Search

In difficult times, people turn to poetry, reading, and writing for solace and peace. In emotionally intense and traumatic times, people use poetry to process and understand the lived eyepieces. The havoc wreaked by the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the emotional and psychological well-being of individuals all across the world. Poetry has emerged as a savior in these difficult times. A phenomenon, "lockdown poems", came into existence as individuals all across the globe processed and shared their lived experiences of isolation, pain, and suffering through poems. In the present paper, students of a management program process and share their experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic, the subsequent lockdowns, and their community work experience. Poetry as a therapeutic and hope-building tool is discussed in the paper along with the original poems written by the students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Adab Al-Kufa is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper offers an extended introduction to the Kavikaṇṭhapāśa (or "Leash for Poets"), an anonymous text on the metaphysical qualities of poetry. By way of an annotated translation of key passages, the essay argues that the Kavikaṇṭhapāśa was likely composed sometime in the twelfth or thirteenth century, and that it is closely connected to the earliest Tamil pāṭṭiyal s. This suggests that it is one of the earliest witnesses to the metaphysical analysis of poetry in the Deccan and southern India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the manifestation of Dalit consciousness in the poems of Malayalam Dalit litterateur Vijila Chirappad. A close reading of her poems reveals a series of serious discriminations and disparities meted out to the lower castes by the ideologies upheld by the dominant castes. The canonical tradition of Malayalam literary discourse never bothered to give a realistic representation of the sensibilities of the marginalized sections of Kerala society. For example, the literature produced by upper-caste Malayalam poets was the result of a torpid lifestyle, detached from the world of sweat and toil. The long silenced and neglected voices of Malayali Dalit writers, especially women writers, have now amassed noteworthy recognition and accolades from literary spheres across India as well as academia devoted to Dalit literary studies. One of the chief traits visible in their texts is a strong note of resentment and resistance, which is the manifestation of their long-suppressed anguish and rebellion. Their use of linguistic structures and thematic content might sound too raw and painfully honest. We come across these tenets in the poems of Vijila Chirappad, who had struggled severely to come to the fore through the medium of literature. This paper tries to provide insights into the different forms of discriminations confronted by Dalit women of Kerala society and how Vijila Chirappad, who hails from this community has given expression to it through the frankness of her poems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on exploring dhvani as a hermeneutical tool for reading Christian devotional literature. Dhvani is a theory of poetic suggestion proposed by Ānandavardhana in the eighth century and elaborated upon by Abhinavagupta in the eleventh century that posits layers of semantics in poetic language. By focusing on the devotional poetry of the seventeenth-century religious poets of England, this paper argues for Ānandavardhana's proposed poetics of suggestion as an enabling way of reading and cognizing devotion as a psycho emotive process. In the context of Indian Christianity, dhvani has been suggested by certain scholars as also enriching the possibilities of interfaith dialogue. This paper argues for incorporating poetic frameworks like dhvani as modes of interfaith dialogue, especially when reading Christian texts in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an overview of the current trends in technical communication in English in India. The use of English language has undergone a great change and has largely become industry-specific. The prescribed text books for college students, which earlier had a mix of prose, poetry, drama and essays, have now been replaced by text books in Business English or Communciative English. This paper examines the effects of learning English purely for the purpose of professional communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shelley, one of the major English Romantic poets, was greatly influenced by the Indian thought that reached him through the works of the early English Orientalists of his time. Although his dream of personally visiting India had never materialized, his favorite readings included Sir William Jones's poems and essays on Indian subjects in 1770s, Captain Francis Wilford's essay, "Mount Caucasus" (1801), Sidney Owenson's The Missionary: An Indian Tale (1811), and James Henry Lawrence's The Empire of the Nairs, or, The Rights of Women: An Utopian Romance (1811). This paper provides an account of the influence of these works on some of Shelley's major poems (such as Queen Mab, Alastor, The Revolt of Islam, Prometheus Unbound, "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" and "Adonais") in their setting, style, and themes. As a revolutionary, Shelley was influenced by the forces of liberation and freedom suggested by oriental models as opposed to the hackneyed and overused neoclassicism of European literature. This paper argues how his was an attempt at a sympathetic understanding of India as a cradle of ancient civilization that knew no divide in terms of the so-called Western moral and racial superiority. His creative vision of India embraced an approach to integration as opposed to the Victorian reaction of mixed feelings. In fact, the Indian influence was not just a matter of stylistic embellishment away from the traditional but an indirect yet powerful means of attacking Western political system he so passionately rebelled against. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper will look at three dimensions of culture, in addition to religion, in the poetry of Agha Shahid Ali and try to arrive at an understanding of the nature of the poet's attitudes towards his past and present milieu and his inheritance. The first dimension is that of the relationship of the writer to the past and to Indian culture with reference to rituals and traditions and the location of these in the poet's familial environment. The next dimension is that of myths, legends and folklore. The focus will be on the use of mythology, made by the poet, which he recasts to reflect contemporary concerns and explore personal dilemmas. Finally, this paper will try and understand the role of religion in the life of the poet and the extent to which religious affiliation and belief impacts on his identity. Does the poet display an attitude of acceptance or does he use moribund practices as a tool of protest and in the spirit of reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PCK Prem has emerged as a major poet writing in the contemporary world of Indian English poetry. It is needless to say that he has secured his place not only as a contemporary poet but also as a contemporary critic. His book, English Poetry in India: A Comprehensive Survey of Trends and Thought Patterns (2011), from AuthorsPress, New Delhi has found favour with the critics and students of Indian English poetry. Though his latest book of poems is Rainbow at Sixty (2010), but in the present paper I attempt an exploration of his book, Enigmas of Identity, published about 21 years back in 1990, for the study of hope and beauty as manifest in it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Daruwalla is one who is good in presenting what he sees and one who is non-committal and who has a neutral approach. Daruwalla, though outwardly may be ironic and sarcastic in his tone and the manner in which he describes what he sees, has all the sympathy of the society he sees around. He is an individual who has experienced the impact of the post-independence trauma, the formation of India and Pakistan, the formative period of 'India Union'. The vision he had, the reality he saw around were poles apart. The Western education he had, the post he held and the reality that he experienced are reflected in his poems. He gives us a panoramic picture of Indian landscape where there are contradictions galore. This paper is an attempt to probe the sensibility of Daruwalla as a poet who has a deep concern of the Indian society though he has not explicitly expressed his concern of the Indian society his choice of subject and theme and his vivid depiction of the unhealthy practices of the people are nothing but his concern for the society. He is able to express his sympathy of the Indian society in a subtle way in both the poems: "Graft" and "Death by Burial". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though trace fossils have been recorded from the Tal Group of the Krol-Tal Belt by earlier workers, most of the records are at generic level only. This paper describes, in detail, 24 ichnospecies from 20 ichnogenera, some of which are being reported for the first time, from the Ganog and Koti Dhaman sections of the Nigalidhar Syncline, H.P. Based on the ichnostratigraphic and ichnofabric analyses these ichnofossils have been categorized into three ichnoassemblages, namely Palaeophycus-Phycodes, Daedalus-Phycodes, and Cruziana Ichnoassemblages. An attempt has also been made for correlation of the Tal sections with other Precambrian-Cambrian sections of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much has been said about how fruitfully European aesthetics worked on the minds of Indian writers in the 19th century. For this reason Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), even before he turned twenty, in the eyes of some of his compatriots was already a Romanticist—'the Shelley of Bengal'. Of course, he could not be Shelley because of the very different historical circumstances of India and England (in India at that time historically could not be born aesthetic rebels like Shelley). But what was implied in this assertion remains: in Bengali writing about Tagore and his embarkation upon new aesthetic approaches, almost always the view is expressed that this happened only because of foreign influences. The task of this paper is to show very summarily that such a conclusion may not be correct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of an ongoing ethnographic study, this paper aims to consider the practice of poetry, sher-o-shayari , as naturalistic peer learning among a group of heroin addicts in Yamuna Bazaar, New Delhi. By examining meanings given to sher-o-shayari and experiences of participating in the practice, this article makes the claim that the practice of poetry involved three learning processes. First, it entailed ‘legitimate peripheral participation’ during group sessions in which implicit performance rules were created, evolved, and transferred to newcomers. Second, it included ‘meaning negotiation’ in which participants ‘break’ and ‘join’ different lines, images, or themes in group improvisation or individual creation events. Third, it contained ‘reflective learning’, which enabled development of the ‘whole’ person and helped situate the individual in the social world. Such data are important for the creation of ‘organic’ peer education programs that utilize naturalistic peer learning mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]