This article discusses the implications of the symbology of Kali from a different and fresh perspective and positions the worship of Kali in the bigger picture of the divinisation of everything in Sanatana Dharma. It also discusses the needless marginalisation of so-called ‘ugly’ and ‘terrible’ and how these prejudices have to be overcome to…[Read more]

This article focuses on Jewish women’s experiences of the amen meal ritual. The central intention of this meal is to achieve many recitations of the word “amen” in response to benedictions recited for different sorts of food. The women’s voices and experiences, reflected in in-depth interviews with participants and participant observa…[Read more]

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) includes several provisions concerning trade facilitation such as advance ruling, duty drawback, use of information technology, post clearance audit, and single window.One important aspect of USMCA is the inclusion of de minimis threshold for imports. De minimis is a valuation ceiling for goods…[Read more]

The question this article addresses is how the WTO supports and deals with digital trade. This article briefly discusses the historical advancement of the Internet, defines the concept of digital trade and its development in the international market. The article then analyzes how existing WTO agreements have dealt with digital trade. The article…[Read more]

Is it worst to be killed by a crazed mob wielding machetes or to die via conveyor belt and filing system? The Better Angels of Our Nature keeps falling victim to the halo effect, creating an aura around reason itself. The question, then, is whether the book should be viewed as a jewel in reason’s crown or as among its costume jewellery.

While Anton Chekhov’s influence on Katherine Mansfield is widely acknowledged, the two writers’ settler colonial aesthetics have not been brought into systematic comparison. Yet Chekhov’s chronicle of Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East parallels in important ways Mansfield’s near-contemporaneous account of colonial life in New Zealand…[Read more]

This paper presents a reading of Sarah (Genesis 11:29-23:19) as a proto-trans(gender) figure. The author addresses the problem of cisnormativity and its impact on biblical interpretation. In particular, throughout this paper Sarah is presented as a character who has been cisnormalised within the literary tradition of the Biblical text in order to…[Read more]

Il s’git d’une lettre aux pays membres d’Union Africaine.

While male illustrators including Alberto Vargas (1896–1982), George Petty (1894–1975), and Gil Elvgren (1914–1980) are synonymous with the field of early-twentieth-century pin-up art, there were in fact several women who also succeeded in the genre. Pearl Frush (1907–1986), Zoë Mozert (1907–1993), and Joyce Ballantyne (1918–2006) each establi…[Read more]

Starting from the critique of Enlightenment from Horkheimer/Adorno to Foucault, this essay discusses implications of such critique for the most eminent figure of Serb enlightenment, Dimitrije (Dositej) Obradović. Topics: Politics towards Josef II’ enlightened despotism, the misunderstanding about Obradovic’ championship of a popular literary…[Read more]

Book chapter exploring the queering of identity in Bioshock, including analysis of masks and carnivalesque culture in the game. The chapter argues that Bioshock presents an opportunity to queer identity and cultural systems, but forecloses on that possibility and instead reinscribes violence. Finally, the chapter uses its close analysis of the…[Read more]

Video game culture has a long, ongoing history of problems with representation and inclusivity, as a wide variety of forces have constructed video games and gaming as masculine. Against this
background, the popular gamer-oriented web series The Guild (2007–2013) appears to offer a unique counterperspective, presenting a gender-diverse cast and f…[Read more]

Through a detailed analysis of the story “The Three Sisters” from Mia Couto’s collection O Fio das Missangas (“The Bead Necklace”) published in 2004, I reveal how Couto recreates a space where relational practices are at the forefront of existence. I analyse this specific story to reveal Couto’s relational practices and its accompanyin…[Read more]

. I demonstrate how The Book of Chameleons is replete with metaphors of what I call the “non-self,” or “supra-self,” or even “God,” which are commonly found in Zen Buddhist thought, classical African epistemological and ontological paradigms, and more specifically, the idea of African Personality as put forward by Léopold S. Senghor or even in s…[Read more]

As a continuation of my previous transcultural comparative project, the current study aims to unearth some other similarities that exist between African classical knowledge systems, as put forward in the writing of Mia Couto and the work of other Africanists such as Wole Soyinka, Jacob Olupona and Léopold Senghor— in respect to their links to po…[Read more]

The idea of a critical theory has colonized the social consciousness of academia, and become an integral part of the pursuit of higher knowledge. Competing ideas have thereby become standard bearers in that critical theory acts as a measure of true understanding . The only problem, however, is that many of the distinct theories similarly answering…[Read more]

The Nakba not only resulted in the loss of the homeland, but also caused the dispersal and ruin of entire Palestinian communities. Even though the term Nakba refers to a singular historic event, the consequence of 1948 has symptomatically become part of Palestinian identity, and the element that demarcates who the Palestinian is. Palestinian exile…[Read more]

Book Review: Miniature Metropolis: Literature in an Age of Photography and Film (Andreas Huyssen)

Quarter Horses are considered one of the earliest and most enduringly popular breeds of horse that is “native” to the United States.

The American Quarter Horse Association formed as a breed registry in 1940, and set clear rules for what horses could be called Quarter Horses in its stud book. Recently, after several years of legal bac…[Read more]

CFP for a special issue of the European Journal of Humour Research