Cursed Empires

In this essay the author creates and discusses an interplay of two incommensurable concepts of evil: Hannah Arendt’s radical evil from The Origins of Totalitarianism, and David Lynch’s evil presented artistically as “the bad electricity” in Ronnie Rocket. The first concept is related to Hell which Arendt uses in a few essays and in The Origins... In her opinion the first step towards the pure hell of Auschwitz was made in internment camps for stateless refugees. Giorgio Agamben revisits this idea and shows the link between statelessness and superfluousness. For Arendt the road which started with the inability to solve the refugee problem in Europe ended up in a Hell on Earth created in extermination camps. Agamben believes that spaces of extermination which reappeared on the European continent during the wars in former Yugoslavia demonstrate the grim possibility of recreating Hell in Europe. In his extraordinary script for the unmade film Ronnie Rocket, David Lynch creates a fictional hellhole of a city in which the rulers torture the population with bad electricity. The author discusses these two dramatically different visions of hell in order to show how Arendt’s radical evil when compared to “the bad electricity” can be understood as a production of Hell, and how Lynch’s switching from the bad to good electricity represents a revolutionary change which is simultaneously political and cosmological.

Since the ‘migration crisis’ in 2015 at the latest, the politics of a broadly conceived Central Europe has been marked by conflicts over symbols, values and norms. Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Croatia, Austria, and the Czech Republic have witnessed divisive debates and campaigns over refugee quotas, women’s and gay rights, abortion laws and public monuments. As the term ‘culture wars’ was becoming ubiquitous, it remained ambivalent in its meaning and usage. The aim of this article is to identify a political logic of recent Central European cultural conflicts without leaning solely on the ideological explanation, e.g. the anti-liberal backlash thesis of Rupnik, and Krastev and Holms. By borrowing R. Brubaker’s conceptualizations of identity and populism, the article contends that it is possible to analyze culture wars as a repertoire of a populist political style. To do so, the article develops a critical perspective on culture wars, defined as polarizing conflicts in the arenas of the politics of memory, politics of identity and politics of morality. Culture wars are analyzed as a strategy of re-politicization of memory (especially of World War II), (civilizational) identity and public morality and a code used in struggles for political and cultural hegemony.

It's the weekend – leisure time. It's the interlude when, Guy Debord contends, the proletarian is briefly free of the 'total contempt so clearly built into every aspect of the organization and management of production' in commodity capitalism; when workers are temporarily 'treated like grown-ups, with a great show of solicitude and politeness, in their new role as consumers.' But this patronising show turns out to be another form of subjection to the diktats of 'political economy': 'the totality of human existence falls under the regime of the 'perfected denial of man'.' (30). As Debord suggests, even the creation of leisure time and space is predicated upon a form of contempt: the 'perfected denial' of who we, as living people, really are in the eyes of those who presume the power to legislate our working practices and private identities.

Being Reconciled is a radical and entirely fresh theological treatment of the classic theory of the Gift in the context of divine reconciliation. It reconsiders notions of freedom and exchange in relation to a Christian doctrine which understands Creation, grace and incarnation as heavenly gifts, but the Fall, evil and violence as refusal of those gifts. In a sustained and rigorous response to the works of Derrida, Levinas, Marion, Zizek, Hauerwas and the 'Radical Evil' school, John Milbank posits the daring view that only transmission of the forgiveness offered by the Divine Humanity makes reconciliation possible on earth. Any philosophical understanding of forgiveness and redemption therefore requires theological completion.Both a critique of post-Kantian modernity, and a new theology that engages with issues of language, culture, time, politics and historicity, Being Reconciled insists on the dependency of all human production and understanding on a God who is infinite in both utterance and capacity. Intended as the first in a trilogy of books centred on the gift, this book is an original and vivid new application of a classic theory by a leading international theologian.

African Modernism in America, 1947–1967

Strategic culture literature identifies political and military cultures’ important, enduring influence over an actor’s strategic behaviour. However, it has not provided an understanding of how these factors relate to an actor’s unique social dynamics, and how, in tandem, national identity, political culture and military culture interact during a conflict to influence an actor’s strategic behaviour. To address this gap in the literature, this dissertation examines strategic culture’s influence on Russia’s campaign during the 1994-1996 Russo-Chechen War. Examining strategic behaviour within a conflict requires consideration of the complex influence of multiple variables. Any analysis is potentially distorted when these variables are considered in isolation. To address this matter, this thesis utilizes an original strategic culture model, inspired by Clausewitz’s Trinity of ‘passions’ (national identity), ‘chance’ (military culture) and ‘subordination’ (political culture). The model applies the Trinity’s operating characteristics to generate an understanding of how political, military and social structures interact and impart varying degrees of influence on an actor’s wartime behaviour. The thesis finds that both rational calculations and cultural factors influenced the Russian campaign’s ‘passions’, ‘chance’ and ‘subordination’. Furthermore, many of Russia’s supposedly rational calculations, such as the need to restore legality and maintain territorial integrity, were found to be underpinned by Russian cultural factors. This thesis argues that the post-Soviet transition’s uncertainty and disruption, particularly its impact on the conception of a stable, coherent Russian national identity greatly influenced Russian strategic culture in the First Chechen War. The resulting social upheaval, and fragmentation of nationality created ‘a disconnect’ between the model’s identity, and the political and military culture components. This ambiguous national identity produced dysfunctionality within Russian strategic culture. Without consensus on identity, neither Russian political nor military culture could function properly. As a result, the government failed to mobilise popular support, as it conducted an obsolete information campaign, and relied on an entrenched, but inappropriate, approach to military operations. These findings indicate that developing a more nuanced appreciation of the social, intangible factors that influence an actor’s strategic behaviour complements studies on strategic behaviour’s complexity, and provides a more enhanced, comprehensive understanding of an actor's strategic culture.

Introducing Cultural Politics

Notes on Intellectual Property: Copyright Law

Will to the Original: Platonism in Henry James’ <i>Roderick Hudson</i>

One might hope that philosophy could reconcile us to our social world and each other. To entertain this as plausible is to think there is some perspective one could reach via philosophical enquiry that shows our life and society to be as they are for good reason, allows us to see it all as in some sense rational. Hegel is no doubt the great exponent of this ideal, his system promising to trace history's patterns and conceptual development, while he is so optimistic as to believe that, at its end, we would achieve the perspective whereby every agent's own actions and situation can be made intelligible to themselves and others. This was meant to be true for us the readers, so we would be able to see for ourselves how what we do makes sense, given our circumstances, and is plausibly tending towards a good end. 1 Of course, the problem is that there may not be such a perspective. Perhaps to see the world aright is to recognize it as a jumbled mess, with no progressive tendency towards greater coherence, and no satisfaction to be had in achieving superior insight. Perhaps there is no good end we are collaboratively working towards, no possible reconciliation with each other; maybe we are perpetually on the brink of descending once more into a Hobbesian nightmare. Hegel hoped to reassure us that the existence of that clarificatory perspective is guaranteed; as free agents, once we achieve self-awareness we necessarily mutually recognize one another as engaged in a fundamentally cooperative project tending towards justified ends. 2 But, alas, not all of us have been convinced, and a kind of existential anomie can befall a thoughtful person who surveys our present socio-cultural situation. 3 What if there really just is no excuse for how things are, and no good reason for me to carry on?

Vargas era elites confronted the same basic question faced by other centralizing political regimes—how to shape Brazil beyond the affairs of Rio de Janeiro (and perhaps even beyond the provincial capitals). Daryle Williams shows how cultural policymakers of the Vargas era confronted the core challenges of political and administrative centralization by looking at the newly created Ministry of Education and Health’s initiatives in art, architecture, and historical memory. These included the creation of a program for protecting—in effect federalizing—historical landmarks, including the city of Ouro Preto; the establishment a network of historical museums that often appropriated regional histories and made them “Brazilian”; the promotion a modern and nationalist vision of Brazil at overseas expositions; and the endorsement of modernist art and architecture as an official symbolic language of brasilidade, or Brazilianness.Culture Wars in Brazil draws the reader into an engaging crossroads in Brazilian history where the politics of a centralizing federal government intersected with the ongoing debate among elites about the nature of national culture. The result is an elegant study of both Brazilian culture in a political context and of Vargas regime politics in a cultural context that should satisfy a broad constituency of readers interested in Brazilian history. Williams’s transparent use of sources for cultural history, the clarity of his narrative, the depth of his characterization of the Vargas regime, and his caution in situating the narrative within broader currents of Brazilian history, all suit this book to undergraduate classroom use.Williams shifts the center of gravity for scholarship on the Vargas era by bringing needed recognition to the importance placed by the regime upon the politics of culture. His analysis reveals not only the ways in which Vargas era cultural politics were embedded in long-standing Brazilian debates about nationhood but also the strategies of state managers who sought to locate the regime within a sympathetic—and often elitist—vision of national history and identity. This is not to suggest that Vargas era culture managers sought to crassly legitimate the regime through appeals to the past. Rather, as the regime courted the participation of artists and intellectuals, it became enmeshed in long-standing cultural, intellectual and aesthetic debates over brasilidade.Culture Wars in Brazil shows us how the recently formed Ministry of Education and Health was envisioned as a “Ministry of Culture” by Gustavo Capanema, the third official to hold the portfolio of minister of education (1934– 45). Capanema became a catalyst linking the Vargas regime’s centralizing tendencies and a simmering debate between aesthetic and intellectual modernists and tradi tionalists about the meaning of Brazilian culture. Within this debate, modernists rejected the Brazil’s traditional adherence to European cultural and artistic trends as well as the sentimental embrace of imagery from the Brazilian colonial past. Largely through Capanema’s involvement in the debate, the modernists succeeded in placing their imprimatur on the major symbolic projects of the Vargas regime, from state expositions to official art, architecture, and the preservation of historical landmarks. Despite the modernists’ ascendancy, traditionalists continued to dominate key institutions which were rendered more prominent by the Vargas regime’s considerable support for cultural projects. While Williams acknowledges that figures such as Oscar Niemeyer, Cándido Portinari, and Carlos Drummond de Andrade, among many others, were the emerging winners of the debate over national culture, the real weight of Williams’s analysis lies in his examination of the federal government’s choice to become the debate’s sponsor. As Williams explains, “As the debate continues over the ‘revolutionary’ nature of the Revolution of 1930, it is clear that the Vargas era, and most especially the Estado Novo, stood for a time and place in which the federal government established itself as the center of cultural authority” (p. 259).Culture Wars in Brazil fills a conspicuous gap in the English-language historiography of Brazil and points to other crucial areas of study surrounding the Ministry of Education and the politics of culture in Brazil. These include the Ministry’s mainstay initiatives in establishing a federal role over public health and education, the politics of censorship and the press which the Ministry enjoined, as well as the role of the state in mediating popular culture, from radio, music and carnival to cinema, theater and recreation. Williams’s thorough study of the ministry’s cultural politics will serve as a basic reference for future scholarship on Brazilian cultural history. Culture Wars in Brazil convincingly shows that cultural history is not peripheral to the affairs of state traditionally privileged by historians. To the contrary, state managers of the Vargas era, like their counterparts throughout Brazilian history since the arrival of the French artistic mission in 1813, have been firm in their conviction that national culture, and the definition of brasilidade, were crucial areas of state involvement.

Nach den Bedingungen der Hogrefe OpenMind-Lizenz ist es Ihnen gestattet: – das Werk zu vervielfältigen, zu verbreiten und öffentlich zugänglich zu machen – Abwandlungen bzw. Bearbeitungen des Inhaltes anzufertigen zu den folgenden Bedingungen: – Namensnennung. Sie müssen den Namen des Autors/Rechteinhabers in der von ihm festgelegten Weise nennen – Keine kommerzielle Nutzung. Dieses Werk darf nicht für kommerzielle Zwecke verwendet werden Im Falle einer Verbreitung müssen Sie anderen die Lizenzbedingungen, unter welche dieses Werk fällt, mitteilen. Am Einfachsten ist es, einen Link auf diese Seite einzubinden. Jede der vorgenannten Bedingungen kann aufgehoben werden, sofern Sie die Einwilligung des Rechteinhabers dazu erhalten. Diese Lizenz lässt die Urheberpersönlichkeitsrechte unberührt.

This article considers the discursive continuities between a specifically liberal defence of cultural patrimony, evident in the debate over film colourization, and the culture war critique associated with neo-conservatism. It examines how a rhetoric of nostalgia, linked to particular ideas of authenticity, canonicity and tradition, has been mobilized by the right and the left in attempts to stabilize the configuration and perceived transmission of American cultural identity. While different in scale, colourization and multiculturalism were seen to create respective (postmodern) barbarisms against which defenders of culture, heritage and good taste could unite. I argue that in its defence of the ‘classic’ work of art, together with principles of aesthetic distinction and the value of cultural inheritance, the anti-colourization lobby helped enrich and legitimize a discourse of tradition that, at the end of the 1980s, was beginning to reverberate powerfully in the conservative challenge to a ‘crisis’ within higher education and the humanities. This article attempts to complicate the contemporary politics of nostalgia, showing how a defence of cultural patrimony has distinguished major and minor culture wars, engaging left and right quite differently but with similar presuppositions.

One of the most distinguished filmmakers working today, David is a director whose vision of cinema is firmly rooted in fine art. He was motivated to make his first film as a student because he wanted a painting that 'would really be able to move'. Most existing studies of Lynch, however, fail to engage fully with the complexities of his films' relationship to other art forms. The Film Paintings of David Lynch fills this void, arguing that Lynch's cinematic output needs to be considered within a broad range of cultural references. Aimed at both fans and film studies specialists, Allister Mactaggart addresses Lynch's films from the perspective of the relationship between commercial film, avant-garde art, and cultural theory. Individual works - The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, The Straight Story, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire - are discussed in relation to other films and directors, illustrating that the solitary, or seemingly isolated, experience of film is itself socially, culturally, and politically important. The Film Paintings of David Lynch offers a unique perspective on an influential director, weaving together a range of theoretical approaches to Lynch's films to make exciting new connections among film theory, art history, psychoanalysis, and cinema.

Layers of Seeing and Seeing through Layers: The Work of Art in the Age of Digital Imagery Louisa Wood Ruby (bio) Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be. This unique existence of the work of art determined the history to which it was subject throughout the time of its existence. This includes the changes which it may have suffered in physical condition over the years as well as the various changes in its ownership. —Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, 1936 In consulting on or creating a Web site designed to use works of art for teaching purposes, it is extremely important to be aware of the differences between seeing an artwork “in the flesh” and in reproduction. Museum educators are highly aware of this disparity and are therefore eager to have students visit museums to experience authentic works of art instead of seeing them only in books, slides, or on Web sites. Already in 1936, Walter Benjamin called attention to the drawbacks of reproductions; his words resonate all the more in our age of digital image overload. Easy access to images is, of course, desirable, and the advanced technologies we now have can even aid our understanding of a work of art. Nonetheless, the physical experience of standing in front of a work of art can never be replicated by seeing it on a flat screen or a piece of paper. In this article I will examine the advantages, disadvantages, differences, and similarities between looking at a Web-based image of a Rembrandt painting, a photograph of a Rembrandt painting, and actually standing in front of one of his original works. I will also discuss the more advanced technologies for examining paintings and how they can help us “see” further into a work of art and increase our understanding of it. [End Page 51] When standing in front of a painting, you are seeing a three-dimensional object with a history of its own. Its nicks, the dings in its frame, its true colors and texture, its exact size, the quality of the brushstrokes, and the amount of paint are all visible to the careful observer, who stands in a long line of viewers over the centuries who have appreciated the artist’s achievement. When approached from different angles, a painting in real space can even seem to vary in the mood it conveys or the impression it gives. A striking demonstration of this phenomenon occurred during a recent visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, when Rika Burnham, a museum educator, divided our Rembrandt Project group in half and asked us to look at Rembrandt’s 1660 Self-Portrait from different angles and describe the sitter’s mood. When we compared notes, our impressions of the painting were so different that an outside listener would have thought we were looking at two completely different paintings. We then switched angles, and our respective impressions changed dramatically. Effects of light (shadows, highlights, color) and interpretations of elements in the painting, such as the hand or the hat, had been affected by the angle from which we had approached the work, and these minor adjustments had significantly altered the way we “read” the painting. This kind of experience is of course not possible when looking at a photograph of a work of art. A photograph can be very useful and can usually tell you much about a painting, but, unfortunately, the photograph itself is an object that was taken at a specific time and place, under specific circumstances that might or might not be ideal for capturing the essence of what it is trying to reproduce. Because the angle from which a photograph is taken remains static, it only allows us to experience the painting from one direction, under the given set of lighting conditions. Other problems abound. Two color reproductions of a given painting will more than likely offer wildly different color tonalities because photographs and reproductions in many publications imperfectly correct for color. Lighting of the painting may...