511 research outputs found
Observatory's linguistic landscape: semiotic appropriation and the reinvention of space
Using a longitudinal ethnographic study of the linguistic landscape (LL) in
Observatory's business corridor of Lower Main Road, the paper explores changes
brought about by the influx of immigrant Africans, their artefacts and language
practices. The paper uses the changes in the LL over time and the development of an
"African Corner" within Lower Main Road, to illustrate the appropriation of space and
the unpredictability, which comes along with highly mobile, technological and
multicultural citizens. It is argued that changes in the LL are part of the act of claiming
and appropriating space wherein space becomes summarily recontexualized and hence
reinvented and "owned" by new actors. It is also argued that space ownership can be
concealed through what we have called "brand anonymity" strategies in which the
identity of the owner is deliberately concealed behind global brands. We conclude that
space is pliable and mobile, and that, it is the people within space who carve out new
social practices in their appropriated space.IBS
Avatars of Eurocentrism in the critique of the liberal peace
Recent scholarly critiques of the so-called liberal peace raise important political and ethical challenges to practices of postwar intervention in the global South. However, their conceptual and analytic approaches have tended to reproduce rather than challenge the intellectual Eurocentrism underpinning the liberal peace. Eurocentric features of the critiques include the methodological bypassing of target subjects in research, the analytic bypassing of subjects through frameworks of governmentality, the assumed ontological split between the âliberalâ and the âlocalâ, and a nostalgia for the liberal subject and the liberal social contract as alternative bases for politics. These collectively produce a âparadox of liberalismâ that sees the liberal peace as oppressive but also the only true source of emancipation. However, the article suggests that a repoliticization of colonial difference offers an alternative âdecolonizingâ approach to critical analysis through repositioning the analytic gaze. Three alternative research strategies for critical analysis are briefly developed
From the production of rules to seed production: Global Intellectual Property and local knowledge
Living between languages: The politics of translation in Leila Aboulelaâs Minaret and Xiaolu Guoâs A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers
This is the author's final draft post-refereeing as published in The Journal of Commonwealth Literature 2012 47: 207 DOI:10.1177/0021989412440433. The online version of this article can be found at: http://jcl.sagepub.com/content/47/2/20
Rethinking Radical Democracy
Over the course of three decades, vocabularies of radical democracy have pressed their stamp on democratic thought. Trading on the intuition that there is more to democracy than elections, they have generated critical insights into the important role that practices of pluralisation and critique play in bettering institutional politics. As a result, few would today deny the radical democratic contribution to democratic thought. What many might question, however, is its continuing traction. The paper probes this question, focusing on the nuanced place of democracy in contemporary radical work. It grapples with the difficulties that this poses for radical democrats and it suggests that a way of overcoming these difficulties â that threaten to undermine the coherence of radical democracy â is to rethink and reconstruct the distinctiveness of its vocabulary. The paper attempts such a reconstruction. It develops the idea of the promissory rule of the many and it discusses the ways it rejuvenates broader democratic thought
Bridging the gap to those who lack: intercultural education in the light of modernity and the shadow of coloniality
Anthropocene and "development" : intertwined trajectories since the beginning of the Great Acceleration = Antropoceno e "desenvolvimento" : trajetórias entrelaçadas desde o começo da Grande Aceleração
Objectives: We aim to propose the thesis that the trajectories of the Anthropocene and the current mainstream understandings of development are intertwined from the beginning. It means that the Anthropocene and the âdevelopmentâ are coetaneous: the implementation of development policies for the so-considered underdeveloped regions started to happen at the same time of what is known as The Great Acceleration of production, consumption and environmental degradation in a global level. Method: In this conceptual paper, we adopt a decolonial critique as an analytical lens and argue that different geopolitical positions may be necessary for approaching the issue of the Anthropocene from epistemological reflections that can include the cultural and political context of the production and reproduction of local knowledge. Results: Our theoretical argumentation sheds light on the role of Global North and South relations in shaping the environmental crisis. Latin America (LA) exemplifies the modus operandi of the intertwinement of the practical effects of development policies and the environmental consequences underlying the Anthropocene, in which natural resources are over-explored to satisfy export-oriented trade, from the South toward the North. LA is not only a propitious context to show the validity of our thesis, but also the source of alternatives to such developmental model. Conclusion: The emphasis on development as a cause of the Anthropocene supports The Great Acceleration thesis. The proposition of the name Developmentocene comes from the thesis that development and Anthropocene are coetaneous, the intertwinement of both resulting in the very definition of the new epoch.Objetivo: Buscamos propor a tese de que as trajetĂłrias do Antropoceno e o entendimento atualmente dominante sobre desenvolvimento estĂŁo entrelaçadas desde o começo. Isso implica que o Antropoceno e o âdesenvolvimentoâ sĂŁo coetĂąneos: a implementação de polĂticas de desenvolvimento em regiĂ”es tidas como subdesenvolvidas começou a acontecer ao mesmo tempo em que teve inĂcio A Grande Aceleração da produção, do consumo e da degradação ambiental em nĂvel global. MĂ©todo: Neste artigo conceitual, nĂłs adotamos a crĂtica decolonial como lente analĂtica e argumentamos a necessidade de diferentes posiçÔes geopolĂticas para abordar a questĂŁo do Antropoceno a partir de reflexĂ”es epistemolĂłgicas que possam incluir o contexto cultural e polĂtico de produção e reprodução do conhecimento. Resultados: Nossa argumentação teĂłrica enaltece as relaçÔes entre o Norte e o Sul Global no delineamento da crise ambiental. A AmĂ©rica Latina (AL) exemplifica o modus operandi do entrelaçamento entre os efeitos prĂĄticos das polĂticas de desenvolvimento e as consequĂȘncias ambientais subjacentes ao Antropoceno, em que os recursos naturais sĂŁo explorados alĂ©m dos limites para satisfazer o comĂ©rcio para exportaçÔes, desde o Sul para o Norte. Nesse quadro, a AL nĂŁo Ă© apenas um contexto propĂcio para mostrar a validade da nossa tese, mas tambĂ©m a fonte de alternativas a esse modelo de desenvolvimento. ConclusĂŁo: A ĂȘnfase no desenvolvimento como causa do Antropoceno apoia a tese da Grande Aceleração. A proposição do nome Desenvolvimentoceno advĂ©m da tese de que o desenvolvimento e o Antropoceno sĂŁo coetĂąneos e que o entrelaçamento de ambos resulta na prĂłpria definição da nova Ă©poca
The Football Supporter in a Cosmopolitan Epoch
Arguably, the later process of globalization served to reshape how socializations are fostered and maintained across time and space. Additionally, in the last fifteen years a new phenomenon that reinvigorated time and space compression has emerged: social media. Moreover, it is argued that the conjunction of those processes can be seen as taking place on a distinct Age - the Anthropocene or the cosmopolitan epoch. Arguably those processes have the capacity to alter the way individuals enact their football fandom In this light, this paper seeks to conceptualize one particular football support identity that takes into account this fragmented period. Based on an 18-month ethnographic research with supporters of one English Premier League, this paper conceptualizes the football fan in the Anthropocene as the cosmopolitan flĂąneur. I conclude by pointing out to some prospective avenues for future research based on a cosmopolitan imagination
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