DOCSLIB.ORG

Uncovering the Genre of Threatening Texts a Multilayered Corpus Study a Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School O

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Uncovering the Genre of Threatening Texts a Multilayered Corpus Study a Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School O Uncovering The Genre Of Threatening Texts A multilayered corpus study A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Linguistics By Mitchell J. Abrams, B.A. Washington, DC April 15, 2019 Copyright c 2019 by Mitchell J. Abrams All Rights Reserved ii Uncovering The Genre Of Threatening Texts A multilayered corpus study Mitchell J. Abrams, B.A. Thesis Advisor: Amir Zeldes Ph.D. Abstract Threatening communication has received research attention from the perspective of psychology and behavioral analysis for threat assessment purposes, and linguistics for pragmatics research and legal applications. While threats are dangerous in nature and prevalent in our society, little is known about the linguistic and discursive nature of threats as a genre, and there are few studies that have empirically tested the linguistic features of threats in general (Gales, 2010; Muschalik, 2018; Nini, 2017). Exploring written threats as an underrepresented genre can help us see patterns in how these types of texts are structured and the linguistic methods people employ to perform this social action. This knowledge is not only applicable to genre studies and linguistics, but also practically useful for law enforcement, threat assessment practitioners, and forensic linguists who deal with this text type regularly. This study uses analytical tools such as the Rhetorical Structure Theory frame- work (Mann and Thompson, 1988) to facilitate a rhetorical analysis of the genre, and uses rhetorical relations to serve as linguistic evidence for the structuring of the texts. The study also utilizes part of speech tags and dependency syntax to explore other linguistic features of threatening texts, and compare them to text types in GUM (Georgetown University Multilayer) corpus. Lastly, this study also contributes a new corpus, CCT (Corpus of Conditional Threats), to GUM for further linguistic research on threatening communication. iii This multilayered approach reveals the prototypical generic structure (GSP) of written conditional threats and the distribution of its salient lexico-grammatical fea- tures. Overall, this study argues for threatening text as its own genre, and explains the flexibility of the genre. Index words: Threatening messages, genre, corpus linguistics, multilayer corpora iv Dedication This thesis would not be possible without the incredible support of many people, and so this research is dedicated to them- To my advisor, Dr. Amir Zeldes, for your encouragement and feedback on my project, and helping me to see the beauty of corpus linguistics throughout my studies at Georgetown. To my professor, Dr. Natalie Schilling, for your encouragement and forensic linguistics class, which inspired me to pursue this research area To my parents, Gloria and Alex, and sister, Laura, for being interested in my research and supportive of my academic pursuits. To my colleagues in the linguistics department at Georgetown University, for your ideas and support To my colleagues in the computational linguistics concentration, Janet, Logan, and Luke, for inspiring me and helping me to grow as a student Thank you, Mitchell J. Abrams v Table of Contents Chapter 1Introduction................................. 1 2LiteratureReview.............................. 5 2.1 WhatisaThreat .......................... 5 2.2 ThreatTypes ............................ 7 2.3 Genre Studies . 15 2.4 CorpusLinguistics ......................... 25 3 Methodology ................................ 31 3.1 Data................................. 31 3.2 Syntax Annotation . 37 3.3 Discourse Annotations . 38 4Analysis................................... 43 4.1 Genre Analysis . 43 4.2 Rhetorical Structure . 51 4.3 Comparison to Genres in the Georgetown University Multilayer Corpus................................ 55 4.4 Lexico-Grammatical Features in the Corpus of Conditional Threats and the Georgetown University Multilayer Corpus . 64 5 Conclusion.................................. 71 References . 74 vi List of Figures 3.1 Screenshot of threatening text extracted from NexisUni. 33 3.2 Screenshot of spreadsheet in GitDox with annotation columns. 36 3.3 Visualization of dependency annotation in the Arborator interface. These sentences can be manually corrected by dragging edges and choosing a functional label from a list of options. 38 3.4 Screenshot of rstWeb interface and partial discourse structure of a threatening text. 40 4.1 Typical uses of condition relation in threats. 53 4.2 Use of the circumstance relation in the Background Information (BI) stage and Demanded Action (DA) stage. 54 4.3 Proportional distribution of relations in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus and the Corpus of Conditional Threats. 57 4.4 Example of motivation RST relation in a how-to text from the George- town University Multilayer corpus. 59 4.5 Example of motivation RST relation in the Corpus of Conditional Threats. .................................. 60 4.6 Proportional distribution of relations in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus and the Corpus of Conditional Threats. 61 4.7 Example of background RST relation in a Bio text from the George- town University Multilayer corpus. 62 vii 4.8 Example of background RST relation in a the Corpus of Conditional Threats. .................................. 63 4.9 RST tree with second person pronoun in a text from the Corpus of ConditionalThreats. ........................... 66 4.10 Proportional distribution of Stanford dependency relations in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus and the Corpus of Condi- tionalThreats. .............................. 67 4.11 Example of vocative dependency function in the Corpus of Conditional Threats. .................................. 68 4.12 "if" clause construction in the Corpus of Conditional Threats. 68 4.13 Example of nsubj dependency function in the Corpus of Conditional Threats. .................................. 69 4.14 Example of nsubjpass dependency function in the Corpus of Condi- tionalThreats. .............................. 69 viii List of Tables 3.1 Inventory of rhetorical relations in the Corpus of Conditional Threats (CCT).................................... 40 4.1 Generic Structural Potential (GSP) of written conditional threats. 50 4.2 List of Rhetorical Relations in the Corpus of Conditional Threats (CCT). 52 4.3 List of rhetorical relations that coincided with generic stages in the Corpus of Conditional Threats (CCT). 55 4.4 Proportions of Texts in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus andtheCorpusofConditionalThreats.. 56 4.5 Proportions of Texts in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus andtheCorpusofConditionalThreats.. 56 4.6 Frequencies of pronoun usage in the Georgetown University Multilayer corpus and the Corpus of Conditional Threats. 65 ix Chapter 1 Introduction Listen MARCIANO: Another reminder-either let EZ CHARLES beat you in that June XXX fight or your wife and child get bumped off.We’reveryfamiliarwiththecityofBrocktonandthe entire surrounding area. If you think that it is worth the lives of your loved ones to win an old boxing watch, go ahead. If you do you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. You’re guaranteed a return in 90 days, ain’t you? Why be so foolish as to ignore this threat on your loved ones’ lives. Play ball with us; you can take care of CHARLES in the return match. Desperate Duo From FBI vault (Rocky Marciano, File 1) This authentic threat was sent to the famous boxer, Rocky Marciano, in an effort to convince the fighter to lose a fight, or face negative consequences for his family. This is not a letter than anyone would want to receive, but it reminds us of the severity of threats and their potentially negative impact on society, as threats have the potential to instill fear in those involved and manipulate participants. This also makes threatening communication an important area of study. We might not realize that threats are prevalent in our lives, from a parent threatening punishment on their children if they do not behave to a teacher threatening a student with detention. But 1 threats like these are innocuous and considered legal threats. Illegal threats, however, are dangerous and can have serious implications. For this reason, threats have been studied mainly for the purposes of threat assessment (Cornell, 2010; Meloy et al., 2008; Turner and Gelles, 2012), as individuals and institutions must assess the severity of athreattobecarriedout,potentiallyleadingtodestructivebehavior. Anotablehighprofilecasestudyinvolvingathreateningcommunicationwasthe Unabomber airliner threat in June of 1995. Theodore Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber (UNiversity and Airline BOMBER), threatened to blow up an airline departing Los Angeles. The threat was taken seriously and lead to increased security measures in anticipation of a violent attack that was never realized. Another high profile, however, did not have the same outcome. In the Lindbergh kidnapping case in 1932, Charles Lindbergh’s 20 month year old son was abducted from his home. The kidnapper left a threatening ransom note demanding $50,000 and indicated that they had his son, implying that his son was in danger if the demands were not met. The case caught national attention and brought distress to the Lindbergh family as well as an exhaustive search effort for the missing child. While the perpetrator, Bruno Hauptmann, was eventually convicted of the crime, the Lindbergh baby was found
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Studies in African Linguistics Volume 46, Numbers 1&2, 2017 Melanie
    Studies in African Linguistics Volume 46, Numbers 1&2, 2017 CONDITIONAL CONSTRUCTIONS IN BUWAL Melanie Viljoen SIL Cameroon Buwal is a Central Chadic language spoken in the Far North Region of Cameroon. This study examines the structure of conditional constructions in Buwal and their functions. Conditionals in Buwal can be divided into four major categories according to how they are marked: possible, counterfactual, necessary and concessive. Possible conditionals include both reality and unreality conditionals. The usual order is for the protasis to precede the apodosis, but the reverse order is also possible. All types of tense/aspect marking are possible in both the protasis and the apodosis with variations arising from semantic rather than grammatical restrictions. The possible conditional marker can also function as a temporal marker in certain contexts. In a conditional construction, the protasis provides a framework or background for the apodosis. Keywords: conditional, Buwal, Chadic 0. Introduction Buwal is a Central Chadic language spoken by approximately 10 000 people in and around the village of Gadala in the Far North Region of Cameroon, Mayo-Tsanaga Division, Mokolo Subdivision. Buwal’s classification according to the Ethnologue (Lewis, Simons & Fennig 2014) is Afroasiatic, Chadic, Biu-Mandara, A, A7. The majority of linguistic research done on this language has been conducted by the author, who completed a description of the grammar to fulfil the requirements of a Ph.D. in 2013. This study, although partially based on this description, goes into greater depth than the description in examining both the structure of Buwal conditionals and their functions. 1. Structure of Buwal Conditional Constructions Conditional constructions in Buwal can be divided into four major categories according to how they are marked; possible (1.1), counterfactual (1.2), necessary (1.3) and concessive (1.4).
    [Show full text]
  • Conditionals in Political Texts
    JOSIP JURAJ STROSSMAYER UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Adnan Bujak Conditionals in political texts A corpus-based study Doctoral dissertation Advisor: Dr. Mario Brdar Osijek, 2014 CONTENTS Abstract ...........................................................................................................................3 List of tables ....................................................................................................................4 List of figures ..................................................................................................................5 List of charts....................................................................................................................6 Abbreviations, Symbols and Font Styles ..........................................................................7 1. Introduction .................................................................................................................9 1.1. The subject matter .........................................................................................9 1.2. Dissertation structure .....................................................................................10 1.3. Rationale .......................................................................................................11 1.4. Research questions ........................................................................................12 2. Theoretical framework .................................................................................................13
    [Show full text]
  • The Semiotics of Axiological Convergences and Divergences1 Ľubomír Plesník
    DOI: 10.2478/aa-2020-0004 West – East: The semiotics of axiological convergences and divergences1 Ľubomír Plesník Professor Ľubomír Plesník works as a researcher and teacher at the Institute of Literary and Artistic Communication (from 1993 to 2003 he was the director of the Institute, and at present he is the head of the Department of Semiotic Studies within the Institute). His research deals primarily with problems of literary theory, methodology and semiotics of culture. Based on the work of František Miko, he has developed concepts relating to pragmatist aesthetics, reception poetics and existential semiotics with a special focus on comparison of Western and oriental epistemes (Pragmatická estetika textu 1995, Estetika inakosti 1998, Estetika jednakosti 2001, Tezaurus estetických výrazových kvalít 2011). Abstract: This study focuses on the verbal representation of life strategies in Vetalapanchavimshati, an old Indian collection of stories, which is part of Somadeva’s Kathasaritsagara. On the basis of the aspect of gain ~ loss, two basic life strategies are identified. The first one, the lower strategy, is defined by an attempt to obtain material gain, which is attained at the cost of a spiritual loss. The second one, the higher strategy, negates the first one (spiritual gain attained at the cost of a material loss) and it is an internally diversified series of axiological models. The core of the study explains the combinatorial variants which, in their highest positions, even transcend the gain ~ loss opposition. The final part of the study demonstrates the intersections between the higher strategy and selected European cultural initiatives (gnosis). 1. Problem definition, area of concern and material field Our goal is to reflect on the differences and intersections in the iconization of gains and losses in life between the Western and Eastern civilizations and cultural spheres.
    [Show full text]
  • Dissertations, Department of Linguistics
    UC Berkeley Dissertations, Department of Linguistics Title A Cognitive Approach to Mandarin Conditionals Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/5qw934z5 Author Yang, Fan-Pei Publication Date 2007 eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California A Cognitive Approach To Mandarin Conditionals By Fan-Pei Gloria Yang B.A. (National Taiwan Normal Univeristy) 1998 M.A. (University of California, Berkeley) 2003 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the Requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Eve Sweetser, Chair Professor George Lakoff Professor Jerome Feldman Spring 2007 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. A Cognitive Approach To Mandarin Conditionals Copyright © 2007 By Fan-Pei Gloria Yang Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Abstract A Cognitive Approach To Mandarin Conditionals By Fan-Pei Gloria Yang Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics University of California, Berkeley Professor Eve Sweetser, Chair This dissertation provides a description of some of the common Mandarin conditional constructions, with a focus on describing the contributions of the linking devices to the conditional interpretations and their interactions with other elements in constructions. The analyses are based on corpus data and include studies on the pragmatic uses of conditionals. The discussion endeavors to show how cognitive structures link to linguistic structures and how spaces are built and frames evoked. Consequently, the research does not just provide a syntactic description, but offers an in-depth discussion of epistemic stance and grounding of information indicated by the linking devices.
    [Show full text]
  • The Birth of Gilgamesh
    THE BIRTH OF GILGAMEÍ (Ael. NA XII.21) A case-study in literary receptivity* Wouter F.M. Henkelman (Leiden) Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Laß mir dein Haar herunter! 1. Greek and Near Eastern literature 1.1. Das zaubernde Wort – In a letter to Helene von Nostitz, Rainer Maria Rilke wrote about the Babylonian Gilgameß Epic, a translation of which he had just read in the Inselbücherei series. According to Rilke the epic contained “Maße und Gestalten die zum Größesten gehören, was das zaubernde Wort zu irgendeiner Zeit gegeben hat. (...) Hier ist das Epos der Todesfurcht, entstanden im Unvordenklichen unter Menschen, bei denen zuerst die Trennung von Tod und Leben definitiv und verhängnisvoll geworden war.”1 The literary quality of the Gilgameß epic is indeed striking – the celebrated friendship of Gilgameß and Enkidu and the sorrow of Gilgameß over the latter’s death are pictured in a compelling drama of such powerful imagery that it has even outlived its own bold image of eternity, the mighty walls of Uruk. Ever since its rediscovery, now some 130 years ago, the epic has stirred the minds of its many readers and – as is the hallmark of any true work of art – found just as many interpretations. It may come as no great surprise, then, that in the debate on Oriental ‘influences’ or (better) Near Eastern or ‘West-Asiatic’ elements in Greek literature the Gilgameß Epic has continuously held a central place. This is not the place to review the long and, at times, tediously unproductive debate between the modern philobarbaroi and the defenders of the romantic vision of a monolithic Hellas rising from the lowly dusts of time to a sublime state of ‘edle Einfalt’ all by itself and by itself alone.
    [Show full text]
  • Information to Users
    INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfrlm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from anytype of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is d^endoit upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margin^, and inqnoper alignment can adverse^ affea reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these wül be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note wiD indicate the deletioxL Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlays. Eadi original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photogr^hic prints are availablea iq rfor photogr^hs or illustrations ^jpearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. Ml 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800.521-0600 THE STRUCTURE OF SOCRATIC DIALOGUE: AN ARISTOTELIAN ANALYSIS DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Robert L.
    [Show full text]
  • Dramatic Structure from Aristotle to Modern Times
    Drama Dr. Abdel-Fattah Adel Upon the completion of this section, you will be able to: 1. To define "plot" as an element of drama 2. To summarize the development of the understanding of the dramatic structure from Aristotle to modern times. 3. To recognize the parts Freytag's pyramid of the development of dramatic plot. 4. To state the main criticism to Freytag's pyramid. 5. To apply Freytag's pyramid on a story line. Plot Dramatic structure Plot is a literary term for the events a story comprises, particularly as they relate to one another in a pattern, a sequence, through cause and effect, or by coincidence. It is the artistic arrangement of a sequence of events. Dramatic structure is the structure of a dramatic work such as a play or film. There is no difference between plot and dramatic structure. •Agree •Don’t agree There is no difference between plot and dramatic structure. Plot is related to the arrangement of the events. Dramatic structure is the overall layout of the story. There can be more than one plot in a play. •Agree •Don’t agree There can be more than one plot in a play. The play may contain a main plot a several sub-plots. Aristotle Horace Freytag In his Poetics, Aristotle considered plot ("mythos") the most important element of drama—more important than character, for example. He put forth the idea that ("A whole is what has a beginning and middle and end. This three-part view of a plot structure (with a beginning, middle, and end – technically, the protasis, epitasis, and catastrophe) must causally relate to one another as being either necessary, or probable.
    [Show full text]
  • Translating Mimesis of Orality
    Translating mimesis of orality: Robert Frost’s poetry in Catalan and Italian Marcello Giugliano TESI DOCTORAL UPF / ANY 2012 DIRECTORS DE LA TESI Dra. Victòria Alsina Dr. Dídac Pujol DEPARTAMENT DE TRADUCCIÓ I CIÈNCIES DEL LLENGUATGE Ai miei genitori Acknowledgements My first thank you goes to my supervisors, Dr. Victòria Alsina and Dr. Dídac Pujol. Their critical guidance, their insightful comments, their constant support and human understanding have provided me with the tools necessary to take on the numerous challenges of my research with enthusiasm. I would also like to thank Dr. Jenny Brumme for helping me to solve my many doubts on some theoretical issues during our long conversations, in which a smile and a humorous comment never failed. My special thanks are also for Dr. Luis Pegenaute, Dr. José Francisco Ruiz Casanova, and Dr. Patrick Zabalbeascoa for never hiding when they met me in the corridors of the faculty or never diverting their eyes in despair. Thank you for always being ready to give me recommendations and for patiently listening to my only subject of conversation during the last four years. During the project, I have had the privilege to make two research stays abroad. The first, in 2009, in Leuven, Belgium, at the Center for Translation Studies (CETRA), and the second in 2010 at the Translation Center of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, USA. I would like to give a heartfelt thank you to my tutors there, Dr. Reine Meylaerts and Dr. Maria Tymoczko respectively, for their tutoring and for offering me the chance to attend classes and seminars during my stay there, converting that period into a fruitful and exciting experience.
    [Show full text]
  • On the Role of Protases in Conditional Statements: Some Evidence from Hindi Ghanshyam Sharma
    On the role of protases in conditional statements: Some evidence from Hindi Ghanshyam Sharma To cite this version: Ghanshyam Sharma. On the role of protases in conditional statements: Some evidence from Hindi. Rajendra Singh, Ghanshyam Sharma. Annual Review of South Asian Languages and Linguistics, De Gruyter Mouton, pp.49-78, 2011, 9783110270655. 10.1515/9783110270655.49. hal-01377536 HAL Id: hal-01377536 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01377536 Submitted on 7 Oct 2016 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. On the role of protases in conditional statements: Some evidence from Hindi* Ghanshyam Sharma Providing evidence from Hindi, the present study determines the crucial role played by the protasis (or antecedent or P-clause) in the actualization of conditional constructions. It maintains that tense-aspect-mood elements of the protasis establish different degrees of hypotheticality in a condition- al statement. The paper questions some widespread misunderstandings about the clause ordering in conditional constructions, namely that condi- tionals can exhibit both the protasis-apodosis (P-Q) and apodosis-protasis (Q-P) orderings. By examining data from Hindi and making reference to data from other languages, the paper reiterates our earlier claim that protasis-apodosis ordering in conditional constructions cannot be reversed and advances a new idea that a ‘conditional string’ is the defining charac- teristic of a conditional construction.
    [Show full text]
  • Prufrock's Stream of Consciousness AUTHOR: R
    PRUFROCK'S STRE.AM 'OF CONSCIOUSNESS PRUFROCK t S STRE.AM OF CONSCIOUSNESS By R •.ANNE JAMIESON. B • .A • .A Thesis Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of .Arts McMaster University August 1975 MASTER OF ARTS (1975) McMASTER UNIVERSITY (English) Hamilton, Ontario TITLE: Prufrock's Stream of consciousness AUTHOR: R. Anne Jamieson, B.A. (University of Wales) SUPERVISOR: Dr N. Rosenblood NUMBER OF PAGES: v, 92 ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I should like to thank my supervisor, Dr Norman Rosenblood, whose help and guidance in the preparation of this thesis were invaluable. iii T~BLE OF CONTENTS I INTRODUCTION 1 II : PRUFROCK: THE CONNECTIVE TISSUE 20 III PRUFROCK: THE THEMES .53 IV PRUFROCK: THE STRUCTURE 72 V CONCLUSION 86 BIBLIOGR~PHY 91 1v ...... ,.... ; EXPLAN.ATORY NOTE \'ihere an asterisk (*) appears in the script it denotes a point originally suggested by Dr Ng Rosenbloodo 'J ••' .: " . " ... v I INTRODUCTION Much T.S. Eliot criticism of the last decade or so has been moving toward the assertion that, in "The Love Song of J. ,Alfred Prufrock" and The ~'laste Land, and perhaps in most of his earlier poetry, Eliot's primary aim was an expl- oration of consciousness. And one critic, at least, has claimed that to achieve this end Eliot adapted the 'stream­ of-consciousness' techniques of modern fiction to poetry. Anne Bo1gan, in 1973, claimed that what The Waste Land "aspired to be" was "a neo-epic of the interior life 1 an epic, that is, mounted upon Ie pa;ysage int~rieur." And, further, she held that "what Eliot set out to write, and what The \Vasts Land was generically 'aiming to be' was an extended --- 2 -interior monologue." Ms Bolgan considers that not only were Eliot's ideas about consciousness born from his study of the philosophy of F.H.
    [Show full text]
  • Catastrophe in the Context of Dramatic Form and Theory
    ENDS AND MEANS: Catastrophe in the Context of Dramatic Form and Theory Criticism on Beckett's play, Catastrophe, has often taken note of the dramatic associations of the title. Several critics - Zeifman and McMillan, for example - have highlighted the connection between the etymological connotations of catastrophe and its theatrical associations. 1 "The Director is using the word 'catastrophe, '" writes McMillan, "partly in the every day sense of 'disaster' ( ... ). But he is also using the word in its more technical, theatrical sense, derived from its Greek roots, kata, (down), strophien (turn), to allude to the scene of classical tragedy depicting the downward turn of the protagonist's fortunes" (98). Other critics, including Libera, States, Brater, Sandberg, and Lyons, have referred at some point in their reading of the play to the theatrical connotations of catastrophe. 2 Lyons has perhaps gone furthest in reading the play in relation to the legacy of dramatic catastrophe: "The term 'catastrophe'," Lyons asserts, "has come to signify a structural part of tragedy, that dramatized moment in which the hero suffers the ultimate reversal. The literal meaning of the Greek noun, a turning up and down, held a more encompassing and less technical significance in the language of the tragic poets" (91). Though as Lyons notes, the Greek tragic poets used the term catastrophe in a variety of telling ways, Aristotle, contrary to popular opinion, did not use the term "catastrophe" in The Poetics. 3 Rather did the term enter the parlance of European drama and dramatic criticism by way of Donatus, the fourth century C.E.
    [Show full text]
  • Understanding Drama.Pdf
    mathematics HEALTH ENGINEERING DESIGN MEDIA management GEOGRAPHY EDUCA E MUSIC C PHYSICS law O ART L agriculture O BIOTECHNOLOGY G Y LANGU CHEMISTRY TION history AGE M E C H A N I C S psychology Understanding Drama Subject: UNDERSTANDING DRAMA Credits: 4 SYLLABUS One-act Plays Introduction to One-Act Plays, The Bishop's Candlesticks, Refund, The Monkey's Paw Macbeth Background Study to the Play & Discussion, Characterisation & Techniques A Doll's House: A Study Guide Introduction to Drama, Themes and Characterisation, Critical Analysis: Acts and Dramatic Techniques, Arms and The Man: A study Guide Ghashiram Kotwal : A Study Guide Dramatic Techniques, Themes and Characterisation, Background and Plot, Ghashiram Kotwal Suggested Readings: 1. Indian Drama in English : Chakraborty Kaustav 2. The Cambridge Companion To George Bernard Shaw: Christopher Innes 3. Dramatic Techniques: George Pierce baker CONTENTS Chapter-1: Origin Of Drama Chapter-2: The Elements Of Drama Chapter-3: Asian Drama Chapter-4: Forms Of Drama Chapter-5: Dramatic Structure Chapter-6: Comedy (Drama) Chapter-7: Play (Theatre) Chapter-8: Theories Of Theatre Chapter-9: Theater Structure Chapter-10: Shakespeare's Plays Chapter-11: American Drama Chapter-12: Othello – William Shakespear Chapter-1 Origin of Drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" (Classical Greek: drama), which is derived from the verb meaning "to do" or "to act‖. The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a collective form of reception. The structure of dramatic texts, unlike other forms of literature, is directly influenced by this collaborative production and collective reception.
    [Show full text]