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Grotesque Body
The grotesque body is a concept, or literary trope, put forward by Russian literary critic Mikhail Bakhtin in his study of François Rabelais' work. The essential principle of grotesque realism is degradation, the lowering of all that is abstract, spiritual, noble, and ideal to the material level. Through the use of the grotesque body in his novels, Rabelais related political conflicts to human anatomy. In this way, Rabelais used the concept as "a figure of unruly biological and social exchange". It is by means of this information that Bakhtin pinpoints two important subtexts: the first is ''carnival'' ( carnivalesque), and the second is ''grotesque realism'' (grotesque body). Thus, in ''Rabelais and His World'' Bakhtin studies the interaction between the social and the literary, as well as the meaning of the body. Carnival The Carnival is known as the feast of fools. In America, this is better known as Mardi Gras. Mardi Gras is a religious celebration where people consume co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Literary Trope
A literary trope is the use of figurative language, via word, phrase or an image, for artistic effect such as using a figure of speech. Keith and Lundburg describe a trope as, "a substitution of a word or phrase by a less literal word or phrase." The word ''trope'' has also come to be used for describing commonly recurring or overused literary and rhetorical devices, motifs or clichés in creative works. Literary tropes span almost every category of writing, such as poetry, film, plays, and video games. Origins The term ''trope'' derives from the Greek (''tropos''), "turn, direction, way", derived from the verb τρέπειν (''trepein''), "to turn, to direct, to alter, to change". Tropes and their classification were an important field in classical rhetoric. The study of tropes has been taken up again in modern criticism, especially in deconstruction. Tropological criticism (not to be confused with tropological reading, a type of biblical exegesis) is the historical study of tr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King
King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the title may refer to tribal kingship. Germanic kingship is cognate with Indo-European traditions of tribal rulership (c.f. Indic '' rājan'', Gothic '' reiks'', and Old Irish '' rí'', etc.). *In the context of classical antiquity, king may translate in Latin as '' rex'' and in Greek as ''archon'' or ''basileus''. *In classical European feudalism, the title of ''king'' as the ruler of a ''kingdom'' is understood to be the highest rank in the feudal order, potentially subject, at least nominally, only to an emperor (harking back to the client kings of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire). *In a modern context, the title may refer to the ruler of one of a number of modern monarchies (either absolute or constitutional). The title of ''king ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plautus
Titus Maccius Plautus (; c. 254 – 184 BC), commonly known as Plautus, was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest Latin literary works to have survived in their entirety. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the genre devised by the innovator of Latin literature, Livius Andronicus. The word Plautine refers to both Plautus's own works and works similar to or influenced by his. Biography Not much is known about Titus Maccius Plautus's early life. It is believed that he was born in Sarsina, a small town in Emilia Romagna in northern Italy, around 254 BC.''The Concise Oxford Companion to Classical Literature'' (1996) Ed. M.C. Howatson and Ian Chilvers, Oxford University Press, Oxford Reference Online According to Morris Marples, Plautus worked as a stage-carpenter or scene-shifter in his early years. It is from this work, perhaps, that his love of the theater originated. His acting talent was eventually discovered; and he adopted the names "Macciu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Materialism
Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds matter to be the fundamental substance in nature, and all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions. According to philosophical materialism, mind and consciousness are by-products or epiphenomena of material processes (such as the biochemistry of the human brain and nervous system), without which they cannot exist. This concept directly contrasts with idealism, where mind and consciousness are first-order realities to which matter is dependent while material interactions are secondary. Materialism is closely related to physicalism—the view that all that exists is ultimately physical. Philosophical physicalism has evolved from materialism with the theories of the physical sciences to incorporate more sophisticated notions of physicality than mere ordinary matter (e.g. spacetime, physical energies and forces, and dark matter). Thus, the term ''physicalism'' is prefe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heteroglossia
The term ''heteroglossia'' describes the coexistence of distinct varieties within a single "language" (in Greek: ''hetero-'' "different" and ''glōssa'' "tongue, language"). The term translates the Russian разноречие 'raznorechie'': literally, "varied-speechedness" which was introduced by the Russian literary theorist Mikhail Bakhtin in his 1934 paper ''Слово в романе'' lovo v romane published in English as "Discourse in the Novel." The essay was published in English in the book '' The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M.M. Bakhtin'', translated and edited by Michael Holquist and Caryl Emerson. Heteroglossia is the presence in language of a variety of "points of view on the world, forms for conceptualizing the world in words, specific world views, each characterized by its own objects, meanings and values." For Bakhtin, this diversity of "languages" within a single language brings into question the basic assumptions of system-based linguistics. Every wo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gilles Deleuze
Gilles Louis René Deleuze ( , ; 18 January 1925 – 4 November 1995) was a French philosopher who, from the early 1950s until his death in 1995, wrote on philosophy, literature, film, and fine art. His most popular works were the two volumes of ''Capitalism and Schizophrenia'': '' Anti-Oedipus'' (1972) and '' A Thousand Plateaus'' (1980), both co-written with psychoanalyst Félix Guattari. His metaphysical treatise '' Difference and Repetition'' (1968) is considered by many scholars to be his magnum opus. See also: "''Difference and Repetition'' is definitely the most important work published by Deleuze." (Edouard Morot-Sir, from the back cover of the first edition of the English translation), or James Williams' judgment: "It is nothing less than a revolution in philosophy and stands out as one of the great philosophical works of the twentieth century" (James Williams, ''Gilles Deleuze's Difference and Repetition: A Critical Introduction and Guide'' dinburgh UP, 2003 p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed with songs or ballets. It became popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, but the idea of vaudeville's theatre changed radically from its French antecedent. In some ways analogous to music hall from Victorian Britain, a typical North American vaudeville performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill. Types of acts have included popular and classical musicians, singers, dancers, comedians, trained animals, magicians, ventriloquists, strongmen, female and male impersonators, acrobats, clowns, illustrated songs, jugglers, one-act plays or scenes from plays, athletes, lecturing celebrities, minstrels, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Burlesque
A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects."Burlesque" ''Oxford English Dictionary'', , accessed 16 February 2011 The word derives from the Italian ', which, in turn, is derived from the Italian ' – a joke, ridicule or mockery. Burlesque overlaps in meaning with , and travesty, and, in its theatrical sense, w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Commedia Dell'arte
(; ; ) was an early form of professional theatre, originating from Italian theatre, that was popular throughout Europe between the 16th and 18th centuries. It was formerly called Italian comedy in English and is also known as , , and . Characterized by masked "types", was responsible for the rise of actresses such as Isabella Andreini and improvised performances based on sketches or scenarios. A , such as ''The Tooth Puller'', is both scripted and improvised. Characters' entrances and exits are scripted. A special characteristic of is the , a joke or "something foolish or witty", usually well known to the performers and to some extent a scripted routine. Another characteristic of is pantomime, which is mostly used by the character Arlecchino, now better known as Harlequin. The characters of the usually represent fixed social types and stock characters, such as foolish old men, devious servants, or military officers full of false bravado. The characters are exaggerat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going from hand production methods to machines, new chemical manufacturing and iron production processes, the increasing use of steam power and water power, the development of machine tools and the rise of the mechanized factory system. Output greatly increased, and a result was an unprecedented rise in population and in the rate of population growth. Textiles were the dominant industry of the Industrial Revolution in terms of employment, value of output and capital invested. The textile industry was also the first to use modern production methods. The Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain, and many of the technological and architectural innovations were of British origin. By the mid-18th century, Britain was the world's leadin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Social System
In sociology, a social system is the patterned network of relationships constituting a coherent whole that exist between individuals, groups, and institutions. It is the formal structure of role and status that can form in a small, stable group. An individual may belong to multiple social systems at once; examples of social systems include nuclear family units, communities, cities, nations, college campuses, corporations, and industries. The organization and definition of groups within a social system depend on various shared properties such as location, socioeconomic status, race, religion, societal function, or other distinguishable features. Notable theorists The study of social systems is integral to the fields of sociology and public policy. Social systems have been studied for as long as sociology has existed. Talcott Parsons Talcott Parsons was the first to formulate a systematic theory of social systems, which he did as a part of his AGIL paradigm. He defined a soc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insult
An insult is an expression or statement (or sometimes behavior) which is disrespectful or scornful. Insults may be intentional or accidental. An insult may be factual, but at the same time pejorative, such as the word " inbred". Jocular exchange Lacan considered insults a primary form of social interaction, central to the imaginary order – "a situation that is symbolized in the 'Yah-boo, so are you' of the transitivist quarrel, the original form of aggressive communication". Erving Goffman points out that every "crack or remark set up the possibility of a counter-riposte, topper, or squelch, that is, a comeback". He cites the example of possible interchanges at a dance in a school gym: Backhanded compliments A backhanded (or left-handed) compliment, or asteism, is an insult that is disguised as, or accompanied by, a compliment, especially in situations where the belittling or condescension is intentional. Examples of backhanded compliments include, but are not ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
