A Postcard Autobiography: Jurek Becker’s Unnarrated Response to the Holocaust

As the child of German-Polish Jews living in Łódź in the 1930s and ‘40s, Jurek Becker sustained losses—of his mother, of his childhood, and of his memories of that time period—that haunted him long into adulthood. A short autobiographical text that he wrote a few months before his death from cancer in 1997, sent in the form of a postcard to his friend Joachim Sartorius, employs a kind of ellipsis, interestingly unmarked by any typographical symbols, that stands in for those losses. What Becker does not write in his postcard text is as important as what he does write. This essay sheds light on the way in which the gaps in Becker’s text serve as the actual communicators of its theme, expands upon Robyn Warhol’s categories of the “unnarratable,” and explores what Becker’s text might tell us about the concept of the unnarrated in general

Video Art: Cultural Transformations

In the 1960s, there were efforts to move broadcast television in the direction of the experimental video art by altering television\u27s conventional format. Fred Barzyk, in his role as a producer and director at WGBH-TV in Boston, was uniquely positioned to act as a link between television and experimental video artists who normally would not have had access to the technology available at a major broadcast facility. As the leading innovator in the beginnings of video art, the Korean American Nam June Paik (1932-2006) deserves special mention. His work bridges the worlds of art, video technology, and television. The video works of Nan June Paik, Amy Greenfield, Peter Campus, Feng Meng Bo, Elizabeth Sussman and other video artists are considered in this essay as key contributors to the development of video art. The selection is based on my experience with the artists cited. Despite video art\u27s growing popularity among contemporary artists in the 1970s and beyond, the museums were slow to acknowledge this development. One of the problems was deciding where, among the existing museum collections, to locate video art. In its 50 some years of history, video art has enjoyed a remarkable success in its artistic innovations while undergoing changes in formats virtually at the speed of rapid advances in electronic visual technology. Ironically, the legacy of creative television set in motion by Barzyk and his generation has been largely coopted by the television broadcasting industry, which mainly serves as a platform for mass media advertising

Vanishing Acts: Creative Women in Spain and the United States

This exploratory cross-cultural study examines the experiences of women in advertising creative departments in Spain and the United States. The study, an exploration of the creative environment and its impact on female creatives, is framed by Hofstede’s dimensional model of national culture (Hofstede 2001; de Mooij & Hofstede 2010) and signalling theory (Spence 1974). Interviews with 35 top female creatives suggest that the challenges women face are rooted in the ‘fraternity culture’ or ‘territorio de chicos’ of creative departments in both countries. The data further suggest that the gender-bound cultural environment of advertising creative departments may be a global phenomenon, one that may adversely affect the creative process and impact women’s upward mobility

STEREOTYPES OF AFRICAN-AMERICANS REPRESENTED IN LOS SANTOS MISSIONS OF GTA: SAN ANDREAS

“GTA: San Andreas” is an action adventure video game developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Game. The game’s main storyline represents racial issues in the United States especially the African-American stereotypes. The purpose of this study is to analyze the gameplay, storyline, and cutscene of the game. The study uses ergodic, textual, and contextual theories to analyze the data and library research to compile the data. Library research is used to get literary and stereotype theories. There are five stereotypes showed in this game, namely, African-Americans have savage behaviour; African-Americans are poor people who live in ghettos; African-Americans tend to love hip-hop as well as raps music;African-Americans use ebonic language; and African-American males love to wear saggy pants or baggy clothes

Playing in the Camps: Performative Practices in the Migrant Camps of Southern Italy

The article addresses the role of performative practices in the informal camps and shantytowns in southern Italy, where many sub-Saharan migrants live. In these settlements, creation and performative expressions take various forms: an organic and unplanned one, which gives shape to multiple improvised languages; one supported, sustained, and often directed and managed by associations; and finally, one produced by non-migrant artists who see the camps as a challenging field of research to situate their works. These three forms (of/with/on) bring several critical issues concerning the role played by migrants, the dynamics of appropriation and agency, and the power relations with local associations, professional artists, and political activists, which intersect in complex ways. The article addresses these different artistic experiences, considering strategies of self-representation, artistic legitimacy, and authorship. Finally, it analyses how performative practices become a primary political tool for facing spatial segregation and racial discrimination

The existence of Roma in youth justice discourses

Critical scholars have repeatedly emphasised the importance of how various categories become constructed. This paper discusses the ‘existence’ of ‘the other’ in youth justice discourses. Drawing on qualitative analysis of police, prosecution, youth court and social services discourses, this paper discusses the positioning of migrant youths, referred to youth court on suspicion of having committed an offence. The talk particularly focuses on Czech and Slovak Roma in two legal departments in Belgium. I discuss in what types of cases and discourses the case of Roma (i.e. references to ethnicity and popular images of the ‘Roma culture’) exists and in what instances it seizes to exist. Particular attention is directed to the constitutions, circularity and contexts of ethnicising discourses throughout youth justice trajectories, as well as their performative nature

Images, forms and presence outside and beyond the pink ghetto.

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to consider entrepreneurial imagery that sheds light on differing and emerging patterns of female entrepreneurial identity which illustrate shifts in the locus of power that challenge masculine hegemony and power structures. As a concept, power has an image component, and shifts in power are often conveyed by subtle changes in the cultural semiotic. Globally, images of female-entrepreneurship are socially constructed using stereotypes which are often pejorative. The semiotics of gendered identity as a complex issue is difficult to measure, assess and understand. Gender has its own semiotic codes, and, universally, images of female-entrepreneurship are socially constructed using pejorative stereotypes. Entrepreneurial imagery can shed light on differing and emerging patterns of female-entrepreneurial identity illustrating shifts in the locus of power that challenge masculine hegemony and power structures. Artefacts, images and semiotics construct alternative gendered social constructs of the entrepreneur to the heroic alpha-male. The imagery associated with the female-entrepreneur is either said to be invisible, or associated with 'Pinkness' and the 'Pink Ghetto'. Therefore, images, forms and presence associated with gendered entrepreneurial identities have been explored. Design/methodology/approach – One hundred images of female-entrepreneurship were analysed semiotically using photo-montage techniques to identify common stereotypical representations, archetypes and themes. The resultant conceptual typology highlights the existence of near universal, archetypal gendered entrepreneurial stereotypes including the Business Woman; the Matriarch; the Diva; and the Pink-Ghetto Girl. Findings – Although the results are subjective and open to interpretation, they illustrate that the contemporary female-entrepreneur, unlike their male counterparts, is not forced to adopt the persona of the 'conforming non-conformist' because they have more options available to them to construct an entrepreneurial identity. Research limitations/implications – This study extends research into entrepreneurial identity by considering visual imagery associated with socially constructed stereotypes. In looking beyond images associated with the 'Pink-Ghetto' the author challenges stereotypical representations of the appearance of female-entrepreneurs, what they look like and how they are perceived. Originality/value – This study widens knowledge about entrepreneurship as a socio-economic phenomenon via images forming part of enterprising identity, a physical manifestation of nebulas phenomena acting as 'visual metaphors' shaping expected constructs