Browsing by Author "Yazbec, Olga"

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    A Feminist Interpretation of the Plays of Amhara Regional State Television Programme
    (Addis Ababa Universiy, 2008-06) Derso, Fisseha; Yazbec, Olga
    Gender stereotyping is a cross cultural phenomenon prevalent across boarders. The nature and the negative impact of such stereotyping are pronounced in poorest countries of the world like Ethiopia where education and access to media for females is deficient. The preponderance of such stereotyping in the region becomes the reason which compels the resea rcher to engage in studying the contribution of the Amhara region's Television drama in this regard. This study, thus, which primarily focuses on investigating the extent of the reflection of gender stereotyping and the degree of females resistance to such stereotyping, also tries to asses the significance of the plays in abolishing this stereotyping. To this effect, the researcher has employed a purposive sampling technique to select some plays which could better show cultural roles of sexes. In this respect, from the total of 102 plays transmitted in 1997 and 1998EC, the researcher had to confine himself to the study of only five plays. The result of this study shows the availability of dramas which addresses the most important problems of femininity like early marriage and consideration of marriage as a reward for a female . However important raising these issues in the plays is for feminists, the plays are not up to the expectations of feminists because the portrayal of characters couldn't show the expected transforma tion. From the plays, it is also observed that the television dramas a re only rhythmic . with the contemporary society in representing the role and representation of both sexes. However, feminists, in this ,regard, believe that the absolute reflection of a patriarchal society in a television play is only a contribution to producing a new patriarchal generation. Thus, the ;.); plays of the television programme in focus ;, in this project, shall act on ·re creating a. reasonably new environment with regard to the role and representation of sexes,rto bring about a change in the actual patriarchal society. In the sense of bringing the change in the plays and thereby the targeted audience, this study, therefore, intends to suggest some solutions. The researcher believes that both the agency and the drama producing companies including authors have to be aware of transforming the nature of plays in response to feminists aim of creating a new world free from females' oppression.
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    The Image of the Child in Selected British and American Novels
    (2009-06) Yazbec, Olga; Wole, Darge (Prof.)
    In this thesis, an attempt has been made to examine the representation of fictional child characters in Stevenson's Treasure Island, Dickens's Oliver Twist and Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer based on a psychological framework of analysis evolved from Bronfenbrenner's theory of human development and selected aspects of developmental psychology. Both psychology and literature study human behavior although psychology observes human behavior directly from real life, whereas fiction deals with a reflection of reality. Focus has been on textual and extra-textual details since the literary texts are considered as psychological and sociological documents and are examined in relation to their respective Macrosystems. Attention has also been paid to the discourse and pragmatic features that the characters use in dialogues. Therefore, the correlation between the cognitive, psychosocial and pragmatic ski lls that the child protagonists display has also been considered. In addition, the literary techniques that the novelists use to highlight behavioral traits of the child protagonists, or to create literary effects, have been touched upon wherever such features appear in the novels. The findings of this study have been discussed in chapter seven in relation to other critics' opinions on the child protagonists that have been analyzed in this study. By applying a psychological framework of analysis, the present researcher tried to probe into the cognitive and psychosocial aspects of the child characters' behavior. She feels that applying parameters selected from developmental psychology to literature helped her to make an objective analysis of characterization. Some reviewers, for instance, stated that Oliver Twist, in Dickens 's Oliver Twist, and Tom Sawyer, in Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, are different from other children belonging to their age group, but they did not provide a theoretical explanation for such behavior. Therefore, thi s study has contributed something new by identifying the cognitive and psychosocial aspects of late childhood, early adolescence and gifted children that the child protagonists of the selected texts display in their behavior. Besides, although the child protagonists analyzed in thi s study lived in different Macrosystems, they share similarities, which can be attributed to the fact that they represent universal children.On the other hand, they also possess individual behavioral traits which distinguish them from one another. To sum up, this research is only a modest attempt at showing that it is possible to analyze fictional characters based on an eclectic approach derived from developmental psychology, literary criticism, discourse analysis and pragmatics because the nature of literature is such that it can respond to different approaches to literary analysis and interpretation ..
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    The State of the Short Story in Ethiopia: an Unexploited Genre
    (Addis Ababa University, 1981-06) Yazbec, Olga; Araaya, Hailu (PhD)
    The main purpose of thls r esea r c h i s to introduce the Ethiopian short s t ories to the Ethiopian public, a work that has not been attempted so f a r. The r esear ch examines why the short s tory, which is a recent genre, i s un exp l o ited and unfamiliar to the Ethiopian public. The Ethiopian short stories have been analyzed fr om the thematic and technical point of vi e w~ During the progress of th e s tudy, an attempt has been made to look into the conditions which have hind ered the d e velopment of the s hort s tory in Ethiopia, and have "lade it an unexploited genre~ Finally, recommenda tion s have been suggested in order to familiarize the public with the short story, and to encourage writ e r s to use thi s literary medium.