Cultural Studies: Not Drowning but Waving?

A review of:Gilbert B. RodmanWhy Cultural Studies?Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester and Malden, MA, 2015ISBN 9781405127974 RRP AU$44.95 (pb

Men Who Surf

As a surfer, I experience and participate with countless rituals, myths, legends, laws, body modifications, feelings and ideas. Riding a wave is more than an act. To ‘become-surfer’ is to undergo a complex lived experience of surging relations. My analysis of surfing in this article shows how male bodies surf with tidal flows of relations. That is, how they reckon with varying, confusing, and moving experiences. I want to provide a mapping of male surfing bodies whereby fibreglass meshes with flesh, wax, fear, excitement, economics, sweat, politics, erotica and representations. I map masculinity fuelled by feelings of moving, relational and paddling bodies

Get out in front!: an evaluation of a media workshop for young elite sportswomen

Research into sport and gender in Australia has suggested that teenage girls are still under-represented in sport and physical activity when compared to boys of similar age groups. Sports such as football and cricket dominate media coverage (and sponsorship interest) and remain male-dominated. While there has been increasing opportunity for young girls to participate in mixed and non-traditional sports, the perception of these sports as predominantly a masculine pursuit at pre-elite and elite levels affects assumptions about adolescent girls’ competency and interest in sporting participation. This article is about how young elite sportswomen view the fact that women’s sports continue to struggle for recognition and coverage in newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations. This type of representation impacts on women’s sports credibility

Get out in front!: an evaluation of a media workshop for young elite sportswomen

Research into sport and gender in Australia has suggested that teenage girls are still under-represented in sport and physical activity when compared to boys of similar age groups. Sports such as football and cricket dominate media coverage (and sponsorship interest) and remain male-dominated. While there has been increasing opportunity for young girls to participate in mixed and non-traditional sports, the perception of these sports as predominantly a masculine pursuit at pre-elite and elite levels affects assumptions about adolescent girls’ competency and interest in sporting participation. This article is about how young elite sportswomen view the fact that women’s sports continue to struggle for recognition and coverage in newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations. This type of representation impacts on women’s sports credibility

Introduction: doing rural cultural studies

The guest editors of the Rural Cultural Studies section introduce the articles

Young people, social media, social network sites and sexual health communication in Australia: ‘this is funny, you should watch it

Social media and social network sites (SNS) are an evolving area for sexual health communication with young people. They present opportunities and challenges for sexual health professionals and young people alike, such as learning through interactivity and addressing concerns about privacy. In this article, we present and discuss the findings from six rural and urban focus groups with young people in Australia about the use of social media and SNS for sexual health communication. We discuss a number of issues related to the use of social media and SNS for sexual health communication, such as concerns about bullying, privacy, and the stigma attached to sexual health

A Rubbish Idea: The material dump, and casting trash talk in a new light

Inspired by the trash-art creations of artists such as Tim Noble and Sue Webster, this creative article-assemblage was gathered together over several months by the UNNC Litter Lovers collective. The aleatoric article attempts to provocatively explore alternative ways of thinking about (or with) trash, modern life and recycling. The article is formed by found, chanced upon, and recycled fragments of used cultural material, at times united by original-organic discussions and catalytic ideas, but ultimately demands the intellectual light of the reader to cast the concepts into relief. The collective utilises form and content to generate new ways of seeing and thinking about waste and rubbish, and like the actual trash heaps and trash-art that inspired this work, they attempt to show how matter itself and (used) material is not inert and passive but rather vibrant, expressive and alive: boasting productive powers and forces capable of bringing about unforeseen reactions and new forms of synthesis. The article is designed to ignite new processes within, between, across and ‘below’ the chaotically assembled fragments. The piece is in part motivated by a drive to ethically recycle in an inspiring and creative way, and be part of new things emerging out of the old. This alternative intellectual happening is also in part designed to help people ‘clean’ their collective conscience and learn to 'love rubbish.' We hope that this is in part achieved by de-centering the human, and foregrounding a polysemous concept of the material dump that forces readers to reinterrogate everyday (non-thought) notions of waste, nature, (human) resources, thought and art.Additional co-author: the UNNC Litter Lovers (a creative academic collective

Transmedial projects, scholarly habitus, and critical know-how in a British university in China

‘Transmedial’ education programs are still in their infancy, and what conceptual shifts they require to function and whether they aid in learning and teaching continues to be up for debate. This article evaluates employing a ‘transmedial project’ assessment and incorporating ‘transmedia pedagogies’ to assist students to become creators of knowledge within the cultural milieu of a British University situated in Mainland China. The ‘Transmedial Projects’ are inspired by Transmedia Storytelling, which media scholar Henry Jenkins defines as “the unfolding of stories across multiple media platforms, with each medium making distinctive contributions to our understanding of the world” (2006, 293). This article primarily interrogates group discussions among teaching staff, which draw on participant observation notes (gathered between 2014 - 2016). Student Evaluation of Modules (SEM) and Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET) commentary also inform the discussion, as do two focus groups with students. We will also discuss the culturally-specific ‘scholarly habitus’ and move towards ‘critical know-how’ which were the conceptual starting points that inform the transmedial approach which we employed. We subsequently explore a number of issues and benefits which we felt arose from our implementation of this transmedial approach. For example, while some students ‘reverse-engineered’ projects to fit taught theories and perpetuate a tradition of teacher-led training, there was also the emergence of more autonomous learning accomplished by ‘thinking through making’

A Rubbish Idea: The material dump, and casting trash talk in a new light

Inspired by the trash-art creations of artists such as Tim Noble and Sue Webster, this creative article-assemblage was gathered together over several months by the UNNC Litter Lovers collective. The aleatoric article attempts to provocatively explore alternative ways of thinking about (or with) trash, modern life and recycling. The article is formed by found, chanced upon, and recycled fragments of used cultural material, at times united by original-organic discussions and catalytic ideas, but ultimately demands the intellectual light of the reader to cast the concepts into relief. The collective utilises form and content to generate new ways of seeing and thinking about waste and rubbish, and like the actual trash heaps and trash-art that inspired this work, they attempt to show how matter itself and (used) material is not inert and passive but rather vibrant, expressive and alive: boasting productive powers and forces capable of bringing about unforeseen reactions and new forms of synthesis. The article is designed to ignite new processes within, between, across and ‘below’ the chaotically assembled fragments. The piece is in part motivated by a drive to ethically recycle in an inspiring and creative way, and be part of new things emerging out of the old. This alternative intellectual happening is also in part designed to help people ‘clean’ their collective conscience and learn to 'love rubbish.' We hope that this is in part achieved by de-centering the human, and foregrounding a polysemous concept of the material dump that forces readers to reinterrogate everyday (non-thought) notions of waste, nature, (human) resources, thought and art