„Pictez din nevoia de a stabili o pace cu mine însumi. Ce mă definește? Simplitate, ordine și ritm” (Constantin Ilea)

Orientalism/Occidentalism. How big is the misunderstanding between cultures?

By analyzing the discursive mechanism put in place by both Orientalism and Occidentalism, the article intends to shed light not only on the deeply rooted misunderstandings occurring in the definition of Eastern and Western societies, but on the general conditions that favor such radical orientations as Orientalism and Occidentalism. Focusing on the latter phenomenon, the article analyzes the difficulties faced by Westerners in accepting the well founding of a genuine critique, avoiding to confront with critique by retrenching behind a pure counter-offensive attitude. The critique proposed here is that of free market mechanisms that distort the production, dissemination and evaluation of cultural items. The particular issue of cultural values is taken here for a telling example of the massive transformations which have taken place in Western societies in the last decades.

Keywords: Orientalism, Occidentalism, Islam, marketization, cultural values.

The Politics of Space or The Double Modality of The Irony of The`80S, to Capture our Attention

The present study approaches the visual anecdotal politics illustrated by the Comrade Detective series (2017), in order to confirm, on the one hand, that Linda Hutcheon’s statement on the irony of the 1980s that captured our attention most, can be validated with arguments from a specific area, and, on the other hand, that the temporal context of the `80s gives meaning to an ironically guided temporality, with a specific role in the ironic filtrating of space, and as a return, by ironic recompense, to a certain past. The mentioned series has two sequences that can be read in the parameters of a particular space – Monopoly game and the reflexes of the distributional inequality and of the discriminatory geography (Edward W. Soja) & the other, New York Avenue as transportable space, following Juliet Flower MacCannell`s simulated-space-films. Both converge towards the ironically remodeling of an architecture plan/project of the 1980s Romania.

Keywords: irony and space; spatial (in)justice; transportable space; the politics of space; televisual city

Toxic Mothers, Devoured Children – An Overview of the Maternal Imaginary in Romanian Cinema

The article explores possible connections between a maternal imaginary (i.e. elaborations of mother representations) of the Romanian cinema and the national imagery of maternal filiation (e.g. metaphors of motherland). It is the author’s contention that, in the context of growing Romanian migration and upsurging frustration with national conditions of belonging (in the social, political and economical sense), the filmic representations of mothers turn to a black, negative imaginary. This turn has happened in the last twenty years, following decades of representations of good, sacrificial, hardworking and nurturing mothers. For the last five decades, giving birth, having children, and mothering led to representations in which several ideologies regulated intimacy.

Keywords: Romanian New Wave, maternal imaginary, Cristian Mungiu, Călin Peter Netzer, Luminița Gheorghiu, “children of the Decree”

I.L: Caragiale In Alternative Readings. The Comic For Export And Caragiale’s World In Cinematographic Interpretation – From The Communist Propaganda To The New Romanian Wave

The following paper aims to recontextualise the works of Ion Luca Caragiale by means of applying the contemporary methodologies of World Literature studies in order to inscribe the author in an international literary circuit. At the same time, the study will also try to investigate I.L. Caragiale as a transnational author, for his catalytic influence on the New Wave of Romanian cinema, by far the most exportable autochthonous cultural product. For this, the paper proposes to discuss Caragiale as an author not in the classical terms of canonicity and Romanian literary classicism, but as a continuous influence for a rather „alternative canon” that can be identified in Romanian cinematography.

Keywords: Caragiale, Romanian cinematography, New Wave, transnationalism, cultural export.

Ethos and Pathos in Opinion Journalism

This article addresses a less debated concern with regard to news articles: the rhetorical dimension of discourse, by drawing upon persuasive strategies. In this study we have identified the role and the forms in which these persuasive strategies occur in editorials, with a particular focus on ethos and pathos and their respective roles in persuading and capturing the reader’s attention. The theoretical approach is directed towards the discursive ethos (with elements of subjectivity or techniques of the so-called illusion of orality) or to marked, obvious pathos, embedded by linguistic means (such as clues, discursive scenarios, loaded words, with strong emotional implications).

Keywords: Persuasive Strategies, Journalistic Text, Reasoning, Ethos, Pathos, Logos, Opinion Piece

The Function of the Textual – Emotional Paradigms in eLearning

This project initiates the search and identification of the data collection and processing instruments with the highest degree of transparency and objectivity. In this process, the ‘Moodle’ educational platform is accountable as the main data collection instrument. In terms of research methods, the focus will be on observations of the occurrence, co-occurrence, recurrence and of the congruence between the raw and the reported emotional feedback. The main stated objective of the present study is therefore, the calibration of educational programs through ‘emoji,’ which is regarded as the student’s main emotional feedback vehicle about the quality of the educational process. The four types of measurements account to four pillar elements which can become paradigmatically interchangeable. Pivotal therefore are, synchronicity, asynchronicity, the interactional and the transactional exchanges. The design envisions the harvesting of two distinct data sets addressing the same target group, with the first group bearing a test function, while the second group having a control function.

Keywords: CMC, elearning course design, augmented text, emoji, emotional feedback, virtual classroom calibration, sentiment analysis, digital persona perception, student satisfaction

The role and importance of narrative in the evaluation of aphasia

Defined as an acquired communication disorder caused either by stroke or by brain damage, aphasia affects millions of people worldwide by impairing speaking, writing, listening and writing. Aphasia has a huge impact on people’s daily activities as they struggle to understand what they are being told to and to be understood by others. Numerous elicitation methods have been used in order to produce aphasic discourse that eventually is analyzed in order to be utilized in aphasia therapy. Picture naming, personal narrative, procedural discourse are only a few tasks that have successfully been implemented in aphasia rehabilitation. One of the most frequently used discourse investigation tasks is storytelling. Cinderella’s story is widely used in aphasia therapy but researchers can adapt stories from their own culture and use them in investigating aphasic speech.

Keywords: aphasia, language impairment, Cinderella story, discourse analysis, fairytales

Neo-Soviet or Imperial Hangover

The paper aims at exploring the introduction of the concept “neo-Soviet” in relation to already widely used “post-Soviet”, “post-communist”, taking into account social-political aspects of former Soviet republics. The special focus is on the main traits of this concept in case of Russia as the successor of the Soviet Union: Soviet nostalgia, incapacity to escape the collective self and to find identity and purpose within the transitional milieu, along with some obsessive conspiracy patterns when it comes to world view. Corruption, bribery, financial inequality, media control and information bubble, as well as relationship with the west and western values and products are other facets of our brief analysis. This attempt of conceptualization wouldn’t be complete without an excursion into the Russian Idea as the Russian national ideology, presented as such by N. Berdyaev, on one hand, and the persistent “imperial hangover” as suggested by V. Pozner, on the other.

Keywwords: Neo-Soviet, post-Soviet, transition, imperial hangover, (post/neo-) Soviet mentality

Postmodern Gothic: Forrays into Andrei Codrescu and Venedikt Erofeev’s Prose

The article offers a glimpse into the complex subject of the gothic in the postmodern paradigm as well as several insights into two types of gothic– American and Soviet– exemplified through the work of Andrei Codrescu and Venedikt Erofeev. Both of these writers’ prose writings present gothic and postmodern features, analysed here through the lens of recent theories and concepts on the gothic.

Keywords: American gothic, Soviet gothic, postmodern gothic and gothic postmodernism, Andrei Codrescu, Venedikt Erofeev

Margaret Atwood And The Logic Of Narrative Possibilities

The article, introducing an almost canonical text by Margaret Atwood, attempts at underlining the irradiating force of the auctorial options, and of the authority of the narrative voices within the literary artefact. The relation with the reader, both the one inside and the one outside the text, is also approached through following the evolution of the way the expectation patterns are completed.

Keywords: auctorial decisions, the logic of narrative possibilities, the fictional pact

Anthim the Iberian – The Typographer Promoter Of The Romanian National Identity

Fundamental landmarks of national identity, Romanian language, and Christian-Orthodox religion were promoted at the turn of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries through the brilliant printer Antim Ivireanul, the future Metropolitan of Wallachia. Aware of the power of the pattern to popularize advanced ideas for the epoch and to promote the image of the country and Prince Constantin Brâncoveanu, Antim Ivireanul himself publishes or co-ordinates the appearance of over 60 books. This effort is made on the one hand to support and enhance the reputation of Orthodox religion on the other hand to introduce the Romanian language into the religious service in order to increase the delivery of the Christian message and to educate the population by reading and listening to texts in the language native. That’s why the printer Antim Ivirean can be considered one of the creators of the national identity.

Keywords: Anthim the Iberian, identity, language, orthodoxy, printings

The Relation between Language and National Conscientiousness, as an Aspect of Cultivation of the Romanian Language, Debated in the 19-th Century Publications from Transylvania

This research underlines the magnificent role the language played at the time of the 19-th century, being a means of spiritual union, an element for the preservation of nationality and an expression of our historical origin and continuity. Each journalist views language as a political argument, a part of the political program, an element of national cohesion, main player in the course of development, emancipation and unity. According to the orientation of the time, the unity of the language triggered the unity of the people in a national state. The problem of the Romanian language was widely debated in the press of the time. A special attention is given to the development of the national-patriotic feeling, the result of a close connection between language and nation.

Keywords: language, nation, progress, press, consciousness

The Exigency of Pudicity and the Exigency of Truth

Diaries of contemporary writers and philosophers, published while they are still alive, always have to make a negotiation between what should be said and what can be said – between the exigency of truth and the exigency of pudicity. The present study examines the diary of Ion Dur, contemporary professor and essayist, known for his lifelong attachment to the wotks of Emil Cioran and Constantin Noica, aiming at seeing how his philosophical background influences his quotidian movements within the field of the real. Such diaries represent an applied, most concrete philosophy, translated into the movements of everyday life.

Keywords: contemporary Romanian literature, Ion Dur, contemporary diary, autobiographic pact

Illusion, Seduction and Authenticity in the Confessional Literature

The writing is a bipartisan critical essay that in its first part focuses on the complex theme of authenticity in confessional writings; the second part, using the hermeneutical perspective suggested in the opening, deals with the recently published diary of Ion Dur by the Cartea Romaneasca publisher The prerequisite for this enterprise is that diaristic writing, particularly the very intimate one, destined for anthumous publication, is a pretense of confession, and actually institutes a pact of verisimilarity (not of authenticity) in which sincerity becomes secondary and irrelevant. In the case of intimate-extimateanthumousdiaries, the stake of discourse, in a literary pragmatic sense, resides in the reconstruction of a partially biographical ego, delivered as a possible, seductive and thus esthetic hypostasiation of a principial and ontological ego.

Keywords: diary, intimate, extimate, confessional literature, Ion Dur, authenticity, sincerity

An Analysis Of Mihail Sebastian’s Reception: “The Increment” Through Translation And The Problem Of The Double Canon

The present paper aims for an analysis on how “For two thousand years” and the journal of Mihail Sebastian have been perceived within the Romanian as well as the western space, where it entered via translation. Although he will remain outside the literary canon locally, because of the difficulty to define writer on the Romanian literary stage, he will achieve a level of visibility and acknowledgement for the foreign public through translation. Using Pascale Casanova and David Damrosch’s theories on literary canon as well as Andrei Terian’s hypothesis on capitalizing the written creations, I will examine how Sebastian’s texts respond (or not) to the aesthetic criteria in an attempt to analyze the different ways in which they were received autochthonously, in a space dominated by canon and transnationally, with a wider range of critical judgement.

Keywords: national canon/ transnational canon, translation, critical reception, aesthetic criteria, canonical authority

The Conditions for a Contemporary Critical Biography

Starting from the awareness of a “biography boom” în today’s media landscape, the article discusses the predicament of the literary biography in modern literatures, focusing on the Romanian case. While Romanticism encouraged a philosophically motivated surge in writers’ biographies, the modernist spreading of aesthetic autonomy made the practice of biography a troubled one. Furthermore, poststructuralist thinkers such as Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault sought to separate biographical inquiries from actual literary or philological studies. However, their caveats helped in constructing a more nuanced, reasoned, self-critical and ideologically-aware concept of biography, giving biographers a very narrow, yet consistent margin for hermeneutic freedom.

Keywords: biography, literary theory, poststructuralism, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, M. Blecher