Revolutionary Spirit Research Articles

Cracking the Crystal in STS: Marcelo Fetz Talks with Harry Collins

In this interview, Harry Collins and Marcelo Fetz discuss Collins’ early work on the importance of tacit knowledge in laboratory research, the revolutionary spirit of early Science and Technology Studies (STS) research, and his concerns about its current intellectual decline which he sees as a result of the popularity of Actor-Network Theory (ANT) approaches and an increasing focus on policy-relevant STS studies. Collins describes how, in the early years of STS, he was part of a group of social scientists, interested in the analysis of scientific knowledge and practices, who immersed themselves in particular research fields, and then used their familiarity with science to develop radical new approaches to the topic. For him, the “interactional expertise” developed in such encounters is a key research tool––STS’s most effective means of generating compelling new ways of understanding science and technology––which should not be abandoned in favor of alternative approaches. In his following reflection, Marcelo Fetz considers the unifying conditions that were needed to “crack the crystal of science,” and the later problems resulting from the institutionalization of STS.

The Keys of Power: The Rhetoric and Politics of Transcendentalism

The Keys of Power: The Rhetoric and Politics of Transcendentalism

Disillusioned with the Labour Movement: Late Marx and the Prospects of Revolution in Western Europe

ABSTRACTRecent research has emphasised how Marx’s views underwent profound change after 1870. Its major focus has been on how Marx’s increasing interest in developments in Russia culminated in his adoption of the Russian populists' belief that the country might reach socialism without passing through the stage of capitalism. Less attention has been devoted to Marx’s later attitude towards the prospects of proletarian revolution in Western Europe. This paper attempts a more detailed explanation of Marx’s approach to the development of the labour movement in Britain, France and Germany during the 1870s. It also aims to show that he no longer expected a forthcoming revolution carried out by the organised working class in the most advanced Western European countries. First, Marx complained of the lack of revolutionary spirit in the British proletariat; moreover, he criticised the immaturity of the French labour movement; finally, he rejected the eclectic ideology of German social democracy, which was on the rise.

The Scarlet Professor as Spectacle: Responding to the Opera from a Queer Studies Perspective

<i>The Scarlet Professor</i> as Spectacle: Responding to the Opera from a Queer Studies Perspective

The Transmission of the Revolutionary Spirit: Reflections on Civil Disobedience in Hannah Arendt

The aim of this paper is to take up Hannah Arendt’s analysis on civil disobedience. This is one aspect of Arendt’s thought which represents a powerful spur towards a positive and meaningful view of the world we live in. In taking up this argument I start from Arendt’s idea of the law, discussing its relational dimension and its links to the consensus universalis, seen as a conscious, wholehearted adhesion to the laws of a country. Bearing these two points in mind, I then consider Arendt’s proposal, put forward in her essay “Civil Disobedience,” for making the spirit of the law compatible with civil disobedience. The idea that civil disobedience is compatible with the spirit of the law represents, for Arendt, the acknowledgement of the community’s constitutive function, in which individuals define themselves in their relationships with others, drawing on a type of justice which emerges from the encounter of differing opinions. From this perspective, I explain how civil disobedience allows citizens to assert their public freedom, thereby adding something new to the world and exercising their responsibility. Thus for Arendt civil disobedience reaffirms the creation, also fostered by the revolutionary spirit, of a space of permanent participation in public life: a shared arena for the enjoyment of public happiness.

An Impossible Bildung and the Bounds of Realism and Britishness in Vanity Fair

An Impossible Bildung and the Bounds of Realism and Britishness in Vanity Fair Ilsu Sohn (bio) William Makepeace Thackeray's Vanity Fair (1848) covers the period from the last years of the Napoleonic Wars up to 1832, the year of the first Reform Act. The novel portrays the era of the Bourbon Restoration, a time when the British Empire was climbing to its unprecedented global prominence. The rapidly widening and mobilizing world forced the then-burgeoning British realism to challenge continuously the limits of its representation in both empirical and psychological dimensions, and Thackeray's monumental work was a representative literary attempt. Equally noteworthy is the fact that the novel was serialized from 1847 to 1848, during the very same years when revolutionary fervor ignited the Continent, especially France. Vanity Fair is a literary response to and reflection of both these historically decisive moments. Thackeray's novel not only reflects but also ideologically attempts to contain the revolutionary spirit that presumably threatens to compromise Britishness. In the formative years of both realism and a new national consciousness centering on the rapidly-emerging middle class, Vanity Fair engages in discursively drawing a map of Britishness as well as the scope of realist literary representation. To investigate the implications, this essay focuses on how this novel transforms the classical Bildungsroman to serve its own meta-generic purpose as well as both the geographical and socio-economic mobility of the problematic and ambitious female protagonist, Becky Sharp. This revolutionary female upstart unsettles British high society and is eventually banished from the territories of Britain as well as from the representable scope of British realism. The results structure the entire narrative in a way that contributes to testing and mapping the boundaries of realism as well as Britishness. Here, I examine the liminality of Becky's position, which is crucial in highlighting and monitoring multivalent borders of Britishness and of realism and thereby undertaking what I call the "cartographic" project of this novel. Recent literary scholarship about Vanity Fair tends to explore how the novel ultimately uncovers contradictions in Britishness and British national culture. Patricia Marks, for instance, argues that the ebb and flow of Becky's success mimic the disruptive effect of French on the British linguistic field. For Corri Zoli, the novel suggests that French and Indian elements are already part and parcel of British culture in the context of [End Page 72] the world economy and that the nationalist attempt to homogenize British culture cannot but fail. Cheryl Wilson also explores the presence of French influence in British national consciousness by focusing on British social dance while Julia Kent turns to how the novel portrays French "amoral" culture as part of Britishness, debunking the British illusion of the separate spheres of domesticity and market. Although well situating Vanity Fair historically, such scholars have not investigated fully how Becky's coming of age not only informs the plot of this self-fashioned realist novel but also maps Britishness, even though the novel is apparently Becky's "failed" Bildungsroman. Also, with a few exceptions, scholars interpret the novel as debunking British national culture by focusing on its inherent heterogeneity. In response, I want to suggest the novel's performance as a disciplinary power that tracks, monitors, and contains Becky's radically alien nature and thereby argue that the novel eventually aims at being part of the discursive procedure to establish a normative national culture. Section One: Thackeray's Use of Absent Childhood in Characterizing Becky The earliest noticeable fact regarding the problematic nature of Becky's coming of age is the absence of her childhood. Thackeray tells us Becky "never had been a girl, she said; she had been a woman since she was eight years old" (12). The absence of childhood derives from "the dismal precocity of poverty" (12). Everything that she finds in her boarding school bores her because "her father, reprobate as he was, was a man of talent; his conversation was a thousand times more agreeable to her than the talk of such of her own sex as she now encountered" (14). According to Nancy Armstrong, modern fiction "helped to formulate the ordered space we now recognized as the...

Critical thresholds. Traversing architectural pedagogy, research, and practice

&lt;p&gt;It is significant that the AASA – Association of Architecture Schools of Australasia (&lt;a href="https://aasa.org.au"&gt;https://aasa.org.au&lt;/a&gt;) conference on &lt;em&gt;“&lt;/em&gt;Applied Collaborations&lt;em&gt;”&lt;/em&gt; took place in Christchurch in the Fall of 2015, not long after the earthquakes that tragically destroyed a major part of the city. Although the physical devastation was extensive and highly traumatic for the inhabitants, it was encouraging to observe that, after an initial phase of shock and paralysis, came an optimistic period of quasi euphoria, a revolutionary spirit, a sense that the city could be radically reinvented instead of being rebuilt merely as a faithful replication of the past.&lt;br /&gt;Rather than aspiring to a reinstatement and perpetuation of the status quo, it was felt that it could emancipate itself from its colonial past, become a better city and, most importantly, that its rebirth could call upon the energy, enthusiasm, self-motivation and generosity of all its inhabitants and truly involve the participation of the community as a whole.&lt;br /&gt;The city, while still licking its wounds and clearing up the debris, went through a vibrant period of recovery and utopian dreaming, a phase when it was felt that anything was possible, that not only could the urban fabric and its supporting infrastructure systems be radically changed but that its governing institutions could also be transformed, as well as the fabric of society as a whole. It was felt that this unique opportunity had to be seized before it was too late. The time had come for a major urban and social mutation.&lt;/p&gt;

1950-60년대 인도네시아의 정치 변화와 수카르노의 “혁명”

In the mid-1950s, Indonesian society suffered from political conflicts and economic downfall in the context of regional rebellions and the Cold War. As a solution to these problems, Sukarno, the 1st president of Indonesia, suggested the return to the “Revolution (Revolusi).” In Indonesian history, Revolution refers to the anti-Dutch struggle for independence in 1945-49. Sukarno explicated that the Revolution was not over yet and the revolutionary spirit should be revived to accomplish the goal of Indonesian nation for an independent state, social justice, and a new international order. He suggested a new political system called “Guided Democracy” as an alternative to parliamentary democracy, which was often criticized as an western system unsuitable for Indonesian society. Under this system the political power was concentrated on the president, while political parties and parliaments were dissembles or transformed according to the governmental policy. Two political powers, the military forces and the communist party, grew rapidly in the absence of powerful parties, and the Guided Democracy was operated through the interplay between these two groups, while Sukarno working as an powerful arbiter between the two. However, increasing conflicts between the two archrivals eventually led to the collapse of the system and the emergence of Suharto’s “New Order.” The New Order abandoned the quest for Revolution, and was completely different from Sukarno’s government in its economic goals and international relations. Yet its basic political system - such as enormous power of the president and the role of functional groups – was inherited from Sukarno’s Guided Democracy. Ironically, the practices of a revolutionary political leader contributed to emergence of a most reactionary government.

Fighting for Lithuanian Freedom in 1918–1920: Volunteers from Pumpėnai

The article is dedicated to the volunteers of the Lithuanian army fighting for revival of the Lithuanian state. It contributes to the history of freedom research in two ways. First, the historical narrative from 1918–1920 clearly testifies that fighting for freedom presents a social challenge and indicates a threat that has immense uniting power. Second, main part of the study focuses on those who according to their free will chose to defend their Fatherland.The address of the temporary Lithuanian Government to the Lithuanian people in December 29, 1918, was essentially similar to proclamations of the uprisings of 1831 and 1863; even the means of its spreading and publication were the same. Those who responded travelled to join the army on foot or riding a horse, frequently poorly equipped, but bearing an accordion and singing songs, with firm resolve and faith in their hearts. After long years of foreign occupation, the volunteers that at first made up the whole core of the Lithuanian army, subsequently diminishing to one third of the armed forces, aspired for freedom, their own national government and establishment of the Lithuanian state.The article is based on the study of 154 participants of the fighting for Lithuanian independence from the historical Pumpėnai rural district in Panevėžys region. According to this study, young men of about 19–23 years of age formed the majority of those who responded to the appeal to stand for freedom and Fatherland in the country occupied by the Bolsheviks in the end of the 1918 – beginning of the 1919. By comparison, militia (the armed forces of the local self-defense) usually consisted of 26–29 year-old men, or even older. The age of partisans ranged from 17 to 57 years, which is a peculiar feature of the freedom fighting in northern Lithuania. Many of the latter, especially married men owning their households, returned home after the Joniškėlis region was liberated in May of the 1919. The invasion of the Bermont-led forces in July of the 1919 did not elicit any substantial response in Pumpėnai. Only in August and October of the 1920, in view of the Polish aggression, three men from Pumpėnai volunteered to join the army again (among them, Mikalojus Grabauskas volunteered for the second time).Although the land promised as reward by the government did motivate the volunteers, it was not always the main reason for their fighting. Among volunteers from Pumpėnai, there were landless workers, employees, small farmers, farmers, young people of noble origins and landowners in possession of up to 180 hectares. Afterwards many of them even did not submit an application for land.The burning enthusiasm that overfilled these young men inspiring them to join the ranks of volunteers and subsequently characterizing them as their main quality, manifested as a great desire to act, as a fighting fervor. The volunteers were under significant influence of the imagery of the great Lithuanian historical narrative and the revolutionary spirit (to use the words by Vytautas Kavolis), that ever since the 1795 united different generations of the Lithuanian freedom fighters, inspiring their children and grandchildren to continue the deeds of their fathers and grandfathers.

The appeal of the ‘Old School’: From De cierta manera/One Way or Another (1974) to Conducta/Behaviour (2014)

Abstract This article compares the critical perspectives on society, education and morality found in Sara Gómez’s classic De cierta manera/One Way or Another (1974) and Ernesto Daranas’ more recent Conducta/Behaviour (2014). Considering the films’ engagement with cinematic traditions from Italian neo-realism to melodrama, it argues that Conducta displays a return to a cinematic ‘old school’ in terms of its emotional appeal, its focus on a transcendent individual and its tendency to turn the social and physical context into aesthetically appealing backdrop. Given the overdetermination of both children and teachers in Cuba’s history, the analysis shows the conversion of Daranas’ teacher, Carmela, into a sanctified, syncretic heroine and her pupil, Chala, into a choteo-imbued, macho, miniature Hombre Nuevo (new man). Thus, the critical, imperfect and collective qualities of Gómez’s rapidly transforming revolutionary society are displaced in Daranas’ film by a melancholy aesthetic, a quasi-sacred aura and a coercive kind of care. The problem, therefore, does not necessarily lie in this film’s use of ‘old-school’ narrative techniques, but rather in their deployment to cement values of ‘authentic’ revolutionary spirit and ‘true’ cubanía – in other words, to reinforce the appeal of the ‘old school’.

Byron’s and Shelley’s Revolutionary Ideas in Literature

The paper explores the revolutionary spirit of literary works of two Romantic poets: George Gordon Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. In the period of conservative early 19th century English society that held high regard for propriety, tradition, decorum, conventions and institutionalized religion, the two poets’ multi-layered rebellious and subversive writing and thinking instigated public uproar and elitist outrage, threatening to undermine traditional concepts and practices. Acting as precursors to new era notions and liberties, their opuses present literary voices of protest against 19th century social, religious, moral and literary conventions. Their revolutionary and non-conformist methods and ideas are discussed and analyzed in this paper through three works of theirs: Byron’s The Vision of Judgement and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage and Shelley’s Prometheus Unbound.

A True Reflection of the Poet: On the Resemblance Between Samson and Milton

John Milton made great use of his youth experience in the writing of Samson Agonistes . The image and description of the hero reflected the poet himself almost in all aspects. Both Samson and Milton were divinely appointed to glorious cause and recorded great achievements, persecuted severely by their enemies and suffered a lot from blindness. The unwise marriage and the grappling with God’s justice of Samson truly reflected that of Milton. The revolutionary spirit of Samson is truly that of Milton’s and his last vengeance reflected Milton’s completion of the three great poems. In a sense, Samson is Milton.

Revolutionary Art or “Revolutonizing Art”? Making Art on the Streets of Cairo

In an article published on December 17, 2014, Surti Singh, an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the American University in Cairo (AUC), wrote that “a new set of questions is crystallizing about the role of art in contemporary Egypt” and posed the following questions: “Can art still preserve the revolutionary spirit that spilled out in the graffiti and murals that covered Egypt’s streets? Should this even be art’s focus?” (Singh, 2014). Singh’s questions at the time were indicative of a growing debate in Egypt over what constitutes a legitimate “art” and what its focus should be following the uprising of January 2011, given the emergence of new forms of art in public spaces. Public art is not a new phenomenon in Egypt – its modern history goes back to the late 19th century (Karnouk 2005; Winegar 2006), and street art also has a history prior to the uprising in Egypt (Charbel 2010; Jarbou 2010; Hamdy et.al 2014, Abaza, 2016). However, the form, content and even the players of public art and street art have changed as practices have become more visible and with this visibility come new questions – what is the role of art in uprising and post-uprising Egypt? Should art incite the public to act against a repressive government, should it serve as a form of awareness, and/or should it document the revolutions “real” history versus what is reported in state media? Is overtly “political” art serving the “revolution” or undermining it? Is aesthetically pleasing, but seemingly content deprived art, a disservice to the revolution?

My Brigadista Year by Katherine Paterson

Reviewed by: My Brigadista Year by Katherine Paterson Elizabeth Bush Paterson, Katherine My Brigadista Year. Candlewick, 2017 [208p] ISBN 978-0-7636-9508-8 $15.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 4-7 In 1961 Cuba, Batista has been ousted and Premier Fidel Castro calls for a campaign to raise the nation’s standards of living, beginning with the goal of eradicating illiteracy within a year. The call goes out for volunteer tutors who will be trained in pedagogy and sent out to remote farms and plantations to work alongside their students by day and teach them to read and write in the evenings. Revolutionary spirit and optimism appeal to thousands of adolescents and young adults, among them thirteen-year-old Havana resident Lora, who wears down her parents to gain their permission to enlist, trades her school uniform for military-style gear, and heads off into the mountains to live with small farmers Luis and Veronica Santana and their three young children, teaching them and four of their neighbors to read, while learning how to tend crops, ride a horse, and live on next to nothing. The adult students are determined, making steady progress and often driving each other forward through clever acts of social subterfuge and competition. However, counterrevolutionary followers still lurk in the hills, targeting the Conrado Benítez Brigade workers and their hosts. Paterson skillfully navigates the Zeitgeist, capturing the enthusiasm of young people reshaping their country, censuring the enemy United States while embracing the Twist, bonding with their host families even as they long to flee from insurgents to the safety of their city homes. A timeline of Cuban history is included, as well as author notes incorporating sources for her research. Copyright © 2017 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Hispanidad y Revolución: la vieja guardia del Modernismo ante la guerra civil española

espanol?Como reaccionaron las viejas glorias del modernismo ante guerra civil espanola? Este articulo indaga en el posicionamiento politico e ideologico de autores que fueron, en su momento, figuras importantes del movimiento modernista. En un primer instante, se analiza actitud ante guerra de dos de los grandes poetas del modernismo: Guillermo Valencia y Leopoldo Lugones. A continuacion, se examina reaccion de tres exmodernistas hispanofilos: los novelistas Carlos Reyles y Enrique Larreta, y el peruano Felipe Sassone. Entre los antiguos modernistas que retenian en parte su espiritu revolucionario juvenil, se examinan las figuras de Manuel Ugarte, Alberto Ghiraldo, Alejandro Sux y Horacio Quiroga... Como colofon, se contempla el papel que tuvieron en el conflicto Manuel Gonzalez Prada, Jose Marti y Ruben Dario, resucitados por sus herederos como partidarios, respectivamente, del anarquismo, de Republica, y de Franco y EnglishHow did the old school of modernistas react to the Spanish Civil War? The article explores the political and ideological positioning of authors who were, in their heyday, important figures of the modernist movement. It focuses initially on the attitude towards the war of two of the movement's greatest poets, Guillermo Valencia and Leopoldo Lugones, before analysing the reaction of three hispanophiles: two novelists, Carlos Reyles and Enrique Larreta, and Peruvian Felipe Sassone. Among the ex-modernistas who retained part of the revolutionary spirit of their youth, the article centres on Manuel Ugarte, Alberto Ghiraldo, Alejandro Sux and Horacio Quiroga... A brief colophon examines the role in the conflict of Manuel Gonzalez Prada, Jose Marti and Ruben Dario, resuscitated by their heirs as followers, respectively, of Anarchism, of the Republic, and of Franco and la Hispanidad.

Vygotsky’s theory of method and philosophy of practice: implications for trans/formative methodology

O projeto de Vygotsky precisa ser compreendido como um tipo ainda sem nome de uma abordagem que, ao continuar o espírito revolucionário do marxismo, mudou-se para além da velha divisão entre teoria e prática e, ao invés disso, consubstancia sua unidade em uma mistura peculiar com distintos aportes filosóficos, teóricos e éticos e suportes ideológicos. O objetivo de criar uma nova psicologia para uma sociedade que necessitava de princípios orientados para justiça social e igualdade transformou esta abordagem em um projeto crítico-prático de transformação social e de mudança. O principal argumento em que este trabalho avança é que o cerne do método de Vygotsky é a transformação onto-epistemológica, juntamente com a ética sócio-política de igualdade e justiça, que desafiam a ideologia de adaptação e controle. Eu discuto este conjunto de questões à luz de uma postura ativista de transformação que ilumina sobre os compromissos dos pesquisadores e orientações de valor.

Amor mundi e espírito revolucionário: Hannah Arendt entre política e ética

Este artigo delineia alguns contornos interpretativos da expressão “amor mundi” nas formulações teóricas de Hannah Arendt e, principalmente, em contato direto com a obra Sobre a Revolução. O texto acompanha, portanto, as definições possíveis desses três termos – “amor”, “mundo” e “revolução” – na tentativa não só de evidenciar significados ao conhecido emblema político arendtiano, mas também de defender certa conciliação entre a “responsabilidade pelo mundo político” legado aos homens e o “cuidado com o eu moral”. Em poucos termos, a proposta é sugerir uma via de interpretação não apenas política da expressão amor mundi, mas, também, ética e de espírito revolucionário.

Political Action Beyond Resistance: Arendt and “Revolutionary Spirit” in Egypt

The article examines what it calls the “politics-as-resistance” frame in contemporary political theory, originating in the works of Michel Foucault and Judith Butler. This way of organizing political experience is contrasted with Hannah Arendt’s political thought, particularly her writings on revolutionary action. Arendt’s often overlooked – and partly unpublished – passages on virtu and fortuna are further suggested as important additions to her thinking on action. I argue that Arendt’s “world-centric” approach can illuminate certain aspects of political experience that remain dimmed in the more subject-oriented politics- as-resistance frame. Particular focus is paid to the austere notion of freedom in politics-as-resistance, its overly process-oriented presentation of political temporality, underdeveloped approach to institutions, and insufficient exploration of the joyful end of the affective register of action. In the last part of the article, the tragedy of the Egyptian 2011 revolution is discussed as an illustration of the arguments.

A Promising Problem: The New Chicana/o History . Edited by Carlos Kevin Blanton

In A Promising Problem, Carlos Blanton notes a paradox for Chicana/o historians. On one hand, a new generation is advancing the field in four specific ways, by: 1) exploring Chicana/o identities that are “relational” and “transnational” instead of culturally nationalist; 2) venturing beyond the Southwest; 3) demonstrating a keen self-awareness as members of well-established sub-field of U.S. history; and 4) following earlier historians in their “quest for justice” and portrayal of “social realities” (p. ix). On the other hand, despite its dynamism and (not always harmonious) entrenchment within the academy, Chicana/o history and Chicanas/os themselves still suffer public attacks that delegitimize them. According to Blanton, this conundrum represents the “promise” and the “problem” of the new Chicana/o history. But beyond the external threats that Blanton focuses on in his introduction, the following essays identify internal, more existential challenges to “traditional” Chicana/o history. Traditional Chicana/o history, Blanton writes, held “assumptions of a far more universal experience, and a more flattened sense of community than scholars today would assert.” It “came from the activist ethos” of the 1960s and 1970s, and it “emphasized the proletarian, revolutionary spirit in Chicana/o history and the theme of resistance against the overwhelming totality of structural racism and class exploitation” (p. 9).

Fidel Castro and the Radicalization of Non-Alignment

This article tries to advance the theoretical study of non-alignment through the use of a political psychology-based approach related to the important but seldom mentioned influence of political leaders’ personality traits on the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Key non-aligned leaders were highly charismatic and voluntaristic individuals whose personality features clearly impacted the creation and development of the NAM. The article analyses the case of Fidel Castro, whose efforts to shape the non-alignment process were particularly important during the 1960s and the 1970s. A close causal relationship is identified between the features of Castro’s revolutionary totalitarian personality—which include revolutionary spirit, charisma, narcissistic desire for power and prestige, and ‘evangelistic’ foreign policy style—and his actions intended to radicalize non-alignment. The case study of the Cuban leader suggests that the systematic analysis of the personality traits of key non-aligned leaders would provide a useful perspective on the evolution of the NAM.