Media Awareness Homework

1. Synesthesia

Synesthesia (also spelled synæsthesia or synaesthesia, plural synesthesiae or synaesthesiae)—from the Ancient Greek σύν (syn), meaning "with," and αἴσθησις (aisthēsis), meaning "sensation"'—is a neurologically-based phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. In one common form of synesthesia, known as grapheme → color synesthesia, letters or numbers are perceived as inherently colored, while in ordinal linguistic personification, numbers, days of the week and months of the year evoke personalities. In spatial-sequence, or number form synesthesia, numbers, months of the year, and/or days of the week elicit precise locations in space (for example, 1980 may be "farther away" than 1990), or may have a (three-dimensional) view of a year as a map (clockwise or counterclockwise).

 

Source: "Synesthesia".Wikipedia.org. 8 Feb. 2008. 10 Feb. 2008. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia>.

2. Allusion

Allusion is a figure of speech, reference/representation of/to a well-known person, place, event, literary work, or work of art, and M.H. Abrams defined allusion as "a brief reference, explicit or indirect, to a person, place or event, or to another literary work or passage"^[1]. It is left to the reader or hearer to make the connection (Fowler); an overt allusion is a misnomer for what is simply a reference.

In discussing the richly allusive poetry of Virgil's Georgics, R.F. Thomas^[7] distinguished six categories of allusive reference, which are applicable to a wider cultural sphere. These types are 1) Casual Reference, "the use of language which recalls a specific antecedent, but only in a general sense" that is relatively unimportant to the new context; 2) Single Reference, in which the hearer or reader is intended to "recall the context of the model and apply that context to the new situation"; such a specific single reference in Virgil, according to Thomas, is a means of "making connections or conveying ideas on a level of intense subtlety"; 3) Self-Reference, where the locus is in the poet's own work; 4) Corrective Allusion, where the imitation is clearly in opposition to the original source's intentions; 5) Apparent Reference ""which seems clearly to recall a specific model but which on closer inspection frustrates that intention" and 6) Multiple Reference or Conflation, which refers in various ways simultaneously to several sources, fusing and transforming the cultural traditions.

 

Source: "Allusion".Wikipedia.org. 16 Jan. 2008. 10 Feb. 2008. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allusion>.

 

3. Drama

Dra´ma   Pronunciation: drä´må or drā´må; 277

n.	1.	A composition, in prose or poetry, accommodated to action, and intended to exhibit a picture of human life, or to depict a series of grave or humorous actions of more than ordinary interest, tending toward some striking result. It is commonly designed to be spoken and represented by actors on the stage. A divine pastoral drama in the Song of Solomon. - Milton.
	2.	A series of real events invested with a dramatic unity and interest. Westward the course of empire takes its way; The four first acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama with the day; Time's noblest offspring is the last. - Berkeley. The drama and contrivances of God's providence. - Sharp.
	3.	Dramatic composition and the literature pertaining to or illustrating it; dramatic literature. The romantic drama the kind of drama whose aim is to present a tale or history in scenes, and whose plays (like those of Shakespeare, Marlowe, and others) are stories told in dialogue by actors on the stage. - J. A. Symonds.

Source: "Definition of Drama".Webster-Dictionary.net. 23 Oct. 2004. 10 Feb. 2008. <http://webster-dictionary.net/definition/drama>.

 

4. Shakespearean Theatre

English Renaissance theatre is English drama written between the Reformation and the closure of the theatres in 1642. It may also be called early modern English theatre. It includes the drama of William Shakespeare along with many other famous dramatists.

English Renaissance theatre is sometimes called "Elizabethan theatre." The term "Elizabethan theatre", however, covers only the plays written and performed publicly in England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (that is, 1558–1603). As such, "Elizabethan theatre" is distinguished from Jacobean theatre (associated with the reign of King James I, 1603–1625), and Caroline theatre (associated with King Charles I, 1625 until the closure of the theatres in 1642). "English Renaissance theatre" or "early modern theatre" refers to all three sub-classifications taken together.

 

Source: Ross, David. "Elizabethan Theatre". BritainExpress.com. 2004. 10 Feb. 2008. <http://www.britainexpress.com/History/elizabethan-theatre.htm>.