Honors Thesis Colloquium

Feelings of justification, belonging, integrity, and undying devotion could all be felt by members of a fraternity, church congregation, and a family. These feelings, too, could be felt (and arguably, to a much stronger degree) by members of militant New Religious Movement. A number of theories have been explored regarding why people join larger groups and the feelings that are evoked. I propose to write a thesis that would investigate socio-psychological questions surrounding the case of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). Although not formally considered a terrorist organization, the MB preaches moderately violent courses of action against those who oppose aspects of their ideology and they have allied themselves to extreme thought, namely the denial of the Holocaust, reinstatement of dar al-Islam, and complete segregation of genders, as Shari’ah (Muslim Law) mandates.

Past psychological literature focuses on inherent aspects of “personality” which are responsible for people becoming members of NRMs, such as terrorist organizations. In addition, they focus on the negative aspects (i. e., deindividuation) of an individual submitting to a larger and more powerful group. Through the case study of the MB, “personality” orientations will be shared and discussed, more emphasis will be placed on a situational attribution, and the positive aspects of belonging to such an organization will be discussed.

For the development of my thesis, I will draw on the work of the following authors: Weber, Herriot, Juergensmeyer, Horgan, James, Stern, Zimbardo, Galanter, Festinger, Strozier, etc. Although a number of these works are relatively antiquated, they have had a strong influence on the literature that currently exists on the subject and have given a strong foundation to the social psychological study of NRM. Mainly, I intend to use journal articles which will be derived from social psychology.

Hi everyone, you should now be able to post your annotated bibliographies in the category so designated.

The Anti-Heroine in Zhang Ailing’s “A Love that Topples a City”
& Wang Anyi’s The Song of Everlasting Sorrow

Spanning nearly half a century in their respective emergence onto the literary scene of China, prominent Chinese women writers Zhang Ailing and Wang Anyi directly pushed the boundaries of literature, engaging in a discourse on gender, sexuality, and modernity within their text.  Such engagement is most evident in the canonical works of the novella “A Love that Topples a City” (1944), the most renowned of Zhang’s Hong Kong stories, and Wang’s The Song of Everlasting Sorrow (1995), recipient of the Mao Dun Prize—China’s highest literary award.  In this thesis, I will show how the main female protagonists, apolitical and driven by motives of self-interest, are anti-heroines who nonetheless exert profound political influences.

I intend to explore the writing styles of both texts as being itself a form of antiheroic writing, against the conventional literary epic form dominant within the period of their writing. I will draw upon Rey Chow’s theory of the feminine detail and Jie Lu’s theory of gossip to show how the texts’ focus on the everyday, the banal, feminine spaces, and interiority as support for my claim of an antiheroic writing.  This will be further argued through drawing evidence that the protagonists’ actions are motivated by self-interest and not by intents of nation-building. Unlike the traditional hero, Liusu and Wang Qiyao become admired not for their actual qualities, but for their existence of an idealized abstract, as a form of Oriental past.  They are romanticized as embodiments of the bygone Shanghai.

In order to demonstrate how the protagonists are antiheroines, I will discuss the role of antiheroines as defined by other critics.  Beckson argues that “the anti-hero[ine] finds commitment to ideals difficult or impossible because of his sense of helplessness in a world over which [s]he has no control.”    In “A Love that Topples a City,” Bai Liusu is a divorcee trapped within her own household, enduring the harsh antagonism of multiple members of the extended family.  Discontent with her helpless position, her attraction to playboy Fan Liuyuan, who recently returned from London, is the physical form of her individualistic desire to escape her boredom—to divorce her family.  Her apoliticalness is observed by her response to the societal disruption caused by the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong as a pure means of obtaining Liuyuan and escaping from her family altogether.  Conversely, this revolutionary atmosphere that is essentially beneficial for Liusu has the opposite effect for Wang Qiyao of The Song of Everlasting Sorrow.  Wang Qiyao is a figure unwilling to adapt to the modernizing ideals and norms set into motion by the Communist takeover.  This unwillingness is not caused by political ideology, but by the individualistic desire to escape boredom, desperately clinging onto the customs of a past.  She becomes a portrait of “Old Shanghai,” remaining static, ahistorical and apolitical as the architectural, cultural, and social landscape of Shanghai constantly transform and evolve around her.

Notwithstanding the apolitical motives of the anti-heroines, they exert influences within a political and social context.  This claims attempts to respond to traditional connotations of antiheroines as being failures and therefore unable to leave a certain impact or relate significantly with the greater world.  At the conclusion of “A Love that Topples a City,” Liusu’s impact is generalized to the collective actions of others just like her that disrupts social norms to the point that an entire city collapses.  Meanwhile, Wang Qiyao is presented as a distinct individual within society, a microcosm that is indicative of the macrocosm that is a transforming society. Wang Anyi calls attention to the fact that there are many other Shanghainese girls just like Wang Qiyao.  The ordinariness of both characters is yet another quality aligning them as anti-heroines.

Aside from analyzing the primary texts of both novels in English as well as the original Chinese, I will also be drawing upon a number of secondary texts, including peer-reviewed journal articles, literary criticism books, essays by both authors, and one New York Times Sunday Book Review on Anyi’s novel by Francine Prose.  I also intend on gathering articles written in Chinese.  In examining what factors allow both protagonists to constitute an anti-heroine, a key aim of my research is to focus on the relationship of women within a modernizing, revolutionary society and the implications on women identity and gender politics.

Hi Jesse,

I am not sure how interested you would be in this or how relevant it is to your topic (it seems as though it might help you with your research) but there is an event called The City’s End at the Graduate Center on November 24 at 6:30 pm. It addresses “fantasies, fears, and premonitions of New York’s Destruction.” Here’s the brief description I got from the grad center’s website. 

At each stage of New York’s development over the past century, visions of how the city would be demolished, blown up, swallowed by the sea, or toppled by monsters have proliferated in films and science fiction novels, photography, painting, graphic arts, television advertisements, postcards, cartoons, and computer software. In a project begun well before September 11, but given a new importance in its wake Max Page, Professor of Art History, University of Massachusetts – Amherst, seeks to offer a critical historical perspective to our understanding of the recent disaster.  Book signing to follow

In a refreshing and passionate manner, Naomi Klein, Hernando de Soto and Joseph Stiglitz engaged in an enthusiastic conversation regarding the current global economic crisis. The event was focused on capitalism, the market system and mostly on the recent bail out of the banks by the government.

Both Klein and Stiglitz criticized the American bail out. While Stiglitz praised the British handling of the bail out because of their stipulations and clear guidelines on where the money will be allocated, he condemned the United States government for the failure to do so. Where or who exactly is the bail out money going to? This is an important flaw in our bail out, especially in the light of recent AIG spending on exotic hunting trips for their executives. Klein also raised an interesting point regarding the issue. The government is not establishing the rules for Wall Street and the financial sector in the crisis. Rather, it is Wall Street that is directing the actions of our government. It really demonstrates that the government does not act in the interest of all; instead it is controlled by the elites for the elites.

Klein and Stiglitz primarily discussed the crisis in terms of the American government, Wall Street, the upcoming elections and what it means for the next president in office and the actions they will have to take. Hernando De Soto, on the other hand, brought the perspective of the developing nations, the so-called “banana republics” to the conversation. He emphasized that the cause of the financial collapse in northern countries is due to the failure of reconciling the reality and records. He insisted that the foundation of our economic system was our legal system, in the form of property rights. The collapse of the system of property rights has subsequently led to the downfall of the financial sectors.

Although the event was enlightening, it was disappointing in one aspect. I was expecting a more wholesome discussion on capitalism as an economic system and how it changed due to the bail out. I was hoping they would address the future of capitalism. Was it a failure as a system or just needed additional tweaking? But overall, it was a very lively evening where the audience got to hear some of the most prominent people discuss the current economic conditions. 

Since India’s economic liberalization, media attention has been focused on its development. While its growth has been phenomenal economically, India continues to lag behind in other critical areas such as women’s rights, rural development, and child labor. Despite rapid modernization, India fails to meet some of the millennium goals proposed by the United Nations. In spite of the advancement, India has a long journey ahead. Socially, it has not progressed at the same rate as it has witnessed its economic growth. Women have secured great success in other parts of their lives, although their struggle continues in these areas also. Such achievements include an increasing number of women in the workforce, illegal pronouncement of the dowry system, acquiring political rights and attaining a valuable education.

My thesis addresses the issue of women’s health in India, specifically the subject of women’s sexuality and reproductive health. I will examine how Indian societal views on sexuality have affected its policies on reproductive health, particularly those on abortion rights, contraceptives (implied is safe and protected sex), and pregnancy and child- birth. Furthermore, I intend to compare the trends and access to reproductive health facilities between urban and rural areas. In order to fulfill my latter aim more effectively, I might limit my comparative research to certain key areas, on which I am undecided currently.

In regards with reproductive health, I would argue that it would be beneficial to women and the Indian society to modernize using the western countries as a model. This does not necessarily mean imitation of their struggles against a patriarchical society. It only means that women could use this model as a building block for their movement. It should be noted that even in western countries, women have not fully gained equal rights to those of men. While this is a shortcoming in looking towards the West for inspiration, it does offer Indian feminists a point of departure. As I will show, the western model will have to be tweaked and prodded to accommodate the Indian cultural, political, economic and social environment to achieve equal and complete rights for women. It is my hope that our Indian counterparts will aim to achieve even those goals not yet accomplished by the feminist movements in the West.

Historians normally utilize archives and secondary sources to support their arguments. Consequently, I plan to use both categories of sources, although one more than the other. The majority of my research will be secondary. But I also intend to look into the World Health Reports, other Indian government statistics regarding the health of its citizens, the Indian Constitution and the five year developmental plans, etc. 

By examining the current issues facing the progress of women’s reproductive and sexual health, I hope to learn the difficulties of their development. Acknowledging their difficulties and the problems they experience, better governmental policies could be formed. It would aid in establishing more effective and constructive programs for organizations and government to utilize in developing this critical health concern. 

NOTE: I have footnotes in the original proposal but in order to save space, I have deleted them on the blog. 

Anti-Semitism and Themes of Disease and Discrimination

The research that I shall be focusing on this year will deal with anti-Semitic attacks in the German principalities during the Black Death and the underlying themes of disease and discrimination. I became interested in the correlation between disease and discrimination while studying Nazi conceptions of Jews as disease/parasite within a larger social body. Meanwhile, other important texts on anti-Semitism, such as Joshua Trachtenber’s The Devil and the Jews and Deborah Dwork and Robert Jan Van Pelt’s Holocaust: A History draw correlations between medieval and modern modes and patterns of anti-Semitism and argue that they are still pertinent today.
In his article “Christian anti-Semitism,” Marcel Simon explains that a major shift from ancient to medieval anti-Semitism was that Jews began to be regarded as a contagious sickness within a larger social body. Although Europeans had reacted to the mid-14th century bubonic plague in various ways (some had adopted a stringent asceticism while others took to drinking, partying, and other debaucheries), many had reacted by scapegoating and enacting violence toward Jewish Ashkenazi inhabitants. As one French cleric explains, “Some said that this pestilence was caused by infection of the air and waters, since there was no famine nor lack of food supplies…[and that]…”the Jews were suddenly and violently charged with infecting wells and water and corrupting air.”
In his article, Simon concludes that, “When the Jewish sickness is regarded in this light, as a contagious thing, anti-Semitism takes on the character of therapy.” It thus appears most plausible that during times of actual disease, especially on such a momentous scale as the Black Death, in which the public was trying to rid both society and their individual bodies of contamination, pre-conceptions of Jews as disease within a larger social body would make Jewish attacks a logical response to disease. In my thesis I claim that Christian attacks on Jewish inhabitants were not only retributive, but a method of curing society. I believe that my research will better help us understand why certain anti-Semitic groups have found rationale in their discrimination, and may also be a way of exploring more current forms of discrimination and decide if they fit the “body-disease” model.
In order to understand the relationship between 14th century medieval society and the Jews as conceived by medieval Christians, I will examine medieval plays, poems, sermons and dialogues written by Christians. I am particularly interested in the work of the non-nobility, since these people had been most prominent in Jewish attacks. Besides researching important secondary works on anti-Semitism from renowned scholars such as David Berger, Rosemary Reuther, and Joshua Trachtenberg, I am also interested in examining scientific, psychological, and religious articles/works which discuss the subject of bodily reactions to disease. This non-traditional research will hopefully strengthen my thesis and shape it accordingly.

Hi everyone,

Jonathan Schoenwald, director of the Honors program at Hunter, introduced me to Zotero, an online citation tool that supposedly does wonders. I’m not exactly sure of all the details, but thought that maybe we could all try it out together.

It can be installed at Zotero.org

- Chris

For the upcoming Great Issues Forum on Economic Power, I’d like for each of you post a question here by Thursday at the latest.  The questions do not need to be elaborate.  In fact, short and  direct inquiries will be more likely to be used by the moderator.  Here is the website for the event–again, a most impressive line up: http://greatissuesforum.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=68&Itemid=76

Sorry to post my response to the “Great Issues Forum: Political Power” so late.

I found the event extremely insightful and educational touching on numerous topics ranging from the war in Iraq, to the Israeli- Palestinian issues, genocides around the world, climate change, the upcoming elections in the United States and the changing role of the United States in the global arena.

When asked about the role of the United States in the conflicts around the world, all three speakers stressed the importance of multilateral coalitions and open dialogue. I completely agreed with this assessment. In order for the United States to resume its role as a world leader, it is important for the country to engage in dialogues and discussion with other countries. It cannot act without any cooperation or approval from other countries. Mary Robinson made an important distinction between the war in Iraq and war in Afghanistan in terms of human rights violations. She said she supported the war in Afghanistan but the war in Iraq was a violation of human rights and it was necessary to be condemned as such. It raises the question of when invading another country is deemed okay and when military force is condemned by the international community.

Regarding the biggest issue that needed to be addressed in the near future, Brzezinski indicated the over-consumption and the general lack of responsibility that pervades the American society as a major problem. He discussed the irresponsibility in the government. Over-consumption has always been an American way of life, which Brzezinski believes has contributed to the current economic crisis.

Mary Robinson and Kristoff both pointedly said that humanity shines the brightest in the midst of abject violence, poverty, and conflict (Malushka also mentions this in her review). This humanity is what helps them both overcome and change the grim and often hopeless situations into something, which could be resolved with persistence, faith, and determination.

I really enjoyed this event. The speakers had clear, blunt, and precise if sometimes a differing view on the path America should follow, especially after the election of a new presidency.