Cultural Connections
Oxford Brookes University (Gipsy Lane Campus)
Online News Sharing among Arabs: Topics, Users' Demographics, and Motivations View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Azza Ahmed
Sharing news over social media (SM) has become an everyday practice among internet-users all over the world. Despite the potential importance of news-sharing, little is known about this phenomenon in the Arab region. The news-sharing literature and uses and gratifications approach form the theoretical framework of the current research which examines the tendency of news-sharing on SM and its motivations among Emiratis and Arabs residents in the United Arab Emirates. It also explores the correlation between motivation and topics shared on social media. It investigates the difference in news-sharing and motivational factors among the demographic groups, mainly gender, age, nationality, level of education (undergraduate and post-post-graduate), and type of education (private vs. governmental). A convenient sample of 324 respondents filled an online constructed questionnaire. Based on the Uses and Gratification approach, factor analysis revealed four motivational factors that stimulate respondents to share news through SM. A positive significant correlation between news-sharing and both “status-seeking” and “social responsibility” was found. The correlation was non-significant between news-sharing and both “socializing” and “dissemination of information.” These factors significantly correlate positively with the type of topics that the Arab respondents share on SM. There is no significant difference between males and females in the news-sharing motivational factors except in the category of “socializing,” which is higher in the mean value among females than males. Emiratis have higher mean values in all news-sharing motivations as compared to Arab expats. More results are discussed in the paper and further research is recommended.
Symbolic Interpretation in Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea: An Intertextual Study
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Rushali Vaishnav
The intertextuality begins from the continuity of characters of a novel, same or different setting to give the effect, a new perspective and angle shown which is relevant to the contemporary time of different culture. The novels of intertextuality are also interesting for testing various standpoints, the evolution of societal norms, and understanding and sensitizing to cultural contexts. One such novel is The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys which is a post-colonial prequel to Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. Jean Rhys has used the character of Rochester and Bertha and left out Jane. The novel talks about the early life of Bertha whose original name is shown as Antoinette Cosway and how she faces problems of identity, in a patriarchal society. Both novels have employed symbolism subtly for driving home the points and creating heightened effects. Symbols are significant literary devices employed by writers to bring about the various ideas, themes, effect of the setting and the correlation among characters, setting and themes. There are symbols in Jane Eyre and The Wide Sargasso Sea and they have been used effectively with strategic positioning throughout the plot structure. The symbols like ‘Fire’, ‘Dreams’ and the thesis discusses their deep meaning and philosophical connotation with the themes and ideas. The paper endeavours to understand the use of symbolism as a literary device and endeavours to interpret and analyse various symbols, both from colonial and post-colonial perspectives as the same symbols are used differently by both writers.
