Assignment #5

International Association of Media and Communication Research 2016

Gender is culturally defined. It is the practice of that gender (the clothes we wear, our taste in music and film) and the perception of that practice, both ultimately determined by culture, which defines our gender. Schippers (2007) thus argues that it is not biology that determines our perception of gender but is instead the signs that we invoke and which others interpret. Socrates (The Republic, Book X) discusses the hierarchy of realism ' the 'divine' thought or idea is most real, the instance of signs we invoke to represent that idea are less real, and the imitation or interpretation of those signs are the least real. Together, the theories of both Socrates and Schippers present a hierarchy of gender perception: the instance and the imitation.This paper discusses the semiotic duality of gender in the ABC's LOST, focussing on Schippers' non-biological and hegemonic gender argument as well as Socrates' hierarchy of realism. LOST provided Western audiences a unique view of a non-linear narrative (Lain & Treat 2010), conflict between Eastern and Western narrative styles (Kosaka 2010), and traditional and nontraditional gender roles (Hester 2013), making it the second most watched show worldwide in 2006 (BBC News 2006). Through character analysis and narratology, the thesis of this paper uses the theories of both Schippers and Socrates to discuss conflict between gender representations of the 'idea' (or the referent), 'instance' (or sign), and 'imitation' (or signified). Within LOST, the characters' gender hierarchy and their conflict between the 'instance' and 'imitation' draws a theme of balance, both within the narrative of LOST and an overarching comment on gender in society. Male characters embody both hegemonic and subordinate masculine traits, while female characters show both emphasised and pariah feminine traits, creating conflict.This paper theorises that LOST attempts to subvert traditional gender hierarchy roles through a long narrative. As such, this paper begins with the conflation of both Schippers and Socrates in a hierarchy of gender theory and investigates masculinity and femininity in media representations, and moves to apply this theory to ABC's LOST through character analysis and narratology. The paper concludes that, while balance is an overarching theme of LOST's narrative, the attempt to subvert traditional hierarchy gender roles focuses on the betterment of a 'divine idea' of one's self rather than on the un-real 'instance' or 'imitation'.

Lesbian Lives Conference, University of Brighton, UK, 15-16 March 2019: The Politics of (In)Visibility, 2019

Visibility has long been an important goal in European lesbian activism and an important means of political empowerment. Yet, visibility can also bring about an increased vulnerability for marginalized groups, especially in times of hate speech and an increasing political backlash. Moreover, we need to ask: whose visibility is recognized by whom, and on what grounds? In my paper I look at the ways both national and grassroot film archives recognize lesbian lives through collection and selection policies, through the use of metadata and via the curation of online access. Presenting case studies from the Swedish and British Film Institutes, from the Hamburg-based archive bildwechsel as well as the Lesbian Home Movie Project in Maine, this paper discusses the ambivalence of lesbian visibility after (amateur) film footage has left the safe space of the archive to be widely circulated online. The paper looks at legal and ethical challenges archivists are facing when dealing with nudity, lesbian affection and other representations which challenge hegemonic heteronormative scopic regimes. How can an ethically conducted archival practice be guaranteed? How can archives avoid making lesbian lives invisible again? This paper presents some of the results of my research project “The Cultural Heritage of the Moving Image” (Swedish Research Council 2016-2018).

From our voices: Art educators and artists speak out …, 2003

This series aims to provide theoretically ambitious but accessible volumes devoted to the major fields and subfields within communication and media studies. Each volume sets out to ground and orientate the student through a broad range of specially commissioned chapters, while also providing the more experienced scholar and teacher with a convenient and comprehensive overview of the latest trends and critical directions.

Pages 35-43 of _InLand_ reveals for teachers that they needn't worry that using comics and graphic novels keeps them from addressing important standards. This truth holds true when using the IRA/NCTE standards from 1996 or the inferior Common Core State Standards, which were just starting to gain traction in 2011. Brian Kelley coauthors with Carter and Monnin.

10th International Conference Crossroads in Cultural Studies in Tempere July 1-4, 2014 This article examines Iranian cultural studies in the field of representation studies. Our main question asks how Iranian cultural studies researches apply the method of representation and, more importantly, how we can apply the method of representation studies to the studies of representation in Iran. We also ask, to what extent can we follow that traces of power (biases) in “critical research” itself. The results demonstrate that representation studies in Iran operate as a part of ideological state apparatuses in two ways: First, they reinforce cultural clichés; and second, they overlook subjects that power centers do not wish to be studied. In the first case, the subordinate groups such as women, youth, and ethnic minorities are studied only as identities after they have become “cultural clichés” in the media. In the process universities and research centers reproduce cultural clichés through such studies. In the second case, specific issues related to religious and sexual minorities and immigrants are overlooked or deemphasized because they are believed to be politically too sensitive in the view of power centers. We conclude that although cultural studies was supposed to be the advocate of the subordinate groups, in Iran it has further marginalized the disenfranchised and voiceless groups by producing knowledge that is in the service of power.

2019

This article aims to examine politics of Seoul Queer Culture Festival, the name of gay pride in Seoul. This discussion derives from the dissociation between increasement of public involvement in Seoul Queer Culture Festival, the name of Seoul gay pride and stagnation of social awareness of rights of queer communities in South Korea. This discussion grapples with a wider issue within queer politics around consumption of SQCF. Insights from queer theory are employed to interrogate the notion of term ‘queer’, its politics, and politicization of SQCF in Korean context.

Globalization as a concept has reached an impasse exhausted of its potential to generate imagination and critique. Hence worlding, defined in various ways such as “the whole new way to globalize” and “the art of being global”. In worlding, we are invited to re-imagine globalization in a new light unaffected by the dominant discourses of state and business. Unlike globalization, wording is neither a fatalistic structural force nor the triumphant sweep of neoliberal capitalism. It is practice of world-making, a pursuit of an alternative globalization (or globalizations). The Inter-Asia cultural studies scholarship has been an effort to engage in cultural and intellectual construction of Asia. What Asia has been made during this initial phase? What Asia should be made in the future? With the theme of worlding, the 2017 conference hopes to re-examine the efforts thrown thus far and to appreciate emerging trans-bordering forms in Asia outside or in the gaps and cracks in the neoliberal hegemon. The term should open up new research areas and agendas of inter-Asia cultural studies.

2016

Advanced communication technologies allow audiences access to mass culture artifacts produced outside of their own national and cultural borders. Therefore, it is important to understand how producers of mass culture appropriate and recontexualize national and cultural identities into new globalized, transcultural contexts. The film Sukiyaki Western Django remixes filmic signifiers representing notions of national and cultural identities to create a new hybridized transcultural identity indicative of 21st century globalization.

Academia Materials Science, 2024

The development of casein-based plastics is, together with starch-based one, an alternative to conventional ones, produced from hydrocarbons and their derivatives. Though dating back to late XIX century, under the principal name of galalith, its interest has been revived recently, also due to the efforts taken into implementation of circular economy, therefore to the waste-to-materials process. This recognizes the abundance of refuse derived from the dairy products sector, which allowed casein also entering the field of material tinkering for design. In a more industrial sense, a number of works exist in the last two decades focused on the revival of casein-based materials, mostly, yet not exclusively, in a formaldehyde-free version. These include a particular attention to the creation of packaging films, in some cases edible ones, which includes the experimentation on the effect of different plasticizers, such as polyols e.g., glycerol and sorbitol, and blending with starch or pectins. Other applications are being furthermore explored, which include biomedical use of casein films especially as wound dressing, the use of casein in the production of fibers, for textile and antibacterial purposes. In general terms, studies on casein materials are aimed at serving to the replacement of oil-based plastics, or as the matrix for natural fiber composites.