Papers by Mark Kirby-Hirst
Acta Classica, 2014
Philostratus' Heroikos is a dialogue between a vinedresser, tending the sanctuary of the hero, Pr... more Philostratus' Heroikos is a dialogue between a vinedresser, tending the sanctuary of the hero, Protesilaos, and a Phoenician merchant. By reading this dialogue in tandem with the Vita Apollonii, which includes several notable instances engaging with the hero-cult, Philostratus' opinion of this traditional form of Greek worship, and of the Eastern mystery cults as well, becomes clear. Philostratus initially expresses his displeasure at the religious status quo of his time through his character of Apollonius of Tyana, a time when mystery cultism was beginning to overthrow the ancient rites of the Olympian deities with its individualistic approach to belief. This article argues that together, these two works provide evidence of a call by Philostratus to renew the worship of the old Homeric heroes as a viable replacement for the declining rites of the Olympian gods, and as an attack on mystery rites as foreign intrusions on the religious landscape.
Image & Text, 2019
This article proposes that Black Panther, with its aesthetic and thematic emphasis on Afrofuturis... more This article proposes that Black Panther, with its aesthetic and thematic emphasis on Afrofuturism, as well as its spectacular technical production, makes a unique contribution to cinematic history in several significant ways. In order to establish these noteworthy contributions, both the film and Afrofuturism are engaged with. This article is divided into three distinct parts. Part I provides a brief theoretical overview of Black Panther and Afrofuturism. Part II, a short review, follows. Co-authored by Mark Kirby-Hirst, the review contextualises and analyses the film within the bounds of Afrofuturism and twenty-first century art and film criticism, in an effort to argue for the relevance and import of such a unique and yet mainstream piece of cinema history; which, we conclude, is owing in no small part to the rise in popularity of decolonising tendencies in the humanities, in art, and in wider twenty-first century visual culture. The last section of this article, Part III, provides a brief synopsis of the contributing articles to this special themed section of Image & Text.
Communicatio, 2018
This article is divided into two distinct parts. The first part contextualises John Trengove's in... more This article is divided into two distinct parts. The first part contextualises John Trengove's internationally renowned, award-winning, feature-length isiXhosa film, Inxeba. The second part of the article is an interview with Batana Vundla, conducted by Mark Kirby-Hirst (Film Theory and Visual Discourse Subject Manager at The Open Window), held in mid-2018, shortly after the High Court's decision was made public regarding the final classification of Inxeba. The interview ranges from Batana Vundla's history in the South African film and television industries, to the production processes behind the scenes of the film and concludes with a focus on the nuanced manner through which the film often broaches a wide variety of physical and psychic traumata.
Magic and the supernatural have always been fascinating topics for investigation, none more so th... more Magic and the supernatural have always been fascinating topics for investigation, none more so than the belief in prophecy. Actually being able to predict future occurrences, sometimes long before they take place, is certainly a desirable ability, and so naturally it was something that was much sought after in ancient Greece and amongst the Zulu people of South Africa. This is the domain of this dissertationbelief in the power of divination and how this belief could appear to be interrelated between two distinct peoples who are separated not only by the passage of time and their geographical locations, but also by socioeconomic changes like industrialization and globalisation. TABLE OF CONTENTS.
Communicatio, 2018
This special themed issue of Communicatio explores the profound transformation of the political, ... more This special themed issue of Communicatio explores the profound transformation of the political, cultural and intellectual contours of Africa from the vantage point of African film and grounded within the theoretical and epistemological discourses of trauma studies, memory studies, postcolonial studies, and decolonial studies. The contributors are particularly interested in exploring the relational flows between African cinematic works and the social and imaginary circumstances of their production, engagement and representation. Through an explication of the screen and viewing cultures from Africa, this themed issue wishes to make three contributions. The first is to the already established but ongoing scholarly work of trauma studies, but specifically from an African, cinematic vantage point. The second contribution is to the theoretical body of work on African cinema (and in this context, "cinematic" includes both film/television). And the last contribution is to the emerging view that culture is a "two-way street," to put it colloquially: a reversal of the dominant "Western" direction of culture, with an emphasis on different tones of social values and contexts, that have been marginalised in mainstream popular culture discourses.
Akroterion, 2012
Since the early eighties, the personal computer has come to form an integral part of most aspects... more Since the early eighties, the personal computer has come to form an integral part of most aspects of our existence. In Hollywood this is no different. Indeed, the influence of the computer is so powerful that it is rare for an action-adventure film to be able to call itself a 'blockbuster' unless it is released with some sort of videogame tie-in following closely in its wake, as the case of James Cameron's Avatar (2010) suggests. It is the relationship between film and videogame and their combined strengths as a teaching tool that are the concerns of this article. The analysis therefore centres on two examples of film and videogame tie-in: Clash of the Titans and Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The lightning thief, both 2010 releases. The investigation targets this film / videogame complex through the use of a new concept, the 'reality world', to be defined in the course of the article that better allows an assessment of the relevance and utility of films and their videogame tie-ins as pedagogical tools for the teaching and study of the discipline of Classics. KARAM & KIRBY-HIRST to aid the audience in suspending its disbelief of the fictional narrative situated within this recreated world. From the well researched minutiae of simple day-today living environs, to the more complex cultural and religious stria of society, this construction grounds even the most fantastical of tales in a 'reality world', or put another way, it offers a phenomenological realism that provides an inherent logic and cohesion giving credibility to the most far-fetched of tales and epics. This approach does not seek to critique the historical accuracy of these two respective mediums, but rather the manner in which they create 'reality worlds', for it is these 'reality worlds' with which the 'viewser' will engage. Searle Kochberg, who coined the term 'viewser', defined it as 'the viewer-cum-user' (2007:51). Simply put, the interconnectivity of twenty-first century multimedia has fused the viewer of a film or DVD with the user of the computer or videogame. The steady advance of the internet and social networking media has then in turn added a third dimension to this individual so that he / she not only watches a film, but 'blogs' about it, and even purchases the videogame based on the film in order to expand his / her experience of the 'reality world' that the film first introduced them to. This investigation makes use of two case studies-Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The lightning thief and Clash of the Titans-selected to exemplify the 'reality worlds' being assessed. They are also examples of the 'viewser' phenomenon because they were released concurrently with videogame tie-ins, and are therefore ideal for elucidating the employment of the film and videogame tie-in as a new pedagogical tool for teaching of the Classics in the twenty-first century. As early as 1908, film critics were touting the capacity of the new cinematic medium to animate the past (Tredell 2002:15, cited in Rosenstone 2006:11). This has resonance in the twenty-first century for both the mediums of film and videogames because both allow for the reconstruction of a particular view of the past, 'a vanished world' (Rosenstone 2006:2) that can no longer be interacted with. This ability, which is only amplified by the convergence of film and videogame tie-in, is the chief concern of this article. The article's primary thesis therefore, is founded on a belief in the relative importance of the interaction between a film and its associated videogame, a pairing that, in the particular instance of the selected case studies, makes the Classics of interest to, and more easily accessible to new audiences. This study is thus comprised of three broad sections: the discussion of the two filmic case studies, followed by the description of their videogame counterparts, and lastly the theoretical argument.
This article examines the potential for a videogame-based pedagogy in a South African open and di... more This article examines the potential for a videogame-based pedagogy in a South African open and distance learning (ODL) environment, wherein videogame interactivity might address the absence of individualised tuition. The discipline of Classics is utilised as a working example, with its primary educational elements, namely the study of history and culture, illustrating the broader appeal of a videogame-based pedagogy that can be deployed to courses ranging from anthropology to cultural and media studies, to history and even art. In largely literature review format, this article first assesses the representation of these elements in commercial videogames, before concentrating on user-modified videogame scenarios (‘mods’), and the employment of easy to understand ‘toolsets’ for creating such course specific content. The creation of such content using these ‘toolsets’ and other means (eg, free-to-play games) enables lecturers to construct unique videogame learning environments (VGLEs) f...
In an effort to distance himself from the Democritan conception of the atomic particle, Epicurus ... more In an effort to distance himself from the Democritan conception of the atomic particle, Epicurus posited three essential characteristics to explain the movement of atoms in the void - mass, velocity and something that has puzzled ancient and modern thinkers, called the klinamen . This occurrence was an hypothesized shift in the linear trajectory of an atom at an entirely unexpected and random point in time, and explains how compounds came to be formed in the Epicurean universe, where atoms fall unhindered in parallel to one another. I argue that the klinamen is not an entirely random occurrence but is instead a phenomenon predicated upon the laws of modern physics, the Newtonian laws of motion and gravitation in particular. I further posit that the klinamen is an entirely necessary aspect of the development of the universe from its initial origins of ‘atoms and void’ (Epicur. Phys. 1.13,14; Ep. Hdt. 39).
This article examines the potential for a videogame-based pedagogy in a South African Open-Distan... more This article examines the potential for a videogame-based pedagogy in a South African Open-Distance Learning (ODL) environment, wherein videogame interactivity might address the absence of individualised tuition. The discipline of Classics is utilised as a working example, with its primary educational elements, namely the study of history and culture, illustrating the broader appeal of a videogame-based pedagogy that can be deployed to courses ranging from anthropology to cultural and media studies, to history and even art. In largely literature review format, this article first assesses the representation of these elements in commercial videogames, before concentrating on user-modified videogame scenarios (‘mods’), and the employment of easy to understand ‘toolsets’ for creating such course specific content. The creation of such content using these ‘toolsets’ and other means (e.g. free-to-play games) enables lecturers to construct unique videogame learning environments (VGLEs) for teaching purposes. Modern pedagogical principles are also brought to bear upon this notion of a videogame-centred multimedia approach to student-centred learning to properly situate it within the parameters of current educational practice. Finally, the pros, cons, and particular challenges of the use of a VGLE within the South African educational environment are considered.
Akroterion 56, 2011
Since the early eighties, the personal computer has come to form an integral part of most aspects... more Since the early eighties, the personal computer has come to form an integral part of most aspects of our existence. In Hollywood this is no different. Indeed, the influence of the computer is so powerful that it is rare for an action-adventure film to be able to call itself a 'blockbuster' unless it is released with some sort of videogame tie-in following closely in its wake, as the case of James Cameron's 'Avatar' (2010) suggests. It is the relationship between film and videogame and their combined strengths as a teaching tool that are the concerns of this article. The analysis therefore centres on two examples of film and videogame tie-in: 'Clash of the Titans' and 'Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The lightning thief', both 2010 releases. The investigation targets this film / videogame complex through the use of a new concept, the 'reality world', to be defined in the course of the article that better allows an assessment of the relevance and utility of films and their videogame tie-ins as pedagogical tools for the teaching and study of the discipline of Classics.
Akroterion 55, 2010
The dragon is one of the most ubiquitous of images — from its appearance in the dreams of individ... more The dragon is one of the most ubiquitous of images — from its appearance in the dreams of individuals to the legendary works of men like J R R Tolkien — it is known across the world but never viewed in the same way. This article takes a Jungian psychoanalytic approach to the dragon as symbol, and juxtaposes two distinct perspectives on the dragon, that of the ancient Greeks (the mythic dragons Typhon and Python in particular) and the Zulu people of South Africa (with special attention given to the place of the python as a possible “dragon” in the practice of divination), in an effort to better understand the creature’s significance to these two cultures and to the world at large.
Phronimon 10.1, 2009
In an effort to distance himself from the Democritan conception of the atomic particle, Epicurus ... more In an effort to distance himself from the Democritan conception of the atomic particle, Epicurus posited three essential characteristics to explain the movement of atoms in the void - mass, velocity, and something that has puzzled ancient and modern thinkers, called the klinamen. This occurrence was an hypothesized shift in the linear trajectory of an atom at an entirely unexpected and random point in time, and explains how compounds came to be formed in the Epicurean universe, where atoms fall unhindered in parallel to one another. I argue that the klinamen is not an entirely random occurrence but is instead a phenomenon predicated upon the laws of modern physics, the Newtonian laws of motion and gravitation in particular. I further posit that the klinamen is an entirely necessary aspect of the development of the universe from its initial origins of "atoms and void" (Epicur. "Phys." 1.13,14; "Ep. Hdt." 39).
Talks by Mark Kirby-Hirst
In the words of Matthew Fox (2001:81), ‘rhetoric itself is an inseparable part of any attempt to ... more In the words of Matthew Fox (2001:81), ‘rhetoric itself is an inseparable part of any attempt to exercise moral or political judgment.’ The rhetoric of which he speaks is the skill set taught by Greek sophists as part of the rhetorical and literate education that distinguished the ruling elites of antiquity from the rest of the inhabitants of the Graeco-Roman world. Learning in Greek writing and culture was also part and parcel of this ‘higher’ education, a form of symbolic capital in which both Roman and Greek alike could partake. At the heart of this was the value system of the ancient sophists, and it was their teachings that formed the keystone to many social interactions that occurred in the Graeco-Roman world, from legal and political debates, to the arguments of philosophers and other pepaideumenoi. This paper seeks to examine the "Vitae Sophistarum" of Flavius Philostratus with a view to assessing the place and relative importance of sophistry within the context of imperial Roman political and social interactions of the early third century CE. This investigation seeks to problematise elite relations in imperial Rome by determining whether, as Simon Swain (1991:149) contends, the pepaideumenoi of ancient Rome in fact shared a similar and singular sophistic value system because of their common education, or whether this was mere pretense in what amounted to a continuous battle for position and prestige among the learned elite?
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Papers by Mark Kirby-Hirst
Talks by Mark Kirby-Hirst
The Landscapes of Cinema and Antiquity project is an MIT project between Unisa and the University of Pretoria, which through screening topical films, followed by discursive seminars, aims to bring film and its analytical tools to the student community. Given that much of popular culture is predicated upon the film industry, this project seeks to provide access to this body of knowledge by teaching skills of visual literacy, thereby providing an understanding of the 21st century and phenomena like globalisation, thus contributing to students becoming critical, informed members of society. This paper defines the role of cinema in knowledge creation, before exploring the Landscapes project and its attempts at bringing visual literacy and an African film identity to students.