Five artists' valuations of the visual

Abstract

This paper comprises interviews with five practising artists: Terry Atkinson, Torie Begg, Rebecca Fortnum, Lubaina Himid, and James Hugonin. The aim is to gauge the ways in which ‘the visual’ features in contemporary fine art practice, not only at the end of a century in which the visual ‐ at least for much of the first half of that century ‐ was often accorded special status, but also, more recently, after Conceptualism and radical egalitarian interventions have challenged the status of and assumptions about the value of the visual. All five artists were asked the same questions: What/who are the formative influences on your work?; What role does the visual play in your work ‐ to what extent do you value the visual?; Can you say something about (i) aesthetic and (ii) pleasure ‐ however you define them?; How does a work evolve?; How do you define quality ‐ what makes you think one of your works is better than another?; What is the spectator's relationship to your work? ‐ what role does the spectator have? The responses bear witness to significantly different ways in which contemporary artists value the visual.     

“You Don't Get to Sing a Song When You Have Nothing to Say”: Oliver Mtukudzi's Music as a Vehicle for Socio-Political Commentary

Abstract

Oliver Mtukudzi's music is known for both its musicality and because it addresses social and political issues. Mtukudzi uses his music to tackle the political realities of Zimbabwe and issues related to AIDS, gender and street children. The use of riddles and innuendo is common within Shona music and it is these tools that Mtukudzi uses to deal with these issues that are not commonly addressed by many other musicians. This article analyses his lyrics and music to examine these particular issues. Particular attention is paid to music because the embedded subtexts of music help to illuminate the subtexts of the lyrics.     

Express yourself! A student's experience of running a movement improvisation workshop

This paper is an account of a social work student's experience running an improvisation workshop whilst on placement in a children's residential home. It describes the ways in which children were able to use movement and music in a spontaneous and unstructured manner to express their emotions, and how the improvised use of music can enable children to relate to, and understand, their experience.     

A river revitalization: Seen through the lens of local community members

This article provides insight into a revitalization project of a river near Basle in Switzerland. The authors conducted an evaluation study to investigate the river revitalization from a social point of view. How do people, who spend their spare time there or who live near by, perceive and evaluate the changes? What does the revitalization mean to them? Do they support the nature‐preserving intentions? Might the ecological ambitions oppose behavioral habits and social life at the riverside? The research project included a visual part: visitors were first asked to take Polaroid photographs of what they liked and what they disliked about the locality. In a second step, they explained their pictures and their reasons for taking them. The article presents and analyses the visual and the verbal data. A nature‐oriented and ecological perspective emerges as but one of many ways visitors experience the area. Social and aesthetic arguments are prominent in the photographs and in the verbal evaluation of the revitalization project.     

The musical composition of social reality? Music,action and reflexivity1

Developments in the sociology of music during the 1980s have brought the sub-field more firmly in to the center of sociological concerns, The ‘worlds’ concept, and the concern with music and social status have helped to ground and specify links between music and society. Meanwhile however, questions concerning music's social content have been sidelined. This paper explores music as an active ingredient in the constitution of lived experience. As with other cultural/technical forms, music provides a resource for the articulation of thought and activity. Bodily conduct and movement, the experience of time, and social character within opera are used to illustrate this point. Recent developments in feminist music analysis have been suggestive for the ways in which music metaphorizes social processes and categories of being. These developments can enrich the sociology of music. However, as with all attempts to ‘read’ music's social content, they should be conceived as claims made by analysts who are themselves engaged in social projects. Analytical readings of music have no a priori claim of privilege. A constructivist sociology of music should therefore be devoted to the question of how specific music users forge links between musical significance and social life. A sociology of the construction and deployment of musical realities is capable of avoiding the naive positivism otherwise implicit in attempts to ‘read’ music's social content.     

The algorithmic imaginary: exploring the ordinary affects of Facebook algorithms

ABSTRACT

This article reflects the kinds of situations and spaces where people and algorithms meet. In what situations do people become aware of algorithms? How do they experience and make sense of these algorithms, given their often hidden and invisible nature? To what extent does an awareness of algorithms affect people's use of these platforms, if at all? To help answer these questions, this article examines people's personal stories about the Facebook algorithm through tweets and interviews with 25 ordinary users. To understand the spaces where people and algorithms meet, this article develops the notion of the algorithmic imaginary. It is argued that the algorithmic imaginary – ways of thinking about what algorithms are, what they should be and how they function – is not just productive of different moods and sensations but plays a generative role in moulding the Facebook algorithm itself. Examining how algorithms make people feel, then, seems crucial if we want to understand their social power.     

Freirian Codifications and Social Work Education

Abstract

Although social workers have been writing about the significance of the Freirian framework for decades, a gap exists in the social work literature on Freirian conscientization—Freire's term for the ongoing learning process involved in co-learning. This article attempts to fill that gap by outlining an approach to training students that will enable them to facilitate conscientization. The approach involves the construction and use of politicizing pictures, which Freire called “codifications”. The author describes Freire's method and gives detailed guidance on how to provide training suitable for social work students. The benefits for social work students with this training are that they will be better able to facilitate reflection and abstraction, will become more sensitive to different oppressed groups, and will become more dialogical.     

Terms for Intergenerational Relations Among the Tumbuka of Northern Malawi

ABSTRACT

Culturally enshrined ideas about generational relations affect language, the use of language, and linguistic conventions for expressing these ideas. Generation terms (or age-set terms) distinguish people in the social group according to their age and sex. The age set is a formally organized group of youths, or men or women which has collectively passed through a series of stages each of which has distinctive status, ceremonial, military or other activities. Membership of the group frequently involves ritual in initiation, accompanied by special teaching of the community's law and customs, instructions in sexual matters, and, in some societies, physical initiation that is the mark of attainment of maturity. But how is the system of intergenerational relationship manifested in a particular social group? How do the members of each generation use language differently? How does language treat the generations differently? How do such differences affect our perceptions, attitudes and behavior in everyday life? How do language and behavior reflect unity of the generation groups and their relationship to each other? In this paper we are going to examine the social, cultural, and linguistic characteristics that focus on features common to members of a particular generation and account for its relationship to other generations. We will do this by looking at the Tumbuka of northern Malawi, and examining their social organization and the system of terms and social behavior that is employed in addressing and referring to members of a particular generation. The learning of generation-type language by children and cross-cultural aspects of these questions will be considered.     

To belong or not to belong: some self-conceptual and behavioural consequences of identity uncertainty / Pertenecer o no pertenecer: algunas consecuencias de la incertidumbre identitaria en el autoconcepto y en el comportamiento

Abstract

How does identity uncertainty affect the extent and way in which people identify with and define themselves in terms of prototypical group attributes? According to uncertainty-identity theory feelings of uncertainty about oneself and one’s identity are a powerful motive for identifying with and defining oneself in terms of a social group, particularly one that is a distinctive and clearly defined entity that furnishes a consensual group prototype. In this article I overview uncertainty-identity theory and some of its key findings, with a particular focus on how uncertainty-identity processes can produce extremism — zealous identification with and attachment to autocratically led, normatively homogeneous groups that are pronouncedly ethnocentric and intolerant of dissent. I also explore uncertainty-identity contexts in which groups may break apart and where people may be reticent about identifying with highly entitative groups — a discussion of marginalization, exclusion and schism.     

Mothers behaving badly: chaotic hedonism and the crisis of neoliberal social reproduction

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the significance of the plethora of representations of mothers ‘behaving badly’ in contemporary anglophone media texts, including the films Bad Moms, Fun Mom Dinner and Bad Mom’s Christmas, the book and online cartoons Hurrah for Gin and the recent TV comedy dramas Motherland, The Let Down and Catastrophe. All these media texts include representations of, first, mothers in the midst of highly chaotic everyday spaces where any smooth routine of domesticity is conspicuous by its absence; and second, mothers behaving hedonistically, usually through drinking and partying, behaviour that is more conventionally associated with men or women without children. After identifying the social type of the mother behaving badly (MBB), the article locates and analyses it in relation to several different social and cultural contexts. These contexts are: a neoliberal crisis in social reproduction marked by inequality and overwork; the continual if contested role of women as ‘foundation parents’; and the negotiation of longer-term discourses of female hedonism. The title gestures towards a popular British sitcom of the 1990s, Men Behaving Badly, which popularized the idea of the ‘new lad’; and this article suggests that the new lad’s counterpart, the ladette, is mutating into the mother behaving badly, or the ‘lad mom’. Asking what work this figure does now, in a later neoliberal context, it argues that the mother behaving badly is simultaneously indicative of a widening and liberating range of maternal subject positions and symptomatic of a profound contemporary crisis in social reproduction. By focusing on the classed and racialised dynamics of the MBB – by examining who exactly is permitted to be hedonistic, and how – and by considering the MBB’s limited and partial imagining of progressive social change, the article concludes by emphasizing the urgency of creating more connections between such discourses and ‘parents behaving politically’.     

Research as part of everyday practice: A finishing student's experience

Abstract

While social work education has come a long way, some of the most valuable lessons are learnt not in the class but in the field. This article explores the relationship between the practice of research and social work practice through my struggles within my final social work placement. How does one come to terms with the relationship between everyday social work practice and the practice of research? How does one reconcile what many see as a gap between research and the practice of social work? Is it possible to incorporate research into everyday practice? In the end it must be argued that both have comparable underlying goals and follow almost identical processes. In many ways a researcher carries out similar investigations utilising similar skills as those of a social worker. Thus being skilled in research and being able to integrate research into everyday practice will produce a better social worker.     

Changing Attitudes to ‘Passing For White’ in an Urban Coloured Community

The paper suggests a framework for the comparative study of the situations in South Africa and Northern Ireland. It builds on John Rex's view of a race relations situation and compares both the overt practices of discrimination and also the inner perceptions and interpretations of the participants. One aim is to establish, for these two areas, whether the decisive causes of the intractable character of the conflicts lie in the economic and political conditions which obtain or in the way these situations are perceived and understood by the groups in them. Another aim is to suggest how the differences between South Africa and Northern Ireland ‐ in both the practice of inequality and also in the racist or sectarian ideology used to justify it ‐ might or might not make for a peaceful resolution of the conflicts.     

The Spiritual Reality: A Christian World View

SUMMARY

Every human being must answer the question, does God exist? If the answer is no, God does not exist, the follow-up question is, where or how will I anchor myself in life? If the answer is yes God exists, the follow-up question must be, what is God's nature? To acknowledge that God exists and not seek God's nature is to ignore that which we ourselves believe created and rules the universe. The Christian World View addresses the nature of God from a very specific perspective. It is a perspective that organizes the lives of many of our clients. In this article the author presents a non-theological summary of the Christian spiritual perspective and relates some of the main Christian beliefs to family systems thinking as well as to implications for practice.     

Value of “haafu” as a Category in Education Research

This paper examines the importance of better recognizing and representing haafu students in Japanese education policies by using Fraser's tripartite theory of social justice. In today's transnational Japan, there has been a remarkable increase in the number of haafu, a term used in reference to children with Japanese and non‐Japanese parents. However, the educational experiences of haafu children have not been adequately investigated by researchers and the government for education policies. Central to these arguments are concerns that haafu children occupy a liminal space, and hence are potentially educationally “at risk.” They are generally viewed as Japanese because of their nationality and are expected to perform like the majority of Japanese students with two Japanese parents due to their familiarity with Japanese culture. Yet, in practice there is a paradox that haafu students might be marginalized as a consequence of being viewed as not Japanese enough. In this context, how should public education respond to an increasingly culturally diverse student body? This paper argues why there is a need for public education, its policy and practices to more effectively recognize, represent and redistribute resources ‐ as Fraser frames the three dimensions of social justice ‐ in support of these students.     

“Anyone Can Be a Lesbian”

ABSTRACT

An overview of the history, politics, and marketing of the 1970s lesbian-feminist music movement. This article addresses the specific audience created by and receptive to the women's music “sound” and message, and examines some of the backlash and critique concerning the meaning and application of a separatist message. Artists' responses to questions of women-only space and coalition building are included in the analysis of concert and recording politics.     

Black Edens,country Eves: Listening,performance, and black queer longing in country music

ABSTRACT

This article explores Black queer country music listening, performance, and fandom as a source of pleasure, nostalgia, and longing for Black listeners. Country music can be a space for alliance and community, as well as a way of accessing sometimes repressed cultural and personal histories of violence: lynching and other forms of racial terror, gender surveillance and disciplining, and continued racial and economic segregation. For many Black country music listeners and performers, the experience of being a closeted fan also fosters an experience of ideological hailing, as well as queer world-making. Royster suggests that through Black queer country music fandom and performance, fans construct risky and soulful identities. The article uses Tina Turner's solo album, Tina Turns the Country On! (1974) as an example of country music's power as a tool for resistance to racial, sexual, and class disciplining.     

Social workers and intercultural mediators: challenges for collaboration and intercultural awareness

ABSTRACT

Social work in Europe is facing numerous challenges in terms of promoting the participation of migrants and their descendants in super-diverse societies. This study investigates collaboration between social workers and intercultural mediators based on international debate and fieldwork in Italy. Does social work require collaboration with other professions specialised in intercultural relations? What are the characteristics of intercultural professionals? What are the pros and cons of collaboration between social workers and intercultural mediators? This study shows that local social services need to work with intercultural mediators, allowing local social services to implement various strategies for tackling cultural and linguistic barriers with their clients and rely on professionals inside or outside their own. Furthermore, intercultural mediators tend to have weak and heterogeneous training backgrounds and working conditions. This article aims to contribute to the debate on the welfare reform process to support migrants and their descendants’ equal rights and participation in society, highlighting the need for collaboration between interculturally aware social workers and intercultural mediators to tackle institutional structural weaknesses in such professions as part of an organisational innovation process in social-welfare institutions.