Daniel Rancour-Laferriere's Books

The Sign of the Cross

From Golgotha to Genocide

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Sign of the Cross

From Golgotha to Genocide

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

This book presents a unique effort to create a new understanding of the Christian sign of the cross. At its core, it traces the conscious and unconscious influence of this visual symbol through time. What began as the crucifixion of a Jewish troublemaker in Roman-occupied Judea in the first century eventually gave rise to a broad spectrum of readings of the instrument used to accomplish such a punishment, a cross. The author argues that Jesus was a provocative, grandiose masochist whose suffering and death initially signified redemption for believers. This idea gradually morphed into a Christian sense of freedom to persecute and wage war against non-believers, however, as can be seen in the Crusades ("wars of the cross"). Many believers even construed the murder of their savior as a crime perpetrated by "the Jews," and this paranoid notion culminated in the mass murder of European Jews under the sign of the Nazi hooked cross (Hakenkreuz). Rancour-Laferriere's book is expertly written and argued; it will be readable to a large audience because it touches on many areas of controversy, interest, and scholarship. The work is critical, but not unfair; it employs psychoanalysis, art history (the study of the symbol of the cross in works of art), religion and religious texts, and world history generally. The interweaving of these various themes is what gives this work its ability to draw in readers-and will ultimately be what keeps the reader interested through the conclusion.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

282

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1351474219

ISBN 13

9781351474214

Tolstoy on the Couch

Misogyny, Masochism and the Absent Mother

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Tolstoy on the Couch

Misogyny, Masochism and the Absent Mother

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

In his 1889 novella The Kreutzer Sonata Lev Tolstoy declared war on human sexuality. Having fathered thirteen children by his wife and at least two children by peasant women, the great Russian writer now has the arrogance to suggest that people should stop having children. Psychoanalysis of Tolstoy's diaries and other private materials reveals that Tolstoy's anti-sex position was grounded in a sadistic attitude towards women (including his wife Sonia) and a punishing, masochistic attitude towards himself. These feelings, in turn, were related to the trauma of maternal loss in Tolstoy's early childhood.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

279

Publisher

Springer

Published Date

ISBN 10

1349147796

ISBN 13

9781349147793

Imagining Mary

A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Devotion to the Virgin Mother of God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Imagining Mary

A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Devotion to the Virgin Mother of God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Imagining Mary breaks new ground in the long tradition of Christian mariology. The book is an interdisciplinary investigation of some of the many Marys, East and West, from the New Testament Mary of Nazareth down to Our Lady of the Good Death in the twentieth century. In Imagining Mary, Professor Rancour-Laferriere examines the mother of God in her multireligious and pan-historical context. The book is a scholarly study, but it is written in a clear, straightforward style and will be comprehensible to an educated – and, above all, intellectually curious – general audience. It will appeal to anyone who has ever wondered, for example, about the flimsy scriptural basis of many beliefs about Mary; or the tendency of many mariologists to depict Mary as an incestuous "bride of Christ"; or the theological notion of Mary’s "loving consent" to her son’s crucifixion; or the idea that Mary was a "priest" officiating at the sacrifice of her son; or the unfortunate association of Mary with Christian anti-semitism; or the curious appeal of Mary to the terminally ill; and so on. Special attention is given to the psychology of representations of Mary, such as: the psychological basis for promoting Mary to the status of a "goddess"; the psychology of Mary’s compassion for her son at the foot of the cross; and the psychological conflict in Mary’s personal relationship with her son Jesus. These topics are admittedly diverse, but they all have long been on the minds of mariologists. The author takes a questioning approach to received wisdom about marian themes – including the assumption that one has to be a theist in order to understand the great appeal of Mary down the centuries. Indeed, Imagining Mary may be regarded as a first step in the direction of an atheist mariology.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

406

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1351349678

ISBN 13

9781351349673

Tolstoy's Quest for God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Tolstoy's Quest for God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

The religious dimension of Tolstoy's life is usually associated with his later years following his renunciation of art. In this volume, Daniel Rancour-Laferriere demonstrates instead that Tolstoy was preoccupied with a quest for God throughout all of his adult life. Although renowned as the author of War and Peace, Anna Karenina, The Death of Ivan Ilych, and other literary works, and for his activism on behalf of the poor and the downtrodden of Russia, Tolstoy himself was concerned primarily with achieving personal union with God. Tolstoy suffered from periodic bouts of depression which brought his creative life to a standstill, and which intensified his need to find comfort in the embrace of a personal God. At times he was in such psychic pain he wanted to die. Yet Tolstoy felt that he deserved to suffer, and he learned to welcome suffering in masochistic fashion. Rancour-Laferriere locates the psychological underpinnings of Tolstoy's suffering in a bipolar illness that led him actively to seek suffering and self-humiliation in the Russian tradition of "holy foolishness." With voluntary suffering, and Jesus Christ as his model, Tolstoy advocated "nonresistance to evil," and in his daily life he strove never to return evil actions or words with physical or verbal resistance. On the other hand, being bipolar, Tolstoy in some situations would drift in a manic direction, indulging in delusions of grandeur. Indeed, the aging Tolstoy occasionally went so far as to equate himself with God, as can be seen from his diaries and personal correspondence. The pantheistic world view which Tolstoy achieved at the end of his life meant that God was within himself and within all people and all things in the entire universe. By this time Tolstoy was also utilizing images of a mother to represent his God. With this essentially maternal God so conveniently available, there was nowhere Tolstoy could be without Her. For, in the end, Tolstoy's quest for God was a compensatory search for the mother who died when he was barely two years old. Tolstoy's Quest for God is an original and penetrating contribution to the study of one of the world's supreme writers.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

210

Publisher

Transaction Publishers

Published Date

ISBN 10

1412813670

ISBN 13

9781412813679

The Slave Soul of Russia

Moral Masochism and the Cult of Suffering

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Slave Soul of Russia

Moral Masochism and the Cult of Suffering

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Rancour-Laferriere (Russian, U. of California, Davis) discusses the theme of suffering in Russian history, religion, folklore, and literature, and brings to light examples of self-defeating behaviors that have become an integral part of the Russian psyche. He look at folktales of the fool and his mother, gender issues in Russian masochism, the masochism of Russian bathhouse rituals, masochism and the collective, and the post-Soviet antimasochistic trend. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

344

Publisher

NYU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

081477458X

ISBN 13

9780814774588

The Digital Child

The Evolution of Inwardness in the Histories of Childhood

By: Daniel Dervin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Digital Child

The Evolution of Inwardness in the Histories of Childhood

By: Daniel Dervin

Nothing is more synonymous with the twenty-first century than the image of a child on his or her smart phone, tablet, video game console, television, and/or laptop. But with all this external stimulation, has childhood development been helped or hindered? Daniel Dervin is concerned that today's childhood has become unmoored from its Rousseauist-Wordsworthian anchors in nature. He considers childrens development to be inextricably linked with inwardness, a psychological concept referring to the awareness of ones self as derived from the world and the internalization of such reflections. Inwardness is the enabling space that allows ones thoughts, experiences, and emotions to be processed. It is an important adaptive marker of human evolution. In The Digital Child, Dervin traces the evolution of how we have perceived childhood in the West, and thus what we have meant by inwardness, from pre-history to today. He identifies six transformational stages: tribal, pedagogical, religious, humanist, rational, and citizen leading up to a new stage, the digital child. This stage has emerged from current unprecedented and pervasive technological culture. Dervin delves deeply into each stage that precedes today's, studying myths, literary texts, the visual arts, cultural histories, media reports, and the traditions of parenting, pediatrics, and pedagogy. Weaving together approaches from biology, culture, and psychology, Dervin revisits who we once were as a species in order to enable us to grasp who we are becoming, and where we might be heading, for better or worse.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

330

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1351372459

ISBN 13

9781351372459

Imagining Mary

A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Devotion to the Virgin Mother of God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Imagining Mary

A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Devotion to the Virgin Mother of God

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

406

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1351349678

ISBN 13

9781351349673

The Slave Soul of Russia

Moral Masochism and the Cult of Suffering

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Slave Soul of Russia

Moral Masochism and the Cult of Suffering

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Why, asks Daniel Rancour-Laferriere in this controversial book, has Russia been a country of suffering? Russian history, religion, folklore, and literature are rife with suffering. The plight of Anna Karenina, the submissiveness of serfs in the 16th and 17th centuries, ancient religious tracts emphasizing humility as the mother of virtues, the trauma of the Bolshevik revolution, the current economic upheavals wracking the country-- these are only a few of the symptoms of what The Slave Soul of Russia identifies as a veritable cult of suffering that has been centuries in the making. Bringing to light dozens of examples of self-defeating activities and behaviors that have become an integral component of the Russian psyche, Rancour-Laferriere convincingly illustrates how masochism has become a fact of everyday life in Russia. Until now, much attention has been paid to the psychology of Russia's leaders and their impact on the country's condition. Here, for the first time, is a compelling portrait of the Russian people's psychology.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

344

Publisher

NYU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0814774822

ISBN 13

9780814774823

Tolstoy on the Couch

Misogyny, Masochism and the Absent Mother

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Tolstoy on the Couch

Misogyny, Masochism and the Absent Mother

By: Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

279

Publisher

Springer

Published Date

ISBN 10

1349147796

ISBN 13

9781349147793

Book's by Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

The Sign of the Cross

The Sign of the Cross

Tolstoy on the Couch

Tolstoy on the Couch

Imagining Mary

Imagining Mary

Tolstoy's Quest for God

Tolstoy's Quest for God

The Slave Soul of Russia

The Slave Soul of Russia

The Digital Child

The Digital Child

Imagining Mary

Imagining Mary

The Slave Soul of Russia

The Slave Soul of Russia

Tolstoy on the Couch

Tolstoy on the Couch

Username

Password

Username

Password

Password again

Birthday

Email