‘Not Simple,Not Pure’: Revisioning of Mythical Wicked Women in the Stories of Sara Maitland

The British novelist, feminist and religious thinker Sara Maitland (b.1950) is renowned for her short stories, many of which involve the rewriting of fairy tale and classical and biblical myth. This article situates Maitland's retellings within the contemporary feminist tradition of literary revisioning, but emphasises that her retelling of old tales is distinguished by a deep—and often discomforting—engagement with questions of morality. This is rooted in Maitland's political commitment and Christian faith, and is particularly evident in her treatment of mythical female evil. Her short stories take a morally ambiguous approach, paying attention to the moral and psychological complexities of the wicked stepmothers in fairy tale, gorgons and child-killers of classical myth, and temptresses of the Hebrew Bible. Maitland's feminist revisioning of mythical wicked women does not flinch from their darkness, or impose simple ethical lessons, but at the same time she is (sometimes horribly) aware of their moral significance. This article examines the portrayal of feminist theology's concept of the ‘female sin’ of passivity in Maitland's revisioning of Delilah (in Daughter of Jerusalem, 1978) and ‘Helen of Troy's Aerobics Class’ (in On Becoming A Fairy Godmother, 2003); how the crimes of mythical wicked women are retold as being motivated by revenge against men in ‘Deborah and Jael’ (Daughter of Jerusalem), ‘Siren Song’ and ‘The Swallow and the Nightingale’ (Far North and Other Dark Tales, 2008). The latter of these raises issues of women's conflicting loyalties, which is also considered in ‘The Swans’ (2008). The taboos of incest and child abuse are explored powerfully and sensitively in ‘Jocasta’ (2003) and ‘The Wicked Stepmother's Lament’ (A Book of Spells, 1987), and resistance to simplistic moralising is encapsulated in the story of a menopausal Eve, in ‘Choosing Paradise’ (2003).     

Death and the erotic woman: the European gendering of mortality in times of major religious change

This paper explores the use of European erotic death imagery produced in the Death and the Maiden (D&M) genre in two time periods. It compares and contrasts D&M imagery produced by the Germanic-speaking proto/early-Reformation artists, Hans Baldung (alias Grien) (c1484–1545), Niklaus Manuel (known as Deutsch) (c1484–1530) and Sebald Beham (known as Hans Sebald Beham) (1500–1550) which highlighted the folly, futility and transience of earthly vanities during the transition from Roman Catholic to Protestant Christianity, with contemporary calendar art produced by Cofani Funebri (from 2003) and Lindner (from 2010) which advertise coffins manufactured in the increasingly secular countries of Italy and Poland. Drawing on Biblical narrative, Augustinian theology and European socio-cultural perceptions of gender, this paper argues that these D&M images are highly eroticised and place woman as signifiers of transcient life (vanitas) and earthly pleasure (voluptas), juxtaposing her with a masculine/male representation of death; Death being imaged as an individual in the sixteenth century, and as a coffin in the contemporary works. The paper also contextualises the imagery in terms of traditional European Christian notions of life and death, as informed by the Biblical Fall narrative, with its elucidations of sin, concupiscence and punishment. It thus asserts that both socio-cultural and religious attitudes towards gender are highly significant in D&M imagery and indeed in terms of the artworks, argues that the masculine signifier of Death can be placed as Adam, whilst the Maiden, as fecund life, represents Eve. However, the overt eroticism of both sets of artworks also allows for a reading that draws on Messaris' [(1997). Visual persuasion; the role of images in advertising. London: Sage] notion that visual images ‘make a persuasive communication due to iconicity; the emotional response to the visual image presented’. Thus, this paper contrasts D&M imagery produced over 400 years apart to examine consciously erotic gendered thanantological allegories of women as vanitas and voluptas, and the male/masculine as representations of Death.     

Jewish joke telling in Muttersprache Mameloschn: performing queer intervention on the German stage

This essay explores the central role of Jewish joke telling in Sasha Marianna Salzmann’s play Muttersprache Mameloschn (first performed in 2012). Subversively revealing the problematic of essentializing cultural, national, and even sexual identity, Jewish joke telling figures as a performance of social and political resistance and disidentification in this play. Engaging with Jack Halberstam’s queer epistemology of failure and José Esteban Muñoz’s theory of queer disidentification, I propose that the act of Jewish joke telling by a young lesbian plays out as a new queer project of intervention in this play that confronts both antisemitism and culturally positioned sexual hegemony.     

论当代中国马克思主义政治经济学的新境界

政治经济学与经济学的主要区别在于是否研究生产关系。马克思主义政治经济学用唯物主义的自然史的方法论述经济关系。当代中国马克思主义政治经济学有如下新境界：准确把握中国社会主要矛盾的变化,准确把握中国经济新常态,创新宏观调控思路和方式等。历史发展没有止境,当代中国马克思主义政治经济学新境界的开拓也没有止境。而要不断开拓当代中国马克思主义政治经济学的新境界,需要有科学的方法论和正确的思考方式,既着眼当前又立足长远,做到“六个坚持”,具有批判精神,尤其是必须深入学习马克思主义政治经济学的基本原理和习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想。     

中国传统官德对当代反腐倡廉的启示

中国传统官德养成于几千年的封建传统文化,受历史、阶级的局限,其中有精华,也有糟粕。从精华方面来看,主要有担当精神、敬业态度、公仆观念、自律意识等;从糟粕方面来看,主要有愚忠、愚民、牧民、制民等思想。当代有中国特色的反腐倡廉道路建设,应该对传统的官德有所甄别和扬弃,继承和发扬其精华,树立"以人为本,执政为民"的当代新官德,从而从源头上遏制腐败,营造风清气正的吏治环境。     

恩格斯社会合力论思想及其当代价值

恩格斯晚年提出“合力”论思想。他认为社会历史发展是社会各种因素共同作用的。这一思想科学解释了经济因素、上层建筑等诸因素在推动社会发展中的作用，进一步发展和完善了历史唯物主义理论。目前我国正处于构建社会主义和谐社会的新的历史时期，恩格斯的社会合力论思想对我国目前的发展有很强的现实意义和价值。     

我国封建社会农地制度历史流变及其当代启示

我国有着悠久的历史文明,在长达二千多年的封建历史长廊中,朝代的更替伴替着土地制度的变革与转换。回溯我国封建社会的农土制度的演进,解构这一时期农地制度的形成、发展、发达与覆灭,总结其中的实践主题、时代背景与演变规律,凝练出可值借鉴的对策建议。     

张闻天马克思主义观的历史地位与当代价值

张闻天是我党著名的马克思主义理论家，他在长期的革命实践中形成了独具特色的马克思主义观。张闻天的马克思主义观是马克思主义发展史的重要组成部分，对毛泽东思想的形成和发展与邓小平理论的形成作出了突出贡献，深化并拓展了中国共产党人科学的马克思主义观，进一步推进了马克思主义中国化的伟大事业。     

当代青年生存无意义感的理性反思

随着现代科技的迅猛发展和由传统文化建构的意义世界的解体,不少青年人在面对瞬息万变及复杂多样的现代生活时逐渐丧失了支撑其生命活动的价值资源和意义归宿,产生了身心分离的碎片感、疲惫感、宿命感和孤独无助感。对此,德育工作必须改变过去“纯工具化”理性,赋予当代青年更多的人文关怀,如生命情感关怀、终极信仰关怀、社会责任感关怀和苦难与死亡意义的关怀等,引导他们超越自身的有限性和现实的物质纷扰,追求生命的永恒价值。     

传统考文化在当前和谐家庭建设中的现实意义

中国孝文化历经几千年,具有十分丰富的内涵。然而,孝文化在当今社会却未得到足够的体现和弘扬。于此,文章拟从分析中国孝文化教育在当今社会缺失的现象入手,探讨和分析如何在中国传统孝文化和当代家庭道德建设中寻找一个契合点,希望籍此获得解决当前家庭道德建设问题的良方。