THE ENTROPIC EFFECT OF GLOBALIZATION AND THE SUSTAINABILITY CHALLENGE: TOWARDS A BIFURCATION

The entropic effect of globalisation and the challenge of sustainability provide an opportunity for a critical exploration of the interplay between life, order and social change. Drawing on the principles of self-organisation observed in living beings, we delve into the continuous exchange of energy and resources, the general connectedness of all that is alive. Organisms, through their interaction with the environment, renew themselves by dissipating entropy, a process essential to maintaining internal order. Life (physical, biological, psychic or social) is a (dynamic) balance between entropic and neghentropic forces and tends towards greater complexity and organisation. Conversely, when entropy grows and prevails, life moves towards disorganisation, fragmentation, de-differentiation, chaos and death. Human beings are able to extend their reach through technology and socio-political institutions. These exosomatic extensions redefine their relationship with the environment, expanding the possibilities of life. Industrialisation has further catalysed this process, liberating individual desire and increasing productive capacity. As a result, billions of people have witnessed unprecedented improvements in their life possibilities. But all this has greatly increased entropy. To improve neghentropy beyond the individualisation/totalisation model favoured by digitisation, towards true sustainability, a paradigm shift from individualism to interdependence (based on scientific, rather than ethical, evidence) is required. In sum, our exploration reveals how the inherent interconnectedness of life can be a starting point for addressing the unexpected consequences of globalisation, challenging entropy and promoting resilience in the face of new global challenges

Advertising on television : a comparative sociosemiological analysis

The aim of this thesis is to provide an analysis of advertising on television based on a comparative approach to textual contents and structures which attempts to identify some of the ways in which semantic, pragmatic and textual elements interact and exert mutual influence. The main focus is on the way in which advertisements activate specific fields of discourse (the semantic aspect) by engaging the viewer in an interpretive activity (the pragmatic aspect) through specific visual and aural elements (the textual aspect). Preliminary to the analysis is a brief review of some of the philosophical and socio linguistic positions on textual meaning (Part 1). Particular attention is paid to the main contributions to a pragmatically oriented textual analysis, including Halliday's concept of social semiotics, which has been especially useful for the definition of the theoretical framework for the analysis. In Part 2 the issue of the specificity of audio-visual language, as a language that combines different signifying systems (sounds, words, images, and music) is explicitly addressed: one of the aims of the research is indeed to avoid the transference of models of analysis from written or verbal to audiovisual texts, and to devise a method of analysis consistent with the specific character of the object of inquiry. Two main imperative have guided the analysis (Part 3): the need to escape both textual and social determinism, while taking into account the way in which textual elements represent and address specific social situations; and the need to consider the context of advertising discourse, in order to avoid a text-bound approach. For this reason advertisements have been approached within a comparative framework. The main characters of the two broadcasting systems have been also considered (Appendix). The data for the analysis consist of British and Italian advertisements video recorded in peak time from October 1988 to March 1989; the main focus being on car advertisements and on transnational campaigns. The other referential value of advertisements has been emphasized, with p articular regard to the repertoire of social commonplaces (or "topoi") that bear upon textual production and interpretation. The comparative framework is crucial for differentiating social conventions from what in a mere textual perspective may appear as neutral representations. The aim of this thesis is not to exhaust the argument but to develop an original a pp roach to televisual texts which is intended to complement rather than exclude other approaches

Being Humans. The Human Condition in the Age of Techno-Humanism

Cosa significa essere umani nell'era dove una tecnologia pervasiva e sempre più 'incorporata' ha eroso il confine tra natura e cultura? Come le nuove possibilità di potenziamento ridefiniscono l'idea stessa di normalità? Quali implicazioni sul nostro vivere insieme? Come porre, se è il caso, la questione del limite? Quali forme narrative concorrono alla costruzione degli immaginari su questi temi? Nella tradizione della rivista, il monografico affronta questo intreccio di questioni a partire da diverse prospettive e diversi ambiti disciplinari. I contributi sono suddivisi in tre sezioni che riguardano alcuni cambiamenti significativi nella sfera pubblica, la ridefinizione dell'idea di 'normalità' relativamente al corpo, gli immaginari legati al tema del 'potenziamentoTechnological artefacts that only twenty years ago were but evocative objects have now become ordinary presences in our life: from artificial implants to mass cosmetic surgery and body manipulation, from new forms of permanent media interconnection to interaction with artificial intelligences. Hence a number of new crucial questions arise, related to our living together in the age of post-humanism. Nowadays, when technology is no longer a tool, or even just an environment, but is wearable and incorporated, and can act retroactively on the very structure of the organism, what are the main challenges we have to face, and the main narratives for making sense of this new human condition? In the tradition of the journal, this special issue addresses the topic from different theoretical perspectives and disciplinary fields. Contributions are divided in three sections: 1) The post-human condition: living in a brave new world'. The essays in this section embrace different ambits relevant to the public sphere and our life together, such as politics, work, religion, fashion, literature. 2) Bodies in question/questioning bodies: here the main focus is on the redefinition of the ableism-disability relationship (and the resulting problematic redefinition of 'ableism' itself) in the light of the typical post-human question of healing-enhancement. 3) Representations/Imaginaries: here the focus is on the way in which the topos of enhancement has been dealt with by fictional and non fictional texts over time, from early television to cinema up to web series

Intimità, vulnerabilità e giochi di ruolo: immagini dell'individualismo moderno

L'attuale complessità del vissuto (umano ed ecclesiale) impone con urgenza di ripensare l'alterità. L'analisi sociologica caratterizza la nostra epoca, da un lato con i tratti di un esasperato individualismo e di una generalizzata frammentazione sociale, dall'altra lo sguardo ad alcuni fenomeni contemporanei (moda, istinto di imitazione, pulsioni gregarie, affollamenti sportivi, musicali e religiosi) sembra convincere del contrario. La profondità di questi mutamenti sollecita in tal senso a ripensare l'alterità, non solo come l'altro da me, che mi sta di fronte, ma anche come l'altro di me, che è parte costitutiva della mia identità e mi pone inesorabilmente di fronte alla mia radicale incompiutezza. Perché la relazione interpersonale è non solo la dimensione più profonda del mistero di Dio, ma anche dell'uomo creato a sua immagine

Out of the Great Recession: the conditions for prosperity beyond individualism and consumerism

While pursuing its ideal of autonomy and material prosperity, modernity has found in capitalism a strong ally for its project of the greatest happiness of the greatest number. During the last decades, such a project has been extended on a global scale thanks to the alliance of economic neoliberalism and political individualism, which conflated the ideal of the citizen into the reality of the individual consumer. The chapter claims that the crisis can enlighten some serious shortcomings of the socio-anthropological view at the foundation of the modern project. In fact, moving from Arendt’s as well as Simmel’s critical notes on individualism and consumption, it is possible to show that the process of economic expansion through individual liberation on the one hand and the systemic exploitation of desires through consumption on the other hand ended up in a condition of personal discontent and collective inequality, which threatens the very possibility of prosperity and autonomy for many. In conclusion, using Simmel’s and Arendt's criticism and the concept of social generativity, we will tentatively explore a different vision of individual freedom, one that can constitute a more reliable socio-anthropological ground upon which a much-needed new model of growth may be built