The Normativity of the Concept of Heteronormativity

The aim of the article is to analyze and to critically examine use of the concept of heteronormativity. We find it important to adjust the concept to some extent in order to analyze, for example, changes occurring in homosexual families, contemporary gender-equal families, or the progressive youth culture. We find two approaches when using the concept. One minimizes the importance of how sexual practices are embedded in social institutions. The first approach becomes too idealistic, whereas the second approach often is based on a structural view of society. This approach makes it hard to imagine a transformation of the family that could lead to more equal and democratic relations in contemporary families. We suggest a third approach, and the possibility of finding creative ways of analyzing actual change and contestations of heteronormativity. An approach containing a space of reflexivity and aiming at political change both involving subjects as well as structures.     

对马恩有关文艺与意识形态关系理论的再认识--兼与董学文的有关观点商榷

笼统地把文艺视为意识形态,或认为文艺是与意识形态相适应的社会意识形式,具意识形态性,都把文艺泛意识形态化。这些观点既不符合马克思《政治经济学批判序言》的原意,也不符合中外文学史的实际。马克思在《序言》中明确把文艺视为一定基础上的社会意识形式,其中部分属于意识形态文艺。文学史上存在着大量的非意识形态文艺和带意识形态性文艺。马克思关于意识形态和自由的精神生产区别的观点,说明应使意识形态文艺和自由生产的文艺并行不悖的发展。     

For better,for worse? Public support for the capitalist model of the economy

A capitalist market economy is based on several institutional elements, such as private ownership and competition. Does public support for this economic model rise if the economy prospers, and fall during a downturn? Or is public support largely independent of the ups and downs of economic cycles? We hypothesize that positive economic performance increases support and that persons profiting personally are more supportive of the economic system's constitutive institutional elements. Using multilevel regression we study the determinants of individual-level support for the economic system. We also test for differences in the perception of economic performance due to political attitudes and personal properties. The findings partly support the hypotheses, indicating that macro-economic factors matter for individual-level attitudes towards the economy. Attitudes towards different institutional elements of the economic system also differ in the degree to which they are political or economic, and influenced by economic performance. Individual features – education and personal economic stakes – affect attitudes towards the economy, but a substantial share of the individual-level variation in economic attitudes remains unexplained.     

西方国家意识形态扩张的现代性路径及应对方略

生态、潮流、反恐、普世等问题已异化为西方意识形态扩张的现代性路径;从全球化趋势的形成和发展、主流意识形态建设的弱化、新媒体发展和普及等方面着力分析西方意识形态扩张现代性路径的诸多原因,加强马克思主义意识形态宣传教育、提升马克思主义意识形态交往的主动权和影响力、促进社会发展和惠民建设等进行应对。     

Violence in the name of god? A framing processes approach to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria

Since summer 2014, the insurgent group ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’ (ISIS) has become a major concern for international politics and global security due to its rapid territorial gains, violent operations and the propagation of Salafi-jihadist ideology. This study aims to enhance the academic understanding of ISIS by demystifying the ideological reasoning behind its use of violence. It therefore investigates the link between structural factors that served ISIS’s evolution, its ideological outlook and the significance of this ideology to legitimize violent action. As its theoretical basis, the study employs framing processes within the study of social movements. Methodologically, discursive frame analysis serves to explore the relation of ISIS’s ideology to structural events and experiences to better understand how the group justifies violence. Therefore, the study draws on audio speeches and issues of the magazines Dabiq and Dar al-Islam published by ISIS, which are examined on the rhetoric of othering, collective identity and justifying violence. It is argued that ISIS constructs a collective action frame which creates a social reality that bestows the group with a rationale for action. ISIS’s ideology, based on Islamic symbolism, presents an interpretative lens which assigns meaning to the structural environment of ISIS’s emergence. In this context, violence is justified as a necessity to defend Islam and as an obligation for the true Muslim believer. The discussion concludes that ISIS’s ideology legitimizes the very existence of the group and conceals its mundane struggle for power, territory and wealth through reference to divine authority.     

English and discourses of commodification among tourism workers in the Himalayas

In this article, I investigate commodification discourses and ideologies of English from the perspective of Nepali tourism workers. Drawing data from interviews with porters and trekking guides in Nepal, I argue that English is not seen as merely a transactional means to convey meaning; it works in combination with the traditional form of labor and care in the local economy, establishing itself as a powerful tool to establish closer interpersonal relationships, enhance such interpersonal relationships for economic gains and commodify local identities and cultures in the tourism market. The interview and ethnographic details show that language learners are agentive and capable of making sense of their actions by positioning themselves variously in terms of ethnicity, economic class and job category. These workers think that tourists' linguistic and financial resources are the empowering tools that enable them to travel to locations that they want. They also want to empower themselves with English skills and translocal imaginaries to travel and see the world beyond their immediate reach. Repertoires in English are considered as instruments to mediate their imaginaries and the foreign worlds they want to be part of.     

微空间主流意识形态边缘化危机及消解策略

微空间的主体多样性、信息碎片化、文化多元性为各种思想观念、价值理念的传播提供了平台,对微空间主流意识形态的主导性形成挑战、权威性产生冲击、理论性带来消解,导致主流意识形态出现边缘化危机.要克服微空间中淡化意识形态思潮渗透、主流意识形态“失语”、传播信息整合能力弱化的影响,必须增强微空间主流意识形态的主导向心力和辐射凝聚力意识,通过更新话语体系提升微空间主流意识形态的话语效力,强化人文关怀改进微空间主流意识形态的话语方式,重视培养微空间主流意识形态队伍的媒介素养与隐性传播方式的运用,建立和完善微空间信息评估反馈监管机制,加强主流意识形态对微空间信息的整合力度,以消解微空间主流意识形态边缘化危机.     

The Promethean role of Europe: changing narratives of the political and scholarly left

ABSTRACT

The gradual abandoning of the ‘socialism in one country’ doctrine during the post-war period and the intensive transformation of European social democracy in the 1990s pushed social democratic politicians and intellectuals into the front line of advocates of a unified and powerful Europe. They contributed to the inclusion of social democratic and environmentalist values in the EU’s official narrative. The success of European integration and George W. Bush’s presidency created the narrative of the Promethean role of Europe. Scholars with a social democratic or environmentalist background created this narrative and it was also shaped by authors’ national contexts.     

马克思主义意识形态在我国法治建设中的作用

法治总与一定社会的政治、经济、文化紧密相连,它不能脱离社会生活条件而抽象存在。法的关系正像国家的形式一样,既不能从它们本身去理解,也不能从所谓人类精神的一般发展来理解,相反,它们根源于物质的生活关系。按照历史唯物主义的观点,我国的法治建设是建立在我国的社会主义经济基础之上的,我国的法治建设遵循马克思主义有关上层建筑是经济基础反映的客观规律;而马克思主义意识形态是以历史唯物主义为世界观基础,反映无产阶级的根本经济政治利益的、自觉的、系统化的思想观念体系,是对当前我国基本国情的科学反映。那么,马克思主义意识形态与我国的法治建设二者有没有关系呢？如果有,那它们之间是什么关系呢？试图通过论证马克思主义意识形态在我国法治建设中的作用,以期客观地揭示二者的关系。     

Commodification of place,consumption of identity: The sociolinguistic construction of a ‘global village’ in rural China1

This paper seeks to contribute to the understanding of place as it relates to globalization and mobility by examining the sociolinguistic construction of a tourism site. A former residential neighborhood, West Street in Yangshuo County, China, was gradually transformed into a so‐called ‘global village’ for domestic tourists partly through appropriating English as one semiotic resource. Positioning this place in the global‐national‐local nexus, this study shows that the promotion of West Street as a ‘global village’ is not only driven by globalization or westernization, but more importantly capitalizes on English as a stylistic resource that indexes the modernist aspirations of the Chinese people. This commodified sense of place is nevertheless negotiated by tourists as they activate and (re‐)work the social meaning of place through their discursive practices. This highlights how place is a social construct, constantly transformed in the process of socio‐historical change, and also mediated by people's conceptualization, imagination and experience. 本文从社会语言学角度考察一处旅游景点的建构,旨在增进在全球化和流动时代背景下对‘地域’ (place) 的理解。位于中国阳朔县的西街,通过把英语作为一种符号资源,从一个历史居民街区转变成为所谓的‘地球村’。本研究从全球‐国家‐地方三位连结的框架审视该地域,说明‘地球村’不仅仅是全球化带动下的地方经济发展策略,更重要的是借用了在英语作为一种语言风格资源在中国社会中的作用。然而,这种构建的地域涵义也同时被游客通过不同方式激活和改写。本文提出,地域是社会构建的产物,其涵义随着社会历史的变革,人们对地域的理解,想象和体验,而不断改变。[Chinese]