Thinking Onto the Box: The Photographer’s Archive as Instrument

The case study of the island of Taquile in the Peruvian part of Lake Titicaca will be used to explore how textiles functions as intermediaries for social interactions and change and how they respond to demands from ethnic tourism. By using theories of material culture, specifically the analytical approach of "the biography", I aim to shed light on the process by which some textiles in Taquile have passed from being the person’s “second skin” to a commodity responding to ethnic tourism. However, such a process, rather than being contradictory, expresses the capacity of Taquilean culture to adapt the local values to a monetary economy. Taquilean culture is also an agent in these encounters with tourism, impeding the complete commoditization of the textiles.

In recent years an increasing number of scholars have incorporated a focus on emotions in their theories of material culture, transnationalism and globalization, and this book aims to contribute to this field of inquiry. It examines how ‘emotions’ can be theorized, and serves as a useful analytical tool for understanding the interrelated mobility of humans, objects and images. Ethnographically rich, and theoretically grounded case studies offer new perspectives on the relations between migration, material culture and emotions. While some chapters address the many different ways in which migrants and migrant artists express their emotions through objects and images in transnational contexts, other chapters focus on how particular works of art, everyday objects and artefacts can evoke feelings specific to particular migrant groups and communities. Case studies also analyse how artists, academics and policy makers can stimulate positive interaction between migrants and non-migrant communities.

This article provides an introductory discussion of the ways in which popular perceptions of artworks, artists, and the creative process have generated a repertoire of recurring motifs. Sometimes reinforced by art historical research and documentary evidence and sometimes at variance with all such scholarship, the tropes of ‘artlore’ constitute a catalogue of persistent story types that spring from visual interpretation experienced within a shifting cultural context.

This study discusses the renaissance of terracotta as a primary medium in modern Nigerian sculpture, its evolution from a traditionally historical material to one of conceptual and aesthetic significance. Terracotta has strong roots in Nigeria's sculptural history, particularly in the Nok, Ife, and Benin civilizations, where it was used ritualistically, spiritually, and symbolically. But its use diminished under the influence of colonial power, modernist tendencies, and the embracing of industrial materials such that it was relegated to the periphery of modern art practice. Based on fieldwork, interviews with practicing artists, and observation of exhibitions, the research explores how Nigerian sculptors are envisioning a renewed interest in terracotta to contest existing art hierarchies and reconstitute material value. These artists are engaging with the medium not only for its natural and material potential but also for its ability to address subject matter of identity, cultural memory, environmental sustainability, and postcolonial critique. Grounded in postcolonial and material culture theory, the article argues that terracotta's revival reflects a broader trend of re-centring indigenous materials and epistemologies in Nigerian art. It argues that this re-engagement places terracotta as a medium of resistance and innovation and lends to a vibrant sculptural vocabulary mediating between tradition and modern relevance.

Handicrafts are not merely objects of beauty; they are living repositories of moral imagination, cultural identity and inherited wisdom. This article explores the ethical and cultural dimensions of rural Indian handicrafts, focusing on Chanderi and Maheshwari weaving, bell-metal work, terracotta pottery and bamboo craftsmanship from Madhya Pradesh. Drawing on material culture theory, phenomenology and Indian aesthetic philosophy, it examines how these practices embody dharma (righteous duty), karma (work as devotion) and samskara (cultural refinement). Field-based observations reveal that artisans view their work not as production but as prayer - a yajna, a ritual offering sustaining moral order and ecological harmony. In an age of industrial uniformity, such crafts endure as vessels of memory and moral meaning, weaving together tradition, embodiment and philosophical reflection.

This article examines the art practice of a group of professors and students—who later came to be known as Group 57—at the Fine Arts College of the University of Tehran during the revolutionary period of 1978 to 1980. Through interviews with artists and art historical research, the authors describe the artists’ workshop where they produced posters against the Shah, the United States, and imperialism. Their posters drew on the bold colors, clear text, symbolic imagery, and easy reproducibility of international radical poster art and the early Russian revolutionary avant‐garde. The authors recover these aesthetic and intellectual connections in the academic and professional training of the artists and in the art historical context of the posters themselves, examining the posters’ recent and more distant influences, and reinscribing the artists in the history of Iranian art and international art history. The authors also point toward connections between Group 57 and protest art in Iran today.

Latvian sculptures created before the mid-19th century are located mainly in churches, not in museum collections. The most serious obstacle to research of Latvian art in the given period is lack of pertinent documentary material. As a result, Latvian art historians have mostly studied the sculptures for which written sources are available. This article will offer solutions for further research in cases when written sources are limited or altogether unavailable. How much and what can be discovered using digitisation solutions? The study of the sculptures of the Biķernieki Church in Riga provides a paradigmatic case for further research with the help of digitisation. In 1967, when the congregation of the Biķernieki Church was forced to abandon the church, the sculptures were transferred to museums. Today they can be seen in the exhibition of the Rundāle Palace Museum. The scant extant documentary evidence does not allow us to establish the authorship of the sculptures or the time of their creation with certainty. The study discussed in the article shows the importance of digitisation in art history research. The current research is based on 3D models of the sculptures of the Biķernieki Church obtained using 3D scanning technology. Supplementing them with high-resolution photographs and other digital solutions can confirm or, on the contrary, refute assumptions about their authorship and creation made by historians so far. The article outlines the methods used to identify stylistic influences on the sculptures of the Biķernieki Church, suggesting that they may have been modelled after similar sculptures in Gdańsk (Danzig) and Dresden and even after certain antique sculptures. The graphic methods used in the research have made it possible to precisely identify the style of execution of a single sculptor in several churches in Riga.

If I find out that you have bought a $90 red light sabre, Tara, well there's going to be trouble. -- Kevin Brabazon A few Saturdays ago, my 71-year old father tried to convince me of imminent responsibilities. As I am considering the purchase of a house, there are mortgages, bank fees and years of misery to endure. Unfortunately, I am not an effective Big Picture Person. The lure of the light sabre is almost too great. For 30 year old Generation Xers like myself, it is more than a cultural object. It is a textual anchor, and a necessary component to any future history of the present. Revelling in the aura of the Australian release for Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, this paper investigates popular memory, an undertheorised affiliation between popular culture and cultural studies.1 The excitement encircling the Star Wars prequel has been justified in terms of 'hype' or marketing. Such judgements frame the men and women cuing for tickets, talking Yodas and light sabres as fools or duped souls who need to get out more. My analysis explores why Star Wars has generated this enthusiasm, and how cultural studies can mobilise this passionate commitment to consider notions of popularity, preservation and ephemerality. We'll always have Tattooine. Star Wars has been a primary popular cultural social formation for a generation. The stories of Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Darth Vader, Yoda, C-3PO and R2D2 offer an alternative narrative for the late 1970s and 1980s. It was a comfort to have the Royal Shakespearian tones of Alec Guinness confirming that the Force would be with us, through economic rationalism, unemployment, Pauline Hanson and Madonna discovering yoga. The Star Wars Trilogy, encompassing A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, was released between 1977 and 1983. These films have rarely slipped from public attention, being periodically 'brought back' through new cinematic and video releases. The currency of Star Wars is matched with the other great popular cultural formations of the post-war period: the James Bond series and Star Trek. One reason for the continued success of these programmes is that other writers, film makers and producers cannot leave these texts alone. Bond survives not only through Pierce Brosnan's good looks, but the 'Hey Baby' antics of Austin Powers. Star Trek, through four distinct series, has become an industry that will last longer than Voyager's passage back from the Delta Quadrant. Star Wars, perhaps even more effectively than the other popular cultural heavyweights, has enmeshed itself into other filmic and televisual programming. Films like Spaceballs and television quizzes on Good News Week keep the knowledge system and language current and pertinent.2 Like Umberto Eco realised of Casablanca, Star Wars is "a living example of living textuality" (199). Both films are popular because of imperfections and intertextual archetypes, forming a filmic quilt of sensations and affectivities. Viewers are aware that "the cliches are talking among themselves" (Eco 209). As these cinematic texts move through time, the depth and commitment of these (con)textual dialogues are repeated and reinscribed. To hold on to a memory is to isolate a moment or an image and encircle it with meaning. Each day we experience millions of texts: some are remembered, but most are lost. Some popular cultural texts move from ephemera to popular memory to history. In moving beyond individual reminiscences -- the personal experiences of our lifetime -- we enter the sphere of popular culture. Collective or popular memory is a group or community experience of a textualised reality. For example, during the Second World War, there were many private experiences, but certain moments arch beyond the individual. Songs by Vera Lynn are fully textualised experiences that become the fodder for collective memory. Similarly, Star Wars provides a sense-making mechanism for the 1980s. Like all popular culture, these texts allow myriad readership strategies, but there is collective recognition of relevance and importance. Popular memory is such an important site because it provides us, as cultural critics, with a map of emotionally resonant sites of the past, moments that are linked with specific subjectivities and a commonality of expression. While Star Wars, like all popular cultural formations, has a wide audience, there are specific readings that are pertinent for particular groups. To unify a generation around cultural texts is an act of collective memory. As Harris has suggested, "sometimes, youth does interesting things with its legacy and creatively adapts its problematic into seemingly autonomous cultural forms" (79). Generation X refers to an age cohort born between the mid-1960s and the mid-1970s. Finally cultural studies theorists have found a Grail subculture. Being depthless, ambivalent, sexually repressed and social failures, Xers are a cultural studies dream come true. They were the children of the media revolution. Star Wars is integral to this textualised database. A fan on the night of the first screening corrected a journalist: "we aren't Generation X, we are the Star Wars generation" (Brendon, in Miller 9). An infatuation and reflexivity with the media is the single framework of knowledge in which Xers operate. This shared understanding is the basis for comedy, and particularly revealed (in Australia) in programmes like The Panel and Good News Week. Television themes, lines of film dialogue and contemporary news broadcasts are the basis of the game show. The aesthetics of life transforms television into a real. Or, put another way, "individual lives may be fragmented and confused but McDonald's is universal" (Hopkins 17). A group of textual readers share a literacy, a new way of reading the word and world of texts. Nostalgia is a weapon. The 1990s has been a decade of revivals: from Abba to skateboards, an era of retro reinscription has challenged linear theories of history and popular culture. As Timothy Carter reveals, "we all loved the Star Wars movies when we were younger, and so we naturally look forward to a continuation of those films" (9). The 1980s has often been portrayed as a bad time, of Thatcher and Reagan, cold war brinkmanship, youth unemployment and HIV. For those who were children and (amorphously phrased) 'young adults' of this era, the popular memory is of fluorescent fingerless gloves, Ray Bans, 'Choose Life' t-shirts and bubble skirts. It was an era of styling mousse, big hair, the Wham tan, Kylie and Jason and Rick Astley's dancing. Star Wars action figures gave the films a tangibility, holding the future of the rebellion in our hands (literally). These memories clumsily slop into the cup of the present. The problem with 'youth' is that it is semiotically too rich: the expression is understood, but not explained, by discourses as varied as the educational system, family structures, leisure industries and legal, medical and psychological institutions. It is a term of saturation, where normality is taught, and deviance is monitored. All cultural studies theorists carry the baggage of the Birmingham Centre into any history of youth culture. The taken-for-granted 'youth as resistance' mantra, embodied in Resistance through Rituals and Subculture: The Meaning of Style, transformed young people into the ventriloquist's puppet of cultural studies. The strings of the dancing, smoking, swearing and drinking puppet took many years to cut. The feminist blade of Angela McRobbie did some damage to the fraying filaments, as did Dick Hebdige's reflexive corrections in Hiding in the Light. However, the publications, promotion and pedagogy of Gen X ended the theoretical charade. Gen X, the media sophisticates, played with popular culture, rather than 'proper politics.' In Coupland's Generation X, Claire, one of the main characters believed that "Either our lives become stories, or there's just no way to get through them." ... We know that this is why the three of us left our lives behind us and came to the desert -- to tell stories and to make our own lives worthwhile tales in the process. (8) Television and film are part of this story telling process. This intense connection generated an ironic and reflexive literacy in the media. Television became the basis for personal pleasures and local resistances, resulting in a disciplined mobilisation of popular cultural surfaces. Even better than the real thing. As the youngest of Generation Xers are now in their late twenties, they have moved from McJobs to careers. Robert Kizlik, a teacher trainer at an American community college expressed horror as the lack of 'commonsensical knowledge' from his new students. He conducted a survey for teachers training in the social sciences, assessing their grasp of history. There was one hundred percent recognition of such names as Madonna, Mike Tyson, and Sharon Stone, but they hardly qualify as important social studies content ... . I wondered silently just what it is that these students are going to teach when they become employed ... . The deeper question is not that we have so many high school graduates and third and fourth year college students who are devoid of basic information about American history and culture, but rather, how, in the first place, these students came to have the expectations that they could become teachers. (n. pag.) Kizlik's fear is that the students, regardless of their enthusiasm, had poor recognition of knowledge he deemed significant and worthy. His teaching task, to convince students of the need for non-popular cultural knowledges, has resulted in his course being termed 'boring' or 'hard'. He has been unable to reconcile the convoluted connections between personal stories and televisual n

Cultural Competence Reexamined: Critique and Directions for the Future

This multidisciplinary study analyses the social dynamics of missionary Christianity's influence on Vhavenda traditional belief systems and healing practices, emphasising institutional development, cross-cultural patterns, and contemporary policy implications. This study employs sociological frameworks of institutional analysis, cultural capital theory, and organisational change to examine how colonial-era religious institutions systematically eroded indigenous knowledge systems while establishing new social hierarchies and power structures. The analysis reveals that Vhavenda traditional belief systems, characterised by a complex monotheistic theology centred on Nwali (the Supreme Being), environmental spirituality, and comprehensive healing practices, encountered systematic institutional suppression beginning in the 1860s through the deliberate use of educational and healthcare systems as instruments of social control and cultural transformation. Cross-cultural comparisons among Maori, Australian Aboriginal, and North American indigenous experiences illustrate universal patterns of institutional colonisation, including the weaponization of educational systems, the medicalisation of indigenous healing practices, and the systematic devaluation of ancestral knowledge systems. Despite ongoing institutional persecution, traditional customs persisted through adaptive strategies such as syncretism, covert preservation networks, and community resistance mechanisms, demonstrating the resilience of indigenous social institutions. Current research reveals that 80% of African communities still depend on traditional medicine for primary healthcare, underscoring the ongoing significance and shortcomings of exclusively Western healthcare programmes.This study employs a historical-institutional analysis and cross-cultural synthesis of secondary sources, drawing on archival records, historical accounts, ethnographic literature, and sociological scholarship to examine patterns of religious colonisation and indigenous response across multiple contexts.This study enhances interdisciplinary scholarship by (1) employing sociological institutional theory to elucidate patterns of religious colonisation; (2) creating comparative frameworks for examining the suppression of indigenous knowledge in diverse global contexts; (3) recognising contemporary policy ramifications for healthcare systems, educational curricula, cultural preservation initiatives, and decolonisation efforts; and (4) offering actionable policy recommendations for the incorporation of traditional knowledge systems into contemporary institutional frameworks while respecting indigenous sovereignty and cultural integrity.

The ideology of the era pluralist of the 1990s in the development of Malaysian printmakers has led to a new dimension in the production of contemporary artwork. Before the ideology of the era pluralist, printmaking in Malaysia only focused on conventional methods applied by immigrants from China to Malaysia at that time. The spread of the ideology of the era pluralist has resulted in diversity in the production of printmaking artworks where printed artworks can exist through everyday materials. Indirectly, the ideology of this era pluralist has shown the end of art history that is more concerned with aesthetic value and limited to personal questions. The existence of the term anything goes has boosted the production of printed artwork that was previously strained by strict rules in production. This study was carried out using art history research methods through a survey of the Alternative Printmaking Art Exhibition 2010 focusing on the works of Samsudin Wahab, Mansor Ibrahim, Dr Chew Teng Beng, Ishak Ramli, Noraza Arzain and Samsu Muhamad and will be analyzed using the theory of Style by Meyer Shapiro. The result of this exhibition review is expected to be used as a guide to discuss the relationship between daily use materials and printed artworks in classifying print art after the 1960 convention and the ideology of the pluralist era in the production of contemporary printed works.

This paper investigated science as a systematic knowledge used for discovery of the world, observation, test and presentation that entails validated facts, and how technology, which is adjudged to be using scientific knowledge for excecution of things at factory or industry with the use of tools is evidently ingrained in certain Yoruba cultural practices like farming, blacksmithing, sculpting and African power in Yoruba Egungun (masquerade). Several scholarly works abound on culture, science and technology, but little or nothing is established to address insuniation that lack of scientific or technological knowledge in Yoruba culture is responsible for economic and political backwardness of the people. Effort to ascertain that scientific and technological knowledge is present and real in Yoruba culture is what the paper out to proove. Cultural theory and theory of the sociology of literature in which Hyppolite and his disciples are one of the proponents is adopted for its capability to offer explicit information on culture as product of the society whose main function is to reflect the same society in the same way literature does. Secondary data were collected from books, journals, social media and unstructured interview with four resourceful elders at Ogbomoso on certain scientific/technological knowledge observed in some Egungun masquerades. Findings revealed that scientific/technological knowledge is well ingrained in Yoruba culture before the advent of the Europeans. It was revealed also that the secreet behind the entrenchment of scientific/technological knowledge in Yoruba culture is hidden and known only to very few individuals, hence, the reason for negative insinuation in some quarters that there is no iota of scientific/technological presence in the culture and the assumption that there is economic and political backwardness is not tenable. It was recommended that scientific/technological power ingrained in the culture should be codified and shared because ‘a knowledge shared is a knowledge retained’. Government should provide financial supports for the traditional practitioners to discover and promote more scientific/technological knowledge embedded in the cultural practices of the people.

Invisible power, visible dispossession: The witchcraft of a subterranean pipeline

This paper challenges the pervasive 'pedagogical colonialism' in contemporary education, where dominant cultural paradigms systematically marginalize diverse knowledge systems and disconnect learning from learners' cultural realities. The paper argues that the cultural context must shift from peripheral consideration to a pedagogical foundation. Through critical analysis of Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development, Bandura's Social Learning Theory, culturally responsive pedagogy frameworks, and fourth-generation Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT-4), combined with ethnographic evidence and practice-based innovations, this work demonstrates how systematic cultural integration transforms educational fragmentation into elite community-connected learning. The central contribution is the Culturally Contextualized Pedagogical Integration (CCPI) model, a comprehensive six-pillar framework that encompasses concept anchoring, relational learning, practical application, value reflection, critical analysis, and collaborative innovation. Using theoretical synthesis and practice-informed methodology, the paper demonstrates how the CCPI model enhances student and teacher's individual achievement while building collective capacity for local, socio-industrial, and global engagement. This work contributes to educational theory by repositioning culture as a pedagogical necessity rather than an educational luxury. The framework addresses three critical imperatives: honoring cultural diversity while evolving local culture into intellectual capital, leveraging technology for cultural amplification, and preparing learners for meaningful participation in an interconnected digitalized world that increasingly values institutional cultural and professional competence. The model bridges the gap between local knowledge systems, national education philosophy, and global educational standards without sacrificing cultural authenticity or academic rigor.

The rationale behind traditional knowledge management initiatives is to create, capture, share, organize, and use intangible assets such as organizational knowledge. Information systems have been playing a vital role in the implementation of knowledge management practices and systems. Recently, organizations are adopting new forms of information and communication technologies such as social software to encourage employees to create and share knowledge. This article explores the adoption of social software tools by Indian knowledge workers working for information technology consultancy firms. A mixed method approach has been applied, and drawing on social dilemma theory and Hofstede’s cultural theory, this study discusses the factors affecting the adoption of social software by knowledge workers. A quantitative descriptive-explanatory study and a qualitative exploratory study have been employed to gather data from Indian organizations. It was found that even though information technology consultancy firms are at the forefront of deploying social software, the active use of these tools is rather limited among knowledge workers. The present study sheds light on both personal and organizational factors that hinder the adoption of such tools. Finally, on the basis of these research findings we aim to contribute to managerial implications for organizations wishing to adopt social media.