ENTHYMEMA
Not a member yet
846 research outputs found
Sort by
Interactivist Refutation of Radical Epistemic Skepticism Characteristic of Postmodern Literary Studies and Fiction
Full text linkPostmodern fiction and literary theory have endorsed radical skepticism about knowledge, which was partly conditioned by philosophers’ inability to provide a viable epistemology that would resolve the radical skeptical problems. Most recent developments in both fiction and theory have largely ignored the apparently still unresolved issue and have instead embraced the position of active commitment that presupposes that knowledge is in fact possible. In this text, we address this apparent oversight and present an interactivist ontology of the mind and culture that explains how we can acquire knowledge about the world, and why the postmodern radical skepticism is ungrounded. We argue that once the interactivist theory of cognition as well as ontology of the mind and culture are assumed, the skeptical problems that troubled postmodern thought become non-problems and further pursuit of epistemically evaluable theory of culture (fiction included) gains solid theoretical grounds
Phenomenology of scales on summits: sensations, consciousness and literary language at the trial of the mountain in Manuel Rojas and Gary Snyder
Full text linkEste artículo se centra en una selección de obras narrativa y poéticas del chileno Manuel Rojas y del estadounidense Gary Snyder, ambos autores montañistas y acomunados por la inquietud por plasmar, en el lenguaje literario, el adentrarse del ser humano en el ambiente salvaje de la montaña y su sumirse en un estado de alerta perceptiva y contemplación lúcida frente a escalas dispares que allí se evidencian. Enmarcándose en la teoría de las escalas (DiCaglio, Jue, Horton, Cueto) y en el concepto de aventura (Agamben), la hipótesis postula que las obras registran cómo la experiencia humana de la escalaridad en el medio montano produce una expansión de la conciencia, derivando, según el caso, en una desposesión del yo o en una intuición ofuscada del peligro mortal que se propone como exemplum al lector, así como en una modificación del lenguaje literario mismo que acompaña y hace posible la aventura.This article focuses on a selection of narrative and poetic works by the Chilean Manuel Rojas and the American Gary Snyder, both mountaineers and driven by the concern of capturing, in literary language, the human being\u27s venturing into the wild environment of the mountain, and his plunge into a state of perceptual alertness and lucid contemplation in the face of the disparate scales that are revealed there. Framed in scale theory (DiCaglio, Jue, Horton, Cueto) and in the concept of adventure (Agamben), the hypothesis postulates that the human experience of scales in the mountain environment is translated into an expansion of consciousness, deriving, depending on the case, in a dispossession of the self or in an obfuscated intuition of the mortal danger that is proposed as exemplum to the reader, and in a modification of the literary language itself that accompanies and makes the adventure possible
Review of Gloria Scarfone, Il pensiero monologico. Personaggio e vita psichica in Volponi, Morante e Pasolini (Mimesis, 2022)
Full text linkRecensione di Gloria Scarfone, Il pensiero monologico. Personaggio e vita psichica in Volponi, Morante e Pasolini (Mimesis, 2022)Review of Gloria Scarfone, Il pensiero monologico. Personaggio e vita psichica in Volponi, Morante e Pasolini (Mimesis, 2022
Per una ricomprensione social della posture littéraire: Édouard Louis e Jonathan Bazzi
Full text linkIf the early Web had allowed literary authors to freely assume different forms (anonymous, collective, pseudonymous), today the advent of social networks and Web 2.0 impose the construction of a virtual literary posture as close as possible to the real one. The aim here is to analyse, starting with Instagram, the literary posture of Édouard Louis and Jonathan Bazzi, whose works are extremely similar in theme and form. The analysis will attempt to understand how social networks intervene in the process of the construction of the literary posture and if, starting from them, a new understanding can be achieved.Se il Web dei primordi aveva permesso agli autori letterari di assumere liberamente forme diverse (anonima, collettiva, pseudonima), oggi l’avvento dei social network e del web 2.0 impone la costruzione di una postura letteraria virtuale il più aderente possibile a quella reale. In questo articolo ci si propone di analizzare, a partire da Instagram, la postura letteraria di Édouard Louis e Jonathan Bazzi, le cui opere sono estremamente simili nei temi e nella forma. L’analisi cercherà di comprendere come i social intervengano nel processo di costruzione della postura letteraria e se, a partire da essi, vi sia la possibilità di una sua ricomprensione
‘Owing the Comforts of Life to Art’: Elizabeth Helme’s Critical Reception and the Practice of Writing
Full text linkIn the context of the rise of the novel in eighteenth-century Britain, this article examines the understudied production of Elizabeth Helme (c. 1743-1814), who enjoyed a long and successful career as a writer of novels, as a translator and essayist. Special attention will be paid to Helme’s reception in the English press and the translations of her novels into Spanish and French. It will further argue that Helme’s own practice as author, translator, and translated author configured a synergy of knowledge-building that allowed her to articulate her own style as a writer and posed a critical reflection about the art of writing, particularly in her non-fiction work that remains largely unexplored. More generally, Helme’s eclectic approach is indicative of the ways in which eighteenth-century translation and writing practice can foster reflection on literary theory and criticism by confronting the author with the function of their own work
Killing the Law: Raskolnikov’s problem
Full text linkThis article discusses Crime and Punishment with the objectives to: 1. analyze Raskolnikov’s project: to kill not a person, but a “principle”, that is the need for the Law in society; 2. explain the meaning of his gesture: killing the Law is an even more radical gesture than “the death of God” described by Nietzsche; 3. clarify the motive(s) for Raskolnikov’s action, adopting the theories of desire and the polysemy of identity. What drives Raskolnikov is the desire to be, an indispensable concept after Freud, but one which requires investigation on a philosophical level. If, undoubtedly, Raskolnikov’s first motive is the wish to affirm the distinction between ordinary and “extraordinary” men, there is, however, a second, less visible motive, which consists in trying to sever a deeper dependence, that with his mother. Crime and Punishment is alsothe novel of matricide. 4. The extraordinary semantic density of Dostoevsky’s prose is reached through relationships: he is the master of overcoming and ambivalence. Analyzing the fabric of relationships in Dostoevsky highlights the importance of the female figures belonging to the series of mothers and to the series of daughters, which can only be understood through a logic of overcoming, and its unsettling outcomes. 5. Finally, contrary to a common tendency to separate the content (the ideas) in Dostoevsky from the artistic form, this article affirms that a) in Dostoevsky there are no ideas: if anything, there is the Idea, as a manifestation of the Sublime; b) in Dostoevsky there are no idea-concepts, but only characters.This article discusses Crime and Punishment with the objectives to: 1. analyze Raskolnikov’s project: to kill not a person, but a “principle”, that is the need for the Law in society; 2. explain the meaning of his gesture: killing the Law is an even more radical gesture than “the death of God” described by Nietzsche; 3. clarify the motive(s) for Raskolnikov’s action, adopting the theories of desire and the polysemy of identity. What drives Raskolnikov is the desire to be, an indispensable concept after Freud, but one which requires investigation on a philosophical level. If, undoubtedly, Raskolnikov’s first motive is the wish to affirm the distinction between ordinary and “extraordinary” men, there is, however, a second, less visible motive, which consists in trying to sever a deeper dependence, that with his mother. Crime and Punishment is alsothe novel of matricide. 4. The extraordinary semantic density of Dostoevsky’s prose is reached through relationships: he is the master of overcoming and ambivalence. Analyzing the fabric of relationships in Dostoevsky highlights the importance of the female figures belonging to the series of mothers and to the series of daughters, which can only be understood through a logic of overcoming, and its unsettling outcomes. 5. Finally, contrary to a common tendency to separate the content (the ideas) in Dostoevsky from the artistic form, this article affirms that a) in Dostoevsky there are no ideas: if anything, there is the Idea, as a manifestation of the Sublime; b) in Dostoevsky there are no idea-concepts, but only characters
From Dialogic Imagination to Polyphonic Thinking: Bakhtin in Saransk 2021
Full text linkThe article presents the results of the XVII International Bakhtin Conference held in Saransk (Russia) on July 5-10, 2021. The forum brought together over 100 participants from 22 countries and was held online. The 18 plenary lectures and more than 100 panels and online-discussions focused on the most important questions of the reception of Bakhtin’s heritage, and the influence of the thinker’s ideas on contemporary humanities. Presentations included works in the following areas: biography of Bakhtin, determining the place of his ideas in modern philology, philosophy and other social sciences, the theory and practice of education, and interdisciplinary research. This article analyses and contextualises the work of the conference against the background of the Bakhtin Forums of the 1980s and 2010s, which became an important part of the global Bakhtin Studies, as well as of the recent development of Bakhtin’s heritage in Russia and worldwide. The authors highlight the most important results of the last conference as supplementing and reconstructing Bakhtin’s biography, clarifying the details of the process of dialogical interaction of Bakhtin’s work with his contemporary ideas and the preceding traditions, defining the boundaries of Bakhtin’s influence on the humanities and the natural science, as well as the possibilities of integration of these disciplines under the “sign of Bakhtin”. The article presents the results of the XVII International Bakhtin Conference held in Saransk (Russia) on July 5-10, 2021. The forum brought together over 100 participants from 22 countries and was held online. The 18 plenary lectures and more than 100 panels and online-discussions focused on the most important questions of the reception of Bakhtin’s heritage, and the influence of the thinker’s ideas on contemporary humanities. Presentations included works in the following areas: biography of Bakhtin, determining the place of his ideas in modern philology, philosophy and other social sciences, the theory and practice of education, and interdisciplinary research. This article analyses and contextualises the work of the conference against the background of the Bakhtin Forums of the 1980s and 2010s, which became an important part of the global Bakhtin Studies, as well as of the recent development of Bakhtin’s heritage in Russia and worldwide. The authors highlight the most important results of the last conference as supplementing and reconstructing Bakhtin’s biography, clarifying the details of the process of dialogical interaction of Bakhtin’s work with his contemporary ideas and the preceding traditions, defining the boundaries of Bakhtin’s influence on the humanities and the natural science, as well as the possibilities of integration of these disciplines under the “sign of Bakhtin”
Tra verità e inganni. Polifonia apparente e aspetti picareschi nel viaggio dialogato del Lazarillo de Ciegos Caminantes
Full text linkTra tutti gli scritti odeporici del XVIII secolo, spicca senza dubbio un’opera che ha generato numerosi dibattiti riguardanti la struttura, la narrazione e addirittura la questione della paternità: il Lazarillo de ciegos caminantes. In questo lavoro sarà messo in risalto uno degli aspetti più intriganti del testo, ossia la presunta polifonia letteraria che, in realtà, rivela una narrazione unilaterale dettata da una sola, autentica voce. A ciò si aggiungerebbe una possibile reminiscenza della picaresca tradizionale. L’analisi di questa commistione di elementi, tra la prospettiva rigido-monolitica e l’ipotetica influenza picaresca, sarà l’argomento centrale di questo studio.Among all 18th-century travel writings, there is one work that certainly stands out for giving rise to many debates related to its structure, narration and even authorship: Lazarillo de ciegos caminantes. This essay addresses one of the most fascinating aspects of the text, which is the supposed presence of literary polyphony that actually reveals a unilateral narration articulated by just one true voice. A possible inspiration of the traditional picaresque could have been added to it. The analysis of this combination of elements, between the rigid-monolithic perspective and the hypothetical picaresque influence, is the main topic of the study
Filologia come interpretazione. Un ricordo di Costanzo Di Girolamo
Full text linkIn memory of Costanzo di Girolamo (1948-2022).In ricordo di Costanzo Di Girolamo (1948-2022)
Macchine per leggere: promuovere la lettura con il distant reading
Full text linkWe present Macchine per leggere project, a collaboration between the Department of Literary, Philosophical and Art History Studies of the university of Rome “Tor Vergata” and the MiC Center for Books and Reading. The project aims at creating a digital environment (desktop and mobile) that introduces secondary school students to the knowledge and use of computational text analysis as a cue for approaching the reading of classics of Italian literature (among others that will be made available on the site, Il piacere, I Malavoglia, Il fu Mattia Pascal...). The distant reading approach and a set of computer tools for corpus analysis and text mining (word cloud, term and syntagma frequency indices, topic modeling, sentiment, and network analysis), combined with other resources such as geolocation on digital maps of literary places, will be presented both as a method for simulating reading strategies in a virtual environment and as models for integrating traditional hermeneutic practices-close reading. In a dedicated section of the site, the various tools will be available to students in the form of a web application so that they can experiment independently and on other texts in their possession with the distant approach proposed as part of the project.Questo articolo presenta il progetto Macchine per leggere, nato dalla collaborazione tra il Dipartimento di Studi letterari, filosofici e di storia dell’arte dell’Università di Roma “Tor Vergata” e il Centro per il Libro e la Lettura del MiC. Scopo del progetto è la realizzazione di un ambiente digitale (desktop e mobile) che introduca gli studenti della scuola secondaria di secondo grado alla conoscenza e all’utilizzo delle tecniche di analisi computazionale dei testi, qui proposte come spunto per accostarsi alla lettura dei classici della letteratura italiana (tra gli altri che saranno resi disponibili sul sito, Il piacere, I Malavoglia, Il fu Mattia Pascal…). L’approccio del distant reading e gli strumenti informatici per l’analisi e la rappresentazione dei corpora e per il text mining (word cloud, indici di frequenza di termini e sintagmi, topic modeling, sentiment e network analysis), uniti ad altre risorse come la geolocalizzazione su mappe digitali dei luoghi letterari, saranno presentati sia come metodo per simulare in ambiente virtuale reading strategies, che come modelli per integrare le prassi ermeneutiche tradizionali – close reading. In una sezione del sito dedicata, gli algoritmi di cui si darà dimostrazione saranno a disposizione degli studenti in forma di web app, così che possano sperimentare in autonomia e su altri testi in loro possesso l’approccio distant proposto nell’ambito del progetto