Colonial governance in the Dutch East Indies revived after Johannes van den Bosch launched the infamous cultivation system on Java in 1830. Portrayed as the Dutch pinnacle of colonial exploitation,...Show moreColonial governance in the Dutch East Indies revived after Johannes van den Bosch launched the infamous cultivation system on Java in 1830. Portrayed as the Dutch pinnacle of colonial exploitation, this system has been the topic of heated scholarly and non-scholarly debates. But apart from a system of colonial agricultural production, it also posed a framework for colonial governance. Crucial in this framework was the collaboration of the Javanese administrative elite with the Dutch. This thesis examines the relation between the Dutch local authorities and the indigenous rulers on Java in the early 1830s. An in-depth investigation of power-division and political games in the residencies (the provincial units of colonial control), it analyzes the techniques and tricks the Dutch and Javanese used to cope with each other. Daily practice of colonial governance seemed not to have been motivated really by any centrally organized ideology, but by the personal skills and experiences of the Dutch officials, and their ability to make use of the traditional power of the Javanese rulers. Describing a system of men rather than rules or laws, this thesis attempts to showcase the paradoxical character of Dutch colonial rule in practice, to stress that in colonial Southeast-Asia it were not merely the colonizers who constructed the colony.Show less
The thesis analyzes the role of memories of past emigrations within the context of discourses on immigration, integration and citizenship policy-making in Spain from 1980 to 2010. It contends that...Show moreThe thesis analyzes the role of memories of past emigrations within the context of discourses on immigration, integration and citizenship policy-making in Spain from 1980 to 2010. It contends that these memories were a crucial part of the discourse of policy-makers in the process of the transition of Spain from being a country of emigration to being an immigrant-receiving society. The thesis analyzes in depth how memories are employed by different sides of the political spectrum in different manners to cater to different political aims. From this empirical analysis it seeks to draw a theoretical understanding of the role of collective memories of emigration in the context of a country's migrational transition.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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This thesis explores the field of photography and studies its relationship with and its influence on the meaning and interpretation of privacy. The latter has been widely discussed in recent years...Show moreThis thesis explores the field of photography and studies its relationship with and its influence on the meaning and interpretation of privacy. The latter has been widely discussed in recent years because of the presumed lack thereof in our contemporary digitalized, globalized and 'free' world. Privacy is considered to be pivotal to our identity and being in this world. In this thesis I will argue that privacy is innately individual and can be considered as a personal desire to protect and demarcate everything that we do not know yet. It is a desire not to be a victim of everything that is happening in the world around oneself. In our contemporary world privacy is increasingly 'rational' and no longer concerned with physical access to something or somebody. Photography has the ambiguous task to lay bare the things we do not already know, and to be the threat to our privacy.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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This thesis examines the relationship between Nietzschean Aesthetics and the writings signed under the names of Pessoa's major heteronyms. It analyzes Nietzsche and Pessoa's treatment of philosophy...Show moreThis thesis examines the relationship between Nietzschean Aesthetics and the writings signed under the names of Pessoa's major heteronyms. It analyzes Nietzsche and Pessoa's treatment of philosophy and the aesthetic and dramatic manner in which they write it. I argue that common to the texts by both writers, particularly in Pessoa's case, his tentatively titled 'Fictions of the Interlude', lies a tension between aesthetic, if not ironic, distancing and earnest formative discourse.Show less
Research master thesis | Linguistics (research) (MA)
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In the southern Italian dialect of Airola (Campania) feminine plural and masculine plural are distinguished by means of two phonological processes: metaphony and Raddoppiamento Fonosintattico (RF...Show moreIn the southern Italian dialect of Airola (Campania) feminine plural and masculine plural are distinguished by means of two phonological processes: metaphony and Raddoppiamento Fonosintattico (RF henceforth). They appear to be in complementary distribution and to create gender distinction in the plural of nouns; in fact, metaphony takes place in masculine plural forms, while RF marks feminine plural ones. Therefore, two distinct phenomena, one being phonological, namely metaphony, and one being phono-syntactic, namely RF, happen to interact within plural noun formation. These two processes, which developed separately, acquired, synchronically speaking, a value of gender distinction. Metaphony is a well-known phenomenon of Italian dialects, which consists in the raising or diphthongization of a stressed vowel under the influence of a non-adjacent following high vowel (Rohlfs 1966, Fanciullo 1994, Ledgeway 2009, Maiden 2010). In the dialect of Airola, it only affects mid vowels, namely /ɔ, o, e, ɛ/, and its attestation is not limited to the nominal class; it occurs, in fact, in various word categories, such as adjectives, verbs and possessive pronouns. RF is an external sandhi phenomenon which consists in the gemination of a word-initial consonant under the influence of a preceding word (Rohlfs 1970, Leone 1984, Loporcaro 1997, Borrelli 2002). In Airolano RF is lexically triggered, differently from the RF attested in Standard Italian, which occurs to be stress-induced. The aim of this thesis is to describe the two phenomena, metaphony and RF, in Airolano and to give an analysis of them in order to explain their division of labor. To do so, the processes are first analyzed separately. Then, a unified analysis is elaborated aiming to shed some light on the difference between genders in the plural of nouns. The analysis of the two phenomena will be based on data from Airolano that were collected in December 2013 and April 2014 by the author.Ten informants were selected, which were classified into four different age groups. All the recordings were, subsequently, transcribed in IPA and they appear in this form in the text. The full set of data is stored in the Italian Dialect archive of Leiden University.Show less
Research master thesis | Linguistics (research) (MA)
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This thesis aims to present a new critical edition of the first section (anuvāka) of book (kāṇḍa) 17 of the Atharvaveda Paippalāda, a corpus of religious hymns and magical incantations dated to the...Show moreThis thesis aims to present a new critical edition of the first section (anuvāka) of book (kāṇḍa) 17 of the Atharvaveda Paippalāda, a corpus of religious hymns and magical incantations dated to the late second millenium BCE, which furnish the second-oldest body of Vedic Indian literature to survive to the present day. This thesis focuses on the first section of book 17, consisting of a great praise hymn addressed to the earth. It strives to improve the previous Indian edition (Bhattacharya 2011), by collating additional manuscript sources, providing a rigorous critical apparatus that includes all the variants found in the manuscritps, as well as an edited text based on established text-critical criteria. In addition, an analysis of the poetic meter of each verse is also provided next to each stanza, as well as a translation and detailed commentary in which I discuss the interpretation of each stanza with notes on its ritual, literary and linguistic context. Given the limited extension of the extant corpus of Vedic texts, the edition of a new text is of extreme importance, as it not only adds new information to our knowledge of the Vedic language, but also furnishes new precious linguistic material for the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European and the study of the history of its Indo-Iranian branch. Moreover, the acquisition of a philologically reliable version of such a text is a fundamental step towards any future anthropological or religious study on ancient Vedic India.Show less
Research master thesis | Asian Studies (research) (MA)
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In this study, An Kuk-sŏn (also known as Chŏngang,1876-1926), a leading writer of the Greater Korean Empire period, is regarded as one prototype of Korean reformist intellectuals in the face of the...Show moreIn this study, An Kuk-sŏn (also known as Chŏngang,1876-1926), a leading writer of the Greater Korean Empire period, is regarded as one prototype of Korean reformist intellectuals in the face of the global expansion of imperialism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Based on An’s Chŏngch’i Wŏnnon (政治原論, Basic Principles of Politics, 1907), the first modern political science textbook in Korea, the study explores the adoption of modern Western political science, which some of these intellectuals regarded as a means of national survival. This study also revalorizes Chŏngch’i Wŏnnon and the act of translation, the most common way of learning the West yet has been undermined in the discourse of nationalist historiography, by applying the frameworks of translation studies.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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When confronted with laws that ignore, reinforce or legitimise violence, the possibility to judge seems to be put into question, since there are no rules to rely upon to avert that violence. On the...Show moreWhen confronted with laws that ignore, reinforce or legitimise violence, the possibility to judge seems to be put into question, since there are no rules to rely upon to avert that violence. On the other hand, judgment is crucial since it might be a way to counter such circumstances of corrupt law and stop ongoing injustice. This paradoxical issue is prominent in the case study of this thesis, the documentary film "The Act of Killing" (Joshua Oppenheimer, 2012). Dealing with the mass killings of Indonesia in 1965/66, the film opens a case that has been concealed since its occurrence and never taken to court. This is despite the events being characterised as ‘crimes against humanity’ by human rights organisations. I propose that by documenting how the perpetrators of the killings re-enact their deeds by means of stage-play, the film poses a theatrical trial that at the same time evokes, eludes and performs judgment or evaluation of the killings. Drawing back on theory by Hannah Arendt and Gilles Deleuze, I argue that the film stimulates political judgment that is informed by the tension between critical distance and affect, which may be a productive method for citizens to deal with mass atrocities and present corruption. Moreover, exceeding the realms of structured societies, the film as a work of art performs an ‘immanent evaluation’ that acknowledges victims and perpetrators equally and challenges clear boundaries in favour of a continuous becoming of bodies. As such it allows us to productively and reparatively rethink the notion of judgment outside the confinements of law as ambiguous and ongoing process.Show less
Research master thesis | Linguistics (research) (MA)
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Different speech variants can exist of one word, but how much information of these variants is actually stored in the mental lexicon of the speaker? I hypothesise that dialect makes for different...Show moreDifferent speech variants can exist of one word, but how much information of these variants is actually stored in the mental lexicon of the speaker? I hypothesise that dialect makes for different reduction patterns in the consonant cluster /st/ and that consequently, phonetic detail of reduced word forms is stored in the mind of the speaker. This was tested by a production experiment in which spontaneous speech and read speech are compared and a perception experiment in which participants had to perform a lexical decision task. Results showed that different dialects indeed show different frequencies and patterns of cluster reduction. Specifically, the Ede dialect reduced and deleted /s/ more frequently than the dialect Roosendaal. Reaction times of the third experiment showed that reduced word forms are not stored next to the canonical form. However, response data revealed that phonetic detail was influential when recognising reduced forms. I propose a hybrid model of the episodic and abstract model of storage of word forms in that phonetic detail of variants is stored next to the canonical form.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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What makes it possible to turn science, a field that is supposedly grounded in fact and objectivity, into a topic that untrained readers can engage with and enjoy? Connecting science with art,...Show moreWhat makes it possible to turn science, a field that is supposedly grounded in fact and objectivity, into a topic that untrained readers can engage with and enjoy? Connecting science with art, popular science writing relies heavily on the evocation of affect as a rhetorical strategy. In works that are written for children, and not intended as textbooks, creating an affective bond with the work is necessary in order to entice a child to voluntarily engage with the object outside the classroom. I have investigated Nick Arnold and Tony De Saulles’s Horrible Science series (1997-present) as a case study, as the long-lasting international success of these works indicates the effectiveness of their rhetorical strategies. The ways in which the authors attempt to evoke an affective response ranges from the direct evocation of positive affects such as enthusiasm, to employing negative affect such as disgust. Such affective responses are an effective way to mark reading the book as different from engaging with knowledge in the classroom, which in its turn is marked as tedious and dull. The affect theories of Silvan Tomkins in psychology and Gilles Deleuze in philosophy might at first sight look dissimilar, but both make the distinction between positive and negative affects a centrepiece of their theories: Deleuze calls this ‘joy’ and ‘sadness’. The Horrible Science series problematises this distinction, as it employs the evocation of negative affects to strengthen the bond with the reader, a method that at first sight seems to be counterintuitive. Therefore, I will look at what defines whether an affect is considered positive or negative, and to what extent it is a rhetorically effective strategy to evoke what at first sight seems to be a negative affective response in the young reader.Show less
Research master thesis | Classics and Ancient Civilizations (research) (MA)
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It has long been recognised that ancient Egyptian women occupied a unique position within society in comparison to women in other ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern civilisations. This was...Show moreIt has long been recognised that ancient Egyptian women occupied a unique position within society in comparison to women in other ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern civilisations. This was already characteristic of the culture in antiquity and recognised by ancient Greek and Roman historians. Classical visitors of Egypt, like Herodotus, commented on the position of women as unusual and different from the situation they knew from their own cultures. This situation persisted even after the introduction of Greek and Roman traditions, which more heavily restricted women’s position and activities. Women participated in the economy of Egypt to a greater extent than can be documented for women from any other society in antiquity. When compared to women from other ancient cultures, such as Greece or Rome, the average Egyptian woman was relatively independent. She could inherit, own and dispose of property in her own right. She enjoyed a legal status, in theory equal to a man, and could act independently in business and court settings. In contrast to some cultures, no male guardian was required to act for her. Considering all these examples of female independence within society, it seems to be expected that women also enjoyed a certain degree of freedom when it comes to their occupational activities.Show less
Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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This thesis analyzed the development of discourse on extra-European art in art historical surveys published between 1842 and 1900 and how this discourse was influenced by the development and...Show moreThis thesis analyzed the development of discourse on extra-European art in art historical surveys published between 1842 and 1900 and how this discourse was influenced by the development and institutionalisation of art history and by discourses on extra-European arts from other, related, scientific disciplines. It argues that the selective influence of art history as an institutionalizing discipline and other scholarly disciplines with an interest in extra- European art enlarged, changed and complicated the understanding of extra-European art as expressed in these discourses. Moreover, it substantiates that while certain dimensions of the understanding of extra-European art may have seemed to stay constant, this does not constitute a uniform understanding of this art. The findings are based on the analysis of the Handbuch der Kunstgeschichte (1842) by Franz Kugler, the Handbuch der Kunstgeschichte (1855) by Anton Springer and the Geschichte der Kunst aller Zeiten und Völker (1900) by Karl Woermann with the use of the method of Critical Discourse Analysis, which investigates not just the texts but also their scholarly environment, and an extensive close reading of the three surveys.Show less
This thesis looks at changes in landholding patterns in the age of Sulla. While most studies on landholding patterns focus on the second century B.C., the author argues that the first century B.C....Show moreThis thesis looks at changes in landholding patterns in the age of Sulla. While most studies on landholding patterns focus on the second century B.C., the author argues that the first century B.C. is deserving of more scholarly attention since many big changes occur in this period. The author discusses Sulla’s colonization programme and the proscriptions in order to determine the effect of these measures on landholding patterns in Italy. Specifically, this thesis seeks to help illuminate the reasons behind the veritable explosion of villa-buildings after the age of Sulla. This study offers up a reassessment of the colonization programme and argues that the programme was conducted on a much smaller scale than is often thought. The overall impact of the programme is also far less significant than often assumed. It is argued that the proscriptions had a far larger impact on landholding patterns. The author argues that it was the proscriptions, and not the colonization programme, that is likely to have led to an increase in villa-buildings.Show less
Pieter Albert Bik (1798-1855), a Dutch colonial official, left behind an unpublished manuscript detailing his travels during his career both in Asia, especially in Japan and the Dutch East Indies,...Show morePieter Albert Bik (1798-1855), a Dutch colonial official, left behind an unpublished manuscript detailing his travels during his career both in Asia, especially in Japan and the Dutch East Indies, and in Europe, notably along the Rhine. A close examination of the manuscript suggests that Bik's interpretation of his travel experiences in Europe and overseas were remarkably similar, and that both were influenced by the burgeoning phenomenon of European tourism that was taking root along the Rhine at the time. A close reading of this source, and a brief comparative analysis, show that tourism indeed influenced the discourse of colonial travel much earlier than has so far been acknowledged. An examination of this influence calls to question several conventional presumptions of colonial history, and draws attention to a thus far seldom recognised character: the early colonial leisurely tourist. This analysis, however, requires - apart from primary research - a synthesis of the academic literatures on colonial travel on the one hand, and European tourist culture on the other.Show less
