Pain,pleasure and bridal beauty: mapping postfeminist bridal perfection

Despite renewed media attention on the wedding, and the emphasis that this pays to bridal performance, feminist analysis of wedding culture has made few inroads. Accounts are needed that understand women's experience of the wedding day, the narrative of becoming the bride, and the way this takes place against a backdrop of postfeminist ambivalence, where traditional wedding practices are re-fashioned through discourses of (consumer) choice and empowerment. In this article, we draw on qualitative data collected with five married women from the Netherlands, who spoke to us about their wedding day and their experience of being/becoming brides. We show how retraditionalisation shapes a new romaticisation of wedding day storytelling, constructed through transformation and the experience of beauty. In analysing these narratives, we show how postfeminist bridal perfection comes to anchor the subjective and affective power of ‘the wedding’ in contemporary culture.     

Under construction and highly contested: Islam in the post-Soviet Caucasus

While scholarship on Islam in the Caucasus has focused on the late Soviet religious revival – the rise of Salafi jihadism and religious radicalisation in the northern part of these strategic crossroads – no study to date has addressed the discursive struggle over the social functions of regional Islam. This article deconstructs these discourses in order to examine the very varying, and often conflicting, representations of Islam advocated by various actors across the region and within particular republics. The article highlights the contested functions of regional Islam against the background of a religious revival that is still a work in progress.     

Real and unreal masculinities: the celebrity image in anti-trafficking campaigns

Numerous scholars note the highly gendered nature of anti-trafficking responses. Much of the literature exploring anti-trafficking campaigns, however, focuses on the objectification of women and their placement as abject bodies, objects of violence, in pain and to be pitied. Nevertheless, few scholars explore how these campaigns portray men and shape masculinities. Using as example a highly publicised online anti-trafficking campaign, ‘Real Men Don't Buy Girls’, this article responds to this gap in the literature by exploring depictions of masculinities through this prominent anti-trafficking public service announcement. The article observes that this announcement serves not to reshape gender performance around trafficking, but instead further reproduces existing gender structures and power relations underpinning trafficking and child exploitation. It observes that the campaign re-instantiates hegemonic masculinities – framing men enacting this masculine form as ‘real men’ – while encouraging men to embody a virile, successful, consumerist, controlling, and patriarchal manliness. We observe that these characteristics are notably assigned to celebrity men. Meanwhile, it is noted that men who buy girls are set in binary opposition to these real men, being shaped as faceless, un-described, deviant, and ‘unreal’. The result is that the campaign not only patterns masculinities, but also objectifies the objectifier as well as women, recreating a gender ordering in which women and girls remain disempowered, and buyers of girls are ultimately denied subjecthood and thus the ability to change. This article, therefore, uses this one case study to call for anti-traffickers, researchers, and scholars to urgently consider, research, and reshape portrayals of masculinities in anti-trafficking literatures. It calls for greater diversity and fuller account for a broader spectrum of gender representations in the visual representations of those involved in, and responding to, human and child trafficking, in both our scholarly work and public action.     

公安工作中社会主义法治理念的践行

社会主义法治理念具有丰富的内涵。公安工作践行社会主义法治理念是构建社会主义和谐社会的必然要求,是确保公安工作社会主义政治方向的客观需要,也是建设高素质公安队伍的客观需要。当前,在公安工作中应进一步增强党性观念、大局观念,牢固树立严格、文明、公正、效能、公开的执法思想,切实提高法律素养,自觉接受法律监督,从而践行社会主义法治理念的基本要求。     

贝克的风险社会理论及其启示——评《风险社会》和《世界风险社会》

乌尔里希·贝克的风险社会理论是一种重视制度面向的社会学批判理论,其认识论基础是反思的现实主义,其理论预设是等级秩序的存在.中国以一种特殊的方式开始进入风险社会.风险社会理论透视出中国在现代化反思能力、法律系统、科学理性和社会理性的互动、环境法基本原则方面存在一些问题.     

由建设社会主义新农村看"农民工"权益保障

党的十六届五中全会提出了建设社会主义新农村的重大历史任务,这不仅是解决"三农"问题的重大战略举措,而且是一项惠及广大农民的民心工程.作为从农民中剥离出来的农民工是城市化发展的必然结果也是建设社会主义新农村的必然要求,然而面对农民工的权利伤害对建设社会主义新农村构成了一个障碍,因此有必要采取相关对策以实现建设社会主义新农村的终极目的.     

论河北文化的现代建构

文化的现代转型是社会现代化的基础,河北文化追求的现代性是体现人与自然和谐、社会公平公正的现代性,文化主体对河北传统文化的自觉认知是文化现代建构的基础,博采众长、开拓创新是行河北文化的现代建构的必要条件。     

汉英对比与英语教学

不论从教学过程,还是交际功能讲,英语都与汉语言、汉文化有着千丝万缕的联系。因此英语教师不仅要有过硬的专业水平,而且要有较高的汉语言修养和汉文化修养。在英语教学中通过对两种语言的对比分析,加快学生学习和掌握英语的进程。     

关于毛泽东社会主义建设思想的思考

毛泽东社会主义建设思想是毛泽东对中国建设什么样的社会主义、如何建设社会主义的理论观点和经验总结。由于实践发展不成熟和党的理论准备不充分的原因,毛泽东社会主义建设思想并未形成一个完整独立的科学体系。科学准确地把握毛泽东社会主义建设思想的本质内容和理论特征,对我们认识毛泽东思想、认识社会主义和进行社会主义现代化建设具有重大的意义。     

从明代滇、黔移民特点比较看贵州屯堡文化形成的原因

对贵州屯堡文化的研究,近年来硕果累累。本文通过明代滇、黔移民特点的比较,从不同的视野和角度对屯堡人及其文化形成的原因作出新的探讨和补充。