21th-Century Studies

Anul III, Semestrul 6, S.I.D., a.u. 2018-2019. Curs (obligatoriu) | Credite: 5 | Evaluare: examen. În fiecare marți, de la 14.00-16.00, sala M415. Curs 1: 19 februarie. Curs 2: 26 februarie. Curs 3: 5 martie. Curs 4: 12 martie. Curs 5: 19 martie. Curs 6: 26 martie. Curs 7: 2 aprilie. Curs 8: 9 aprilie. Curs 9: 16 aprilie. Curs 10: 23 aprilie. Examen: mai 2019.

Writings on the metropolis generally foreground illimitability, stressing thereby that the urban ultimately remains both illegible and unintelligible. Instead, the purpose of this interdisciplinary study is to demonstrate that mentality as a tool offers orientation in the urban realm. Nora Pleßke develops a model of urban mentality to be employed for cities worldwide. Against the background of the Spatial Turn, she identifies dominant urban-specific structures of London mentality in contemporary London novels, such as Monica Ali's »Brick Lane«, J.G. Ballard's »Millennium People«, Nick Hornby's »A Long Way Down«, and Ian McEwan's »Saturday«.

In this master thesis I have investigated how and why Norway abolished its extraterritoriality in China. Extraterritoriality was a privilege that allowed Norwegians, as well as other foreign citizens in China, to be sentenced by their own national laws instead of the Chinese ones. This privilege was originally established by Great Britain in 1842 and then later extended to other foreign powers throughout the 19th century. This happened mainly because Western nations deemed the Chinese laws to be unjust, brutal and arbitrary and thus incapable of guaranteeing the safety and judicial rights of its foreign population. Hence extraterritoriality was enjoyed by Western citizens for about a century until the mid 1940s.
In this thesis I have examined how and why Norway positioned itself and participated in the abolishment-processes of foreign extraterritoriality in China. I have explored as well as investigated the correspondence between the Norwegian diplomats in China and the Norwegian government. I have through this examined how the correspondence reflects the Norwegian role within this process. I have also made use of several specialist studies that have researched extraterritoriality in China as a historical phenomenon, and thereby attempted to put my Norwegian findings into a greater context. I have also tried to see how the general historical developments in both China and Norway may be understood as contexts for the decisions that were made. 
Conclusively I have seen that Norway and China agreed in 1931 that Norway would abolish its extraterritoriality in China when all the other treaty powers did the same. This mutual understanding lasted for over a decade, Norwegian citizens thereby continued to enjoy their extraterritorial privileges while the negotiations between China and the great powers persisted. These negotiations lasted until the Second World War, when Great Britain and the United States agreed to abolish their extraterritoriality in 1943. Norway then followed their example and abolished its extraterritoriality the same year just as earlier promised.

Το παλαιστινιακό ζήτημα από το τέλος του Ψυχρού Πολέμου μέχρι σήμερα 1 ΠΕΡΙΕΧΟΜΕΝΑ: 1. Εισαγωγή 3 2. Το παλαιστινιακό ζήτημα από το τέλος του Ψυχρού Πολέμου μέχρι σήμερα 5 3. Επίλογος 12 Βιβλιογραφία 13 1. Εισαγωγή 2 Η περιοχή της Παλαιστίνης εδώ και χιλιάδες χρόνια αποτελεί πεδίο σύγκρουσης μεταξύ λαών 1 . Στα νεότερα χρόνια όμως ιδιαίτερα μετά την ίδρυση του κράτους του Ισραήλ, πράξη που αποφασίστηκε σύντομα μετά τη λήξη του Δευτέρου Παγκοσμίου Πολέμου, η περιοχή ταράζεται από νέες συγκρούσεις μεταξύ Παλαιστινίων και Ισραηλινών. Το γεγονός της απόφασης των Ηνωμένων Εθνών που προέβλεπε παράλληλη ίδρυση αυτόνομου Παλαιστινιακού κράτους, που ποτέ δεν εφαρμόστηκε, έπαιξε σίγουρα σημαντικό ρόλο στις εχθροπραξίες που επακολούθησαν στα επόμενα χρόνια και οι οποίες συνεχίζονται μέχρι και σήμερα. Η διχοτόμηση που επιβλήθηκε από τον ΟΗΕ το 1947 με την οποία αποφασίστηκε η διχοτόμηση της Παλαιστίνης σε δύο διαφορετικά κράτη, τα οποία διέφεραν σε ποιοτικά χαρακτηριστικά μεταξύ τους, ως προς τη γλώσσα, τον πολιτισμό και την θρησκεία, οδήγησε στην πόλωση δυο στρατοπέδων τα οποία συγκρούονταν μεταξύ τους με σκοπό την κυριαρχία της περιοχής. Οι συγκρούσεις αυτές κλιμακώθηκαν το επόμενο έτος και έτσι το 1948 έφθασαν στο σημείο να συγκρουστούν με σφοδρότητα οι Ισραηλινοί με τους Παλαιστινίους, οι οποίοι όμως συνεπικουρούνταν και από άλλες αραβικές χώρες 2 . Κατά τη διάρκεια του Ψυχρού Πολέμου οι Παλαιστίνιοι διαβλέποντας την ανάγκη συγκρότησης ενός οργανωμένου σώματος που θα διεκδικεί τα δικαιώματά τους για απελευθέρωση συγκρότησαν το 1964 την Οργάνωση για την Απελευθέρωση της Παλαιστίνης (PLO). Μάλιστα κατά τον Οκτώβριο του 1974 στη συνάντηση κορυφής των αραβικών χωρών που διεξήχθη στο Ραμπάτ του Μαρόκου ο Αραβικός Σύνδεσμος αναγνώρισε τη συγκεκριμένη οργάνωση ως τη μοναδική που μπορεί να εκπροσωπεί τον αραβικό πληθυσμό της Παλαιστίνης 3 . Μάλιστα λίγο πριν τη λήξη του Ψυχρού Πολέμου, το 1988, το Εθνικό Παλαιστινιακό Συνέδριο προχώρησε στη διακήρυξη της ανεξαρτησίας του Κράτους της Παλαιστίνης, 1 Ροπς, Ν., Η καθημερινή ζωή στην Παλαιστίνη στους χρόνους του Ιησού, σ. 87-93. 2 Moors A., Discourse and Palestine Power, Text and Context, σ. 2-4. 3 ΕΛΕΣΜΕ Περιοδικό Προβληματισμοί, Μέση Ανατολή, Παλαιστίνη και Παλαιστινιακό Ζήτημα. Δυο Έθνη στην ίδια γη (2009) [online], διαθέσιμο στο: http :// nrdisaster . blogspot . com /2009/02/ blog -post _01. html [Πρόσβαση 11 Νοεμβρίου 2010]

The session is here: https://tinyurl.com/yja66m85  - Just as the European Union previously condemned Hungarian leader Viktor Orban in June 2020, he paid an official visit to the Serbian authoritarian leader, then to the Belarusian leader Lukashenka. Numerous articles were published by the Hungarian opponents raising the question why Orban visited Lukashenka. The content of documents of the very visit is an official “state secrete”, against which the larger Hungarian party of opponents, the Liberal “Democratic Coalition” (whose support is now 12% among potential voters) officially protested in the parliament. The question for Eastern Europe is: where are the limits of the European Parliament's means and capabilities? When Brussels accepts sanctions against Hungary, the unpleasant member of the EU, and sanctions against Belarus, too, the dangerous neighbor of Europe, then, in spite of the sanctions, the autocratic leaders still laugh in the face of democratic Europe and mock the principles of Western democracy. An alliance seems to be unfolding among the dictators: Serbian soldiers took a part in the Belarusian events, as it has evidenced by the photos of a Belarusian journalist. Both Hungarian Orban and Belarusian Lukashenka often consult the Russian president Putin - much more often than it would be necessary. The author of the paper is of the opinion that Eastern European peoples can also support the processes of democratization in the very European Union itself: by changing their authoritarian regimes to open societies. Most of the Hungarian opponent parties agree that a future fall of Belarusian Lukashenka may sway the position of our Orban, too. As for the countries of “Intermarium”, the “Region-Between-Seas”, those located between the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea, these countries are not only children who need to grow up to the level of European countries, but also adult peoples who themselves influence European countries, as well. We used to think that there was no political culture in Belarus. But now Belarusians show that their level of political culture is remarkably high. It evidences the political culture can develop also where the level of economy is even lower, also where the tradition of democracy is not so strong as in highly developed societies of Western Europe, such as Great Britain. The development of political culture is a guarantee for the fall of dictators. That is why dictators restrict the development of the political culture, keeping the people in childhood of paternal state and repressing the freedom of expression. When the authoritative regimes in Eastern Europe change to open societies, then Russian Putin will lose his influence over Eastern Europe. The task is to raise the level of political culture, then peoples of Central and Eastern Europe can do a lot, together.

Marjorie Levison introduced the notion of New Formalism in 2007, to name a movement within literary criticism which vindicates the methodological principles of New Criticism, with the aim of dealing with the questions posed by the indeterminacy and undecidability of literary meaning, as upheld by the deconstructive critics. From then on, several researchers have joined the movement, such as Verena Theile and Linda Tredennick, who edited the volume New Formalism and Literary Theory (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). This work is remarkable because it provides the
Neoformalist methodological basis. Both Theile and Tredennick start from pedagogical premises with a view to recovering close reading as a didactic method for teaching literature, but without contradicting at any time the deconstruction theory on the instability of literary meaning. Despite the newness of approaching Derrida’s theory
from a pedagogical point of view, the New Formalist perspective does not clarify the issue of the impact of hermeneutical relativism on education. The present article engages with the matter in the light of Theile and Tredennick’s didactic proposal and, in addition, weighs the consequences for teaching literature, considering the deconstructive denial of hermeneutical consensus.

El artículo realiza un análisis del resurgimiento reciente de la extrema derecha en Estados Unidos, en concreto de la Derecha Alternativa. Se plantea la hipótesis de que resulte una consecuencia indeseada y tardía de algunas de las características esenciales del sistema liberal-democrático desde sus comienzos, en general y en el país. Se realiza, para ello, una exposición de tales premisas, trasladándolos a su vez a la historia reciente y situación actual de la sociedad estadounidense, marcada por una creciente desigualdad, competitivad y sentido meritocrático. Todo ello alimentaría la renovada vindicación de los llamados “derechos culturales” enarbolados por la Derecha Alternativa.