The Study of International Cultural Relations of Postwar Japan

The paper examines policies and activities of cultural exchange carried out by Japanese national, local and private agents since the end of WWII. Methodologically, we distinctively use the notion culture as a tool and as an object of study, and to synthesize the two in full intention, based on the debate among IR students about so called Cultural Turn in IR theories. As case studies, the Japanese experiences are examined from two points. Firstly, it is compared with the German experiences in Europe, with special attention to the construction of national identity.In both countries, the peoples tried to make use of cultural exchange activities in the management of international relations. The actual developments of cultural relations by the two countries, however, were in striking contrast to each other. Secondly, our study focuses on the explosive expansion of private sector's international cultural exchange in the 1980s in association with so called "emerging civil society" phenomenon observed worldwide throughout 1970s and 1980s. By using our original approach mentioned in the Chapter 1, the paper tries to sketch out that the increase of the private organizations is largely the response of the Japanese society to outside influences, not something genuinely outgrown from within the society itself due to mainly domestic causes.

Minding the gaps: Disability culture + cultural competence in interior design

Despite the increased attention to the relationship of disability and design, this area still suffers from terminological confusion, oversimplification and a positivist bias that continues to produce ableist space. Here, I am suggesting that space is not a fixed container or a pochéd plan that needs to be ‘altered’ in order to accommodate, but that space is a fundamental element of social life and that space continually reproduces the social and cultural relations of its production. This paper serves as a critical foundation for ongoing explorations into how disability culture is situated within interior design. A shift towards disability as culture is necessary to move our understanding of how to design for those with disabilities out of the objective realm (prescriptive codes and guidelines) and into a subjective realm (the lived experience and embodied know-how of those with disabilities). By framing disability around a cultural model rather than a medical model it allows for epistemological and pedagogical shifts in our ways of knowing in interior design. In defining culture as “a way of life” it is important to look at disability as both a diverse way of living and a diverse way of knowing. Most significant, is that the everyday expertise of people with disabilities is recognized as knowledge that can inform the field of interior design. The urgency for defining disability culture is essential to our understanding of cultural competence in interior design education and practice. The aim of this paper is to challenge our current understanding of how to design for those with disabilities and to shift our ways of knowing in interior design towards a deep understanding of the lived experience, embodied know-how and culture of those with disabilities. This paper will begin by analysing the different models of disability and how interior design education and practice has shifted to reflect these different models. Defining disability culture and all of its complexities is also an essential component of this paper. Finally, this paper will present best practices and case studies of how a cultural model of disability can shape interior environments and interior design pedagogy.

La Cooperación Cultural como herramienta de Diplomacia Cultural. Estudio de caso: Secretaría GeneraL Iberoamericana (SEGIB), 2005-2012

El interés de este estudio de caso es evaluar a la Cooperación Cultural como herramienta de Diplomacia Cultural en la Secretaria General Iberoamericana (SEGIB) entre 2005-2012. En este estudio de caso se visualiza la manera en que la Cooperación Cultural impulsa como herramienta a la Diplomacia Cultural y en consecuencia pueda ser entendida como expresión de Diplomacia Cultural por medio de su ejecución y el papel que desempeña en cada uno los programas “IBER” de dicha institución. Finalmente se analiza y explica si la Cooperación Cultural es un mecanismo apto para fortalecer el sistema de Cooperación Iberoamericana.

Genealogía de la diversidad : la diversidad cultural como poder constituyente

El motivo de este artículo es analizar la trayectoria mutante de la diversidad cultural, con el objetivo de entender su importancia en las políticas públicas contemporáneas. Para ello se repasan los distintos períodos históricos por los que cruza este concepto. En la noción de diversidad cultural converge la lucha por los derechos civiles y políticos de los inmigrantes africanos y asiáticos así como, la crítica a las visiones del desarrollo político y las teorías coloniales y postcoloniales que sitúan el debate sobre las relaciones culturales entre el norte y el resto del mundo a mediados del siglo XX. En un segundo momento los territorios de lo diverso amplían sus actores, enfoques y tramas y los estudios culturales de corriente crítica reconocen estas rupturas obligando a la toma de decisiones políticas en materia de cultura. En 1997 y como síntesis a estos procesos, la Comisión Mundial de Cultura y Desarrollo publica el Informe Mundial sobre la Diversidad Cultural, documento fundamental cuyo impacto se ve reducido por una tendencia al multiculturalismo laxo propio de la orientación ultraliberal. En 2010, el Informe Mundial de la UNESCO 'Invertir en la diversidad cultural y el diálogo intercultural' sitúa definitivamente la diversidad como poder constitutivo de las políticas no solo de desarrollo sino también de participación democrática y uno de los asuntos más esenciales de las agendas contemporáneas

Negotiating and creating intercultural relations: Chinese immigrant children in New Zealand early childhood education centres

A multiple-case study investigation of the experiences of eight Chinese immigrant children in New Zealand early childhood centres suggested that the immigrant children’s learning experiences in their first centre can be understood as a process of negotiating and creating intercultural relations. The children’s use of family cultural tools, such as the Chinese language, was a distinctive feature of their learning experiences, simultaneously revealing and extending their exploration of the intercultural practices and their establishment of a sense of belonging. In the presence of Chinese-speaking peers who acted as ‘bridges’ and ‘boundary objects’, the Chinese language was actively used by the immigrant children in English-speaking early childhood centres and, as a result, they created intercultural relations which: (i) bridged the two cultures; (ii) brought the cultures into convergence; (iii) enabled the children to claim group identity; and (iv) battled intercultural constraints. The absence of Chinese speakers, on the other hand, constrained possibilities for intercultural relations. The focus on intercultural relations in this study is expected to lead to educational initiatives to support the incorporation of diverse cultures in early childhood services.

Proyección y política cultural estadounidense en argentina (1928-1941)

El objetivo del artículo es analizar algunos aspectos de los orígenes de la “política cultural” estadounidense en Argentina. La atención se concentrará en el pasaje desde las declaraciones del presidente Hoover, que contribuyeron a favorecer un clima útil y propicio a la intensificación de los intercambios, a los primeros pasos concretos realizados en el periodo de la presidencia de Roosevelt. Se tratará, en particular, de individualizar las características de la cooperación establecida entre organismos estadounidenses y argentinos para favorecer la proyección cultural estadounidense en el país y el intercambio cultural entre Estados Unidos y Argentina, donde se iba intensificando la difusión de un sentimiento anti-imperialista, y que era entonces objetivo de formas de propaganda particularmente agresivas por parte de los regímenes totalitarios.

E-learning and access : getting behind the hype

Rapid advances in information and communications technology (ICT) - particularly the development of online technologies -have transformed the nature of economic, social and cultural relations across the globe. In the context of higher education in post-industrial societies, technological change has had a significant impact on university operating environments. In a broad sense, technological advancement has contributed significantly to the increasing complexity of global economies and societies, which is reflected in the rise of lifelong learning discourses with which universities are engaging. More specifically, the ever-expanding array of ICT available within the university sector has generated new management and pedagogical imperatives for higher education in the information age.

Defining critical literacy

This article traces the lineage of critical literacy from Freire through critical pedagogies and discourse analysis. The author discusses the need for a contingent definition of critical literacy, as a situated and contextual response to political economies, institutional and cultural relations of power.

Rip, mix, burn: The politics of peer to peer and copyright law

Whereas Lessig's recent work engages with questions of culture and creativity in society, this paper looks at the role of culture and creativity in the law. The paper evaluates the Napster, DeCSS, Felten and Sklyarov litigation in terms of the new social, legal, economic and cultural relations being produced. This involves a deep discussion of law's economic relations, and the implications of this for litigation strategy. The paper concludes with a critique of recent attempts to define copyright law in terms of first amendment rights and communicative freedom.

Memórias e Histórias do Curso de Psicologia da Faculdade Salesiana de Lorena/SP: Uma contribuição para a historiografia da Psicologia no Brasil

O presente estudo objetivou construir uma história do Curso de Psicologia da Faculdade Salesiana de Filosofia, Ciência e Letras de Lorena, com a perspectiva de compreender as relações sociais, culturais, as práticas cotidianas e os modos de fazer que caracterizaram a constituição do curso, tendo como recorte histórico o período de 1952 a 1974. A meta final foi contribuir para a historiografia da Psicologia no Brasil. Apresentamos, inicialmente, de forma concisa, a história dos salesianos, desde sua criação e de sua inserção no Brasil. Detemo-nos mais em sua chegada à Lorena, com a fundação do Colégio São Joaquim e, muito mais especialmente, do Laboratório de Psicologia Experimental. Exploramos seu significado para os salesianos e sua missão educativa, bem como para a emergência do curso de Psicologia. Foram utilizados, como fontes documentais, documentos escritos e iconográficos, além disso, foram realizadas Entrevistas Narrativas, que nos possibilitaram apontar algumas características do começo do curso, como, por exemplo, as questões de gênero. Assinalamos como a abordagem experimental, dominante no primeiro momento do curso, em que os principais professores eram oriundos da USP e da PUC-SP, muda aos poucos para a abordagem humanista, ruptura causada pela presença de um professor, Franz Victor Rudio. Concluímos que o curso de Psicologia de Lorena emergiu não por um documento ou por uma ação intencional e isolada de um sujeito individual, mas por ação de muitos personagens que, durante um longo período, construíram práticas ligadas à Psicologia que levaram à constituição do curso. No entanto, pode-se afirmar que estas práticas foram fundamentadas na missão salesiana de formar educadores qualificados para o exercício do magistério, apoiada no tripé razão, religião e amorevolezza.

Reflexões sobre a Islamofobia nos Estados Unidos após onze de setembro de 2001: a construção discursiva da ameaça islâmica e o processo decisório em política externa

A dissertação objetiva analisar a influência da Islamofobia no processo decisório em política externa nos Estados Unidos após a data de 11 de setembro de 2001 por meio de sua apropriação por atores sociais considerados como potencialmente influentes no referido processo. A Islamofobia será conceituada a partir de um medo cultural que converte as culturas islâmicas em uma fonte de ameaça. Alinhando-se a uma perspectiva teórica que aponta para a força criativa dos discursos, se procederá à análise de alguns discursos ilustrativos para se sugerir a construção da ideia de ameça islâmica, bem como as formas através das quais o medo inspirado por tal concepção de uma ameaça islâmica alcançou as instâncias decisórias em política externa nos Estados Unidos. Por intermédio de uma análise de conteúdo que se utilizará de uma bibliografia de apoio multidisciplinar, serão abordados temas relativos à problemática de se representar as culturas, à dimensão social do medo, e às diretrizes gerais da política externa dos Estados Unidos após os Atentados Terroristas de 11 de Setembro, considerando que o desenvolvimento de tais questões subsidiará o alcance do objetivo principal do trabalho. Trata-se, em última instância, de um estudo que busca conjugar considerações sobre a política externa dos Estados Unidos com uma análise antropológica acerca da problemática das culturas, expressa a partir da conversão de uma cultura determinada em uma fonte de ameaça. Nesse sentido, a dissertação pode ser caracterizada como de natureza exploratória, uma vez que busca situar um tema pouco explorado no horizonte teórico, sobretudo em estudos sobre política externa.

Animal maiming, intimacy and the politics of shared life: the bestial and the beastly in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England

The everyday lives of many farm workers in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England were intricately and often intimately bound with the lives of animals, the ebb and flow of human life being inseparable from that of animal life. Farmyards, fields, folds as well as barns and stables were all spaces where animals transcended being the mere instruments of capital to instead being obvious co-constituents of the rhythms of existence. Living and working in such close proximity meant that the ‘species barrier’ was crossed and intimacies developed in everyday agricultural practices. Still, the relationship was based upon, if not reducible to, the workings of capital: the animal enrolled as a form of embodied capital, the labourer engaged by the farmer to act upon the animal. And in such relationships intimacies are mirrored by violences: the keeping captive, slaughter, and – occasionally – abuse. In this formative period in which the discourses and policies that continue to inform animal welfare were first formulated, the declining economic and material fortunes of farm workers when juxtaposed to farm animals’ fortune as increasingly ‘cosseted capital’ gave a particular charge to these abuses. Farm animals, and especially horses and cattle, so it is shown, were subjected to a series of violences. Many cases of animal maiming parodied tenderness in their brutality, whilst other attacks on the sexual organs of animals represented complex statements about the ways in which agrarian capitalism regulated all culture. Analysing the changing relationship between humans and animals therefore also helps us to better understand how capitalism mediates – and is mediated by – the non-human as well as the human, and how it defines cultural relations.

Marginal/minority popular music : the concept of the "third space" and the case for "hybridities" of cultures/identities /

The topic of this thesis is marginaVminority popular music and the question of identity; the term "marginaVminority" specifically refers to members of racial and cultural minorities who are socially and politically marginalized. The thesis argument is that popular music produced by members of cultural and racial minorities establishes cultural identity and resists racist discourse. Three marginaVminority popular music artists and their songs have been chosen for analysis in support of the argument: Gil Scott-Heron's "Gun," Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car" and Robbie Robertson's "Sacrifice." The thesis will draw from two fields of study; popular music and postcolonialism. Within the area of popular music, Theodor Adorno's "Standardization" theory is the focus. Within the area of postcolonialism, this thesis concentrates on two specific topics; 1) Stuart Hall's and Homi Bhabha's overlapping perspectives that identity is a process of cultural signification, and 2) Homi Bhabha's concept of the "Third Space." For Bhabha (1995a), the Third Space defines cultures in the moment of their use, at the moment of their exchange. The idea of identities arising out of cultural struggle suggests that identity is a process as opposed to a fixed center, an enclosed totality. Cultures arise from historical memory and memory has no center. Historical memory is de-centered and thus cultures are also de-centered, they are not enclosed totalities. This is what Bhabha means by "hybridity" of culture - that cultures are not unitary totalities, they are ways of knowing and speaking about a reality that is in constant flux. In this regard, the language of "Otherness" depends on suppressing or marginalizing the productive capacity of culture in the act of enunciation. The Third Space represents a strategy of enunciation that disrupts, interrupts and dislocates the dominant discursive construction of US and THEM, (a construction explained by Hall's concept of binary oppositions, detailed in Chapter 2). Bhabha uses the term "enunciation" as a linguistic metaphor for how cultural differences are articulated through discourse and thus how differences are discursively produced. Like Hall, Bhabha views culture as a process of understanding and of signification because Bhabha sees traditional cultures' struggle against colonizing cultures as transforming them. Adorno's theory of Standardization will be understood as a theoretical position of Western authority. The thesis will argue that Adorno's theory rests on the assumption that there is an "essence" to music, an essence that Adorno rationalizes as structure/form. The thesis will demonstrate that constructing music as possessing an essence is connected to ideology and power and in this regard, Adorno's Standardization theory is a discourse of White Western power. It will be argued that "essentialism" is at the root of Western "rationalization" of music, and that the definition of what constitutes music is an extension of Western racist "discourses" of the Other. The methodological framework of the thesis entails a) applying semiotics to each of the three songs examined and b) also applying Bhabha's model of the Third Space to each of the songs. In this thesis, semiotics specifically refers to Stuart Hall's retheorized semiotics, which recognizes the dual function of semiotics in the analysis of marginal racial/cultural identities, i.e., simultaneously represent embedded racial/cultural stereotypes, and the marginal raciaVcultural first person voice that disavows and thus reinscribes stereotyped identities. (Here, and throughout this thesis, "first person voice" is used not to denote the voice of the songwriter, but rather the collective voice of a marginal racial/cultural group). This dual function fits with Hall's and Bhabha's idea that cultural identity emerges out of cultural antagonism, cultural struggle. Bhabha's Third Space is also applied to each of the songs to show that cultural "struggle" between colonizers and colonized produces cultural hybridities, musically expressed as fusions of styles/sounds. The purpose of combining semiotics and postcolonialism in the three songs to be analyzed is to show that marginal popular music, produced by members of cultural and racial minorities, establishes cultural identity and resists racist discourse by overwriting identities of racial/cultural stereotypes with identities shaped by the first person voice enunciated in the Third Space, to produce identities of cultural hybridities. Semiotic codes of embedded "Black" and "Indian" stereotypes in each song's musical and lyrical text will be read and shown to be overwritten by the semiotic codes of the first person voice, which are decoded with the aid of postcolonial concepts such as "ambivalence," "hybridity" and "enunciation."

Alexandre de Rhodes inventou o quôc ngu?

O autor trata da questão das relações culturais com o Vietname (também chamado Cochinchina) desde o século XVI e particularmente da introdução do alfabeto latino por vários membros da Companhia de Jesus - entre os quais portugueses -, numa fase que precedeu as relações de tipo colonial que se viriam a desenvolver posteriormente, em particular com a França. Sublinha ainda como é importante manter a memória desse diálogo Ocidente-Oriente não obstante a atual situação pós-imperial e pós-colonial.

Germán Colmenares: un historiador visto en fragmentos (Debates)

Este artículo analiza el aporte historiográfico de Germán Colmenares. Se abordan, especialmente, los alcances del proyecto historiográfico denominado Historia Regional, los contextos en los que Colmenares desarrolló sus reflexiones teóricas, concretamente su preocupación por el desarrollo de la historiografía colombiana a partir de modelos flexibles de interpretación para el estudio de escenarios “marginales”, y sus indagaciones en relación a la historia económica y social colonial, en el estudio de las regiones fronterizas como veta de análisis de las relaciones sociales y culturales.