Humanities Bulletin

Umberto Eco’s Writing Labyrinth: From the Code’s Theory to the Interpretation Process

Bujar Hoxha — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

The present text will concentrate on some of Eco’s theoretical books on the semiotic method. The primary focus shall be on the narration theory, semiotics “proper” (at least, according to Peirce), and the structural approach to semiotics. The reason for stating the above is the interdisciplinarity in developing the semiotic method (as designated by Eco, among other related authors) to demonstrate its importance in the present century. Not only is one academic approach relevant for exploring scientific matters of the sort, but more of them (such as the dichotomies between ontology and epistemology, “artistic” vs “realistic” occurrences, as well as the method of writing itself as a “special technique”). As initially designated by Peirce, the “unlimited” semiosis process is meant to unite or see as a totality of several semiotic approaches closely related to Eco’s work, besides, naturally, the permanent and uninterruptible “transformation” and moveability of signs. The goal is twofold: methodological and scientific.

Settings Predication and Opposition in Dào Dé Jing Thought Experimental Analyses of (e.g.) dao ke dao fei chang dao (III) Global Cross-cultural and Religious Aspects

C.P. Hertogh — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 00:00:00 -0400

In this contribution we apply methodologies of semantics of thought experiments (TE) to Dào Dé Jing (DDJ). Like all TE research, the research is not foremost about explanation of the contents of DDJ, although some indications may be given, but it is intended as a manual how to read and understand DDJ, e.g., how to handle the many oppositions (pairs of opposites, linguistically speaking, antonyms), how to understand the many aphoristic conundrums, like the first line dào ke dào fei cháng dào. Dào ke dào … may be analyzed and interpreted as modus ponens instantiation, whereby relevant aspect is derived as major from information in same chapter or elsewhere in DDJ, in this case, e.g., chapter 35, as in accordance with hermeneutic principle that interpretation of single parts may be derived from other parts or whole of the text, and vice versa (hermeneutic circle). Wúwéi and its aphorisms could be analyzed as (double) negation resulting in seeming contradictions (paradoxes) and univocal tautologies—as in Donia Zhang (2022) on translation of ‘non-action contrary to nature’—instead of mystifying adagial advices. In the first part of Interpretations we touch upon Wittgenstein’s ‘noticing of an aspect’ (1953, # xi), Da Costa’s and Beziau’s paraconsistent situation, optical illusions, yin-yáng diagram (Ch. 32), Huàtóus, Koans etc. Hofstadter (1979/1999) proposed a global cross-cultural hypothesis that feedback loops (as we know from present-day IT and AI) may represent the core of cognition, seat of consciousness. We show that logical analyses of spiritual thought experiments (STE), like Huàtóus and Koans, are well-possible without denying possibly beneficial effects of meditation. Lastly, in Interpretations, we try to explain enigmatic nature of many aphorisms from an antithetical attitude towards views and practices of contemporary ruling government, as by putting the generic statements back into their particular context.

Historicity and Axiology: Temporal Implications for Axiology

Bennett Gilbert — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

To develop the axiology of moral (or ethical) values, phenomenological analysis must look at temporality in a way that is unfamiliar to it. This way is through knowledge and experience of the actual historical past, from which it has been separated by the Heideggerian conception of historicity and its classical Husserlian analysis of time consciousness. The development of historical studies helps to make this possible. A simple sample model of the diachronesis of the awareness of ethical significance, value, and obligation is presented. It moves the analysis from a presentist focus to the field of experience in which subjects develop moral agency. Two concepts, historical phenomenology and interpersonal values-making, are advanced as the bases of a research program. It will amplify the potential of phenomenology to understand ethical goods such as empathy and will also encourage interactions of ethics, philosophy of history, and phenomenology.

The Ideal of Bildung in the 20th Century: Crisis – Reconfiguration – Erosion?

Till Neuhaus, Alexandre Alves — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

The following article addresses a peculiar development, namely the abandonment of the concept of Bildung in Germany; the same state where it has been developed, discussed, and refined. This development can be traced back to the 1950s – despite humanistic Bildung also being under attack during National Socialism – and be ascribed to different dynamics which mutually reinforced each other. Therefore, this article will cover three key aspects regarding the reconstruction of the here hinted at dynamics: Firstly, it will further sketch out the peculiarity of this specific dynamic and further contextualize it historically. Secondly, it will identify Bildung’s main adversaries (the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory and the empirically-minded educational science) and illustrate their axiomatic presuppositions as well as their coming-into-being. Thirdly, the paper will elaborate on two positions (Reinhart Koselleck and Hans Georg Gadamer) which attempted to argue for the usefulness of the concept despite them ultimately failing, at least nationally. The paper will close with a reflection on key aspects and an informed speculation regarding Bildung’s future.

L’éclat de Antigone: For the Plural Form of Lacanian Ethics

Shengzhou Yu — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

In this paper, starting from the idiosyncratic ethics of heroin, we attempt to follow the thread in Lacan to specifically delineate Antigone with her unbearable splendor. Antigone inherits her debt of the incest from her lineage while pays it off at the cost of her life. In an ambivalent sense, she does not succumb to the desire of the Other and not to the desire on her own, either. This Lacanian Antigonean ethics is antagonistic to the chimera of moral ideals as well as the commensurable politics for the good(s). By powerful and close reading, we rather take the very path to the archi-ethics through her traversal of the limit of Atè and of being human, bearing henceforth “beyond death” the connotation of the ever-presence of the signifier. In conclusion, the desiring subject for the void unravels the particular dimension towards the death-beyond-limit which vindicates the Lacanian ethics in plural form.

Historical Revisionism as Trauma Revisited: And, Why Historical Revisionism Is Necessary Anyway

Jason Morgan — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

Historical revisionism is a feature of much history writing, because much history writing is done by members of dominant social groups or by historians unaware of, or consciously working to uphold, dominant historiographical (or social, cultural, religious, or political) paradigms. “Historical revisionism,” in this usage, means the occlusion of parts of the past, often traumas by which dominant historiographical paradigms are constructed and maintained. But this first act of historical revisionism necessitates a corrective, a second historical revisionism that overcomes the first, falsifying revision of historical truth. This second act of historical revisionism often entails revisiting occluded traumas. However, this is necessary, because history is a moral act, and historians are, ideally, moral actors.

From Great Deeds to Time Sequence as the Source of the Meaning of History: Christianity, the Enlightenment, and Marx’s Alternative Modernity

Sinkwan Cheng — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

This essay argues that linear time is not inherently colonialistic; rather, its politics emerge from its interactions with the power structures of its era. I explore the progressive roles of linear time in Christianity, the Enlightenment, and Marxism within key historical contexts, highlighting also the diversity of linear temporalities. This diversity enabled Marx to position his “Revolution” against both Christian and Enlightenment temporalities while drawing from them. Key points include:

All three linear temporalities challenged social hierarchies—for instance, by redefining human identity on their future potential rather than birth origin.
The Enlightenment's homogeneous time was countered by Christianity on "original sin" and Marx on capitalism. Christianity maintained grace as humanity's only salvation from cycles of “vanities”; Marx advocated for proletariat revolution to break capitalist alienation’s vicious cycles.

Building on the (dis-)continuities among these temporalities, I show how Marx initiated an alternative modernity, radically heterogenizing (the temporality of) modernity before post-structuralism. Christianity emphasized grace as humanity’s salvation from cyclical time, while Marx advocated for proletariat revolution to escape the cycles of alienation. I illustrate the (dis-)continuities among these temporalities to show how Marx initiated an alternative modernity, significantly contributing to the heterogenization of modernity before post-structuralism.

We Need to Talk About “Sumerian Literature”

Cristian Popescu — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

The scope and purpose of the world’s earliest extant literature remain a matter of debate. Why bother to debate, however, since Sumerologists can study Sumerian literature despite their disagreement on the very definition of their topic, or even on the need thereof? Simply because this disagreement risks to hinder the understanding that the study seeks, is my contention. My research hypothesis is that a definition of Sumerian literature can be reached that is explanatory, involving a proximal genus and a specific differentia. In order to test this hypothesis, informed by Sherma’s (2011; 2022) “hermeneutics of intersubjectivity”, I argue that Sumerian literary compositions should be defined by the specific difference of being framed as distant in space, time, manner, or any combination thereof (that is, may I say, of their being of yonder, of yore, and/or of wonder) in contrast with other Sumerian compositions. A brief discussion of this definition against the backdrop of ancient Near Eastern literature helps to situate this paper beyond Sumerology and in the theory and history of literature. Indeed, Sumerian literature has a “performative” dimension in terms of the self-transformation of its literary audience. The definition of Sumerian literature is a topic whose time has come.

Stigma/ta: Eyes Slant like Chinks of Christ, or Chin-Kee of American Born Chinese

Sheng-mei Ma — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

Genuine pushbacks from Asian North American—off-white, yellow-ish—minority against white mainstream stereotypes are few and far between, given that the bulk of off-white (self-)representations blossom in English after a lifetime of nurture by, and internalization of, white culture. Thus, in their mother tongue of English, projected from the white patriarchal gaze, off-white visual culture reprises Western Orientalist polarization of the “Chink,” pardon my Americanism. On the one hand, the racial slur “Chink” stigmatizes the they-all-look-alike Asian Other as having eyes slanting upward and/or in long narrow slits, from Robert Hans van Gulik’s self-designed book cover to off-white Gene Luen Yang’s graphic books and Domee Shi’s animations. On the other, the West projects its own longing onto the exotic Other, whose visual, auditory, and sensorial differences “open sesame” to otherworldly, fantastical escapades. The offensive stigma of slant-eyed Asians hence morphs into, not to mince words, the crucified Christ’s stigmata, windows to the soul of transcendent resurrection. The West—white as well as off-white—manages to eat the body of the Other and to have it, too, as proof of the West’s spirituality. This project examines cases of Oriental stigma of slanting eyes transformed into stigmata of white and off-white spiritual triumphalism. I hereby talk back against the linguistic and cultural hegemony that schizophrenically splits the racial or immigrant other, skewing/skewering Oriental eyes, from Van Gulik to Yang, Shi, and the like. Let us turn our gaze to those strange, even monstrous, eyes in the mirror!

A Schopenhauerian Reading of Lovecraft’s Fiction: The Will, the Intellect, and Never-Ending Struggle of Life in Cosmic Horror

Justine Shu-Ting Kao — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

This essay aims to explore how Lovecraft applies Schopenhauer’s theory of the will. Lovecraft’s works reflect Schopenhauerian Will, wherein Schopenhauer underscores the service of the intellect to the will. Yet Lovecraft develops his cosmic horror by reiterating the vanishing of humanism into an unknown amorphous form of life due to the influence of a monstrous force within the will. The first section of the essay involves the explication of the will in Schopenhauerian ideas: the will itself is immanent, undifferentiated, and indifferent to the existence of an individual while it maintains the existence of the species. The second section provides a discussion of Lovecraft’s worldview. The significant notion in Lovecraft’s view of the world as something sad parallels Schopenhauer’s theory regarding the will and immeasurable sufferings in the world of phenomenon. However, the horror presented in Lovecraft’s fiction might be more frightening than the blind force of the will in Schopenhauer’s ideas: Lovecraft’s creatures regress to amorphous beings manipulated by the monstrous force of the will. Finally, the essay focuses on Lovecraft’s fiction, including The Shadow Over Innsmouth and At the Mountains of Madness, tracing the extraterrestrial beings as representations of an indefatigable and despotic will.

Different Shapes of Anarchy in Edward Albee’s Who is Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Olfa Gandouz, Khaled Knani — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

Edward Albee’s Who is Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1961) starts with chaos and anarchy, subverting the traditionally strict gender roles and cultural prescriptions and expectations. Albee’s play has revolutionized dramatic writing by opening the play with a deep male identity crisis. The repressive and oppressive gender roles are mimicked. This paper will try to demonstrate that Albee’s play is a one pervaded by different levels anarchy, instability of meanings and both verbal and structural turbulence. The play’s title indicates two instances of anarchy and sources of fear: the female and the mad. This paper will demonstrate how the reversal of gender roles operates in the play: the husband is feminized while the wife is masculinized, the wife plays an emasculating and unfeminine role while the husband is dominated and in a submissive position. The play’s anti-realistic and post-modern structure conveys ideas of improvisation, structural anarchy. It is unbound, fluid and both regressive and digressive. If anything, the play’s structure is anarchically unstable, defying the traditional realistic strictures. It is written in a grotesque and comic way that subverts the conventions of the comic genre. The disruptive verbal energy and dueling in the play aims at displaying disrespect for some of the main American values and institutions: family, marriage and academia are constantly debunked. The play stages a state of anarchy beneath the happy and tranquil surface of these institutions. This paper will also attempt to show how the play of anarchy has eventually to be stopped in order for the social order to be restored and vindicated.

Broken Clocks, Reclaimed Spaces: Melancholy and Resistance in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury and Ghassan Kanafani’s All That’s Left to You

Mourad Romdhani — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

This paper explores the themes of melancholy and resistance in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury (1929) and Ghassan Kanafani’s M? Tabaqq? Lakum / All That’s Left to You (1966). Reincarnated in Kanafani’s work, the characters in Faulkner’s novel oscillate between past and present, experiencing a sense of imperial anxiety that casts a melancholic shadow over them due to colonialism or the fall of imperial “empire”. Following Faulkner’s Quentin and Jason Compson as well as Kanafani’s Hamid and Maryam through their day and night journeys, this essay studies motifs such as the wall clock, the wristwatch, and the land offering a postcolonial analysis of time and space. It concludes that while the colonized individual uses this melancholy as a means of resistance, finding in it a threshold to voice and identity, the colonizer, faced with this resistance, experiences a melancholy that prompts a reevaluation of prevailing colonial concepts.

Shaftesbury’s Re-imagining of the Passions

Madhvi Zutshi — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

The Third Earl of Shaftesbury is generally viewed as the key philosopher in eighteenth-century England to reiterate the classical idea that man’s virtue lay in recognizing the interconnectedness of all beings through his use of reason. In the face of a growing acceptance of self-interest as natural to man in the eighteenth century, Shaftesbury, through his writings, has been understood to have countered the view of man as naturally selfish by arguing that man through his reason can comprehend how all beings are organically linked, and desire the good of all. In this article, I focus on how Shaftesbury addressed a more particular problem – the idea of public good was now being seen as too abstract and remote to evoke the instinctive benevolence and virtue in man. In his time, the passions were increasingly understood as the prime mover or motivation for man’s benevolent actions, and reason was not adequate enough to move men in desiring public good, especially the welfare of people outside their own familiar circle. This article shows how Shaftesbury reworks the older idea of virtue based on reason, into a virtue that is interwoven with the passions, in order to answer the problem of how people can be motivated to desire public good. Shaftesbury refurbishes a notion of virtue based on reason, and seeks to make it coterminous with a natural affection towards the idea of public good.

The Representation of Music in the Novels of Chinua Achebe, Aminata Sow Fall and Zora Neale Hurston

Alassane Abdoulaye Dia — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

This paper explores the multidimensional concept of musical representation in the African and African American novel with a focus on the works of Chinua Achebe, Aminata Sow Fall and Zora Neale Hurston. It analyzes how music conveys meaning both within and beyond linguistic frameworks. It contributes to the philosophical debates surrounding whether music can represent anything beyond its popular concept as means of entertainment. The study delves into the role of metaphors, symbols, gestures, and embodied cognition in musical understanding, arguing that listeners often credit narrative or emotive content to musical structures. Drawing on the examples of these prominent writers, the paper highlights how musical motifs can evoke movement, emotion, or narrative arcs without requiring textual elements. Finally, the paper concludes that music as a representational system operates through dynamic, non-verbal analogies to human experience; it challenges, to some extent, the notion that representation requires fixed semantic content.

Behind The Scenes of a Mysterious Meeting: Romanian And British Diplomacy on the 1983 Meeting Between Pope John Paul II and Lech Wa??sa

Gabriel Stelian Manea — Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 -0400

Negotiations for organizing Pope John Paul II’s second visit to Poland in 1983 were marked by controversies regarding a possible meeting between the Pope and Lech Wa??sa, the leader of Solidarity. The Vatican considered the meeting essential, while the Polish government rejected it, fearing its political impact. For months, intense negotiations took place involving the Vatican, the Polish government, and the Episcopate. The research uses diplomatic documents from the archives of Romania and the United Kingdom, supplemented by reports from the Western press. The visit, initially planned for 1982, was postponed due to political tensions. Eventually, a compromise allowed a private meeting between the Pope and Wa??sa, but it did not fully satisfy the involved parties. The events highlighted political tensions and underscored the symbolic role of the visit in supporting Solidarity’s ideals. The meeting, lasting about 30 minutes, remained confidential but was considered a symbolic gesture of support for Polish workers and Solidarity’s ideals. However, subsequent articles in the Western press speculated about an agreement between the Vatican and Jaruzelski’s regime, suggesting that Wa??sa was marginalized to facilitate national reconciliation. The controversial editorial in L’Osservatore Romano highlighted Wa??sa’s sacrifice, generating criticism towards the Vatican.