Literary authorship has traditionally been conceptualised by the values of individuality, originality, ownership, and authority. In the digital era, we are experiencing new attitudes towards and...Show moreLiterary authorship has traditionally been conceptualised by the values of individuality, originality, ownership, and authority. In the digital era, we are experiencing new attitudes towards and ideas on authorship which show that these four values are being uprooted. Namely, big publishers are editing texts of deceased children’s book authors such as Roald Dahl. At the same time, the digital medium has become the dominant means of interaction and dissemination of text in society. This thesis aims to identify in which ways the digital medium is taking part in our changing conceptualisations of and attitudes towards literary authorship. To do so, this thesis follows a conceptual framework proposed by Kathleen Fitzpatrick. She theorises that the technological properties and our uses of a medium indirectly shape our conceptualisations of and attitudes towards text and concepts such as scholarly authorship. Therefore, the digital medium and print medium indirectly create different ideas on text and scholarly authorship. Additionally, she posits that this mechanism interplays with societal expectations and the practice of the publisher. Eventually, this thesis presents that literary authorship has changed on all four values by which we traditionally conceptualised authorship and this partly finds it origin with the digital medium and the digitisation of text. Namely, our use of the medium and digital text have indirectly altered our conceptualisations of and attitudes towards text and the practice of the literary author.Show less
Authorship attribution studies use features to analyse an author’s idiolect. The current study investigates the usage of some of these features over time. Over 120,000 WhatsApp text messages of...Show moreAuthorship attribution studies use features to analyse an author’s idiolect. The current study investigates the usage of some of these features over time. Over 120,000 WhatsApp text messages of seven Dutch participants were processed and analysed. Using relative frequencies of specific features, distributions of authors’ usage of the features throughout a period of three to five years was extracted and visualized to determine which features are consistent over time and which are not. The goal of the study was to determine a ranking of the features, which could speak to their reliability in authorship attribution, especially when there is a considerable time interval between samples. The results suggest that common abbreviations, filler words and message length are largely consistent features, while emojis are largely inconsistent.Show less
This thesis researches the presumed connection between the theory of semiotics and the work of contemporary text-based artist Nora Turato (1991). More specifically, Turato’s publication pool 5 ...Show moreThis thesis researches the presumed connection between the theory of semiotics and the work of contemporary text-based artist Nora Turato (1991). More specifically, Turato’s publication pool 5 (2022) will be used as a case study to answer the research question: ‘To what extent does Nora Turato’s artists’ book pool 5 integrate text and visual design to create a distinct form of expression within the realm of text-based arts?’. By analyzing Turato’s use of the medium of the artists’ book, situated in text-based arts, this thesis aims to explore the supposed connection between the arts and semiotics, while also situating the work of Turato in a broader contextual sphere. Using the perspectives of visual analysis and semiotics, this thesis aims to extend the understanding of the relationship between authorship, language, and meaning within text-based contemporary art.Show less
In this thesis I will give a reading of the films Big Eyes (Tim Burton, 2014) and Bright Star (Jane Campion, 2009), in which authorship is addressed or at stake. Burton’s film is about the female...Show moreIn this thesis I will give a reading of the films Big Eyes (Tim Burton, 2014) and Bright Star (Jane Campion, 2009), in which authorship is addressed or at stake. Burton’s film is about the female painter Margaret Keane and Campion’s film is about the last three years of the life of the poet John Keats (1795-1821) For my analyses I will use Foucault and Barthes’ theories of the author as starting point because their theories are, especially in certain circumstances, such as in the case of female authorship, still relevant today. The overall research question of my thesis is: ‘when or in what circumstances are the theories of Foucault and Barthes relevant, and when are they not relevant?’Show less
