National Symbols Research Articles

The Semiotic Potential of Mythology: Post-Metaphysical Version

Myth has been and continues to be an enigma to science, and its interest has led to an endless number of theories, concepts, and new questions. One of them is the phenomenon of myth when it is infinite through its semantic interpretation of the world without giving up its symbolic character. If for a long time the concepts of “myth” and “logic” were conceptually opposed, the linguistic paradigm of cultural philosophy, born in the womb of postmetaphysics, has opened the possibility of fully thinking through the logic of myth.In Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophy, myth is total – it is in language and style, among the means of logical constructions of his texts, etc., because for him the existence of the world itself is semiotic. The phenomenology of Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, spoke about the myth in the key of finding and recreating their primary meanings as the reference concepts of ontology. The philosophy of symbolic forms by Ernst Cassirer, as well as the apology of the logic of myth by Alexey Losev, Yakov Golosovker are considered in terms of justification of the symbolic nature of myth as a manifestation of the symbolic language of sacral character.The “mythology” term used in this work does not claim to be a concept, but its legitimacy is based on the teaching of Claude Levi-Strauss, “charged” ideas of existential philosophy, which contributed to the discovery of the phenomenon of «handiness" as manifestations of immediate sensitivity to the world as existence. The ideas about the sacred nature of the symbol, which are further developed in this article, served as a basis for the possibility of speaking about mythology as a method of encoding the sacred, which is particularly significant and peculiar in the symbol. It is assumed that the symbolic exists in the space of the sacred, whose loss transforms it into a sign.

Russia as the State-Legal and Theoretical-Historical Category

Introduction . Ensuring the legal order and fostering the legal values constitute the complex multifaceted process requiring concentration of efforts on behalf of the state, society and personality, all integrated in an overarching term "provision of national security", that is being supplementary edited in legal sciences into the category "legal provision of national security". There are no minor or insignificant problems on the way to achieving the objectives aimed at respecting the national interests, the same as not yet compiled is the list of measures considered exhaustive enough to achieve them. In the present scientific article the problems directly referring to the terminology used in the name of the state "Russia" are investigated in the state-legal and theoretical-historical sense. In addition, the issues related to the use of the state emblem, anthem and flag as official state symbols of the Russian Federation, the legal status of which is regulated by the federal legislation and the international regulatory legal acts, are addressed. The use of the above symbols in practice refers directly to such an attribute of a state as the legal sovereignty in terms of its visual and phonetic demonstration on the international arena and within the state. The attitude to the state symbols as well as the interpretation of the name of the state are the markers of the legal status of the country, its actual capacities on the world arena and attitude of its own people and foreign citizens towards Russia as a civilisational, cultural and state-legal phenomenon. Thus in order to increase the efficiency of the legal provision of the national security, it is expedient to detail the legal status of the state and the national symbols of Russia. The aim of this study is to carry out the state-legal and theoretical-historical research of the verbal and visual designation of the Russian Federation as a sovereign subject of the international law. Materials and Methods . This scientific article investigates the topical problems of the national security provision in correlation with the verbal, phonetic and neuro-linguistic designation of Russia as a sovereign subject of the international law. The legalistic, the historical-legal and the concrete-historical methods, as well as the political-legal method of juridical research have been used. Results . It has been proved that the constitutional-legal norm stating the identity of the categories "Russia" and "Russian Federation" does not have a completely identical semantic meaning at the level of scientific doctrine and the former refers to the latter as the general to the specific. The authors draw attention to the fact that the name "Russian Federation" being the name of the state formed in 1918-1991 is not the only etymological variant of denoting the Russian state. The term "Russia" is a Greek interpretation of the category "Rus", which has been specificated as "Ancient Rus" in the historical and historical-legal doctrine. Therefore the “Russkaya Pravda (Russian Truth)” is entitled to be referred to the first monuments of law, as well as the "Zakon Russkij (Russian Law)" mentioned in the treaties with Byzantium. At the same time, attention is paid to the need to toughen the measures preventing cases of incorrect or, not to mention it, offensive attitude to the name of the Russian state, as well as to the official state symbols. According to the authors, participation of the Russian Federation citizens in the status of "neutral athletes" in the international competitions, where the state symbols of foreign states are demonstrated corresponds to such cases. Depriving Russia of the sovereign right to officially demonstrate the state symbols is illegitimate and should not be permitted in any circumstances under the threat of refusal of the official representatives from participation in the events where the multinational Russian people is discriminated against. Moreover, the very participation of athletes from Russia in the "neutral status" is regarded “by default” as a consent with implementation of the illegitimate Russophobically tended measures discriminating against the state. At present, such participation is not considered to be a violation of the Russian Federation legislation, but it is obviously unethical and unpatriotic, but in future the law-makers may change the qualification of the respective "misdeed". Discussion and Conclusions. The state-legal and theoretical-historical type of problems related to understanding of the categories "Russia" and "Russian Federation" fixed in the legal consciousness have been revealed. The objective to specificate the meaning of these notions at the level of a doctrine has been fully achieved, which enables to clarify the unbiased understanding of the state genesis as well as the current level of development of the Russian statehood and the mission of the Fatherland on the international arena.

NATION BRAND ARCHITECTURE- A REALITY OR REVERIE FOR AFRICAN NATIONS: THE CASE OF BOTSWANA

Nation brand architecture gives a ‘sense of mission’ which can help unify key players, concentrate resources, increase efficiency, and create synergies in customer attraction Joao (2018). However, what seemingly works for product/ corporate brands appears to be more of a brown study for nation branding. Adoption of nation brand architecture is gaining traction in Western nations. Many countries in Africa such as Botswana seem not to be consciously employing this seemingly beneficial concept.This paper therefore explores the extent to which Botswana; an African nation has adopted this concept. It also focuses on how the nation embeds and applies the existing national identities such as national colours (reflected in the nation flag), symbols, animals, and plants in the brand architecture.The study employs a content analysis approach that investigates the nation against four overarching themes of brand architecture. Using the Dinnie (2008) Nation Brand Architecture Model (NBAR), the paper draws valuable insights from an analysis of brand architecture concepts as well as the current adopted or default brand architecture for the nation of Botswana. The paper forms the initial sequel of papers on Botswana nation brand architecture model. The initial findings present a tenuous understanding of the adopted architecture reflective of both the endorsed and branded house architecture.

Role of the sporting and educational organizations at Galychyna in the formation of national self-consciousness and legal culture during the first half of the 20th century

Purpose. The purpose of the article is to analyze, study and determine the role of sports and educational organizations and movements of Galychyna in the establishment and further formation of national legal consciousness, as well as the legal culture of the local population. Method. The methodological basis of scientific research was a system of general scientific, special scientific and philosophical methods. Analytical method in combination with the comparative approach was among the main ones, which made it possible to reveal the peculiarities of the influence of sports and educational organizations on the legal awareness and legal culture of the local population during the considered historical period. Results. It was established that a number of political mottos were claimed in the programs and statutes of sports and educational organizations. Thus, the program of «Sokil» organization stated the achievement of the peoples’ «freedom». The struggle for the declaration of an independent state was a key ideology postulated by «Plast». The members of «Sich» popularized the democratic values and wish for freedom dated back to the times of the Cossacks. The influence of the mentioned organizations on the legal awareness and legal culture of the local population of Galychyna was realized through the popularization of historical and legal traditions, in particular the ideas of freedom-loving times of Zaporizhzhya Sich, preservation and propagation of national symbols – coat of arms and flag, emphasizing of the moral and ethical and Christian values. This principle was implemented by «Sokil» and «Plast», approval of statutory ideas and involvement of participants in the liberation struggles and development of the West Ukrainian People's Republic, and in the interwar years – political activity under the frame of legal political parties; spreading the ideas of a healthy lifestyle, physical and military training of young generation. Scientific novelty. A hypothesis about the direct influence of the activity of sports and educational organizations and movements on the formation of national legal awareness and legal culture of the local population, both on purpose (membership and activity within the framework of movements and organizations) and indirectly (educational and legal educational work) is well substantiated. Practical significance. The achieved results can be used in the process of further historical and legal research, preparation of dedicated special courses, as well as in the study of the history of the state and law of Ukraine, the history of education about the state and law.

It’s Life as I See It: Black Cartoonists in Chicago, 1940–1980

It’s Life as I See It: Black Cartoonists in Chicago, 1940–1980

(Re-)Shaping Italian-Canadian and Indigenous Connections through Naming Practices

Long before the formation of the first Italian communities in Canada, notable Italian navigators played a key role in the so-called “discovery of the Americas.” Suffice it to think of names like Cristoforo Colombo and Giovanni Caboto, who sailed to North America in 1492 and 1497 as part of European exploration journeys to the “new world.” The history of colonization in Canada and North America in general is therefore inextricably linked to these names, although Italian respon­sibilities in the occupation of Canada are not always acknowledged as such. On the contrary, celebratory traces of this history are still visible in the names of streets, squares, lakes, rivers, mountains, etc., as well as in public holidays and commemorative monuments. The present article aims at addressing the power of names in the creation of cultural mem­ory. More specifically, the article explores the role that place-names and other commemorative practices linked to the Italian presence in Canada play in the commemoration of the colonial past and in the production of a narrative that celebrates the Italian contribution to its colonial occupation. Naming places, people, or holidays is not just a matter of choosing one name over another, but it reveals ideological stances and narratives. Similarly, the presence of celebratory monuments turning Caboto and Colombo into national myths and symbols of Italian Cana­dians ends up affecting the relationships between local Italian-Canadian communities and Indigenous peoples. Possible alternatives may change attitudes towards Indigenous peoples, thus promoting a new solidarity with the Italian-Canadian communities across the country.

The nation in bronze and granite: Creating national monuments in post‐Soviet Bishkek

AbstractScholars of nationalism have long looked to material forms of symbolic power to understand the politics and cultures of nations, and national monuments specifically have been studied as reflections of ideological programmes of political regimes. However, these approaches have paid insufficient attention to processes of creation. Given the importance of material symbols as sites through which the nation is understood, I argue that analysing the dynamics of creation expands our understanding of symbolic nation making. Using the case of Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, and focusing on moments of creation and the actors involved in them, I build a conceptual framework for understanding the construction of national symbols on the ground based on three interconnected and co‐constituting dynamics: spatial, temporal and aesthetic/semiotic. Using this framework, I demonstrate how meaning and materiality are related to one another both as component and consequent in the creation of national monuments and how it is their very imperfection as material representations that provides the context for the nation to emerge as a category of discourse.

MYSTICAL SYMBOLS IN THE CULINARY DISCOURSE OF JOAN HARRIS’S NOVEL “CHOCOLAT”

The article deals with analyzing the nature of Joan Harris’s novel “Chocolat” mystical symbolism. The authors state that the culinary discourse is a mixed, personal-oriented type of communication, which is manifested in the everyday communication sphere which has an institutional character. Foreign language Culinary discourse is represented by precedent texts of culinary recipes that reflect the specifics of national culture, which has social and gender characteristics and is a special type of communication that uses certain professional-oriented signs – terminology, stable turns of phrase, characteristic morphosyntactic structures. It is noted that sign are characterized by a symbolic nature, structuredness, the presence of cultural interpretants, individually authored nature of coding, communicative orientation. Certain features of the image indicate that it acts as a special connecting link between the life world of a person and the linguistic representation of this world. This is done through the process of encoding spiritual and cultural values with the help of linguistic means (signs). The magic in the plot of the novel is connected, first of all, with mystical seniority. The novel, written as a diary of the heroine and her daughter, alternating with the letters of Vianne’s antagonist, Curé Raynaud, to his father, intimates the story from the beginning, emphasizing the specific symbolism of the characters’ world. All this makes it possible to imagine chocolate as a mystical substance that evokes a whole range of sensations described in detail in the novel.

Propagating Afrikaner nationalism: The Voortrekker stamps as icons of an ideology, c.1933–1949

AbstractThis paper posits the importance of visual representations in cultivating a national consciousness among white Afrikaners in South Africa. It provides a case study of stamps issued to commemorate the centenary of the Great Trek in 1938 that sought to raise awareness of and funds for the Voortrekker Monument project. Although stamps are, ordinarily, symbols of banal nationalism, the Voortrekker stamps resonated strongly with the sentiments the Afrikaner volk (people). They reified an iconography of the Voortrekkers and the narrative of the Great Trek already embedded in a canon of texts, images and rituals. The paper provides a semiotic reading of the designs of the stamps and shows how they shaped the cultural imaginary of Afrikaners. Although the Voortrekker stamps were issued with the approval of the postal authorities, they were actually commissioned by the Sentrale Volksmonumentekomitee [Central People's Monuments Committee (SVK)], which had close ties to the National Party (NP) opposition. Although the project was largely state sponsored, the SVK insisted upon its autonomy. Thus the government sanctioned a project over which it exercised no jurisdiction. The United Party paid a price for accommodating sectional Afrikaner interests when it lost control of the state in 1948.

“Local guys wanted”: homoerotic photography, censorship, and national belonging in apartheid South Africa – the case of Alternative Books (1981-1991)

This article explores the singular case of Alternative Books (AB), a South African publisher of homoerotic photography active in the late apartheid period. While AB's titles broadly engaged established Western aesthetic traditions of the male nude (salient in gay print cultures of the twentieth century), their erotic scenes frequently played out against national landmarks and symbols, suggesting a distinct mode of vernacular homoerotic photography. Given the widespread disenfranchisement of gay men during apartheid, this study considers the affective and political potential of such images for reconciling same-sex desire with national identity, albeit for a limited (that is, predominantly white) historical audience. First, to plot the history of social homophobia and anti-gay legislation in apartheid South Africa, this study considers censorship discourse a compelling barometer of the state's attitude towards male homosexuality during this time. Second, via comparison with contemporaneous homoerotic commodities distributed in apartheid South Africa, accessed from the GALA Queer Archive, this article suggests that AB's visual language uniquely challenged heteronormative associations with the South African landscape to open the nation to queer possibilities.

Onomatopoeia in representing the semantics of love, affection, and gender relations

The paper describes the sound symbolic nature of linguistic units with the semantics of love, affection, gender relations in German and Russian. It is known that onomatopoeic words with the semantics of blow, the physiological sound of the body and the sounds of speech in German and Russian languages regularly form associated with love, affection, and gender relations. In most cases, this type of semantics is expressed by combination of plosives and sonorants sounds, and also vibrants. Inter-relation between sound and meaning, as well as the soundiconic functions of phonotypes is clarified: voiceless fricative sounds – reflection of pejorativeness, less often – femininity (dearness and softness); explosive and vibrant sounds –reflection of strong feelings, pressure, perseverance, aggressiveness in a relationship.

Violent conflict and National identity among the Pakistani Pukhtuns (Pashtuns) in Swat Pakistan: A theoretical and empirical exploration

ABSTRACT Using an extended constructivist position and the case study of Pukhtuns in Swat, Pakistan, this study outlines the interplay between violent conflict (between Muslim Militants and Pakistani state military) and National identity and its markers. The conflict is peculiar; (1) because of the use of Islam by Muslim militants which is an identity marker for Pakistani national identity and Pukhtun ethnic identity, (2) the case of Swat, an ex-princely state integrated only in 1969 in Pakistan with a history of religious violent mobilizations. Further, as Pakistani state has been facing problems with the process of national integration of its multiple ethnicities, the case of national identity becomes significant to be explored The study argues that the impacts of conflict and violence on national identity are complex and multi-dimensional. National identity is neither lost nor reaffirmed, yet as a result of the violent conflict. The article explores the impacts of violent conflict for religion (Islam), State institutions (military), discourses (of pride, sacrifice, and complains) and national symbols (holidays) as markers of National Identity in Pakistan through a fieldwork in Swat from November 2016 to May 2017 and later in November 2021.

The sacred stone from the sea. Archaeological and ethnographic perspectives on the ritual value of coral across the Pacific

ABSTRACTThe Pacific Islands offer a variety of marine environments providing peoples in the present and past with abundant coral materials, a “stone from the sea”. Archaeologists have long recognised the importance of coral in ancient contexts, whether as gravel, natural branches, squared blocks or cut‐and‐dress slabs. Coral was also used to manufacture tools such as files or pounders and incorporated in monumental ceremonial architecture as a favoured construction material and foundation offerings. However, Pacific Islanders also employed coral material for other ritual applications that remain overlooked in the literature. In this article, we consider the multiple uses of coral in the archaeological and ethnographic records of three Pacific regions: Central‐East Polynesia (CEP), New Caledonia and the Torres Strait Islands. This includes offering of coral branches, sometimes associated with cairns, paraphernalia and magic stones, also production of coral lime for body ornamentation. Using these case studies, we consider material selection, modes of deposition, archaeological and ethnographic contexts, associations with other features and artefacts, before interrogating the potential significance of these unrealised datasets. By doing so, we shed new light on the ritual value of coral and reflect on the symbolic nature and function of this material.

The Political Function and Inference of the World Cup 2022 in Qatar Lingua- Franca and Language Chants

The purpose of this paper is to examine the political function and inference of the World Cup 2022 in Qatar Lingua- Franca and language chants, a symbol of Arabs nationalism and unity. This has always been implied in negative concepts, but this research argues that such understanding misrepresents most football chants. The discourse involving football in World Cups’ interaction is frequently positive and integral. Language chants function as a lingua franca amongst football fans. This linguistic coding is however both inclusive and selective. Multilingual football fans/supporters such as Arabs may appreciate the resentful reputation of being nationalists and united as the situation may be, but the jeopardy of political uncertainty when all the language chants are not dealt with justly. The jeopardy of politicizing linguistic bias or disparity is high in multilingual sports arenas where one nation or language is viewed to dominate others. In the World Cup 2022 (in Qatar), Arabic and English are the official languages with equal positions. However, the strong institutionalization of linguistic stance has generated intricacies of superiority and inferiority among Arabs and others (English, French, Spanish, etc.) Arabs interacted in the fight between two language movements: Arabic-only movement performing as defensive nationalism and English-only performing as offensive Westernism. The two movements that involve the origins of nationalism and Westernism are in rivalry for endurance in sports arenas, and in attempting to do so, they recreate national and political identities grounded on language affinities. The research views that the use of lingua franca and language chants can be inferred as a symbol or linguistic umbrella for defensive nationalism and unity, which oblige political claims that may go as further as questioning the spirit of nationalism and unity.

The voice of COVID-19: Breath and cough recording classification with temporal decision trees and random forests

Symbolic learning is the logic-based approach to machine learning, and its mission is to provide algorithms and methodologies to extract logical information from data and express it in an interpretable way. Interval temporal logic has been recently proposed as a suitable tool for symbolic learning, specifically via the design of an interval temporal logic decision tree extraction algorithm. In order to improve their performances, interval temporal decision trees can be embedded into interval temporal random forests, mimicking the corresponding schema at the propositional level. In this article we consider a dataset of cough and breath sample recordings of volunteer subjects, labeled with their COVID-19 status, originally collected by the University of Cambridge. By interpreting such recordings as multivariate time series, we study the problem of their automated classification using interval temporal decision trees and forests. While this problem has been approached with the same dataset as well as with other datasets, in all cases, non-symbolic learning methods (usually, deep learning-based) have been applied to solve it; in this article we apply a symbolic approach, and show that it does not only outperform the state-of-the-art obtained with the same dataset, but its results are also superior to those of most non-symbolic techniques applied on other datasets. As an added bonus, thanks to the symbolic nature of our approach, we are also able to extract explicit knowledge to help physicians characterize typical COVID-positive cough and breath.

Republic of Moldova: between the presidential and parliamentary republic

The article examines the form of government of the Republic of Moldova - from the proclamation of the country’s independence in 1991 to the present day. The evolution of the forms of government during 3 stages of the country’s history will be analyzed: 1991 - 1994 (from independence until the adoption, on July 29, 1994 of the country’s Constitution), 1994 - 2000 (from the adoption of the Constitution and until the amendments of the Constitution from July 5, 2000) and 2000 – till our days. The article will examine how the form of government has changed from a de facto presidential presidency during the term of the first president of the country, Mircea Snegur, to a semi-presidential republic, after the adoption of the Constitution in 1994 and finally the transformation of the state into a parliamentary republic, after changes made by the party led by the country’s third president, Vladimir Voronin. This fact, notwithstanding the amendments brought by the Decision of the Constitutional Court of March 4, 2016, which restored the way of electing the president of the country directly by the people, did not change in any way the prerogatives of the head of state, who acts in the past and continue to act in the present mainly as a national symbol.

Rethinking Post-Authoritarian Chile through Its Popular Music

AbstractThis article is a study of Chilean popular music produced during the 1990s, the first decade following the end of the Pinochet dictatorship. The return of democracy and a period of strong economic growth contributed to a boom in the Chilean music industry. A wealth of music was recorded and the opportunities for listening to live music multiplied. The article's main objectives are to illuminate the ways in which Chilean popular music addressed democracy's inspiring promises and frustrating limits and to consider how Chileans used popular music to foster new post-authoritarian identities. First, it argues that music was used to reclaim national symbols that had been coopted by the dictatorship. Second, it considers the music of two generations of musicians who returned to the country after living in exile. Finally, it focuses on punk and hip-hop, the styles that produced the most significant examples of protest music in the post-authoritarian period.

Cuando las cruces hablan. Analisis de los rastros de ritualidad popular sobre la pared desde una optica antropologica

Since a whole series of investigations began to appear more than twenty years ago on the so-called scriptures on display up to the present day, especially those on popular epigraphs, studies on certain manifestations captured on walls have made it possible to define a very common practice, times enormously repetitive, as occurs with certain symbols of a religious nature embodied on civil and religious architecture. However, even though we have an important corpus at our disposal, there are not many interpretations of an anthropological nature that allow us to place in specific coordinates the intentions through which certain writings and symbols were shaped in very specific contexts. Through the study of three particular examples of the religious architecture of the community of Castilla y León (Spain), we try to address the intentionality of these manifestations and shed light on a phenomenon, very widespread in the Christian world, little studied to date.

Culture wars, perception gap and affective polarization: an approach from the Spanish case

Previous research has shown the existence of strong relationships between affective polarization and culture wars, but it is unknown to what extent this emotional division is, in fact, a ‘false polarization’ generated from second-order beliefs in those identity issues that categorize and define group membership. Using data from the ‘First National Survey of Political Polarization’ in Spain, an operationalization of the concept of ‘perception gap’ is proposed and an individual measurement of it through a formula that adapts the coefficient of Average Deviation (Dx̄), defined as the arithmetic mean of the absolute values of the deviations from the mean. This seeks to describe the ‘perception gap’ in Spain around two relevant culture wars in the discursive articulation of the ideological blocs: gender violence and national symbols. In the same way, the relationship between the partisan affiliation of the voters and the levels of perceptive gap is analyzed. In this regard, it is shown that, in those matters that are claimed as a symbolic property of an ideological bloc, the supporters of this bloc have a higher level of ‘perception gap’, that is, they tend to exaggerate their differences with the outgroup distorting the real positions of the adversaries. When the thematic battle redirects to a position of moral superiority of the group and becomes a key issue for intergroup differentiation, the homogeneity of the positions of its members is more accentuated and a greater perceptual deviation bias is also produced.

Persona Ken - A Self-Monitoring Application

We present a daily To-do managerto efficiently manage daily goals and tasks. Our system will help to create and track daily tasksbounded in long-term goals which the users can securely access anytime from anywhere via the Internet. The Daily To-do Manager not only keeps track of the goals and tasks but also tracks the task completion of user by dividing task into smaller parts. It also provides means to analyze day to day tasks efficiency via reports displaying complete statistics of tasks achieved as well as total tasks planned along with daily streaks indicating no. of consecutive days for which task efficiency is good. thought. Here there are two contradictory functions of education which are bothnecessary and it can be shown thatthere are conditions of society under which these can be reconciled. In our study we found that in the general To-do manager applications, tasks are listed in binary form - completed oruncompleted. But contrary to popular belief, people do not complete their task in one go. Instead, they prefer to divide the task in smaller chunks and want their partial completions to be managed by To-do manager. Bytracking out partial task completions of user, we hope to provide a solid base for laying the design of a daily. Keywords Cultural Heritage, Elements of Indian Culture, National Symbols, Fine Arts, Performing Arts, Social Structure.