On Narrative: An Interview with Roland Barthes

his article presents a dialogue between Roland Barthes and Paolo Fabbri, which took place on 18 December 1965 in Florence, Italy. Barthes offers an engaging account of his structuralist approach to narrative, as was later published in essay form, ‘Introduction to the Structural Analysis of Narrative’, included in a special issue of Communications (Issue 8, 1966). In a cordial exchange with Fabbri, Barthes provides a more candid presentation of method than found in print, along with critical reflection of the underlying importance of the structuralist approach, as perceived at the time. The interview took place as part of a small conference on narrativity. Participants included Algirdas Julien Greimas, Claude Bremond, Umberto Eco, Jules Gritti, Violette Morin, Christian Metz, and Tzvetan Todorov. Subsequently, a number of these participants contributed articles to the same issue of Communications, on the structural analysis of narrative

Neutral Life: Roland Barthes' late work

As the introduction and lead article for a special section of Theory, Culture & Society, ‘Neutral Life: Critical Reflections on the Late Writings of Roland Barthes’, this article offers an overview of the ‘new’ Barthes that emerges from the late writings and recent ‘Barthes Studies’. The account centres upon the posthumous publication of Barthes’ three key lecture courses delivered at the Collège de France, at the end of 1970s, which reflect his preoccupation with the everyday, yet reveal a new degree of sophistication, both formal and conceptual. Presented in their original note form, the lectures present perhaps the clearest (if incomplete) affirmative project of Barthes’ entire career. The Neutral in particular is pivotal in understanding an ethics of the late works. While Barthes is perhaps most cited for his rumination on the temporality of the photograph, the lecture courses give rise to an ethics of space and distance, rather than of time and telos. Crucially, for Barthes, the Neutral is not neutrality; it is not divestment, but ‘an ardent, burning activity’. In establishing Barthes’ ethics of a Neutral Life, the articles closes – with reference to Derrida’s mourning of Barthes – with a reminder to read Barthes again, or rather a reminder of our current postponed reading of him

The art of Paolo Cirio: exposing new myths of big data structures

This article examines the work of Internet activist and artist Paolo Cirio, whose practice intersects with matters of copyright, privacy, transparency, and corporate finance. His project Loophole for All, for example, exposes the practice of tax evasion in the Cayman Islands by counterfeiting Certificate of Incorporation documents. An important aspect of Cirio’s work is how he names himself in the process. Placed within our contemporary ‘data turn’, his work is framed critically in this article in terms of a ‘new structuralist’ account of culture and society. The article attends to the view that power increasingly comes through the algorithm, but argues we risk reifying so-called generative rules, which may simply be algorithms out of sight. Cirio’s art practice helps focus on what it means to make a critique of contemporary and ubiquitous algorithm structures. As part of which, the article considers how ‘anonymity’ underlines subversive art practices of the twentieth century and contemporary protest groups, but which arguably undermines attempts to affect change

Image critique and the fall of the Berlin Wall

Although we are now accustomed to watching history unfold live on the air, the fall of the Berlin Wall was one of the first instances when history was produced on television. Inspired by the Wall and its powerful resonances, Sunil Manghani’s breakthrough study presents the new critical concept of “image critique,” a method of critiquing images while simultaneously using them as a means to engage with contemporary culture. Manghani examines current debates surrounding visual culture, ranging from such topics as Francis Fukuyama’s end of history thesis to metapictures and East German film. The resulting volume is an exhilarating interweaving of history, politics, and visual cultur

Image Studies: Theory and Practice

In order to better understand images and visual culture the book seeks to bridge between theory and practice; asking the reader to think critically about images and image practices, but also simultaneously to make images and engage with image-makers and image-making processes. Looking across a range of domains and disciplines, we find the image is never a single, static thing. Rather, the image can be a concept, an object, a picture, or medium – and all these things combined. At the heart of this book is the idea of an ‘ecology of images’, through which we can examine the full ‘life’ of an image – to understand how an image resonates within a complex set of contexts, processes and uses.Part 1 covers theoretical perspectives on the image, supplemented with practical entries on making, researching and writing with images.Part 2 explores specific image practices and cultures, with chapters on drawing and painting; photography; visual culture; scientific imaging; and informational images.A wide range of illustrations complement the text throughout and each chapter includes creative tasks, keywords (linked to an online resource), summaries and suggested further reading. In addition, each of the main chapters include selected readings by notable authors across a range of subject areas, including: Art History, Business, Cognitive Science, Communication Studies, Infographics, Neuroscience, Photography, Physics, Science Studies, Social Semiotics, Statistics, and Visual Culture

Practice PhD Toolkit

This article provides an account of the practice PhD in art and the nature of the debates surrounding its development and status. Primarily, the article is aimed at prospective and current PhD candidates (as well as supervisors), offering a critical approach to shaping and championing practice research. In helping to define the practice PhD, the article distinguishes between projects and practice and provides a reference to key debates. A catalogue of articles from Journal of Visual Art Practice is included in an appendix as part of wider encouragement for candidates to be critically informed about practice research and to help develop a literature review. The article ends with 8 practical steps for pursuing the practice PhD

Love messaging: mobile phone txting seen through the lens of tanka poetry

The article examines the nature of mobile phone text messaging, or 'txting', in the context of a discourse of love. It draws links between the txt message and the much older, revered form of love messaging, Japanese tanka poetry. In cutting across both a historical and technological divide, it seeks to elucidate a more subtle understanding of how text messaging — from a literary perspective — plays its part in amorous exchange and argues how it has the capacity to enable individuals to affirm their own private thoughts, feelings and anxieties. Taking a cue from Michel Foucault's late work, concerned with the philosophical precept of 'care of the self', the article argues that these differing forms of exchange — as 'tender' technologies of the self and inter-subjectivity — go beyond any one medium or age of media. Aspects of our relationships are worked out in the silent confines of being alone with text and, in the case today, with text messaging, making for the potential of a new poetics of time and space. While we cannot free ourselves from the lover's code or discourse, there is the potential for an affirmation of our part in its production, which prompts a question about how we might go on to research the currently missing archive of text messaging