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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

A Different Crossroads: Meeting The Devil In Cultural Studies, Marcus Breen Sep 2013

A Different Crossroads: Meeting The Devil In Cultural Studies, Marcus Breen

Marcus Breen

The Crossroads Conference in Paris, July 2012 offered an international perspective on cultural studies. After the event, seeing mention of cultural studies in the context of Nazi Germany opened up questions about the history of cultural studies, its ambitions and position in the contemporary, neo-liberal academy. Drawing on various conjunctures in personal and social life, the article reflects on the challenges for cultural studies when set against knowledge of European history.


Relation Between Sacrifice And Mercy In Forms Of Worship And Pacification (Contents & Extended Abstract) Jun 2013

Relation Between Sacrifice And Mercy In Forms Of Worship And Pacification (Contents & Extended Abstract)

Matija Kovačević

Contents and extended abstract of a thesis defended in 2013 at the University of Zagreb Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Arts in Ethnology & Cultural Anthropology. Translated from Croatian.


Odnos Žrtve I Milosti U Oblicima Obožavanja I Postizanja Mira, Matija Kovačević Jun 2013

Odnos Žrtve I Milosti U Oblicima Obožavanja I Postizanja Mira, Matija Kovačević

Matija Kovačević

Žrtva je jedan od najrasprostranjenijih pojmova diljem svjetskih kultura. Prisutan je u sekularnom i religijskom rječniku, svakodnevnim i izvanrednim prilikama, privatnoj i javnoj sferi. U skladu s time, neki oblik žrtvenog rituala našao se u praktički svim svjetskim kulturama i tradicijama. Iako umanjeni i promijenjenih oblika, ni danas nisu nestali iz čovječanstva, a u prošlosti su sačinjavali uobičajeni dio svakodnevnog života. Svrha žrtvenih rituala bila je raznovrsna, ali jedan od najčešćih motiva kojim su bili prožeti jest pomirenje s božanstvom, zajedno s izbjegavanjem kazne i osiguranjem života i sigurnosti pojedincu i/ili svijetu. S druge strane, koncept milosti i milosrđa nije …


Narratives Of War In Islamic Societies, Whose Side Is God On?, Ahmed Souaiaia Jun 2013

Narratives Of War In Islamic Societies, Whose Side Is God On?, Ahmed Souaiaia

Ahmed E SOUAIAIA

The so-called Arab Spring ushered in a new era of conflict that is transforming Islamic societies in unprecedented ways. In the past two years, peaceful protests ousted some of the most ruthless dictators of the Arab world. Then, violent rebellions destroyed communities in Libya and Syria, stifled the non-violent movement, and amplified sectarian tensions by interjecting God into some of the most gruesome conflicts. By looking at the Syrian crisis as a case study, in this article I explore the function of narratives in managing war and the nature and evolution of Islamism in Islamic societies.


A Turkish Spring Even If Different From The Arab Spring, Ahmed Souaiaia Jun 2013

A Turkish Spring Even If Different From The Arab Spring, Ahmed Souaiaia

Ahmed E SOUAIAIA

The wide-spreading protest movement in Turkey is bringing up the irresistible analogy: Taksim Square is for Turkey what Tahrir Square is for Egypt. Considering that Tahrir Square events were the extension of the protest movement that started it all from Tunisia, it follows that the turmoil in Turkey is similar to the so-called Arab Spring. But most observers and media analysts are dismissing Taksim Square movement arguing that Turkey’s uprising is not similar to the Arab Spring because Erdoğan and his party are democratically elected and that Erdoğan has governed over a period of unprecedented economic prosperity.


Humanitarian Adhocracy, Transnational New Apostolic Missions, And Evangelical Anti-Dependency In A Haitian Refugee Camp, Elizabeth Mcalister Apr 2013

Humanitarian Adhocracy, Transnational New Apostolic Missions, And Evangelical Anti-Dependency In A Haitian Refugee Camp, Elizabeth Mcalister

Elizabeth McAlister

This article addresses religious responses to disaster by examining how one network of conservative evangelical Christians reacted to the Haiti earthquake and the humanitarian relief that followed. The charismatic Christian New Apostolic Reformation (or Spiritual Mapping movement) is a transnational network that created the conditions for post-earthquake, internally displaced Haitians to arrive at two positions that might seem contradictory. On one hand, Pentecostal Haitian refugees used the movement’s conservative, right-wing theology to develop a punitive theodicy of the quake as God’s punishment of a sinful nation. On the other hand, rather than resign themselves to victimhood and passivity, their strict …


November Uri Community Diversity Project 2010, Joseph A. Santiago Mr, Riley Davis Ms, Richard V. Travisano Mr Apr 2013

November Uri Community Diversity Project 2010, Joseph A. Santiago Mr, Riley Davis Ms, Richard V. Travisano Mr

Richard Travisano

November is National Novel Writing Month. For the first time at the University of Rhode Island November was a month for the URI community to share their stories, poems, art, and photos with the world. The Writing to Model Diversity project intends to connect individuals across cultural boundaries and borders by sharing the stories and experiences that challenge our everyday experiences and the dreams of the future. Built on the efforts of the World Voice series, URI presents a book that shares the stories and culture of the students, faculty, staff, and community members who embrace the idea of becoming …


Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D. Apr 2013

Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D.

Michael I Niman Ph.D.

Mike Niman discusses the future of journalism in a PR-dominated communication environment. In particular, he examines the migration of talent from journalism to the PR industry, the collapse of mainstream journalism and the role of an emergent alternative media as American journalism goes through metamorphosis from what it was to what it could become. Journalism is a social good that should equip people to understand and resist spin. Niman argues that mainstream American journalism, rather than rising to this challenge, has transparently succumbed to serving as an arm of the corporate PR industry, thus laying the groundwork for its own …


Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D. Apr 2013

Journalism In A Pr World, Michael I. Niman Ph.D.

Michael I Niman Ph.D.

Mike Niman discusses the future of journalism in a PR-dominated communication environment. In particular, he examines the migration of talent from journalism to the PR industry, the collapse of mainstream journalism and the role of an emergent alternative media as American journalism goes through metamorphosis from what it was to what it could become. Journalism is a social good that should equip people to understand and resist spin. Niman argues that mainstream American journalism, rather than rising to this challenge, has transparently succumbed to serving as an arm of the corporate PR industry, thus laying the groundwork for its own …


Territorializing Indigeneity And Powwow Markets, Blaire Gagnon Feb 2013

Territorializing Indigeneity And Powwow Markets, Blaire Gagnon

Blaire Gagnon

North American powwows are presented by organizers and presumed by society at large to be Native events. Research has rarely considered the processes by which powwows become places or the role of territorialization in that process. This article examines the socio-spatial practices powwow organizing committees employ to construct powwows and their arts and crafts markets as places from undifferentiated space and the responses to these practices. I suggest that powwow committees construct powwow space as a form of sovereign political space from which they can manage relations with multiple constituencies and in which contemporary conceptions of Nativeness are negotiated.


Indigenismo From Below? Carlos Castaneda, New Age Anthropology And Identity Politics, Ageeth Sluis Jan 2013

Indigenismo From Below? Carlos Castaneda, New Age Anthropology And Identity Politics, Ageeth Sluis

Ageeth Sluis

This paper explores the intersections between Carlos Castaneda’s work on shamanism, indigenismo, and larger changes within the field of anthropology from the 1960s to 1980s. Castaneda introduced a large readership to Mexico at a time when the Americas saw pronounced socio-political and cultural changes. Despite criticism by fellow anthropologists, Castaneda's bestselling books became instrumental in constructing new indigenous identities, a magical Mexico, and new directions in anthropology. This paper seeks to understand Castaneda within a larger historical context of the historical trajectories of indigenismo and changes in gender and race identity politics both in Mexico and the U.S. due to …


Engendering S2013tatus And Value In The Powwow Art Market, Blaire Gagnon Dec 2012

Engendering S2013tatus And Value In The Powwow Art Market, Blaire Gagnon

Blaire Gagnon

This article examines the relationship between people and objects in the powwow arts and crafts market. Over the past century, the field of Indian art developed a system of valuation that employs the "negative relationship" to create a hierarchy of people, objects, and markets. Central to this system are regimes of value associated with art and commodity. I argue that the presence of the mass-produced makes it possible for artisan-vendors to employ the negative relationship to define, value, and make sustainable the artistic in the powwow market context. Ultimately, this marks artisan-vendors and mass-produced vendors as position-takers with the Indian …


Roy Rappaport, Brian Hoey Dec 2012

Roy Rappaport, Brian Hoey

Brian A. Hoey, Ph.D.

Roy Abraham Rappaport, an American anthropologist recognized as a key figure in ecological anthropology and the study of religious ritual in human evolution.


Deleuze & Guattari And Minor Marxism, Eugene W. Holland Dec 2012

Deleuze & Guattari And Minor Marxism, Eugene W. Holland

Eugene W Holland

This paper suggests a version of Marxism - a minor Marxism - derived from Deleuze & Guattari's political philosophy.


“On Marriage Equality” (Review Of Jay Cee Whitehead's The Nuptial Deal: Same-Sex Marriage And Neo-Liberal Governance [University Of Chicago Press, 2011]), Margot Weiss Dec 2012

“On Marriage Equality” (Review Of Jay Cee Whitehead's The Nuptial Deal: Same-Sex Marriage And Neo-Liberal Governance [University Of Chicago Press, 2011]), Margot Weiss

Margot Weiss

Jaye Cee Whitehead’s book The Nuptial Deal is a sociological study of a marriage equality organization (given the pseudonym Marriage Rights Now, or MRN) in the western United States