Popular Culture and the Austerity Myth
Popular Culture and the Austerity Myth

Author: Pete Bennett

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-10-14

Total Pages: 355

ISBN-13: 1317374258

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Contemporary popular culture is engaged in a rich and multi-levelled set of representational relations with austerity. This volume seeks to explore these relations, to ask: how does popular culture give expression to austerity; how are its effects conveyed; how do texts reproduce and expose its mythic qualities? It provides a reading of cultural texts in circulation in the present ‘age of austerity’. Through its central focus—popular culture—it considers the impact and influence of austerity across media and textual categories. The collection presents a theoretical deconstruction of popular culture’s reproduction of, and response to, mythical expressions of ‘austerity’ in Western culture, spanning the United Kingdom, North America, Europe and the Middle East and textual events from political media discourse, music, videogames, social media, film, television, journalism, folk art, food, protest movements, slow media and the practice of austerity in everyday life

Popular Culture and the Austerity Myth
Popular Culture and the Austerity Myth

Author: Pete Bennett

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2016-10-14

Total Pages: 254

ISBN-13: 1317374266

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Contemporary popular culture is engaged in a rich and multi-levelled set of representational relations with austerity. This volume seeks to explore these relations, to ask: how does popular culture give expression to austerity; how are its effects conveyed; how do texts reproduce and expose its mythic qualities? It provides a reading of cultural texts in circulation in the present ‘age of austerity’. Through its central focus—popular culture—it considers the impact and influence of austerity across media and textual categories. The collection presents a theoretical deconstruction of popular culture’s reproduction of, and response to, mythical expressions of ‘austerity’ in Western culture, spanning the United Kingdom, North America, Europe and the Middle East and textual events from political media discourse, music, videogames, social media, film, television, journalism, folk art, food, protest movements, slow media and the practice of austerity in everyday life

Shadow Cinema
Shadow Cinema

Author: James Fenwick

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2020-11-12

Total Pages: 281

ISBN-13: 1501351613

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Filmmakers and cinema industries across the globe invest more time, money and creative energy in projects and ideas that never get produced than in the movies that actually make it to the screens. Thousands of projects are abandoned in pre-production, halted, cut short, or even made and never distributed – a “shadow cinema” that exists only in the archives. This collection of essays by leading scholars and researchers opens those archives to draw on a wealth of previously unexamined scripts, correspondence and production material, reconstructing many of the hidden histories of the last hundred years of world cinema. Highlighting the fact that the movies we see are actually the exception to the rule, this study uncovers the myriad reasons why 'failures' occur and considers how understanding those failures can transform the disciplines of film and media history. The first survey of this new area of empirical study across transnational borders, Shadow Cinema is a vital and fascinating demonstration of the importance of the unmade, unseen, and unknown history of cinema.

Matrix Activism
Matrix Activism

Author: Michela Ardizzoni

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-11-03

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 1317265734

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The intersection of virtual and physical spaces at the heart of contemporary political protests is a pivotal element in new practices of activism. In this new and global ecology of dissent and activism, different forces, stakeholders, and spaces, once defiantly discordant, come together to define the increasingly malleable nature and terms of participatory politics and the performance of democracy. This book explores the emerging sites, aesthetics and politics of contemporary dissent as a critical attempt to foreground their mediation and negotiation in an era of neoliberal globalization. Contemporary forms of media activism occupy deeply ambivalent spaces, which Ardizzoni analyzes using the lens of what she calls "matrix activism." Rather than confining the analysis to a single platform, a single technology, or a single social actor, matrix activism allows us to explain the hybrid nature of new forms of dissent and resistance, as they are located at the intersection of alternative and mainstream, non-profit and corporate, individual and social, production and consumption, online and offline.

Spectral Spaces and Hauntings
Spectral Spaces and Hauntings

Author: Christina Lee

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2017-02-17

Total Pages: 220

ISBN-13: 1317515021

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This anthology explores the spatial dimension and politics of haunting. It considers how the ‘appearance’ of absence, emptiness and the imperceptible can indicate an overwhelming presence of something that once was, and still is, (t)here. At its core, the book asks: how and why do certain places haunt us? Drawing from a diversity of mediums, forms and disciplinary approaches, the contributors to Spectral Spaces and Hauntings illustrate the complicated ways absent presences can manifest and be registered. The case studies range from the memory sites of a terrorist attack, the lost home, a vanished mining town and abandoned airports, to the post-apocalyptic wastelands in literary fiction, the photographic and filmic surfaces where spectres materialise, and the body as a site for re-corporealising the disappeared and dead. In ruminating on the afteraffects of spectral spaces on human experience, the anthology importantly foregrounds the ethical and political imperative of engaging with ghosts and following their traces.

The Trauma Graphic Novel
The Trauma Graphic Novel

Author: Andrés Romero-Jódar

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2017-01-06

Total Pages: 190

ISBN-13: 1315296608

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Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- 1 Through Traumatized Eyes: Trauma and Visual Stream-of-Consciousness Techniques in Paul Hornschemeier's Mother, Come Home -- 2 Joe Sacco's Documentary Graphic Novels Palestine and Footnotes in Gaza: The Thin Line Between Trauma and Propaganda -- 3 From "Maus" to MetaMaus: Art Spiegelman's Constellation of Holocaust Textimonies -- 4 Greek Romance, Alternative History, and Political Trauma in Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen -- Conclusion -- Index

Politics, Media and Democracy in Australia
Politics, Media and Democracy in Australia

Author: Brian McNair

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2017-02-10

Total Pages: 255

ISBN-13: 1317675029

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In Australia, as in many comparable democracies, the role of the media in the political process is high on the public agenda. There is a perception of widespread disillusionment with and disengagement from politics amongst voters, and criticism of the media for failing to fulfil their democratic responsibilities adequately. This book evaluates public perceptions of the performance of the political media in the context of the declared aims and objectives of media producers. From there the authors present findings for improving the capacity of political media to engage and inform their audiences in ways which enhance the quality and popular legitimacy of the democratic process. These conclusions are of import not only to Australians, but to observers of mediated politics in the UK, the US and other countries where similar debates around the ‘crisis of public communication’ are on-going.

Tracing the Borders of Spanish Horror Cinema and Television
Tracing the Borders of Spanish Horror Cinema and Television

Author: Jorge Marí

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-04-07

Total Pages: 448

ISBN-13: 1351858505

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This critical anthology sets out to explore the boom that horror cinema and TV productions have experienced in Spain in the past two decades. It uses a range of critical and theoretical perspectives to examine a broad variety of films and filmmakers, such as works by Alejandro Amenábar, Álex de la Iglesia, Pedro Almodóvar, Guillermo del Toro, Juan Antonio Bayona, and Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza. The volume revolves around a set of fundamental questions: What are the causes for this new Spanish horror-mania? What cultural anxieties and desires, ideological motives and practical interests may be behind such boom? Is there anything specifically "Spanish" about the Spanish horror film and TV productions, any distinctive traits different from Hollywood and other European models that may be associated to the particular political, social, economic or cultural circumstances of contemporary Spain?

Affective Sexual Pedagogies in Film and Television
Affective Sexual Pedagogies in Film and Television

Author: Kyra Clarke

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2017-02-17

Total Pages: 262

ISBN-13: 1317310780

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Popular film and television hold valuable potential for learning about sex and sexuality beyond the information-based model of sex education currently in schools. This book argues that the representation of complicated—or "messy"—relationships in these popular cultural forms makes them potent as affective pedagogical moments. It endeavours to develop new sexual literacies by contemplating how pedagogical moments, that is, fleeting moments which disrupt expectations or create discomfort, might enrich the available discourses of sexuality and gender, especially those available to adolescents. In Part One, Clarke critiques the heteronormative discourses of sex education that produce youth in particularly gendered ways, noting that "rationality" is often expected to govern experiences that are embodied and arguably inherently incoherent. Part Two explores public intimacy, contemplating the often overlapping and confused boundaries between public and private.

A Level Media Studies
A Level Media Studies

Author: Pete Bennett

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-07-09

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 1351976982

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A Level Media Studies is a comprehensive guide to the subject content of AS and A Level Media Studies, across all examining boards. It is specifically designed to meet the needs of both students and teachers with an accessible writing style, helpful notes on key theories and theorists and a range of learning exercises. The book’s overall approach is gradual immersion, assuming no prior knowledge of the subject. Starting with an overview of the discipline, the book moves on to develop increasingly sophisticated ideas whilst repeatedly reinforcing the basic principles of media studies. Each component of media studies is illustrated with practical examples and guided exercises that demonstrate the application of theories and concepts. In addition, numerous case studies offer examples of media studies in practice. Working through these examples, students will acquire the skill set and confidence to tackle the analysis of media products and the discussion of media issues to the standard required at A Level. The focus is on contemporary media, but there is also full acknowledgement of historical precedents, as well as the significance of social, cultural, political and economic contexts. With its clear structure and integrative approach, A Level Media Studies is the ideal introductory resource for students and teachers.