School of Culture and Communication - Research Publications
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ItemArchitectures of the senses: neo-baroque entertainment spectacles(MIT Press, 2003)It was sometime in November 2000. I was walking along an Arabian street, taking in the rhythms of the arabesque decorations and the spectacular, multi-colored buildings; being entertained by the exotic street musicians; and occasionally being lured into various bazaars that offered the temptations of products ranging from Persian rugs and glassware, to Versace gowns and DKNY accessories. At one point, I found myself at a pier. I looked up at the sky and, while soft, fluffy clouds punctured its blue (yet somewhat solid) surface, it seemed like it was going to be a beautiful day. But what do I know? No sooner had I thought this than the rumbling sounds of thunder vibrated through the air and flashes of lightning lit up the now-transformed dark and ominous clouds. And the rain came pouring down, creating restless ripples in the previously still waters near the pier. So I left Arabia and walked across the road to Lake Como, where I took in the sights of the palazzo Bellagio as it stood majestically in the background. Initially, the enormous lake reflected the palazzo in its tranquil waters, then thousands of small tubes began to puncture its surface, and the first bars of music suddenly filled this vast space. I recognized the tune Frank Sinatra's "Lady Luck" - and it was, indeed, a toe-tapper. As hundreds flocked around balconies overlooking the lake, the lake's water began to magically take on a life of its own: spurts of water swayed left and right, back and forth in perfect unison with the rhythms of Sinatra's crooning. And the audience continued to look on, mesmerized by the spectacle they witnessed, astounded by the rhythmic motions of water, which included stretches of up to fifty meters erupting to heights that exceeded one hundred meters.
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ItemGothic fiction: introduction(Adam Matthew Publications, 2003)It seems appropriate that the Sadleir-Black collection of Gothic fictions, a genre peppered with illicit passions, should be described by its progenitor as the fruit of lust. Michael Sadleir (1888-1957), the person who cultivated this passion, was a noted bibliographer, book collector, publisher and creative writer. Educated at Rugby and Balliol College, Oxford, Sadleir joined the office of the publishers Constable and Company in 1912, becoming Director in 1920. He published seven reasonably successful novels; important biographical studies of Trollope, Edward and Rosina Bulwer, and Lady Blessington; and a number of ground-breaking bibliographical works, most significantly Excursions in Victorian Bibliography (1922) and XIX Century Fiction (1951). According to Sadleir, the roots of his "mania" for Gothic Romance lay in his "youthful enthusiasm" for Baudelaire and Mallarmé. These writers were "profound admirers of Edgar Allan Poe". Following in their footsteps, Sadleir read Poe's gothic stories and so was led to "the work of Charles Brockden Brown; and from Brown to the English, German and French romances of the 'Terror' school".
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ItemVive L’Amour: eloquent emptiness(British Film Institute, 2003)Vive L’Amour (Tsai Ming-liang, 1994), winner of the Golden Lion at the 1994 Venice International Film Festival, is the second part in a three-part film-cycle by Tsai Ming-liang, the Malaysian-born art-house director working from Taiwan. Following Rebels of the Neon God (Tsai Ming-liang, 1992) and preceding The River (Tsai Ming-liang, 1996), Amour contributes to Tsai’s ongoing filmic exploration of the conditions of human subsistence in millennial Taipei. His films’ settings amid the city’s dismal concrete and neon streetscapes, their minimalist stories of the aimless days and nights of drifting, marginal characters and their austere cinematic style have earned Tsai his name as filmic philosopher of existential anxiety in post-‘economic miracle’ Taiwan.
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ItemIntroduction(Hodder Arnold, 2003)Before you begin reading this book, take a moment to think about its title: Interpreting Everyday Culture. What kind of project does this title suggest? What’s the definition of ‘everyday’, and what sort of ‘culture’ might characterize it? And, whatever definition we agree on, is ‘everyday culture’, in any case, amenable to interpretation? Or does the very ordinariness and taken-for-grantedness of the culture of our day-to-day lives make it inherently resistant to academic elucidation? Evidently, since you hold in your hands an entire book written by us on this subject, we’re going to try to convince you that there is indeed much to be gained from subjecting everyday culture to intellectual scrutiny. But we want to start out by drawing your attention to what a strange, slippery, and paradoxical concept ‘everyday culture’ is, despite its deceptive obviousness. Consequently, the interpretation of everyday culture is often a counterintuitive -even unsettling- endeavour. But in the pages that follow, we hope to show you how it’s also a very rewarding project, one that can lead to unexpected and illuminating insight into the surprisingly complex significance of all the things we do, day after day, while barely noticing that we’re doing them.
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ItemPaging ‘New Asia’: sambal is a feedback loop, coconut is a code, rice is a system(Duke University Press, 2003)The issue of sexuality in Singapore is an ambivalent discourse that crosses the borders between prohibition and endorsement, official and unofficial and private and public. On one level, homosexuality is prohibited and consensual same-sex desires are punishable as criminal offences. On another level, transgenderism is endorsed by the discourses of biology and medicine, and sanctioned (albeit unofficially) through state support and policy. This ambiguity manifests itself in numerous aspects of Singapore’s cultural location within both Asia and the West, and is exemplified also in recent discourse about New Asia. This chapter will investigate the culture of such an ambiguity by examining the consumption practices of computer-mediated communication (CMC) technology by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities in Singapore cyberspace.
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ItemIntroduction: Taiwan's literature of transgressive sexuality(University of Hawaii Press, 2003)This collection presents ten key texts of 1990s tongzhi wenxue for the first time in English translation. Like the commentaries that accompany the translations, this Introduction attempts to position tongzhi wenxue in relation to its role within the broader transformation in public discourse on sexualities in 1990s Taiwan.
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ItemFiona Foley. Silent witness?(Humanities Research Centre, ANU, 2003)Of course Fiona Foley is a witness! In one sense her work is all about determined efforts of remembering – bearing witness to both specific instances and pan-Aboriginal experiences of colonialism – and refusing to remain silent. I want to consider and elaborate this characterisation as relevant to what I’ll call Foley’s historical art works. But I also want to take Fiona Foley’s art as an incitement to ask some different questions: What is witnessing? How have Aboriginal people been called upon to bear witness? What are the relationships between silence and witnessing? What kinds of connections can be made between witnessing, human rights and other kinds of rights: rights to knowledge, to land or perhaps even silence?