Copyright (c) 2009 University of Pennsylvania All rights reserved. http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007 Recent documents in Undergraduate Humanities Forum 2006-7: Travel en-us Wed, 09 Dec 2009 20:06:38 PST 3600 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/13 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/13 Tue, 07 Aug 2007 07:55:36 PDT This thesis is an exploration of the diplomatic relationships that developed between various African kingdoms and Europeans between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries, with a focus on African experiences and agendas. Andrea Felber Seligman http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/12 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/12 Mon, 06 Aug 2007 12:48:21 PDT I first became interested in this topic after attending an AIDS awareness workshop focusing on South Asia and a lecture given by a nursing professor who had just returned from Botswana. Although these two events dealt with different geographic areas, the problem of brain drain underlay both of them. Inspired by Paul Farmer's belief that health care is a human right, and driven by my own curiosity and interest in international development and global health, I began to dig more deeply into the problem. After further research, I realized how extensive and multi-faceted the brain drain phenomenon is, and I decided to conduct an independent research project that I hoped would complement the existing studies by identifying and exploring some of the issues associated with it that have not yet been thoroughly examined. Upon the suggestion and encouragement of Dr. Renee Fox (my wonderful faculty adviser), I drafted a proposal to undertake a qualitative inquiry that would examine the brain drain process through face-to-face interviews with a small, but intensive sample of physicians and nurses who had migrated to the United States from so-called developing countries. Cheryl Yang http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/11 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/11 Mon, 06 Aug 2007 12:28:18 PDT Though English colonization of the Caribbean brought with it a new and strictly British education system and set of ideals, its backlash also caused "a debil of a bump-anbore,/Rig-jig an palam-pam," a chaotic whirlwind of sociopolitical and cultural leanings (Bennett 1966:215:25) which battled with each other and formed polarized camps. As the colonial rule brought with it a new language as well, the variety of reactions to its residual effects on the area were expressed in distinct and deliberate ways. Anglophone poets of this changing time and place used language and dialect to depict their sociopolitical and cultural climates as a result of colonization in a powerful and telling way. Poets of the postcolonial context deal with issues of identity, homeland and heritage in ways that narrative cannot, though a student would be hard-pressed to find any poetry represented in a postcolonial literature class. By placing particular attention to poetic form, diction and dialect, Caribbean Anglophone poets express their struggles with identity as a result of colonial rule. Sheira Feuerstein http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/10 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/10 Mon, 06 Aug 2007 12:08:49 PDT The aim of this study, commissioned under the auspices of the Penn Humanities Forum, was twofold. First, to ascertain why there was an urge in the African immigrant community to return to their country of birth; or to "return home," as it is referred to colloquially. And secondly, to discover how actualized this urge was. Was this wish to return home some fond, yet quixotic longing to return to what was remembered as old and familiar? Or was it the product of a more deep seated nostalgia, one supplemented by careful planning and serious intent? To answer this question I set out to craft a survey in which the questions, and answers, would provide insight into why this segment of America, many who are citizens, many who have been in the US for decades, would decide to leave and return to places they departed long ago. Kojo Minta http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/9 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/9 Mon, 06 Aug 2007 08:07:53 PDT The past twenty years have been witness to what can be called a dialogue on the subject of the American postwar suburb. Keep in mind that though there has almost been three quarters of a century since the end of the Second World War and the inception of the post war suburb, only recently has there been a dialogue instead of a hostile chorus of criticism. Therein lies the tension between title and subtitle of this paper; after all, a dialogue by definition should have a back and forth, a point and counterpoint, while a jeremiad uniformly bewails. There has and continues to be a kind of intellectual default that pervades popular and scholarly examinations of the suburb. We cannot necessarily be sure from where this kind of stance was derived, whether the popular critique takes its cues from the scholarly or vice versa. When examining both popular and scholarly criticism it is easy to see that there is a kind of uniformity of deprecation, of judgmental displeasure toward the suburb. If we discount those boosters who might have had a vested interest in selling goods and houses, then we can only really begin to see a critical defense of the suburb in the past 20 years. Gerard Leone http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/8 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/8 Fri, 03 Aug 2007 08:44:46 PDT "Of Milton's interests in contemporary affairs," says J.B. Broadbent, "one of the strongest - and most typical of his period - was geography." Indeed, when confronting the countless placenames and allusions in Paradise Lost, there can be no ignoring the prominent role that geography plays in the poem, especially in its description of Hell. By infusing this description with cartographic references, Milton takes his place in the long line of epic poets that descends from Homer and Virgil. But his participation in the epic tradition is by no means static since he uses it for purposes relevant to seventeenth-century England. In Paradise Lost, the depiction of Hell appears to be part of a theological apology. More than just attempting to emulate the epic tradition, Milton employs that tradition to ultimately promote belief in an actual Hell as a rejection of the growing claim among certain radical Protestant sects that Hell was merely an internal state. Justin Tackett http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/7 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/7 Fri, 03 Aug 2007 08:03:36 PDT During the Cold War (1945-1990), many western travelers visited countries in the Socialist bloc despite the tension between the capitalist and socialist camps. Different visitors have different rationale in visiting the communist world: some are "fellow travellers" who consider the socialist bloc as a place for political and intellectual pilgrimage, some are trying to seek dialogue and exchange with the communist authorities, while some were just seeking to understand more about the culture and the people. Yet regardless of their rationale, traveling to this "semi-secretive" part of the world was always an exciting experience given the differences in the social, cultural and political atmosphere. On the other hand, western travelers were also important for the communist authorities: besides being a good source of foreign exchange, the journeys of western tourists could also be good opportunities for the authorities to publicize the "achievements of socialist construction" and instill in them an impression that the socialist bloc is strong and prosperous. Leonard Tso http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/6 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/6 Fri, 03 Aug 2007 07:46:26 PDT An innocuous tourist pamphlet? The hyperbolic claim of a self-important city? Or the relics of slavery-era paternalism and nostalgia in a twentieth century Southern city dominated by an elite class obsessed with heritage. The associations that leap from this pamphlet, published and widely distributed in the 1930s and 1940s advertising Charleston as a tourist destination for those seeking the aesthetic and historic, raise illuminating questions about the nature of tourism in Charleston. The artist could have chosen anybody to hold the door open to the incoming public, but he chose an elderly black gentleman, grasping the gate with a huge grin on his face, having taken his hat off, and with a slightly bowed posture. Inside the gate, the luscious gardens and blooming azaleas beckon, along with the steeples of the city's churches in the distance. The image, in short, seems to invite a very specific audience into Charleston. This brochure markets Charleston tourism as packaged for tourists seeking to go back to olden times; they desired to view gardens, historic houses and landmarks, and in essence experience the Charleston of an antebellum planter, complete with a happily subservient and very visible black population. Ellen Louise Mossman http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/5 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/5 Fri, 03 Aug 2007 07:40:20 PDT The journey is for us and was for Saigyo an impermanent condition of movement, but aside from this essential similarity, our conventional conception and Saigyo's diverge. Whereas we embark on a journey to get to a destination, ultimately returning to our home, Saigyo transcends all such structures and anchors by dwelling permanently in the condition of the journey. That is, the journey itself is home for him. It would be easy to argue that he is no more than nature poet, drawn into a lifestyle of traveling because of its privileged connection with the natural. This stance has been argued in the past, and convincingly grounded in the strong value of nature in Japanese literary tradition. However, framing him this way overlooks the deep spiritual beliefs and unique cultural influences that inspire his work and push him to along his wandering way. In this essay I seek to understand the connections between Saigyo's fundamental spiritual beliefs and poetry, while focusing on how and why a wandering lifestyle is integral to his life and work. I believe he expresses through his poetry and wandering lifestyle the realization and acceptance of what he feels to be the absolute truth and beauty of impermanence, as symbolically and actually present in nature. Andrew Meyer http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/4 http://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2007/4 Fri, 03 Aug 2007 07:31:37 PDT The simplest, and yet most knotty, place to start with The Book of Margery Kempe is to ask plainly: what is it? It has most frequently been proclaimed the first autobiography in English, seemingly more as a marketing ploy than as a result of careful analysis of genre. In reality, Kempe's book occupies an uncomfortable space between first person and third person, written (and even this is problematic) by a self who calls herself "this creature." Yet it is not hagiography either. The Book falls short of the criteria of hagiography for practical reasons - to name only a few, Margery Kempe has not been canonized and she has no proper "vita," the primary criterion for which is posthumous creation. Barry Windeatt and Sarah Salih, seemingly frustrated with the Book's apparent refusal to conform to a devotional genre, have facetiously called it "autohagiography" with palpable discomfort and skepticism. "Autohagiography" proves a concept with nearly insurmountable troubles, for a number of reasons which perhaps go beyond the scope of this paper. In short, scholars have found efforts to fit Kempe's book into some wider corpus of texts tremendously problematic. Sara Gorman