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abstracts

viii

By comparing the two genres we find many similarities concerning the personality and psyche

of their heroes, who are not merely literary characters, since they must save the world. The

similarities are surprising because the heroes differ totally from each other in their appearance

and the fictional world around them. This stands out in the analogy between Harry Potter and

Ender, as a test-case. Hence, the uniqueness of science fiction and fantasy and their heroes stems

from their visual design.

Keywords

: magic, fantasy, science fiction, literary visual design, simulacres (J. Baudriard),

symbolic violence (P. Bourdieu), Harry Potter (J. K. Rolling), Ender (Orson Scott Card).

ILLUSTRATIONS IN GEOGRAPHY TEXTBOOKS DURING THE

PRE-STATEHOOD PERIOD AND CONTEMPORARY ISRAEL

Yuval Dror

Jaime and Joan Constantiner School of Education, Tel Aviv University

This article reviews the illustrations in Geography textbooks of the “Yishuv” (pre-statehood)

period, displayed by Bar-Gal in

Moledet (motherland) and Geography in a Hundred Years of Zionist

Education

(1993), as compared with popular textbooks of social studies, geography and “Eretz

(the land of) Israel”, used in Israeli schools during the two recent decades. Illustrations and/or

pictures were analyzed according to their visual contribution to Zionist education. The study

draws on Anderson’s

Imagined Communities

(1999[1991]). The methodology combines semiology

and iconography, both quantitative and qualitative. The findings were classified into two group:

Those focusing on ‘national contents’ (settlements; ‘man against nature’; preferred professions;

borders and unique biblical events; national leaders; minorities and ethnic groups), and those

dealingwith geographical tools (maps; statistical tables; diagrams and illustrations; geographical

terms; landscapes; flora and fauna; integrative geographical texts and related subjects). The

main section of the study is devoted to a detailed comparison between two Zionist periods,

before and after establishment of the State, according to the same categories.

The findings ratified the textual conclusions of Bar-Gal (and, thereafter, of Schnell [2002]), as to

the continuity of “enlisted contents of Moledet and Geography” in support of Zionist ideology,

since the British Mandate period and onwards, including the two first decades of statehood; and

- since the 1970s - the gradual and growing transition toward academic/disciplinary teaching of

geographical sciences.

Keywords

: textbooks, homeland, geography, social studies, pre-state and contemporary Israel,

visual analysis, semiology, iconography, nationalism, Zionist education.