International Journal of Cultural Studies current issue

A `cover narrative': from Nightmare to Reality

Hartley, J. — 2008-05-29

Imitating Incas and becoming llama: Tintin in Latin America -- or the Latin American in Tintin?

Scorer, J. — 2008-05-29

This article revisits Tintin's adventures in Latin America, not only tracing the themes of colonialism and the ethnographic present in the works but also reconsidering the traditional reading of The Adventures of Tintin as simply a patronizing vision of the Latin American other. The article draws on fluid notions of latinidad to highlight how Tintin and friends are sometimes (unwittingly) able to `act Latin' — at least until Tintin becomes weary of his adventures and, in so doing, loses his own sacred nature.

The repressed memory of Brazilian slavery

Sepulveda Dos Santos, M. — 2008-05-29

This article investigates the over-exposure in Brazilian narratives and images of the suffering and humiliation of the black population during the slavery era. It argues that the emphasis placed on the painful memories of slavery still has the power to undermine the self-esteem of the Brazilian population. Seventy-five per cent of the slaves who were brought to Brazil died within the first three years. Undoubtedly the slavery trade and the humiliation and torture suffered by the black population were traumatic events that left their marks on the victimised individuals. We find images of slaves being tortured and beaten in all the nation's major educational and cultural institutions. However, when history is a product of traumatic situations, it unfolds as though without witnesses. Because slaves were unable to transmit the full horror of their experiences to subsequent generations, our partial representations of the past fail to promote social justice for present-day Afro-descendants.

Goldfinger's gold standard: Negotiating the economic nation in mid-twentieth century Britain

Karl, A. G. — 2008-05-29

`Goldfinger's gold standard' reads the James Bond/007 spy film Goldfinger (1964) to interrogate how economic institutions and ideas shape a British national imaginary during the decolonising mid-century. I argue that Goldfinger answers anxieties about the loss of British `standards' of global authority by economically delimiting the nation and privileging cultural Britishness, at the same time that the film acknowledges the flexibility and the ironies of the Bretton Woods gold standard that is its premise. As such, Goldfinger is prescient about the transactive nature of Britishness and economics alike that are characteristic of life under contemporary global capitalism. I contend that ideas about Britain are conditioned by economic policy, and suggest that the interfaces of economic, national and cultural histories may serve as the basis for further interdisciplinary inquiry. •

`Riveting and real -- a family in the raw': (Re)visiting The Family (1974) after reality TV

Holmes, S. — 2008-05-29

Paul Watson's 12-part documentary serial, The Family (BBC, 1974), focused on the lives of the working-class Wilkins family from Reading. Along with An American Family (PBS, 1973), The Family has been positioned as a landmark precursor to reality TV. Yet it has largely been referred to rather than analysed, and the potential relationship at work between `then' and `now' is often obscured. In seeking to (re)construct the popular reception of The Family, this article argues that it is particularly productive to `revisit' the Wilkinses right now, precisely because the growth of reality TV has led to an `opening up' of the traditional terrain of documentary studies. Drawing on new archival research, this article examines how discussion of the programme generated an expansive extratextual framework. This framework turned The Family into a cultural event, and it represents a crucial site for accessing its historical circulation — particularly with regard to discourses on `ordinary' people as television performers, and `ordinary' people turned television `stars'.

The personal is professional: Personal trainers as a case study of cultural intermediaries

Smith Maguire, J. — 2008-05-29

The article examines the discursive construction of personal training as a case study of the characteristics of cultural intermediary work. Based on an analysis of US personal training occupational texts from 1990 to 2000, the article employs a cultural economy perspective (du Gay and Pryke, 2002) to examine the importance of normative codes of professionalism, the investment of personal resources and aesthetic labour, and the tension between cultural and economic categories in representations of the work. Personal training is a particularly revealing case because of its explicit tensions between cultural factors (e.g. a professional, service-oriented ethic) and economic parameters (e.g. the entrepreneurial aspects of selling services). In response, trainers are encouraged to adopt a vocational attitude, suggesting how cultural intermediary work more generally invokes particular dispositions, which are the outcomes of negotiating between economy and culture, and the personal and the professional, in specific occupational contexts.

Mediating hope: New media, politics and resistance

Fenton, N. — 2008-05-29

In an attempt to reimagine the concept of resistance in media studies this article argues for a reconsideration of the concept of political hope in non-mainstream mediated political mobilization that will take us beyond a focus on resistance to one of political project(s). The critical first step in such an endeavour is to reach beyond the confines of media and communication studies. This article draws on political science, sociology, social movement studies and cultural geography, among other subjects, to consider the ways in which new media may allow a reimagining of hope so that a collective consciousness can be developed and maintained. In doing so the article suggests that if, as scholars, we wish to enhance our political purchase then the notion of resistance in media and communication studies should be made to engage with the struggle of changing the terms of the polity.