scholarly journals Children’s Dances at First Nation Powwows in Atlantic Canada

Ethnologies ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 29-52
Author(s):  
Janice Esther Tulk
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
First Nation ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Atlantic Canada ◽  
Eastern Canada ◽  
Cultural Events ◽  
Cultural Functions ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Informal Culture

In this article, based on ethnographic research conducted at Mi’kmaw powwows throughout Atlantic Canada between 2004 and 2010, I will begin to address the lacuna in literature on First Nation children’s dances. I will describe the various children’s dances observed at powwows in Eastern Canada, as well as songs that are specifically used for children’s dances, contextualizing them within the traditional powwow event and in relation to emcee stage talk. I will also illuminate the socio-cultural functions of children’s dance at powwows and the relationship between dance and play. Finally, by focussing specifically on the living dance tradition of Mi’kmaq at cultural events in the Atlantic provinces, I will elucidate some of the forces that act upon informal culture, shaping and re-shaping it through time. This approach will highlight the relationship between popular culture and tradition in this context, revealing the emergent nature of lived traditions.

Home, Sweet Home: Negotiating Intimacy in Brazilian Elitist Closed Condominiums

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 374-395
Author(s):  
Rafael Ignacio Estrada Mejia ◽  
Carla Guerrón Guerron Montero
Keyword(s):  
Collective Mode ◽  
Living Arrangement ◽  
Public Life ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Social Distinction ◽  
History Of ◽  
Collective Production ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Do So

This article aims to decrease the cultural invisibility of the wealthy by exploring the Brazilian emergent elites and their preferred living arrangement: elitist closed condominiums (BECCs) from a micropolitical perspective.  We answer the question: What is the relationship between intimacy and subjectivity that is produced in the collective mode of existence of BECCs? To do so, we trace the history of the elite home, from the master’s house (casa grande) to contemporary closed condominiums. Following, we discuss the features of closed condominiums as spaces of segregation, fragmentation and social distinction, characterized by minimal public life and an internalized sociability. Finally, based on ethnographic research conducted in the mid-size city of Londrina (state of Paraná) between 2015 and 2017, we concentrate on four members of the emergent elite who live in BECCs, addressing their collective production of subjectivity. 

Humanism and Music

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher M. Driscoll
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Popular Culture ◽  
Popular Music ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Contemporary Music ◽  
Theoretical Relationship ◽  
Rock Band ◽  
Historical Developments ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter explores the relationship between humanism and music, giving attention to important theoretical and historical developments, before focusing on four brief case studies rooted in popular culture. The first turns to rock band Modest Mouse as an example of music as a space of humanist expression. Next, the chapter explores Austin-based Rock band Quiet Company and Westcoast rapper Ras Kass and their use of music to critique religion. Last, the chapter discusses contemporary popular music created by artificial intelligence and considers what non-human production of music suggests about the category of the human and, resultantly, humanism. These case studies give attention to the historical and theoretical relationship between humanism and music, and they offer examples of that relationship as it plays out in contemporary music.

Becoming fertile in the land of organic milk: Lesbian and queer reproductions of femininity and motherhood in Sweden

Sexualities ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (7) ◽  
pp. 1021-1038 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulrika Dahl
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Family Formation ◽  
The Other ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Organic Milk ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
Lesbian Motherhood ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

This article draws on popular culture, ethnographic materials and mainstream commercials to discuss contemporary understandings of the relationship between fertility, pregnancy and parenthood among lesbians and other queer persons with uteruses. It argues that, on the one hand, same-sex lesbian motherhood is increasingly celebrated as evidence of Swedish gender and sexual exceptionalism and, on the other, queers who wish to challenge heteronormative gender disavow both the relationship between fertility and femininity, and that of pregnancy and parenthood. The author argues that in studying queer family formation, we must move beyond addressing heteronormativity and begin studying how gender, sexuality, race and class get reproduced in queer kinship stories.

scholarly journals Elite ethnography in an insecure place

Focaal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 (82) ◽  
pp. 80-93 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosita Armytage
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
Business Owners ◽  
Power Dynamics ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
The Relationship

Based on ethnographic research conducted with the wealthiest and most powerful business owners and politicians in urban Pakistan from 2013 to 2015, this article examines the particular set of epistemological and interpersonal issues that arise when studying elite actors. In politically unstable contexts like Pakistan, the relationship between the researcher and the elite reveals shifting power dynamics of class, gender, and national background, which are further complicated by the prevalence of rumor and the exceptional ability of elite informants to obscure that which they would prefer remain hidden. Specifically, this article argues that the researcher’s positionality, and the inversion of traditional power dynamics between the researcher and the researched, can ameliorate, as well as exacerbate, the challenges of undertaking participant observation with society’s most powerful.

scholarly journals Towards Religious Understanding: An Assessment of the Ambivalence Roles of Religious Leaders in Christian-Muslim Relations in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
pp. 9-20
Author(s):  
Rapheal Joseph Ojo
Keyword(s):  
Religious Communities ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Religious Leaders ◽  
General Belief ◽  
Religious Conflicts ◽  
The Government ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Religious Understanding ◽  
Shaky Ground

The world today is becoming more violent than ever before. Sometimes, the violence can be political, ethnic, economic and or religious. In most cases, distinguishing the main cause of such violence from other causes might be difficult. The factors could be a combination of two issues viz: ethnoreligious conflicts or politico-religious conflicts. The religious experience in Nigeria today, as a multi-religious society so far has proven contrary to the general belief and the widespread expectation of people about religion as an institution that promotes social integration. Christian-Muslim relations in Nigeria today (though being the dominant religions in Nigeria) is standing on shaky ground. The relationship is highly characterized by mutual suspicion, mistrust and distrust. In understanding this characterized reality in their interactions, this work interrogated the ambivalence roles played by religious leaders in Nigeria. And in doing this, the ethnographic research method was adopted. As part of its findings, it was discovered that there is a high level of intolerance among Christians and Muslims in Nigeria occasioned by unguarded utterances and abuse of freedom of speech by many uncensored religious leaders. Thus, setting the stage for avoidable and constant religious confrontations among the adherents of the two religious communities in Nigeria. The study recommends that peaceful co-existence can be possible if the government is responsible and responsive enough to address the basic needs of her masses which would reduce largely the manipulation of religion by clerics for personal gain. Furthermore, the place of meaningful dialogue should be embraced by religious leaders across different religious divides. Keywords: Christian-Muslim Relations, Dialogue, Peaceful Co-existence, Religious leaders, Religious Understanding

scholarly journals “A reward rather than a right”: Facilitators’ perspectives on the place of music in Norwegian prison exceptionalism

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 274-289
Author(s):  
Áine Mangaoang
Keyword(s):  
Interpersonal Communication ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Research Data ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Research Practice ◽  
Music Making ◽  
Critical Understanding ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Music Activities

Scholarship on prison music-making projects and programmes to date has largely overlooked the perspectives of prison music facilitators, who form an integral part of many prison music activities. The aim of the study, which was exploratory in nature, was to contribute to a better understanding overall of the relationship between music and imprisonment by focusing on the perspectives of prison music practitioners. Drawing from data collected in four Norwegian prisons through ethnographic research, data was analysed thematically with four key themes emerging: interpersonal communication and emotional connection; social responsibility; prison system and environment, and (in)difference and exclusion. The findings highlight the fact that the range of prison music activities offered in many Norwegian prisons affects music facilitators deeply in a number of ways, and support existing studies that find that prison music practices can contribute to creating a community of caring individuals both inside and outside prisons. Notably, the emergence of the (in)difference and exclusion theme demonstrates a more critical and nuanced view of prison music facilitators’ experiences as going beyond simplistic, romantic notions of music’s function in social transformation. Concerns raised for those who appear to be excluded or differentiated from music-making opportunities in prison – in particular foreign nationals and women – suggest that (even) in the Norwegian context, music in prisons remains a “reward” rather than a fundamental “right.” This study marks a step towards a richer and more critical understanding of prison musicking and aims to inform future research, practice, and the processes involved in the possibilities for offering music in prisons.

5. Inventing the samurai

2021 ◽  
pp. 86-112
Author(s):  
Michael Wert
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Military Science ◽  
Meiji Restoration ◽  
Tokugawa Period ◽  
Unique Identity ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter argues that the samurai were “invented” in the Tokugawa period as a strictly defined group with a unique identity created through popular culture and codified social cultural practices. Commoners and samurai alike consumed, and participated in, warrior-related activities. People read warrior histories, military science manuals, were influenced by warrior theatre, like the 47 ronin story, and the value therein. It also describes how low-ranking warriors became more political, their education increasing connected to notions of warrior legitimacy and the relationship between warriors and the imperial institution. In so doing, the chapter, chronologically, leads readers to the collapse of the last warrior regime during the Meiji Restoration and the Boshin War.

Opportunity (Let’s Make Lots of Money)

2021 ◽  
pp. 59-96
Author(s):  
Melissa Vosen Callens
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Family Dynamics ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Conspicuous Consumption ◽  
Economic Power ◽  
Careful Attention ◽  
Income Gap ◽  
The Family ◽  
Economic Landscape ◽  
The Relationship

Chapter three describes how the economic landscape of the 1980s heavily influenced the family dynamics discussed in chapter two, with careful attention to the widening income gap and the paradoxical rise of conspicuous consumption. The chapter demonstrates how access to the American Dream—or lack thereof—is represented in 1980s popular culture and Stranger Things, reflecting and generating increased cynicism of Gen Xers. While many films of the 1980s fail to explore the relationship between economic power and social and political power, Stranger Things does so, but does so implicitly.

Inscribing çingene in Late Ottoman Cultural Forms

2019 ◽  
pp. 124-166
Author(s):  
Sonia Tamar Seeman
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Popular Culture ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Rural Settings ◽  
Social Landscape ◽  
Tanzimat Reforms ◽  
Ottoman Literature ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Late Ottoman

This chapter focuses on the relationship between Ottoman social order and urban popular culture. Social upheavals contributed to the intensified display of the çingene stereotype, with the çingene representing the experience of social marginalization. Playing out the anxieties of urban audiences as they confronted problems of modernity, urbanism, social disruption, and moral decay, the stereotypical figure of the çingene remained consistent from the late nineteenth century to the 1990s. A discussion of the dramatic nineteenth century Tanzimat reforms is followed by analyses of çingene characters in karagöz shadow puppetry, kanto theatrical songs, and Ottoman literature. The çingene was portrayed in two irreconcilable types: as an essentialized, nomad in pastoral rural settings; as the polluted degenerate and potentially contagious agent of urban chaos, social disorder, and moral decadence. By portraying the “çingene” as the quintessential “other” among an array of diverse social types, these forms rendered the anxiety-producing urban social landscape in stark relief.

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