Ambivalent Interpretation Research Articles

THE ARCHETYPICAL IMAGE OF THE WITCH IN WOMEN'S INITIATIVE PLOTS OF STORY THERAPY

Abstract: the article is devoted to the psychological analysis of the image of the witch in women's initiation stories of fairy-tale therapy. It was revealed that in the modern culture of various peoples of the world there are female images that are similar both in name and in their psychological characteristics, the main functions of which are keeping the hearth and taking care of children. The etymological and lexical analysis of the images of the witch, grandmother Yaga, sorceress, healer, fortune teller, priestess showed an ambivalent interpretation: on the one hand, she is a wise woman who gives and possesses secret knowledge, has supernatural abilities, heals, can predict the future; on the other hand, it is an evil hag that brings trouble, an enemy, knows how to taunt and cast a spell. The article studies how the psychoanalytic interpretation indicates the manifestation of the Archetypes of the Great Mother and the Wild Woman when these characters are perceived in the human psyche. In our opinion, it is possible to define three psychological stages of women's initiation stories of fairy-tale therapy - exit from the comfort zone, search for allies, tests, psychotherapeutic rethinking of which it is possible to acquire new behavioral patterns for overcoming stressful situations.

Un/recognisable and dis/empowering images of disability: a collective textual analysis of media representations of intellectual disabilities

ABSTRACT This paper introduces a framework of five consecutive but potentially intersecting tropes of representation of intellectual disabilities. The framework was developed in a post-qualitative manner by a researcher collective of people labeled with and without intellectual disabilities. As many existing disability media analyses have been reproached for being un-nuanced, elitist and reductionist, our approach and framework offer a more layered, ambivalent and complex interpretation of media representations of intellectual disabilities. More specifically, we unpack representations that (1) patronize people with disabilities, (2) consolidate, (3) deconstruct and (4) reconstruct the hegemonic order on dis/ability and (5) impose an ableist normalcy. Although the framework was developed by means of a collective textual analysis of a specific case, i.e. Tytgat Chocolat, a Flemish television series on people with intellectual disabilities, we argue that it also serves as a valuable starting point for further analysis of media texts on (intellectual) disabilities.

Top management Team's cognitive diversity and the Firm's ambidextrous innovation capability: The mediating role of ambivalent interpretation

The top management team (TMT) diversity has received considerable attention in literature, especially due to its influence on an organization's innovation strategy. While previous studies have considered diversity in terms of education, experience, skills, functionality, and gender, little is known about the TMT's cognitive diversity. We contribute to the literature by examining the influence of the TMT's cognitive diversity on an organization's ambidextrous innovation capability; i.e., its incremental and radical innovation capability. Results from 50 TMTs involved in the electronics industry support our hypothesized mediating role of ambivalent interpretation; that the TMT cogitative diversity positively influences ambivalent interpretation, and this, in turn, positively influences both radical and incremental innovation capability. These findings have important implications for how a firm's decision makers (i.e., the TMT) with their diverse cognitive styles support building the firm's ambidextrous capability through ambivalent interpretation.

Excavating the Modern Self: Haggard’s Egyptological Romances

Henry Rider Haggard’s Egyptomania took many shapes, from regular journeys to Egypt to extensive collections of ancient Egyptian artefacts. This article looks more particularly at Haggard’s representation of ancient Egypt in his literary works and at the implications of his narrative choices in the scientific and imperial context in which he wrote his Egyptological romances. By establishing genealogical links between ancient Egypt and modern Britain through the literary form of archaeological fiction, Haggard constructs a palimpsestic vision of individual and collective history that can be read both in psychoanalytical and in imperial terms. This paper examines the place Egypt occupies in Haggard’s imagination by considering some of the narrative and narratological elements shared by his Egyptological romances, with a particular focus on The Ancient Allan and “Smith and the Pharaohs”. The depiction of Egypt as an oneiric place located within the Victorian mind and as the origin of a layered modern identity suggests an ambivalent interpretation of Haggard’s imperialist stance at the turn of the twentieth century.

Translation as a Form of Literary Communication in Poetry of Silver Age: Three Lyrical Versions of a Poem by Paul Fort

Three translations of Paul Fort small poem “Cette fille, elle est morte” by Konstantin Balmont, Valery Bryusov and Mikhail Kuzmin are considered. The results of a comparative analysis of these three texts using the analysis of the original are presented. The question is raised about the originality of the form used by Paul Fort: the text he wrote is a deformed trio, and this deformation should be recognizable for his potential reader. It is stated that the semantic side of the text is ambivalent: in the first half of the text negative moods prevail, in the second - positive ones, which is shown not only lexically, but also rhythmically. The relevance of the study is due to a detailed analysis of the three translations using material about the biography and work of the translators themselves. The novelty of the research is seen in the fact that such an analysis of the translation options for the Fort text and its formal, rhythmic and sound features has not been carried out before. The author dwells on the characteristic features of each of the three translations, noting both their connection with the original and the reliance on the translation of the predecessor, or, on the contrary, ignoring it. Particular attention is paid to the grammatical and lexical features of the original, which allow for an ambivalent interpretation of the meaning of the text.

A Likert-Type scale for evaluating the “bottom line” of patient safety

The formally reported number of adverse events may be open to ambivalent interpretation – actual higher prevalence of adverse events versus a patient safety culture supporting reporting and learning. Many methods appearing in the literature that are not based on reporting systems struggle for adequately assess the precise level of prevalence of adverse events. Confronting this challenge in patient safety research, we suggest evaluating the perceived state of “almost no adverse events” in the ward, by using a short Likert- type scale we developed for this purpose. Some evidence for its reliability and validity are presented using two samples (99 head nurses, and 383 nurses). As was expected, leadership had a significant direct effect on the measured state of “almost no adverse events” as well as an indirect effect mediated successively by psychological safety, and safety behavior.

Correlation and dialectical connection of law and culture as a problem of the philosophy of law

The dialectical connection of law and culture is the relevant subject of research in philosophy, theory, and sociology of law, first and foremost due to the fact that insufficient theoretical substantiation lawmaking activity of politicians currently generates serious issues. Those of one cultural-legal traditions are unable to understand their partners belonging to another legal culture. Any modern legal theory should take into account the definition of culture the backbone factor for modern civilization. The novelty this research consists in examination of the fundamental aspects of “law-culture” system alongside on the analysis of views of Western researchers previously unfamiliar to the Russian science. The goal of this work lies in revealing the key aspects of dialectical connection of law and culture and their correlation in modern era. The philosophy of law features ambivalent interpretation of the phenomenon of law: 1) as one of the forms of collective consciousness – along with culture, morality, philosophy, science ,or religion; 2) in broad view of culture as a synonym of civilization, law would manifests as the crucial element of culture that generates multiple realities of sociocultural life of the people, society and the state. The research of dialectical connection of law and culture developed in the modern era, may contribute to resolution of complex problems that emerge in the contradictory “law-culture” system, which is of vital importance for the existence of separate national communities, as well as for survival of all the entire humanity.

Reading Kierkegaard, against and with Adorno – From Objectless Inwardness to Self-reflection through the Other

Abstract Søren Aabye Kierkegaard’s thought has often been regarded as a philosophy of inwardness, especially within the German-speaking world. Theodor W. Adorno takes an ambivalent attitude toward this view: He criticizes Kierkegaard’s conception of subjectivity as ‘objectless inwardness’, while pointing to its potential for self-reflection that enables the subject to recognize its relationship to the outside world. Beginning from this ambivalent interpretation, this study aims to read Kierkegaard against and with Adorno. First, it clarifies that Kierkegaard does not remain in a closed ‘objectless’ conception of inwardness. Second, it explores how Kierkegaard conceives of inward self-reflection on remorse for sin, which is brought about through the ‘other’ and makes the subject confront its own reality. Thus, Kierkegaard’s concept of inwardness not only overcomes its objectlessness, but also implies a subjective self-reflection through the ‘other’, which can lead to social critique.

Expanding or limiting the boundaries of the “allowable”: to the problem of outlining the concept of “religious art”

Religious art is one of the most complex and controversial phenomena in the history of art. The attempts to conceptualize this phenomenon are relatively recent, and are carried out mostly in the context of the existence of confessional, ecclesiastical/nonecclesiastical, cult/atheistic art. Therefore, religious art within the Russian humanities traditionally receives ambivalent interpretation. In a narrow sense, religious art implies a combination of artworks with dogmatic, doctrinal, and liturgical meaning. In a broad sense, religious art represents a set artworks that reveal religious themes from ideological and figurative perspectives, reflect religious worldview, faith and experience, but do not carry sacred statues, nor intended for reverence, worship, liturgical practices.  The author concludes that neither definition describes the distinctness and novelty of the religious art. The appropriate interpretation describes religious art as d both, ecclesiastical/non-ecclesiastical and cult / atheistic art. This leads to a terminological confusion, and doubts the need for introducing the concept of “religious art” and the phenomenon itself. The key towards understanding this phenomenon and a new definition of the concept of “religious art” can be their context – the European and Russian secularization. It is not coincidental that the first was addressed, and the second was deliberately formulated at the turn of the XIX – XX centuries. Religious art mainstreams during the historical periods when the boundaries of secularization/religion become flexible, initiating struggle for them.

Cultural Words in Sacral Text and their Translation: Linguistic and Extra-Linguistic Factors

The purpose of this article is to study the issue of key features of the so-called cultural words (realia) in sacred texts (the Bible is taken as an example) as well as a distinctive nature of their cross-language transfer. This problem is essential not only for the Bible translation as such but it also enables to clarify some aspects related to the representation of the vocabulary with cultural identity in the target language that is explained by the very nature of the Old and New Testaments containing a wide variety of the realia that refer directly to a religious cult and to the everyday life of Palestinian people and their neighborhood in the Bible times. The material for the present research includes versions of the Holy Writ created in different periods in a number of languages (Latin, Church Slavonic, Russian and English). While analyzing, the classical translations labelled often as “national” ones have been used (the King James Bible, Synodal Translation), as well and the versions created in the 20th and 21st centuries. The main approach applied herein is the identifying of the corresponding units in the said Bible texts, the ascertainment of the possibility of their ambivalent interpretation, the correlation within the considered versions of translation, the determination of translation strategies used for representing the realia and their comparative analysis. When considering the options presented, special attention has been paid to extra-linguistic factors, since they often play a decisive role in solving the said task. The key results of the made survey can be formulated as follows: 1) since translations could have been made from different versions of the source text, there are cases when certain realia are available in some translations but are missing in others; 2) the use of transcription / transliteration of the realia in Russian versions of the Old Testament in some cases is determined by their representation in the Greek and Church Slavonic texts of the Bible and therefore in both the Synodal and the new translations they can be presented in a form different from that available in European languages; 3) the representation of the Greek word diopetês ( fallen from heaven ) as the proper name Diopet in the Synodal Translation is usually qualified as an elementary mistake, but it could have been also provoked by an intention to follow Greek and Church Slavonic traditions; 4) the existence of the so-called ‘undefined realia’ in the source text, an exact meaning of which is not known, causes their various interpretations in the target language; 5) during the analysis of the units of the target language used in the translation of the Holy Writ, the diachronic aspect must be taken into account considering, on the one hand, the possibility of losing or changing the meaning in the course of linguistic evolution, and on the other hand, avoiding vesting the reality with the meaning that it could not have; 6) a number of translations made in recent decades are characterized by a pronounced pragmatic orientation, in some cases causing a significant neutralization of the national-cultural specificity or its adaptation to the corresponding cultural environment, the degree of admissibility of which in some cases is controversial. The above items enable to clarify a number of aspects related to the methods of translating the realia and the importance of such aspects for attaining the translation adequacy.

African Housing Renaissance: The Case of Gacuriro Valley Satellite Settlements, Kigali, Rwanda

This article traces an African Housing Renaissance through the Trabantenstadt (Satellite City) vision for Kigali embedded in the Gacuriro Valley Satellite, which is composed of two settlements (or umudugudu, in Kinyarwanda): Kigali 2020 (2001–2005) and Kigali Vision (2013–2016). While the Kigali 2020 is an integrated Trabant (Satellite) which is able to interact with the existing context and trace the future built and unbuilt developments, the Kigali Vision adopts the idea of a protected compound, morphologically connected with the older settlements, but unable to tackle and solve spatial and social issues due to its ‘defensive’ character. The particular topography of the hillside receives an ambivalent interpretation: in the first umudugudu, the slope inspires the whole project, an organic raumplan, and in the second it has been denied, having been leveled for flat houses’ foundations and consequently a flat spatial indoor distribution. Nevertheless, this article argues that despite the evident architectural differences between the two settlements, they remain in the tradition of the Neues Bauen, in which mass housing represents the physical way of accommodating different social classes, granting equal and favorable living conditions. The typological variety demonstrates the aim to inclusively target distinct segments of the population. Apartment buildings (condominiums), row houses, twin houses and single houses mixed with public facilities, schools, a church, and sports structures, make up the settlements as unique pieces of a system and, at the same time, a singular whole.

The Nature of the Hu: Wuhuan and Xianbei Ethnography in the San guo zhi and Hou Han shu

Scholars of early China have dedicated considerable attention to the encounter between the Han dynasty and the Xiongnu, as it stands as the archetypal conflict between the Huaxia cultural order of the Central State(s) and the northern cultural others known as the Hu. This issue has been viewed from an array of diverse perspectives, including literary studies of the Xiongnu ethnographies found in the Shi ji and Han shu. The present article seeks to illuminate the representation of northern others in the post-Han era through an examination of the earliest ethnographies of the Wuhuan and Xianbei, as preserved in the San guo zhi commentary edition and the Hou Han shu. A close reading of the Wuhuan and Xianbei accounts reveals deep resonances with earlier Xiongnu accounts, but finds many divergences as well, which combine to produce a more ambivalent interpretation of the contemporary northern others.

Trust discourse in existential philosophy

The conceptual analysis of the problematization of the crisis of trust in the context of existential philosophy is performed in the article, paying special attention to the specificity of the ambivalent interpretation of the ontological and phenomenological levels of trust as the value basis for social interaction. Addressing the works of K. Jaspers, M. Buber, O. F. Bollnov, N. Abbagnano, the ways of overcoming the crisis bases of trust and the conditions of the “possibility of possibilities” of trust as a positive existential of responsible coexistence are analyzed. The conceptualization of trust as an existential self-determination in the horizons of reliability of world and readiness for vulnerability is presented.An existential analytics of the phenomenological level of trust in the interpretation of strategies of critical optimism and suspicion practices is proposed, which allowed us to consider the constructive and destructive effects of trust in terms of meaningful problems of choice, fear, anxiety, concern, freedom, responsibility in the “trust-to-the-world” and “trust-to-Other” horizons, conceptualizing internal and external resources of basic expectations of reliability, security, optimistic openness and pulsating humanity.

Право на доступ к культурным ценностям: сравнительно-правовой анализ зарубежного законодательства

The article is devoted to consideration of the concept of “cultural values”, the ambivalent interpretation in international legal acts and reception into laws of various states. Culture has always been and continues to be the most important line of activity of a state which is closely connected with the state of the spiritual sphere of the society’s life. The cultural rights form an independent section of rights and relate, in historic terms, to the so-called “second generation rights”, along with economic and social rights. 
 Since the last half of the XX century, introducing of cultural rights into the category of constitutionally vested becomes one of the distinguished features of law making development in many countries of the world.
 The article aims to demonstrate development of the concept of “universal heritage of humanity” and its globalization in the modern international law. It has been observed in the article that, despite different attitudes to the concept of “cultural values”, the mentioned category acquires an attribute of “universal significance” for the world culture in general. The author also sets a target to disclose the concept of “rights for access to cultural values” through the example of reviewing laws of former CIS countries and a number of Western European countries. The article draws attention to the fact that regulatory acts of European countries do not contain direct provisions of rights for access to cultural values as a complex of legal institutions; however, a number of laws contain certain elements of this right. In his article the author also considers the provision of interdetermination of the right for access to cultural values with right of dignified life.
 The dialectic, systematic, legal comparative, normative and other methods of obtaining knowledge were taken as a methodological basis of this scientific work.
 On basis of the reviewed material, the author comes to a conclusion that the international law establishes universal human and civil rights and freedoms in scope of cultural rights and determines their content. Each state should not only provide details in national law but also ensure their practical realization in order to save and rationally use its cultural heritage.

Historical and functional aspects of the collection «stories and sketches» by Ahatanhel Krymskyi

The historical and functional aspects of the debut collection of A. Krymsky Short stories and sketches from Ukrainian life (Kolomyia-Lviv, 1895), which is an important document of the Ukrainian modern, are illuminated. The constructive and representative functions of the collection in the literary process are investigated on the basis of its comparison with the works of predecessors and successors at the thematic, genre and style levels. The stories about such problems as the conflict between generations, the criticism of the Narodnik tradition, the condemnation of petty-bourgeois narrow-mindedness and xenophobia, and the ambivalent interpretation of decadence had an innovative character. The collection reflected the tendencies of genre - compositional fragmentation and the approximation of narrative forms to the technique of the flow of consciousness.

‘What can a crowd do?’: revisiting Tarde after the demise of the public

Until now, Gabriel Tarde's essay ‘The Public and the Crowd’ was partially inaccessible to Anglophone scholars, as Terry Clark's 1969 translation – the only version in English – omitted nearly half the essay. As a result, the essay is typically understood as a diatribe against the primitive, uncivilized crowd, cast as the diametrical opponent of an eminently reasonable and thoroughly modern public. The pages that follow correct this lapse by providing the remaining portions of Tarde's essay in English. As will become clear, this translation reveals that Tarde was no champion of modernity, nor did he consistently celebrate the ascendant public's conquest of the savage crowd. In the process, the translation casts doubt upon rigidly ideological readings of Tarde, while lending support to a more politically ambivalent interpretation of his ideas. In its most open-ended moments, the newly translated segments recall Tarde's early affirmative statements about crowds and are suggestive of clear continuities throughout his work.

The Green Bible: A Timely Idea Deeply Flawed

This article offers a critical review of the recently published Green Bible (HarperCollins, 2008), a ‘green-letter edition’ intended to enable readers to discover the Bible’s message concerning humanity’s duty to care for creation. Despite the often valuable and stimulating essays and study materials that surround the ‘green-letter edition’ of the biblical text, the idea at the heart of the project is deeply flawed. It fails to do justice to the fact that the biblical material is, as on other ethical issues, profoundly ambivalent, requiring careful and constructive interpretation which is, in turn, open to debate and contestation. Concepts such as stewardship, which are presented here as simply what the Bible teaches, are interpretative constructions whose hermeneutical and ethical value may be questioned. A coherent ‘green’ message cannot come simply from lining up supposedly relevant biblical texts but only from creative and constructive interpretation of the Bible.

High-spin Cyclopentadienyl Complexes, Part 7. Ambivalent Interpretation of the Bonding in Iron-Copper Complexes: Metalated Arene versus Carbocyclic Carbene

The electron distribution within a mesityl ligand bridging a cyclopentadienyliron fragment attached to the mesityl π system and a second metal fragment connected to the ipso carbon of the mesityl ring has been probed using a copper(I) halide as a component in [CpmFe (μ,η5 :η1-C6H2Me3)CuCl] (2) and its copper bromide derivative 3. This approach minimizes steric effects and allows for DFT calculations the results of which are in very good agreement with structural data. The calculations show a significant carbene character already for the bare phenyl anion as a result of electrostatic repulsion of the lone pair pushing the π electrons away from the ipso carbon towards the para carbon atom of the aromatic ring. π Coordination of a cyclopentadienyliron(II) fragment to the phenyl anion to form a hypothetical sandwich complex does not change this situation. The iron center rather follows the unsymmetric distribution of π charge with an unsymmetrical coordination to the π system. Coordination of a copper(I) chloride moiety to the phenyl anion or to the hypothetical π complex [CpFe(C6H5)] in both cases equally lowers that carbene character by attracting the lone pair of the ipso carbon and thus decreasing its repulsive influence on the π electrons.

Schubert, Mignon, and Her Secret

Schubert set Mignon's lyric “Heiß mich nicht reden” (from Goethe's Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre) twice. The first setting constitutes an extremely ambivalent and mysterious interpretation of Mignon, and the secret of which she speaks; many components of this initial setting are radically reused in the second to create an alternative reading that speaks more clearly of the secret's tragic nature. Schubert's contraction of syphilis between the two settings may have had an impact on his understanding of Mignon and her own illness, although the very consideration of this possibility is primarily testament to the compelling nature of Schubert's differing poetic interpretations.

Слава Бессилия. Мартирологическая Парадигма Грузинской Политической Теологии

SUMMARY: The present article reconstructs the political theology of the medieval historical epos “Kartlis Tshovreba.” The term “tshovreba” has a double meaning, encompassing both “history” and “salvation.” Thus the history of Kartly was constructed by medieval Georgian historians as a history of salvation and directly associated with Kartly’s Christianization. Through the religious conversion, its population acquired a status of the chosen people, while Kartly as land was perceived as sacral. Political theology of “Kartlis Tshovreba” unfolds between two poles: the heavenly and the mundane glory. The central paradigm of this political theology is based on the ambivalent interpretation of the image of the sacral worrier, who simultaneously suffers and triumphs. While suffering represents a victory in the name of Christ, i.e., the heavenly glory, victory over the infidels as symbolized by the transformation of saint-warriors from sufferers into triumphant heroes, brought closer the notions of heavenly and mundane glories. The symbol of the dual mundane and heavenly glory found its fullest expression in the image of the righteous monarch. This model can be seen in the idealized descriptions of the reigns of David IV and Tamara. This “martyrology paradigm” of Georgian political theology was successfully applied against Georgia’s Muslim environment. However it presented problems while directed toward the Orthodox Byzantium – and later on toward imperial Russia. In these cases, the legitimization of the “martyrology paradigm” required the representation of the enemy as a religious apostate, and the opposition of the righteous biblical kingdom of David and Solomon to the Roman model of imperialist statehood. The article shows how historical applications of this paradigm added an anti-imperial dimension to the Georgian historical consciousness, finding explicit or latent examples of such anti-imperialism in medieval texts as well as in political narratives of the nineteenth century. The same political theology, in the author’s interpretation, informs the current political processes in Georgia.