Using Unexpected Simplicity to Control Moral Judgments and Interest in Narratives

The challenge of narrative automatic generation is to produce not only coherent, but interesting stories. This study considers the problem within the Simplicity Theory framework. According to this theory, interesting situations must be unexpectedly simple, either because they should have required complex circumstances to be produced, or because they are abnormally simple, as in coincidences. Here we consider the special case of narratives in which characters perform actions with emotional consequences. We show, using the simplicity framework, how notions such as intentions, believability, responsibility and moral judgments are linked to narrative interest

Spiritual Borrowing: Appropriation and Reinterpretation of Christian Mystic Practices in Three Emergent Churches

This thesis investigates the process of spiritual borrowing between the emergent church (EC) and the Christian mystical tradition. From its inception, the EC has displayed interest in mystic practices, but the exact nature of this interest or how these practices are appropriated and reinterpreted in the EC context has not been researched. My research shows that the emergent church is appropriating Christian mystic practices by investing these practices with their own theological content. After introduction to areas of inquiry and the historical development of the EC in the USA, I proceed to prove my point through literary and empirical strategies. Close scrutiny of EC literature shows a lack of connection with historical provenance of mystic practices. Rather than a historical connection, mystic practices are viewed as neutral containers which can be invested with a great range of theological content. Consequently, EC authors tie the appropriation of practices to the theological content which they are also investing into the practices. Several theological values, or ‘anchors’, are evident as primary investments in EC literature. Empirical research through phenomenological case studies displays less of a tidy relationship than the literature portrays. Principally, spiritual borrowing of mystic practices is tied to a high theological value on experimentation with lesser value tied to other anchors. The practices themselves are changed to fit in their new context with new theology, showing that EC belief shapes EC behavior. My study contributes notably to the sociological examination of the process of spiritual borrowing, especially through close inspection of how a spiritual practice changes to fit a new theological context. Additionally, my thesis contributes to the study of the complex relationship between belief and behavior

Bard Observer, Vol. 10, No. 4 (December 15, 1999)

https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/observer/1503/thumbnail.jp

Spain’s Francoist Broadway: American musicals in Madrid, 1955-1975

This article traces the itinerary followed by the earliest Broadway musicals to be imported to Madrid in the 1950s and 1960s. Such innovative format dazzled critics and audiences, carving out a niche of enthusiastic followers that would grow larger over time. The handful of works borrowed in this period will receive attention, especially insofar as their reception is concerned. The final phase of the Francoist dictatorship brought an increased visibility to the form, as heated controversy surrounded the eventual importation and prohibition of titles such as Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar. In the case of the former, shows purporting to bring to Spaniards what the authorities had banned will be briefly discussed. The latter will receive closer attention. Both these plays will serve as privileged viewing platforms whence the tensions inherent to a moribund regime and its outdated cultural policies will become obvious

Factional realities in Remi Raji's Gather My Blood Rivers of Song

This paper explores the transformative vision of the Nigerian poet, Remi Raji from imaginative mooring in his earlier works to factional realities in Gather My Blood Rivers of Song published in 2009. In some poems in this collection, Raji embraces factional realities as he grapples with the narration of actual existence in Nigeria. This signifies a movement away from the speculative construct of the imagination as he presents the tangible properties of events, not as history, but the facts in reality. This differentiates him from other writers who merely re-echo or document events. Based on the materialist frame of reference presented in some of the poems in this collection, Raji is able to enact plausible narrations that have identifiable referentiality through which he guides his poetic presenta- tion of actual human existence.&nbsp

Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationFrom the outset of the effort to produce the first edition of Remembering Dismembrance: A Critical Compendium, the prime motivation has been the continued support of the novel's life in conversation, among academics and artists, fans and aficionados. The Compendium is a collection of work that stands in dialogic relation to the novel Dismembrance and its readers; it serves as an expansion of the text's heteroglossic potential, a furthering of polyphony and imagination. Successful as the first edition may be in this regard, over time the Compendium has come to look a bit buttoned down for our taste, too focused on writing about the novel. With this second edition, our attention has been paid instead to works that embody the notion of writing through the novel, whatever that may mean. Where the contents of the first edition often employ a familiar literary discourse in order to speak about the novel and its possible meaning(s), the second edition eschews such questions of "aboutness," offering fewer answers, opting to evoke the character of the novel instead of its characters, to explore the power of the novel's language rather than its plot, to be the dream the novel is having now. In this second edition, ostensibly innocuous aspects of the novel give rise to new worlds and unfamiliar adventures that resonate with echoes of the concerns of the source text, their sound gleefully warped in the wide open spaces of each new author's imagination. If the pieces included in this second edition move us further from the novel, so be it. Such is the price paid by those who would add to the novel's network of reading but resist the terminal assignment of meaning. If the Compendium's first edition was a carnivalesque imagining in the face of a funhouse mirror, let this second be a stained glass through which to see the novel, blurred but brighter for the freedom its inexactness offers