Emron Esplin. Borges’s Poe: The Influence and Reinvention of Edgar Allan Poe in Spanish America

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CLAVES PARA LA COMUNICACIÓN INTERCULTURAL

Rollason, C. (2007). CLAVES PARA LA COMUNICACIÓN INTERCULTURAL. Revista de Lingüística y Lenguas Aplicadas. 2:85-91. doi:10.4995/rlyla.2007.704SWORD8591

‘Buying a path’: rethinking resistance in Rwanda

In this essay, I tell the story of Jean-Baptiste, the president of a motorcycle taxi drivers’ co-operative, and his struggle against the machinations of certain high officials in Kigali City Council. Crucial to this story is the way in which Jean-Baptiste’s attempts to retain his position in the face of powerful opposition pit certain agencies of Rwanda’s party state against others. I use this ethnographic narrative to question the way in which much scholarship on popular resistance in Rwanda, drawing on Scott’s simplified opposition between the powerful and the powerless, opposes ‘ordinary Rwandans’ to ‘the state’ as monolithic entities with opposed interests. Theorising Jean-Baptiste’s story in terms of Rwandan idioms of relative power and influence, I suggest that such a Manichean view of power and resistance in Rwanda oversimplifies social realities. I propose instead a model of power and resistance that sees the state as a field of capacities and possible relationships that it presents for certain people, where ‘paths’ to influence and security may by ‘bought’ – especially, but not exclusively, by those who are ‘strong’ and ‘high’

Safety and efficacy of fluoxetine on functional outcome after acute stroke (AFFINITY): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial

Background Trials of fluoxetine for recovery after stroke report conflicting results. The Assessment oF FluoxetINe In sTroke recoverY (AFFINITY) trial aimed to show if daily oral fluoxetine for 6 months after stroke improves functional outcome in an ethnically diverse population. Methods AFFINITY was a randomised, parallel-group, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial done in 43 hospital stroke units in Australia (n=29), New Zealand (four), and Vietnam (ten). Eligible patients were adults (aged ≥18 years) with a clinical diagnosis of acute stroke in the previous 2–15 days, brain imaging consistent with ischaemic or haemorrhagic stroke, and a persisting neurological deficit that produced a modified Rankin Scale (mRS) score of 1 or more. Patients were randomly assigned 1:1 via a web-based system using a minimisation algorithm to once daily, oral fluoxetine 20 mg capsules or matching placebo for 6 months. Patients, carers, investigators, and outcome assessors were masked to the treatment allocation. The primary outcome was functional status, measured by the mRS, at 6 months. The primary analysis was an ordinal logistic regression of the mRS at 6 months, adjusted for minimisation variables. Primary and safety analyses were done according to the patient's treatment allocation. The trial is registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry, ACTRN12611000774921. Findings Between Jan 11, 2013, and June 30, 2019, 1280 patients were recruited in Australia (n=532), New Zealand (n=42), and Vietnam (n=706), of whom 642 were randomly assigned to fluoxetine and 638 were randomly assigned to placebo. Mean duration of trial treatment was 167 days (SD 48·1). At 6 months, mRS data were available in 624 (97%) patients in the fluoxetine group and 632 (99%) in the placebo group. The distribution of mRS categories was similar in the fluoxetine and placebo groups (adjusted common odds ratio 0·94, 95% CI 0·76–1·15; p=0·53). Compared with patients in the placebo group, patients in the fluoxetine group had more falls (20 [3%] vs seven [1%]; p=0·018), bone fractures (19 [3%] vs six [1%]; p=0·014), and epileptic seizures (ten [2%] vs two [<1%]; p=0·038) at 6 months. Interpretation Oral fluoxetine 20 mg daily for 6 months after acute stroke did not improve functional outcome and increased the risk of falls, bone fractures, and epileptic seizures. These results do not support the use of fluoxetine to improve functional outcome after stroke

The Construction of the Subject in the Short Fiction of Edgar Allan Poe

This study is primarily concerned with the diverse processes of constitution and deconstitution of subjectivity at work in the writing of Edgar Allan Poe. The analysis is largely confined to the short fiction, although some reference is made to Poe's other work; twentyone tales are examined, in greater or lesser detail, with the aid of various theoretical perspectives - sociological, structuralist and, above all, psychoanalytic. The aim is to present a new reading of Poe's texts which rejects traditional "unity"-based interpretations. The thesis privileges the psychological dimension, but in textual, not biographical terms; it stresses the tales' often undervalued element of modernity as well as their receptiveness to emergent processes and discourses. The psychological dimensions analysed include: the explicit presentation of mental splitting ('William Wilson') and institutionalised madness ('The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether'); the signification of alienation ('The Man of the Crowd') and self-destruction ('The Imp of the Perverse', 'The Black Cat', 'The Tell-Tale Heart') as constitutive of the subject at a determinate historical moment; the simultaneous construction and subversion of mythical signifiers of an illusory "full" subject, both metonyms (the detective, the mesmerist) and metaphors (the artwork, the interior); the symbolic emergence from repression of active female desire, perceived as threatening in the male unconscious ('The Oval Portrait', 'Ligeia'); and the disintegration of the subject under the pressure of its own repressions ('The Fall of the House of Usher'). Particular stress is laid throughout on the textual undermining of the dividing-lines between "normal" and "abnormal", "sane" and "insane", "respectable" and "criminal". It is concluded that Poe's work constitutes a map of the vicissitudes and contradictions of subjectivity in patriarchal culture; from the study of these texts, the "I" emerges as formed out of a massive repression, and as therefore constantly liable to fragmentation and rupture

Ningún desconocido total – la epopeya del nobel de literatura de Bob Dylan

This essay examines the phenomenon of the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature for 2016 to the US singer-songwriter Bob Dylan (born in 1941) and the worldwide controversy it has given rise to. After consideration of the history of the campaign and the various classes of objection (categorial, aesthetic, individual-centred, hardline left and identitarian), it is concluded that, given also the quality of Dylan’s work, it is legitimate to award a Literature Nobel to a composer of songs.Este texto analiza el fenómeno de la concesión del Premio Nobel de Literatura de 2016 al cantautor estadounidense Bob Dylan (nacido en 1941) y la polémica planetaria que ha suscitado. Después de considerarse la historia de la campaña y las varias clases de objeciones (relativas a categoría textual, estética, situación del individuo, ultraizquierdismo y discurso identitario), se llega a la conclusión de que, también a la luz de la calidad de la obra de Dylan, es lícito otorgar un Nobel de Literatura a un compositor de canciones

Solo Soy Un Guitarrista : Bob Dying in the Spanish-speaking world--influences, parallels, reception, and translation

This paper aims to examine the relationship between Bob Dylan's work and the cultures, literatures, and musics of the Spanish-speaking world. The relationship is bidirectional, taking in Spanish and Latin American influences and themes in Dylan's production, as well as the influence and reception of that work in the Hispanophone universe. I further consider not only direct influences but also literary and musical parallels, and also briefly examine the translation of Dylan into Spanish. What I am offering is a case-study in intercultural relations, not an excursion into theory, and I shall not be explicitly entering into issues of ethnoliterature, ethnomusicology, cultural studies, or translation studies.Note: The Peformance Artistry of Bob Dylan: Conference Proceedings of the Caen Colloquium. Title note: quotation marks removed to ensure alphabetical order. Difference as follows; "Solo Soy Un Guitarrista": Bob Dylan in the Spanish-Speaking World--Influences, Parallels, Reception, and Translatio