Atom Egoyan CC ( / ɛ ˈ ɡ ɔɪ ə n / ; Armenian : Ատոմ Եղոյեան ; born July 19, 1960) is a Canadian filmmaker. Emerging in the 1980s as part of the Toronto New Wave , he made his career breakthrough with Exotica (1994), a film set in a strip club . Egoyan's most critically acclaimed film is the drama The Sweet Hereafter (1997), for which he received two Academy Award nominations . His biggest commercial success is the erotic thriller Chloe (2009).
97-443: Egoyan's works often explore themes of alienation and isolation , featuring characters whose interactions are mediated through technology, bureaucracy, or other power structures. His films often follow non-linear plot structures, in which events are placed out of sequence in order to elicit specific emotional reactions from the audience by withholding key information. He received the 2008 Dan David Prize for "Creative Rendering of
194-491: A Czech libretto by the composer, based on the play Její pastorkyňa by Gabriela Preissová . It was first performed at the National Theatre , Brno on 21 January 1904. Composed between 1896 and 1902, it is among the first operas written in prose. The first of Janáček's operas in which his distinctive voice can clearly be heard, it is a grim story of infanticide and redemption. Like the playwright's original work, it
291-411: A cycle of never ending wants which makes them strangers to each other. When referring to ideological alienation , Axelos proposes that Marx believes that all religions divert people away from "their true happiness" and instead turn them towards "illusory happiness". There is a commonly noted problem of translation in grappling with ideas of alienation derived from German-language philosophical texts:
388-437: A fake reality masking a degradation of human life. The Theory of Communicative Action associated with Jürgen Habermas emphasizes the essential role of language in public life , suggesting that alienation stems from the distortion of reasoned moral debate by the strategic dominance of market forces and state power. This critical program can be contrasted with traditions that attempt to extract problems of alienation from
485-523: A feeling of having become a stranger to oneself, or to some parts of oneself, or alternatively as a problem of self-knowledge , or authenticity . Seeman recognized the problems inherent in defining the "self", while post-modernism in particular has questioned the very possibility of pin-pointing what precisely "self" constitutes. Further in that way, if the self is relationally constituted, does it make sense to speak of "self-estrangement" rather than "social isolation"? Costas and Fleming suggest that although
582-724: A group of soldiers, drunk and boasting of his prowess with the girls. He calls for music and drags the miserable Jenůfa into dancing with him. The Kostelnička steps into this rowdy scene, silences the musicians and, shocked by Števa's behavior, forbids him to marry Jenůfa until he can stay sober for one full year. The soldiers and the family leave Števa and Jenůfa alone, and she begs him to love her, but he, unaware of her pregnancy, gives her casual answers and leaves. Laca returns, as bitter as ever. He attempts to goad Jenůfa into criticizing Števa, but she takes her lover's side despite everything. Laca rages that Števa would never even look at her if it weren't for her rosy cheeks, then slashes her across
679-480: A high degree of distance or isolation (3a) between individuals, or (3b) between an individual and a group of people in a community or work environment [enumeration added] ". It is a sociological concept developed by several classical and contemporary theorists. The concept has many discipline-specific uses and can refer both to a personal psychological state (subjectively) and to a type of social relationship (objectively). The term alienation has been used over
776-589: A limited release in theatres. His 2019 drama Guest of Honour , was nominated for a Golden Lion in competition in Venice in 2019, had a Special Presentation at the Toronto International Film Festival, and opening night galas in Vancouver and Montreal. His latest film is Seven Veils (2023) ; the film was a Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) Official Selection with a special advance premiere at
873-448: A loss of identity and stigma. Attachment relationships in adults can also involve feelings of alienation. Indeed, emotional alienation is said to be a common way of life for many, whether it is experienced as overwhelming, unacknowledged in the midst of a socioeconomic race , or contributes to seemingly unrelated problems. Social isolation refers to "The feeling of being segregated from one's community". Neal and Collas emphasize
970-469: A new understanding of mental alienation, particularly through his 'medical-philosophical treatise'. He argued that people could be disturbed (alienated) by emotional states and social conditions, without necessarily having lost (become alienated from) their reason, as had generally been assumed. Hegel praised Pinel for his ' moral treatment ' approach, and developed related theories. Nevertheless, as Foucault would later write, "... in an obscure, shared origin,
1067-399: A number of biological, psychological, social, and structural factors affecting the family, including attachment disorders, incompatible values and beliefs, unfulfilled expectations, critical life events and transitions, parental alienation, and ineffective communication patterns." The degree of alienation has been positively correlated with decreased emotional functioning in the parent who feels
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#17330941179311164-777: A particular legal - political meaning since as early as Ancient Roman times, where to alienate property ( alienato ) is to transfer ownership of it to someone else. The term alienation itself comes from the Latin alienus which meant 'of another place or person', which in turn came from alius , meaning "other" or "another". Another usage of the term in Ancient Greco-Roman times was by physicians referring to disturbed, difficult or abnormal states of mind, generally attributed to imbalanced physiology . In Latin alienatio mentis (mental alienation), this usage has been dated to Asclepiades . Once translations of such works had resurfaced in
1261-718: A person had become separated from themselves, their reason or the world. From the 1960s alienation was again considered in regard to clinical states of disturbance, typically using a broad concept of a 'schizoid' ('splitting') process taken from psychoanalytic theory. The splitting was said to occur within regular child development and in everyday life, as well as in more extreme or dysfunctional form in conditions such as schizoid personality and schizophrenia . Varied concepts of alienation and self-estrangement were used to link internal schizoid states with observable symptoms and with external socioeconomic divisions, without necessarily explaining or evidencing underlying causation. R. D. Laing
1358-507: A prerequisite to expectancies for control; and the unintelligibility of complex affairs is presumably conducive to the development of high expectancies for external control (that is, high powerlessness)". Geyer believes meaninglessness should be reinterpreted for postmodern times: "With the accelerating throughput of information ... meaningless is not a matter anymore of whether one can assign meaning to incoming information, but of whether one can develop adequate new scanning mechanisms to gather
1455-655: A production of Martin Crimp 's Cruel and Tender . After the release of the West Memphis Three from 18 years in prison, Egoyan directed a movie about the case called Devil's Knot (2013) starring Reese Witherspoon and Colin Firth , based on a book, Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three by Mara Leveritt . His next feature, The Captive (2014), starred Ryan Reynolds and screened in competition for
1552-412: A psychological state and an objective process, and in general posited that the self was a historical and social creation, which becomes alienated from itself via a perceived objective world, but can become de-alienated again when that world is seen as just another aspect of the self-consciousness, which may be achieved by self-sacrifice to the common good. Around the same time, Pinel was popularizing
1649-411: A sixth element (cultural estrangement), although this element does not feature prominently in later discussions of his work. In a broader philosophical context, especially in existentialism and phenomenology , alienation describes the inadequacy of the human being (or the mind ) in relation to the world. The human mind (as the subject who perceives) sees the world as an object of perception, and
1746-506: A social-political framework, and so therefore are psychological problems. Likewise, some psychoanalysts suggest that while psychoanalysis emphasizes environmental causes and reactions, it also attributes the problems of individuals to internal conflicts stemming from early psychosocial development, effectively divorcing them from the wider ongoing context. Slavoj Zizek (drawing on Herbert Marcuse , Michel Foucault , and Jacques Lacan's psychoanalysis) argues that in today's capitalist society,
1843-543: A state of psychological disconnection from a policy programme being implemented. Self-estrangement is an elusive concept in sociology, as recognized by Seeman, although he included it as an aspect in his model of alienation. Some, with Marx, consider self-estrangement to be the result and thus the heart of social alienation. Self-estrangement can be defined as "the psychological state of denying one's own interests – of seeking out extrinsically rather than intrinsically satisfying , activities...". It could be characterized as
1940-467: A term he found in Schelling. It is the feeling of “estrangement from the spirit” so intense that it entails a willful closing of the soul to the transcendent. Philosophers Heidegger , Peter Sloterdijk and more recently Alexander Grau argue for a similar fact of alienation . Alienation is most often represented in literature as the psychological isolation of an individual from society or community. In
2037-563: A volume of Bloom's Literary Themes, Shakespeare 's Hamlet is described as the 'supreme literary portrait' of alienation, while noting that some may argue for Achilles in the Iliad . In addition, Bartleby, the Scrivener is introduced as a perfect example because so many senses of alienation are present. Other literary works described as dealing with the theme of alienation are: The Bell Jar , Black Boy , Brave New World , The Catcher in
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#17330941179312134-633: A younger sister, Eve . In 1963, the family moved to Victoria in the Canadian province of British Columbia due to the rise of Arab nationalism , and changed their last name to Egoyan. As a teenager, Egoyan became interested in reading and writing plays. Influences included Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter . He also attributes his future in the film industry to Ingmar Bergman 's Persona (1966), which he viewed at age 14, according to an interview he had with journalist Robert K. Elder for The Film That Changed My Life : It gave me an incredible respect for
2231-439: Is a high expectancy that socially unapproved behaviours are required to achieve given goals". Neal and Collas write that "[n]ormlessness derives partly from conditions of complexity and conflict in which individuals become unclear about the composition and enforcement of social norms. Sudden and abrupt changes occur in life conditions, and the norms that usually operate may no longer seem adequate as guidelines for conduct". This
2328-457: Is a particular issue after the fall of the Soviet Union, mass migrations from developing to developed countries, and the general sense of disillusionment that characterized the 1990s. One concept used in regard to specific relationships is that of parental alienation , where a separated child expresses a general dislike for one of their parents (who may have divorced or separated ). The term
2425-403: Is about the loss of primary relationships such as familial bonds in favour of goal -oriented, secondary relationships . This idea of alienation can be observed in some other contexts, although the term may not be as frequently used. In the context of an individual's relationships within society, alienation can mean the unresponsiveness of society as a whole to the individuality of each member of
2522-513: Is articulated most clearly in the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 and The German Ideology (1846). The 'young' Marx wrote more often and directly of alienation than the 'mature' Marx, which some regard as an ideological break while others maintain that the concept remained central. Structuralists generally hold that there was a transition from a philosophical- anthropological ( Marxist humanism ) concept (e.g. internal alienation from
2619-465: Is distanced from the world, rather than living within it. This line of thought is generally traced to the works of Søren Kierkegaard in the 19th century, who, from a Christian viewpoint, saw alienation as separation from God, and also examined the emotions and feelings of individuals when faced with life choices. Many 20th-century philosophers (both theistic and atheistic) and theologians were influenced by Kierkegaard 's notions of angst, despair and
2716-440: Is engaged". Seeman writes that meaninglessness "is characterized by a low expectancy that satisfactory predictions about the future outcomes of behaviour can be made." Whereas powerlessness refers to the sensed ability to control outcomes, this refers to the sensed ability to predict outcomes. In this respect, meaninglessness is closely tied to powerlessness ; Seeman argues, "the view that one lives in an intelligible world might be
2813-536: Is established by interaction between deaf and hearing people, sometimes resulting in marginalization of the deaf, which is sometimes challenged. It has also led to the creation of alternatives and the deaf community is described as one such alternative. Physicians and nurses often deal with people who are temporarily or permanently alienated from communities, which could be a result or a cause of medical conditions and suffering, and it has been suggested that therefore attention should be paid to learning from experiences of
2910-495: Is faced with the necessity of making the lie true. She wraps the baby in a shawl and leaves the house. Jenůfa wakes up and says a prayer for her child's future, but the Kostelnička, returning, tells her that the baby died while she slept. Laca appears and comforts Jenůfa gently, asking that they spend the rest of their lives together. Seeing the tenderness of the couple, the Kostelnička tries to convince herself that she has acted for
3007-464: Is in deadly anguish,” writes Voegelin, “because he takes life seriously and cannot bear existence without meaning.” For reflection on the limits of the human condition to give rise to ideology, a certain “mood” must be present. What is this mood? It is the mood not only of alienation but of revolt. Ideology involves the active revolt against existential truth and the effort to construct a different world. Voegelin designates this mood as “pneumopathological,”
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3104-436: Is infinite and overflowing, and claimed that any attempt to describe or understand the thing-in-itself is "reflective consciousness". Since there is no way for the reflective consciousness to subsume the pre-reflective, Sartre argued that all reflection is fated to a form of anxiety (i.e. the human condition ). As well, Sartre argued that when a person tries to gain knowledge of the "Other" (meaning beings or objects that are not
3201-587: Is known for its unsentimental realism . While today it is heard in the composer 's original version, Jenůfa' s early popularity was due to a revised version by Karel Kovařovic , altering what was considered its eccentric style and orchestration . Thus altered, it was well-received, first in Prague , and particularly after its Vienna première also worldwide. More than 70 years passed before audiences again heard it in Janáček's original version. Janáček wrote an overture to
3298-471: Is not applied where there is child abuse . The parental alienation might be due to specific influences from either parent or could result from the social dynamics of the family as a whole. It can also be understood in terms of attachment , the social and emotional process of bonding between child and caregiver. Adoptees can feel alienated from both adoptive parents and birth parents. Familial estrangement between parents and adult children "is attributed to
3395-399: Is now engaged to marry Karolka, the mayor's pretty daughter. Števa leaves, and Laca enters. He still doesn't know the truth about the baby, and when the Kostelnička tells him, his first reaction is disgust at the thought of taking Števa's child under his wing. Fearful that Jenůfa will be left with no one to marry, Kostelnička hastily lies that the baby is dead. Laca leaves, and the Kostelnička
3492-716: Is set to be presented again by LA Opera in 2025. In 2009, he directed the erotic thriller Chloe , which was theatrically released by Sony Pictures Classics on March 26, 2010. This film grossed $ 3 million in limited theatrical release in the United States, which was generally considered as a respectful result for an arthouse film release in early 2010's. Several months after the DVD/Blu-ray release of Chloe , Egoyan said that Chloe had made more money than any of his previous films. The success of Chloe led Egoyan to receive many scripts of erotic thrillers. In 2012, he directed
3589-513: Is the perception that the individual does not have the means to achieve his goals. Ultimately breaking with the Marxist tradition, Geyer remarks that "a new type of powerlessness has emerged, where the core problem is no longer being unfree but rather being unable to select from among an overchoice of alternatives for action, whose consequences one often cannot even fathom". Geyer adapts cybernetics to alienation theory, and writes that powerlessness
3686-491: Is the result of delayed feedback : "The more complex one's environment, the later one is confronted with the latent, and often unintended, consequences of one's actions. Consequently, in view of this causality-obscuring time lag, both the 'rewards' and 'punishments' for one's actions increasingly tend to be viewed as random, often with apathy and alienation as a result". A sense of meaning has been defined by Seeman as "the individual's sense of understanding events in which he
3783-846: The 50th Cannes Film Festival : the Grand Prix , the FIPRESCI Jury Prize, and the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury . The film also earned Egoyan Academy Award nominations for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay . Beginning in 1996, Egoyan has directed several operas, including Salome , Così fan tutte , Jenůfa , and The Ring Cycle , at the Canadian Opera, Vancouver Opera, Pacific Opera Victoria, and elsewhere. The film Ararat (2002) generated much publicity for Egoyan. After Henri Verneuil 's French-language film Mayrig (1991), it
3880-619: The Armenian-American painter Arshile Gorky ). In 1999, Egoyan was made an Officer of the Order of Canada ; he was promoted in 2015 to Companion of the Order of Canada, the highest grade of the honour. In 2009, he won the 'Master of Cinema' award from the Mannheim Film Festival, 25 years after receiving his international festival premiere at the same event. In 2017, Egoyan was presented with
3977-693: The Palme d'Or at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival , where it received largely negative reviews from critics. Justin Chang from Variety described the film as "a ludicrous abduction thriller that finds a once-great filmmaker slipping into previously un-entered realms of self-parody." In 2015, Egoyan directed the thriller Remember , which starred Christopher Plummer and premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September, before being given
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4074-814: The University of Toronto for three years. He joined the Faculty of Arts and Science as the Dean's Distinguished Visitor in theatre, film, music, and visual studies. He subsequently taught at Ryerson University . In 2006, he received the Master of Cinema Award of the International Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg . His film Adoration (2008 film) has been adapted into an opera by Mary Kouyoumdjian and librettist Royce Vavrek . It premiered in New York in 2024 and
4171-587: The nation state . In the same century a law of alienation of affection was introduced for men to seek compensation from other men accused of taking away 'their' woman. In the history of literature, the German Romantics appear to be the first group of writers and poets in whose work the concept of alienation is regularly found. Around the start of the 19th century, Hegel popularized a Christian ( Lutheran ) and Idealist philosophy of alienation. He used German terms in partially different senses, referring to
4268-517: The 'alienation' of physicians and the 'alienation' of philosophers started to take shape—two configurations in which man in any case corrupts his truth, but between which, after Hegel, the nineteenth century stopped seeing any trace of resemblance." Marx was initially in the Young Hegelian camp and, like Feuerbach, rejected the spiritual basis, and adapted Hegel's dialectic model to a theory of (historical) materialism . Marx's theory of alienation
4365-523: The 1990s, there was again an upsurge of interest in alienation prompted by the fall of the Soviet Union , globalization , the information explosion, increasing awareness of ethnic conflicts, and post-modernism . Felix Geyer believes the growing complexity of the contemporary world and post-modernism prompted a reinterpretation of alienation that suits the contemporary living environment. In late 20th and early 21st century sociology, it has been particularly
4462-652: The Canadian Opera Company’s theatre, the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts . He has also occasionally appeared in films as an actor, most notably in his own film Calendar and Jean Pierre Lefebvre 's The Box of Sun (La boîte à soleil) . Egoyan is based in Toronto, where he lives with his wife, actress Arsinée Khanjian , who appears in many of his films, and their son, Arshile (named after
4559-557: The Lifetime Achievement Award at the International Film Festival of India. Social alienation Social alienation is a person's feeling of disconnection from a group – whether friends, family, or wider society – with which the individual has an affiliation. Such alienation has been described as "a condition in social relationships reflected by (1) a low degree of integration or common values and (2)
4656-512: The Marxian view of the worker's condition in capitalist society: the worker is alienated to the extent that the prerogative and means of decision are expropriated by the ruling entrepreneurs". More succinctly, Kalekin-Fishman says, "A person suffers from alienation in the form of 'powerlessness' when she is conscious of the gap between what she would like to do and what she feels capable of doing". In discussing powerlessness, Seeman also incorporated
4753-587: The Past" and the 2015 Governor General's Performing Arts Award . Egoyan is married to actress Arsinée Khanjian , whom he has often cast in his films. Egoyan was born Atom Yeghoyan on July 19, 1960, in Cairo in what was then the United Arab Republic to Armenian-Egyptian painters Shushan ( née Devletian ) and Joseph Yeghoyan. He was named Atom to mark the completion of Egypt's first nuclear reactor . Egoyan has
4850-752: The Rye , The Chosen , Dubliners , Othello , Fahrenheit 451 , Invisible Man , Mrs Dalloway , Notes from Underground , One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde , The Stranger and The Myth of Sisyphus , The Trial , The Castle , Waiting for Godot , The Waste Land , and Young Goodman Brown . Contemporary British works noted for their perspective on alienation include The Child in Time , London Fields , Trainspotting , and Regeneration . Sociologist Harry Dahms has analysed The Matrix Trilogy of films in
4947-550: The Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War , migrants from Eastern Europe and developing countries have flocked to developed countries in search of a better living standard. This has led to entire communities becoming uprooted: no longer fully part of their homelands, but neither integrated into their adopted communities. Diaspora literature depicts the plights of these migrants, such as Hafid Bouazza in Paravion. One manifestation of
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#17330941179315044-566: The West in the 17th century, physicians again began using the term, which is typically attributed to Felix Platter . In medieval times, a relationship between alienation and social order has been described, mediated in part by mysticism and monasticism . The Crusades and witch-hunts have been described as forms of mass alienation. In the 17th century, Hugo Grotius put forward the concept that everyone has ' sovereign authority' over themselves but that they could alienate that natural right to
5141-441: The above dimensions of alienation can be a feeling of estrangement from the political system and a lack of engagement therein. Such political alienation could result from not identifying with any particular political party or message, and could result in revolution , reforming behavior, or abstention from the political process, possibly due to voter apathy . A similar concept is policy alienation , where workers experience
5238-513: The ages with varied and sometimes contradictory meanings. In ancient history it could mean a metaphysical sense of achieving a higher state of contemplation , ecstasy or union—becoming alienated from a limited existence in the world, in a positive sense. Examples of this usage have been traced to neoplatonic philosophers such as Plotinus (in the Greek alloiosis ). There have also long been religious concepts of being separated or cut off from God and
5335-403: The army. Laca, in love with Jenůfa, expresses bitterness against his half-brother's favored position at home. As he complains he plays with a knife and, finding it blunt, gives it to the mill foreman to be sharpened. The foreman informs the family that Števa has not been drafted, to Jenůfa's relief and Laca's increased frustration. The others leave, and Jenůfa waits to greet Števa. He appears with
5432-407: The best. It is now spring, and Laca and Jenůfa's wedding day. All seems right again, except that the Kostelnička is a nervous wreck. Števa and Karolka visit, and a chorus of village girls sings a wedding song. Just then, screams are heard. The body of the baby has been discovered in the mill-stream under the melting ice. Jenůfa immediately says that the baby is hers, and in her grief appears guilty of
5529-586: The broader socioeconomic context, or which at least accept the broader context on its own terms, and which often attribute problems to individual abnormality or failures to adjust. After the boom in alienation research that characterized the 1950s and 1960s, interest in alienation research subsided, although in sociology it was maintained by the Research Committee on Alienation of the International Sociological Association (ISA). In
5626-405: The centrality of social isolation in the modern world: "While social isolation is typically experienced as a form of personal stress, its sources are deeply embedded in the social organization of the modern world. With increased isolation and atomization, much of our daily interactions are with those who are strangers to us and with whom we lack any ongoing social relationships." Since the fall of
5723-642: The century, which included influential analyses of false consciousness by György Lukács . Critics of bureaucracy and the Protestant Ethic also drew on the works of Max Weber . Figures associated with critical theory , in particular with the Frankfurt School , such as Theodor Adorno and Erich Fromm , also developed theories of alienation, drawing on neo-Marxist ideas as well as other influences including neo-Freudian and sociological theories. One approach applies Marxist theories of commodification to
5820-447: The cheek with his knife. Months later, it is winter. The baby has been born, but Števa has not yet come to visit his child. Jenůfa's face is still disfigured, but she is happy in her love for the baby. While Jenůfa sleeps, the Kostelnička summons Števa and demands that he take responsibility. He answers that while he will provide money in secret, no one must know the baby is his. His love for Jenůfa died when Laca spoiled her beauty, and he
5917-408: The common good, an early social contract theory. In the 18th century, Hutcheson introduced a distinction between alienable and unalienable rights in the legal sense of the term. Rousseau published influential works on the same theme, and is also seen as having popularized a more psychological-social concept relating to alienation from a state of nature due to the expansion of civil society or
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#17330941179316014-402: The common wealth but they can only express this fundamentally social aspect of individuality through a production system that is not publicly social but privately owned, for which each individual functions as an instrument, not as a social being. Kostas Axelos summarizes that for Marx, in capitalism "work renders man an alien to himself and to his own products." "The malaise of this alienation from
6111-513: The concept of self-estrangement "has not weathered postmodern criticisms of essentialism and economic determinism well", the concept still has value if a Lacanian reading of the self is adopted. This can be seen as part of a wider debate on the concept of self between humanism and antihumanism , structuralism and post-structuralism , or nature and nurture . Until early in the 20th century, psychological problems were referred to in psychiatry as states of mental alienation, implying that
6208-663: The concept's most prominent use, it refers to the economic and social alienation aspect in which workers are disconnected from what they produce and why they produce. Marx believed that alienation is a systematic result of capitalism . Essentially, there is an "exploitation of men by men" where the division of labor creates an economic hierarchy. His theory of alienation was based upon his observation that in emerging industrial production under capitalism, workers inevitably lose control of their lives and selves by not having any control of their work. Workers never become autonomous, self-realized human beings in any significant sense, except in
6305-448: The conscious and unconscious mind , between different parts of a hypothetical psychic apparatus , and between the self and civilization . It postulates defense mechanisms , including splitting , in both normal and disturbed functioning. The concept of repression has been described as having functionally equivalent effects as the idea of false consciousness associated with Marxist theory. A form of Western Marxism developed during
6402-426: The context of theories of alienation in modern society. He suggests that the central theme of The Matrix is the "all-pervasive yet increasingly invisible prevalence of alienation in the world today, and difficulties that accompany attempts to overcome it". Jen%C5%AFfa Její pastorkyňa ( Her Stepdaughter ; commonly known as Jenůfa ( listen ) ) is an opera in three acts by Leoš Janáček to
6499-418: The cultural, educational and party-political spheres. Links are drawn between socioeconomic structures, psychological states of alienation, and personal human relationships. In the 1960s the revolutionary group Situationist International came to some prominence, staging 'situations' intended to highlight an alternative way of life to advanced capitalism , the latter conceptualized as a diffuse ' spectacle ',
6596-406: The economic machine by endlessly competing, exploiting others and maintaining mass alienation in society. Political Alienation refers specifically to the idea that "politics is the form that organizes the productive forces of the economy" in a way that is alienating because it "distorts the logic of economic development". Through Human Alienation , individuals become estranged to themselves in
6693-513: The faithful, alienated in a negative sense. The New Testament mentions the term apallotrioomai in Greek—"being alienated from". Ideas of estrangement from a Golden Age , or due to a fall of man , or approximate equivalents in differing cultures or religions , have also been described as concepts of alienation. A double positive and negative sense of alienation is broadly shown in the spiritual beliefs referred to as Gnosticism . Alienation also had
6790-708: The film Exotica (1994). He received the Grand Prix (Belgian Film Critics Association) in Brussels, the FIPRESCI Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival , and Best Motion Picture at the Canadian Screen Awards (then called the Genie Awards ). However, it was Egoyan's first attempt at adapted material that resulted in his best-known work, The Sweet Hereafter (1997), which earned him three prizes at
6887-455: The goal-relevant information one needs, as well as more efficient selection procedures to prevent being overburdened by the information one does not need, but is bombarded with on a regular basis." Information overload or the so-called "data tsunami" are well-known information problems confronting contemporary man, and Geyer thus argues that meaninglessness is turned on its head. Normlessness (or what Durkheim referred to as anomie ) "denotes
6984-463: The importance of the individual. Martin Heidegger 's concepts of anxiety (angst) and mortality drew from Kierkegaard; he is indebted to the way Kierkegaard lays out the importance of our subjective relation to truth, our existence in the face of death, the temporality of existence and the importance of passionately affirming one's being-in-the-world. Jean-Paul Sartre described the "thing-in-itself" which
7081-518: The individual is estranged from their self through the repressive injunction to "enjoy!" Such an injunction does not allow room for the recognition of alienation and, indeed, could itself be seen as an expression of alienation. More to the political right, however, psychotherapy and associated notions have long been considered anywhere from ineffectual due to their inherent bias against the reality of inborn such as group-specific (genetic) traits to actively destructive much rather than emancipatory. On
7178-433: The insights of the psychologist Julian Rotter . Rotter distinguishes between internal control and external locus of control , which means "differences (among persons or situations) in the degree to which success or failure is attributable to external factors (e.g. luck, chance, or powerful others), as against success or failure that is seen as the outcome of one's personal skills or characteristics". Powerlessness, therefore,
7275-499: The language and history of his ethnic heritage. Egoyan also wrote for the University of Toronto's independent weekly, The Newspaper , during his time at the school. Egoyan began making films in the early 1980s; his debut film Next of Kin (1984) world-premiered at the International Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg and won a major prize. He directed the 1985 Twilight Zone episode "The Wall". His commercial breakthrough came with
7372-411: The larger hearing community. Only when the respondents described interactions with deaf people did the theme of isolation give way to comments about participation and meaningful interaction. This appeared to be related to specific needs, for example for real conversation, for information, the opportunity to develop close friendships and a sense of family. It was suggested that the social meaning of deafness
7469-561: The medium and its possibilities. To me, Persona marries a pure form and a very profound vision with absolute conviction. It's very inspiring. I felt that it was able to open a door that wasn't there before. Egoyan graduated from Trinity College at the University of Toronto . It was at Trinity College that he came into contact with Harold Nahabedian, the Armenian-Canadian Anglican Chaplain of Trinity College. In interviews, Egoyan credited Nahabedian for introducing him to
7566-414: The murder. The village is ready to exact immediate justice against Jenůfa, but the Kostelnička calms them and says that the crime is hers. Hearing the whole story, Jenůfa forgives her stepmother. The crowd takes the Kostelnička off to jail. Jenůfa and Laca are left alone. Jenůfa asks Laca to leave her, as she cannot expect him to marry her now. He replies that he will not leave her, and that he wishes to spend
7663-406: The opera begins, the mill-owner Grandmother Buryja had two sons. The elder married the widow of a man named Klemeň, became stepfather to her son Laca, and had a son of his own with her, Števa. The younger married twice, and had a daughter, Jenůfa, with his first wife. When the opera opens, Grandmother Buryja's sons and their wives have died, except for the Kostelnička (the sacristan or sextoness of
7760-518: The opera, but decided not to use it. It was partly based on a song called Žárlivec ( The jealous man ). It is now performed as a concert piece under the title Žárlivost ( Jealousy ), JW 6/10. The composer dedicated the work to the memory of his daughter Olga (d. 1903), as he did his choral composition the Elegy on the Death of Daughter Olga . The plot depends on a tangled set of village relationships. Before
7857-591: The other hand, they are not alone in this sentiment either as Marcuse, among others, goes on to speak of repressive desublimation . Differences between persons with disabilities and individuals in relative abilities, or perceived abilities, can be a cause of alienation. One study, "Social Alienation and Peer Identification: A Study of the Social Construction of Deafness", found that among deaf adults one theme emerged consistently across all categories of life experience: social rejection by, and alienation from,
7954-453: The quest to stay alive, where "they lose their true existence in the struggle for subsistence". Marx focuses on two aspects of human nature which he calls "historical conditions." The first aspect refers to the necessity of food, clothes, shelter, and more. Secondly, Marx believes that after satisfying these basic needs people have the tendency to develop more "needs" or desires that they will work towards satisfying, hence, humans become stuck in
8051-417: The same theme. In a related vein, for Ian Parker , psychology normalizes conditions of social alienation. While it could help groups of individuals emancipate themselves, it serves the role of reproducing existing conditions. This view can be seen as part of a broader tradition sometimes referred to as critical psychology or liberation psychology , which emphasizes that an individual is enmeshed within
8148-452: The self means that the worker does not affirm himself but denies himself, does not feel content but unhappy....The worker only feels himself outside his work, and in his work he feels outside himself....Its alien character emerges clearly in the fact as soon as no physical or other compulsion exists, it is avoided like the plague.". Marx also wrote, in a curtailed manner, that capitalist owners also experience alienation, through benefiting from
8245-415: The self) to a structural -historical interpretation (e.g. external alienation by appropriation of labor), accompanied by a change in terminology from alienation to exploitation to commodity fetishism and reification . Marx's concepts of alienation have been classed into four types by Kostas Axelos : economic and social alienation, political alienation, human alienation, and ideological alienation. In
8342-417: The self), their self-consciousness has a "masochistic desire" to be limited. This is expressed metaphorically in the line from the play No Exit , "Hell is other people". In the theory of psychoanalysis developed around the start of the 20th century, Sigmund Freud did not explicitly address the concept of alienation, but other analysts subsequently have. It is a theory of divisions and conflicts between
8439-421: The situation in which the social norms regulating individual conduct have broken down or are no longer effective as rules for behaviour". This aspect refers to the inability to identify with the dominant values of society or rather, with values that are perceived to be dominant. Seeman adds that this aspect can manifest in a particularly negative manner, "The anomic situation ... may be defined as one in which there
8536-462: The society. When collective decisions are made, it is usually impossible for the unique needs of each person to be taken into account. The American sociologist C. Wright Mills conducted a major study of alienation in modern society with White Collar in 1951, describing how modern consumption-capitalism has shaped a society where you have to sell your personality in addition to your work. Melvin Seeman
8633-515: The special pain that alienation can bring. Eric Voegelin with whom also originates the related phrase "to Immanentize the eschaton ", may be read as rather accepting of alienation: The human condition has radical limits, and humans do not feel perfectly comfortable (to say the least). But it is not “ideological” to feel dissatisfaction or to desire something more perfect than what we have. Indeed such feelings as disquiet, anxiety, frustration and even alienation are, according Voegelin, normal. “Man
8730-537: The terms interchangeably, though he also wrote " Entfremdung ... constitutes the real interest of this Entäußerung ." Many sociologists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were concerned about alienating effects of modernization. German sociologists Georg Simmel and Ferdinand Tönnies wrote critical works on individualization and urbanization . Simmel's The Philosophy of Money describes how relationships become more and more mediated by money. Tönnies' Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft ( Community and Society )
8827-463: The village church), the younger son's second wife and Jenůfa's stepmother. Custom dictates that Števa alone, as the elder son's only child, will inherit the mill, leaving his half-brother Laca and cousin Jenůfa to earn their livings. Jenůfa, Laca, and Grandmother Buryja wait for Števa to return home. Jenůfa, in love with Števa and secretly pregnant with his child, worries that he may have been drafted into
8924-627: The way the bourgeoisie wants the worker to be realized. His theory relies on Feuerbach's The Essence of Christianity (1841), which argues that the idea of God has alienated the characteristics of the human being . Stirner would take the analysis further in The Ego and Its Own (1844), declaring that even 'humanity' is an alienating ideal for the individual, to which Marx and Engels responded in The German Ideology (1845). Alienation in capitalist societies occurs because in work each contributes to
9021-443: The word alienation , and similar words such as estrangement , are often used interchangeably to translate two distinct German words, Entfremdung and Entäußerung . The former means specifically interpersonal estrangement, while the latter can have a broader and more active meaning that might refer also to externalization, relinquishment, or sale (alienation) of property. In general, and contrary to his predecessors, Marx may have used
9118-445: The works of Lauren Langman and Devorah Kalekin-Fishman that address the issue of alienation in the contemporary western world. Alienation in the sense of a lack of power has been technically defined by Seeman as "the expectancy or probability held by the individual that his own behaviour cannot determine the occurrence of the outcomes, or reinforcements, he seeks." Seeman argues that this is "the notion of alienation as it originated in
9215-454: Was part of a surge in alienation research during the mid-20th century when he published his paper, "On the Meaning of Alienation", in 1959. Seeman used the insights of Marx, Emile Durkheim and others to construct what is often considered a model to recognize the five prominent features of alienation: powerlessness, meaninglessness, normlessness, isolation and self-estrangement. Seeman later added
9312-441: Was particularly influential in arguing that dysfunctional families and socioeconomic oppression caused states of alienation and ontological insecurity in people, which could be considered adaptations but which were diagnosed as disorders by mainstream psychiatry and society. The specific theories associated with Laing and others at that time are not widely accepted, but work from other theoretical perspectives sometimes addresses
9409-535: Was the first major motion picture to deal directly with the Armenian genocide . Ararat later won the award for Best Motion Picture at the Canadian Screen Awards, marking his third win. The film was released in over 30 countries around the world. In 2004, Egoyan opened Camera Bar, a 50-seat cinema-lounge on Queen Street West in Toronto. The bar has since closed. Beginning in September 2006, Egoyan taught at
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