“Smoke Rising Day and Night”: Exploring Chava Rosenfarb’s Implicit Mysticism in "Edgia’s Revenge"

The central preoccupation of Chava Rosenfarb’s “Edgia’s Revenge” is an escape from a perceived outward Jewishness. That Rosenfarb’s protagonist is never afforded this vital flight is one of the story’s key dramas that plays out in the form of a power dynamic between two Holocaust survivors, Rella and Edgia. On the surface, this failure can be attributed to Rella’s anxiety and guilt about her former role as a kapo in a concentration camp. This article argues, however, that Rella’s failure to rid herself of her Jewishness and her past is exemplified through the use of mountains as sacred zones in “Edgia’s Revenge.”La préoccupation centrale de « Edgia’s Revenge » de Chava Rosenfarb est d’échapper à une judéité perçue comme extérieure. Le fait que le protagoniste de Rosenfarb ne puisse jamais s’offrir ce vol vital est l’un des principaux drames de l’histoire qui se joue sous la forme d’une dynamique de pouvoir entre deux survivants de l’Holocauste, Rella et Edgia. À première vue, cet échec peut être attribué à l’anxiété et à la culpabilité de Rella concernant son ancien rôle de kapo dans un camp de concentration. Cet article soutient cependant que l’échec de Rella à se débarrasser de sa judéité et de son passé est illustré par l’utilisation des montagnes comme zones sacrées dans « Edgia’s Revenge »

Introduction: Carved into Rock and Labelled with Hebrew Script: Thinking about the Canadian Jewish Landscape

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“Westmount’s Sinai”: Projecting a Jewish Landscape onto Montreal through Fiction

For Canadian Jewish authors, every peak and every valley, every lake and every island, every forest and every plain, is a potential locus for mythic energy. In this brief article, I wish to offer a glimpse into the implicit means by which Jewish authors project a specifically Jewish landscape onto their surroundings. Through a short study of Chava Rosenfarb’s Edgia’s Revenge and Leonard Cohen’s The Favourite Game, I will explore both authors’ uses of Mount Royal and the Laurentian Mountains as sacred spaces in the tradition of earlier Jewish stories involving mountains and wilderness. These similarities are especially poignant when we consider Cohen and Rosenfarb’s very different experiences of being Jewish in the world—one a wealthy uptown Jew from Montreal and the other a survivor of the Holocaust.Pour les auteurs juifs canadiens, chaque sommet et vallée, chaque lac et île, chaque forêt et plaine, est un lieu potentiel d’énergie mythique. Dans ce bref article, je souhaite offrir un aperçu des moyens implicites par lesquels les auteurs juifs projettent un paysage spécifiquement juif sur leur environnement. À travers une brève étude d’Edgia’s Revenge de Chava Rosenfarb et The Favourite Game de Leonard Cohen, j’explorerai les usages par les deux auteurs du Mont Royal et des Laurentides en tant qu’espaces sacrés dans la tradition d’histoires juives antérieures sur les montagnes et la nature. Ces similitudes sont particulièrement probantes lorsque nous considérons les expériences très différentes de Cohen et Rosenfarb de vivre leur judéité — l’un un juif nanti élevé à Westmount et l’autre une survivante de l’Holocauste

Why do women invest in pre-pregnancy health and care? A qualitative investigation with women attending maternity services

Background Despite the importance attributed to good pre-pregnancy care and its potential to improve pregnancy and child health outcomes, relatively little is known about why women invest in pre-pregnancy health and care. We sought to gain insight into why women invested in pre-pregnancy health and care. Methods We carried out 20 qualitative in-depth interviews with pregnant or recently pregnant women who were drawn from a survey of antenatal clinic attendees in London, UK. Interviewees were purposively sampled to include high and low investors in pre-pregnancy health and care, with variation in age, partnership status, ethnicity and pre-existing medical conditions. Data analysis was conducted using the Framework method. Results We identified three groups in relation to pre-pregnancy health and care: 1) The “prepared” group, who had high levels of pregnancy planning and mostly positive attitudes to micronutrient supplementation outside of pregnancy, carried out pre-pregnancy activities such as taking folic acid and making changes to diet and lifestyle. 2) The “poor knowledge” group, who also had high levels of pregnancy planning, did not carry out pre-pregnancy activities and described themselves as having poor knowledge. Elsewhere in their interviews they expressed a strong dislike of micronutrient supplementation. 3) The “absent pre-pregnancy period” group, had the lowest levels of pregnancy planning and also expressed anti-supplement views. Even discussing the pre-pregnancy period with this group was difficult as responses to questions quickly shifted to focus on pregnancy itself. Knowledge of folic acid was poor in all groups. Conclusion Different pre-pregnancy care approaches are likely to be needed for each of the groups. Among the “prepared” group, who were proactive and receptive to health messages, greater availability of information and better response from health professionals could improve the range of pre-pregnancy activities carried out. Among the “poor knowledge” group, better response from health professionals might yield greater uptake of pre-pregnancy information. A different, general health strategy might be more appropriate for the “absent pre-pregnancy period” group. The fact that general attitudes to micronutrient supplementation were closely related to whether or not women invested in pre-pregnancy health and care was an unanticipated finding and warrants further investigation.This report is independent research commissioned and funded by the Department of Health Policy Research Programme Pre-Pregnancy Health and Care in England: Exploring Implementation and Public Health Impact, 006/0068

Sex differences in discriminating between cues predicting threat and safety

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is more prevalent in women than men. PTSD is characterized by overgeneralization of fear to innocuous stimuli and involves impaired inhibition of learned fear by cues that predict safety. While evidence indicates that learned fear inhibition through extinction differs in males and females, less is known about sex differences in fear discrimination and safety learning. Here we examined auditory fear discrimination in male and female rats. In Experiment 1A, rats underwent 1-3 days of discrimination training consisting of one tone predicting threat (CS+; presented with footshock) and another tone predicting safety (CS-; presented alone). Females, but not males, discriminated between the CS+ and CS- after one day of training. After 2-3 days of training, however, males discriminated whereas females generalized between the CS+ and CS-. In Experiment 1B, females showed enhanced anxiety-like behaviour and locomotor activity in the open field, although these results were unlikely to explain the sex differences in fear discrimination. In Experiment 2, we found no differences in shock sensitivity between males and females. In Experiment 3, males and females again discriminated and generalized, respectively, after three days of training. Moreover, fear generalization in females resulted from impaired safety learning, as shown by a retardation test. Whereas subsequent fear conditioning to the previous CS- retarded learning in males, females showed no such retardation. These results suggest that, while females show fear discrimination with limited training, they show fear generalization with extended training due to impaired safety learning