Understanding how indeterminacy is different from uncertainty is crucial to posthumanism and has major implications for reconfiguring curriculum. Uncertainty has to do with "epistemology," about not knowing whether a state of affairs is or is not; for instance, one would not know whether something is here or there, now or then.…

Analyzes a cinematic version of "Othello" starring Lawrence Olivier for its realistic interpretation of Shakespeare's drama. (RB)

Martha Nussbaum and others claim that the study of literature can make a significant contribution to political education by nurturing empathic capacities. In Nussbaum's reading of the situation, the need to promote the creation of bonds of compassion-based solidarity between co-citizens provides material for an argument to restore the study of…

A facetious private detective story embroidered with literary interpretation, autobiography, logical positivism, David Hume on personal identity, and "The Happy Hooker." (RL)

Proposes that Flannery O'Connor's work should be judged apart from the author's comments about it. Suggests her work should be evaluated on its own merits, read as fiction that represents and reflects the real world. Concludes that O'Connor was a "religious propagandist of minor importance who wrote didactic fiction." (PM)

Discusses the emergence of a new kind of criticism which has as its philosophical starting point the rejections of mimesis, and traces the process leading up to the development of this critical theory--a process which began in English criticism of the romantic period. (DD)

Case study rhetoric, or the rhetoric of real experience, is concerned with the ways by which case studies appeal to their own intrinsic realness or authenticity. On the surface, case studies are often accepted fully as representing real experience. But the design, arrangement, and emphases of case studies are rhetorically constructed by the writer…

Maintains that, over the past two decades, postmodern theorists and critics fundamentally have challenged many of the basic tenets of aesthetics, education, and art criticism. Discusses how postmodernism questions long-held realist assumptions of nature, truth, beauty, and human nature. (CFR)

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 32 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: literary criticism in nineteenth century United States; effects of sexist and nonsexist literature on children's attitudes; effects of silent reading and video…