Performance Art, Performativity, and Environmentalism in the Capitalocene

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane Chin Davidson
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Vital Role ◽  
Cultural Knowledge ◽  
Ecological Crisis ◽  
Feminist Art ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
The Arts ◽  
European Colonization ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Eco Art

Since the late 20th century, performance has played a vital role in environmental activism, and the practice is often related to concepts of eco-art, eco-feminist art, land art, theatricality, and “performing landscapes.” With the advent of the Capitalocene discourse in the 21st century, performance has been useful for acknowledging indigenous forms of cultural knowledge and for focusing on the need to reintegrate nature and culture in addressing ecological crisis. The Capitalocene was distinguished from the Anthropocene by Donna Haraway who questions the figuration of the Anthropos as reflexive of a fossil-fuel-burning ethos that does not represent the whole of industrial humanity in the circuit of global capital. Jason W. Moore’s analysis for the Capitalocene illustrates the division between nature and society that is affirmed by the tenets of the Anthropocene. Scientists Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer had dated the Anthropocene age to the industrial acceleration of the late-18th/mid-19th century but Moore points to the rise of capitalism in the 15th century when European colonization reduced indigenous peoples to naturales in their modernist definition of nature that became distinct from the new society. As material property, women were also precluded from this segment of industrial humanity. By the 20th century, the Euro-American system for progressive modernism in the arts was supported by the inscription of cultures that represented un-modern “primitivist” nature. The tribal and the modern became a postcolonial debate in art historical discourse. In the context of the Capitalocene, a different historiography of eco-art, eco-feminist art, and environmental performances can be conceived by acknowledging the work of artists such as Ana Mendieta and Kara Walker who have illustrated the segregation of people according to the nature/society divide. Informed by Judith Butler’s phenomenological analyses of performative acts, the aesthetic use of bodily-oriented expression (with its effects on the viewer’s body) provides a vocabulary for artists engaging in the subjects of the Capitalocene. In the development of performances in the global context, artists such as Wu Mali, Yin Xiuzhen, and Ursula Biemann have emphasized the relationship between bodies of humans and bodies of water through interactive works for the public, sited at the rivers and the shores of streams. They show how humans are not separate from nature, a concept that has long been conveyed by indigenous rituals that run deep in many cultures. While artists have been effective in acknowledging the continuing exploitations of the environment, their performances have also reflected the “self” of nature that humans are in the act of destroying.

Water Management in East Africa

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew V. Bender
Keyword(s):  
Water Management ◽  
Surface Water ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
East Africa ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Human Populations ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Surface Water Resources ◽  
European Colonization

East Africa is among the most environmentally diverse regions of the continent, and this diversity is reflected in its hydrology. The steppe plains, home to much of the region’s great wildlife, are defined by scarcity of rainfall and surface water resources. Within this sea of aridity, mountain peaks such as Kilimanjaro, Kenya, and Meru induce large amounts of rainfall and give rise to rivers that reach out into the grasslands. To the west, the forest–savannah mosaic and the shorelines of the Great Lakes likewise feature plentiful precipitation and surface water, giving rise to abundant vegetation and marine life. The Indian Ocean coast falls between in terms of rain, but its fate has been shaped by oceanic trade. In short, East Africa is a hydrological mosaic that has long influenced the social, cultural, and economic diversity of its human populations. The peoples of East Africa have long depended on the region’s water resources for their livelihoods. They have made sense of the region’s waterscapes, and developed strategies to manage them, in ways that reflected their own needs. Water management consisted not just of hydrological and technological expertise, but also cultural, spiritual, and political expertise. These in turn shaped economic as well as social relationships and hierarchies. With the onset of European colonization in the 19th and 20th centuries, water management became a focal point of struggles between local communities and various colonial actors—government officers, scientists, missionaries, and settlers—who developed very different impressions of the region’s waterscapes. These struggles involved not only conflict over the physical control of water resources, but also debates over what constituted useful and relevant water-management knowledge. Colonial actors described their water management in terms of science and modernity, while existing knowledge and practice were framed as primitive, wasteful, and destructive. Over the 20th century, conflicts intensified as users, African as well as European, demanded larger shares of increasingly scarce water resources. The post-colonial period did not spell an end to these struggles. Since the late 20th century, water management has emerged as a key aspect of national strategies for economic and social development. Yet decades of emphasis and millions of dollars spent have not led to sufficient progress in providing water to everyday people. Today, millions of East Africans lack access to clean, reliable water, a problem that is likely to worsen in the future.

Indigenismo

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Estelle Tarica
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Latin American ◽  
English Word ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Las Casas ◽  
The Social ◽  
Bartolome De Las Casas ◽  
The Status ◽  
Indigenous Social Movements

Indigenismo is a term that refers to a broad grouping of discourses—in politics, the social sciences, literature, and the arts—concerned with the status of “the Indian” in Latin American societies. The term derives from the word “indígena,” often the preferred term over “indio” because of the pejorative connotations that have accrued to the latter in some contexts, and is not to be confused with the English word “indigenism.” The origins of modern indigenismo date to the 16th century and to the humanist work of Bartolomé de las Casas, dubbed “Defender of the Indians” for his efforts to expose the violence committed against native populations by Spanish colonizers. Indeed indigenismo generally connotes a stance of defense of Indians against abuse by non-Indians, such as criollos and mestizos, and although this defense can take a variety of often-contradictory forms, it stems from a recognition that indigenous peoples in colonial and modern Latin America have suffered injustice. Another important precursor to modern indigenismo is 19th-century “Indianismo.” In the wake of Independence, creole elites made the figure of “the Indian” a recurring feature of Latin American republican and nationalist thought as the region sought to secure an identity distinct from the colonial powers. The period 1910–1970 marks the heyday of modern indigenismo. Marked by Las Casas’s stance of defense toward indigenous people and by creole nationalists’ “Indianization” of national identity, the modernizing indigenismo of the 20th century contains three important additional dimensions: it places the so-called “problem of the Indian” at the center of national modernization efforts and of national revolution and renewal; it is, or seeks to become, a matter of state policy; and it draws on contemporary social theories—positivist, eugenicist, relativist, Marxist—to make its claims about how best to solve the “Indian problem.” Though its presence can be found in many Latin American countries, indigenismo reached its most substantive and influential forms in Mexico and Peru; Bolivia and Brazil also saw significant indigenista activity. Anthropologists played a central role in the development of modern indigenismo, and indigenismo flourished in literature and the performing and visual arts. In the late 20th century, indigenous social movements as well as scholars from across the disciplines criticized indigenismo for its paternalist attitude toward Indians and for promoting Indians’ cultural assimilation; the state-centric integrationist ideology of indigenismo has largely given way to pluri-culturalism.

‘Comunicare con il popolo’: Novel, Drama, and Music in Mazzini’s Work

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlotta Sorba
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Active Power ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Role ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Art ◽  
The Aesthetic

This chapter observes and relocates the role of the arts in Mazzini's political reflections, seeing in it a kind of prelude to the aesthetic dimension of politics generally explored in the 20th century. Through a close analysis of his large output of literary and musical criticism (1826–44), it shows how the language of the arts, and especially drama as ‘the social art par excellence’, was considered by the Italian thinker to be the main means to communicate to the public – in a forceful and emotional way – political and national goals. Mazzini believed that, in the specific case of Italy, opera, with its active power to move, thrill, and provoke enthusiasm in Italian theatres, could play a crucial political role.

scholarly journals Russian Classics in the USA Transcultural Canon

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-175
Author(s):  
Evgeniya M. Butenina
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Contemporary Literature ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
The Usa ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
The 19Th Century

The issue of the canon (the most studied and taught classics) is one of the most important in the world literature system. The paper briefly outlines the formation of the USA literary canon since the middle of the 19th century and details the formation of the Russian segment in the transcultural canon since the late 20th century. In the history of the USA canon formation, the institutional or sociological model (Jonathan Culler, Stanley Fish, Paul Lauter), which argues that social institutions respond to ideological demands, and the aesthetic model embodied by Harold Blooms Shakespeare-centered Western Canon stand out. An up-to-date approach to the canon assumes taking both models into account, as well as the perception of the canon as cultural memory. Anthologies are most important sources of documenting the canon. For the 20th century American literature researchers distinguish three phases formed by the leading literary trends: historiographic (1919-1946), new critical (1947-1967) and multicultural (1967- present). Based on the analysis of Norton and Longman anthologies, as well as a popular textbook The Bedford Introduction to Literature since the late 20th century to the present, the paper highlights the Russian core in the USA transcultural canon, which became the source of creative reinterpretation in contemporary literature. The present research is to be continued through the study of the Russian literature canon in specialized editions to outline a comprehensive history of the Russian-American cultural transfer.

Literati Culture

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Roddy
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Social Categories ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Mature Phase ◽  
Late Ming ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Social ◽  
Bronze Vessels ◽  
Second Tier ◽  
The Aesthetic

Although the term literati culture (wenren wenhua) entered the Chinese lexicon only in the late 20th century, the aesthetic, moral, and intellectual pursuits it encompasses can be traced back nearly two millennia to the Wei-Jin era (220–420 ce). In its narrowest sense, it denotes the “four arts” (siyi) associated with cultured, literate males (wenren): music (especially the qin or guqin), the game of go (weiqi), calligraphy, and painting, as well as poetry and lyrical essays (especially xiaopin) associated with them. Literati culture is also usually construed to include connoisseurship of various categories of material objects, including tea and its implements, antique paintings and specimens of calligraphy, celebrated or rare manuscripts and book editions, rubbings taken from steles, ancient bronze vessels, and objets d’art associated with writing, such as ink stones or seals. During the mature phase of literati culture in the late Ming and Qing dynasties, this repertoire of practices further widened to include, inter alia, the collecting of any manner of rare or prized objects (both natural and man-made), garden design and architecture, the connoisseurship of the theater and its actors or other entertainers, and the espousal of philosophical ideals associated with leisure or reclusion. Given this expansive scope, scholarship has tended to treat this array of arts and avocations either through disciplinary lenses such as art history and material culture, or in terms of their associations with the principal intellectual vocations—literature (the so-called wenyuan or Garden of Literature) and textual scholarship (rulin or Forest of Scholarship)—that marked literati status. As the relatively elastic conception of literati culture has gained currency, however, cultural historians have increasingly studied these arts within the continuum of socioeconomic practices that marked membership in the elite, and also in light of the position of these arts in relation to more-demotic (tongsu) cultural forms. The growth of literati avocations and the writings about them after c. 1500 was stimulated by the surfeit of first- and second-tier examination holders, along with opportunities for patronage by wealthy merchants in the Yangzi delta region. Also evident in the late Ming and throughout the Qing is the influence of philological scholarship (kaozheng) on the classification or cataloguing of objects of various kinds. Finally, the statecraft-oriented (jingshi) scholarship and letters that flourished during the last century of Qing rule, and critiques of literati social preeminence relative to other vocations and social categories, stimulated the rethinking of the social and cultural institutions that perpetuated their dominance, which extended to the arts associated with the literati as well.

Calligraphy

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy McNair
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Art World ◽  
Shang Dynasty ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Excellent Research ◽  
Bronze Vessels ◽  
Precise Moment

Calligraphy is the art of writing characters with a brush and ink. Yet, the word “calligraphy,” from the Greek kalligraphía (beautiful writing), is something of a mistranslation of the Chinese term shufa (書法), which means “model writing,” or writing that is good enough to serve as a model. Calligraphy has no referent in nature, so all writing is modeled on that of another. Traditional calligraphers were less interested in mere beauty than in the ability of the gesture and the line to create images of aesthetic power and movement and in the paramount issue of upon whose writing they were modeling theirs. The precise moment Chinese characters were born is unknown, but a fully developed system was in use by c. 1200 bce, as seen on scripts on the incised oracle bones (jiaguwen甲骨文) and inscriptions cast into ritual bronze vessels (guwen古文) of the Shang dynasty. Over the next millennium, five major script types evolved. The archaic scripts gave way to the “large” seal script (zhuan篆) of the Zhou dynasty and the “small” seal script of the Qin. In Qin the clerical script (li隸) came into being and flourished during the succeeding Han, whereas by the end of the 2nd century the modern script types of regular (kai楷 or zhen真), running (xing行), and cursive (cao草) all had developed. Seal and clerical were relegated to decorative and monumental functions until they were revived as antiquarian modes in later times. Although mythic names are associated with the creation of each script type, there were no signed works of calligraphy until the Han dynasty. Since that time, when it began to be seen as expressive of its writer’s personality and character, calligraphy has been accorded the supreme position among the arts. Calligraphers could practice their art purely for their own pleasure or self-expression, or their work could be done for payment or in exchange for goods and services. Calligraphy had a rich tradition until the 20th century, and after China’s turmoil ended in the late 1970s, the amateur scene burgeoned again. In the late 20th century, Chinese calligraphy made a place for itself in the international art world, particularly through the incorporation of nonsense characters in multimedia installations. Critical texts that assessed famous calligraphers appeared in the 4th century, and histories of calligraphy have been written continually from the 5th century to the early 21st century. Japanese scholars have produced excellent research in the 20th and early 21st centuries, and researchers in the West have been writing on calligraphy history since the 1970s.

“Band Wagon and Gravy Train”: uses and abuses along the Silk Road

Afghanistan ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-194
Author(s):  
Warwick Ball
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Silk Road ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Ancient Trade ◽  
International Image ◽  
Academic Discussion ◽  
The Silk Road

The Silk Road as an image is a relatively new one for Afghanistan. It appeals to both the pre-Islamic and the perceived Islamic past, thus offering an Islamic balance to previous identities linked to Bamiyan or to the Kushans. It also appeals to a broader and more international image, one that has been taken up by many other countries. This paper traces the rise of the image of the Silk Road and its use as a metaphor for ancient trade to encompass all contacts throughout Eurasia, prehistoric, ancient and modern, but also how the image has been adopted and expanded into many other areas: politics, tourism and academia. It is argued here that the origin and popularity of the term lies in late 20th century (and increasingly 21st century) politics rather than any reality of ancient trade. Its consequent validity as a metaphor in academic discussion is questioned

Zygmunt Krasiński wobec sztuk pięknych / Zygmunt Krasiński and the Fine Arts

2013 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olga Płaszczewska
Keyword(s):  
Fine Arts ◽  
Literary Tradition ◽  
Individual Sensitivity ◽  
What Works ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
A Current ◽  
Aesthetic Preferences

Summary This is an attempt at examining Zygmunt Krasiński’s opinions and preferences with regard to the fine arts, a theme many critics believed to be missing from his writings. While putting things right, this article looks at the issues involved in his artistic choices, for example, what works or artists attracted his attention, in general, and to the point of him actually drawing on them in his own work or provoking him to some response (critical, approving, emotional, etc.). Furthermore, the article tries to explore the reasons and circumstances which may account for Krasiński’s interest in a given painting, print, or sculpture. It may have been the work’s theme as in the case of his ekphrasis of Ary Scheffer’s Dante and Virgil Encountering the Shades of Francesca and Paolo Di Rimini, where literary tradition provided the impulse, or the mode of its execution, or the personal ties with its author, or, finally, some other factors, like a current vogue or simply Krasiński’s individual sensitivity. The ultimate aim of all these inquiries is to outline Krasiński’s relationship with the arts (beaux arts) in the context of the aesthetic preferences of the epoch.

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