* Indicates student co-author
Fazia Aïtel. “France and North Africa: A Cinematic Retrospective of Centuries of Entangled Relations.” A Companion to African Literature, edited by Olakunle George. Wiley Blackwell, 2021, pp. 181-194.
Abstract: This chapter provides a brief genealogy of filmmaking between North Africa and France, and shows how the shared colonial history laid ground to the future cinematographic exchanges and collaboration between the two sides of the Mediterranean. France and North Africa, comprised here of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, have a challenging, robust, and rich relationship grounded in colonial history. This is true at many different levels and especially when it comes to the film industry. While other contemporary and global questions also inform and irrigate the film production on both sides of the Mediterranean today, the shared colonial and postcolonial history and its multilayered human, cultural, and economic consequences have prompted the emergence of a large body of films. This corpus goes as far back as the birth of cinema and reveals in its industry, production, and content the ambiguities, paradoxes, as well as the collaboration and cross-pollination at work in the film industry across and within these respective countries.
Kim, Minju. “Development of the Korean Connective ultheyntey Into a Final Particle of Wishing and Worrying.” Journal of Pragmatics, vol.173, 2021, pp. 51-65.
Abstract: Recent studies demonstrate that connectives can develop into final particles that perform interactional functions in turn-final position. Using natural conversation data and the theoretical frameworks of (inter)subjectification and insubordination, I demonstrate that the Korean connective ultheyntey ‘CONJECTURE + but/so’ has developed into a final particle that expresses speakers' stances of wishing, regretting, worrying, or hedging. The functional shift of the logical connective into an emotive marker was enabled by its recurrent use in negative contexts. In particular, speakers often use the contrastive ultheyntey (‘CONJECTURE + but’) with conditional or deontic modal expressions to imagine an ideal situation that contrasts with a current, undesirable situation. Eventually, the co-occurrence of imagined ideal situations and ‘but’ engendered the final particle's sense of wishing or, in the past tense, regret. On the other hand, speakers often use the causal ultheyntey (‘CONJECTURE + so’) to express a reason for worry that they imagine. Speakers also employ it to provide the reason for a negative assessment, often without the main clause containing the actual negative assessment, to create a hedging effect. Through these uses of ultheyntey in providing a reason for a speaker's worry, it came to encode the meaning of worry.
Kim, Minju. “The Story of Two Connectives: Korean tunci ‘or’ and kena ‘or’.”Discourse Studies, vol. 23, issue 4, 2021, pp. 497-518.
Abstract: Using 129 natural conversations and 185 episodes of television drama conversations as well as the theoretical frameworks of usage-based theory and grammaticalization, I investigate two forms of ‘or’ in Korean, tunci and kena. Generally believed to be largely interchangeable, these two forms’ actual usages have never been compared. I demonstrate that the two are selectively used in conversation, and propose that three types of factor influence the selection. The first factors are genre and setting. In formal settings and formal descriptive writing, kena is preferred. The second factor is the presence of negative markers: while 43% of kena tokens were used in negative sentences, only one token of tunci was. The third factor is the distinction between ‘propositive’ tunci and ‘descriptive’ kena. In conversation, tunci occurs mainly in making suggestions and presenting plans, and hence is oriented toward the future tense and the irrealis domain. Kena occurs mainly in describing present and past situations, facts, or premises, and hence is oriented toward the present and past tense and the realis domain. This study confirms the usage-based theory’s argument that speakers possess extensive procedural knowledge of language: Korean speakers may not be conscious of it, but they differentiate tunci and kena with high regularity. Lastly, I explain their differences based on their history. The older form, kena, dates back to the 8th century, whereas tunci became widespread only in the 19th century. Because tunci retains its original semantics of probability, tunci tends to occur in presenting suggestions and plans (irrealis) and not in factual descriptions.
Valencia, Norman. “El arte de no decir: representaciones de la violencia en Abraham entre bandidos (2010) de Tomás González.” [“The Art of Not Saying: Representations of Violence in Tomás González’s Abraham entre bandidos (2010)”] El manglar de la memoria: Ensayos criticos sobre la obra de Tomás González, edited by Norman Valenica and Claudia Montilla. Universidad de los Andes, 2021.
Abstract: This is my chapter on the Tomás González book. It deals with one of his lesser-known works, Abraham entre bandidos (Abraham among Bandits) dedicated to the kidnapping of an old man called Abraham during the period known as 'La Violencia' in the late 1940's and early 1950's in Colombia. This book was not well received by the public, probably because of its topics (historical novel, kidnappings, etc.) which were not in favor in Colombia at the time. I try to explain why González made these choices, and how the novel is a valid reflection, not only of historical representations of violence in Colombia, but also of how current day violence needs to be understood as a long and complex process that must include historical views on issues of inequality, exploitation, and colonization in the country.
Valencia, Norman and Claudia Montilla. “‘Leyendo a Tomás uno casi pierde el miedo a la muerte…’ Entrevista a Peter Schultze-Kraft.” [“‘Reading Tomás One Almost Stops Fearing Death…’ An Interview with Peter Schultze-Kraft.”] El manglar de la memoria: Ensayos criticos sobre la obra de Tomás González, edited by Norman Valenica and Claudia Montilla. Universidad de los Andes, 2021.
Abstract: This is our interview with Peter Schultze-Kraft, Tomás González’s German translator. Schultze-Kraft has been an extremely important translator of Latin American authors to the German language, including Gabriel García Márquez. However, he has a unique relationship with González, and he has managed to translate most of the Colombian author's works. In the interview, we discuss his relationship with Colombia (he lived for a few years in the small town where García Márquez was born), his discovery of González’s work, his unique take on translation (he always translates in collaboration, usually with well-known German authors), and his personal views on the importance of González’s entire oeuvre.
Valencia, Norman and Claudia Montilla, editors. El manglar de la memoria: Ensayos criticos sobre la obra de Tomás González. Universidad de los Andes, 2021.
Abstract: This is the first volume of selected essays dedicated to Tomás González, one of the most important Colombian writers of the last 20 years. Our book presents some of the key topics in González's oeuvre, including his engagement with ecology and the environment, representations of gender in his work, issues of spirituality, especially Buddhism, in his writing, and his unique views on Colombian history. The volume ends with an interview with Peter Schultze-Kraft, González's German translator, who has become an important figure for the dissemination of his work.
Valencia, Norman, Claudia Montilla. “Prologue.” El manglar de la memoria: Ensayos criticos sobre la obra de Tomás González, edited by Valencia Norman and Claudia Montilla. Universidad de los Andes, 2021.
Abstract: This is the prologue to the book on Tomás González. There my co-author, Claudia Montilla, and me explain why it is so important to produce more critical works on an author like González, who is deeply admired both in Colombia and abroad, but who lacks more academic works on his oeuvre. We also provide brief summaries of each of the chapters of the book.
Valazco, Salvador. “A las nueve en punto. Cine, viajes, literatura.” Puertabierta Editores, 2021.
Abstract: A collection of short articles dealing with cinema, travels, cities, and literature.