Author: Noys, Benjamin File Type: epub []

Author: Marcel Danesi File Type: pdf An Anthropology of Puzzles argues that the human brain is a puzzling organ which allows humans to literally solve their own problems of existence through puzzle format. Noting the presence of puzzles everywhere in everyday life, Marcel Danesi looks at puzzles in society since the dawn of history, showing how their presence has guided large sections of human history, from discoveries in mathematics to disquisitions in philosophy. Danesi examines the cognitive processes that are involved in puzzle making and solving, and connects them to the actual physical manifestations of classic puzzles. Building on a concept of puzzles as based on Jungian archetypes, such as the river crossing image, the path metaphor, and the journey, Danesi suggests this could be one way to understand the public fascination with puzzles. As well as drawing on underlying mental archetypes, the act of solving puzzles also provides an outlet to move beyond biological evolution, and Danesi shows that puzzles could be the product of the same basic neural mechanism that produces language and culture. Finally, Danesi explores how understanding puzzles can be a new way of understanding our human culture. **Review Puzzles-inclusive of riddles, games, optical illusions, enigmas, oracles, labyrinths-appeal to the individual human mind and to collective cultural traditions, from prehistory up to today, and around the globe. The motivation to play may lie in the reward the ah-ha for pastimes andor the gotcha when intellectual challenge is involved. Semiotics own magister ludi Marcel Danesi has collected, curated, and clarified the addiction experienced by those lured onto the dialectical thin ice between logical reasoning and sheer imagination. Myrdene Anderson, Purdue University, USA Marcel Danesi, the worlds leading authority on puzzles, provides an insightful historical overview of the creative, psychological, and interactional role of puzzles in cultures worldwide. These cultural artifacts date from the dawn of history, and Professor Danesi illustrates clearly and convincingly how solving puzzles stimulates the imagination and the inventiveness of the individuals and the societies that produce them. These enigmatic forms constitute the brains tools for resolving problems and they are an essential component of human intellectual endeavors. Frank Nuessel, University of Louisville, USA How are puzzles solved before their algorithm is found? Non-algorithmically using creativity of semiotic logic. This is what Marcel Danesi, a leading scholar of the Toronto Semiotic Circle, is demonstrating. Kalevi Kull, University of Tartu, Estonia An intriguing and fascinating overview of puzzles throughout human history. The book unravels the mysterious underlying origins of mind and culture through puzzles, with many mind-twisting puzzle examples. Kumiko Tanaka-Ishii, University of Tokyo, Japan About the Author Marcel Danesi is Professor of Semiotics and Linguistic Anthropology at the University of Toronto, Canada. He has published extensively and is editor-in-chief of Semiotica, leading journal in the field of semiotics. He is author of The Semiotics of Emoji (Bloomsbury, 2016).

Author: Lindsay Jones File Type: pdf Among Library Journals picks of the most important reference works of the millennium - with the Encyclopedia Judaica and the New Catholic Encyclopedia - Mircea Eliades Encyclopedia of Religion won the American Library Associations Dartmouth Medal in 1988 and is widely regarded as the standard reference work in the field. This second edition, which is intended to reflect both changes in academia and in the world since 1987, includes almost all of the 2,750 original entries - many heavily updated - as well as approximately 600 entirely new articles. Preserving the best of Eliades cross-cultural approach, while emphasizing religions role within everyday life and as a unique experience from culture to culture, this new edition is the definitive work in the field for the 21st century. An international team of scholars and contributors have reviewed, revised and added to every word of the classic work, making it relevant to the questions and interests of all researchers. The result is an essential purchase for libraries of all kinds.

Author: Clare Copeland File Type: pdf This work offers a detailed reconstruction of the campaigns for and trials resulting in the beatification (in 1626) and subsequent canonization in 1169 of the Florentine mystic nun, Maria Maddalena de Pazzi (1566-1607). Clare Copeland places her findings in the wide context of the politics of saint-making at a time of particular significance for the history of Roman Catholic canonization. The Protestant Reformation had put the Roman Catholic Church on the defensive in this area of devotional practice and the period covered in this volume (ca. 1600-1669) saw far-reaching reforms in the ways in which sanctity was measured and adjudicated by Rome. Copeland shows how these developments need to be seen less in terms of a top-down attempt by the central organs of ecclesiastical control to impose a hegemony of holiness and more in terms of negotiation over the meanings of sanctity--and how it relates to canonization-between the various stakeholders. **