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Deep Fake: Plato’s Cave and the Virtual World: Who are we becoming?
No full textHuman beings are animals who use tools. But the tools we use also reshape us – changing the way we think, the way we organize our lives, our relationships, our societies. Each time, the introduction of a new technology into human societies has brought war, the destruction of human lives. Because with technology change, we get paradigm change. When there is paradigm change, what it means to be human changes too. For the way we see and interact with the world around us determines who we are.
And yet, some things don’t change. Essential to being human are two things - ideas and love. But today, with the coming of the internet and the smartphone, how we access love and ideas has changed. No technology has had quite as much of an effect on so many human lives at once as the internet. We all spend at least a few hours on our computers and phones. We all have at least two identities, a digital one and a real one. This is as true in Africa as it is in Iceland, in Delhi or New York. Today we find and enact love through apps. Accessing news and ideas is happening mostly through apps. We see ourselves through the eyes of social media apps. We listen to music on apps. And social media ‘influencers’ can bring down governments or get a president elected.
Technology also affects the words we use. It can even produce new words. In the eighties, the spread of cheap music technology brought words like ‘rewind’ and ‘fast forward’ into the English vocabulary. ‘Groovy’, a very seventies hippie word, came from records and vinyl technology. Most of these words died along with the technologies that produced them. But some didn’t – they lingered, taking on a life of their own as they attached themselves to concepts that were important to us humans.
The internet has generated all kinds of interesting words – ‘reddit’, ‘ping me’, ‘like’, ‘emoji’. But I will concentrate on one word, ‘deep fake’, for it symbolizes, for me, the central problem of the internet age: trust. I came across this word around the time of the first Trump election and since then my mind won’t let go of it for it symbolizes the central conundrum of our internet world – the loss of trust. Society is built on trust. One has to have some trust between people in order for society to function. Trust is an important part of any relationship whether it is with one’s partner or with one’s banker. But how do you trust a person when you are communicating through a machine? How do we know what is real and what is not?
Deep Fake, to me, refers to something that is fake, but which people believe in and act upon because they no longer trust. I believe we are living in an age of ‘deep fake’ where certain concepts such ‘truth’ no longer play an important part in our political and social lives, what matters more is liking or not-liking ideas/people. Trust has been replaced or is being replaced with liking or disliking, loving or hating.
Lastly, I will look at the relationship between trust and education. What does one study in a world where one cannot trust that what one is being taught/learning is important? What can one learn if liking what one is learning feels more important than learning something new? And how does the crisis of trust affect literature and writing fiction?
Which brings me to Plato’s allegory of the cave. Today Plato’s cave is the digital world. When we are online, we do not, or cannot, look behind or around us. We forget that it is not the real world at all, but a simulacrum of the real world, and that the knowledge we seem to be able to access so easily, is not really knowledge at all but a shadow of knowledge, a compilation of knowledge with some important elements left out or misunderstood. Have we entered a time when even philosophers cannot get out of the cave for ‘light’ (truth in Plato’s case) itself is no longer important
Remarks on the morphology of non-triliteral adjectives in Mehri and western Modern South Arabian
No full textNon-triliteral adjectives, either reduplicated or true quadriliterals, in the eastern branch of Modern South Arabian (Jibbali/Shehret and Soqotri) mark the distinction between masculine singular and feminine singular by ablaut (Müller 1909): for example, Jibbali/Shehret M.SG. šəṣ́rɔ́r vs. F.SG. šəṣ́rér ‘yellow’ (Johnstone 1981: 265) and Soqotri M.SG. kə́rkam vs. F.SG. kə́rkim ‘jaune’ (Lonnet 2008: 130). Since the publication of Lonnet (2008), this phenomenon has been regarded as an important isogloss for the subgrouping of Modern South Arabian (MSAL), distinguishing Jibbali/Shehret and Soqotri from the rest of the MSAL. However, the morphological characteristics of non-triliteral adjectives in western MSAL (Mehri, Harsusi, Bathari and Hobyot) have not been satisfactorily described to date.
The aim of this short article is to provide some remarks on this topic and foster further reflection based on novel (albeit limited) data from the field
Defining regeneration within China’s agrifood system: Institutional frames and practitioners’ perspectives
No full textIn the past two decades, the concept of sustainability and its dominant developmental paradigm have been widely criticized for failing to halt environmental and social degradation. As a response, regeneration or ‘regenerative sustainability’ has emerged as an alternative paradigm, advocating holistic, process-oriented, and place-based approaches that support the thriving of socio-ecological systems.
Agrifood systems, which strongly affect ecosystems and are closely linked to issues of social justice, are among the sectors where regeneration is urgently needed. Yet the concepts of regeneration and regenerative practices have already been defined in academic debates and have also been co-opted by industrial agriculture to reinforce eco-modernist narratives. This raises important questions about how regeneration can be defined from the bottom up in ways that reflect its emphasis on place-based approaches, and how such a context-specific definition can be meaningfully situated within the Chinese agrifood landscape.
This contribution addresses these questions by presenting the results of a participatory online workshop that brought together practitioners from different fields within China’s agrifood system. Through collaborative activities, participants identified drivers, practices, and outcomes of regeneration and co-created a working definition that can serve as a foundation for further socio-ecological research
Kinship terms in Shehret and Mehri
No full textThis paper examines the semantics, patterning and morpho-syntax of kinship terms in Shehret and Mehri, two Modern South Arabian languages (MSAL) spoken in Southern Arabia. Comprising data and expertise from native speakers, field linguistics, and linguistic anthropology, this paper describes semantic patterning and interesting morphological blending shared by the two languages, as well as a preliminary discussion of the pragmatics of kin terms in both languages. Sets of terms for Mehri and Shehret repeat across degrees of relational distance, but pattern in complex ways depending on cross or parallel gender of intervening parent and generational relation in ways that differ from patterning in Arabic. Kinship terminology are highly salient and highly conserved lexemes, particularly in these speech communities where they play a daily role in conversation and identification, and as this paper emphasizes, are sources for insights into morphological processes that hold more broadly in the language and that may indicate future questions for historical linguistic research
The rendering of Japanese comedy: The case of culture-specific references in the English subtitles of Hitoshi Matsumoto presents Dokyumental
No full textThis study focuses on the linguistic and socio-cultural components in the translation process of Japanese humour. The cultural apparatus plays a key role in the development of humour exchanges but is still insufficiently explored. Heydon and Kianbakht (2020) argue that there is no greater challenge than to deal in translation with references directly related to cultural aspects of other, often distant and different languages. All of this contributes to historical theories on the untranslatability of humour (Delabastita 1994), even though more recent research favours a predominantly functional approach especially in the field of audiovisual translation (Dore 2020).
In this context, this study, in addition to providing a brief examination of the main characteristics of Japanese-made humour - an area almost unexplored by previous studies - has the primary aim of intercepting the rendering in English subtitles of culture-specific references (CSRs) in the Japanese comedy programme Hitoshi Matsumoto presents Dokyumental. The programme counts thirteen seasons, but now only two are available in translation on the Amazon Italia platform. In particular, I try to analyse the strategies adopted by the translator to convey a type of humour that often significantly transcends Western canons (Davis, 2006; Swan, 2022b). As Ranzato (2010: 42) points out, the problem of cultural references has not been exhaustively explored in the context of audiovisual translation yet. Although research in cultural references has been fruitful in the recent years, the statement of Ranzato remains valid for what concerns the Japanese context. This is why the present study may prove significant in the fields of Audiovisual Translation Studies, Humour Studies and Japanese Studies
Material witnesses: Object-fiction and raw realism in Saadat Hasan Manto’s symbolic resistance
No full textThis study examines how Saadat Hasan Manto’s short fiction stories employ everyday objects as narrative agents in ten of his Urdu short stories to reveal how material symbols destabilize linear temporality, normative dualisms, and political mythmaking. Building on Gadamerian hermeneutics and object‑oriented narratology, the analysis triangulates three frameworks: (1) the temporal dualism of Chronos (cyclical violence) and Aevum (ideological eternity), (2) phenomenological object studies (Merleau‑Ponty; Heidegger) highlighting how things embody absence and historical anxiety, and (3) paratextual contextualization by Gérard Genette through Manto’s Gañjē Fārishtē (Bald Angels) , and Letters to Uncle Sam. Textual selection is purposive, focusing on stories in which objects are thematically central and function to rupture narrative flow or symbolically articulate unspeakable experiences. The findings demonstrate that Manto’s thing‑stories operate as chronopolitical ruptures that resist both the erasure of traumatic history and the promise of transcendental closure. This object‑centric lens not only deepens our understanding of Manto’s symbolic realism but also offers a model for analyzing material‑mediated moral rupture in postcolonial literature
Development of a Sustainability Disclosure Index model for higher education institutions
No full textIntroduction. The objectives is to develop a comprehensive and relevant Sustainability Disclosure Index (SDI) show that can be utilized by stakeholders to measure sustainability in Indonesian Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) using legitimacy theory
Methodology. The population is Indonesian HEIs registered at the University of Indonesia Green Metrics (UIGM) in 2022, totaling 126 HEIs. The census method used in this research and triangulates methods between researchers by confirming the results of content analysis carried out by researchers with experts
Results. The first finding was the development of SDI for HEIs based on the Global Reporting Initiatives (GRI), UIGM and Times Higher Education (THE) lists by considering the pointers related with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the National Accreditation Board for Higher Education/BAN PT. There are 115 indicators were obtained including sustainability indicators (economic, environmental and social) as well as scholarly pointers (education, research and community service).
Discussion. Sustainability Assessment Tools (SATs) has been carried out, but most of them were carried out before 2015 so that the dimensions measured in SATs have not yet accommodated efforts to achieve the SDGs. Consequently, this research develop the new SAT can be utilized by stakeholders to degree sustainability in Indonesia HEI
Three proverbs in Muslim and Jewish Arabic from Baghdad
No full textThe aim of this short article is to present three proverbs in Muslim Baghdadi and Jewish Baghdadi dialects, characterized by conveying teachings and moral values that have parallels and similarities with concepts expressed in the Quranic text, and to offer their linguistic analysis and description in order to show some features of the two varieties. The interaction between language and religion is very significant for Arabic paremiology, as the Qurʾān is a rich source of proverbs. On the one hand, many Quranic verses are used as proverbs; on the other, many proverbs are mentioned and recalled in the Quranic text.
As far as the analysis of proverbs is concerned, the transcription in Latin characters and the translation into English will be undertaken by the author. For each proverb, a commentary on its use and on the message transmitted will be provided, along with the Quranic verses that convey similar concepts. Then, some phonological and morphological features of the two dialects will be described, taking the move from the analysis of the most significant expressions and terms of the proverbs; for this purpose and to better highlight the characteristics of the two varieties a comparison with Classical Arabic will be offered
Persian, Turkish, or European? An investigation into a table carpet at the Pitti Palace and its place in history
No full textThis paper draws attention to an important but little-known needlework table carpet (inv. no. MPP 10562), dated to around the seventeenth century (?) and currently preserved in one of the storerooms of the Pitti Palace in Florence. Rediscovered in the Palace’s tapestry storeroom (c. 2009), the Pitti carpet measures 421 x 212 cm and is made up of four red velvet pieces embroidered in gold and silk. While eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth-century inventories define this carpet as Persian and/or Turkish in origin, and although more recent research has suggested European provenance, its original place of production is still to be definitively established. Thus, this paper aims to reconstruct the history of this carpet by going back in time, providing new insights into its place of origin, dating, materials, and techniques, all supported by diagnostic analyses. By going through the research stages, it traces routes which pass from Asian trading centres to Portugal, and unravels the mystery by proving that the carpet is a Chinese needlework piece, rather than Persian, Turkish, or European. During the research, archival evidence led to the removal of the lining, which confirmed the presence of golden characters from a Far Eastern language, painted in close proximity to the selvedges of the carpet. Deciphering these characters has become the challenge within the challenge. Further research routes can be followed due to the existence of two comparable pieces, which deserve to be studied and reported on alongside this carpet. First, an analogous needlework carpet of roughly the same size (548 x 212 cm), thought to be Ottoman, approximately dated to the sixteenth or seventeenth century (or, more recently, to the nineteenth century) and currently preserved at the Topkapı Palace Museum, in Istanbul (inv. no. 13/10 [TSM]). Secondly, a further carpet, considered to be Indian (or Persian), from the Musée des Arts Décoratifs’ collections, has been preserved at the Louvre Museum, in Paris, since 2007 (inv. no. MAD 4455). By presenting these comparisons, the paper raises new research questions and opens avenues for further exploration to clarify the relationship between the Pitti carpet and its primary similar prototypes, as well as their clientele and uses
