conceptualizes the tension between autonomous art, community art and the state
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conceptualizes the tension between autonomous dance and community dance in the light of the commitment of the state
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More people voted in 2024 than any other year in human history, while often relying on the internet for political information. This combination resulted in critical challenges for democracy. To address these concerns, we designed an exhibition that applied interactive experiences to help visitors understand the impact of digitization on democracy. This late-breaking work addresses the research questions: 1) What do participants, exposed to playful interventions, think about these topics? and 2) How do people estimate their skills and knowledge about countering misinformation? We collected data in 5 countries through showcases held within weeks of relevant 2024 elections. During visits, participants completed a survey detailing their experiences and emotional responses. Participants expressed high levels of self-confidence regarding the detection of misinformation and spotting AI-generated content. This paper contributes to addressing digital literacy needs by fostering engaging interactions with AI and politically relevant issues surrounding campaigning and misinformation.
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This city profile provides a multi-dimensional overview on the most recent social, economic, political and spatial changes in the city of Amsterdam. We map the social-geography of the city, discussing recent housing and spatial development policies as well as city-regional political dynamics. Today, the city of Amsterdam is more diverse than ever, both ethnically and socially. The social geography of Amsterdam shows a growing core–periphery divide that underlines important economic and cultural asymmetries. The tradition of public subsidies and regulated housing currently allows for state-led gentrification within inner city neighborhoods. Public support for homeownership is changing the balance between social, middle and high-end housing segments. Changes in the tradition of large-scale interventions and strong public planning are likewise occurring. In times of austerity, current projects focus on small-scale and piecemeal interventions particularly oriented to stimulate entrepreneurialism in selected urban areas and often relate to creative economies and sustainable development. Finally, underlying these trends is a new political landscape composed of upcoming liberal and progressive parties, which together challenge the political equilibriums in the city region
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Using political discourse analysis, this book examines the extent to which the salient approaches of previous leadership generations have translated into present day policies shepherded in by Xi Jinping. On the strategic political level, the book includes comparisons of China's recent leadership periods with a focus on Xi Jinping's era, and contains examples of whether and how specific topics and tactics reoccur across generations. The state development strategy section then goes on to include chapters on shaping China’s strategic narratives, neoliberal discourse within state developmentalism, and keyword evolution. The practical policies part looks at the issues of re-education, health, class, and ethnicity, analysing how the leaders talk about China’s poor, frame the representations of megaprojects on social media, and discursively display diplomatic strength. As a study of the rule of Xi Jinping and the rhetoric of the contemporary Chinese political system, this book will be of huge interest to students and scholars of Chinese politics and political science more broadly.
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World globalisation drives companies to undertake international expansion with the aim of retaining or growing their businesses. When companies globalize, managers encounter new challenges in making international marketing strategy (IMS) decisions, which are influenced by perceived cultural and business distance between their home- and foreign country. Telkom Indonesia International (Telin) was formed by Telkom Indonesia (i.e. the state-owned company in the telecommunication industry in Indonesia) to engage in international business within a global market. The central question in this study is to what extent do managers’ perceived cultural and business distance between home- and foreign country influence their IMS decisions? A mixed research strategy will be employed by applying qualitative and quantitative methods concurrently. The data collection will involve interviews with CEOs and managers, alongside a web survey to 55 managers of Telkom's. Results suggest important consequences for IMS decisions and emphasizes the need for dialogue on perceptions of cultural and business characteristics of countries.
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Aim. Although cultural dimensions theory is a topical strand of quantitative cultural research, few intercultural simulation games use it. We present the design and review of the application of OASISTAN, an intercultural role-playing simulation game that is specifically based on cultural dimensions theory. Method. OASISTAN was first designed in 1999 for use in Master’s courses on cross-cultural management at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, attracting 20-23 year old students with a Bachelor degree in engineering and from various cultural backgrounds. Since its first design the game has been played approximately 45 times at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and three times at Harbin Institute of Technology in China in the years 2006-2008. We reviewed their experiences designing and facilitating OASISTAN since 1999. Results. The game has a no-tech role-play design and revolves around the geopolitically complex region of the Caspian Sea, specifically the fictional country of ‘Oasistan’. The game consists of students forming small teams of Oasistani, Western and non-Western public/private actors collaborating with each other to try and reach the common goal of oil exploration and production in this country. In total 15-30 students were involved. We found that OASISTAN allowed its players not only to intensely experience the difficulty and awkwardness of being confronted with cultural differences, but also to interpret and understand these differences through cultural dimensions. Students who played OASISTAN identified ten out of the 12 dimensions by Maleki and De Jong. The two dimensions that students were not able to identify are uncertainty avoidance and collaborativeness. Conclusion. OASISTAN shows how a game design field (i.e., intercultural simulation gaming) can be reinvigorated in light of new or updated scientific theories pertaining to the field’s subject matter (i.e., cultural dimensions). Several opportunities for future research are identified.
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The Routledge Handbook of Cultural Tourism explores and critically evaluates the debates and controversies in this field of Tourism. It brings together leading specialists from a range of disciplinary backgrounds and geographical regions, to provide state-of-the-art theoretical reflection and empirical research on this significant stream of tourism and its future direction.The book is divided into 7 inter-related sections. Section 1 looks at the historical, philosophical and theoretical framework for cultural tourism. This section debates tourist autonomy role play, authenticity, imaginaries, cross-cultural issues and inter-disciplinarity Section 2 analyses the role that politics takes in cultural tourism. This section also looks at ways in which cultural tourism is used as a policy instrument for economic development. Section 3 focuses on social patterns and trends, such as the mobilities paradigm, performativity, reflexivity and traditional hospitality, as well as considering sensitive social issues such as dark tourism. Section 4 analyses community and development, exploring adaptive forms of cultural tourism, as well as more sustainble models for indigenous tourismdevelopment. Section 5 discusses Landscapes and Destinations, including the transformation of space into place, issues of authenticity in landscape, the transformation of urban and rural landscapes into tourism products and conservation versus development dilemmas. Section 6refers to Regeneration and Planning, especially the creative turn in cultural tourism, whichcan be used to avoid problems of serial reproduction, standardisation and homogenisation. Section 7 deals with The Tourist and Visitor Experience, emphasising the desire of tourists to be more actively and interactively engaged in cultural tourism. This significant volume offers the reader a comprehensive synthesis of this field, conveying the latest thinking and research. The text is international in focus, encouraging dialogue across disciplinary boundaries and areas of study and will be an invaluable resource for all those with an interest in Cultural Tourism. This is essential reading for students, researchers and academics of Tourism as well as those of related studies in particular Cultural Studies, Leisure, Geography, Sociology, Politics and Economics.
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This article starts from the observation that popular culture resides in a contradictory space. On the one hand it seems to be thriving, in that the range of media objects that were previously studied under the rubric of popular culture has certainly expanded. Yet, cultural studies scholars rarely study these media objects as popular culture. Instead, concerns about immaterial labor, about the manipulation of voting behavior and public opinion, about filter bubbles and societal polarization, and about populist authoritarianism, determine the dominant frames with which the contemporary media environment is approached. This article aims to trace how this change has come to pass over the last 50 years. It argues that changes in the media environment are important, but also that cultural studies as an institutionalizing interdisciplinary project has changed. It identifies “the moment of popular culture” as a relatively short-lived but epoch-defining moment in cultural studies. This moment was subsequently displaced by a set of related yet different theoretical problematics that gradually moved the study of popular culture away from the popular. These displacements are: the hollowing out of the notion of the popular, as signaled early on by Meaghan Morris’ article “The Banality of Cultural Studies” in 1988; the institutionalization of cultural studies; the rise of the governmentality approach and a growing engagement with affect theory.
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Skyler White is a protagonist in the top-ranking television series Breaking Bad. She is also one of the most hated characters on television. This paper focuses on how the character of Skyler and Anna Gunn – the actor that plays her – are turned into a ‘composite celebrity’ in audience discussions. This is achieved by analysing threads on the social news website Reddit that specifically discuss Skyler. We discovered three main speaking positions: ‘savvy’ viewing; moral realism; and public shaming. This type of audience research may help further discussion on how celebrity culture is supported by neoliberal changes in the public sphere and caught up in the devaluation of professionalism and professional status – which, as will be shown, has especially dire consequences for professional women. Breaking Bad showcases predominantly masculine narratives. The derogation of its key female character therefore does not come as a surprise. However, a feminist defence of both the character and the actor – although a minority perspective – is also voiced. This article reveals how the interlinking fields of celebrity gossip and television criticism are a space of vibrant and sometimes frightening discussion in which a neo-conservative gender agenda is simultaneously asserted and contested
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