Of Comics and Charisma: Representing Transpacific White Masculinities

2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina D. Owens

AbstractThis article employs palimpsestuous reading practices to query the transpacific reach and imperial pedigree of the comic strip “Charisma Man.” Turning to Max Weber’s theory of “charismatic authority” to understand the comic’s humorous portrayals of white male heterosexual privilege in Asia, the article proposes that the comic strip illuminates the patterns of raced and gendered “hereditary charisma” that continue to haunt transpacific relations. “Charisma Man,” penned by a team of North American men living in Japan, links contemporary white migrants across Asia – especially native English teachers – with a longue durée of Euro-American imperial actors abroad and builds meaning through intertextual engagement with the iconic cultural texts Superman and Madame Butterfly. The article concludes that “Charisma Man” makes light of white male hereditary charisma in Asia through a layering of temporally-disjointed transpacific discourses and, in turn, adds one more layer to a palimpsestuous sedimentation of sexist and racist hierarchies, normalizing their continuation within contemporary globalization.

Sexualities ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 136346072093238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Belinda Middleweek

Debates about human–machine relationships have intensified following the launch of the world’s first commercially available sex robot ‘Harmony’, a hyperrealistic sex doll with AI-capabilities. With the likely consumer market for these devices among white, male, heterosexual sex-doll owners, their views about sex robot technology and the niche online communities in which they discuss their doll relationships have received little scholarly attention. Through a qualitative analysis of the discursive practices of male users of a major sex doll forum, this study found complex and dynamic homosocial relations characterized men’s online interactions. In their discussion of a sex robot future, men negotiate competing structures of masculinity and sexuality and create a safe, online space for others to express their sexual desires and preferences. Using the concept of the ‘seam’ or join, the results reveal the way male users of sex dolls position themselves subjectively and are positioned by technology and the increasingly porous interface between human and machine.


2017 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 232-234
Author(s):  
CARMEN GADELHA

The play Cidade Correria (City Rat Race) from Rio de Janeiro is my point of departure for a study of tragedy in contemporary theatre from the perspective of decolonization. A colonial mentality blanketed the New World with a white, male, heterosexual rationality whose universalizing pretensions would usher the native peoples ‘who had no writing or history’ into ‘civilization’. Dismantling this structure today requires connecting heterogeneities and dissonances. In the theatre, narratives demolish dramatic structure, proposing unstable compositions where figures pass by charting a cartography for today. Accordingly, Cidade Correria brings those from the periphery and the favelas, who have historically been excluded from mainstream narratives, into the urban fabric.


2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 100-120
Author(s):  
Kyle B. T Lambelet

This article investigates the role theology plays in generating political action in las Américas through research on the School of the Americas Watch. It commends theopolitics as a lens for analyzing the competing projects of US military training and protests against that training, both of which work under the sign of redemption. The materiality of these signs can be apprehended by asking who is saving whom from what, by what means, and for what end. Anthropological analysis of these redemption narratives reveals the regimes of the invisible that animate opposing political projects—redemption for one through imperial formations enabled by the messianic figure of the white, male, heterosexual warrior, and redemption for the other through the agential presence of the dead who haunt empire’s wake.


1997 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 403-437 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clive Marsh

AbstractThis article looks at the way that the so-called Third Quest relates to past versions of the Quest of the Historical Jesus. Nine different forms of the Quest are uncovered. The history of the Quest is then re-examined in the light of this mapping exercise, drawing on New Historicist insights. Five themes are taken up: the dominance of white, male European/North American contributors to the Quest; its close alliance with Western bourgeous capitalism and individualism; issues surroundings the Quest's marketability and popularity; the consequences of reading the Quest less as a single narrative than as a collection of local ideological explorations; the necessity and dangers of re-writing the Quest's own history. In conclusion, it is suggested that the future of the Quest lies with greater attention to ideology, not less. This in turn invites a reconsideration of the christological framework within which Jesus Research must inevitably be placed.


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (25) ◽  
pp. 42-56
Author(s):  
Sarahi Isuki Castelli Olvera

En este artículo se examinó la dinámica cultural y de historietas en México en las décadas de los ochenta y noventa retomando la categoría de campo, de la teoría de la dominación de Pierre Bourdieu. Se realizó una analogía del campo de las historietas con el del fútbol, con la finalidad de describir y analizar la complejidad de los movimientos socioculturales involucrados en las luchas por capital simbólico y económico. En este trabajo cualitativo-interpretativo, basado en el análisis de documentación primaria y secundaria, se partió del argumento de que en México, mientras la historieta industrial estaba en decadencia, las historietas de autor se encontraban en eclosión. Este argumento se fundamenta en que, mientras empresas como Editorial Vid, Novaro y Novedades, se regían por estrategias empresariales que incluían reedición de material nacional, importación de cómics extranjeros; el cómic de autor eclosionaba, alimentado por el cómic europeo y norteamericano. Se encontró que en las décadas de estudio, el panorama cultural se vio modificado por la implantación del modelo neoliberal, que introdujo múltiples productos culturales, los cuales transformaron el consumo cultural mexicano y dieron a la historieta industrial una competencia ante la cual no pudo ganar. Como conclusión, se propone que pese a que la historieta industrial cayó en decadencia, por falta de estrategias de adaptación, las condiciones que llevaron a su caída permitieron que los creadores de la historieta de autor se enriquecieran con nuevas influencias, que los llevaron a generar obras adultas, críticas, vinculadas con su entorno. In this article, the cultural and comic book dynamics in Mexico in the eighties and nineties were examined, taking up the category of field, from Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of domination. An analogy of the field of comics with that of soccer was made, in order to describe and analyze the complexity of the sociocultural movements involved in the struggles for symbolic and economic capital. This qualitative-interpretative work, based on the analysis of primary and secondary documentation, arouses from the argument that in Mexico, while the industrial comics were in decline, the author comics were flourishing. This argument is based on the fact that, while companies such as Editorial Vid, Novaro and Novedades were governed by business strategies such as reissuing national material and importation of foreign comics; the author’s comic was emerging, inspired by the European and North American comic. It was found that, in the decades of study, the cultural panorama was modified by the implantation of the neoliberal model, which introduced multiple cultural products, that, therefore, transformed Mexican cultural consumption and gave industrial comics a competition which it could not win. As a conclusion, it is proposed that, despite the fact that the industrial comics fell into decline due to lack of adaptation strategies, the same factors allowed the creators of the author’s comic to enrich themselves with new influences, that led them to generate adult, critical works linked to their environment.


Author(s):  
Rocío Carrasco Carrasco

The idea of national identity as threatened by foreign invasions has been at the centre of many popular Science Fiction (SF) films in the United States of America. In alien invasion films, aggressive colonisers stand for collective anxieties and can be read “as metaphors for a range of perceived threats to humanity, or particular groups, ranging from 1950s communism to the AIDS virus and contemporary ‘illegal aliens’ of human origin” (King and Krzywinska, 2000: 31-2). Such films can effectively tell historical and cultural specificities, including gender concerns. In them, the characters’ sense of belonging to a nation is destabilised in a number of ways, resulting in identity crisis in most cases. A fervent need to defend the nation from the malevolent strangers is combined with an alienation of the self in the search of individual salvation or survival.The present analysis will attempt to illustrate how threats to configurations of power are employed in a contemporary alien invasion film: The War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg, 2005). Specifically, the film takes the narrative of destruction to suggest the destabilisation of US national power within the context of post September 11, together with a subtle disruption of the gender and sexual status quo. Indeed, new ways of understanding masculinity and fatherhood assault both the public and the private spaces of its white male heterosexual protagonist, Ray, performed by popular actor Tom Cruise. Ambiguous patriotism, identity crises and selfishness are at the core of this contemporary version of H.G. Wells’s landmark novel.


2020 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 1050-1062
Author(s):  
Keren Dali ◽  
Lindsay McNiff

This article positions the practice of working with readers in academic libraries as a diversity practice and examines this practice through the lens of the Diversity by Design concept. We use Diversity by Design to propose and explicate a differentiated approach to reading promotion on campus, drawing attention to the broader and multiple meanings of diversity in the context of reading engagements. We look at the differentiated nature of readerships on campuses as an expression of inherent diversity in North American institutions of higher education and, by extension, academic libraries. We also make specific recommendations on how to give reading practices in academic libraries a boost and a new direction, befitting the diverse and eclectic nature of contemporary North American universities.


PEDIATRICS ◽  
1960 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 248-257
Author(s):  
Israel Diamond ◽  
Carlos Vallbona

The clinical and pathologic features of kwashiorkor are described in an 11-year-old white male resident of Kentucky. The syndrome was present for 2 years. Remissions occurred with adequate diet and relapses were not prevented by vitamin therapy. Characteristic lesions in the skin, liver, pancreas and thyroid were present. In addition, lesions in the alimentary tract characterized by hyperplasia of the epithelium are described; these are believed to be an integral part of the syndrome.


2015 ◽  
Vol 48 (1-3) ◽  
Author(s):  
I Ketut Trika Adi Ana

Abstract: Teaching English for Young Learners Using a Digital Comic Strip. Since young learners get bored easily, English teachers should be creative in designing the instruction in order to make it interesting for the students. One of the ways that can be done by the English teachers to make their teaching and learning process becomes an interesting activity is by providing good teaching media. It is believed that young learners love story and colorful teaching media. Therefore, this article aims at explaining how to create a colorful digital comic strip and how to use it for teaching English. Specifically, this article discusses about: (1) the role of story in teaching English for young learners; (2) how to design and develop a digital comic strip; (3) how to teach English for young learners using a digital comic strip; and (4) the benefits of teaching English for young learners using a digital comic strip. It is expected that this article could give enough information for those English teachers who want to teach English for young learners using a digital comic strip. Keywords: comic strip, instructional media, young learners Abstrak: Pembelajaran Bahasa Inggris untuk Peserta Didik Anak-Anak Menggunakan Komik Strip. Para guru yang mengajar Bahasa Inggris untuk anak-anak hendaknya kreatif dalam mendesain sebuah pembelajaran untuk menciptakan pembelajaran yang menarik bagi peserta didik. Hal tersebut karena peserta didik anak-anak sangat cepat bosan. Salah satu cara yang dapat dilaku-kan untuk mencipatakan pembelajaran yang menarik adalah dengan membuat media pembelajaran yang bagus. Anak-anak biasanya menyukai cerita dan media pembelajaran yang berwarna-warni. Untuk itu artikel ini akan menjelaskan mengenai cara mengembangkan komik strip digital berwarna dan strategi untuk mengajar Bahasa Inggris menggunakan komik strip digital tersebut. Secara spesi-fik, artikel ini akan membahas mengenai: (1) peranan cerita dalam pembelajaran Bahasa Inggris un-tuk peserta didik anak-anak; (2) cara mendesain dan mengembangkan komik strip digital; (3) strate-gi mengajar menggunakan komik strip digital; dan (4) manfaat pembelajaran bahasa Inggris meng-gunakan komik strip digital. Diharapkan artikel ini dapat memberikan informasi yang cukup bagi guru yang tertarik untuk mengajar Bahasa Inggris menggunakan komik strip digital. Kata-kata Kunci: komik strip, media pembelajaran, peserta didik kanak-anak,


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document