scholarly journals Into the Interior of Cultural Affiliations: Joan Anim Addo’s Imoinda and the Creolization of Modernity

2015 ◽  
pp. 62
Author(s):  
Mina Karavanta
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Dominant Culture ◽  
Caribbean Diaspora ◽  
Plantation Economy ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
A Site ◽  
British Culture

If creolization was represented as the property of the postcolonial world, the sign of hyphenated cultures emerging from the slave plantation economy and the slave trade, it has become a concept that names the transformation of the dominant cultures from within the other “minor” cultures and histories with which they have been living. Creolization emerges as the urgency to develop new concepts and disseminate “contrapuntal” and “affiliated” histories (Said) in order not only to narrate the Caribbean diaspora but also the social, political, and historical development of a wider British culture. In this light, this essay examines Imoinda: Or She Who Will Lose Her Name as a text that mediates between cultures represented as oppositional and operates as a site where their discrepant histories are translated, written anew, and rethought. The text as a site of translation and affiliation of different aesthetics, genres and traditions represents a new poetics of the human whose history is now narrated by the formerly dispossessed and expropriated other. The history of imperialism and slavery narrated of imperialism and slavery is an old narration but its telling is new for it generates new ways of understanding this history in the present where constituencies and communities of different cultural practices, often speaking different languages while sharing the language(s) of the dominant culture, are called forth to live together and live well.

scholarly journals Χορευτική-μουσική ταυτότητα και ετερότητα

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Χρήστος Παπακώστας
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Professional Activity ◽  
Collective Identities ◽  
Theory Of Practice ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Positive Perspective ◽  
The Times ◽  
Dynamic Quality

The present dissertation aims at studying dancing and music and the relationship between these two forms of culture in the construction of the cultural identity of the Roma in Heracleia of the Prefecture of Serres. Nowadays, Heracleia is a town with 4,000 residents. Its population has a mixed ethnological composition: Vlachs, natives (Greek speakers, and Slavic speakers), refugees, Sarakachans, Roma and Gypsies. In the past Heracleia was known as Tzumaya and was flourishing both financially and culturally thanks to its geographical position in the times of the Ottoman Empire and thanks to its famous bazaar. Thus, for a more complete understanding of the changes and transitions that took place it is significant to embody history as a new fundamental framework of interpretation. An important research tool for the accentuation of the principal arguments of thedissertation is the space. In this specific experiential paradigm the construction of identities and the distinction between the ethnic groups is also reflected on the organization of space. The neighborhood, the space of the Roma(sedentary gypsies), is juxtaposed to the respective neighborhood of the Vlachs, the market. Thus, the space is not only examined a “geography” but as a historical and dynamic category connected and interacting with culture. The dynamic quality of dancing and music, the ethnic mosaic and the history of Heracleia and the neighboring area as well as the continuous mobility of the Roma musicians invites us to investigate if there is actually a total isomorphism of space and culture. Music and dancing are not seen as static and fixed cultural phenomena but as historical, dynamic and fluid categories that are the object of negotiation of collective identities and variants. Dancing and music are simultaneously products and processes and do not merely reflect the social structures but are closely related to the cultural identity of a group. For the transgression of the dichotomy structure/action we adopt the theory of practice (Bourdieu 1977). In this way, dancing and music become cultural practices, by which the Roma of Heracleia handle their cultural identity in any historical conditions. Especially in the case of the Roma, this approach is even more helpful, because, as a social group with a low social status, within music and dancing they are given the chance to re-determine their identity in relation to the others. That is to say that by applying various practices of resistance, acquiescence, conflict and acceptance, they attempt to give a positive perspective to their cultural identity. In the framework of this dissertation the dancing phenomenon in the neighbourhood of the Roma and the music, as a prominent form of their professional activity, are examined.

scholarly journals First occupants: the erosion of indigenous sovereignty through legal narratives

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Taylor MacLean
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Court System ◽  
Land Claim ◽  
Indigenous Nations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Legal Narratives ◽  
History Of ◽  
Indigenous Sovereignty

Land claim cases within Canada have yielded mostly small wins for Indigenous nations. While certain cases represent success in reinstating rights to cultural practices, granting certain levels of autonomy, and acknowledging rights to land use for culturally relevant activities, overriding sovereignty rests with Canada. Even land claim cases deemed successful are still adjudicated within the Canadian court system, and it is the nation-state of Canada that determines the validity of Indigenous claims to traditional territories. In this paper, I explore the discursive and narrative devices utilized within judicial rulings that uphold Crown sovereignty and deny Indigenous sovereignty. I argue that Indigenous sovereignty is undermined in legal discourse through the use of concealed narrative acts, which serve to sterilize racialized legal doctrines and distort the social and political history of relations between Indigenous nations and the Crown.

scholarly journals 7000 years of turnover: historical contingency and human niche construction shape the Caribbean's Anthropocene biota

2020 ◽  
Vol 287 (1927) ◽  
pp. 20200447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa E. Kemp ◽  
Alexis M. Mychajliw ◽  
Jenna Wadman ◽  
Amy Goldberg
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Biodiversity Loss ◽  
Modern Human ◽  
Priority Effects ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Historical Contingency ◽  
Spatial And Temporal Patterns ◽  
Species Introductions ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Caribbean

The human-mediated movement of species across biogeographic boundaries—whether intentional or accidental—is dramatically reshaping the modern world. Yet humans have been reshaping ecosystems and translocating species for millennia, and acknowledging the deeper roots of these phenomena is important for contextualizing present-day biodiversity loss, ecosystem functioning and management needs. Here, we present the first database of terrestrial vertebrate species introductions spanning the entire anthropogenic history of a system: the Caribbean. We employ this approximately 7000-year dataset to assess the roles of historical contingency and priority effects in shaping present-day community structure and conservation outcomes, finding that serial human colonization events contributed to habitat modifications and species extinctions that shaped the trajectories of subsequent species introductions by other human groups. We contextualized spatial and temporal patterns of species introductions within cultural practices and population histories of Indigenous, colonial and modern human societies, and show that the taxonomic and biogeographic diversity of introduced species reflects diversifying reasons for species introductions through time. Recognition of the complex social and economic structures across the 7000-year human history of the Caribbean provides the necessary context for interpreting the formation of an Anthropocene biota.

scholarly journals Care and affective relations: Social justice and sociology

2020 ◽  
pp. 003802612095274
Author(s):  
Kathleen Lynch ◽  
Manolis Kalaitzake ◽  
Margaret Crean
Keyword(s):  
Public Discourse ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Dominant Culture ◽  
The Social ◽  
Egalitarian Theory ◽  
A Site ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Status Recognition ◽  
Affective Relations

This article examines the ways in which the care-indifferent and gendered character of much political egalitarian theory has contributed to a disregard for the care-relational dimensions of social injustice within the social sciences. It demonstrates how the lack of in-depth engagement with affective relations of love, care and solidarity has contributed to an underestimation of their pivotal role in generating injustices in the production of people in their humanity. While humans are political, economic and cultural beings, they are also what Tronto has termed homines curans. Yet, care, in its multiple manifestations, is treated as a kind of ‘cultural residual’, an area of human life that the dominant culture neglects, represses and cannot even recognize for its political salience. If sociology takes the issue of relational justice as seriously as it takes issues of redistribution, recognition and political representation, this would provide an intellectual avenue for advancing scholarship that recognizes that much of life is lived, and injustices are generated, outside the market, formal politics and public culture. A new sociology of affective care relations could enhance a normatively-led sociology of inequality, that is distinguishable from, but intersecting with, a sociology of inequality based on class (redistribution), status (recognition) and power (representation). It would also help change public discourse about politics by making affective in/justices visible intellectually and politically, and in so doing, identifying ways in which they could be a site of resistance to capitalist values and processes.

Harbouring Traditions in East Timor: Marginality in a Lowland Entrepôt

2007 ◽  
Vol 41 (6) ◽  
pp. 1113-1143 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANDREW McWILLIAM
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Global Market ◽  
East Timor ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Trade Networks ◽  
Indonesian Archipelago ◽  
The Social ◽  
Timor Leste ◽  
History Of

Drawing on the literature of networks and marginality, this paper explores the social history of the small trading port of Com on the northeast coast of Timor. Com's marginality, as I define it, is constituted as a remote outpost of inter-island and trans-local trade networks of the Indonesian archipelago, and reproduced in its contemporary isolation from centres of economic power and processes of the global market. The paper draws on narrative traditions and documentary evidence to chart Com's fluctuating historical fortunes and contemporary cultural practices. In the fragile post-independence environment of Timor Leste, the resident population of Com is once again looking towards a creative engagement with external others in the hope of renewed prosperity.

scholarly journals CHANGE AND EMPOWERMENT IN THE CULT OF GUAN GONG IN SOUTHERN VIETNAM

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (27) ◽  
pp. 56-69
Author(s):  
Tho Ngoc Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Driving Forces ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Southern Vietnam ◽  
Vietnamese History ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cultural Exchanges ◽  
Development Change ◽  
History Of

Cultural practice is a kind of expression and reflection of real livelihood into human mind and experience, is a set of knowledge, values, faiths and social standards constructed by the whole community; therefore, it contains the rhythm and breath of life and can be changed to meet the demands. Regarding socialenvironment, the communities always keep going on the processes of developing and diversifying their culture through acculturation, exchange and localization, which finally constructs the social norms, goals and driving forces for their advancement. Among various approaches and methodologies, the change in  empowerment in cultural practices actively offers the optimized values in functional standardization and implementation. The final value is undoubtedly the social capital. This research is to investigate the introduction, development, change and empowerment of the Chinese-rooted Guan Gong belief in Vietnam, through which emphasizes the process and nature of the cult during the deep absorption in Vietnamese history of anti-foreign invasions throughout the last two centuries, and enriches local values of a characteristic belief and a symbolic icon of multicultural exchanges in Vietnam, especially in the Southern region. Thispaper applies the theories of deconstruction and empowerment under cultural studies perspective in order to analyze and explain the processes of  deconstruction, restructuring and empowerment in the cult of Guan Gong in Southern Vietnam as well as extract the regular principle of cultural exchanges locally.

Ideology, Chiefly Power, and Material Culture: An Example from the Greater Antilles

1996 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 114-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Antonio Curet
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Puerto Rican ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Cultural Groups ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Caribbean

AbstractTemporal changes in material culture normally have been used by archaeologists to reconstruct the cultural history of an area or site. In the case of the Caribbean, shifts in artifactual style have been used to trace prehistoric migrations and interactions between different cultural groups. Unfortunately, there have been few attempts to explain these changes in terms of the social structures of these cultures. This paper reviews the archaeological evidence for cultural change in eastern Puerto Rico and proposes a model to explain it. Basically, the model suggests that changes in material culture in Puerto Rican prehistory are related to the development of social complexity. Shifts in decoration and types of artifacts are seen as an attempt by elite groups to have greater control over the symbolism represented in the artifacts in order to acquire and maintain their power. These changes are not abrupt, but gradual, as social organization evolves from simple to more complex chiefdoms.

Gender and Ottoman Social History

2014 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 379-381 ◽  
Author(s):  
Başak Tuğ
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Social History ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
One Dimensional ◽  
Western Modernity ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Past Experiences

Starting with Said's critique of Orientalism but going well beyond it, poststructuralist and postcolonial critiques of modernity have challenged not only one-dimensional visions of Western modernity—by “multiplying” or “alternating” it with different modernities—but also the binaries between the modern and the traditional/premodern/early modern, thus resulting in novel, more inclusive ways of thinking about past experiences. Yet, while scholars working on the Middle East have successfully struggled against the Orientalist perception of the Middle East asthetradition constructed in opposition to the Western modern, they often have difficulties in deconstructing the traditionwithin, that is, the premodern past. They have traced the alternative and multiple forms of modernities in Middle Eastern geography within the temporal borders of “modernity.” However, going beyond this temporality and constructing new concepts—beyond the notion of tradition—to understand the specificities of past experiences (which are still in relationship with the present) remains underdeveloped in the social history of the Middle East.

‘SLOW REVOLUTION’ IN SOUTHERN AFRICA: HOUSEHOLD BIOSOCIAL REPRODUCTION AND REGIONAL ENTANGLEMENTS IN THE HISTORY OF CATTLE-KEEPING AMONG NGUNI-SPEAKERS, NINTH TO THIRTEENTH CENTURY CE

2020 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raevin Jimenez
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Young Men ◽  
Broad Context ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of

AbstractIn the eleventh to thirteenth century, Southern African Nguni-speakers made a counterintuitive choice to begin investing in large herds of cattle. Despite a long-standing knowledge of cattle, the earliest Nguni-speakers did not take to cattle-keeping as a way of life. Rather, the transition came as the result of changing social circumstances as households sought to manage the lifecycles of young men and reliably exploit their labor through gendered and generational expectations of decorum. Nguni-speakers grounded new concepts about cattle in older practices and norms regarding the social reproduction of young men. Agropastoralists situated cattle-keeping among the obligations young men faced after passing through initiation, giving cattle local salience. The transformation unfolded in gendered and generational household choices, but was shaped by the broad context of an increasingly interconnected Southern Africa.

The Polis as Rhetorical Community

1993 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 211-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolyn R. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
The Social ◽  
Rhetorical Community ◽  
History Of ◽  
A Site

Abstract: Although “community” has become an important critical concept in contemporary rhetoric, it is only implicit in ancient rhetorics. In the rhetorical thought of the sophists, Plato, and Aristotle, the polis stands as a presupposition that was both fundamental and troublesome. Various relationships between the faculty of speech and the social order are revealed in different tellings of the history of civilization by Protagoras, Plato, and Aristotle, as well as in more formal discussions of rhetoric and politics. These ancient disagreements about the nature of community can help us reformulate the current debate between liberalism and communitarianism. A rhetorical community as a site of contention can be both pluralist and normative.

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