Ateneo de Manila University: Journals Online
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Heroic Women in Deuteronomistic History
Get PDF“Hero” is the usual translation of the Hebrew word gibbôr which in the Bible refers to a “young vigorous man apt for all that is virile” or a “strong, valiant man.” Gibbôr can thus be used for men who have achieved military or political victory for the welfare of the nation. In this article, however, we examine some texts on women in the Deuteronomistic History (DH) to determine whether the qualities that constitute a gibbôr can also be found in them. Indeed, some women in the DH could well qualify to be “heroines” based on the second part of the description of a gibbôr, that is, “those who achieved victory for the welfare of the nation.
Intercultural Theater and the Local Context of Reception: Lady Macbeth 2016 and the South Korean Presidential Scandal
Get PDFThis essay investigates the relationship between intercultural performance and the sociopolitical context of reception by drawing parallels between Tae-sook Han’s 2016 changguk adaptation of her own Lady Macbeth and the recent presidential scandal of South Korea. The discourse of intercultural performance has focused on directorial vision and the political dynamics between the source and target cultures, while the local context of reception and its impact on the overall meaning of the work have relatively been overlooked, particularly from a diachronic perspective. Lady Macbeth revolves around the court physician’s psychotherapy sessions for the eponymous heroine, who is haunted by the memories of her past crimes and eventually choked by guilt. While major critics of the play have interpreted the play as a feminist or humanist drama, the scandal challenges such sympathetic views of the heroine due to the play’s strong evocation of allegations brought against then-President Geun-hye Park and her confidante Soon-sil Choi. Previously understood as a woman or Everyman that the spectators could identify with, now the queen seems to have become a symbol of corruption and immorality. The play’s political subtext is amplified by the play’s changguk form whose satire and traditional music contribute to the audience’s purgation of han. Holding more immediate relevance and broader appeal to the local audience than before, the new version of Lady Macbeth demonstrates how an extraordinary socio-political context can transform an intercultural performance into a national drama for the local audience
Filling in the Gaps: Remembering the 1965 Killings in Indonesia
Get PDFAfter more than fifty years, Indonesia remains muted in its acknowledgement of the killings and disappearances of nearly one million suspected leftists in the anti-Communist pogroms of 1965. While the downfall of Indonesian strongman Suharto had opened up a larger space for democracy, the Indonesian state remains reticent in facing accusations of mass human rights violations that have taken place during his rule. Although many former dissidents and political detainees have come forward with their stories in an effort to “straighten istory,” they continue to face harassment from right wing groups as well as the state’s intelligence apparatus. Nevertheless, with the advent of the Internet, human rights activists as well as historical “revisionists” have begun to use the cyber sphere as way to fill in the “gaps” in terms of Indonesia’s narrative concerning the killings of 1965. This paper investigates the dynamics behind the use of this medium in transmitting this dark episode to a younger generation of Indonesians. It looks specifically at Ingat 1965, a website that utilizes “private memory” as a way to “resist” as well as reinvent the narrative, which has so long been dominated by the state. This paper also includes an investigation into how Indonesia is beginning to deal with its past
Food Transformation Technology in Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl and What It Means for Us
Get PDFThis article argues that a stage in history has come where advanced technology, especially that of genetically engineered foods and animals, is quickening the humankind’s downfall. Bacigalupi represents this well in The Windup Girl, a futuristic novel that looks with great focus at the transformation of food and animals in the twenty-third century. In our own world, climate change is creating urgent food issues. Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) technologies, having been initially introduced to overcome dire food shortages, have turned out to have many negative side effects, both in our own world and in the fictional world of The Windup Girl. More problematic are the unknown dangers of food transformation technologies. These technologies are driven by multinational corporations both in the real and fictional worlds, and Bacigalupi suggests that the current trajectories of our food transformation industries and their technologies could lead to the demise of human civilization
Women in Society and in the Church of Tamil Nadu
Get PDFM. Baby Kamala shows that Tamil society, formerly matriarchal and pluralistic, is now patriarchal, and women in the society are in an ambiguous position. They are culturally voiceless and politically powerless. Customs and hardline practices suppress and oppress them. In arguing that women are victims both in society and in the Church, Kamala discusses such issues as low wages for women, inheritance laws, female infanticide, the dowry, and calls for a “discipleship of equals” as a new way of being Church in Asia
