The Visitor

Author(s):  
Daniel Malone

Daniel Malone’s new project tackles the problem of cultural production, playing it out on several levels. On the one side, it questions production as a once-and-for-all established system of generating meanings; on the other, it criticizes cynical and tautological use of empty signs for the purposes of ideology (nation, market). Malone’s starting point is the retelling the story of the alleged visit of David Bowie in Warsaw, during which the artist was to buy a record of the Śląsk ensemble. This record was to later inspire the creation of the famous track Warszawa from Bowie’s 1976 album entitled Low. This story, although seemingly well-known and simple, allows Malone to create an incredibly detailed, but legible network of relations and meaningful comparisons, not as much contra-factual but rather hyper-factual. The tale of the artist, recounted from the legendary record store on the Komuny Paryskiej Square to the fact that Bowie’s track inspired the musicians from the Band Joy Division, is international in its message, but remains local on the level of context, and it can turn out that what we learn from it about the connection of this context to the world at large is more important today than ever. Although the tone of this narration is mostly ironic, it is also true that on the one side the exaggerated gesture of rewriting history is dangerously similar to politician strategies and manipulation techniques used by the media today, forcing us to carefully scrutinize the cultural production we all participate in; on the other, it restores the tradition of storytelling to artistic work – a well-crafted story can distort the status quo, regardless of whether it will be instrumentalised by politics or radicalised by the creators of culture.

2015 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 334-350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew F Cooper ◽  
Vincent Pouliot

Is the G20 transforming global governance, or does it reinforce the status quo? In this article we argue that as innovative as some diplomatic practices of the G20 may be, we should not overstate their potential impact. More specifically, we show that G20 diplomacy often reproduces many oligarchic tendencies in global governance, while also relaxing club dynamics in some ways. On the one hand, the G20 has more inductees who operate along new rules of the game and under a new multilateral ethos of difference. But, on the other hand, the G20 still comprises self-appointed rulers, with arbitrary rules of membership and many processes of cooption and discipline. In overall terms, approaching G20 diplomacy from a practice perspective not only provides us with the necessary analytical granularity to tell the old from the new, it also sheds different light on the dialectics of stability and change on the world stage. Practices are processes and as such they are always subject to evolutionary change. However, because of their structuring effects, diplomatic practices also tend to inhibit global transformation and reproduce the existing order.


Author(s):  
Jenny Andersson

Alvin Toffler’s writings encapsulated many of the tensions of futurism: the way that futurology and futures studies oscillated between forms of utopianism and technocracy with global ambitions, and between new forms of activism, on the one hand, and emerging forms of consultancy and paid advice on the other. Paradoxically, in their desire to create new images of the future capable of providing exits from the status quo of the Cold War world, futurists reinvented the technologies of prediction that they had initially rejected, and put them at the basis of a new activity of futures advice. Consultancy was central to the field of futures studies from its inception. For futurists, consultancy was a form of militancy—a potentially world altering expertise that could bypass politics and also escaped the boring halls of academia.


2009 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Índia Mara Aparecida Dalavia de Souza Holleben ◽  
Marlene Lucia Siebert Sapelli

A educação acontece em diferentes espaços. A mídia também é um desses espaços. Por isso, neste artigo, propusemo-nos a analisar algumas questões, que consideramos relevantes e que, em geral, ocultam a hegemonia de uma classe sobre a outra. No processo educativo que acontece por meio da mídia, há uma contribuição para fortalecer tal hegemonia. Isso comprova a não neutralidade da educação. A mídia tem se mostrado como partido ideológico da elite, e o poder que exerce neste espaço social pode ser definido como poder simbólico, atrelado intimamente ao poder econômico, político e, em alguns casos, até coercitivo. Para discutirmos a mídia como instrumento educativo, em favor da manutenção do status quo, optamos em fazê-lo apresentando como duas temáticas que são por ela tratadas: Gênero e o Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra.   Palavras-chave: Mídia. Educação. Consenso. Hegemonia. Gênero. Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra.   Education is settled in different places and the media is also one of these places. Therefore, in this article we propose to analyze some relevant questions that can usually hide the hegemony of a class on the other. In the educative process intermediated by the media, we can notice a contribution to empower this hegemony. This put in evidence the education no neutrality position. The media can be understood as an ideological political organization of the upper class and its power can be defined as a symbolic one, linked to the economic and politician forces and even acting, in some cases, as a coercion element. To discuss the media as an educative instrument, in favor of the of the status quo maintenance, we present two thematic that have been followed: Gender and Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (The Movement of the Agricultural Workers With No Land).   Keywords: Media. Education. Consensus. Hegemony. Gender. Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra.


Author(s):  
Vincent P. Pecora

Born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund to an Italian Catholic mother and an assimilated Jewish father, Adorno would take his mother’s vaguely aristocratic last name. Philosopher, aesthetician, social theorist, and musician, Adorno throughout his life remained committed to a decidedly secular and socialist European consciousness, even when dissecting German anti-Semitism in the 1940s. Yet his notion of utopian political transformation owed much to his early reading of Ernst Bloch’s insistence on a hunger for the transcendent that Bloch added to Marxian materialism. Adorno’s understanding of the work of art—a crucial element of his thinking, culminating in his Aesthetic Theory—was equally in tension over the historical necessity of its progressive secularization and rationalization. On the one hand, any "contamination of art with revelation" would uncritically embrace the mystical, fetish character of art. On the other hand, "the eradication of every trace of revelation from art" would reduce the artwork to a mere repetition of the status quo—that is, the lifeless routines of an administered society, including film and jazz, both of which Adorno denigrated.


1990 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-153
Author(s):  
Brian Langille

It is not transparently obvious why legal theorists are increasingly attracted to the ideas and methods of Ludwig Wittgenstein. After all, Wittgenstein’s writings are notoriously difficult and he said almost nothing, and certainly nothing sustained, about law. And why would self-proclaimed legal theorists be attracted to someone who was quite explicitly hostile to “theory”, who viewed philosophy as a sort of therapy, and who said, famously, “philosophy leaves everything as it is”? But a still more interesting question is, why has Wittgenstein received such curious and conflicting treatment at the hands of the critical legal theorists? On the one hand critical legal theory celebrates Wittgenstein’s work as a key to the dismantling of traditional jurisprudence, but on the other hand critical scholars bemoan his alleged debilitating endorsement of the status quo. It is this last question upon which this essay is focussed.


2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Baines

This article addresses a research gap by analysing the way the Australian legal system is balancing the right to religious autonomy of organisations and the right of lgbti individuals not to be discriminated against, and considers what ought to be the case. I argue that the Australian legal system recognises the value of religious freedom on the one hand, and on the other hand, does not place a high priority on protecting it as an existing human right. My findings reveal that the Australian legal system is not always defining the religion and society relationship in ways that reflect the lived reality of religion in society. The issue is compounded by the wording of religious exemptions under anti-discrimination law which is contested within faith communities. As a consequence, religious freedom can be unfairly restricted. I conclude with recommendations to improve the status quo.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 125-146
Author(s):  
Keri Matwick ◽  
Kelsi Matwick

Abstract A central aspect of humor is its social function in relating to others and in performing gender. Drawing on insights from interactional sociolinguistics and gender studies, this article explores the relationship between humor and gender in the context of one US instructional tv cooking show The Pioneer Woman. The gender element, while essential to performed humor, is often neglected in research on humor, language, and the media; therefore, this paper looks into how humor is signaled in the cooking show individually and jointly. Humorous joking of the female host Ree Drummond is discussed, specifically self-directed humor and teasing as expressed in personal stories and exaggeration. The ambiguity of the humorous messages reveals contradictory messages: on the one hand, self-deprecating humor reveals feelings of inadequacy for not meeting gendered status quo, and on the other hand, teasing and self-deprecation function as a persuasive strategy to promote the celebrity’s cooking and brand.


2019 ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Sergei V. Pakhomov ◽  

The concept of jīvanmukti, “liberation during life”, arose in Advaita Vedānta as a response to the paradigm of “disembodied” liberation (videhamukti). The condition of jīvanmukti is highly appreciated in Tantrism. The concept of jīvanmukti often includes the meanings of identification with the absolute, the supreme deity. There are different kinds of jīvanmukti, for example, active and passive ones. The state of jīvanmukti is the complete independence, highest ideal, spiritual perfection. Jīvanmukta considers the entire objective world to be a reflection of the higher Self. The status of jīvanmukta can have an ideological dimension when it is opposed to traditions that are considered ineffective in Tantra. The acquisition of jīvanmukti is primarily due to spiritual knowledge. On the one hand, knowledge is a certain state of the carrier of knowledge himself; on the other hand, it is always knowledge of “something”. Although jīvanmukti can be reached through almost all tantric practices, there is a certain gradation of the time spent on it. The man reaches liberation during life not in isolation from the world. Outwardly, jīvanmukta cannot stand out among ordinary members of society; all his uniqueness is hidden inside his consciousness.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-108
Author(s):  
Pranjali Kureel

Media industry in India has witnessed hegemony of dominant castes since its very inception. Such hegemony has had a huge impact on our everyday lives and how we come to experience the world. This paper attempts to analyze how caste operates in the media sector, from its composition to content and argues that Indian media has played a catalytic role in inflicting epistemic violence over the oppressed castes as it helps dominant discourses to prevail and shapes popular perceptions and culture. After going over journalism, the paper examines cinema and television as both- a tool of maintaining the status quo and also as a medium of resistance and assertion. An analysis of the feminist discourse in media reveals a linear and somewhat exclusionary approach that bars the agency of Dalit women from media representation. At the end, it explores the power of the Internet with respect to the emerging Ambedkarite voices that are strengthening a liberatory framework while reclaiming their worldview.


2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-181
Author(s):  
Mihaela Mehedinţi-Beiean

Building large political structures was always closely connected with a fragile balance between military conflicts and peace. Thus, especially in the modern period, diplomats played an extremely important role in managing crisis situations and/or maintaining the status quo. Moreover, they represented the most visible facet of interstate relationships. During the 17th – 19th centuries, Europe’s tumultuous history, characterised by frequent wars, many of which against the Ottoman Empire, gave the diplomats’ services an inestimable value. In this context, Transylvania, Moldavia and Wallachia usually represented only intermediary points on the route towards the diplomats’ final destination, namely the Turks’ Empire. The present study aims at revealing the multiple forms of interaction between the Nordic (chiefly Swedish) and Russian diplomats, on the one hand, and the Romanian rulers, on the other hand. In order to achieve this goal, general historical information was intertwined with numerous testimonies pertaining to this special category of foreign travellers, the result being a picturesque depiction of certain typicalities of the diplomatic ceremonial.


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