Narrative and interpretation

The book of Acts is a missional text, containing many different missionary episodes and concepts. This work argues that Luke's primary purpose in writing Acts is to inspire and equip the church of his day for effective mission. It takes the form of a detailed linguistic and narrative analysis of key words, phrases, and missional passages in Acts. These are examined in the framework of four overlapping conceptual categories: missional stimuli, structures, strategies, and suffering. Acts' missional stimuli are the motivators and the power sources for mission. Acts' missional structures are the foundational physical and social building blocks for successful mission. Acts' missional strategies articulate how the worldwide mission of Jesus is to be carried out. Acts' missional suffering is practical
instruction about how to respond to persecution and imprisonment when a missionary experiences it. Luke expresses all of these, with the goal of calling the church to missional action, that his readers might be Christ's witnesses, even to the ends of the earth.

This essay explores convergences and differences between Martin Luther and Don Quijote through the concept of revelatory reading. Although one belongs to history and the other to fiction, both emerge as readers transformed by texts and compelled to embody truths discovered within books. Luther encountered revelation through Scripture and sought religious reform grounded in personal interpretation of the Gospel; Don Quijote, immersed in romances of chivalry, attempted to restore ethical and heroic ideals within a disenchanted world. Drawing upon Walter Starkie, Jan Rehmann, and broader intellectual history, the study examines parallels between the two figures in their crises of justification, ritual commitments, interpretive authority, and resistance to inherited structures of power. While Luther altered the religious and political landscape of Europe, Don Quijote transformed the imaginative consciousness of literature and culture. The comparison ultimately argues that both figures crossed the unstable frontier between reading and living, turning books into existential vocation and revelation into action.

The essay was prepared for the completion of The Bible in Western Literature course in The University of Helsinki and received the highest grade.

The main argument of this essay is that Leonid Andreyev, based on the New Testament, comes to the conclusion that Judas’s betrayal arises from his own contradictory nature, which is consumed by chaos. Jesus, as in the Bible, doesn’t resist the corrupted human will directed against him, and thus the narrative leads to its famous ending.

Lecture at BIP in Poland (Zielona Gora): "From Chaos to Harmony in Complex Systems". This lecture argues that complex systems theory explains how patterns and order emerge, but it cannot explain their meaning in social and cultural contexts. Therefore, it must be complemented by a hermeneutical approach. Drawing on Gadamer, the lecture shows that meaning arises through interpretation shaped by history, tradition, and dialogue (“fusion of horizons”). Lyotard highlights that coherence in social systems is linked to power, as dominant narratives define what counts as truth and can exclude alternative voices. Derrida adds a critical perspective, showing how fixed meanings and categories overlook ambiguity and difference.
The main conclusion is that social order is never neutral: it must be interpreted, questioned, and evaluated ethically. The movement from “emergence to meaning” requires awareness of interpretation, openness to plurality, and responsibility toward what is excluded.

This study examines the role of creative tourism in empowering local communities surrounding Prambanan Temple, focusing on cultural performances as vehicles for revitalizing local narratives. Using a case study approach with mixed methods data collection, the research demonstrates how cultural performances serve as bridges between heritage preservation and contemporary community development. Findings indicate that creative tourism initiatives centered around authentic cultural performances have significantly increased community participation, economic benefits, and cultural pride. The study reveals a threefold impact: economic diversification, strengthened social cohesion, and the preservation of intangible cultural heritage. These results suggest that creative tourism frameworks can be effectively leveraged to transform heritage sites from passive tourist attractions into dynamic spaces of cultural exchange and community revitalization, providing valuable insights for other heritage destinations seeking sustainable tourism development models.

This study examines the role of creative tourism in empowering local communities surrounding Prambanan Temple, focusing on cultural performances as vehicles for revitalizing local narratives. Using a case study approach with mixed methods data collection, the research demonstrates how cultural performances serve as bridges between heritage preservation and contemporary community development. Findings indicate that creative tourism initiatives centered around authentic cultural performances have significantly increased community participation, economic benefits, and cultural pride. The study reveals a three-fold impact: economic diversification, strengthened social cohesion, and the preservation of intangible cultural heritage. These results suggest that creative tourism frameworks can be effectively leveraged to transform heritage sites from passive tourist attractions into dynamic spaces of cultural exchange and community revitalization, providing valuable insights for other heritage destinations seeking sustainable tourism development models.

Language is a multi-dimensional and rule-guided activity. Many philosophers and scientists considered “Metaphor” as a linguistic phenomenon, a figure of speech in which one thing is represented as something else. Being that so, the role of metaphor is usually confined in the margins of life activities that lack its interactive and interpersonal process that fundamentally shapes our ways of perceiving and understanding the world. The aim of this paper is to examine some of the uses of metaphor in the philosophy of Mind, by giving an alternative account on how the concepts might be understood. Metaphors play an important role in science as a tool of innovation and discovery, providing a way of novelty by connecting unfamiliar facts to familiar experiences. By showing its importance in several epistemic fields we are using the narrative speech in addition to the Wittgensteinian phrase “agreement in judgments”, intending not to expel the scientific theories in epistemology, yet to illuminate some other aspects in the exegetical context.

This article examines the evolution and interpretation of the myth of Orpheus over time, grounded in a close reading of Greek and Roman sources. Central to the analysis is the iconic moment when Orpheus turns back toward Eurydice, interpreted through the lens of Maurice Blanchot’s reading in L’espace littéraire, where this gesture becomes a pivotal act of desire, loss, and transgression. By mobilizing contemporary critical frameworks, the study questions whether this act can be understood as a form of symbolic violence, even as a feminicidal gesture. More broadly, the article highlights how myths function as sites of continual reinterpretation and contestation, ultimately arguing for a critical rereading of canonical narratives in light of present-day concerns.

Un crime mystérieux, une enquête serrée, un dénouement surprenant puisque le détective lui-même se révèle être l’assassin : la pièce de Sophocle, OEdipe roi, est le premier exemple de roman policier.

Mais la culpabilité d’Œdipe est-elle si assurée ? Quand on l’examine en détail, la solution, apparemment rigoureuse, laisse apparaître une faille majeure. Est-il alors possible qu’Œdipe n’ait pas tué son père et que l’assassin coure encore ? Comment résoudre le plus ancien cold case de l’histoire de la littérature ?

Et ce mythe fondateur est-il le seul à être sujet à caution ? D’Antigone à Thésée, d’Ajax à Orphée, d’autres enquêtes dans la Grèce ancienne n’auraient-elles pas été bâclées, qui mériteraient d’être rouvertes dans un souci de justice et de vérité ?

Relire la mythologie à la lumière de la critique policière est le défi que tente de relever ce volume, en recourant à un anachronisme assumé, consistant à poser à des textes anciens des questions que leurs auteurs, bien à tort, ne soulevaient pas.

Sous la direction de Zoé Angelis et Pierre Bayard, avec les contributions de Laurent Binet, Delphine Edy, Stratos Myrogiannis, Efi Papadodima, Claire Paulian, Stéphane Pouyaud, Iraclite Steudler, Lucie Thévenet, Jean-Philippe Toussaint.

This article presents some results of my investigation which began with a focus on that one sentence and evolved into a theory that presents an explanation for interpretation and, more importantly, misinterpretation. An appropriate interpretation is often a serious challenge. Misinterpretations can and have led to terrible consequences. A better understanding of misinterpretation may point to solutions and help avoid conflicts.
An amphoric sentence is one in which information is omitted from the overt structure but implied in the covert structure. Almost all sentences in connected writings are amphoric. Incomplete sentences, amphoric sentences, can be a major advantage. Language works efficiently because of its amphoric nature.  Amphoric sentences contribute to 1) efficiency, 2) openness, 3) creative interpretations.

Axiologické aspekty v próze Ivana Sergejeviča Šmeľova Univerzitnej grantovej agentúry Univerzity Mateja Bela v Banskej Bystrici. Financované EÚ NextGenerationEU prostredníctvom Plánu obnovy a odolnosti SR v rámci projektu č. 09I03-03-V05-00009.

У статті досліджено сприйняття прози Ганни Барвінок у літературній критиці початку ХХ ст. Зокрема, з’ясовано обставини спалаху зацікавлення постаттю письменниці, висвітлено розбіжності між різними літературними таборами у ставленні до її творчості і поступове вироблення модерного розуміння «етнографізму» у світлі перспектив національного мистецтва.
Дослідницька основа цієї розвідки – рецептивно-естетичний підхід до критики як посередниці між красним письменством і публікою, класикою і сучасною літературою, традиційними і новаторськими стильовими течіями.
Першу хвилю уваги до оповідань Ганни Барвінок підняв Борис Грінченко публікаціями до сорокаліття від початку її творчості. Згодом появилися аналітичні і концептуальні інтерпретації Олександра Грушевського, Дмитра Дорошенка, Людмили Старицької-Черняхівської. Часопис «Українська Хата» запросив письменницю до співпраці, а хатянські критики-неоромантики переосмислювали її творчість крізь призму національного самоусвідомолення, орієнтуючи сучасників на багатющі традиції національного мистецтва.
Критику і публіку вабили мистецькі якості прози Ганни Барвінок. Модерністи, особливо хатяни, звертали увагу на недооцінені попередниками і сучасниками стилістичні і світоглядні риси співачки жіночої долі, які, на їхнє переконання, були варті засвоєння й дальшого розвитку в новітньому мистецтві. Природність і витончені форми першоособової нарації, пісенність і ліричність оповідного мовлення, по-жіночому чутливе і вдумливе світовідчуття виявилися суголосними з естетичними потребами і новітніми віяннями модерної доби.
Вивчення рецепції творчості Ганни Барвінок тодішньою критикою веде до висновку: для доби Модерну властиве не тільки відмежування від позитивізму, а й свідоме апелювання до певних, переважно романтичних, традицій, як от «філософія серця», естетизм, індивідуалізм.

Vasyl Budnyy. Hanna Barvinok’s Prose in Early Modern Literary Criticism
This article examines how Hanna Barvinok’s prose was perceived in literary criticism during the early 20th century. It clarifies the circumstances that sparked interest in the writer, explores the differing attitudes towards her work among various literary camps, and highlights the gradual development of the modern understanding of “ethnography” in relation to national art perspectives.
The research is based on a receptive-aesthetic approach to criticism, which acts as a mediator between fiction writing and the public, as well as between classics and modern literature, and traditional and innovative stylistic currents.
Borys Hrinchenko was among the first to draw attention to Hanna Barvinok’s stories with his publications prior to the fortieth anniversary of her career’s commencement. Later, analytical and conceptual interpretations by Oleksandr Hrushevskyi, Dmytro Doroshenko, and Lyudmyla Starytska-Chernyakhivska emerged. The magazine “Ukrainian Khata” invited the writer to collaborate, and neo-romantic critics, particularly the Khatians, reinterpreted her work, guiding contemporaries towards the rich traditions of national art.
The artistic qualities of Hanna Barvinok’s prose attracted critics and the public alike. Modernists, especially the Khatians, recognized the artistic and worldview elements within the poetess's portrayal of female destiny, which had been underestimated by earlier critics and contemporaries. These qualities were deemed worthy of assimilation and further development in modern art. The naturalness and refined forms of the first-person narrative, the lyrical quality of the storytelling, and the feminine, sensitive, and thoughtful perception of the world resonated with the aesthetic needs and contemporary trends of the time.
Examining the reception of Hanna Barvinok’s work leads to the conclusion that the Modern era was characterized not only by a departure from positivism but also by a deliberate embrace of certain romantic traditions in national writing.

The novel ‘Die Wahlverwandtschaften’ (1809) centres on the inscrutable and sometimes destructive attraction that people exert on one another. Goethe presents presents in this novel a classic conflict: the conflict between romantic love and morality. A conflict that can also be interpreted more broadly as a conflict between ‘nature’ and cultural norms, between Wahl (personal choice) and Verwandtschaft (social bond), or even as a political conflict between revolution and order. In ‘Die Wahlverwandtschaften’, the forces drawing the main characters towards one another are more significant and powerful than the characters themselves. They are also inscrutable. As a result, as a reader, you are drawn into the processes between the main characters, but automatically also into the one who sets all these processes in motion: the writer. He is the sorcerer’s apprentice of this novel. Goethe strives for reconciliation and unity. The fact that all the main characters bear the same letters OTT in their names indicates that they are ultimately made of the same substance; there is a unity underlying them. That they find this unity precisely in the letters OTT does not seem to me to be a coincidence; they are the letters of the name GOTT.

В статье представлены результаты исследования средств «приближающего» дейксиса (наречий здесь, тут, сюда / here, сейчас, теперь, нынче / now, форм настоящего времени глагола и др.), позволяющих переключить ретроспективный взгляд на события сюжета на синхронный, погрузить читателя в хронотоп происходящего. С использованием параллельного англо-русского корпуса Национального корпуса русского языка проведен сопоставительный анализ функционирования «приближающих» дейктиков в англоязычных прозаических текстах (созданных на протяжении последней трети XIX века — первой половины XX века) и в их русских переводах (подготовленных и опубликованных в ХХ веке). Для обработки результатов автоматической выборки контекстов с дейктическими средствами, а затем для корректировки количественной оценки переводческих трансформаций был привлечен традиционный функционально-семантический анализ развернутых контекстов. Результаты проведенного исследования показывают, что авторы и переводчики активизируют разные составляющие репертуара «приближающего» дейксиса в своих текстах, и это обусловлено как грамматическими возможностями языков (наличием / отсутствием ограничений на употребление форм настоящего времени в рамках субъективированного нарратива), так и различиями повествовательных традиций: если в англоязычном нарративе особую функциональную нагруженность приобретает наречие now, обеспечивающее эффект синхронизации дейктического центра с повествуемыми событиями даже в случае употребления «дистанцирующих» глагольных форм прошедшего времени или будущего в прошедшем, то в русских переводах для той же цели зачастую привлекается функциональная связка темпоральных и пространственных «приближающих» дейктиков, включающая наречия и презенсные глагольные формы. Переключение на точку зрения наблюдателя в русских переводах маркируется более активно, нередко за счет дополнительных вставок дейктических слов. Выявленный феномен ограничен вышеуказанным хронологическим периодом (переводы, помещенные в корпус, носят доместицирующий характер), перспектива исследования предполагает включение в анализ оригинальных текстов более позднего периода и конкурирующих переводов с форенизирующей стратегией, для чего потребуется формирование поливариантного параллельного корпуса.

Thanks to advanced computed tomography techniques, it was possible late last year to decipher the text of an amulet discovered in 2018 during excavations in a cemetery in the ancient Roman city of Nida, near modernday Frankfurt. The text of the amulet has several peculiarities, including the fact that it can be precisely dated to the middle of the third century, that it is written in Latin on a silver plate, and that it contains the earliest Latin quotation of Philippians, which is also one of the earliest material evidences of this Pauline epistle. This paper will present the discovery and some of the peculiarities of the amulet and its text. It will then concentrate on the quotation from Philippians, examining its text and comparing it with contemporary Greek and Latin versions. It will also analyze how it is interpreted in the amulet and how this interpretation differs from that of contemporary literary texts. The analysis of the quotation and its interpretation will show how biblical texts were transmitted and used in the context of 'ancient lived religion', thus opening a window into a little-known aspect of early Christianity.

The recipients of the 2024 ICHTH/INTH Best Book and Best First Book awards are Jörg van Norden for Verlust der Vergangenheit: Historische Erkenntnis und Materialität zwischen Wiedererkennen und Befremden (Wochenschau Verlag, 2022), recognised as Best Book, and Mariana Imaz-Sheinbaum for Historical Narratives: Constructable, Evaluable, Inevitable (Routledge, 2024), awarded Best First Book.
The Prize Committee, composed of Lisette Jacinto (Benemérita
Universidad Autónoma de Puebla), Lize Kriel (University of Pretoria),
Marek Tamm (Tallinn University), and Berber Bevernage (Ghent
University), selected these two monographs for their originality, rigour,
and contribution to ongoing debates in the history and theory of
historiography.
This Book Forum in Rethinking History is dedicated to the two winning
titles and is structured in two parts. Each part includes a presentation by the
author, followed by critical reviews from three colleagues and a response by
the laureate. The forum on Van Norden’s work was edited by Lisa Regazzoni,
while the forum on Imaz-Sheinbaum’s book was edited by Marek Tamm.
We extend our sincere thanks to all contributors for their thoughtful
engagement and scholarship, and to Antoon de Baets, President of the
ICHTH, for his generous support throughout the process.

Perturbatory narration is a new transmedial narratological concept conceived in order to analyze how innovative experimental fictional texts irritate the reader or spectator by transgressing or annulating the rules of the common narrative system. We distinguish three ludic narrative techniques which are sometimes even mutually exclusive, but nevertheless frequently combined in literary and filmic fiction. Perturbatory narration serves to model and systematize a narrative principle which combines devices of these three strategies, in particular of unreliable narration, paradoxical narration and puzzling narration. The dynamic interplay of these devices is illustrated with two short stories by Julio Cortázar, “Continuidad de los parques”/“The continuity of parks” (1964) and “Graffiti” (1980) and the filmic adaptation Furia (1999) of the latter.

PP – v tejto recenzii sú umiestňované (ne) seriózne produkty. Akýkoľvek literárnokritický text nám dovoľuje posúdiť hodnoteného aj hodnotiteľa. Hravé správanie hodnotíme inými kritériami ako svet za hrou, ale sú miesta, kde tieto sféry nemožno od seba odtrhnúť. Tim Beasley-Murray tematizuje uvedený problém v knihe Critical games: On play and seriousness in academia, literature and life s nevídanou mierou odbornej aj osobnej sebareflexie. Britský slavista a fanúšik rugby kľučkuje pomedzi vážne aj nevážne piliere akademického sveta a literárnej kritiky v dvoch kompozičných polčasoch. Nazýva ich jednoducho The game of academia a The game of literature. Vďaka esejistickému štýlu, hravým metaforám, spomienkam či vtipom je rozhodcom, divákom aj hráčom naraz. Keďže autor ako Diogenes posudzuje každý skúmaný jav blížiacim sa žartom, čitateľ by márne hodnotil jeho fígle iba s vážnou tvárou. Odborný súd nad ním možno vyniesť so všetkou vážnosťou, ale hravý sud, do ktorého autor zaliezol, sa musí v rovnakej hre váľať dolu svahom.

This study examines how migrants' narrative form changes over time when the host society is treated as an external object of evaluation. Two interview waves with five West African migrants in Southern Italy (2018; 2023-2024) are analyzed across three domains: Economic-Political, Socio-Cultural, and Environmental-Geographical. Paired comparisons are reported only where within-speaker narratives were comparable across waves. Using the crafting-styles framework, the analysis shows a shift from more stable, closure-oriented tellings in 2018 to more reversal-driven, deconstructive tellings in 2023-2024. This form drift tracks changes in evaluation, agency attribution, and the narratability of the host society as a setting for future planning. Methodologically, the study shows how narrative selection and crafting-style patterns support parsimonious longitudinal comparison and strengthen within-case temporal inference beyond content-focused readings, while also clarifying how coherence and closure become harder to sustain under prolonged institutional contact and precarity.

Kajian ini dijalankan kerana pengkaji ingin mengetahui bagaimana mentaliti manusia terhadap sesuatu warna dan bentuk. Oleh yang demikian, pengkaji menjalankan kajian tentang warna dan bentuk dalam psikologi manusia dari aspek terapi seni untuk mengkaji sejauh mana warna dan bentuk dapat dijadikan terapi. Selain itu, Pengkaji juga mengkaji tentang abstrak ekspresionisme kerana aliran ini adalah salah satu aliran yang menghasilkan karya yang lebih kepada meluahkan perasan dengan warna dan teknik sapuan berus serta renjisan. Ianya sangat sesuai dengan tajuk kajian yang dijalankan oleh pengkaji

This study examines how lyric poetry can be adapted into cinematic form without being subordinated to narrative-driven conventions. Focusing on the adaptation of Jante Arkidam, the research employs an art-based approach that integrates semiotic-hermeneutic analysis, intersemiotic theory, and creative practice. Rather than treating poetry as a latent narrative to be expanded into plot, the study approaches lyric poetry as a dense semiotic system whose meaning is symbolic, affective, and relational. The findings formulate a three-stage model of poetry-to-film adaptation consisting of poetic interpretation, intersemiotic reconfiguration, and narrative containment. Poetic interpretation identifies the symbolic and affective core of the source text; intersemiotic reconfiguration redistributes poetic meaning across cinematic modalities such as image, sound, rhythm, and spatial composition; and narrative containment provides minimal coherence without imposing causal closure. Together, these stages demonstrate that poetic meaning can be sustained cinematically when it is treated as semiotically transferable rather than narratively fixed. The study further shows that the commonly perceived incompatibility between poetry and cinema does not originate from poetry itself, but from cinema's conventional reliance on narrative clarity and linear causality. When cinematic form recalibrates these expectations, ambiguity, non-linearity, and affective intensity emerge as productive meaning-making strategies. Although grounded in a Sundanese cultural context, the research proposes a transferable methodological framework applicable to lyric poetry across cultures. By integrating intersemiotics and art-based research, the study contributes to broader debates on non-prose adaptation and creative media epistemology, positioning poetic logic as a viable foundation for cinematic form.