Oncologists worldwide are often dealing with hepatitis C virus positive breast cancer patients, questioning adequate chemotherapy protocol, reduction of doses, delays, or even interruptions of treatment. We present a case of a woman in stage IIIB breast cancer, who after the completion of neoadjuvant treatment developed significant increase in liver enzymes and was diagnosed positive for HCV. She was treated with interferon and after the resolving of acute liver disease continued concomitant treatment with interferon, ribavirin, docetaxel, and trastuzumab. Grade 4 neutropenia and grade 3 hepatotoxicity occurred after the third cycle of chemo and 5 months of antiviral therapy. Interferon and chemotherapy were postponed for 1 week. There are no sufficient data in order to recommend the concomitant antiviral and antineoplastic therapy. Hepatitis C virus and antiviral therapy may increase the toxicities of antineoplastic treatment. However, when lifesaving oncologic treatment is necessary, concomitant antiviral therapy can be administered with more intensive follow up.
Premiering at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival to great acclaim (it won the award for the Best Canadian Feature, and was eventually included in the IFF’s annual Canada’s Top Ten), Stephen Dunn’s Closet Monster employs monsters metaphorically, primarily in order to express the psychological damage of violent homophobia and to comment on toxic masculinity. Yet monstrosity is not merely a metaphor but also a strategy: the protagonist, a closeted teenager named Oscar, appropriates both monstrosity and heroic narratives in order to manage life as a homosexual person in a deeply homophobic environment of contemporary suburban Canada. The magic realist details which permeate Closet Monster – the talking pet hamster, the scenes seamlessly fusing body horror with realism – exemplify the film’s poignant, almost fairy-tale-like approach to “homophobia-related violence” and the effects of PTSD initiated by Oscar’s witnessing of violent enforcement of gender normativity in his childhood. This paper proposes to examine the politics of the film, in particular Dunn’s deployment of monstrosity in the representation and condemnation of violent homophobia and toxic/hegemonic masculinity. As these issues are inextricable from the wider cultural context of normative gender and sexuality, Dunn’s criticism of heteronormativity is discussed as well. It is in this context, also, that the film’s depiction of the production, policing and elimination of “monstrous” (i.e. homosexual) bodies is examined. Article received: March 11, 2018; Article accepted: April 10, 2018; Published online: September 15, 2018; Scholarly analysis or debateHow to cite this article: Petković, Danijela. "Heteronormativity and Toxic Masculinity in Stephen Dunn’s Closet Monster." AM Journal of Art and Media Studies 16 (2018): 43−54. doi: 10.25038/am.v0i16.253
U radu se razmatra čuvena trilogija Dž. R. R. Tolkina, Gospodar prstenova, najpre u kontekstu Tolkinovog predavanja "O bajkama". Cilj rada jeste da se ukaže na problematičnu prirodu Tolkinove fantastike i realizma koju, smatramo, upravo ova trilogija najbolje ilustruje. Naime, uprkos tome što Tolkin u predavanju naglašava "oporavak, (veliko) bekstvo i utehu" koje fantastika omogućava čitaocu, u Gospodaru prstenova upadljivo je to da autor prilikom stvaranja svog fantastičnog sveta poseže za vrlo specifičnim naučnim disciplinama, verno reprodukujući njihove metodologije. Ovakav narativno-ideološki izbor nužno problematizuje odnos fantastike i realizma, kao i imaginacije i stvarnosti, jer rezultira mimetičnom istorijom koja je tek minimalno izmeštena u odnosu na političke i vojne igre moći iz stvarnog sveta.
Relying on recent theoretical work in the field of critical animal studies and ecocriticism, the paper discusses several fantasies across different media and genres (a comic book series, a young adult novel, and an animated film), whose common characteristic is a critical stance towards anthropocentrism, also known, tellingly, as "human exceptionalism", "human supremacy", and "human chauvinism". The selected corpus consists of Neil Gaiman's "A Dream of a Thousand Cats", Hannah Moskowitz's "Teeth", and Hayao Miyazaki's "Princess Mononoke". Dissimilar as they are, these fantasies share common thematic concern with the relationship between the human and the nonhuman - primarily animals - as well as commitment to challenging the notions of natural, just and desirable human supremacy over all other forms of life. In the selected works, human exceptionalism is challenged by unmasking human exceptional brutality at its root, and, perhaps more unnervingly, by the exploration of the fundamental kinship between human and nonhuman animals. Although these popular fantasies do not voice explicit or simple ecological messages, due to the abovementioned concerns, they function as ecocritical texts as well. In the context of the global environmental crisis, it is in this ecocritical potential that some relevance of fantasy arguably lies.
The paper analyses diametrically opposite portrayals of animal liberation in four contemporary films (Denis Henry Hennelly’s Bold Native (2010); Kornél Mundruczó’s White God (2014); Chris Renaud’s The Secret Life of Pets (2016), and Joon-ho Bong’s 2017 Okja). The discussion of the films’ “politics of visibility” and its role in animal liberation is informed by the theoretical work being done in the field of critical animal studies (CAS). In CAS, animal liberation, also known as abolitionism, refers to the ethical and political position which rejects all kinds of human use of nonhuman animals; as such, it is at the basis of the animal rights movement and various forms of related activism, primarily the “direct action” of physically rescuing animals from factory farms and research laboratories. Dedicated to animals’ liberty, abolitionism is nonetheless human-centered and is obviously treated as such in Bold Native and Okja, which both romanticize and explore the pitfalls of militant animal rights activism, while deploying the images of nonhuman animals mainly, though not exclusively, as victims. Yet the phrase “animal liberation” in this paper also refers to to the state in which former pets find themselves once they are liberated from generally abusive human ownership. Former pets no longer under human supervision are either ridiculed, as exemplified by Renaud’s Flushed Pets, or, as in White God, depicted as monstrous and bloodthirsty. These portrayals, it is argued, convey the danger and threat a liberated animal poses to the anthropocentric order. Article received: April 22, 2021: Article accepted: June 21, 2021; Published online: September 15, 2021; Original scholarly paper
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