Argument of Inquiry
When I was younger, I pestered my mom to tell me how to say things in Pashto (our family language) and Urdu, the national language of Pakistan. As I grew older, I sought to learn more about Urdu, and my efforts led me toward poetry and Indian Bollywood movies, which I thought to be only in Hindi. While watching, however, I noticed characters using Urdu words like khuda and bahar, which mean “god” and “spring,” respectively, of which the Hindi words are bhagavaan and vasanta. My assumption was that Urdu is a Pakistani language and that Hindi is an Indian language.
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Reestablishing the Value of Fairy-Stories
J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1947 essay “On Fairy Stories” explores the nature of fairy-stories as a genre. Tolkien is best known for his fantasy novel (published as a trilogy), The Lord of the Rings, but he wrote “On Fairy Stories,” first delivered as a lecture in 1939, several years earlier as part of the Andrew Lang lecture series. In typical philological fashion, Tolkien discusses the definition of fairy-stories, their origins, and their purpose in order to capture their true value.
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Fall 2016
Journal Information
Fall 2016 Essays
Digital Forum
Inquiry Essay
Position Paper
Summary Essays
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From Rebel to Revolutionary: The Evolution of the Irish Outlaw and the Reluctant Irish Revival Author
“The lyricism of marginality may find inspiration in the image of the 'outlaw,' the great social nomad, who prowls on the confines of a docile, frightened order.” – Michel Foucault
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Engaging in Ambiguity: Emily Dickinson’s Use of Imagery, Enjambment, and Dashes to Create Multiple Interpretations of Her Poetry
Dickinson’s poetry is filled with moments of ambiguous meaning because she focuses on topics that do not have a definitive interpretation, such as lightning, truth, and the infinite. Nevertheless, Dickinson explores these subjects, not for the purpose of seeking an answer, but for the sake of exploring them. It is because these subjects cannot be defined that Dickinson finds their exploration so essential and focuses on them in her poetry.
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Le Bal Est Fini, and Everyone Was Happy
Through the diminutive and traditional world of local cultures in nineteenth century rural Louisiana, the intermingling of Cajun and Creole cultures manifests in Kate Chopin’s works. In At the ‘Cadien Ball and The Storm, Chopin juxtaposes the restraint on sexuality and gender and the restrictions imposed by religion and class through the cultural constraints of the time.
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Classifying the Renaissance Spirit: The Influence of Nineteenth Century Museum and Science Cultures on Walter Pater's Renaissance
It is tempting to read Walter Pater as a lifeless figure who transcends not only the conditions of the Victorian era he lived in, but also of life itself. It is true that when we sift through the details of his public life we find a man, as Arthur Symons describes, “rarely quite at ease” (102). Denis Donoghue tells us that “in company he was often silent, withdrawn, and when he consented to speak he spoke hesitantly, with long pauses between the words, as if he found conversation at regular speed and vivacity an effort” (54).
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Art about Art, Art about Life: Woolf, Schwitters, and the Blurred Line between the Arts and Life
The first half of the twentieth century was shorn by war, ripping society in England and across the European continent into fragments that many individuals struggled to bring back together to form a new picture. The period proved to be a cultural collage, as people aimed to reconcile their pasts with their presents to create a future. In no arena was this effort more addressed than in the arts. The inception of the avant-garde, modernist period “was characterised by cross-disciplinary practices and the dissolution of boundaries between forms and sense” (Hall 16).
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Spring 2011
Journal Information
Spring 2011 Essays
General Essays
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Subversion in the Kitchen: Food Preparation as a Mode of Feminist Expression
Given that the kitchen is the stereotypical ideal place for a “proper” woman, it is curious that Laura Esquivel’s Like Water for Chocolate, which is mainly set in the De la Garza kitchen and primarily models its structure after a cookbook, is sometimes considered a feminist novel. Writing after the boom of Spanish and Latin American literature in the 1960s and 1970s, Esquivel is often classified as a post-boomor boom femenino author.
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