Cultural History Research Articles

On the margins of Beirut’s cultural modernism: aesthetics and politics in the inter-artistic works of Laure Ghorayeb

ABSTRACT Known for her black-and-white miniatures embedded with Arabic writing, Laure Ghorayeb is a fascinating if understudied figure of Beirut’s cultural modernism. Her work occupied a liminal position between French and Arabic and intersected literature and visual art. This article argues that it is precisely this marginality, manifested in Ghorayeb’s multifaceted cultural identity, that allowed her to move deftly across mediums, practices, languages, and genres, resulting in a uniquely inter-semiotic oeuvre. Close reading selections from her collections of poems, Noir … les bleus (Black … the Blues), 1960 and prose, Iklīl shawk ḥawla qadamayhi (A Crown of Thorns Around His Feet), 1965, in relation to her civil war drawings Témoignages (Testimonies), 1985, this article reveals an inter-semiotic exchange on the page. It offers an interdisciplinary rereading of the modern cultural history of Beirut, revealing an interplay between literature and visual art, which allowed Ghorayeb to maneuver between aesthetic experimentation and political engagement at a time when nationalist and ideological divisions were being sown.

Representing Religion in North and South Korea: Seventy-Five Years of the Semiotics of Stamp Design

As government documents, postage stamps are a rich source of information about a government’s policies on a wide range of subjects. In this article, a comparative semiotic analysis of the first seventy-five years of North and South Korean stamps is used to illustrate the similarities and differences in their attitudes towards ‘religion’ and religious practice. A corpus of stamps on a ‘religious’ theme was created for stamps issued by both governments from which a series of themes and motifs was noted. The semiotic analysis of the themes and motifs showed that while on South Korean stamps Buddhist motifs constituted the majority of stamps commemorating cultural history, there were few references to the commemoration of Buddhism itself. The reverse was found to be true for Christianity. Although Christianity was not shown to be a major expression of Korean culture, Christianity itself was commemorated extensively. On North Korean stamps, folklore and Christian motifs predominated as projections of cultural history, but the Christian motifs referred only to foreign cultures, not Korean culture. Motifs relating to the foundation myth of Tan’gun were common to both North and South Korea. However, in the South, motifs from the myth referred to the nation, while in the North they referred to the ruling family.

Effects of Loquat Juice Addition on Sensory Characteristics and Volatile Organic Compounds of Loquat Beer.

Beer, as an ancient and widely consumed alcoholic beverage, holds a rich cultural heritage and history. In recent years, fruit beer has gained significant attention as a distinct beer type produced by incorporating fruit juice into traditional beer ingredients. This study employed headspace solid-phase microextraction-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry techniques, redundancy analysis, and orthogonal projections to latent structures discriminant analysis to analyze the sensory evaluation, physicochemical properties, organic acids, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of loquat beer with different proportions of loquat juice. The results shown that the addition of an appropriate amount of loquat juice (40%) enhanced the overall sensory quality of the beer; as the proportion of loquat juice increased, the contents of malic acid and tartaric acid significantly increased (p < 0.05). A total of 100 VOCs were identified, among which 23 key VOCs (VIP > 1, p < 0.05) represented the most important characteristic flavor components in loquat beer based on their odor activity value (OAV). This study holds significant importance for the value-added processing and economic development of loquat.

Oral history made tangible and visual: entangling photographs, objects and archaeology in the assertion of identity and feelings of loss

ABSTRACT In 2020, our team organized a touring exhibition among Kenya’s Ilchamus community that set out to make their oral history tangible and visual by including photographic, archival, ethnographic, and archaeological materials. This paper discusses how the exhibition was designed and how it facilitated multivocality about the past, fostered engagement with environmental and cultural histories, and how identity was (re)asserted over the objects. In particular, it discusses how archival photographs and archaeological assemblages were central to evoking imagery of everyday life and highlighting the absence of once ubiquitous objects today. This led to concerns about the ‘loss of culture and identity’ being raised, which are prevalent in the community. However, the exhibition created a contact zone where we could start addressing these concerns by strengthening ties to the cultural heritage and the landscape, building trust between us and the community, and collaboratively determine future research goals.

In Defence of Environmental Anthropocentrism

The critique of anthropocentrism has accompanied environmental thinking since its inception. However, we lack a deeper analysis of anthropocentrism and its forms. The authors of this study concentrate on analysing selected forms of anthropocentrism that were prominent in different periods of the history of European culture. They offer a basic typology of anthropocentrism and characterize philosophical, religious, philosophical-theological and philosophical-scientific anthropocentrism. They also include a fifth form of anthropocentrism, which they call environmental anthropocentrism. The authors consider changes that are important from a philosophical, ethical and axiological perspective and analyse the potential of anthropocentrism in comparison with some of environmental anthropocentrism its alternative forms, such as biocentrism and cosmocentrism. They also attempt to assess the significance of environmental anthropocentrism and the potential for its implementation in human-environmental relations. The environmental anthropocentrism proposed here is a potential solution with applicability to the search for a moderate, humble, non-arrogant, respectful and responsible human approach to relations with nature.

Experiential Learning Model Based on Local Wisdom in Learning Islamic Cultural History

This study examines how the local wisdom-based experiential learning model influences the improvement of metacognitive skills, learning motivation, and learning outcomes in the subject of Islamic Cultural History (SKI) in grade V students of State Madrasah Ibtidaiyah (MI), who previously used more memorisation-based and less contextual learning methods. This study uses a quantitative method with a pretest-posttest experimental design. Data collection through tests, questionnaires, and observations on elementary school students in Tulungagung Regency. Statistical tests using MANOVA and SPSS-26.0. The results of the study showed that the application of experiential learning based on local wisdom was significantly more effective in improving students' understanding of the efforts of the Prophet Muhammad SAW, as well as SKI learning outcomes and metacognitive skills compared to the expository method. This model also succeeded in increasing students' learning motivation and developing independent learning and intercultural skills. In addition, experiential learning plays an important role in preparing students to face global challenges. The average learning outcomes of students taught with the experiential model were higher than the expository method, namely 87.54 compared to 72.72. This study has limitations in the generalization of findings. The originality of this study lies in the experiential learning model based on local wisdom that is effective in improving students' understanding, motivation, and metacognitive skills. The implications of this study for the development of more adaptive curriculum and teaching strategies and preparing students to face global challenges.

Robert Burns’s Friend Robert Cleghorn in his Cultural Context

Folklore, Ethnology, Antiquarianism, Robert Burns, Scottish literature, Scottish poetry, Scottish song, Scottish music, Robert Cleghorn, Cultural History, Scottish history, Caledonian Mercury, Kingsknow, Redford, Saughton, George Thomson, Ann Hunter, Vocal music.

Stills, Shielings and Retting Ponds

Folklore, Ethnology, Scottish History, Rural life, Regional Studies, Local Studies, Archaeology, Material Culture, Scottish Borders, Cultural History, Fieldwork, Excavation, Stills, Illicit Stills, Distilling, Shielings, Retting ponds, Farming History

Recognising a kaleidoscopic archive: working with London Missionary Society records in the geekosphere’

This article is an ultra-reflective account of an encounter with London Missionary Society (LMS) records through the Australian Joint Copying Project (AJCP) collections at the State Library of Victoria (SLV) and the home office as socially and materially informed research spaces. The genealogies of surrogate archives are little analysed, yet they have complex pasts worth investigating. As Jasmine Burns (JALSNA 33: 150–167, 2024), the librarian and metadata specialist explained, information about an archive’s ancestry is valuable as it illuminates the history and a pattern of use beyond the original author’s intent. The subsequent discussion shows how I inspect descriptive categories associated with the AJCP LMS microfilmed and digitised records in the custody of SLV, the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) and the National Library of Australia, (NLA) showing how meaning was layered onto these records. Extending on the social historian Arlette Farge’s analogy of the archive as a kaleidoscope, I demonstrate the introductory process by which a historian determines absences and presences in the archive and to what extent the initial imperial categories used by archivists and librarians informed my research practices. By analysing the history of the LMS AJCP collection, I demonstrate how these Australian-Pacific artefacts contain layers of knowledge about historical cultures and relationships. The different agendas and experiences of librarians, archivists, and historians—all curators of historical records –have revealed or obscured encounter narratives concerning European and indigenous men and women.

The Hexi Corridor Elements in Traditional Music and Contemporary Innovation and Application

This article explores the characteristics of the Hexi Corridor elements in traditional music and their innovation and application in contemporary times. The research background includes a review of the cultural and musical history of the ancient geographical region of Hexi Corridor, analyzing its unique elements in traditional music such as melody, rhythm, and instruments. The research method adopts a combination of literature analysis and field research, collecting and analyzing relevant music materials to explore the core elements of music in the Hexi Corridor. The research results indicate that the musical elements of the Hexi Corridor have been innovatively applied in modern music creation, such as integrating electronic music, modern stage art, etc., enriching the expression forms of contemporary music. This article argues that the innovative application of traditional music elements in the Hexi Corridor not only broadens the expressive power of traditional music, but also provides new inspiration and materials for modern music creation. Research is of great significance in promoting the inheritance and innovation of traditional culture, and promoting the development of cultural diversity.

Reframing Relationality as Cultural Work in the Global South: Moving History into the Present, and the Future.

The Global South was popularised during the 1970s in recognition of the greater economic and political power of the ‘Third World’ and as a reaction to pejorative expressions. Nevertheless, as a terminology it is formed within the colonial/modern world-system imagery and manifests multiple subaltern subjectivities and different articulations of power and resistances. In this chapter, we use the practice of talanoa as a decolonizing community arts-based methodology which is an integral part of Pacific dialogic engagement to re-narrate histories and experiences of oppression as we draw on the colonizing experiences of (hetero) gender and Whiteness shaped how these coloured our agencies. In this paper we put to work the practice and potential of talanoa as a heterodox decolonizing methodology that challenges the orthodoxies of the Global North who habitually rewards normative methodological processes. This paper located in part in the 1970s considers questions of how positionality, power and relationships are experienced and re-negotiated through the talanoa and also explores the relationship between voice and participation. Our experiences of participation articulated in this chapter take the form of narratives with an intent to interrupt, subvert and counter the orthodoxic use of analytical tools and theoretical frameworks habitually deployed and modelled across the academy in the Global North. We consider the power the talanoa has for re-negotiating cultural differences and histories situating affective intensities to guide, dis/connect, excite, divert, inspire, distract, startle, surprise, and re-orient thinking to move history into the present, and the future.

Piagetian Theory and the Psychogenetic Development of Humankind Throughout History. Towards a General Theory of the Human Being.

J. Piaget wanted to study children to find a key to understanding history of mind, culture, science, and philosophy. The new theory program, called the structural-genetic theory program, developed by the author of this article, is an off-spring of Piagetian theory and follows Piaget's main idea concerning the study of parallels between ontogenetic and historical developments. It maintains the full identity of the child's psyche and that of the adult archaic human being concerning traits and features of the preoperational stage and partially the concrete operational stage, thereby evidencing the total sally of the formal operational stage in the minds of archaic people. The identity of the stage structures is not partially given but rather entirely and implies even the smallest details. The article exemplifies this identity concerning several central issues, such as logic, physical understanding, categories such as causality and chance, animism, personification of plants and animals, belief in magic, metamorphosis, ghosts, and understanding of dreams and myths. Accordingly, there is no difference between ontogenetic stages and the psychogenetic development of humankind throughout history. Historically, humankind has gone through the same stages as children do. The new theory program presents the fundamental theory of the human being as he or she existed in history and peopled archaic, ancient, and medieval societies. Consequently, the world history of culture, mind, worldview, politics, law, science, philosophy, morals, religion, and arts must be reconstructed in terms of stages, a task already accomplished by the new program, at least to a certain extent.

A framework for decolonising and diversifying biomedical sciences curricula: rediscovery, representation and readiness.

To date, most efforts to decolonise curricula have focussed on the arts and humanities, with many believing that science subjects are objective, unbiased, and unaffected by colonial legacies. However, science is shaped by both contemporary and historical culture. Science has been used to support imperialism, to extract and exploit knowledge and natural resources, and to justify racist and ableist ideologies. Colonial legacies continue to affect scientific knowledge generation and shape contemporary research priorities. In the biomedical sciences, research biases can feed into wider health inequalities. Reflection of these biases in our taught curricula risks perpetuating long-standing inequities to future generations of scientists. We examined attitudes and understanding towards decolonising and diversifying the curriculum among students and teaching staff in the biomedical sciences at the University of Bristol, UK, to discover whether our current teaching practice is perceived as inclusive. We used a mixed methods study including surveys of staff (N = 71) and students (N = 121) and focus groups. Quantitative data showed that staff and students think decolonising the curriculum is important, but this is more important to female respondents (P < 0.001). Students are less aware than staff of current efforts to decolonise the curriculum, while students from minority ethnic groups feel less represented by the curriculum than white students. Thematic analysis of qualitative data revealed three themes that are important for a decolonised curriculum in our context: rediscovery, representation and readiness. We propose that this '3Rs framework' could guide future efforts to decolonise and diversify the curriculum in the biomedical sciences and beyond.

Afterword

Abstract What is at stake in exploring colonialism and print from the perspective of social history? This collection of articles shows how a social history perspective can tie together people, places, and themes that are often kept separate, opening new avenues of inquiry. As the editors argue in their introduction, by focusing on “the materiality of printing and the ground-level practices and “tactics” of production and circulation,” we can locate “histories of print within the world of comparative social analysis, rather than singularly within book, cultural, or intellectual history.” And, we might add, this in turn enables us to reach a deeper appreciation of the operation of colonial print and print’s place in the history of the modern world. In this short afterword, I would like to pull together some of the themes that stand out for me in this collection, and what they might suggest in terms of ways forward for research. My perspective is as a historian of print culture, and more particularly print media, in twentieth-century Africa.

A Woman of Irish Ancestry in the Cultural History of Italian Diplomacy

A Woman of Irish Ancestry in the Cultural History of Italian Diplomacy

Sustainable Hydroponics Using Zero-discharge Nutrient Management and Automated pH Control

Here we review the 400-year history of hydroponic culture and describe a unique management approach that does not require leaching or discarding solution between harvests. Nutrients are maintained at a low and steady concentration by daily additions of a dilute solution that replaces the transpired water along with the nutrients that were removed in growth each day. A stable pH and a low steady-state concentration of ammonium are maintained through automated additions of a solution of nitric acid and ammonium nitrate. Ample solution volume (at least 20 cm deep) stabilizes nutrient concentrations, reduces root density, and improves uniformity. Gentle aeration at ≈100 mL·min−1·L−1 maintains dissolved oxygen near saturation and increases uniformity throughout the rhizosphere. These practices facilitate a uniform, closed, root zone with rigorous pH control that provides the micromolar nutrient concentrations of N and P that are representative of field soils.

The Story of a Simple Toilet: What a Forgotten Structure can tell us about the Architectural, Cultural and Social History of New Zealand

The Story of a Simple Toilet: What a Forgotten Structure can tell us about the Architectural, Cultural and Social History of New Zealand

Social Sciences: Characteristics of the Subject, Attitude to Sociology

The article discusses the situation in the methodology of social sciences. There were problems with defining the subject of these sciences and distinguishing them from sociology. While some sociologists defend the specifics of sociology, others, for example, Z. Bauman, argue that "sociology is a residual discipline, which is limited by what remains outside the field of view of other social disciplines." The author, following Bauman, separates and connects sociology with the social sciences as follows: in the social sciences, the processes and interactions of people are considered as factors and anthropological conditions of the corresponding deindividual structures and processes (economic, political, legal, institutional, etc.). Answering the question about the nature of the subject of social sciences, the author argues that social sciences study, on the one hand, associations and populations of people, on the other hand, processes and patterns of their changes, on the third hand, social actions under the influence of which these changes occur. Sociology constructs its ideal objects on the assumption that the main thing in this reality are people and their relationships. Other social disciplines consider people as one of the factors and conditions, and distinguish and study various deindividual processes and structures as the main ones. These provisions are explained within the framework of methodological discourse and illustrated by the material of cultural history.

The Good Death in Early Modern Europe

ABSTRACTThe inevitability of death does not change its variability. In The Hour of Our Death (1981), Philippe Ariès positioned the sudden, unexpected, mass death of epidemics (especially from the Black Death) against the personalized, domesticated death for which one had time to prepare. The domesticated death, so he argued, appeared during a specific epoche of European history and was an historical inflection point, coinciding with the 18th century Enlightenment. Ariès looked unfavorably at this climax for what he saw as a process of de‐spiritualization, waning of faith, and the beginnings of commercialization and medicalization of death. Since his publications, scholars from a range of fields—history, anthropology, literature, religion, and art—have sought to address the omissions, exaggerations, and misleading claims in Ariès' account and, in doing so, have developed a rich field studying the cultural history and significance of death. Now situated in a transdisciplinary space, studying the good death and the tradition of ars moriendi (the art of the dying well) offers new perspectives and answers new questions about death. Although there is much that could be discussed, the focus here will be on recent trends in scholarship on the tradition of ars moriendi and its relationship to the interrelated histories of burial, the role of clerical and lay comforters, and the role of physicians as well as the historical and religious‐philosophical problems of the prolongation of life and sudden death.

Monument to Catherine II in Yekaterinodar: the practice of monumental commemoration in the context of the historical culture of the Kuban Cossacks

Monument to Catherine II in Yekaterinodar: the practice of monumental commemoration in the context of the historical culture of the Kuban Cossacks