How does one move forward, as an ordinary citizen, when one lives in the aftermath of a conflict so brutal that it left 200,000 people dead, many of them civilians? This thesis aims to answer this question by exploring the possibility of a third space between fight and flight. In doing so, it draws upon the concepts of French philosopher Gilles Deleuze. Effectuating close readings of four postmillennial films that treat the little known Algerian civil war of the 1990s, known as la décennie noire, research into this conflict’s rare filmic depictions is shown to be highly germane, given the myriad sociopolitical challenges that infuse today’s society and the increasingly futile attempts of warring factions to coexist. Invoking the refusal by Deleuze of a set ontology and acknowledging his rhizomatic notions of change and becoming, as opposed to being and stability, the study will demonstrate the oppressive nature of binarism and show why both fight and flight can and should be problematised. Following the cinematic trajectories of marginalised characters, the Deleuzian body is presented as a transformative force capable of new and powerful movements, ultimately excavating a third space between fight and flight. It will be further demonstrated how identities are destabilised and deterritorialised, molarities become molecular and bodies collide, amidst a backdrop of affective intensities. Subjectivity is ultimately subsumed, thus opening a third space for civil war victims, where protagonists choose neither to take up arms nor to flee, hence rejecting fight and flight and choosing a third space between the two. This enables a hitherto obscure conflict to be reimagined and become more knowable, distilling a micropolitics where the past can return in different forms, as a traumatised body politic is wrested from the crucible of its ossified past. In conclusion, the imbrication of film with philosophy is considered, as a tool with which to address and enhance understanding of sociopolitical issues, especially amongst young people. Accordingly, it is suggested that findings could be incorporated into creative pedagogical methods, such as phenomenon-based learning. More specifically, it is proposed that the concept of a third space between fight and flight paves the way for a more nuanced understanding of conflict by both political and legal bodies.

Why does Viking period mortuary practice matter in contemporary society? Necro-Vikingisms in contemporary society are inspired by mythology and historical sources, and informed by ever-increasing archaeological evidence. In this way, Viking period Scandinavian attitudes and practices towards dying, death and the dead pervade our popular culture far beyond academia, museums and heritage sites. As a case study in contemporary Necro-Vikingisms, this paper critically evaluates the prominent multiple funerals of the long-running and popular television show Vikings (2013–2020) as a means of exploring modern-day uses of Viking death ways and their relationship with mortalities past and present. The chapter focuseson the varied, complex and extravagant funerals in the twenty episodes of season 5 which first aired from 29 November 2017 to 30 January 2019.

The first two phases of the “Family Names of the United Kingdom” [FaNUK] project, funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council, set out to explain the origin of all surnames found in Britain and Ireland that had more than 20 bearers in 1881 and/or more than 100 in 2011. The fruits of the first funded phase (2010–2014) were published as The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland (OUP, 2016). Many surnames had never been explained at all before FaNUK, and given the wealth of new or corrected explanations achieved by the project, and the huge volume of collected and/or e-accessible material now available, deeper analysis is both possible and timely. The aim of the possible further project that we describe here will be to address the theme of variation in the form of surnames. This situates the project primarily within the fields of English historical sociolinguistics and socioonomastics, while relevant to history and demography. Its scope will be unified by the idea of analysing non-canonical changes in English, specifically the following five types: variation as an unstandardized consequence of mechanical or acoustic phonetic processes typical of informal speech (such as unstressed vowel reduction); variation of a particular under-studied phonoorthographic type involving vowel length (as in Sim vs. Sime); variation endemic in unstandardized aspects of English orthography (as in Lee vs. Leigh); variation due to analogy with other names or name elements locally or nationally, and with words of the common vocabulary; and any aspects of hypercorrection and spelling-pronunciation not implicitly covered in the above. This will lead naturally to devoting attention to the phonological and orthographical techniques employed in anglicizing names arriving from abroad, thereby linking the present paper to the conference sub-theme of identity and naming.

This preliminary article applies drone photograph and photogrammetry visualisations to four significant sections of Offa’s Dyke to provide fresh insights into specific features of the monument. Also demonstrated is the role of drones as a means to record the present state of features for future reference, and as a tool for the discovery of subtle features not previously recorded. The four case studies chosen for this article are part of a drone survey that covers an effectively continuous 16km ribbon of the Dyke plus the sections of Hergest Corner and Rushock Hill. Together with the complete set of Offa’s Dyke drone photography undertaken, they establish a platform for future work.

Histories of the so-called ‘Second English Civil War’, fought during 1648, have concentrated on the main areas of military operations – the north-west and south-east of England, and south Wales. While these, ultimately, were the decisive theatres of war, the region encompassing the westerly midland shires of England – including Shropshire – and also northerly Wales has received much less historiographical consideration. However, from the outbreak of the first war in 1642 partisan support for King Charles I was widespread across this territory, and historians have categorised Shropshire as a strongly royalist county. In 1648 militant royalism re-emerged in Shropshire and elsewhere in opposition to the parliamentarian regime victorious by 1646. Parliament’s failure during the interwar period to achieve a constitutional settlement with the king, coupled to unpopular fiscal and governmental policies involving the maintenance of powerful armed forces, emboldened opponents to engage in armed revolt in 1648. However, royalist uprisings attempted across Shropshire’s region failed to achieve serious military momentum – all were either aborted or nipped in the bud by defeat in skirmishing by parliamentary action. This chapter re-evaluates this territorial conflict. Shropshire is central to the analysis, but given the association of events coverage extends to adjacent counties. While historians have tended to dismiss royalist insurgency as being uniformly ineffective, a more nuanced view is taken here. Shropshire is also considered as a case study of popular discontents with the parliamentary regime considered to have inflamed renewed national civil conflict in 1648.

This thesis contends that there is a gap between the theological priorities of a school's teachers and theologies that inform White mission, postcolonialism, focused on binary distinctions and aspects of Uganda's ecclesial theology. This puzzle emerged from traumatic experiences that confronted my hitherto propositional faith. The research accessed Ugandan storytelling through a co constructed research methodology to address this vacancy. The ultimate objective was to unveil the teacher’s everyday theology through attentive listening. This empirical data modestly continues the postcolonial conversation with Ugandan voices at the fore. The research context is an educational community in rural Uganda, where I have had continual involvement since 2005. The school was resuming normal activities after a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic. My Whiteness and the activities I pursue as an NGO Director create a fluid outsider–insider dynamic. Reflexive attentiveness remained paramount. To inform my self-reflections, I analysed contextually relevant literature and maintained a research journal. This reflexive pursuit was critical because experientially, neither the themes of Whiteness nor colonialism would manifest overtly in the participants' accounts. That did not mean they would not be discovered hidden in their stories if I looked diligently. The teachers’ stories are captured using ten face-to-face interviews and a Talking Circle to cede narrative knowledge. The participants’ selection of ‘Key Informants’ to represent them was crucial in maintaining their voice. Data analysis identified eight interconnecting themes. These unveiled a peaceful and relational local theology. Together, they emphasise the collaborative nature of the “ordinary” miraculous whereby Christian communities participate in the saving actions of God. In addition to their transcribed stories, the teachers wanted a creative ‘takeaway’ from the research, which resulted in an unexpected aesthetic drift. We crafted a short poem to represent each motif using a hybrid Afriku-portraiture methodology. This achieved the aim of developing a theological cycle for ongoing community use. Such poetic knowledge challenged my experience of White missional theology and doctrines, where objectivity readily negates experience. Instead, the poems are a theological source open to creative imaginings. Whilst arguing that this research contributes relatable knowledge, participant numbers, context, and my subjective experience limit this claim. Further studies using a replicable approach would progress this research's findings.

Philosophy as a way of life has been undergoing a revival in recent years. This essay explores how the central idea of the spiritual exercises can be used to develop an account of philosophy of religion as a way of life. It details some of the contemporary uses and trajectories of philosophy as a way of life. Through engaging the religiously inflected philosophies of Karl Jaspers and Simone Weil, this paper argues that their thought can present an account of philosophy of religion as a way of life that is both ethically and transcendentally oriented.

This thesis critically analyses the representation of mesmerism in nineteenth-century fictional literature in respect to its influence on women’s minds and bodies. The thesis encompasses a sixty-year timespan to examine how the relationship between mesmerism and women reflects the patriarchal dynamics and distribution of power and authority in contemporary British, European, and American society. The project seeks to stand alongside existing research on literary mesmerism and gender dynamics, from such scholars as Ann Heilmann, Fiona Coll, and Susan Poznar, by incorporating the analysis into a broader discussion of themes such as control and consent, domesticity and marriage, women’s health, the interplay between physical and psychic identity, and nineteenth-century understandings of ideas that would inform later psychoanalytical concepts such as the id/ego/superego, and sociological concepts such as the Medusa complex. The thesis will conclude by discussing how nineteenth-century attitudes towards mesmerism and its effect on women continues to inform modern-day perceptions of the trance state.

Eberhard Jüngel insists on the absolute transcendence of God and on human language as the vehicle for that transcendence. In doing so, he makes claims both about the power of language and the limits of humanity in relation to language. In exploring this tension, the essay will examine whether Jüngel successfully navigates the tension between transcendence and hermeneutics, looking at the ways forward he provides, as well as the questions raised by his solutions. The essay will note the influence of the New Hermeneutic and Heidegger's late work on Jüngel's understanding of metaphors and speech‐events, and bring his insights into critical dialogue with the post‐structuralism of Jacques Derrida and the stress on ordinary language in relation to the divine in Rowan Williams. I will argue that Jüngel's stress on the passivity of the human in relation to the freeness of divine language can challenge Derrida's argument that language is always deconstructive, and that Williams's use of Wittgenstein can bring Jüngel's thought back to the ordinary in productive ways. Both that freeness and that groundedness in language can then allow for more interaction between hermeneutics and transcendence to enable us to think with, but beyond, Jüngel's hermeneutics.

This essay considers Charlotte Brontë’s serialised ‘Journal of a Frenchman’ in her ‘Young Men’s Magazine’. It discusses the representation of Parisian life, showing how this missing fragment fits into the series and the wider context of Charlotte’s engagement with the French language and Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, the latter providing the inspiration for many aspects of the Frenchman’s account of his life.