Emotional Depth Research Articles

Lovetorn (review)

Reviewed by: Lovetorn Karen Coats Daswani, Kavita . Lovetorn. HarperTeen, 2012. [256p]. ISBN 978-0-06-167311-5 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 7-10. At sixteen, Shalini is perfectly happy in living in the family home in Bangalore, India, and spending her time dreaming about marrying Vikram, the boy she's been engaged to since she was three. When her family moves to Los Angeles for two years, her father and younger sister are thrilled and settle in easily, their mother completely shuts down, eventually spiraling into a clinical depression, and Shalini struggles with being teased and friendless in school. It's not until Shalini meets another Indian girl her age (who's never actually been to India), gets her unibrow waxed, and joins a service club that things start to improve for her. She also develops a crush on a guy, and her guilt over her new romantic interest is intense as she considers what it could ultimately mean—disgrace for her family, the ending of a lifelong friendship between Vikram's and her parents, and an uncertain future for herself. Daswani does a fine job of cataloging the differences in cultural expectations, and Shalini's confused negotiation of the conflicting expectations at home and outside of it will be familiar to many readers. Unfortunately, the characters and their responses tend to lack emotional depth: Vikram is unfailingly loving and loyal to Shalini, and Shalini's family responds to her mother's depression by simply going about their business without her. Vikram's accepting reaction of Shalini's betrayal (he'll just wait for her until she tells him not to) is both implausible and narratively anticlimactic. Hidier's Born Confused (BCCB 2/03) is therefore a better choice for emotional realism about the clash between Indian and American identities, but this offers some thoughtful exploration of the challenge faced by young people living across cultures. Copyright © 2012 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

The Tooth that Nibbles at the Soul: Essays on Music and Poetry by Marshall Brown

Marshall Brown. The Tooth that Nibbles at the Soul: Essays on Music and Poetry. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2010. Pp. 384. $75.00 cloth/$35.00 paper. Che impensata novita! exclaim the enraged posse of characters in pursuit of Don Giovanni, when they discover Leperello in his master's guise. What a totally unexpected thing! Beset by mille torbidi pensieri, the characters reel, knocked silly. But what truly unexpected, from the Don's point of view, the behavior of everyone else in the opera. From the opening scene, when he grappled with by Donna Anna--e sono assalitrice d'assalita! she later boasts--everyone off script, refusing their roles. Of course, he persists with the old routines the end, deaf the realignment of desire and language occurring around him. Not. doesn't always mean in Don Giovanni, but as Marshall Brown brilliantly adduces in the concluding chapter of his new book, it the opera's signature utterance, along with two other epithets of the modern: sentire (to feel) and battere (to beat/fight), the latter originated by Giovanni and Anna's deadlocked struggle, but which signifies also, Brown suggests, the restless beat of Mozart's music, and the momentous historical change both the Don and Mozart's Prague audience of 1787 must be made hear (Viva la Liberta!). The skeptical energy that pulses through Mozart's Don Giovanni marks a fitting (actually rousing) conclusion Brown's The Tooth That Nibbles at the Soul, a book concerned throughout with facets of skeptical artistry (37) in music and poetry. Abstraction Brown's master term for the negativity that characterizes music and lyric poetry: how both art forms operate upon a deficit of meaning and thus are always pointing the pure necessity and energy of form. The introductory chapter includes a tour of modernist painting--Picasso, Rothko--before concluding that abstraction is a mode, not a period (14) and setting sail for the long eighteenth century. In Brown's hierarchy of arts, the abstraction or immateriality of music the condition which poetry aspires. In Faure's song Rencontre, for example--Brown's reading of which sets the terms for much of what follow--the lyric does not succeed in rescuing the music from abstraction. Rather, Faure's setting introduces a vital indeterminacy, and thus emotional depth, otherwise bland verse. In this way, the lyric art, written, sung, or played, represents an essential musicalization of experience (xi). All arts are one. In chapter two, the oft-derided subcategory of becomes the name for this principle of abstraction, a contrarian move characteristic of the skeptical sensibility Brown brings Romantic definitions of art. not license (44), even less an unbounded state of mind, but rather an achieved affect dependent on craft. Like the Mephistophelean no coursing through Don Giovanni, fantasy a questioning presence audible not only in custom-made settings such as Mendelssohn's Overture A Midsummer Night's Dream, but in such sublime edifices as Beethoven's Fifth. Fantasy Brown's name for that symphony's incomplete catharsis, its lack of a statement form shore up against the restlessness of a pulse (60). Brown's close analyses of momentary musical effects enacts the difficult rescue of music from ideology, linking it to a different kind of meaning that might rescue society from the tyranny of its principles (62). In a later chapter, Brown reiterates the point in a reading of Dickinson, whose empirical poetics of our phantasmic sense-world communicate their spirit the book (as well as its toothsome title): Poetry's estrangements are not transcendence. Rather, they are antiphonal the hymnic strains that regulate belief systems (98). In such moments as these, the very considerable stakes of Brown's enterprise become clear, as well as the specific powers of an interdisciplinary approach that takes music, not text, as the model of art. …

Ghostbusting Transgenerational Processes

Transgenerational processes contribute to organizing and disorganizing attachment. The past (in all its forms and potentialities) lives on in the present, influencing the affective field of the parent–child intersubjective matrix. In a child's construction of self, he or she may run up against the confounding presence of ghosts: the dissociated, and thereby unreflected upon past of their parents. This implicitly felt, yet explicitly unknown transmission interferes in the processing of emergent experience and impedes the child's development. Attachment theory, informed by psychoanalysis, and nonlinear dynamic systems theory, is the main theoretical underpinning of this paper's examination of the mechanisms involved in the transfer of dissociated dynamics from parent to child. The child's symptoms grow out of an incoherent affective field that defies representational mapping into a flexible usable theory of mind. Through play a child therapist finds openings to enter the attachment system, reflecting on how a child's experience is being felt, yet unthought about by both child and parents. A parent's recognition process, thereby making what was implicitly felt explicit and consequently more coherent, supports the child in his or her efforts to reorganize aspects of the attachment relationship. Both clinical experience and quotations from literary works are woven into this paper in an attempt to convey the texture, emotional depth, and universality of the subject under discussion.

‘A man of great feeling and sensibility’: The Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi and the Tears of a Clown

In the ‘Concluding Chapter’ of his <em>Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi</em> (1838), Charles Dickens describes Grimaldi as ‘a man of great feeling and sensibility’, despite the fact that he thinks ‘many readers will ridicule the idea’ of a clown being capable of such emotional depth. But here Dickens is not merely a traditional biographer, summarizing the evidence and using it as the basis for an evaluation of his subject’s life. In fact, this is the carefully crafted conclusion of a narrative deliberately constructed to tell the life story of ‘a man of the kindest heart’. The level of Dickens’s creative input in the <em>Memoirs</em> has always been a matter for debate, but in a letter to Grimaldi’s doctor, Dickens explains how he directly shaped the way that Grimaldi’s emotional side was presented. Despite claiming his role as a mere editor, Dickens admits that ‘I was very much struck by the many traits of kindheartedness scattered through the book, and have given it that colouring throughout’, clearly signalling his focus on the sentimental side of Grimaldi’s character. In the first section of this article, I demonstrate how Dickens provides that colouring through his shaping of the biographical material, and reconstructs Grimaldi as a real-life counterpart to Dickens’s extremely popular character of time, Mr Pickwick. Through his choice of incidents from Grimaldi’s life, and the way in which he presents the choices and actions Grimaldi takes, Dickens attempts to offer Grimaldi as an admirable model of feeling towards his fellow man. However, in the second section of this article, I show how this biographical imperative to show Grimaldi as a man of feeling is counterposed by a contesting narrative. This second narrative is the work of the more creative writer within Dickens, and like his earlier essay ‘The Pantomime of Life’ (March 1837) it posits identity as being based on external performance and affect rather than interior feeling and emotion. The theatrical nature of many of its figures and the persistent dynamic of performer and audience working within the <em>Memoirs</em> ostensibly seem to set the unaffected figure of Grimaldi apart, moving his character closer to Dickens’s intended ‘colouring’. Yet Grimaldi’s involvement in a number of offstage ‘performances’, particularly in his youth, suggest that there is no easy distinction to be made between what Grimaldi did ‘outside of pantomime time’ and what he did inside it. In my conclusion, I consider the implications that this has for our view of Dickens’s own identity. While Grimaldi’s ‘child-like simplicity’ and openness of emotion is held up to be admired, the converse idea, of life as a performance, would certainly have a dark appeal to a man sometimes unable to directly articulate his own feelings and experiences to his much-beloved audience.

The Grand Plan to Fix Everything (review)

Reviewed by: The Grand Plan to Fix Everything Kate Quealy-Gainer Krishnaswami, Uma. The Grand Plan to Fix Everything; illus. by Abigail Halpin. Atheneum, 2011. 266p. Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-4169-9589-0 $16.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-1-4169-9591-3 $9.99 Ad Gr. 4–6 Despite her obsession with all things Bollywood, eleven-year-old Dini is utterly horrified when her parents announce that their family is moving to India. Leaving her best friend Maddie behind, Dini is dragged along by her parents, who don’t even have the decency to set up their new home in Mumbai, “the center of the filmi universe,” but rather move to Swapnagiri, a small (fictional) town in southern India. To distract herself from her current woes, Dini sets out on a mission to find her favorite movie star, Dolly Singh, who, after a series of tragic heartbreaks, is rumored to be taking a much-needed hiatus in a small, southern village. As literary fate would have it, Dolly is staying in Swapnagiri, and it only takes a missing cell phone, a malfunctioning car, a kindly postman, and a random celebration to bring Dini and Dolly together. In true Bollywood fashion, this breezy romp is a bit over the top, from Dini’s fanatical devotion, to her parents’ cluelessness, to Dolly’s diva-like attitude. The setting plays an integral role, and Krishnaswami easily incorporates both the everyday and the more unfamiliar aspects of India into the story, making the country as much of a character as Dini herself. The third-person narration, however, can border on instructional, often doing the thinking for the reader and leaving too few opportunities to explore the emotional depths of its characters. As a result, Dini herself seems two-dimensional, as do most of the supporting cast. Nonetheless, readers with their own cinematic passions will most likely find Dini’s encounter with her film star hero total wish fulfillment, making this an entertaining read for fellow Bollyphiles. Copyright © 2011 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Torn by Ene Mihkelson , Mari Kaljuste (review)

"I havea heartpierced bya rib./ Fragments ofglassfloat through my blood/ and cloudshiddenbehind white cells." ForNikolaMadzirov, to separatefrom one'sself, tobe alone - in order tocommit oneself toair,fire, stars, andangels - meansthereturn home, toearth, tothose ancient habitatsthatpreserve theremnants of bygone ages. Bojana Stojanovic Pantovic University ofNovi Sad Ashley AnnaMcHugh.Into These Knots. Lanham, Maryland. Ivan R.Dee. 2010.68 pages.$22.50.isbn 978-156663 -878-4 The New Criterion PoetryPrize was established in 1999to recognize "manuscripts thatpay close attention to form."AshleyAnna McHugh's Into These Knots, the2009 winningmanuscript, pays close attention notonly toform butalsoto depth ofemotion andcomplex metaphor .McHughmakesgooduseof severalpoeticforms in thiscollection ,amongthemthesonnet, sestina ,and rhymed quatrain. Rather than allowing prosody todictate her poetics, McHughmakestheforms bend to her purposes.Moreover, thepoetdoesso (inmostinstances) withsubtlety and grace.McHugh's mastery ofform rarely falters, and whenit does,one wondersifperhaps thefailure is intentional. For instance,in the pantoum "Sure Enough,"therhymes are predictable and therhythm pedestrian - a major departure from thesubtlety of therest ofthebook.However, since "SureEnough"is botha drinking songanda lost-love lament, perhaps thecountry-music rhyme scheme is appropriate after all. Anotherdelightthesepoems offer is thatthepoet'swordchoice andsyntax arelushandrich; every word seems necessary and exact. Whileall thesevirtuesmightbe expected ofa formalist incommand ofherart, whatislessexpected isthe rangeofevents, characters, andcircumstances towhich sheappliesher impressive gift ofversification. The collection includes several challenges and responses to religious feelingwritten ina contemporary voice but witha tonefamiliar to those whoreadtheMetaphysical poetsof theseventeenth century (although McHughoften quotesDante).There are poems thatexpress,fromthe inside,thestruggle againstmental illnessand thelureof suicide.A father's hunting accident istreated in three separate poems,eachoneless desperately searching foranswers thanthelast;theunconnected series movesemotionally fromshock,to prayer and disbelief, toa profound acceptance ofmortality. Themostcompelling section of thebook is an interrelated series of sonnetsand coupletsentitled "Cairns.""Cairns"foldstogether a hikeon theMonongahela Trail, cairnsthatmarkbothland mines and forks in thetrail, and a son's burden ofguilt for hisfather's death. Itisimpossible heretofully describe thepowerful intertwining of trails takenand not taken,choicesand theirrepercussions, thatMcHugh bindstogether in thisseries; nevertheless itis possibletorecommend readingthe collectionagain and again.IntoThese Knots is a remarkable book,even moreremarkable becauseitisAshley AnnaMcHugh's first full-length volume.It should puttorest anylingering question of whether formal poetry is adequate to expresscontemporary thought andemotion. Jeanetta Calhoun Mish Oklahoma City University Ene Mihkelson. Torn.MariKaljuste, ill.Tallinn, Estonia. Varrak. 2010.102 pages. €1 1.25. isbn 978-9985-3-2091-4 Secondonlyto thelateJaanKross and alongsideMatsTraat,thecreatorof a lengthy ruralseries,Ene Mihkelson(b. 1944) is the most prominent contemporary Estonian novelist. Mihkelson's elevencollectionsof free-verse poetryand six tensely interwoven novels constitute a new,Mihkelsonian highliterature. Last year,Mihkelson received the BalticAssembly literary prize forTorn (Thetower). Hercollection ofpoemsamounts toa poeticcoda, a "tetrastic" following her noveltriptych NimeVaev(Thetorment of a name),Ahaveeruse uni(Thesleep ofAhasuerus), and Katkuhaud (The plaguegrave;see WLT,July 2008, 67). Torndisplaysthe same seriousattitude , anguish, andsorrow to which rich experience givesrise, and offers harshcriticism ofcontemporary life.Butunliketherather dark 74 1 World Literature Today introspection thatlies at theheart ofMihkelson's previous work, Torn evokesa stimulating opennessto theworld. Mihkelson's poemsarecrystallized outlinesof prose narratives concernedwith pressing social issues:a constant worry aboutthe persistence ofnational identity and moral memory, theenduring, loomingdangerofa cultural holocaust: "Onlywe keepspeaking a strange worn out / languagewhen one shouldsaydirectly Putyourself in prison /Establish censorship Do not cheer before evening /TheNight of theLongKnivesmaycomeagain" (from "Retreat intotower").Those whoignore thetorments ofbygone totalitarianism areat riskoflosing their soul: "Butwe mustspeakof pain to cut off/ theglorification ofvictimhood" (from "WhenGeneralLaidonerorderedtheopening ofborders"). Mihkelson's poeticsresembles thetechnique ofEstonian composer Arvo Part'stintinnabuli: the more distance tohitmusic, thecloser toa symphony. Hertexts arenotmetrical yetare composedwithutmost precision. Each and everyphrase is important in its analytic difference ,displaying distinct pausesand stresses. Shemakesfrequent use of enjambment: a regulartransmission betweentwo versesas well as semantic crossovers insidesingle lines - the internal enjambment. Withitsstyleofdignified thought units, Torn is likethepoetichadron accelerator of cern (to whichshe refers in herbook),creating collisionsofmotives andphrases on its magnetic memory field: someofthe particles willbe tornapart,others infused with hope. "Theinitial ideawastheimpossibility ofclosure," thepoetrevealed in an interview. The finalcycleof the book bears the title"Caspar Hauser" - a reference to thesatire byJakob Wassermann (1908)about an autistic foundling withhis private languagewho had spenthis entirechildhoodin a darkprison towerbeforethe "humane"societydecidedto "civilize"him.On behalf ofherself andherhomeland, Mihkelson posessarcastic questions, suchas: "How togrowout / from thecocoonofbeinga victim andto saythat itwas /wrong tosparemy life...

The role of second-person narration in representing mental states in Sylvia Plath's Smith Journal

Abstract This paper looks at instances of second person narration in the first journal published in The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath (Kukil, 2000) in order to determine the potential that second person narration can have for the linguistic representation of mental states. The contributions of different disciplines (narratology, linguistics, psychology) to the study of second person narration are considered and their findings are re-applied to a non-fictional text. In a corpus-informed comparative analysis, the paper takes into consideration both perspectives from narratology and developments in the understanding of language use in the field of psychology to provide an interdisciplinary, but cognitively inclined perspective on the phenomenon. Appearances of second person narration are chronologically tracked through the data and compared to biographical developments in Sylvia Plath's life; entries written in the first- and second person are compared to each other to determine linguistic differences using corpus methods; the results of the two analyses are then interpreted in the light of traditional functions attributed to second person narration in narratology, and in the light of research in narrative psychology. The paper aims to demonstrate that second person narration can project a sense of emotional depth and inner conflict as well as of emotional balance. However, the temporal orientation of a given text will influence which of these effects predominates.

The Last Metro (review)

Last Metro (1980) Produced and Directed by Francois Truffaut 131 minutes In occupied Western Europe, paraphrasing the historian Tony Judt, there was no locally accredited regime - no legitimate government exercising authority - and thus, neither Norwegians, nor Belgians, nor Dutch were fully responsible for their actions. Although the Germans could not have ruled without the collaboration of the locals, it was they who issued the orders. exception, of course, was France. Marshall Petain's regime had been voted into office in July 1940 and claimed some continuity with the pre-war democratic institutions of the third French Republic. Furthermore, many French citizens regarded Vichy as their legitimate authority until November 1942. In the aftermath of the Second World War the French had to come to terms with the compliant role of the Vichy regime in Nazi policies. Until 1939 La Grand Nation had been a major international power; but the initial military defeat, followed by a demeaning German occupation during the Second World War and two bloody colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria, were reprehensible enough to uphold the myth of a paramount French resistance for a long time in the postwar period. During the youth movement of the 1960s, artists and filmmakers such as Marcel Ophuls or historians like Robert Paxton brought about the end of the public amnesia. Ophuls' documentary Sorrow and the Pity (1969) questioned the self-serving legacy of the resistance, by detailing the daily bribery and collaboration of the citizen in Clermont Ferrand, a mid-size city in central France. He produced nothing short of a new visual representation of France under German occupation. Needless to say, Ophuls' images challenged the collective memory and triggered controversy and ideological struggle in the public sphere. Films dealing with the period that kindled this debate further include, to name just a few: Louis Malle's Lacombe, Lucien (1974) and his later memoir Goodbye Children (1987), Claude Chabrol's newsreel collage Eye of Vichy (1993) and, of course, Truffaut's Last Metro (1980). Truffaut considered Sorrow and the Pity the first film to show this period in French history as a non-legendary story. He believed that in the aftermath of this movie, one couldn't show clowns play Vichy people or militiamen anymore. Surprisingly enough, film critic Naomi Greene evokes precisely Ophuls' work to condemn Truffaut's Last Metro as a resistancialist version of the past a film which us back, once again, to a reassuring world where ideological divisions scarcely existed (82). Could it be that Truffaut disobeyed the public debate entirely, or do Greene and several other critics overlook the artistic and emotional depth of Truffaut's vision of occupied Paris? Last Metro is the story of the prestigious Theâtre Montmartre putting on a production in late autumn of 1942. Lucas Steiner (Heinz Bennent), the German-Jewish director of the theater is forced to go underground. His wife Marion (Catherine Deneuve) takes over the management of the theater and has to survive an onslaught of anti-Semitic policies, material shortage and the looming threat of censorship. Nevertheless, apart from Madame Steiner's preoccupation with the artistic and financial welfare of her theater, she is concerned about her husband - who is not, like everyone is made to believe, in South America - but hidden in the basement of the theater. Tellingly, the play the ensemble performs is called The woman who disappeared. Since the curfew requires that the performance end in time for the theatergoers to catch the last metro home, Marion can disappear every night and pay her husband a clandestine visit. At the same time, a love story unfolds between Marion and the theater's new lead actor Bernard (Gerard Depardieu). Probing the heroism of the three lover's affair, the film ends in a liberated Paris when the curtain falls and Lucas joins Marion and Bernard onstage together taking a bow. …

Bullfighting and Meaning in Life in Oki, Japan

These five Oki islanders reflect the depth of emotions that bullfighting evokes amongst those who practice it. The Oki Islands form an archipelago between 40 and 80 kilometers north of the Honshu coast in Shimane Prefecture in Southwestern Japan. Organized fights between trained bulls are now held only on the biggest island, Dogo, having a population of 15,696 (Okinoshima 2011).

Night in Novalis, Schelling, and Hegel

THE ABSOLUTE NIGHT INVOKED BY THE GERMAN ROMANTIC FRIEDRICH von Hardenberg, better known as Novalis, might well have been more influential at turn of nineteenth century than previously acknowledged. This image saturating his dithyrambic cycle Hymnen an die Nacht [Hymns to Night], published in 1800, continues to be read by some in terms of obscure private experiences despite twentieth-century work of Kate Hamburger, Martin Dyck, and others that show scientific connections. (1) This construal is especially popular in Enghsh-speaking world and has followed long tradition of interpreting Novalis that began with reviews of essayist Thomas Carlyle. In late 1820s, Carlyle had tied this poet not just to medieval German mystic Jakob Bohme but also to what he regarded as tenebrific constellation of Immanuel Kant and Kantists. (2) Common readers today tend to merge Novalis's night more with state of spiritual loneliness Christian mystic St. John of Cross had called the dark night of soul [la noche oscura del alma]. This inclination is not merely result of religious metaphor's familiarity; it derives its understanding from an incident linked to poem's inspiration, an epiphany Novalis experienced at grave of his first fiancre, Sophie von Kuhn, on 13 May 1797. (3) The subsequent view that Novahs's spiritual insight was inextricable from his vulnerability has led several critics to identify wide range of literary influences. Suggestions include August Wilhelm Schlegel's essay on Romeo and Juliet of 1797, Johann Gottfried Herder's mythic poems, religious writings of Karl von Eckartshausen and Johann Patti Friedrich Richter, or Jean Paul, and Edward Young's Night Thoughts of 1742-45. (4) Young's poem, which had numerous European translations by end of eighteenth century, is often cited in view of its thematic resemblance to Novahs's poem and its reputation among German writers such as Herder, Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, Christoph Martin Wieland, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. (5) Novalis might have turned to this reflection on mortality weeks before his graveside experience, but it seems rather excessive to proclaim Young's direct and deep impact. The British surrealist David Gascoyne expresses same doubt in his introduction to an English edition of Hymnen an die Nacht translated by American poet Jeremy Reed and published in 1989: Gascoyne notes that Young's poem exudes disgruntlement--its other tide being, after all, The Complaint--while Novalis's achieves a serene transcendence of bereavement and mourning through resolution of into rapture rather than resignation. (6) This distinction between two otherwise comparable nights demands that we not only make better sense of Novalis's design but also check our own assumptions about lyrical intensity. Well-meaning critics who rehash point of his anguish inadvertently perpetuate tiresome picture of sentimental artist so devastated by loss that he could barely order his thoughts, let alone argue for them. Even esteemed Friedrich Hiebel seems to have contributed to this impression when he found Hymnen an die Nacht deeply rooted in those months of grief and its emotional depth reached only after three years of recuperation. (7) Such views present an obvious interpretive problem: what ultimately saw print in Schlegel brothers' journal Athenaeum is taken to manifest both profound mystical self-transformation and contrary rehance on overcoming of trauma. Novahs's poem becomes both product of strong mind able to integrate and transcend thoughts and mark of irresolution and maladjustment to life, product of weak mind. The inconsistency here is wholly illusory; in what follows I will show that Novalis's main ideas reflect distinct intellectual currents of his time. His image of night is no casual aesthetic plaything and in fact provided heretofore uncharted series of reactions from both philosophers Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. …

Gershwin in the Heartland: Critical and Public Reception of the 1934 Leo Reisman Tour

In 1934, ten years after the famous premiere of Rhapsody in Blue, the music of George Gershwin (1898–1937) could still stir up controversy. His compositions' trademark recipe of classical and popular and his controversial absorption of African American blues and jazz traditions had delighted listeners but had also fostered ambivalence and even contentious partisanship. Was Gershwin highbrow or lowbrow? Was his music a brilliant synthesis or jazz fakery? Apparently Gershwin himself, especially in the 1930s, reflected on his emerging fame and historical place in American music, mirrored by his new compositions of increased intellectual and emotional depth. In early 1934, nearly two years before the premiere of Porgy and Bess, George Gershwin and the Leo Reisman Orchestra embarked on a month-long concert tour of the eastern half of the United States.1 This tour enabled Gershwin to assess his stance in the greater American musical landscape and take the pulse of his reception by critics and audiences across the country. By 1934, the issue of Gershwin as Great American Composer, the contested boundaries of popular and classical music, and the definition of jazz had been hashed out over the last decade by the press of the urban East, but, as Gershwin discovered, these topics still burned in the nation's heartland.

Depression, Guilt and Emotional Depth

It is generally maintained that emotions consist of intentional states and /or bodily feelings. This paper offers a phenomenological analysis of guilt in severe depression, in order to illustrate how such conceptions fail to adequately accommodate a way in which some emotional experiences are said to be deeper than others. Many emotions are intentional states. However, I propose that the deepest emotions are not intentional but pre-intentional, meaning that they determine which kinds of intentional state are possible. I go on to suggest that pre-intentional emotions are at the same time feelings. In so doing, I reject the distinction that is often made between bodily feelings and the world-oriented aspects of emotion.

Self-direction, place and community — re-discovering the emotional depths: a conversation with social workers in a London borough

Self-Directed Support claims that it makes the social work task ‘more personal’ in its engagement with people's real needs and wants. This paper explores this claim through the record of a piece of group work with 11 social work practitioners in a London borough. A brief description of the roots of Self-Directed Support, the Independent Living movement, provides the context for the subsequent examination of themes arising from the group discussion, and the implications of the participants' experiences for practice, the profession and employing organisations. We find that despite system and resource issues, Self-Directed Support has enabled people to do ‘real social work’, re-connecting with values and practice which were obscured by care management. It requires letting go of power and control, without abandoning engagement: and it is essential that the change is underpinned by learning from and working with staff who work directly with people seeking support.

Cipango by Tomás Harris, Daniel Shapiro

Cipango by Tomás Harris, Daniel Shapiro

From the Western Door to the Lower West Side by Eric Gansworth

From the Western Door to the Lower West Side by Eric Gansworth

The Lazarus Project

The Lazarus Project

Computer art gets touchy-feely

Computer artists are increasingly turning to input devices with physical feedback to create work with emotional depth

A haiku suite: the importance of music making in the lives of secondary school students

This study offers an arts-based a/r/tographic inquiry using poetic transcription and representation of interviews conducted with a co-educational group of 14 students in a West Vancouver, British Columbia secondary school rhythm and blues band class. The decision to translate and analyse the interview transcripts into the Japanese poetry form of haiku is rooted in research literature in education and other fields, primarily health and nursing studies. Those studies demonstrate the efficacy of the highly condensed haiku to transmit meaning in a synthesised and creative form. While music education has a body of scholarship on students’ attitudes towards music and their music education, this kind of research has generally been presented in more traditional ways. Our contention here is that arts-based topics are complemented and illuminated when investigated through arts-based methods. As well, arts-based methods such as a/r/tography, offer multiple and complex perspectives of what the data ‘means’, thereby offering a welcome harmony of topic and method. This paper captures the depth and intensity of emotions, engagement and transformative affects that adolescents experience through music making – music matters to young people.

The Blonde Goddess

The Blonde Goddess

The Cancer Council Victoria Arts Awards

Aristotle said about art: “The aim…is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance”. His words make clear why cancer can be a potent inspirer of art. Despair, hope, grief, determination, fear, victory, resignation, relief; cancer brings many things into the lives of those it touches, none without inward significance. The annual Cancer Council Victoria Art Awards, held this month, allows Australians affected by the disease to convey the emotional depths of its impact and affords a medium through which others can begin to understand the inward significance of cancer's pinch.