship; representation.

Resumo: A eliminação a seleção brasileira da Copa de 2014 aconteceu após uma derrota para a Alemanha pelo placar de 7 a 1. Esse jogo foi interpretado por grande parte da imprensa esportiva como a maior vergonha dos cem anos da seleção nacional, completados naquele mesmo ano. Para contar a história do 7 a 1 foi constante o acionamento da derrota de 1950 feito em grande medida com o objetivo de demonstrar que a eliminação da seleção brasileira da Copa de 2014 havia sido uma derrota que quitaria com a chamada " tragédia de 1950 " como ficou conhecida a derrota do Brasil para o Uruguai na Copa daquele ano, no Maracanã. Este artigo propõe-se a analisar as recepções das decisivas derrotas da seleção brasileira em 1950 e 2014, produzidas pela imprensa esportiva, objetivando mostrar aproximações e distanciamentos. Os diferentes modos de se narrar o fracasso da seleção brasileira em campo, em Copas do Mundo, indicam importantes mudanças no cenário nacional e global, relativos não somente ao futebol, mas a aspectos vinculados à imprensa esportiva, assim como às interpretações que o país faz de si mesmo por intermédio do futebol e, em especial, durante as Copas do Mundo. Palavras-chave: Copa de 1950. Copa de 2014. Imprensa esportiva. Abstract: Goodbaye Maracanazo? The press narratives on the Brazilian team from the 1950 tragedy to the 2014 shame. The elimination of the Brazilian team of the 2014 World Cup took place after a defeat to Germany at 7 score of 1. This game was played by much of the sports press as the greatest shame of the hundred years of the national team, completed that same year. To tell the story of 7-1 was constant drive of the 1950 defeat done largely in order to demonstrate that the elimination of the Brazilian team of the 2014 World Cup was a defeat that quitaria with the so-called "1950 tragedy" as He became known the defeat of Brazil to Uruguay in the World Cup that year, at the Maracana. This article proposes to analyze the reception of the decisive defeat of the Brazilian team in 1950 and 2014, produced by the sports press, aiming to show similarities and differences. The different ways of narrating the failure of the Brazilian team in the field, in the World Cup, indicate important changes in the national and global stage, relating not only to football, but the aspects related to the sports press, as well as the interpretations that the country is himself through football, and especially during the World Cup.

In this article, we review the psychology of hero development and hero worship. Heroes and hero narratives fulfill important cognitive and emotional needs, including the need for wisdom, meaning, hope, inspiration, and growth. Hero stories provide epistemic benefits by providing scripts for prosocial action, by revealing fundamental truths about human existence, by unpacking life paradoxes, and by cultivating emotional intelligence. To energize us, heroes promote moral elevation, heal psychic wounds, inspire psychological growth, and exude charisma.

The poster session will examine the successes and failures of a LGBTA organization at a regional university. Building on this case study, participants will be introduced to the work of Marshall Ganz who was instrumental in creating the grassroots campaign for President Obama in the 2008 election. The public narrative approach of Ganz has been adopted by social justice groups including national religious organizations advocating for LGBT rights, The Sierra Club, organizations working on peace in Israel/Palestine, multiple labor unions, moveon.org, and many other groups. Participants will be informed on how to tell their personal narrative in a way that connects to another person and creates a motivation for advocacy. The poster will discuss the implications for this kind of advocacy work and will help participants process how the material can be applied to their lives. Attendees will leave with defined skills that they can utilize elsewhere to create social change.

This book defends an account of the self it calls the NEST (Narrative, Evaluative, Self-Constitutive, Teleological) theory. It argues that the self, rather than being a wholly given entity, at least in part “constitutes” or shapes itself, and does this by endorsing some desires or dispositions and repudiating others. As it is therefore inherently a self-evaluating being it must view itself teleologically, as standing in relation to a standard of value, which it must conceive as having objective authority. Furthermore, as a temporal self-evaluating agent, it must understand itself in narrative terms, though this does not mean that it has complete authorial mastery over its own narrative. Versions of some or all of these ideas have been developed by various influential writers (including Frankfurt, Korsgaard, MacIntyre, Ricoeur and Taylor) but, while drawing extensively on them and replying to some of their critics, this book develops a version of NEST that is importantly different from others familiar in the literature. It takes its main inspiration from Kierkegaard’s account of the self, which it (controversially) argues belongs in the Platonic rather than the Aristotelian tradition of teleological thinking. So the book makes a case, through close engagement with much contemporary philosophical work, for an ancient and currently unfashionable view; that the polarities and tensions that are constitutive of selfhood can only be reconciled through an orientation of the self as a whole to an objective Good.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine Italy’s and Germany’s contrasting, discursive and physical responses of today’s “European refugee and asylum-seeking crisis.” While some argue that Europe is a full-fledged, securitized garrison, others argue that it is liberalizing and embracing cosmopolitan liberal ideals. This thesis argues that the European Union is doing both. Particularly, it dissects both Angela Merkel’s and Germany’s desecuritization narrative as well as Matteo Salvini’s and Italy’s securitization narrative vis-à-vis the “European refugee and asylum-seeking crisis” between 2016 and 2019. Italy’s liberalism crisis has led to the securitization of refugees and asylum seekers; in contrast, Germany’s spreading of cosmopolitan liberalism has led to the desecuritization of refugees and asylum seekers. The purpose of examining these two approaches is to help us better understand the geopolitical divergences within the European bloc. This thesis develops from the Copenhagen School and supplements their existing de/securitization theories with proximization theory. Last, via both contextual and narrative analyses, this thesis also examines identity(s) (i.e. German-ness/Italian-ness), and how ontological, physical, cultural, or economic (in)securities engender the de-/securitization of immigrant bodies.

In this article I explore various current myths that lead foreigners, especially North Europeans and North Americans, to choose to visit/live in Florence or Tuscany for a while or forever. Is it possible to discern any shared, collective representations? If so, how do such myths fit into the contemporary everyday life of the city? Can we identify a pathway from the aesthetic quest for “authentic” Italian life to cultural encounters with Italians in the flesh? My hypothesis is that one of the leitmotifs of foreigners’ experiences is a romantic, and to a lesser degree, intellectual approach towards “Florence without Florentines”. If so, there is nothing new “Under the Tuscan Sun”: the Grand Tour narrative is alive and kicking. Contemporary experiences of Florence and Tuscany continue to be shaped by the social imaginary inherited from the early nineteenth century. Travellers and sojourners come to Florence with a set of expectations shaped through filmic and literary representations and see what they expect to see, not least because the Italians are equally complicit in performing their part in this ritualised experience.

Interpreting human stories, whether those told by individuals, groups, organizations, nations, or even civilizations, opens a wide scope of research options for understanding how people construct, shape, and reshape their perceptions, identities, and beliefs. Such narrative research is a rapidly growing field in the social sciences, as well as in the societally oriented humanities, such as cultural studies. This methodologically framed book offers conceptual directions for the study of social narrative, guiding readers through the means of narrative research and raising important ethical and value-related dilemmas.

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The Paleo diet’s vast popularity, replete with impassioned celebrity endorsements and deep commitment among adherents, has been matched by an equal measure of media mockery and condemnation from health authorities. But beyond the hype, who are the people taking up the diet, and why are they drawn to its restrictive regime? Based on ethnographic research in Melbourne and Sydney, Gressier recounts the compelling narratives of individuals struggling with illness and obesity in order to argue that going Paleo provides a sense of agency, and means of resistance, to the politico-economic structures fuelling the prevalence of lifestyle diseases. From its nostalgic appeal to an idyllic past, to the rise of health populism globally—where a sense of crisis, anti-elite sentiments, and new forms of media are fuelling a lucrative alternative health industry—this book explores the promise and pitfalls of the Paleo diet in Australia.

This article analyzes the representations of non-white identities in an HBO’s fantasy show “Game of Thrones” (GOT). By specifically focusing on hegemonic relations between white characters and characters of color, the research scrutinizes the rhetorical strategies through which non-whiteness is enacted in relation to white “natives” of the “Westeros.” Authors show that the GOT employs orientalist discourse in constructing the world of Westeros and contrasts it with the exotic lands of Essos. Westeros is rich, white and located in the western hemisphere, while Essos is a scorched and mysterious land located in the East. By associating the show’s major characters with Westeros and the casting of white actors, viewers are encouraged to identify with their complex struggles and to embrace their intricate characterizations. On the other hand, Essos’ characters of color typically include marginalized characters such as slaves, servants, and pirates. Their story arcs are glazed over and their characterization serves not to enhance the narrative but to emphasize the uniqueness of a superior cultural entity, i.e. Westeros. The essay discusses the implications in which GOT perpetuates long-established relations in a re-imagined system of power, which its writers and audiences have identified as female progressive and noted for its narrative complexity.

This doctoral thesis is a theoretical and an interpretative study that deals with the genre of autobiography, its position in the contemporary literary theory and problems related to an interpretation of autobiographical texts. Autobiography as a genre of non-fictional literature refers to real characters and events, but at the same time it is a literary work of art, a verbal construct in which the representation of reality is subject to the intentions of the author and to the rules of construction, that are close to the compositional techniques of fictional texts.
The first part of the thesis concentrates on the theory of autobiography and its interdisciplinary context. It summarizes the development of theory of autobiography from the late 19th century to the present. Also, the concepts of the memory studies (especially the concept of collective memory) and the problem of distinguishing fiction and non-fiction (discussed in philosophy of history in 1970s and 1980s, fictional worlds theory, pragmatics of fiction, etc.) are taken into account. The theoretical chapter critically reflects P. Lejeune’s definition of autobiography, based on the concept of the autobiographical pact. In relation with the problem of how to define autobiography, the influence of genre norms and models on the form of particular autobiographies and life stories (Ricœur’s concept of three-fold mimesis) is also discussed. With regard to the performative character of autobiographies, the opening chapter summarizes how the concept of an autobiographical subject developed in the theory of autobiography and proposes a more adequate approach inspired by the socio-constructivist positioning theory (R. Harré, L. Van Langenhove) and based on narrative analysis of texts (concept of narrative identity). Also, specific text areas with semantic potential to be focused on in the narrative analyses are described.
These theoretical and methodological bases are verified and described in the analytical chapters that analyse and interpret the three chosen autobiographies. These autobiographies were written in the same language, originate from the same cultural context, depict a similar period of the historical development of the Czech society and therefore comparative analysis can be applied.
The second chapter contains the analysis of Heda Margolius Kovály’s (1919–2010) autobiography Under a Cruel Star. Heda Margolius Kovály was wife of a prominent communist officer – Rudolf Margolius. Her husband was found guilty of conspiracy during a show trial, sentenced to death and executed, her property was confiscated, she and her young son Ivan were persecuted. The analysis demonstrates that Heda Margolius Kovály takes on the role of a victim and constructs her autobiography according to the narrative scheme of tragic love story.
In his autobiography My Crazy Century, Ivan Klíma (* 1931) tells the story of his opinion development from a whole-hearted communist to a dissident and tries to explain his attitude and his actions. The analysis (in the third chapter of this study) concentrates on the literary representation of membership in the Communist Party and shows that the author tends to marginalize his allegiance to the Party with the help of narrative techniques. Klíma displays his “past self” as naïve, while presenting his “present self” – in essayistic subchapters added to his life story – as wise. Model reader sympathises with the author because he combines confessional and picaresque narrative types in his story.
The fourth chapter is devoted to the literary critic Václav Černý (1905–1987) and his three volumes of autobiographical Paměti (Memoirs). Firstly, it summarizes the complicated publishing history of Černý’s book. The three examples (J. Mukařovský, F. X. Šalda, F. Halas) show how Černý constructs his position in relation to the other characters and then chapter’s focus shifts to the analysis of the author’s self-depiction, characterized through the role of critic, professor and scholar, and through categories of exceptionality, freedom, wilfulness and aggrievement.
The final chapter compares the three autobiographies and summarizes the results of the analyses that are relevant to the theory of autobiography: The author displays him-/herself in the text in accordance with a specific pattern and plot and his/her positioning in the story is therefore a matter of selected and combined narrative – thematic and compositional – techniques.

Keywords:
autobiography; positioning theory; memory; narrative identity; Heda Margolius-Kovály; Ivan Klíma; Václav Černý; Paměti; Under a Cruel Star; My Crazy Century

En este capítulo se analiza todo el trabajo de campo sobre imágenes y sus relaciones con el cuerpo, en búsqueda de entender nuevos dispositivos mediológicos, intentando en 1996 entrever las consecuencias mediológicas que luego se han visto desarrolladas casi 20 años después