Spectrum https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE Journal of the Department of English. en-US Spectrum 1562-7195 Editor's Note https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2458 ---- Kazal Krishna Banerjee Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum i vii Doing Environmental Criticism from Where We Are https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2459 This paper rereads canonical authors of literature in English to highlight issues centering on the environment in their works as well as recent writers who write out of a conviction of environmental injustice, and from perspectives informed by environmental concerns. It suggests how we can redraw our curriculum and teach proactively in the classroom by viewing authors and texts in the light of ecocritical insights derived from Green Cultural Studies and postcolonial ecocriticism in addition to pioneering writers who stressed ecocritical consciousness and the dangers of pollution, climate warming and environmental degradation in the age of the anthropocene. The paper discusses briefly selected writings of Jonathan Swift, Herman Melville, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, Allen Ginsberg and Arundhati Roy, and ends with some examples of recent ecocritical poetry from the American poet Robert Hass and Bangladesh’s Kaiser Haq. Fakrul Alam Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 1 18 Newspapers in Two Ibsen Plays: Some Sociological and Political Issues https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2460 Though Henrik Ibsen is mostly given to be a champion of freedom in general and freedom of expression in particular, we find him checking related matters in much further ramifications and dialectics. Two of his plays give us scope of marking and assessing his closer looks at newspaper, for example, in general and two newspapers in particular. The plays are An Enemy of the People and Rosmersholm. The newspapers are the People’s Herald and The Lighthouse. Ibsen’s expository looks at these exemplify his characteristic manner of probing into and presenting truths in very revealing divisions and tensions. He is found to be closely informed about the political economy and such other motivators of different components of society and culture. Kajal Bandyopadhyay Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 19 26 Guriya-Ghar: Tripti Mitra’s Take on Sambhu Mitra’s Putul Khela https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2462 The paper discusses Tripti Mitra’s Guriya-Ghar (1981), a Hindi adaptation of Sambhu Mitra’s Putul Khela (1958), an acclaimed Bengali re-creation of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House (1879). The Hindi adaptation premiered in Kolkata featured the celebrated actress-director Usha Ganguli as Munya (Nora) who also adapted it into Hindi. The paper employs theatre historiography as its analytical tool to reconstruct the performance and its reception. It argues that the selection of performance testifies to the strong authority, prestige or powerful “cultural capital” connected to Putul Khela. It will show how the Hindi production was not simply copied into a new context. Instead, it will demonstrate that the production became a powerful contemporary statement for the simple reason that the director, actors and spectators re-created the performance with their own time and agenda in the back of their minds. Ahmed Ahsanuzzaman Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 27 38 Reinscribing Identity Formation on Screen: Ashima and Shashi https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2463 The present work observes, from two films of the commercial genre, the negotiation of two leading female characters in sculpting individual identities. Through their thought process, actions and decisions as depicted in the films, the characters attain personal and cultural emancipation which implies that they have traversed a long way from their initial selves. This study traces the mutation of the characters and the transformed reality they create; to understand the nature of the personal struggle they deal with in the course of their journey. Musarrat Shameem Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 39 51 Issues that Matter: Intersemiotic Transfer of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2464 Film adaptations are challenging and tricky for filmmakers in many ways. Good films based on famous and popular literary works provide the filmmakers with much fame and profit whereas a poor adaptation can result in loss in both monetary form and fame. Despite knowing this, filmmakers continue to produce films based on literary pieces, and with the passage of time and with advancement in technologies, film adaptations have improved to a great extent. British novelist Roald Dahl’s novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory has two film adaptations which are Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) directed by Mel Stuart and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) directed by Tim Burton. These two films are adapted in two different ways incorporating sociopolitical, psychological and, to some extent, technological issues. The paper investigates these issues that have been given new meaning departing from the textual dimension of the novel using the semiotics of film. Fahima Tasnim Sabiha Huq Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 52 62 Soul Searching through Third Theatre: Badal Sircar’s Michhil in Postcolonial Semiotics https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2465 Badal Sircar’s (1925-2011) Third Theatre, avowedly a synthesis of First (indigenous performance traditions) and Second (proscenium as Western import) Theatres, was conceived as flexible, portable, and inexpensive performance. Cumulatively, these requirements arose from Sircar’s vision of a ‘political’ theatre that would be self-sustainable, and would have empathic value with audiences. Despite a successful stint with naturalistic proscenium theatre, Sircar was still dissatisfied with keeping audiences at safe removes; and was driven by the urge to (con)sensitize his viewers through performances. Borrowing from Western models of alternative theatre(s), he experimented with optimising of body-acting, first in the Anganmancha (Arena Theatre), and then through performances in public spaces (Muktamancha) across urban-rural locations. All of this gave a radical turn to Badal Sircar’s theatre in and around Kolkata, beginning from the decade of the seventies. This Paper concentrates on Michhil (Procession, 1974), an early Third Theatre specific script, that subjectivised the prototype ordinary man ‘lost’ amidst bewildering maelstroms of postcolonial euphoria and the resultant dehumanising anonymity of urban landscapes. Making subversive use of the visual metaphor of incessant processions on various citizen issues as popular representation of ‘political societies’, Sircar’s play deconstructs such euphoria even as it marks a nuanced turn from mass hysteria to individual soul-searching. Thus, the young ‘dead’ and the old ‘lost’ protagonist(s), both metaphorically named Khoka, emerge as each other’s mirror images in their travails amidst disillusionments and failed promises across generations. As wayside performances, this rescinding of the claustrophobia of urbanism, and the concomitant battling against dominant forces transformed Michhil into a whirlwind that stormed the city of Kolkata amidst statist repression of the Naxalite movement. In transcreation, it has travelled through Mumbai as protest against National Emergency (1975), to Lahore where it marked Ajoka Theatre’s debut (1984) amidst martial regime in Islamic Pakistan. In a throwback to difficult periods of sub-continental history at a time when understandings of nationalism in India are faced with radical polemics, this Paper examines the performative relevance of Michhil in intercultural semiotics. It thereby aims to underscore the continuing relevance of Sircar’s ‘political’ theatre as interrogations on postcolonial subject positions after a span of nearly five decades since its first enactment. Srideep Mukherjee Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 63 74 Motherhood as a “Hidden Transcript”: The Agency of Linda Brent in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2466 One of the earliest slave narratives written by a female author, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) unfolds the tragic account of Linda Brent, who eventually uses her motherhood as a form of resistance and gains freedom. Adopting the fictional name Linda, the author Harriet Jacobs escapes from the sentimental trope of slave narratives in her display of the agency of the protagonist that is primarily manifested through Linda’s chosen, not forced, motherhood. Drawing on James C. Scott’s idea of “hidden transcripts” which stands for the subtle, masked nature of resistance used by the oppressed, this paper argues that motherhood can be read as a “hidden transcript” that Linda uses exhaustively not only to defeat her master but also to keep her dream alive. Gendering the concept of “hidden transcripts,” this paper, thus, explores the “infrapolitics” of Linda’s strategic motherhood in its power to undermine a patriarchal and racist society. Shibaji Mridha Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 75 87 Canto General: Neruda’s Quest for Historicity https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2467 The paper intends to explicate Canto General (1950), one of the most notable works by Pablo Neruda, in the light of Karl Marx's dialectical materialism. It broadly encapsulates how Neruda, a socially and politically committed poet, identified the meeting points between the general history of Latin America and the struggle of the masses there for liberation. This paper also exposes how the bourgeois governments intentionally excluded the contribution and sacrifice of the liberators of the continent from the text-book history to mislead the coming generations. It indicates the poet's love for and commitment to the struggle of the proletariat who sacrificed immensely to glorify the history of the entire continent. This research inquires into how the bourgeoisie exploited the proletariat during the post-colonial era in the mid-twentieth century in Latin America. Therein it elucidates the manifold contributions of the true liberators of the continent who sacrificed their lives to bring socio-political changes in society. On the whole, the paper explores how ahistoricity stands as a threat to history and historicity in Latin America, and why the proletarian struggle is important to challenge and question the rise of ahistoricity. Alongside this, this research concentrates on the concept of the Marxist vision of freedom which, in the end, accelerates the proletarian movement. Tusar Talukder Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 88 97 Partition and Identity Formation: The Case of Agunpakhi and Rajkahini https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2468 In both Agunpakhi by Hasan Azizul Haque and Rajkahini by Srijit Mukherji, the female characters follow the rules of the patriarchy, and more or less are satisfied with their prescribed roles. However, Partition of the country provides them an opportunity to think about their inner strength and distinctiveness and so, the female characters rise above and subvert their previous dominated identities to become new women. Unlike the remarkable Partition narrative, in both Agunpakhi and Rajkahini, we feel the pains of Partition from the experiences of the female characters. However, they are not only the passive victims of partition, they prove their worth by rejecting traditional gender roles and fighting for the country. The aim of this paper to unmask the repressive and fundamentally flawed patriarchal society that restrain the female characters to form their identities, and at the same time to focus on the opportunities that Partition gives them to fabricate their sense of identity. In this paper, Feminist theory will be used. Farhana Yeasmin Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 98 106 Robert Lowell’s Confessional Poems and Linda Hutcheon’s Parody: American Modernism’s Shift towards Postmodernism https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2469 The great modernist tradition fosters impersonality and objectivity in art and life. Though being a modern American poet, Robert Lowell seems to avoid this high modernist tradition by introducing autobiographical details in his collection of confessional poems: Life Studies. Confessional poems connect the past with present observations; they reproduce memories of family and childhood as well as deal with sensitive issues like mental illness. Above all, they use the first person pronoun “I” to create life-like images. In addition to that, these poems share some features with Linda Hutcheon’s concept of parody, discussed in her essay “The Politics of Postmodernism: Parody and History”. According to Hutcheon, parodies are central to postmodernism; they transgress and question authority that controls. However, postmodernism negates modernism; it does not reject it. Unlike modernism, it integrates the past and the repressed history of forms in literature. On the other hand, though Robert Lowell is conscious of the limitations of modernism, his poems are objective and impersonal. Nonetheless, unlike the modern poetic persona, he presents the incongruities of his society not merely as meaningless and helpless ramblings; rather, he connects them with hope. He joins art with life and culture; narrates his contemporary American society in vernacular, and he bridges the gap between the private with the public. By keeping Hutcheon’s idea of Parody in mind, this paper discusses Robert Lowell’s Life Studies as a collection of poems that criticizes modernism, and adopts certain traits of postmodernism to mark American modernism’s shift towards postmodernism. Sanjeeda Hossain Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 107 116 Examining Greater Naturalism, Gender-Balance and Some Other Ideas in Strindberg’s Short Stories https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2470 The paper reviews some short stories by August Strindberg in order to reinterpret gender issues. Mainly two of his short stories- ‘His Servant or Debit and Credit’ (1884) and ‘Compulsory Marriage’ (1884) - have been focused intensely. Besides, necessary references have been taken from some other short stories. Strindberg’s thoughts have been checked from some unconventional points of view. Since ‘Gender’, ‘Sex’, ‘Gender-Balance’, ‘Greater naturalism’ etc. played important roles in Strindberg's works, these terms have been explained separately. The paper casts a glance at Henrik Ibsen as well; because discussion on Strindberg remains incomplete without Ibsen. Adding multi-layered arguments, the paper tries to remove conventional misinterpretations of August Strindberg’s thoughts. It examines Strindberg’s attitude towards feminism, and takes references from relevant works by other writers. It suggests solution to the problems that arise from so-called ‘Gender disparity’. Above all, the paper comes to a conclusion that becomes parallel to August Strindberg's thoughts on gender issues. Mahbub Siddiqee Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 117 125 Gun Island: An Experiment with Fictional Time https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2471 This paper examines the treatment of time in the novel Gun Island by Amitav Ghosh, and scrutinises how its particular temporal perspective explores the connection between humans and nature. Ghosh deploys his own techniques to make readers conscious about the temporal scope of his story, and these techniques can be analysed through the distinctive ways of time measurement, theories of ‘deep time’ or ecological time, the idea of the ‘Anthropocene’, various modes of temporal distortion, and the concepts of public and private memory. Understanding the timeframe of any literary work is crucial to grasp its essence, and it is only within a temporal structure that it can be located. In Gun Island, the author challenges readers by using unique measurement of time, fragmentation of traditional clock time, and juxtaposition of collective with individual memory. I argue in my paper that through these challenges, which definitely make the reading a complicated one, the author is able to offer a new perception of time to the readers. The unique approach of temporality that Ghosh adopts points out how the general human perception of time hinders our capacity to perceive the crucial signs of climate change in the present world. At the same time, this new temporal perspective helps readers to be aware of environmental changes and its consequences. Khadijatul Kaminy Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 126 133 English Language Learners’ Level of Reading Proficiency and their Use of Reading Strategies https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2472 The paper reports on a study that investigated undergraduate English language students’ use of reading strategies based on their reading proficiency level. The main objectives of the study were to identify any relationship between reading proficiency level and strategy use, and any significant differences among highly proficient, moderately proficient, and low proficient students in their strategy use while reading academic materials. The study also aimed at exploring the most frequently used reading strategies among the learners of these three proficiency levels. The study used a questionnaire survey and employed descriptive statistics and ANOVA tests on the data generated from 145 undergraduate English major students of a public university in Bangladesh. Results revealed that all three groups of participants used cognitive strategies most frequently. ANOVA test results showed a significant difference between highly proficient and low proficient participants in their reported use of several strategies. The highly proficient group scored higher than the other groups, which indicates a possible relationship between learners’ level of proficiency and their reading strategy use. Ahmed Bashir Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 134 153 Analyzing Students’ Preference for Audio Feedback from the Perspective of Social Cognitive Theory https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2473 This article makes an attempt to analyze students’ preference for audio feedback from the perspective of social cognitive theory based on secondary research studies. Some researchers have shown students’ preference for audio feedback over written feedback while several researchers have discovered students’ preference for written feedback. However, these preferences for audio feedback have not been analyzed from the perspective of social cognitive theory. Analysis shows that students prefer audio feedback to written feedback when they are familiar with the technology of receiving audio feedback. Finally, this article presents an opportunity to conduct research in the field of audio feedback with multilingual students in countries like Bangladesh. Sukanto Roy Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 154 159 Towards an Agrammatic Grammatical Theory: Evidence from Research on Aphasic Patients https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2474 Research on agrammatism (i.e. a phenomenon commonly known as language loss of aphasic patients whose particular area(s) of brain accidentally get damaged resulting in language impairment) has revealed that the nature of language impairment is systematic and interpretable. This paper summarizes some of the representative studies on agrammatism. All these investigations support that agrammatism has a distinctive linguistic pattern(s) i.e. special grammaticality of its own. I hypothesize that agrammatics have a special kind of grammar of their own that is different from normal speakers’ language patterns. In the following, I elucidate such special patterns of agrammatism. I also speculate that developing such distinctive pattern(s) of agrammatic speech will help administer both diagnoses of and therapies for aphasic patients in more effective ways. Md. Harun Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 160 176 Assessment Literacy: From Theoretical Constructs to Test Design and Delivery https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2475 Assessment literacy is a fundamental requirement for all the personnel involved in activities related to language assessment. The information gathered from assessment is, in the main, used in making impactful decisions about language learners, language programmes, curricula as well as educational institutions. Failure of assessment instruments to provide reliable and accurate information results in misdirected and inappropriate decisions to the detriment of all stakeholders of educational assessment. Hence, all assessment staff must have the knowledge of the theoretical and philosophical underpinnings as well as practical considerations in the field of assessment. Considering the importance of developing assessment literacy among language teachers, this paper intends to shed light on the key theoretical constructs of assessment and testing, stages of test design and successful delivery of tests. Additionally, it aims to provide the beginning language educators with the very basics of assessment in a language neither highly technical nor too specialized for them to understand. The contents of this paper will also cater for novice educators across disciplines. Md. Elias Uddin Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 177 189 Studying in the Department of English at Dhaka University: An Analysis of Learners’ Motivations, Expectations and Reality https://journal.library.du.ac.bd/index.php/JDE/article/view/2476 The yearly enrollment of freshmen in universities at undergraduate level in the English Department at Dhaka University requires attention for manifold reasons. This transition from the previous institution involves not only an admixture of expectations and shock on the learners’ part due to the exposure to an entirely new academic system but also the very idea of university admission to one particular department (i.e. English with two possible options of majoring in language or literature later in their MA years) comes with its own complex realities. In order to seek a possible answer to this multifaceted issue in relation to the framework of tertiary education in a Bangladeshi context, it is of absolute necessity to examine if gaps exist between what the students of this department from different localities expect and what they face in reality. In order to identify any possible gaps as such, this study surveys the opinions of seventy first-year students from the Department of English, University of Dhaka followed by a focus group discussion of ten final year students. The survey examines their expectations and motivations they had prior to their admission into the department, and also presents their reflection on the changes and congruities in those opinions. The questions include issues of motivation, attitudes, in-class tasks, distribution of courses, contribution of teachers, classroom materials, and the overall learning environment in the department. The findings of the study show a number of possible causes of gaps between student expectations and reality. In order to ensure a smooth transition of the students from higher secondary to tertiary level, these gaps needs to be addressed. Motiur Rahman Copyright (c) 2021 Spectrum 190 209