Documents found
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551.More information
This article proposes to examine the place of repetition in the constitution of a female filiation where the body acts as a common space between generations. Sofi Oksanen's novel Purge, winner of the Prix Femina Étranger in 2010, shows that women's bodies have paid the price of the development of Estonian history, and that its bloody repetitions and upheavals have left their mark on female flesh. Between a great aunt who lived under Communism, her humiliations and rapes, and a great-niece who works as a prostitute in Germany while being beaten, abused and pursued by Russian procurers, the novel creates a strange echo. Oksanen views the female body as a deadly repetition. The rallies of history are recorded on the old woman Aliide and the young girl Zara. Is there any way out of this structure of domination where women's bodies speak silently to each other in their suffering ? In what ways can Zara be offered the possibility of a body unscarred by History ?
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552.More information
This article describes and analyzes the working conditions of young restaurant waitresses from the touristic neighbourhood of Ho Chi Minh City (Viet Nam). Although it represents the motor of the lucrative foodservice sector, their work is underappreciated. Sexual harassment is omnipresent in many establishments and the unequal relations lived by these waitresses are made more complex by the presence of numerous foreigners. Expectations towards them exceed waiting. Confronted to poverty and job insecurity, they risk being led into prostitution. In order to resist harassment and improve their conditions, they develop diverse tactics and strategies with relative success.
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555.More information
AbstractStretched between the extreme purity of the ideal and the obstinate dirtiness of reality, Ducharme's work can be read through this opposition — one that matches up with the opposition between child and adult and, in a more complex fashion, the opposition between woman and man. The article, which covers Ducharme's nine published novels from L'avalée des avalés to Gros mots, attempts to show how dirt, originally providing a shell against the world, eventually invades the narrators' feelings and the stories they are living; the fictitious universe created by dirt is explored, along with the characters — "rada" and "shiksa" — that it generates. The author also seeks to elucidate the meaning of the fascination with whiteness, purity and emptiness that appears in the texts as a kind of resistance to invading dirt, and that is carried, specifically, by certain child, female or poetic figures.
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557.More information
Respect for human cadavers can be the object of an interdisciplinary reflection in French and Quebec law. In fact, several contemporary movements have joined together for the benefit of preserving the legal protection of human cadavers through the vector of human dignity. In Quebec, Bill 66 on funeral operations comes to mind (sanctioned in February 2016), as does, in France, the coming into force in 2008 of article 16-1-1 of the Civil Code, which imposes a duty to respect the human body after death.Borrowing the structure of a theatrical essay, the authors reflect on issues related to the determination of the moment of death (Act I), the legal status of corpses (Act II), the protection of the deceased through the memories of those close to them (Act III), as well as once they are forgotten (Act IV), all leading to the ultimate and inevitable denouement (Act V).
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558.More information
This article examines the relations between comedy and gender in French cinema by taking as its case study the comedies of Brigitte Bardot. Its perspective is two-fold: that of Anglo-American genre studies, on the one hand, in particular the feminist and psychoanalytical studies carried out by Kathleen Rowe on comedy, and on the other hand the field of star studies inaugurated by Richard Dyer. Following a discussion of the relations between women's comic narratives and the star system, the article analyzes the evolution of Bardot's character in popular comedies, from the saucy young woman of her early films to characters which situate her in the realm of the sex comedy and then the “dumb blonde.” This study thus offers a perspective on the gendered aspect of French film comedy and on a central yet usually obscured element of Bardot's star persona.
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