Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0004
P. Mountfort
Since practically the dawn of photography, there have been concerns over street photography’s invasive and potentially exploitive nature, from late nineteenth-century tropes of pests and “sneaky characters” trailing women in public parks to more recent panics over “camera fiends” and even state security warnings of the need to be vigilant of photographers potentially casing infrastructure for terrorist attacks. This article argues, using potted history and critical theory, that such straw-man arguments distract from the real dangers that the policing and curtailment of public photography pose, characteristic, as they are, of authoritarian regimes where control over taking and circulating images is an integral part of oppressive state and corporate apparatuses. Street photography’s implicit role in the construction of an archive of aesthetic and documentary value can be understood as a type of resistance to such threatened microfascisms.
{"title":"Defending the Candid Gaze: Theory, the Archive, and Depolicing Street Photography","authors":"P. Mountfort","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0004","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Since practically the dawn of photography, there have been concerns over street photography’s invasive and potentially exploitive nature, from late nineteenth-century tropes of pests and “sneaky characters” trailing women in public parks to more recent panics over “camera fiends” and even state security warnings of the need to be vigilant of photographers potentially casing infrastructure for terrorist attacks. This article argues, using potted history and critical theory, that such straw-man arguments distract from the real dangers that the policing and curtailment of public photography pose, characteristic, as they are, of authoritarian regimes where control over taking and circulating images is an integral part of oppressive state and corporate apparatuses. Street photography’s implicit role in the construction of an archive of aesthetic and documentary value can be understood as a type of resistance to such threatened microfascisms.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"40 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141849891","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0028
Feroza Jussawalla
Sam Bahadur, a new Indian biopic, captures the exceptionalism of Parsis in India, contextualizing it in the rise of exceptionalism in India. It contextualizes South Asian Indian exceptionalism in the context of American exceptionalism and the work of Giorgio Agamben, Donald Pease, George Fredrickson, and new Islamic and Muslim exceptionalisms.
{"title":"“Uncle Sam,” India’s Popular Culture Icon: Sam Bahadur","authors":"Feroza Jussawalla","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0028","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0028","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Sam Bahadur, a new Indian biopic, captures the exceptionalism of Parsis in India, contextualizing it in the rise of exceptionalism in India. It contextualizes South Asian Indian exceptionalism in the context of American exceptionalism and the work of Giorgio Agamben, Donald Pease, George Fredrickson, and new Islamic and Muslim exceptionalisms.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"241 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141840059","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0092
Saumya Sharma
In recent times, narratives of acid attack survivors have become common in the media (newspapers and magazines), showcasing them simultaneously as fashion models and victims of a heinous crime. In a similar vein, the Hindi film Chhapaak underscores the barbarity of an acid attack and the subsequent struggles for justice by the protagonist. Drawing on feminist critical discourse analysis and insights from Nancy Fraser on cannibal capitalism, this article analyzes the discursive construction of acid assault victims through select extracts from media articles and the film to highlight the politics of representation of the survivors and their ordeals against patriarchal and androcentric arrangements in society. Linguistic analysis (through speech acts, vocabulary, and presupposition) reveals contradictory discourses of celebration and discrimination in the media in relation to fashion, where the acid survivors are used not only to increase awareness about the offense but also to promote sales of garments. The discourses of rampant unemployment, gender-based oppression, and racial violence, despite laws regulating the sale of acid, underscore the cannibalizing tendencies of a capitalist society that seeks to devour and shun women after incapacitating them. Furthermore, the complicity of public agencies (legal, medical, and governmental) hints at apathy, callousness, and the systemic violence symptomatic of a profit-driven capitalist society.
{"title":"Politics and Violence in Representation of Acid Attack Victims in the Media: A Feminist Discursive Perspective","authors":"Saumya Sharma","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0092","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0092","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In recent times, narratives of acid attack survivors have become common in the media (newspapers and magazines), showcasing them simultaneously as fashion models and victims of a heinous crime. In a similar vein, the Hindi film Chhapaak underscores the barbarity of an acid attack and the subsequent struggles for justice by the protagonist. Drawing on feminist critical discourse analysis and insights from Nancy Fraser on cannibal capitalism, this article analyzes the discursive construction of acid assault victims through select extracts from media articles and the film to highlight the politics of representation of the survivors and their ordeals against patriarchal and androcentric arrangements in society. Linguistic analysis (through speech acts, vocabulary, and presupposition) reveals contradictory discourses of celebration and discrimination in the media in relation to fashion, where the acid survivors are used not only to increase awareness about the offense but also to promote sales of garments. The discourses of rampant unemployment, gender-based oppression, and racial violence, despite laws regulating the sale of acid, underscore the cannibalizing tendencies of a capitalist society that seeks to devour and shun women after incapacitating them. Furthermore, the complicity of public agencies (legal, medical, and governmental) hints at apathy, callousness, and the systemic violence symptomatic of a profit-driven capitalist society.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"80 11","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141844024","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0124
Tyla Stevenson
{"title":"Borderless Fashion Practice: Contemporary Fashion in the Metamodern Age, by Vanessa Gerrie","authors":"Tyla Stevenson","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0124","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0124","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"10 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141847060","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0119
Harriette Richards
{"title":"Rei Kawakubo: For and Against Fashion, edited by Rex Butler","authors":"Harriette Richards","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0119","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0119","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"1 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141839063","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0068
Shalini Mittal
Acid attack is a gender-based violence, the historical roots of which can be traced back to Victorian-era Britain and Europe. Over the years, acid emerged as a preferred choice of weapon in several other countries. The victims of acid violence are forced to live a life of suffering due to the resultant emotional and physical scars. By adopting an interdisciplinary approach and drawing on examples from literature, movies, and other media, the article will examine the popular culture portrayal of acid attack victims through the lens of Hall’s encoding/decoding model. It examines the ways in which narratives of acid attack victims are depicted and consumed by the public. Moreover, the article highlights the role of the popular media in challenging and perpetuating these narratives and the immense potential it holds to shape public discourse and policy surrounding human rights issues. The article discusses the human rights of the acid attack victims through the lens of Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach. Additionally, the article underscores the need for amplifying the voices and experiences of the acid attack victims in popular culture—thereby advocating for greater awareness, empathy, and activism.
{"title":"Acid Attack Survivors in Popular Culture and the Quest for Human Rights","authors":"Shalini Mittal","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0068","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0068","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Acid attack is a gender-based violence, the historical roots of which can be traced back to Victorian-era Britain and Europe. Over the years, acid emerged as a preferred choice of weapon in several other countries. The victims of acid violence are forced to live a life of suffering due to the resultant emotional and physical scars. By adopting an interdisciplinary approach and drawing on examples from literature, movies, and other media, the article will examine the popular culture portrayal of acid attack victims through the lens of Hall’s encoding/decoding model. It examines the ways in which narratives of acid attack victims are depicted and consumed by the public. Moreover, the article highlights the role of the popular media in challenging and perpetuating these narratives and the immense potential it holds to shape public discourse and policy surrounding human rights issues. The article discusses the human rights of the acid attack victims through the lens of Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach. Additionally, the article underscores the need for amplifying the voices and experiences of the acid attack victims in popular culture—thereby advocating for greater awareness, empathy, and activism.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"1 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141841358","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0044
O. P. Dwivedi, Lisa Lau
There is growing recognition that many university curricula are not necessarily fully fit for purpose in the twenty-first century, being elitist, narrow, and unrepresentative; lacking relevance to the students, lacking diversity, lacking inclusivity. However, ironically, given that Decolonizing the Curriculum (DTC) work is supposed to give prominence to othered knowledges, particularly that from the Global South, much DTC work is still being led from and by the West, by former empires/superpowers and former colonialists. In India, it appears universities have been slow to embrace DTC. This article therefore attempts to address this gap by turning our overdue attention to the situation in Indian academia, asking questions about universities’ and academics’ willingness to decolonize their curricula, and seeking to understand the current awareness and perceptions of and barriers to DTC in India.
{"title":"Are Indian Universities Decolonizing Their Curricula? Investigating Reasons for the Slow(er) Development of Decolonizing the Curriculum (DTC) in India","authors":"O. P. Dwivedi, Lisa Lau","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0044","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.9.1.0044","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 There is growing recognition that many university curricula are not necessarily fully fit for purpose in the twenty-first century, being elitist, narrow, and unrepresentative; lacking relevance to the students, lacking diversity, lacking inclusivity. However, ironically, given that Decolonizing the Curriculum (DTC) work is supposed to give prominence to othered knowledges, particularly that from the Global South, much DTC work is still being led from and by the West, by former empires/superpowers and former colonialists. In India, it appears universities have been slow to embrace DTC. This article therefore attempts to address this gap by turning our overdue attention to the situation in Indian academia, asking questions about universities’ and academics’ willingness to decolonize their curricula, and seeking to understand the current awareness and perceptions of and barriers to DTC in India.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"20 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141844927","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0195
Prerna Subramanian
This article delves into the portrayal of the relationship between indebted individuals and disposable time in the South Korean Netflix TV series Squid Game (2021–present). It argues that the show illustrates how the debt-ridden, so-called unproductive members of society are denied the right to have disposable time and are excluded from moments of play and leisure and denied escape from their perpetual debt cycle. The analysis focuses on two pivotal moments: the recruitment of Gi-Hun and the persuasion of Oh Il-Nam to participate in the deadly game. In the final episode, Oh Il-Nam is revealed as the wealthy mastermind behind the Squid Game, highlighting the rich’s exploitation of the indebted individuals’ time for their own leisure and profit. The article concludes by suggesting an alternative perspective: considering time as stolen rather than wasted, prompting further contemplation on the complex dynamics of power, time, and exploitation depicted in Squid Game.
{"title":"Wasted or Stolen Time: Squid Game, Debt, and Dispossession of Time","authors":"Prerna Subramanian","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0195","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0195","url":null,"abstract":"This article delves into the portrayal of the relationship between indebted individuals and disposable time in the South Korean Netflix TV series Squid Game (2021–present). It argues that the show illustrates how the debt-ridden, so-called unproductive members of society are denied the right to have disposable time and are excluded from moments of play and leisure and denied escape from their perpetual debt cycle. The analysis focuses on two pivotal moments: the recruitment of Gi-Hun and the persuasion of Oh Il-Nam to participate in the deadly game. In the final episode, Oh Il-Nam is revealed as the wealthy mastermind behind the Squid Game, highlighting the rich’s exploitation of the indebted individuals’ time for their own leisure and profit. The article concludes by suggesting an alternative perspective: considering time as stolen rather than wasted, prompting further contemplation on the complex dynamics of power, time, and exploitation depicted in Squid Game.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2023-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139297350","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0251
Alba Sanz Álvarez
{"title":"Memories of Dress: Recollections of Material Identities, edited by Alison Slater, Susan Atkin, and Elizabeth Kealy-Morris","authors":"Alba Sanz Álvarez","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0251","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0251","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"52 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2023-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139294555","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-01DOI: 10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0173
Binayak Roy, Debanjali Dutta
Satyajit Ray’s faith in the integrity of his middle-class protagonists and his philosophical detachment coupled with his aesthetics of contemplation have often been brutally criticized by his Marxist critics. They have accused Ray of being a bourgeois humanist, a political effete without any specific ideology, estranged from tackling pressing contemporary social and political issues. The article attempts to trace Ray’s thoughts on cinema and analyze how his films, even those that seem to be fantasies, are not situated in a rarefied atmosphere but are determined by a number of sociopolitical events that intersect and interact in myriad ways. A ghost story by Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury, provided the filmmaker with the perfect narrative trope to critique what he considered the germs of contemporary social and political conditions, the vantage point from which his allegory could address not only the contemporary scenario but also the distant future. In his fantasy-based musicals Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne (The Adventures of Goopy and Bagha, 1969) and Hirak Rajar Deshe (The Kingdom of Diamonds, 1980), Ray decided to be at his subversive best. These films based on magic realism were not simply departures from his neo-realistic narratives but also veiled satires that indicted the establishment.
{"title":"“Fantasy as Subversion”: Ray, Totalitarianism, and “Dissensus”","authors":"Binayak Roy, Debanjali Dutta","doi":"10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0173","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/jasiapacipopcult.8.2.0173","url":null,"abstract":"Satyajit Ray’s faith in the integrity of his middle-class protagonists and his philosophical detachment coupled with his aesthetics of contemplation have often been brutally criticized by his Marxist critics. They have accused Ray of being a bourgeois humanist, a political effete without any specific ideology, estranged from tackling pressing contemporary social and political issues. The article attempts to trace Ray’s thoughts on cinema and analyze how his films, even those that seem to be fantasies, are not situated in a rarefied atmosphere but are determined by a number of sociopolitical events that intersect and interact in myriad ways. A ghost story by Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury, provided the filmmaker with the perfect narrative trope to critique what he considered the germs of contemporary social and political conditions, the vantage point from which his allegory could address not only the contemporary scenario but also the distant future. In his fantasy-based musicals Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne (The Adventures of Goopy and Bagha, 1969) and Hirak Rajar Deshe (The Kingdom of Diamonds, 1980), Ray decided to be at his subversive best. These films based on magic realism were not simply departures from his neo-realistic narratives but also veiled satires that indicted the establishment.","PeriodicalId":40211,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2023-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139296266","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：