Satire and Geopolitics: Vulgarity, Ambiguity and the Body Grotesque in South Park

Humour and laughter have become the subject of recent geopolitical scrutiny. Scholars have explored the affirmative and liberatory possibilities of humour, and the affective bodily dimensions of laughter as tools for transformative action in critical geopolitics. Humour that is vulgar and politically ambiguous is yet to be explored as a potent geopolitical avenue of enquiry. Studies of satire have suggested that rather than contesting entrenched geopolitical beliefs, satirical shows can serve to further divide audiences both amenable and antagonistic to the satire in question. I argue that this should not involve a wholesale rejection of satirical shows, as humour that uses irony, subversion, and other discursive techniques is just one way satirical media becomes an effective commentator on political issues. I examine the show South Park and argue its satire combines bodily and scatological humour with more traditional satirical techniques to produce a comedy that ridicules contemporary issues by reducing complex politics to the most basic and crass condition possible. This is defined in a Bakhtinian sense of the body grotesque, a social inversion through reference to the common bodily functions of all human beings

Opium evil or opium essential? The geopolitics of drug control from 1909-1961

This thesis examines the international narcotics trade from 1909-1961. The focus is on the United States’ role in shaping the international drug machinery at both the League of Nations and United Nations. Its original contribution is threefold. First, it uses critical geopolitical theory to provide a diplomatic history that does not solely rely on the accounts of important diplomats. It expands the focus to include American discourses about narcotics, and how these helped the US develop a geonarcotic subjectivity of a victim of, and warrior against, the opium evil. Second, it supplements this traditional geopolitical analysis with a materialist analysis of the narcotics themselves. It uses assemblage theory to circumvent the problematic conceptualisation of narcotics as either legal or illegal and highlight the capacities of narcotics, specifically their diplomatic uses. Third, it offers an original empirical account of the heretofore unexamined Opium Determination Programme that the United Nations and the US ran from the mid-1940s to 1960s. Finally, it provides a novel methodological way of studying historical, geopolitical objects by focussing on the technical documents that were produced about them. Ultimately, it provides geographers with conceptual and methodological tools that shift the focus from studying high ranking, plenipotentiary delegates to the objects that they try to regulate. By defining objects by their capacities and interactions in assemblages, rather than as legal or illegal commodities, we can appreciate the multiple ways they help or hinder diplomatic progress

Slow Strategies for Student (and staff) engagement.

The past two years have seen an explosion of interest in the Slow Movement as a response to stress and overwork in universities. Many staff are working less and giving themselves appropriate breaks from academic life. Yet the theoretical and practical tactics and ideas for slowing down have not been shared with students, even as students suffer from overwork and employability concerns. At the same time, many universities have sought to engage students through new research-led approaches to teaching. We suggest that student engagement can be defined as the extent to which a student feels they belong to a department and that a department cares about them. We offer two methods of increasing this type of engagement. First, introduce students to the slow movement and second, take seriously the issue of staff engagement. We evaluate our own efforts to foster slow student and staff engagement through a Shut Up and Write sessions adopted by the Geography Department at UCL

Developing a collaborative project on higher education pedagogy: The institutional, organizational, and community identity dimensions of student staff partnerships

This case study presents an ambitious student-staff partnership project at University College London (UCL) to publish a collaborative book on higher education pedagogy. Over two-and-a-half years, a total of 86 students and staff contributed to the project, which sought to provide educators with a new type of scholarly material under the unifying theme of connecting research and teaching. Multiple layers of student-staff partnership were interwoven throughout the project; this case study contextualizes these layers against three dimensions: institutional, organizational, and community identity. Central to the project was our distinctive approach to engaging with Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) and their crucial role in bringing the three dimensions together. As such, the project represents a model of enhanced student-staff partnership that has the capacity to empower students and break down educational silos to form new, multi-specialty learning communities.</jats:p

Introduction to Postgraduate Pedagogies: Centring Graduate Teaching Assistants in Higher Education

Across the United Kingdom (UK) and beyond, Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) are an integral part of universities and a substantial part of the Higher Education workforce. While there is a growing body of scholarship about the role of the GTA, and texts and materials which seek to support them as they carry out their responsibilities, the voice of GTAs themselves is less often heard and there exists no systematic account of their perspectives, experiences and contributions. This open-access journal aims to help fill this gap by bringing to the fore GTA voices and experiences. Based on the firm belief that GTAs bring important and potentially unique skills, ideas and approaches to lecture halls, labs and seminar rooms, it includes contributions from current or recent GTAs, and those working with them. Postgraduate Pedagogies aims to synthesise and analyse, reflect on and assert the unique experiences of GTAs, the contributions they bring to the Higher Education (HE) teaching and learning environment, and the specific challenges they face

Student reviewers of teaching practice: reflections on the design & experience of participants

This case study focuses on the benefits and challenges of students and staff working in partnership to review virtual learning environments as part of a wider review of an academic course. The paper considers how it enables a more rounded view of the course to be gained and how students identified possible enhancements to online sites in their own departments from the experience. Most issues raised by students related to the organization of the sites, with differences between students and staff in both the approach they thought should be taken to this and the importance placed upon it. These different perspectives make dialogue and respect very important in this area of student-staff partnership

Changemakers and change agents: encouraging students as researchers through changemaker’s programmes

This paper examines the role played by a student-organized research conference in the age of research-led teaching and active learning. Drawing on our experiences of organizing two departmental conferences in Geography in March 2016 and March 2017, we begin to outline how institutional support and funding for student-led “Changemakers” projects can not only introduce students to specific aspects of research (in the case of our conference, to disseminating and communicating research findings), but also encourage collaboration and mutual support outside of formal staff-student hierarchies of teaching, learning and marking