A Foucauldian Analysis of Power and Representation in an Attempt to Run a Photovoice Project with Youth

This project evolved out of a search for ways to conduct research on “others” in a way that does not exploit, stigmatize or misrepresent their experience. This thesis is an ethnographic study in leisure research and youth work and an experiment in running a photovoice project. Photovoice is a participatory visual method that embodies the emancipatory ideal of empowering others through self-representation. The literature on photovoice lacks a comprehensive discussion on the complexity of power and representation. Postmodern theorists have proposed that participatory methods are not benign and that initiatives are acts of power in themselves that produce effects (Cook & Kothari, 2001). A Foucauldian analysis of power is used to deconstruct the researcher’s practice and reflect on why and how youth are “engaged”. This project seeks to embrace the principle of working “with” others, but also work from a postmodern perspective that acknowledges power and representation as ongoing problems.

The Hidden Truths of Self-Presentation, Self-Disclosure, and Deception on Online Dating Profiles: A Call for Change

The way in which individuals seek romantic partners has changed considerably in the past decades, most notably through online dating sites (ODSs). Despite the possibility of misrepresentation amongst client users, such sites continue to grow in popularity because ODSs provide a large pool from which individuals can select and attract potential partners. While much research has been undertaken on ODSs, little empirical research has examined postsecondary students’ use of ODSs. Therefore, this study sought to investigate why postsecondary students have become involved with and how they present themselves on ODSs. The researcher surveyed 20 postsecondary students and conducted in-depth interviews with 2 participants who use ODSs. Although the limited sample prevented results from being generalized, quantitative and qualitative analyses suggest that participants became involved with ODSs for various purposes, such as seeking long-term relationships and/or marriage partners, or simply exploring or visiting ODSs out of curiosity. Findings indicate that ODS users’ physical appearance and/or “attractiveness” is considered the strongest predictor of relationship success. The study discusses how participants’ self-presentation affects outcomes of ODS usage, particularly when negative self-identification and presentation corresponding to factors such as individuals’ weight and age are taken into account.

Darstellung und Wirklichkeit in Der Idiot und Die Dämonen, zwei Dostojewski-Bearbeitungen von Frank Castorf für die Volkbühne Berlin

Comme la représentation théâtrale est une forme d’art fugitive qui, en raison de son caractère performatif, possède son propre monde fictionnel, la question de l’oposition entre représentation et réalité occupe une place centrale dans les études théâtrales. Ainsi, les œuvres scèniques d’un metteur en scène comme Frank Castorf représentent des objets d’analyse particulièrement appropriés. Parce que Castorf met d’abord l’accent sur le moment présent et la réalité de la représentation théâtrale, il est légitime de se demander quelle est la part qu’occupe la représentation d’un monde fictionel dans ses spectacles. Ce travail vise précisément à identifier l’importance qu’accorde Castorf à la performativité dans deux adaptations théâtrales des romans de Dostoïevski Les démons et l’Idiot. Comme notre société donne une place grandissante aux médias reproductibles tels que la télévision et le cinéma, et que l’être humain tend toujours davantage à se méditiaser lui-même, le théâtre comme toutes les autres formes d’art s’en trouve transformé. C’est dans cette optique que ces deux adaptations théâtrales ont donné lieu à d’autres manifestations artistiques, soit deux films et deux livres. Cet ouvrage retrace également le processus de re-représentation, c’est-à-dire du passage d’un média à un autre, dans le but d’analyser l’interrelation entre ces œuvres ainsi que de comprendre les raisons qui ont poussé le metteur en scène et son théâtre, la Volksbühne Berlin, à transposer d’abord des romans en spectacle de théâtre pour ensuite en faire des films et des livres. De plus, malgré son utilisation croissante au théâtre, la vidéo représente encore pour certains puristes un envahisseur à bannir. Elle introduirait la perte de l’essence du théâtre : le caractère performatif, qui consiste en une rencontre du public et des acteurs dans un même espace-temps. Par contre, les images vidéo-projetées en direct peuvent conserver une part de performativité puisqu’elles sont susceptibles d’influer sur le spectateur, et inversement. En prenant comme exemple l’Idiot de Frank Castorf, ce travail montre comment les caméras et leur dispositif de transmission en direct ont la capacité de se substituer aux principaux objets du spectacle théâtral : les acteurs.

THE WINCHESTER CENTRE FOR GLOBAL FUTURES IN ART DESIGN & MEDIA

The Winchester Centre for Global Futures in Art Design and Media highlights historical, contemporary and future roles for art, design and media within globalization. Its members build sustained collaborations with international partners in public service, the creative industries and civil society. Critically concerned with art and design practices of making, thinking and representation, the Winchester Centre actively engages in education and enterprise, exploring the contribution of media, materials and technologies to the improvement of human societies globally. Led by professors Jonathan Harris, Sean Cubitt, and Ryan Bishop, the Winchester Centre will make a decisive contribution to the work of the School and the University in future years. The Centre's inaugural professors would like to invite you now to suggest future research themes and activities. In the coming weeks details regarding the programme and prospective membership of the Winchester Centre will be made available.

Representing traumatic pasts at the District Six Museum

Using this metaphoric framework as a starting point, I would like to focus on the characteristics of the District Six Museum which extend its work beyond being that of representation (of traumatic memory). Representation signifies in some ways distance and separation, a telling of a story depicted for others. The work of the Museum is more akin to what could broadly speaking be described as ‘engagement’. Although this is word is much over-used, it nonetheless indicates more closely an embodied practice which invites personal insertion, empathy and emplacement. It includes a whole range of sense-making practices by those closest to the Museum’s story – the dispossessed ex-residents – who participate in the memorialisation practices of the Museum in both harmonious and dissonant ways. The architectural metaphor of this seminar is key to this approach, indicating a practice which is constructed and layered, fixed yet changeable. It speaks to a spectrum of activities related to the imperatives to develop as well as conserve – elements which are central to the Museum’s work in relation to the process of return and restitution. To signify the unfinished business of representation, the permanent exhibition is called Digging Deeper, a framework which allows for an always further uncovering of facts, meanings and perspectives.

The post-Lisbon role of the European Parliament in the EU's Common Commercial Policy: Implications for bilateral trade negotiations. EU Diplomacy Paper 05/2012, July 2012

This paper sets out to conduct an empirical analysis of the post-Lisbon role of the European Parliament (EP) in the EU’s Common Commercial Policy through an examination of the ‘deep and comprehensive’ bilateral Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) currently negotiated as part of the EU’s Global Europe strategy. The EU-Korea and EU-India FTAs are used as case studies in order to determine the implications of the EP’s enhanced trade powers on the processes, actors and outcomes of EU bilateral trade policy. The EP is now endowed with the ‘hard power’ of consent in the ratification phase of FTAs, acting as a threat to strengthen its ‘soft power’ to influence negotiations. The EP is developing strategies to influence the mandate and now plays an important role in the implementation of FTAs. The entry of this new player on the Brussels trade policy field has brought about a shift in the institutional balance of power and opened up the EP as a new point of access for trade policy lobbyists. Finally, increased EP involvement in EU trade policy has brought about a politicisation of EU trade policy and greater normative outcomes of FTAs.

The high-resolution infrared spectrum of HOF near 2700 cm-1: the ground and 2v2 states

The a/b hybrid-type ν1 fundamental and 2ν2 overtone bands of HOF were investigated by FTIR spectroscopy with a resolution close to 0.008 cm−1. Improved ground state parameters of HOF were determined from a merge of more than 3000 ground state combination differences formed from ν1 and previously measured ν2 transitions with the reported pure rotational lines. Excited state parameters of the v2 = 2 state, ν0 = 2686.924 6(1) and χ22 = −9.942 4(1) cm−1, were determined employing Watson's A-reduced Hamiltonian up to sixth order in I′ representation. The 2ν2 state was found to be unperturbed, the excited state parameters being closely related to those of ν2.

Hierarchical control and optimisation of the Tennessee Eastman process

Based on integrated system optimisation and parameter estimation a method is described for on-line steady state optimisation which compensates for model-plant mismatch and solves a non-linear optimisation problem by iterating on a linear - quadratic representation. The method requires real process derivatives which are estimated using a dynamic identification technique. The utility of the method is demonstrated using a simulation of the Tennessee Eastman benchmark chemical process.

The Spanish Ambassador and Samuel Daniel's Vision of the Twelve Goddesses: A New Document [with text]

The performance of Samuel Daniel's masque The Vision of the Twelve Goddesses at court on January 8, 1604 took place in the midst of the preliminary negotiations that would lead to the signing of the Anglo-Spanish peace at Somerset House the following August. Philip III sent a special ambassador to England to congratulate James on his accession, and a series of tussles between Juan de Tassis and his French counterpart ensued. As a recently-discovered document in the Archivo General de Simancas reveals, Anna of Denmark intervened personally to insure that de Tassis, and not the Frenchman, attended the masque. This was a clear signal of James and Anna's peace aims, which de Tassis conveyed to the King of Spain; moreover, he enclosed in his dispatch a text of Daniel's masque which he clearly considered both political intelligence and of interest to the theater-loving Hapsburg monarch. The Simancas text of the Daniel masque is a new version, hitherto unknown, which adds to our knowledge of the circumstances in which the first Stuart masque was performed. Here we present a transcription and annotated translation of both de Tassis' letter and the text of the masque he had compiled for Philip III. (B. C.-E. and M. H.)

On the flexibility of attention to race

Research on the flexibility of race-based processing offers divergent results. Some studies find that race affects processing in an obligatory fashion. Other studies suggest dramatic flexibility. The current study attempts to clarify this divergence by examining a process that may mediate flexibility in race-based processing: the engagement of visual attention. In this study, White participants completed an exogenous cuing task designed to measure attention to White and Black faces. Participants in the control condition showed a pronounced bias to attend to Black faces. Critically, participants in a goal condition were asked to process a feature of the stimulus that was unrelated to race. The induction of this goal eliminated differential attention to Black faces, suggesting that attentional engagement responds flexibly to top-down goals, rather than obligatorily to bottom-up racial cues.

In the name of the Father : God in Lacan, Judaic or Christian?

This essay challenges the widespread notion that Lacanian psychoanalysis represents a 'Christianing' of psychoanalysis. It argues that Lacanian psychoanalysis brings to psychoanalysis a broadly "Averroist" attitude towards religion which develops out of and transcends Freud's position in Totem and Taboo. For Lacan, religious texts are an invaluable source of pre-psychoanalytic insight or another regal road into the champ Freudien: the dynamic of human beings' desire, in its co-conformity with language and Law. The text focuses on trying to decipher the missing content of the Names of the Father seminar: the seminar that "does not exist" (Miller, 2006) beyond its opening, esoteric and dramatic session. The force of doing this will be to show how much, and how fundamental, the things are that Lacan thinks the bible, and the first Abrahamic monotheism in particular, can teach us about human subjectivity and the instance of the Law that shapes it - insights which go to explain Freud's unmistakable attachment, despite himself, to the civilizational importance of his fathers.

The sexualised body : the cyborg

The word cyborg was created through an amalgamation of the terms cybernetics and organism. The expression was coined during a 1960s NASA conference to describe the internal technological modification of the body. This new term resonated within popular culture and was quickly embraced by science fiction, where the cyborg became a popular character. The image of the cyborg is often hyper-physical and hyper-sexual. The super sexualised woman who can shoot bullets from her breasts is a popular comic book cyborg representation. The Replicants from Riddley Scott’s Blade Runner are other examples of hyper human, super sexualised cyborgs. Increasingly, the future of our physicality is one that is intertwined with technology. Although the image of the cyborg is often exaggerated, it holds within it real future possibilities. This paper argues that cultural anxieties, in relation to the impact of technology on our bodies, can be identified through the cyborg image.

The imagined body – the cyborg

During a NASA conference in the 1960s, the term cyborg was created through an amalgamation of the terms ‘cybernetics’ and ‘organism’. Coined by concert pianist Manfred Clynes and research colleague Nathan Kline to describe the internal technological modification of the body. This new term resonated within popular culture and was quickly embraced by science fiction where the cyborg became a popular character. The image of the cyborg is often hyper-physical and hyper-sexual. The super sexualised woman who can shoot bullets from her breasts is a popular comic book cyborg representation. The Replicants from Riddley Scott’s Blade Runner and Arnold Schwaznegger’s role the Terminator are other examples where the technological and physical combination produces a terrifying hyper humans. Increasingly the future of our physicality is one that is intertwined with technology. Although the image of the cyborg is often an exaggerated character it holds within it real future possibilities. Consider the portable arm wrist communicator from the scifi classic Star Trek. The watch phone communication device was once an object of the imagination but now a reality in the personal mobile phone. This paper argues that through imagined imagery of the cyborg, future possibilities can be seen.

One example of the image of the cyborg representing possible human futures is the performance work Cyborpyg. Cyborpyg is a 40-minute contemporary dance work that integrates three dimensional (3D) animation and video media within the performance. Projected 3D animated prosthetic limbs appear to extend the dancers from within. These digital limbs integrate with dancer’s bodies transforming them into cyborgs. The animations are an extreme form of aesthetic modification reflecting the possible consequences of the integration of technology within the body. Cyborpyg also explores both utopic and dystipic themes within the cyborg paradigm. The dancing hybrid bodies perform magical feats not possible with an unmodified body. Feet twist into talons and flippers, eyes extend from the head, arms transform into robotic attachments. The dancer’s bodies also appear trapped in an unrelenting environment with prosthesis that appear to torture and inflict serious harm. This paper explores the idea that the imagined image of the cyborg reflects future possibilities for the human physicality.

The relationship between performing media and lives on stage

The purpose of this paper is to consider when technology and media’s use in theatre can be described as a co-player with actors on stage. This will be investigated specifically within the realm of ‘dramatic theatre’, which has historically been the domain of live human actors that play characters in a closed fictional world driven by a dramatic text.

The artist in a networked society

Artists are under pressure from two conflicting sets of sociocultural expectations. On the one hand, they are expected to conform to the historically grounded myth of the artist as heroic genius. On the other hand, they must meet the expectations of the state (plus ensure their own survival) as economic contributors. One way  that these conflicting pressures are managed by artists working within the traditional art world is by separating the creator from the labourer through the use of intermediaries such as dealer galleries, critics, publishers and agents. This allows the artist to symbolically distance themselves from the economic structures that allow them to continue to work. However, for those artists working outside of these systems of support, legitimization and representation, the positioning of the individual as ‘artist’ becomes a much more complex task.

The construction of artists persona in online spaces can be seen most clearly in those artists who operate outside of the traditional art world. Lacking the symbolic distance between the economic producer and the bohemian, mythical genius, these individual artists instead negotiate a place to stand in direct relation to  their audience of fans, followers and audiences. Using examples from a range of fringe, alternative or counter-culture creative practice, this paper investigates artistic persona by linking the artist myth, economic considerations, and networked society to explore current presentation strategies.