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In this paper, I examine some ways in which Indian artists explore tradition and modernity by fusing devotional music and spiritual themes with popular music. This is illustrated through examples such as ‘Krishna’ (1996) by the indipop group, Colonial Cousins, as well as works such as ‘Aathma Raama’ (2012), ‘Vaishnava Jana To’ (2019), and ‘All Divine’ (2022) by hip-hop artist Brodha V. My analysis draws upon established theoretical frameworks including cultural hybridity, globalisation theory, transculturation, and modernity. While spiritual motifs appear to be inextricably linked with traditional Indian musics, this is rarely viewed through the lens of modernity. Through a series of case studies, I explore key instances indicative of sonic conversations negotiating the global and local, emphasising the role of language and global cultural flow in facilitating both resistance and transculturation. Beyond uncovering contemporary engagements with spirituality, case studies reveal how Indian modernity is increasingly characterised by a manner of hybridity. Ultimately, the analysis contributes to our understanding of hybrid modernities and postcolonial identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study combines narrative inquiry with Third World feminism to bring a nuanced and scopic perspective of Third World women student experiences in US higher education. Specifically, it utilises Talpade Mohanty's concept of Third World womanhood to visibilise the experiences of five Third World international female students. Understanding womanhood as transnationally fluid and contextual, I investigate how women international students from the Third World perceive themselves to be misrepresented or homogenised in Western higher education. I also examine how gender and foreignness act as dynamic, interrelated categories in doubly‐othering this population. The purpose is to identify how Third World women students enact agency and contest reductive stereotypes. Findings reveal that Third World women students confront a range of exclusions in the US university, including being typecast as poor, needy, and civilisationally lacking, which predicates the (over‐) representation of Third World women as constrained and backward. Third World feminism emerges as a powerful intervention to unsettle colonial and oriental discourses in education and empower minoritised women to determinate selfhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Désert (1980) is a landmark novel, first and foremost for personal reasons but also for its location at the junction of several French intellectual and aesthetic dynamics. The work marks a significant stage in Le Clézio's career as a writer. Whereas his previous novels, from Le Procès-verbal (1963) onwards, evoked contemporary (even futuristic) urban spaces and their perils, Désert (1980) is set between the desert of Morocco and the city of Marseille, from the early twentieth century to the 1970s. The novel engages Le Clézio's work in a more assertive representation of travel and foreign countries. It also encounters several French intellectual movements: a critical evaluation of colonization, growing ecological concerns, the evocation of the difficult migration from the Maghreb to France, and a fascination for the desert space. Considering all these elements, the paper proposes a socio-critical re-reading of this important novel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cahiers d'Études Africaines is the property of Editions EHESS and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The relations of the UK with the majority of Latin American and Caribbean states are not marked by traumatic narratives directly related to colonial dependence, but in recent years the problem of repatriation of cultural objects has become more acute: indigenous communities and civil activists are putting pressure on the British government and museums to return cultural property to the countries of origin. The factor that mitigates the confrontational nature of the problem is the proactive policy of British museums aimed at implementing joint projects with indigenous communities of Latin American and Caribbean states. Nevertheless, many of them are aimed at promoting Western narratives and approaches to the «decolonization of art». British museums also make a major contribution to the dissemination of information about the history and culture of Latin American peoples, both to tourists from around the world and to South American diasporas in the UK. At the same time, as a multipolar international order is being formed, the impact of the problem of repatriation of cultural objects on the UK’s relations with Latin American and Caribbean states will increase: the lack of an effective international legal framework to resolve these contradictions will become more and more acute. A potential method of reducing the resulting tension in the bilateral relations between London and Latin American and Caribbean states may be the transfer of objects on long-term lease or voluntary withdrawal of the British side from the possession of artifacts — in case appropriate changes in the domestic legislation of Great Britain are made.

During and before World War II, Japanese colonial rule cast a profound impact on the cultural and artistic landscapes of its colonies. Choi Seung-hee (1911–1969), a prominent cultural figure from the pre-war period, skillfully navigated the delicate balance between her roles as a representative of Korean national dancer and an emblematic figure within the Japanese empire. Her dual identity elicited diverse public reactions, ranging from slander to praise. In South Korea, post-Korean War, ideological divisions led to the marginalization of artists like Choi who moved north, ambiguously referred to as “Choi X.” In North Korea, autocratic rule infused her evaluations with strong nationalism. In China and the Soviet Union, Cultural Cold War ideologies impacted her assessments. Japan’s perspective reflected its post-colonial introspection and issues. In contrast to the ideologically saturated research in Asian contexts, contemporary Anglophone scholarship on Choi, transcending nationalist confines, nonetheless exhibits distinct limitations. This study primarily scrutinizes the diverse perspectives reflected in Choi research, drawing upon news reports, visual materials, academic studies, and personal observations in China, South Korea, and Japan. The aim is to chart the trajectory and representative viewpoints of Choi research in post-World War II Koreas, China/Soviet Union, Japan, and the Anglophone scholarship. Through literature review and critical analysis, this research underscores how nationalist, socialist, Aesthetic Orientalist, Sinocentric and (Pan) Asian political/non-political ideologies have shaped perspectives on Choi amidst the Cultural Cold War and decolonization. Moreover, it reveals how transnational ideological constructs and dominant research paradigms have shaped and reshaped Choi’s image. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What does it mean to have and sustain a decolonial design practice in the aftermath of political rupture? With an emphasis on elevating the heterogeneity of scale, dynamics, and lived realities, this work focuses on the ways designers and technologists determine the orientation of their worldmaking practices. This work prompts designers and technologists to consider the diverse range of politics of a locale in their efforts toward decoloniality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyse the work of the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies (OCMS) through the lens of Bhabha's 'third space', highlighting its role in the global mission debate and its influence on the integration of non-Western theological perspectives within Western academia. The OCMS, founded with a vision to decolonise theology and create a space for voices from the majority world, has evolved as a hybrid institution bridging various divides–between evangelical and ecumenical missions, majority world and Western academia as well as mission theologians and practitioners. This 'third space' serves as a unique platform where global South scholars can engage in rigorous mission research while remaining contextually grounded. By facilitating this dynamic exchange, OCMS contributes to the decolonisation of theological education and the production of knowledge that resonates globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2017, Ali Zamir's acclaimed debut novel Anguille sous roche became the first Comorian novel to circulate in translation in Europe. This article discusses its English translation, A Girl Called Eel, by Aneesa Abbas Higgins (2019) in relation to the reception, circulation, and canon formation of literature from the Comoros islands. By discussing translation's ties to heritage conservation and literary consecration in the Comorian context alongside a comparative textual and paratextual analysis of Anguille and Eel, I investigate the extent to which the novel's 'Comorianness' was erased, reclaimed, or playfully constructed along this translation journey by a wide variety of actors. These include the independent publishers Le Tripode and Jacaranda Books, who respectively published the French and English texts, various French literary institutions and French and UK-based funding bodies, as well as the author and translator themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that Returning Souls, directed by anthropologist Hu Tai-Li, expresses cultural revitalization sensuously, sensibly, and dialectically in documenting the repatriation of ancestral souls to the indigenous Taiwanese village Tafalong. The images in Returning, through montage, offer a way of accessing and representing the dialectical tensions of myth, indigeneity, historical reality, and secularization among the indigenous Tafalong people. In examining their autonomy and vitality, Hu presents a splintered world populated with fragmented histories and constructed through humor acts and interplays among ritual-images and myth-images. Moreover, she explores the image-spectator relation structure, using images to stimulate meanings relevant to her innermost concern for the indigenous Taiwanese through sensory experiences and embodied knowledge and materiality, toward regional aesthetics. In engagingly juxtaposing and interposing images, Hu's radical cinematic deployments based on the historical enmeshment of the indigenous Taiwanese work toward ushering in new possibilities for archiving indigenous material in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal for Religion in Education / Religionspädagogische Beiträge is the property of Arbeitsgemeinschaft Katholische Religionspadagogik & Katechetik (AKRK) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

What does it mean to have and sustain a decolonial design practice in the aftermath of political rupture? With an emphasis on elevating the heterogeneity of scale, dynamics, and lived realities, this work focuses on the ways designers and technologists determine the orientation of their worldmaking practices. This work prompts designers and technologists to consider the diverse range of politics of a locale in their efforts toward decoloniality.

Informed by postcolonial theories, this research presented critical investigations on Chakri Maha Prasat Throne Hall, the ordination hall at Niwet Thammaprawat Temple, and Munthatu Rattanaroj Villa. Aside from examining the three hybrid Siamese-European buildings beyond stylistic analyses and antiquarian mode of historiography, the upcoming discussions unveiled that the case studies – which were commissioned at the height of Western colonial expansions in Southeast Asia – testified for the Siamese’s: (1) reinterpretations, reappropriations, and recreations of European cultural artifacts; (2) active and authoritative roles in generating, combining, and projecting their versions of contested meanings upon the immediate world and beyond; (3) assertions of a newly acquired self-image by conspicuous consumptions of Western material culture; and (4) long established tradition of mediating power through built forms. In addition, by utilizing the politics of representations as a mode of problematization, these eclectic palatial structures were perceived as representational tools to create a civilized identity and discursive devices for power mediation, as opposed to unskilled or kitschy copies of Western precedents. In conclusion, the inquiries essentially argued that although Siam was among few places in Asia that did not succumb to a direct colonial rule by any Western power, the kingdom was a de facto crypto-colony.

In this article, I identify where contemporary scholarship on Jonah continues to ask enduring questions of any biblical text like dating, structure, and message. I also outline how scholars have brought contemporary approaches to the book. Finally, I suggest some points of divergence between scholarship in the late 20thand early 21stcenturies and consider how recent scholarship has treated past contributions. This survey shows that scholarship continues to grapple with questions that have long pervaded Jonah’s interpretive history. At the same time, contemporary approaches bring exciting possibilities to a book that has often resisted a monologic interpretation.

In 1878, as a consequence of an international Balkan summit in Berlin, Austria–Hungary was given permission to occupy the troubled Ottoman provinces Bosnia and Hercegovina. A gory invasion campaign ensued, followed by four decades of civil administration. Finally, the territories were annexated by the Habsburg Monarchy in 1908 as an appendix of sorts, which almost caused the premature outbreak of a great war in Europe. This article will sketch the background for this last – and lethal – expansion of the empire and pursue the research questions of (a) whether this constitutes a case of colonialism within Europe and (b) what its repercussions were, critically challenging the alleged 'civilising mission' that would legitimise the whole undertaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In various ways, postcolonial initiatives in Germany contribute to the formation of 'national cultures of remembrance' and to the debate about Europe's responsibility for the negative effects of colonial expansion that can still be felt today. One approach, which the activist groups use in their educational and activist work, is that of the guided walking tour – a method that allows them to sensitize an interested audience to colonially contoured spaces in German cities. Interestingly, the postcolonial initiatives do not see themselves as providers of tourist services, even though they use the rather fundamental touristic form of the 'city walk'. As this discrepancy in perception allows discussions about tourism in a more general, conceptual sense, this paper examines the tours at the nexus of activism, education, and tourism. Thereby, it asks what constitutes the walks and discusses their relation to urban tourism. To do so, the article first explains relevant concepts of tourism geographies and postcolonial studies and then connects them to insights gained from the qualitative and quantitative analysis of empirical data collected in a field phase in Germany in 2022. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Postcolonial literary studies has focused on narrative prose. We argue that the field would benefit from expanding this focus to poetics from the Global South. By utilizing the rubric of the Global South, we include decolonial thought from hispanophone and lusophone domains alongside postcolonial thought, often identified with the anglophone academy. Our approach to poetics foregrounds poetry as a literary form pertinent to the project of theorizing global cultural form more broadly. Without proposing a Manichean poetics that would sever the Global South from the Global North, we take a geographically situated approach to poetics, examining how attention to poetry from the Global South might produce knowledge relevant to decolonial and postcolonial critique. Here, we define this special issue's key terms and scope, provide an overview of current scholarship within postcolonial poetry studies, and offer a brief analysis of M. NourbeSe Philip's "Discourse on the Logic of Language" in light of our proposed framework of poetics from the Global South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper studies the Common Man political caricatures by R.K. Laxman, a staff cartoonist at the Times of India, to understand dominant political discourses in postcolonial India. It argues that constructs like the 'common man' and 'vote bank' through popular cultural discourse like caricatures have a critical impact on the political landscape of the country. While the former is associated with an urban English-educated middle class, the latter is used to denote the socially marginalised sections of the electorate voting en masse as a form of political assertion. The latter is perceived as an aberration in the modern secular democracy and its political voice is often delegitimised. Further, the former is associated with economic liberalisation, development and anti-corruption. The paper demonstrates how Laxman's Common Man is a proponent and mascot of these in the popular imagination. Thereby indicating that the popular cultural archive has indeed had a visible impact on the political, economic and sociological cartography of the nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pier Paolo Pasolini's encounter with India is well known, but India's engagement with Pasolini's work is much less considered. This article puts the work of Pasolini in dialogue with the work of Bengali director Ritwik Ghatak, one of the most important figures in Indian parallel cinema. Ghatak discussed the Italian director's work on several occasions. More importantly, Ghatak's intellectual path and films have notable similarities with Pasolini's. Both directors, Ghatak and Pasolini, pursued a 'heretical' approach to Marxist ideology by contaminating it with a passionate identification with the marginalized communities of today's Bangladesh and southern Italy, respectively. Drawing from film critic Bhaskar Sarkar's notion of epic melodrama, I suggest an analysis of two coeval films, Mamma Roma (Pasolini 1962) and Meghe dhaka tara (The Cloud-Capped Star) (Ghatak 1960), in order to expose the directors' complex location between Brechtian aesthetic, epic-religious vision and melodramatic motives. This article argues that these epic-melodramatic films suspend a final interpretation, providing an aesthetic correlative to the unreconciled position of the people the directors aimed to represent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Rundbrief Fotografie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article analyses the search strategies of first families in Bolivia contesting the separation of their children through transnational adoption. These first parents' claims to visibility and acknowledgement have remained largely ignored by adoption policy and scholarship, historically privileging the perspectives of actors in adoptive countries, such as adoptive parents and adoption professionals. Filling in this gap, we discuss the search strategies employed by first families in Bolivia who desire a reunion with their child. Drawing on Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's feminist postcolonial theory, we analyse ethnographic fieldwork with fourteen first families in Bolivia. We read how the agency of first parents, severely limited by the loss of legal rights through the adoption system, is caught in a double bind of dependency and possibility. While hegemonic adoption discourse portrays first parents as passive and consenting to the adoption system, the results of our study complicate this picture. Moreover, we argue that the search activity of the first parents can be read as a claim and request to revise and negotiate their consent to transnational adoption. Ultimately, we read first parents' search efforts as resistance to the closed nature of the adoption system, which restricts them in their search for their children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper lays the ground for a novel discussion on the encounter between José Martí and Antonio Gramsci. It argues that Martí and Gramsci can be profitably and innovatively read together when interrogating the profound "spatial articulations" that animate their political vision. The discussion principally focuses on Martí's concept of Our America and Gramsci's Southern Question. Methodologically, the article deploys a "diachronic tactic" that mobilises a broad body of literature that emerged long after Martí's and Gramsci's lives, particularly considering contributions within Radical Geography and Postcolonial Studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the transition between the 19th and 20th centuries, Brazilian national identity and social thought were shaped considering the spatial and symbolic dichotomy of coast-sertão, with active involvement from psychiatry. However, in the realm of racialist theories studies, these aspects have not been adequately correlated by social sciences and remain generally absent in the interdisciplinary field of mental health. In this article, we explore the significance of the sertão subregion in the Northeast in Brazilian scientific research concerning the history of mental health from the late 19th century until 1940. This specific time frame was chosen considering the relevant period of the violent epistemologies prevalent during that period and the scarcity of scientific literature on this subject. Three academic repositories from two leading institutions in the field of health were analyzed, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation and the University of São Paulo, while the method and analysis were inspired by postcolonial perspectives, collaborative and non-extractive methodologies of southern epistemologies, and critical social psychology. As a review study, a thematic matrix was developed with three categories of analysis—postcolonial studies, Northeast and sertão; racialism and mental health; epistemic justice—and ten topics, in addition to a documentary matrix. The results indicated a scarcity of scientific productions on the Northeast and its sertão subregion, which we refer to as an epistemic invisibility, configuring it as an epistemic south. The originality of the study lies precisely in the method used to analyze academic productions on the sertão, shedding light on intersectional and interdisciplinary debates in health. It brings this territory to the forefront beyond the southeastern axis (Rio de Janeiro-São Paulo, the epistemic center of the history of mental health), and thus democratizing the understanding of the construction of Brazilian identity by emphasizing the role of psychiatry and its lasting effects to generate epistemic justice. Finally, impactful and collaborative actions were recommended to promote studies in this field, updating the relevance of the sertão and highlighting the racist and regionalist foundations ingrained in the construction of knowledge.

Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) or local ecological knowledge (LEK) has only recently gained traction as "legitimate" science in Western academic discourse. Such approaches to inclusivity continue to face institutional, sociocultural, and equity barriers to being fully accepted in academic discourse in comparison to Western-based frameworks. Postcolonial studies have attempted to rectify this Western-domination in characterizing diverse forms of bird--human relationships. However, the integration of multiple cosmologies (worldviews) and ontologies (realities) in research or management creates challenges that we discuss. We elucidate commonalities and antithetical positions between Western-derived bird knowledge and management with that of TEK or LEK in both local and global contexts. We combine ecological/ornithological studies with key terms, theories, and methods from the social sciences to integrate the approaches and facilitate understanding. For example, we follow a "theory synthesis" approach in this conceptual paper to question epistemological and ontological assumptions of bird knowledge and how we acquire it to question, "how do we move from a decolonial approach (discussions and acknowledgement) to decolonization (action)?" This paper is a product of ongoing discourse among global researchers of an academic ethno-ornithology research lab based in the United Kingdom, who partner with global collaborators. The 3 case studies draw from ongoing research in Southeast Asia, South America, and decolonializing policy efforts in New Zealand. We analyzed these case studies using a postcolonial theoretical lens to provide insights into how Western scientists can embrace TEK and LEK and actively work to decolonize ethno-ornithology and ornithology in theory and practice. Further, we discuss perceived core tenets to equity and inclusion in community-based TEK and LEK conservation projects from the Global South. Diversity, equity, inclusivity, and justice in bird--human relations and knowledge were identified as targets for systemic change within the academic institutions of Western scientists. By recognizing, discussing, and embracing non-Western cosmologies and ontologies, non-Indigenous scientists can help influence the decolonization of ethno-ornithology, ornithology, and bird--human relations through respectful, participatory, equitable, culturally considerate, and "non-extractive" community-based initiatives in partnership with local groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The neoliberal enterprise of NGOs has transformed the left-leaning politics of the political theatre movement in the Punjab region of Pakistan. Commencing in the 1980s, this theatre acted as a vibrant movement of the Left, challenging the brutal military dictatorship of General Zia. At a later stage, its politics changed to the neoliberal politics of NGOs, giving way to economics and the agenda of international donor organizations of the Global North. This article demonstrates the turn-around of theatre company Ajoka's recent production Saira aur Miara (2019) and focuses on the production's politics, together with its text, design, and performance modes in aesthetic terms. A materialist and context-specific political approach examines to what extent class struggle and leftist ideas inform this company's ideological imaginings and how much it has moved away from its original political position. It indicates the tensions and contradictions that have been created during this change and because of it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the transition between the 19th and 20th centuries, Brazilian national identity and social thought were shaped considering the spatial and symbolic dichotomy of coast-sertão, with active involvement from psychiatry. However, in the realm of racialist theories studies, these aspects have not been adequately correlated by social sciences and remain generally absent in the interdisciplinary field of mental health. In this article, we explore the significance of the sertão subregion in the Northeast in Brazilian scientific research concerning the history of mental health from the late 19th century until 1940. This specific time frame was chosen considering the relevant period of the violent epistemologies prevalent during that period and the scarcity of scientific literature on this subject. Three academic repositories from two leading institutions in the field of health were analyzed, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation and the University of São Paulo, while the method and analysis were inspired by postcolonial perspectives, collaborative and non-extractive methodologies of southern epistemologies, and critical social psychology. As a review study, a thematic matrix was developed with three categories of analysis--postcolonial studies, Northeast and sertão; racialism and mental health; epistemic justice--and ten topics, in addition to a documentary matrix. The results indicated a scarcity of scientific productions on the Northeast and its sertão subregion, which we refer to as an epistemic invisibility, configuring it as an epistemic south. The originality of the study lies precisely in the method used to analyze academic productions on the sertão, shedding light on intersectional and interdisciplinary debates in health. It brings this territory to the forefront beyond the southeastern axis (Rio de Janeiro-São Paulo, the epistemic center of the history of mental health), and thus democratizing the understanding of the construction of Brazilian identity by emphasizing the role of psychiatry and its lasting effects to generate epistemic justice. Finally, impactful and collaborative actions were recommended to promote studies in this field, updating the relevance of the sertão and highlighting the racist and regionalist foundations ingrained in the construction of knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What if an artwork changes its shape and sense with every encounter? Is there such a thing as polyphonic meaning, resulting from the interactions with an artwork? Barbara Preisig's semi-fictional play brings the reader to a scene at Kunstmuseum Bern. It tells the story of a guided public tour through El Anatsui's Solo exhibition Triumphant Scale. The curator, eager to provide key information about the works, finds herself in a vivid discussion around Anatsui's work Gravity and Grace. Does the artwork's shape resemble an elephant? Should the patterns remind us of the colorful Ghanaian fabrics or, in contrast, do they depict nothing but light, form, transparency and physicality? May El Anatsui be called an African artist or not? The audience – among them a protestant pastor, a musician, the artist, seven-year-old Emma – gathers on stage, observed by the narrator, who listens closely to their interpretations. When suddenly five historical busts, part of the neo-classical staircase, get involved in an argument with the artwork, the discussion threatens to get out of hand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Croatian Journal of Ethnology & Folklore Research / Narodna Umjetnost is the property of Institute of Ethnology & Folklore Research and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Tamoios is the property of Editora da Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (EdUERJ) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

"Tropicality" has historically been used as an epistemological tool by colonial settlers and thereafter local rulers to naturalize and espouse Western rationality and modernity. Singapore is no exception to this lingering Western framing, which continues to define state narratives of success and heritage. "Tropicality" as a hegemonic force manifests in infrastructures of large physical networks, institutionalized knowledges, and media representations. This paper dissects three chronological dominant modes of "tropicality"—the colonial, the nation‐building, and the contemporary neoliberal mode—alongside their corresponding subaltern lived worlds that speak of an alternative "tropicality" often unnoticed (Figure 1). These diametric strands are studied through hegemonic infrastructure and everyday acts that resist, appropriate, or hybridize these power‐laden spaces. A heterogenous methodology was adopted, capturing the epistemologies and metis employed in dominant and alternative tropicalities, respectively. Maps, charts, and archives are used to study the former; ethnographic observation, family memory, and affective experiences elucidate the latter. In this paper, I focus on the nation‐building mode of "tropicality", which shaped Singapore's rapid urbanization in the 1960s. Modernist public housing schemes borrowed from the Tropical Architecture movement are situated within a larger infrastructural field that de‐skilled, cleansed, and civilized an "unruly" population, conflating natural and social order. However, these attempts at creating modern subjects were thwarted by everyday resistance performed at a critical mass, in which displaced populations tapped upon past metis, habitus, and ecological aesthetics to appropriate alienating modern infrastructure. Through these ad hoc infrastructural reconfigurations, a hybrid modern "tropicality" was negotiated. It is through deprivileging infrastructures of "tropicality" and drawing out alternative "infra‐structures" of multiple, lived tropical worlds that we may move toward post‐tropicality—a mentality built on an expanded understanding of how our modern environment is and has been shaped equally by dominant, neocolonial forces and also forsaken memories, practices, and everyday acts of resistance, which hold the key to alternative futures beyond the limited scope delineated by our inherited "tropical modernity". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Lengas is the property of Presses Universitaires de la Mediterranee and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The aim of this article is to compare the transformation process of women exploring two different spaces. This study primarily analyses the representation of women in post-apartheid and postcolonial South Africa and India. Flora Nwapa's novels, such as Efuru (1966), Idu (1970), and One Is Enough (1986), provide critical analysis of the condition of women from different walks of life in these contexts. This research article also examines Perumal Murugan's novels, including One Part Woman (2013), A Lonely Harvest (2018a) and Trial by Silence (2018b). These selected novels direct the study of this research to talk about certain women characters' living conditions in the suburbs, the countryside, and the university campus, like colleges and educational institutions. For this study, the social context and class structure of the post-independence Indian and South African cultures have been taken into account. The research paper also unfolds the sets of social, cultural, political, and ethical conditions of the postcolonial world. The following facets, like cultural violation, power dynamics, use of physical force to marginalise, and lack of self-respect and self-esteem, also draw attention. This article delves into women's relationships with men to represent their lifestyle, feelings and emotions. Here, the observation of women's endurance of specific traumatic experiences at the hands of men and how their struggles help them express themselves to the outside world. It also throws light upon the persistence of women and their voices to be heard in postcolonial South Africa and India during their lives. Therefore, this study culls out the life experiences of women in South Africa and India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine the European devaluation of maternal and female domestic labor after the Industrial Revolution as a defensive byproduct of collective male annihilation anxiety due to the replacement of male manual labor by machines. We argue that an abject attitude towards women was codified in law, economic policy and social norms that still exist today, contributing to an ongoing, unconscious, structural degradation of female caregiving. We also suggest this stance towards female labor was exported to post‐colonial nations through the global adoption of the gross domestic product statistic, which excludes domestic and maternal labor from national accounting measurements. We draw on Julia Kristeva's theory of abjection, research from the fields of economics and policy analysis—and the burgeoning subfield of narrative economics—to suggest a reparative path forward for both men and women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following George Floyd's murder in 2020, academia pursued a policy of diversity, noticeable in the job advertisements for the following academic year. This article analyzes 77 tenure-track positions for the 2020–2021 academic year advertised on the National Communication Association's COMMNotes. With a focus on the job market and labor, the authors explain the assumptions of applying for tenure-track positions. The analysis shows how diversity transforms from concept into practice. However, within the context of the U.S.-based communication studies' economic conditions, the authors ask if labor is outside the conceptualization of diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

'I am from Oran. I translate: I am from Hors En [Out In]' (Cixous 2006, 30). Throughout her autobiographical account entitled 'Promised Cities', Hélène Cixous talks about her cities and her many languages. She deconstructs the significant cities of her life, and in particular the city of Oran in Algeria, where she spent her early years at the onset of the Second World War. In this journey across former cities, exodus cities, cities of the past, reconstructed cities, imagined cities, she tells us how personal experience and historical political events have merged at specific locations. Through close reading of 'Promised Cities', this essay shows that Cixous's writing is an embodied practice that extends beyond the French language and embraces cultural multiplicity. Being outside inside Oran, her experience does not follow the delineation of linguistic and national borders, instead Cixous lives in a permanent state of translation, where not only does every language contain the possibility of other languages but every city contains the possibility of other cities. This essay proposes to learn from Cixous's embodied and situated writing, and her sense of 'doubly open belonging', in order to rethink post-colonial identities and architectures in conflicted cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers are always potential traitors when they represent what they see or hear. This is of particular concern in the case of people in subaltern positions, who lack the power to challenge possible misrepresentations. This article deals with an old dilemma in critical social science: How to use language when research objects are silenced through dynamics of domination? Is it possible for research to create space for marginalized people to speak for themselves? This was one of the questions of the Université Populaire, a group initiative by actors in a marginalized social housing neighborhood in Grenoble. The community‐based people’s education initiative was created in a double context of violence and silence. As a result of incidents of violence, media coverage participates in depicting the neighborhood as a place of danger and otherness, which impedes voices from the neighborhood from being heard. The initiative of the Université Populaire made space for speech in this marginalized and racialized area of Grenoble dealing with the consequences of terrorist violence in France. It is an initiative the author has been involved in since its inception in 2015. This article explains how the author sought ways to reduce power asymmetry in research relationships, why she steered away from using interviews for data collection and organized public debates instead, and how this made space for speech.