Genre Anxiety in the Postmodern Public Sphere

1999 ◽  
Vol 90 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catharine Lumby

This paper examines the roots of contemporary concerns about the influence of poststructuralist theories and aligned disciplines such as cultural studies on media studies, exemplified here by Keith Windschuttle's attack on the latter. Rather than taking detailed issue with Windschuttle's attack on critical theory, I examine the roots of what, I argue, is an anxiety about the shifting boundaries between conventional institutional and discursive arenas. Far from identifying a schism between academic and professional practice in media studies, I argue that recent developments in both fields have fostered a far closer relationship between the two arenas, and that it is precisely this proximity which is engendering anxiety among some commentators.

1998 ◽  
Vol 88 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Jones

This essay reviews John Hartley's Popular Reality: Journalism, Modernity, Popular Culture. The significance of this text is that it provides one of the most developed engagements with the public sphere literatures from an author within cultural studies. The article necessarily addresses the considerable weaknesses in Hartley's understanding of the public sphere case. However, the aim is not to dismiss Popular Reality out of hand. Rather, the critique highlights the methodological and ethical differences between analyses based in cultural studies and ‘critical sociology’. Hartley does partially recognise the significance of recent feminist critiques to the much-needed critical reconstruction of the public sphere thesis. The article acknowledges this insight and then moves to a discussion of the ways in which a reconstructed conception of the public sphere thesis might not only be of value to media studies but also to a settlement between cultural studies and ‘critical sociology’.


2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (8) ◽  
pp. 1151-1166
Author(s):  
Andrew Duffy

Bypassing the dominant Western bias in journalism scholarship is a challenge; it raises the question of what might replace it. Similarly, to evade the Western post-imperialism orthodoxies recurrent in cultural studies scholarship into travel and tourism would require other perspectives. This study combines the two and attempts to circumvent the Western bias in scholarship on travel journalism, given that its constituent parts are – for different reasons – becoming de-centred from the West. Textual analysis of Singaporean newspaper articles in Mandarin and English shows that questions of privilege and power remain but need not be associated with narratives of post-imperialism. Instead, destinations are textually constructed to justify the writer’s decision to travel. The intention for this article is to suggest ways that dominant Western perspectives in media studies may be balanced by other viewpoints which still expose issues of power and privilege but offer a less hegemonic, more culturally neutral starting point


1999 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 481-486
Author(s):  
Linda Shires

VICTORIAN STUDIES PRACTITIONERS have often applauded themselves on their openness to views, topics, and approaches not immediately recognizable as already part of the field. I put the formulation this way because Victorian studies scholars and critics also prize the field for its capaciousness; they tend to think of the field as large and already all-inclusive. It houses many genres and sub-disciplines and it first welcomed certain kinds of critical theory when other historical fields moved more slowly to accept them.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna Szczepanik

Refugee or "Newcomer". Dispute over the Word: About the Artistic Project "Nowacy" ("Newcomers") by Jana Shostak in the Context of the Construction of Meaning and the Migration CrisisThe artistic diploma project of Jana Shostak, a Polish student from Belarus, assumed the introduction of the word “nowak” (newcomer) into the Polish language as an alternative to the negative term “refugee.” This initiative becomes particularly important in the context of the migration crisis, going beyond the safe sphere of art. The methods of presenting it, both by the artist and by the media, in the form of interviews, press articles and comments on internet forums, were analyzed. The article is an attempt to make a meta-interpretation of this artistic proposal from the perspective of critical cultural studies, emphasizing two main areas: culture as a battlefield and language as a tool of constructing meaning. Methodologically, it is also supported by relativistic linguistic theories, the paradigm of symbolic interactionism, ethnomethodology, the concept of engaged aesthetics and critical theory. Uchodźca, czyli „nowak”. Spór o słowo. O projekcie artystycznym  „Nowacy” Jany Shostak w kotekście konstruowania znaczeń i kryzysu migracyjnegoArtystyczny projekt dyplomowy Jany Shostak zakłada wprowadzenie do języka polskiego słowa „nowak” jako alternatywy dla negatywnie nacechowanego określenia „uchodźca”. Inicjatywa ta nabiera szczególnego znaczenia w kontekście kryzysu migracyjnego, wykraczając poza bezpieczną sferę sztuki. Analizie poddane zostały sposoby jej prezentowania zarówno przez artystkę, jak i przez media, w postaci wywiadów, artykułów prasowych oraz wypowiedzi na forach internetowych. Artykuł jest próbą dokonania meta-interpretacji tej propozycji artystycznej z perspektywy kulturoznawstwa krytycznego z postawieniem akcentu na dwa zasadnicze obszary: kultury jako pola walki oraz języka jako narzędzia konstruującego znaczenie. Metodologicznie wspiera się również relatywistycznymi teoriami lingwistycznymi, paradygmatem interakcjonizmu symbolicznego, etnometodologią, oraz koncepcją estetyki zaangażowanej i teorią krytyczną.


The first two seasons of the television series Star Trek: Discovery, the newest instalment in the long-running and influential Star Trek franchise, received media and academic attention from the moment they arrived on screen. Discovery makes several key changes to Star Trek’s well-known narrative formulae, particularly the use of more serialized storytelling, appealing to audiences’ changed viewing habits in the streaming age – and yet the storylines, in their topical nature and the broad range of socio-political issues they engage with, continue in the political vein of the franchise’s megatext. This volume brings together eighteen essays and one interview about the series, with contributions from a variety of disciplines including cultural studies, literary studies, media studies, fandom studies, history and political science. They explore representations of gender, sexuality and race, as well as topics such as shifts in storytelling and depictions of diplomacy. Examining Discovery alongside older entries into the Star Trek canon and tracing emerging continuities and changes, this volume will be an invaluable resource for all those interested in Star Trek and science fiction in the franchise era.


Author(s):  
Nicola Lacey ◽  
Lucia Zedner

This chapter examines the relationship between legal and criminological constructions of crime and explores how these have changed over time. The chapter sets out the conceptual framework of criminalization within which the two dominant constructions of crime—legal and criminological—are situated. It considers their respective contributions and the close relationship between criminal law and criminal justice. Using the framework of criminalization, the chapter considers the historical contingency of crime by examining its development over the past 300 hundred years. It analyses the normative building blocks of contemporary criminal law to explain how crime is constructed in England and Wales today and it explores some of the most important recent developments in formal criminalization in England and Wales, not least the shifting boundaries and striking expansion of criminal liability. Finally, it considers the valuable contributions made by criminology to understanding the scope of, and limits on, criminalization.


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