A Formative Evaluation Of Augmentative And Alternative Communication Approaches To Promote Literacy In Young Children With Severe Speech And Physical Impairments

This thesis describes an educational intervention with three children with severe speech and physical impairments. The intervention focused on storybook reading experiences for early literacy development through the use of Augmentative and Alternative Communication technologies and methods. The review of literature focused on the main aspects relating to children with SSPI, and in particular on the difficulties they experience in developing emergent literacy skills. This review suggests the hypothesis that the use of AAC Techniques in storytelling achievement can provide emergent literacy experiences, which can promote the development of literacy in children with SSPI. In particular the study set out to enquire whether AAC techniques can be used to enhance participation with SSPI in storytelling activities, and whether such activities improve a pupil’s opportunities to become emergent readers. A six-month intervention was designed which included strategies proposed for increasing the children’s participation during storybook reading sessions, like repeated readings of the same story, abundant use of graphic symbols and access to AAC techniques. Qualitative data were gathered from the professionals at the Centre, and from the mothers. Storybook reading sessions with the teacher at school and with the mothers or significant other at home were videotaped, at the beginning and at the end of the intervention. Quantitative data were collected by videotape analysis. Communicative acts of children and adults were divided into communication categories, and their meaning was discussed as to form, use and content. One of the main conclusions of the study was that the use of stories promoting communication and language learning in storybook reading sessions can develop literacy skills if carried out in conjunction with AAC techniques, including graphic symbols and the technology to generate them. A second conclusion is that there is no automatic transfer of the improvement of communicative skills in the classroom to the interaction with the mothers

“The Dada of Haha”: The Hypermodern Anti-Comedy of Tim and Eric, Eric André and Million Dollar Extreme

Meaningfully meaningless anti-comedy is the logical next step in comedy’s evolution as we head into wildly uncertain hypermodern times. Three major case studies from the 21st century will allow us to truly understand this timely transformation: the works of comedians Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim (of Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!) Eric André (of The Eric André Show) and the troupe Million Dollar Extreme (of Million Dollar Extreme Presents World Peace). The three share similar sinews in style; despite their surface-level aesthetic similarities, however, the three utilize the weaponized subgenre to fire shots at completely distinct facets of hypermodern culture

Russian Literature in Exile

In der Reihe Slavistische Beiträge werden vor allem slavistische Dissertationen des deutschsprachigen Raums sowie vereinzelt auch amerikanische, englische und russische publiziert. Darüber hinaus stellt die Reihe ein Forum für Sammelbände und Monographien etablierter Wissenschafter/innen dar

Concert and disconcertion: the music of relationality in the cinema of Claire Denis

This thesis argues that the interest which the films of Claire Denis display in the ever-shifting modes of relations between people is illustrated through analysis of how music is used throughout her corpus of feature films. Denis draws on an extremely eclectic palette of musical styles, and the thesis proposes that these varying musical modalities are central to her treatment of relational issues, as are the ways in which she deploys her chosen musical selections. In this thesis, I develop a number of analytical tools. I draw on the thinking of Jacques Rancière and Jean-Luc Nancy with regard to questions of relationality, community and the dissensual elements which inform both interpersonal relationships and artistic creativity. I adapt the work of Kathryn Lachman on concepts of polyphony and counterpoint in literature for application to the oeuvre of Denis, as I do the writings of Michel Chion on music in film, especially his conceptualization of empathetic modes of cinematic music. The thesis concludes that music in the work of Claire Denis operates in a mode which diverges significantly from the tenets of existing film music theory. Music in a Denis film is at the same time far more fragmentary and yet much more thoroughly integrated than allowed for by standard conceptualizations. It plays hand-in-hand with the challenges and invitations which are a feature of the cinema of Denis

Concert and disconcertion: the music of relationality in the cinema of Claire Denis

This thesis argues that the interest which the films of Claire Denis display in the ever-shifting modes of relations between people is illustrated through analysis of how music is used throughout her corpus of feature films. Denis draws on an extremely eclectic palette of musical styles, and the thesis proposes that these varying musical modalities are central to her treatment of relational issues, as are the ways in which she deploys her chosen musical selections. In this thesis, I develop a number of analytical tools. I draw on the thinking of Jacques Rancière and Jean-Luc Nancy with regard to questions of relationality, community and the dissensual elements which inform both interpersonal relationships and artistic creativity. I adapt the work of Kathryn Lachman on concepts of polyphony and counterpoint in literature for application to the oeuvre of Denis, as I do the writings of Michel Chion on music in film, especially his conceptualization of empathetic modes of cinematic music. The thesis concludes that music in the work of Claire Denis operates in a mode which diverges significantly from the tenets of existing film music theory. Music in a Denis film is at the same time far more fragmentary and yet much more thoroughly integrated than allowed for by standard conceptualizations. It plays hand-in-hand with the challenges and invitations which are a feature of the cinema of Denis

Merovingian Queenship in Early Nineteenth-Century French Historiography

In my Ph. D. thesis I examine the way French historians represented Merovingian queenship in their historical narratives between 1814 and 1848. The French monarchy was re-established in these years and it changed considerably in the early decades of the nineteenth century, from an imitation of the Old Regime to a bourgeois and constitutional monarchy. These changes forced historians and politicians to rethink both the history of France and the function of the monarchy. My objective is to gain new perspectives on the period's historiography by looking at the way in which the early medieval queens were represented and how the representations were affected by the contemporary political and historiographical discussions about the French monarchy. The representations varied according to the author and the intended readership. A historian’s task was to write about events and persons worth remembering, and the Merovingian queens Clotilde (died in 545), Fredegonde (died in 597) and Brunehilde (died in 613) were among those persons. At the same time they functioned as mere types and instruments for the early nineteenth-century historians. The queens were categorized to certain types depending on the historians' political and cultural affiliations. All historiography had a political aspect and the queens were not studied or written about for their own sake, but used by historians to make moral and political claims, to teach and instruct the reader. The political aspects of historiography were visible in the way the new, or redefined, nationalistic agenda affected historians' narratives about the Merovingian period. A history of queenship was essential to construct a shared past. One of the leading motivations for the ways in which the queens were represented was the historians' desire to prove that women could not and should not govern in France. Women could be seen as good rulers despite their gender, but never because of their gender. Women who surpassed their gender were extraordinary and yet simultaneously very dangerous, because they had not stayed in their “natural” place. This was a paradox because, while rivalling the masculine gender was admirable given male superiority over the female gender, it was perceived as very dangerous for society. The Merovingian queens and their representations offered something for everyone in nineteenth-century France; barbarous and morally upright actions, love and passion, scheming and devotion, destruction and civilisation.Tarkastelen väitöskirjassani, miten ranskalaiset historioitsijat käsittelivät merovingikuningattaria vuosien 1814 ja 1848 välisenä aikana. 1800-luvun alussa monarkia palautettiin Ranskaan ja runsaassa 30 vuodessa se läpikävi muutoksen ennen suurta vallankumousta vallinneen hallitustavan imitaatiosta porvarilliseksi ja perustuslailliseksi monarkiaksi. Nämä muutokset monarkiassa pakottivat aikakauden historioitsijat uudelleenarvioimaan koko Ranskan historian sekä monarkian roolin historiassa. Tutkimukseni tavoite on tuoda uusia näkemyksiä aikakauden historiankirjoitukseen tarkastelemalla, miten varhaiskeskiaikaisia kuningattaria käsiteltiin historiankirjoituksessa ja miten heidän käsittelyyn vaikutti aikakauden keskustelu monarkian roolista ranskalaisessa yhteiskunnassa ja historiassa. Kuvaukset kuningattarista vaihtelivat kirjoittajan ja aiotun lukijakunnan mukaan. Historioitsijan tehtävänä oli kirjoittaa huomionarvoisista tapahtumista ja henkilöistä, ja merovingikuningattaret Klotilde (kuoli vuonna 545), Fredegunda (kuoli vuonna 597) ja Brunhilde (kuoli 613) olivat tällaisia henkilöitä, koska merovingit nähtiin ranskalaisen monarkian ensimmäisenä dynastiana. Samalla he kuitenkin olivat instrumentteja 1800-luvun alun historioitsijoiden käsissä. Kuningattaret luokiteltiin erilaisiin tyyppeihin riippuen historioitsijoiden poliittisista ja kulttuurisista sidoksista. Kaikella historiankirjoituksella oli poliittinen aspekti ja kuningattaria ei tutkittu heidän itsensä vuoksi vaan historioitsijat käyttivät heitä perustelemaan moraalisia ja poliittisia näkemyksiään sekä opettamaan lukijoita. Historiankirjoituksen poliittiset aspektit olivat erityisesti näkyviä siinä, miten nationalistiset ajatukset vaikuttivat merovingiajan kuvauksiin. Yhteinen historia oli tärkeä osa nationalistista historiankirjoitusta ja kuningatarten historia oli osa tätä jaettua historiaa. Yksi tärkeä osa kuningatarten jaettua historiaa oli naisten pois sulkeminen poliittisesta vallasta. Historiaa, myös varhaiskeskiaikaa, käytettiin osoittamaan, etteivät naiset soveltuneet käyttämään julkista valtaa Ranskassa. Naiset, mukaan lukien merovingikuningattaret, saatettiin kuvata hyvinä hallitsijoina huolimatta heidän sukupuolesta, mutta ei koskaan sukupuolensa ansiosta. Naiset, jotka ylittivät sukupuolensa, nähtiin erityisinä mutta samalla hyvin vaarallisina, koska he eivät pysyneet “luonnollisella” paikallaan. Tämä oli paradoksi, sillä vaikka naissukupuolen ylittäminen oli tavoiteltavaa, johtuen näkemyksistä miehisen sukupuolen paremmuudesta, se myös koettiin vaarallisena yhteiskunnan vakiintuneelle järjestykselle. Merovingikuningattaret tarjosivat 1800-luvun alussa kaikille jotain: barbaarisia ja moraalisia tekoja, rakkautta ja intohimoa, juonittelua ja hurskautta, tuhoa ja sivilisaatiota.Siirretty Doriast

REPETITION: A Study in Visual Form Using Selected Artworks by Edward Hopper

An attempt was made to study the form, function and patterns of repetition as expressed in visual form. A selected series of paintings by the artist Edward Hopper spanning a period of over thirty years served as the data set and was examined using an integrative approach combining both psychoanalytic theory and art criticism. The paper explored firstly, how unconscious fantasies shaped the content of Hopper\u27s selected works, the function of the repetitive form of visual expression, and the possible psychic determinants. It was suggested that early childhood issues remained ongoing areas of conflict that continued to find repeated symbolic expression and influenced his portrayals of women, particularly those in this study, throughout his career. Secondly, the specific patterns of repetition in terms of exact versus variable repetition as expressed in visual form were examined. Linguistic research suggests that exact linguistic repetitions are linked to unrepresented psychic contents and that when a person is able to use a narrative to describe the same event that is rich, imagistic and evocative, and not repetitive, that it marks a shift in psychic change in terms of a higher level of organization and representation of an experience (Halfon & Weinstein, 2013). This work examined whether the same may be applied to visual repetition. The paper concluded that it was possible to identify painterly equivalents of verbal repetition and that visual repetitive patterns may be valid markers for psychic change. Thirdly, this work explored the presence of repetitive affect in the selected paintings and its possible meanings. Hopper\u27s artwork repeatedly evokes universal feelings such as \u27isolation\u27 and \u27loneliness.\u27 In addition, the selected artworks in this study repeatedly elicited dichotomous feelings such as \u27tense\u27 and \u27calm\u27 within the same artwork. It was suggested that differing levels of affect represented constitutional characteristics as well as underlying areas of conflict for the artist as projected repeatedly in visual form. This study indicated that the process of repetition may be studied in visual form in terms of the expression of repetitive unconscious fantasy, visual patterns and affect. The varying forms of repetition could be observed and tracked across selected artworks and may be indicative of internal conflicts and/or psychic change. When working with patients who are artists or those more visually oriented, tracking repeated patterns expressed in their artworks may be clinically helpful in evaluating therapeutic progress

Writing the symptom: Lacan's Joycean knot

The thesis explores the encounter between psychoanalysis and literature in Lacan's reading of Joyce, and the new possibilities it opens for literary theory. In introduction, it considers how the publipation of Lacan's work in English has obscured these possibilities, and contributed to certain misunderstandings of Lacan (for instance, around the term 'writing' as invoked by some Joycean critics). Part I sets out the question of the aesthetic in Freud (his readings of Hamlet and Michaelangelo's statue Moses), and traces its transformation in Lacan's earlier work, up to the introduction of anamorphosis. Part II returns to Lacan's introduction of the term 'subject' to psychoanalysis, in a representational economy governed by a specifically 'phallocentric' politics (the privileging of the Name-of-the-Father as the safeguard against psychosis); and charts the 'subversion' of this economy by writing—firstly in its contestation by Jacques Derrida in the name of an ungovernable différance of writing, and subsequently (in the 1970s) in Lacan's own elaboration of a 'writing' which is increasingly associated with a 'real' incommensurable with the subject's truth. The final avatar of this real is Lacan's Borromean knot, which the thesis presents in order to show how it provides the basis for the reading of Joyce as sint home. Part III traces this reading, weaving it together with an account of the encounter between Joyce and psychoanalysis, both in the historical real and 'in theory' (chiefly, the encounter with Jung). The question of the author is reworked in terms of Lacan's notion of Joyce as a 'writing-being'; the 'death of the author' proposed by Roland Barthes is shown to elide precisely the central stake of Lacan's concept of writing: its non-metaphorical relation to the real. A translation of Lacan's seminar Le Sinthome (SXXIII, 1975-6) is given as an appendix to the thesis

Appalachian Literature and the Red-Headed Stepchild of Publishing: The Writings of Victor Depta and the Cultural Work of Independent Presses

Over the past couple of decades, Appalachian literature has developed a strong and close relationship with independent publishing, showing the latter to be an important medium for the expression for Appalachian voice. As the attempted consolidation of the book trade into a corporate, bottom-line oriented, high-profit industry minimizes the publication of books with mere regional appeal at the same time that the cultural products of Appalachia, as a region, continue to be marginalized through the continued deployment of stereotypes and attitudes of inferiority, Appalachian writers find it difficult to have their books published and distributed by major publishing houses. As a remedy to this problem, independent publishers are flourishing, and this thesis looks at the work of one prolific author/publisher in particular, Victor Depta, who exemplifies this phenomenon. The published work of Victor Depta crafts a new characterization of Appalachian, by its very defiance of the stereotypes that try to limit that characterization and prevent its voice from being heard