The design of a Shmashana for the Hindu community in the Baakens valley, Port Elizabeth
- Authors: Bolton, Daniel
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Hindu temples -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth -- Designs and plans , Hinduism -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth City planning -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10948/17855 , vital:28461
- Description: This treatise explores the consolidation of the Hindu Community’s identity through the design of a Shmashana (Hindu cremation ground) which allows for the conservation and practice of one of their most important rituals, traditional funeral rites. The Hindu community was amongst the first settlers in Port Elizabeth and entrenched in the historical, culturally rich and diverse suburb of South End. South End was later destroyed by the apartheid government and the Hindu community, as well as other communities were forcefully removed from their homes in South End and relocated to other areas forming pockets of ghettos and a segregated city. The proposal to establish a Shmashana will enhance the Hindu community’s cultural identity and reconnect them to South End, as well as a step towards reconciliation for the injustices of apartheid. This study utilises a qualitative research framework using precedent studies and inductive reasoning to formulate a design approach to the Hindu culture and South End as a place and memory. This investigation reveals that for the creation of a Shmashana there are specific site criteria required combined with particular spatial and physical qualities in the location and the cultural and spiritual needs of the Hindu community. These aspects are examined through a phenomenological lens to create an environment which is meaningful to the community and the memory of the pre-apartheid South End district. The writings of Relph (1976), Shamai (2005), Norberg-Schulz (1985), Manzo (2003), Najafi and Shariff (2011) are used to understand a sense of place and how the architecture and users can relate to it. Peter Zumthor’s (2006) characteristics of an atmospheric environment are applied to create an experiential space while the writings of Thomas Barrie (1996) examine the experience of religious sacred space.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Sylvia Plath images of life in a poet of death
- Authors: Mather, Mary Lynn
- Date: 1992
- Subjects: Plath, Sylvia , Plath, Sylvia -- Criticism and interpretation
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2245 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002288 , Plath, Sylvia , Plath, Sylvia -- Criticism and interpretation
- Description: On a creative and a personal level, Sylvia Plath seems to have been fascinated by the relationship between life and death. Her work reflects an ongoing preoccupation with duality and a sense of tension between two opposing forces suffuses virtually every poem she wrote in the period from 1956 to early 1963. Because her attitude to both life and death is deeply ambivalent, Plath's poetry rests on a strong awareness of conflict and her art is characterized by a continual pull between extremes. This thesis is an examination of how she uses images of life in poems that ostensibly deal with death.While Plath draws on the events of her own life for her poetic material, she also converts her personal experiences into a universal myth. She was familiar with Robert Graves's eclectic study of the pagan nature deity, The White Goddess, and she seems to have incorporated part of his symbolism into her own code of images. In particular, she adopts Graves's triple goddess of nature as one of the dominant figures in her created world, for the White Goddess is associated with life and death alike.Plath's dichotomy of life and death works on different planes. Firstly, she frequently envisages the self as divided and the opposition between life and death takes on the dimensions of an internal psychological war. Secondly, she extends the battle between life and death to the creative sphere. Thirdly, she explores the idea of life as a journey from birth to death. The White Goddess is linked with the three natural realms of earth, sky and underworld. And Plath relies largely on seasonal, lunar and chthonic images in her poetry. Furthermore, the three colours of the goddess - white , red and black - are the dominant hues of her poetry.
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- Date Issued: 1992