This qualitative research explores how social relations and intersections of popular culture, technology, and gender present in performance DJing. The methods used were interviews with performing disc jockeys, observations at various bars, and live music venues. Interviews include both women and men from varying ages and racial/ethnic groups. Cultural studies/popular culture approaches are utilized as the theoretical framework, with the aid of concepts including resistance, hegemony, power, and subcultures. Results show difference of DJ preference between analog and digital formats. Gender differences are evident in performing DJ's experiences on and off the field due to patriarchy in the DJ scene.
What Makes That Black? The African-American Aesthetic identifies and defines seventy-four elements of the aesthetic through text and illustration. Using the magnificent camerawork of R.J. Muna, Sharen Bradford, Jae Man Joo, Rachel Neville, James Barry Knox, and more- as they point their cameras at Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Complexions Contemporary Ballet, and jazz artists such as Cécile McLorin Salvant and Wynton Marsalis- a specific artistic consciousness or sensibility visually unfolds. Luana even joins the camera crew as she shoots Oakland Street Graffiti--Backcover.
Hollywood makes the most widely successful pleasure-giving artworks the world has ever known. The industry operates under the assumption that pleasurable aesthetic experiences, among huge populations, translate into box office success. With that goal in mind, Hollywood has systematized the delivery of aesthetic pleasure, packaging and selling it on a massive scale. In Hollywood Aesthetic, Todd Berliner accounts for the chief attraction of Hollywood cinema worldwide: its entertainment value. The book examines films such as City Lights and Goodfellas that have earned aesthetic appreciation from both fans and critics. But it also studies some curious outliers, cult films, and celebrated Hollywood experiments, such as The Killing and Starship Troopers. And it demonstrates that even ordinary popular films, from Tarzan and His Mate to Rocky III, as well as action blockbusters, like Die Hard and The Dark Knight, offer aesthetic pleasure to mass audiences. Hollywood Aesthetic explains how Hollywood engages viewers by satisfying their aesthetic desires. Visit the companion website at www.oup.com/us/hollywoodaesthetic
This book presents selected papers from the 10th International Conference on Information Science and Applications (ICISA 2019), held on December 16–18, 2019, in Seoul, Korea, and provides a snapshot of the latest issues regarding technical convergence and convergences of security technologies. It explores how information science is at the core of most current research as well as industrial and commercial activities. The respective chapters cover a broad range of topics, including ubiquitous computing, networks and information systems, multimedia and visualization, middleware and operating systems, security and privacy, data mining and artificial intelligence, software engineering and web technology, as well as applications and problems related to technology convergence, which are reviewed and illustrated with the aid of case studies. Researchers in academia, industry, and at institutes focusing on information science and technology will gain a deeper understanding of the current state of the art in information strategies and technologies for convergence security.
This book argues that 3D films are becoming more sophisticated in utilising stereoscopic effects for storytelling purposes. Since Avatar (2009), we have seen a 3D revival marked by its integration with new digital technologies. With this book, the author goes beyond exploring 3D’s spectacular graphics and considers how 3D can be used to enhance visual storytelling. The chapters include visual comparisons between 2D and 3D to highlight their respective narrative features; an examination of the narrative tropes and techniques used by contemporary 3D filmmakers; and a discussion of the narrative implications brought by the coexistence of flatness and depth in 3D visuality. In demonstrating 3D cinematic aesthetics and storytelling, Yong Liu analyses popular films such as Hugo (2011), Life of Pi (2012), Gravity (2013), Star Trek Into Darkness (2013, and The Great Gatsby (2013). The book is an investigation into contemporary forms of stereoscopic storytelling derived from a unique, long-existing mode of cinematic illusions.
How do theatre lighting designers decide what is 'the right light' for each moment of a production? What informs their choices? Why does the audience respond more strongly when the lighting feels 'right'? By interviewing 19 prominent lighting designers and weaving their insights through his own narrative, Nick Moran aims to answer such questions. This book considers practice across different types of theatre, including opera, dance, musicals and drama. Rather than being a technical manual, it allows lighting designers to contribute contrasting and complementary ideas about how to approach lighting design. Moran argues that the best stage lighting is made with emotion, passion and soul, by creative artists willing to take risks. Includes interviews with: Neil Austin – Lucy Carter – Jon Clark – Natasha Chivers – Paule Constable – James Farncombe – Rick Fisher – Mark Henderson – David Howe – Michael Hulls – Mark Jonathan – Peter Mumford – Ben Ormerod – Bruno Poet – Paul Pyant – Nick Richings – Johanna Town – Hugh Vanstone – Katharine Williams.
Covers the key concepts, arguments, problems and figures in aesthetics and the philosophy of artThis introduction to aesthetics provides a layered treatment of both the historical background and contemporary debates in aesthetics. Extensive cross-referencing shows how issues in aesthetics intersect with other branches of philosophy and other fields that study the arts. Aesthetics A-Z is an ideal guide for newcomers to the field of aesthetics and a useful reference for more advanced students of philosophy, art history, media studies and the performing arts.
Evolutionary aesthetics is the attempt to understand the aesthetic judgement of human beings and their spontaneous distinction between "beauty" and "ugliness" as a biologically adapted ability to make important decisions in life. The hypothesis is - both in the area of "natural beauty" and in sexuality, with regard to landscape preferences, but also in the area of "artificial beauty" (i.e. in art and design) - that beauty opens up fitness opportunities, while ugliness holds fitness risks. In this book, this adaptive view of aesthetics is developed theoretically, presented on the basis of numerous examples, and its consequences for evolutionary anthropology are illuminated.
With its pessimistic vision and bleak message of world-denial, it has often been difficult to know how to engage with Schopenhauer's philosophy. Schopenhauer's arguments have seemed flawed and his doctrines marred by inconsistencies; his very pessimism almost too flamboyant to be believable. Yet a way of redrawing this engagement stands open, Sophia Vasalou argues, if we attend more closely to the visionary power of Schopenhauer's work. The aim of this book is to place the aesthetic character of Schopenhauer's standpoint at the heart of the way we read his philosophy and the way we answer the question: why read Schopenhauer - and how? Approaching his philosophy as an enactment of the sublime with a longer history in the ancient philosophical tradition, Vasalou provides a fresh way of assessing Schopenhauer's relevance in critical terms. This book will be valuable for students and scholars with an interest in post-Kantian philosophy and ancient ethics.
Finalist for the 2020 National Book Critics’ Circle Award for Criticism By one of Mexico's greatest contemporary writers, this investigation into state violence and mourning gives voice to the political experience of collective pain. Grieving is a hybrid collection of short crónicas, journalism, and personal essays on systemic violence in contemporary Mexico and along the US-Mexico border. Drawing together literary theory and historical analysis, she outlines how neoliberalism, corruption, and drug trafficking—culminating in the misnamed “war on drugs”—has shaped her country. Working from and against this political context, Cristina Rivera Garza posits that collective grief is an act of resistance against state violence, and that writing is a powerful mode of seeking social justice and embodying resilience. She states: “As we write, as we work with language—the humblest and most powerful force available to us—we activate the potential of words, phrases, sentences. Writing as we grieve, grieving as we write: a practice able to create refuge from the open. Writing with others. Grieving like someone who takes refuge from the open. Grieving, which is always a radically different mode of writing.” “A lucid, poignant collection of essays and poetry. . . . deeply hopeful, ultimately love letters to writing itself, and to the power of language to overcome the silence that impunity imposes.” —New York Times Book Review "For all the losses tallied, the pieces are imbued with optimism and an activist’s passion for reshaping the world." —The New Yorker
