Ethical Economic and Ecological Engagements in Real(ity) Time: Experiments with Living Differently in the Anthropocene

Author(s):  
J.K. Gibson-Graham

The Anthropocene offers us an opportunity to be affected by different temporalities and participate in a newly constituted collective. This paper examines select examples of actual and fictional reality TV programs in which ordinary people wrestle with concerns that are explicitly not those of the neoliberal capitalist imaginary, but are attuned to the task of changing everyday embodied practices of surviving well, distributing wealth, encounter- ing, connecting, and sharing with others. I am concerned with how to take these sparks of an emerging and different common sense and fan them into widespread collective action that reshapes the way we live on this planet. I draw on four inspirational threads of thinking to consider what a politics of participation might be in the Anthropocene: Michael Hardt’s conception of a militant biopolitics, the ideas of Michel Callon and John Law about qualculation, William Connolly’s insights into affective registers that resonate with the ‘sweetness of life’, and J.K. Gibson-Graham’s diverse economy (re)framing. I argue for the need to support experiments with living in new ways by differentiating our economic world and opening up the economy as a site of ethical practice that acknowledges being-in-common with human and earth others. 

2017 ◽  
Vol 104 (3) ◽  
pp. 241-258 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Victoria Johansen

Jury systems rest on the notion that not only specialized judges, but also “ordinary” people should judge defendants. Lay judges are supposed to contribute with their mundane, common sense, untouched by legal reasoning and knowledge.These ideals are also prevalent in Denmark. However, Danish lay judges are appointed for a four-year period and may even serve several periods. The present paper analyses how the repeated participation of newly appointed lay judges in Danish criminal cases changes the way they perceive their own role, as well as their perception of what constitutes relevant knowledge in a case. Over time, there is a tendency to learn and apply a way of reasoning that is closer to the court and its codes than it is to their own everyday life. In this way, the nature of their participation as “lay judges” is challenged.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 657-677 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wilhelm J. Wessels

The book of Jeremiah reflects a particular period in the history of Judah, certain theological perspectives and a particular portrayal of the prophet Jeremiah. Covenant theology played a major role in Jeremiah’s view of life and determined his expectations of leaders and ordinary people. He placed high value on justice and trustworthiness, and people who did not adhere to this would in his view bear the consequences of disobedience to Yahweh’s moral demands and unfaithfulness. The prophet expected those in positions of leadership to adhere to certain ethical obligations as is clear from most of the nouns which appear in Jeremiah 5:1–6. This article argues that crisis situations in history affect leaders’ communication, attitudes and responses. Leaders’ worldviews and ideologies play a definitive role in their responses to crises. Jeremiah’s religious views are reflected in his criticism and demands of people in his society. This is also true as seen from the way the people and leaders in Judah responded to the prophet’s proclamation. Jeremiah 5:1–6 emphasises that knowledge and accountability are expected of leaders at all times, but in particular during unstable political times.


1993 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-177
Author(s):  
Karen Harding

Ate appearances deceiving? Do objects behave the way they do becauseGod wills it? Ate objects impetmanent and do they only exist becausethey ate continuously created by God? According to a1 Ghazlli, theanswers to all of these questions ate yes. Objects that appear to bepermanent are not. Those relationships commonly tefemed to as causalare a result of God’s habits rather than because one event inevitably leadsto another. God creates everything in the universe continuously; if Heceased to create it, it would no longer exist.These ideas seem oddly naive and unscientific to people living in thetwentieth century. They seem at odds with the common conception of thephysical world. Common sense says that the universe is made of tealobjects that persist in time. Furthermore, the behavior of these objects isreasonable, logical, and predictable. The belief that the univetse is understandablevia logic and reason harkens back to Newton’s mechanical viewof the universe and has provided one of the basic underpinnings ofscience for centuries. Although most people believe that the world is accutatelydescribed by this sort of mechanical model, the appropriatenessof such a model has been called into question by recent scientificadvances, and in particular, by quantum theory. This theory implies thatthe physical world is actually very different from what a mechanicalmodel would predit.Quantum theory seeks to explain the nature of physical entities andthe way that they interact. It atose in the early part of the twentieth centuryin response to new scientific data that could not be incorporated successfullyinto the ptevailing mechanical view of the universe. Due largely ...


2021 ◽  
Vol 127 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-134
Author(s):  
Jay Szpilka

While the subject of women’s activity in historical and contemporary punk scenes has attracted significant attention, the presence of trans women in punk has received comparatively little research, in spite of their increasing visibility and long history in punk. This article examines the conditions for trans women’s entrance in punk and the challenges and opportunities that it offers for their self-assertion. By linking Michel Foucault’s notion of parrhesia with the way trans women in punk do their gender, an attempt is made at showing how the embodied experience of a trans woman making herself heard from the punk stage can serve as a site of ‘gender pluralism’.


Author(s):  
Nancy J. Hirschmann

The topic of feminism within the history of political philosophy and political theory might seem to be quite ambiguous. Feminists interested in the history of political philosophy did not urge the abandonment of the canon at all, but were instead protesting the way in which political philosophy was studied. They thus advocated “opening up” the canon, rather than its abolishment. There have been at least five ways in which this “opening” of the canon has been developed by feminists in the history of political philosophy. All of them do not only demonstrate that the history of political philosophy is important to feminism; they also demonstrate that feminism is important to the history of political philosophy. A two-tiered structure of freedom, with some conceptualizations of freedom designated for men and the wealthy, and other conceptualizations designated for laborers and women, shows that class and gender were important dimensions to be explored when examining the history of political philosophy. One way in which feminism has opened up the canon is its relevance to contemporary politics.


2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 180-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis F. Angosto-Ferrández

The unprecedented enfranchisement of Venezuela’s indigenous population is partly a result of the formation of a state-sponsored indigenous movement. This movement prioritizes access to social services, economic development, and political participation in state structures over certain goals of free determination. Other forms of collective action with different priorities are evidence of the existence of diverging interests and goals among indigenous people. These divergences are a reflection of the way in which the indigenous population partakes in the shaping of contemporary Venezuelan politics. La inclusión social de las comunidades indígenas de Venezuela no tiene precedentes y se debe, en parte, a la formación de movimientos indígenas auspiciados por el estado. Estos movimientos le dan prioridad al acceso a los servicios sociales, al desarrollo económico y a la participación política en las estructuras estatales por encima de ciertas metas de libre determinación. Otras formas de acción colectiva con prioridades diferentes revelan la presencia/existencia de intereses y objetivos divergentes entre las comunidades indígenas. Estas diferencias son un reflejo de la manera en que las poblaciones indígenas participan en la formación de la política venezolana contemporánea.


2019 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 29-41
Author(s):  
Piotr Zbróg

The beginnings of the shaping of social representations of borrowings in the public sphereThe article presents an initial phase of the process of shaping of social representations of borrowings. The aim was to obtain a view of the way in which participants of the public sphere talked about these elements of language, how they perceived them as well as what common sense image was created on this basis in the communication sphere and how it was modified. The first judgements and opinions on the matter of foreign words appeared around the 16th century and evolved from that moment. The theory of social representations developed by Serge Moscovici was applied as a theoretical and methodological basis of the description. Its research tools allow us to see the way in which societies construct meanings of matters important to them. On the basis of the analysis of the material it was established that from the beginning there were rather antagonistic elements of social representations of borrowings. The functionality of borrowings was noticed. Yet it was postulated that they should be eliminated from texts on account of the necessity to develop the native language, the incomprehensibility of statements as well as the excessive trend of foreignness.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zohra Akbari

Buildings and city forms are restructured and reused through time in response to evolving contexts, with each successive change leaving traces of the past that accumulate as layers. Collective knowledge and memory are strongly tied to these artifacts, which provide the depth and continuity necessary for the affirmation of identity. Dramatic changes in the contemporary city have prompted a reconsideration of the way architecture adapts, and highlights the need for a creative approach to change and advancement. A successful approach would meaningfully engage the past and memory to record and transmit vital aspects of culture and history while simultaneously using them to inform future actions. The palimpsest as an evolving record provides a productive framework for this kind of transformation, and uncovers the tangible and intangible layers of a site to protect and project the future layers.


Author(s):  
Antonio Desiderio

As part of the societal world, architecture and urban space do not have any ‘objective’ quality. They are representations. Their meaning is produced through the negotiation and interaction of individuals, groups and classes. Yet, such ‘subjective’ meanings do have a ‘material’ relevance, as they reflect a dialectical process between the functions, forms, ownership and practices of space. They reveal construal and construction: the way in which architectural spaces are represented on the one hand, and the way in which they are physically constructed and used on the other. Nowhere does this become more evident in our current society than in the arguments around urban renewal and regeneration. The Westfield Stratford City is a typical example. Part of the vast process of the urban regeneration of East London prompted by London 2012 Olympic Games, Westfield is a massive complex of luxury shops, restaurants, bars and five star hotels. It is seen by investors and local and national political authorities as capable of transforming Stratford into a site for shopping, tourism and leisure. It does this in numerous ways, one of which involves reconfiguring the image of the region through the press and media - through visual imagery and linguistic manipulations that promote a neoliberal agenda of gentrification that simultaneously devalue the existent societal structures and communities in the area. This paper offers a Critical Discourse Analysis of the manipulation of Stratford’s image by government, business and the media and suggests that the purely financially motivated misrepresentation it reveals, is typical of the urban regeneration ethos at work across the developed world today.


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