THE SEXUAL SUBALTERN IN CONVERSATIONS “SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN”: LAW AND THE OLD POLITICS OF COLONIALISM

Ratna Kapur’s recent book entitled Erotic Justice proposes a new politics of postcolonialism whereby the sexual subaltern disrupts the normative principles of the universal, liberal, legal domain. Kapur traces legal strategies regarding censorship, sex-work, homosexuality, sexual harassment, trafficking and migration which travel a treacherous path, countering allegations of ‘unIndian’ and Western practice with cultural histories of ‘authentic’ sexual legitimacies, towards a new politics of desire. Kapur frames her analysis through postcolonial feminist theory as providing a tool for feminist struggle, yet distinct from and disruptive of a liberal project of global sisterhood. This review deeply values the role of the sexual subaltern which disrupts the tenets of a linear, progressive liberalism. Drawing upon Indian feminist and Western feminist perspectives, the review considers how the distinct position of the postcolonial sexual subaltern subject informs the generic role of law as a tool constructing relations of domination regarding gender, sexuality, caste, property and religion. Kapur observes that both the West and the Hindu Right have engaged with liberal legal principles. This engagement, I argue, exposes and informs law as a historical and contemporary tool of gendered legal colonialism, for sisters to disrupt across the Western and Eastern terrains.Review of Ratna Kapur’s Erotic Justice, Law and the New Politics of Postcolonialism, London: Glasshouse Press, 2005, 219 pp., ￡26, ISBN 1-90438-524-9     

The Campesino-to-Campesino agroecology movement of ANAP in Cuba: social process methodology in the construction of sustainable peasant agriculture and food sovereignty

Agroecology has played a key role in helping Cuba survive the crisis caused by the collapse of the socialist bloc in Europe and the tightening of the US trade embargo. Cuban peasants have been able to boost food production without scarce and expensive imported agricultural chemicals by first substituting more ecological inputs for the no longer available imports, and then by making a transition to more agroecologically integrated and diverse farming systems. This was possible not so much because appropriate alternatives were made available, but rather because of the Campesino-a-Campesino (CAC) social process methodology that the National Association of Small Farmers (ANAP) used to build a grassroots agroecology movement. This paper was produced in a ‘self-study’ process spearheaded by ANAP and La Via Campesina, the international agrarian movement of which ANAP is a member. In it we document and analyze the history of the Campesino-to-Campesino Agroecology Movement (MACAC), and the significantly increased contribution of peasants to national food production in Cuba that was brought about, at least in part, due to this movement. Our key findings are (i) the spread of agroecology was rapid and successful largely due to the social process methodology and social movement dynamics, (ii) farming practices evolved over time and contributed to significantly increased relative and absolute production by the peasant sector, and (iii) those practices resulted in additional benefits including resilience to climate change.     

"代表先进文化方向"与自觉的文化意识

"三个代表"理论的完整提出,有着重大的历史意义,其中"代表中国先进文化的前进方向"作为当代中国共产党人文化自觉的理论标志,意味着党对社会发展整体进程及其"内在目的"的深刻把握,意味着党在复杂多变的新形势下,始终坚持共产党人的根本宗旨和坚定信仰,使党的所有现实努力,紧紧维系于造福人民、振兴中华的历史使命,维系于谋求人类完善和人类解放的"内在目的".     

The Czech Islamophobic movement: beyond ‘populism’?

ABSTRACT

Sla?álek and Svobodová’s paper focuses on the ideology of the Czech Islamophobic movement as seen during the 2015–16 migration crisis. In their analysis of interviews with demonstrators and speeches by leaders of the movement, they discuss first how the movement imagined its enemies, and then describe its vision of positive core values. They conclude that the movement’s key ideological features are: an emphasis on social and civilizational decline (declinism); a return to an assumed naturalness in economic and gender relationships (naturalization); and the open evocation of violence and severity (brutalization). In terms of Rogers Brubacker’s distinction between xenophobic ethno-nationalism in Eastern Europe, and the xenophobic defence of liberal values in the West, Sla?álek and Svobodová find that the Czech case fits the allegedly western pattern better than the eastern one, which may cast doubt on the whole essentialization of distinctions between ‘western’ and ‘eastern’ populisms.     

Cultural citizenship and performing homecoming: Russian Jewish immigrants decipher the Zionist national ethos

The paper explores the mutual relation between cultural citizenship and national homecoming. Using the case study of Russian-Jewish immigrants in Israel, it refines the theoretical debate over cultural citizenship by showing how homecoming migration shapes the homecomers' bargaining power over the local cultural tenets. In particular, the research examines the ways in which the ‘Russian’ immigrants negotiate the national ethos of homecoming that constitutes the Israeli civic, discursive field, while dismantling it into its root components: affinity to the place, collective memory, and the warrior ethos. Each of these components constitutes a sphere of action that embodies the tension between Israeliness and Jewishness, nationalism and citizenship, and the personal and the collective. Our main contention is that in the case of homecoming migration, the inextricable affinity between citizenship and nationalism shapes the homecomers' cultural citizenship: on the one hand, it secures their right to participate in the local cultural discourse and avails bargaining power, while on the other hand, it neutralizes the homecomers' subversive voice, and reduces their capacity to undermine the constitutive, national tenets. The analysis is based on immigration stories gathered via in-depth interviews that were conducted with 43 Jewish university students who immigrated to Israel from the former USSR in the beginning of the 1990s.     

在地化关怀、国际化视野、协同化精神——台湾的文化研究特点分析

台湾的文化研究发展有年,呈现出在地化关怀、国际化视野、协同化精神的特点。在地化关怀是台湾文化研究的根本特质,与国际化视野及协同化精神是紧密联系在一起的,它们共同建构了台湾文化研究独立的问题意识和自我主体位置,并对台湾社会产生了深远的影响。这些对我们大陆本土的文化研究有着重要的借鉴意义。     

“Editorials at a Glance”: Cultural Policy,Gender, and Modernity in the World War I Bureau of Cartoons

Cultural policy during the Great War, rather than radiating from the central government, evolved from contemporary culture—propaganda, movies, and mass media. The state was a player, but quasi‐public organizations such as propaganda agencies, non‐state actors like the YMCA, and “public opinion” played important roles. The Committee on Public Information (CPI)—the government's propaganda committee—influenced Americans through books, advertisements, posters, and cartoons. This essay examines two of the CPI's efforts: the Bureau of Cartoons and the Division of Pictorial Publicity. In these materials, we can see the intersection of class‐based notions of gendered idealism and a developing media state's use of a sentimental culture of the Victorian middle‐class to represent and motivate the nation. With staff drawn primarily from advertising agencies and newspapers, the Committee's work shows how the formulation of cultural policy is the result of complex negotiated processes involving state interests, cultural liaisons, and ideological assumptions.     

实现中国梦必须提升文化软实力简

文化软实力在综合国力中的地位不断提高,并逐渐成为实现中华民族伟大复兴和提高我国国际影响力的重要因素之一。当前,我国要实现“中国梦”,就必须不断提升文化软实力,即坚持马克思主义的指导地位、不断传承中华民族优秀文化、努力培育社会主义核心价值观和发展创新文化产业。     

论近代历史变迁中的中国文化转型

文化是历史的重要组成部分,历史的演变必然引起文化相应的改变。在近代这个中国几千年历史的重要转型期,中国文化呈现出了前所未有的波澜起伏,是任其在西方文化冲击下衰弱,还是在痛苦中完成蜕变,寻找新的突破口？从中国文化的艰难转型中,今天的人们获得了很多重要启示。昨天的历史引领着今天的道路。     

全球化与西部民族地区的文化安全

球化是指所有世界各民族融合成一个单一社会、全球社会的变化过程。全球化始于经济一体化 ,进而扩展到政治和文化等各个领域。西方文化的全球扩张影响了西部民族地区的文化安全。为此 ,西部民族文化自身要在新的历史时期不断地发展和创新 ;要大力发展文化产业 ,促进西部民族地区的经济发展 ;要积极探索在新的时期保护和发展民族文化的多种形式 ;警惕全盘西化论和极端民族主义的回潮 ,保证西部民族地区文化的协调健康发展。