A Thorn in the Side of Social History: Jacques Rancière and Les Révoltes logiques

The article explores the intersection of history and politics in the works of French philosopher Jacques Rancière, by focusing on the collectively edited journal Les Révoltes logiques (1975-1985). It argues that the historiographic project of Les Révoltes logiques took up specific forms of counter-knowledge that were embedded in radical left-wing politics of their day. It further traces both the engagement with historiography and the role of history in Rancière's later work after the dissolution of the journal. Its conclusion looks at certain shared interests between some of Rancière's themes and some recent writing of social histor

“A Boot Stamping on a Human Face – For Ever”: George Orwell, Language, Literature, and Politics

Differently from other European countries, Britain experienced the harshness of 20th-century dictatorship and censorship only obliquely, as a reflection of what was happening in several “elsewheres”, from Italy to Spain, from Germany to the Soviet Union. Yet, events such as the Spanish Civil War deeply affected a whole generation of young British writers who, after the period of elitist Modernism, were trying to reassert the political import of literature through a redefinition of the role of the artist as politically and socially engagé. Within this framework, George Orwell figures as one of the most disenchanted and lucid witnesses of this particular historical moment. In both his essays and journalistic articles, as well as in his narrative work, he continuously ponders on the relationship between political power and society on the one hand, and language and literature on the other, providing a most interesting analysis of the mechanisms that preside over this interaction. Whereas in the essayistic production, Orwell predictably addresses the issue from a more objective stand, his narrative transfigures the widespread fears connected with dictatorship and censorship into the threatening dystopias of "Animal Farm" (1945) and "Nineteen-Eighty-Four" (1948), where the worst nightmares concerning thought and language control and intellectual annihilation become true

Villa-Lobos\u27s Compositional Techniques and Treatment of Folk Melodies in Cirandas for Piano

Despite his significance as the most important Latin American composer of the twentieth century, serious analytical studies on the music of the Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos are still few and far between. Recent scholarship has started to demystify the figure of Villa-Lobos as an intuitive composer with no technique, revealing an artist that strove to develop an idiosyncratic musical language. The present document aims to contribute to this new trend in Villa-Lobos’s scholarship by analyzing pieces from the piano cycle Cirandas, W220, considered one of the most important works from the composer’s mature style. Each of the sixteen pieces from the set is based on a different ciranda or round song, therefore sharing similar backgrounds and compositional goals. By comparing the settings of folk songs from some of these pieces, it was possible to identify and analyze recurring compositional practices used by Villa-Lobos to manipulate the folk material. Overviews of the evolution of Villa-Lobos’s writing for piano and his relationship with Brazilian folk music are followed by an account of the genesis of Cirandas as well as of Cirandinhas, a set of round songs of easier execution by the same composer. A study of the general characteristics of Cirandas leads to a detailed examination of the compositional techniques identified in the set. Each technique is illustrated by excerpts from several movements, showing its development through structures of different complexity. Comparisons with settings of the same folk tunes found in two other works (Cirandinhas and Guia prático) by the composer reveal the extent to which Villa-Lobos often molded the round songs to become an organic element of the musical texture. Analytical models used include theories of voice-leading parsimony by Adrian Childs and Richard Cohn, Jay Rahn’s concept of scale heterophormism in incomplete collections, Tymoczko’s scale networks, theories of pitch-class symmetry by Antokoletz and Straus, Solomon’s expanded table of pitch-class sets, as well as models inferred from Villa-Lobos’s music by Duarte, Oliveira, Salles, Souza Lima, Tygel, Vetromilla, and Gustavo Schafaschek. Appendixes include an annotated bibliography of scholarship on Cirandas available in English and Portuguese

Kant on Metaphysics as Science

My paper focuses on what and how Kant had accomplished with his intended “re- form of metaphysics” through “reason’s entering the secure path of science”. In this respect, I will argue that the influence of (pure) sciences on Kant’s programme was a major one, and this may be best highlighted if one assumes that he developed his mature theory only in the B edi- tion of his Critique (1787), where the influence of the model of pure a priori sciences turn to be decisive. This influence, as we already know, is closely related to the “reform of metaphysics” by “reason’s entering the secure path of science”. My claim is upheld also by the historical ar- gument that only in the Prolegomena (1783) and in the B edition of the Critique Kant explicitly conceived the idea of “metaphysics as science”. Therefore, the necessary steps in dealing with “metaphysics as science” must consider the A Critique, the Prolegomena, and the B Critique in this precise order. Assuming this order, my approach will involve three parts: in the first I will investigate the idea of the reform of metaphysics from the A Critique, in the second I will take into account “reason’s entering the secure path of science” (in the Prolegomena and the B Cri- tique), i.e., philosophy as science (the discipline within the B Critique); finally, I will argue that understanding Kant’s “idea of philosophy as science” can best be achieved by focusing on the role and place that pure sciences have in the transcendental philosophy of the B Critique, where its structure and content are themed and projected within the methodological frame of the “ex- periment of pure reason”

Diversification of Malaysian art (1990s- 201Os)

The development of arts in Malaysia during the 1970s and the 1980s has been directly or indirectly influenced by the Malaysian government policy since late 1969s. As a result, the development of Malaysian art during the two decades were highly influenced by the National Economic Policy (NEP), National Cultural Policy and the subsequent Islamization Policy spearheaded by the government