Material Methods; Considering Ceramic Raw Materials and the Spread of the Potter‘s Wheel in Early Iron Age Southern Iberia

This paper discusses the role of clay selection and preparation in the production of wheel-made pottery in Early Iron Age southern Iberia. The first systematic use of potter’s wheels in the production of Early Iron Age ceramics in southern Iberia corresponds to the establishment of pottery workshops associated with Phoenician trade colonies, dating to the period between the end of the 10th and 7th century BCE. There are still many gaps in our understanding of how technological knowledge was transmitted between the Phoenician workshops and “indigenous’ communities that adopted the potter’s wheel. This paper draws upon a growing body of archaeometric and ceramic technological research to consider clay selection strategies in these new workshops. Secondly, this paper will consider the role of ceramic raw materials in the development of new “hybrid’ ceramic forms, particularly grey-ware. It will hereby provide theoretical considerations surrounding the significance of material cultural hybridity in answering questions raised by postcolonial archaeologists about identity, cultural transmission and hybridisation in the context of the Phoenician colonial system.

Yoruba-Chinese Ethical Intersectionality: Towards a Community of Shared Future in Afro-Asian Diasporic Spaces

Diasporic communities, as geographies of national cultures abroad, are central to cultural hybridity as new cultures emerge when migrants intersect with their host communities. They have also been construed by national governments as informal trajectories for continuities of economic and diplomatic relations. This study examines the cultural intersectionality of the Yoruba and Chinese diasporic communities by situating the points of convergence for normative ethics within the Yoruba – Chinese sociocultural experiences as cross-cultural templates for diasporic spaces serving to consolidate official national partnerships. The study explores case studies from performances of the Chinese Ru tradition, founded on three basic virtues of ren, yi and li, and juxtaposes them with Yoruba ethical equivalents of ṣ’ènìyàn (humaneness), òdodo (righteousness) and ìwà-ètọ́ ̣(propriety) as prerequisites for qualifying as omo ̣ lúàbí ̣ . The study contends that these ethical codes, retained in diasporic communities through family traditions, music and theatre, are viable templates for smooth Nigeria-China relations in building the proposed community of shared future within the context of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Black Lives Matter goes global: Connective action meets cultural hybridity in Brazil, India, and Japan

This study examines the global diffusion of Black Lives Matter (BLM) as digitally networked connective action. Combining social network analysis with qualitative textual analysis, we show that BLM was hybridized in different ways to give voice to local struggles for social justice in Brazil, India, and Japan. However, BLM’s hybridization stirred right-wing backlash within these countries that not only targeted local movements but BLM too. Theoretically, we argue that both transnational contiguities and intra-cultural tensions shape the construction of meanings—or “action frames”—as connective action crosses cultural borders. Resonant frames, which are in harmony with the values of the movement, amplify the features of the global movement that resonate with local concerns or hybridize it with a local struggle. Reactionary frames, which are hostile to movement values, may also target the global movement or its hybridization. We theorize the different roles of global and local crowd-enabled elites in transnational connective action.

Exploring the Postcolonial Concept through the Eye of European Expansionism and Imperialism

The Postcolonial study has become very popular—it deals with colonial issues, cultural hegemony, imperialist subjects, and subservient topics. The postcolonial analysis mainly mostly involves Africa, America, Asia, and the Middle East. The imperial forces like England and France were the prominent actors in this venture. Thus, the postcolonial began after these imperial forces had left their former colonies. The formerly colonized countries were given political independence, and they began to govern themselves. However, the postcolonial study began to gain significant attention from Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978), in which he explains how Africa, the Middle East, and Asia were established on the western Imperialist structure. Edward Said explains exclusively that Orientalism vehemently accentuates the disparity between the west, their theories, social orders, literary pieces, the orient political history, tradition, norms, ideology, religion, and destiny. It dramatically reflects how the colonized adapted the cultural identity of their colonizers. The postcolonialism has been used to remember a set of conjectures and practices—and it also explains how colonialism has become a prominent and constant record. This article explores the postcolonial study, delineates the available resources that present the idea of postcolonialism, colonialism, and the effect of the Western imperialist system on the former colonies. The article also reflects Homi Bhabha’s cultural hybridity; he explains how mimicry plays a significant role in making the colonized adopt the culture of their colonizers.

Celebrating Cultural Hybridity Through Storytelling: Othello as a Borderlands Character in Caryl Phillips’ The Nature of Blood

This paper provides a new approach to Othello’s story in Caryl Phillips’ polyphonic novel The Nature of Blood (1997). The fictional Othello finds himself at the crossroads between different cultures and is struggling to define his identity. Making use of Gloria Anzaldúa’s borderlands theory as exposed in her work Borderlands/La Frontera (1987), this study explores Phillips’ Othello as a borderlands character. Accordingly, it is the purpose of this paper to demonstrate that, as a borderlands character-narrator, Othello succeeds in bringing together the two hitherto conflicting cultures that he knows (Africa and Venice) through storytelling. Indeed, his narrative proves a transborder testimony that contributes to creating a debate forum where cultural hybridity is celebrated.um where cultural hybridity is celebrated.

"a distressing lack of regularity": New Zealand Architecture in the 1850s

When Colonel Mould of the Royal Engineers at Auckland reported on behalf of the New Zealand Government on Mountfort's proposed accommodation for Governor Thomas Gore Browne, he queried the design's ability to be "lastingly pleasing to the eye," and identified the building's "distressing lack of regularity." This conference asks whether this phrase, describing Mould's discomfort with Mountfort's picturesque design, might also describe New Zealand's built environment in the 1850s more broadly as it negotiated architectural cultural exchanges, largely resulting from incoming British settlers' "flight from flunkeydom and formality." Philippa Mein Smith refers to a William Strutt drawing ("Settler putting out a chimney fire" (1855/1856)) to indicate its cultural hybridity ("the application of indigenous architecture - the whare, built from ponga logs - combined with elements of the English country cottage"), as well as "the power of the "pioneer legend," unpinned by the religious ideology of western commerce: "Pioneers tamed the land and, they believed, made it productive as God intended."