Media, Communication and Performing Arts

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://eresearch.qmu.ac.uk/handle/20.500.12289/7185

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Cats on a Cold Tin Roof: Female Identity and Language in Plays by Five Contemporary Scottish Women Playwrights
(Queen Margaret University, 1999) Horvat, Ksenija
Cats on a Cold Tin Roof: Female Identity and Language in Plays by Five Contemporary Scottish Women Playwrights concentrates on investigation into the main preoccupations of five Scottish women playwrights in the last twenty years, with an emphasis on the ways in which they deal with the issues of gender identity. The study examines fifteen plays by five very different women authors in the context of modern feminist literary analysis. The main objective of the study is to show how Sue Glover, Liz Lochhead, Marcella Evaristi, Sharman Macdonald and Rona Munro – having come from different experiential perspectives – used recurring themes, imagery and discursive modes in exploring female identity. A further objective of the study is to open up and encourage new avenues for exploring female identity in the work of Scottish women playwrights. It also sets out to identify the common themes and imagery shared by these authors, and the ways in which they are expressed in language.
Motivation and method in Scots translations, versions and adaptations of plays from the historic repertoire of continental European drama.
(Queen Margaret University, 2000) Findlay, William
This study adopts a twin approach to investigation of writers' motivation and method in translating, versionizing, and/or adapting into Scots plays from the historic repertoire of Continental European drama. First, it considers, through historical/critical research, the work ok, and statements by or about, selected writers representative by period of the development of a modern tradition in translating such plays for the Scottish stage from the 1940s through the 1990s. Second, it presents, through practice-as-research, self-reflective commentaries on two playscripts prepared as part of this study in order to allow self-recording and self-analysis of the process from the perspective of motivation and method. The playscripts are a version of Gerhart Hauptmann's Die Weber (The Weavers), and a co-translation of Carlo Goldoni's Le Baruffe Chiozzote (The Chioggian Squabbles; or, in this translation, The Chioggian Rammies).
Media Personality and Fan Community: A Study in Modern Communication and Culture
(Queen Margaret University, 2000) Roberts, Catherine
This study examines the relations between the media personalities and their audiences. Its broad interest is with the implications for contemporary social experience of the fact that modern communication and culture involve mediated interaction. Its focus is on broadcasting's use of personality presenters to interact with viewers and listeners and on audiences' experiences of this. This thesis explains that broadcasting has developed a personality system to relate to audiences and discusses the characteristics of this system. It considers the importance of genre in determining the type of presenter used and the significance of their personality. It is argued that an awareness of the construction of personae has undermined broadcasting's traditional personality system where sincerity is crucial. The fact that nowadays professional personalities operate as commodities in a competitive marketplace is highlighted and the role played by management companies in their careers is explored. This research project provides a case study of the media personality Phillip Schofield. His role as a presenter and his place within popular culture are elaborated. His persona is examined in detail and shown to be consistent with the discourses of broadcasting's personality system. This study proceeds to investigate the consumption of the personality system. It reviews the existing literature on para-social interaction and the mediated relationships of intimacy at a distance that develop between persenters and their audiences. It contributes to this knowledge by presenting the findings from qualitative research into viewers' relationships with a media personality. This empirical study involved conducting in-depth interviews with four of Phillip Schofield's fans and spending time with the fan community these interviewees belong to. The formation of this group is outlined and the fact that sociability is an important aspect of fandom is stressed. Concentrating on the subjects' responses to Schofield, this research demonstrates that one form of fandom is rooted in the intensive cultivation of a para-social relationship.
Community development in cyberspace: a case study of a community network
(Queen Margaret University, 2001) Malina, Anna
This thesis investigates the background, emergence, use and significance of a community based information network, the Craigmillar Community Information Service (CCIS), in Edinburgh, Scotland, to assess its relationship with community development and note also the local network's relationship over time with the community, the city and society. Desk research, i.e. reviews of literature and examination of various documents combined with information gained in the field helped to weave contextual, conceptual and theoretical frameworks to assist in analysis. Data was gathered in the field by means of qualitative interviews with City of Edinburgh (CEC) officials, system developers and CCIS users. Additional data was collected and checks were subsequently made as a result of routine observations of CCIS operating within their base in Craigmillar; and also via virtual observations of on-line structure and content over time. Local media reports and an assessment of regeneration delivery services in Craigmillar, commissioned by CEC also provided insights in the analysis. The main objective was to collect data that would accurately reflect the true nature and significance of the CCIS system. A qualitative methodology was employed in this study. Desk research began in mid 1995, and on-line and real-time observations in 1996. Interviews were carried out in the field during 1997 and early 1998. In the final chapter of this thesis, conclusions emerging from analysis of the data are offered as a means of developing deeper understanding of CCIS and community development in cyberspace. Overall, it is hoped to extend general knowledge of community networks, and broaden understanding of the developing field of social informatics. In light of conclusions drawn, theoretical frameworks are reviewed in the final chapter and potential is outlined for further research into the evolving roles of community-based initiatives situated elsewhere, their socio-technical relations and their significance in different societal settings.
Female 'Self Culture' in Edinburgh: The Ladies' Edinburgh Debating Society.
(Queen Margaret University, 2002) Kelman, K A.
The Ladies's Edinburgh Debating Society met on the first Saturday of each month between 1865-1936 to discuss the books they were reading and to debate prearranged issues. For the first fifteen years its members produced a magazine which carried fictive and general interest articles. This thesis will study the archive of the Society and the magazine that it produced to arrive at an understanding of the women's reading practices, their intellectual lives and their attitudes to the society in which they lived and how these experiences impacted upon them. At a time when women's societal role was limited and access to education was based on wealth or the philanthropy of others, these women were able (through their privileged place in the middle and upper classes) to construct their own canon of improving reading and to set guidelines for the education of others. Working against the hegemonic discourse of the time, yet seeking to exert some controlling influence over others, the women's attempts at self culture throw into rellief the context of their cultural experiences and the correlation between self improvement and women's emancipation. This thesis argues that prevailing ideas about Victorian women's existence in 'separate spheres' needs to be revised. It argues that the members of The Ladies' Edinburgh Debating Society make a move from the private to the public sphere through their utilisation of culture. Moreover, they are able to blend this notion of spheres to make society their concern through collective and individual action; improving themselves and the community in which they lived.
The Fall and Rise of the Anicom: the Sitcom Genre in U.S. TV Animation (1960–2003)
(Queen Margaret University, 2004) Dobson, Nichola M.
The thesis examines the animated sitcom, from 1960 until present, and attempts to locate its development within the genre of situation comedy. Television animation has long been regarded among film, television and animation theorists as a 'lower cultural form' than its theatrical, or 'live action' counterparts. This thesis seeks to establish a pattern of generic development, in a form which has been critically and theoretically neglected over that time. A lack of a consistent definition within critics and theorists has subsequently led to a lack of a coherent canon of theory. It is for this reason that animation is approached from several areas including film theory and cultural studies. Through original empirical research, the thesis examines the animated series in terms of its generic status, and contributes to the debates surrounding definitions of animation and the question of genre in animation. The thesis charts the development of the series, and presents the term 'anicom' to convey the unique nature of the form, its contribution to the sitcom genre and the larger form of animation as a whole.
Learning cultures in cyberspace
(Queen Margaret University, 2004) Bayne, Sian
This thesis is a study of emerging learning cultures. Its focus is on students and teachers who are engaged in using internet technologies for learning in higher education in the United Kingdom. The thesis provides an exploration of theoretical approaches to the cultural impact of new technologies, drawing on cultural, cybercultural and educational theory. It applies these theoretical insights to interview texts generated through discussions with learners and teachers. Its contribution lies in the originality of its empirical material and of the insights applied to their analysis, and in its application of cultural and cybercultural theory to the area of online learning and teaching.
Dramatic Techniques in Performing Aeschylus' Agamemnon: The Oresteia at the Royal National Theatre
(Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, 2005) Burke, A. C.
This thesis explores the theoretical and dramaturgical challenges faced by modern productions of the Oresteia with particular reference to two modern Royal National Theatre productions: Sir Peter Hall's (1981) and Katie Mitchell's (1999). It argues that to appreciate these challenges requires a detailed knowledge of the theatricality of the original text. In support of this position, this thesis contains a detailed analysis of Aeschylus' Agamemnon exploring how the playwright creates the play's world in text and performance. The discussion's focus concentrates on how theatrical space (seen, implied, and diegetic) constructs the world of the play. Concomitant in this discussion is an analysis of how Aeschylus invites the audience to decode the play's theatricality through its knowledge of epic literature and its own non-theatrical spatial environments and practices. To facilitate this understanding, the text and performance are explored with reference to political, domestic and ritual space. In considering these productions, the assumption of theatre reviews that productions can be described as adhering to either modernising or archeologically inspired staging practices is challenged. It is argued that modern productions should be analysed with reference to directorial, translator, and actor intentions. Through a methodology based on interviewing theatre practitioners, the productions of Hall and Mitchell are seen to be irreducibly modern, yet still maintain a relationship with Aeschylus. Hall's use of ancient staging conventions is seen to be a modern interpretation of the theatrical past, which aimed at communicating the foreignness of Aeschylus. In contract, Mitchell's use of modern staging techniques made the Oresteia familiar to a modern audience, but, by suggesting political, domestic, and ritual equivalents, still articulated with the ancient performance.
The Master and Mrs. Wharton: Film Adaptations of the work of Edith Wharton and Henry James.
(Queen Margaret University, 2005-03) Artt, S. J.
This thesis is an examination of six films adapted between 1993 and 2000 from novels by Henry James and Edith Wharton: James's The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl, The Portrait of a Lady and Wharton's The Age of Innocence, The House of Mirth and The Buccaneers. All six films have been claimed as part of the costume drama/literary adaptation/heritage genre. The analysis of this cycle of adaptations focuses on the visual expression of four key themes: wealth, desire, decorum and social mobility. Dress and art are deployed within the visual fabric of these adaptations as symbolic objects that make up what Wharton termed the hieroglyphic world of society. In this cycle of films, the use of art and dress constitutes a new way of viewing costume and art as elements of the adaptation process. Barthes's aspect of the third meaning, the passage from language to significance is conveyed through dress and art as sites of visual meaning, a concept that is also deployed by James and Wharton in their fiction. The mise-en-scene of these six adaptations draws inspiration from a variety of artistic influences, ranging from the paintings of John Singer Sargent and James Tissot to the influence of early cinema and photography. Clothing plays an intrinsic role in both the novels and the film adaptations, in terms of displaying consumption, social class and character, and it also makes up the iconic images created by stars who take on key roles, such as Helen Bonham Carter's portrayal of Kate Croy as a heritage noir (cf. Church Gibson, 2000) femme fatale in the film of The Wings of the Dove. James and Wharton's narratives represent an expression of the 'transcultural aesthetic' making their fiction particularly apt for cinematic adaptation in an era of increased global mobility. This concept of the transcultural aesthetic is vital in attempting to widen the debate on 'heritage' cinema. While these films and novels share textual themes rooted in settings ranging from the late 1870s through to the early 1900s, the narratives are adapted in ways that make James and Wharton relevant to contemporary cinema audiences, while also reminding us of the timelessness of James and Wharton's narratives.
Webfilm theory
(Queen Margaret University, 2007) Kurtzke, Simone
Since its inception in 1989, the World Wide Web has grown as a medium for publishing first text, then images, audio, and finally, moving images including short films. While most new media forms, in particular, hypertext, have received scholarly attention, research into moving image on the Internet had been limited. The thesis therefore set out to investigate webfilms, a form of short film on the WWW and the Internet, over a period of 9 years (1997-2005). The thesis was theoretically embedded in questions regarding new media as new field of research, since the increasing visibility of new media had resulted in the emergence of the discipline of 'new media studies'. This context raised issues regarding the configuration of new media studies within the existing academic disciplines of media and cultural studies, which were explored in depth in the literature review. The case studies of the thesis explored and analysed webfilms from a vantage point of actor-network theory, since this was arguably the most appropriate methodology to a research object considerably influenced by technological factors. The focus was on the conditions of webfilm production, distribution, and exhibition, and the evolution of webfilm discourse and culture. The aim was to seek answers to the question 'How didwebfilm arise as (new) form of film?' In the process of research, a number of issues were raised including the changing definition and changing forms of webfilms, the convergence of media, and the complex interdependency of humans and their computers. The research re-evaluates the relationship between human and non-human factors in media production and presents a fresh approach by focusing on the network as unit of analysis. The thesis as a whole not only provides new information on the evolution of webfilm as a form of film, but also illustrates how the network interaction of humans and nonhumans lies at the heart of contemporary new media and convergence culture.
The Corbicula Cycle : postmodernism and identity in on the edge, throught the night, and in the shade
(Queen Margaret University, 2007) Leddy, David
This practice-based research is based around the creation of a triptych of performances entitled The Corbicula Cycle. The three performance pieces are: On The Edge, Through The Night and In The Shade. The aim of the practice is to take the supposedly 'low' artistic forms of the murder-mystery, Cinderella narrative, blackface minstrelsy and drag cabaret and interpenetrate them with theoretical content from postmodernism and identity politics whilst combining formal elements of dramatic writing and performance art practice. The emphasis of both the research and the research outcomes is a practical one. The DVDs and playscripts represent the core of the submission, with this thesis serving to support and contextualise the practice. Thus the contribution of this work is demonstrated not through new theoretical findings but through new artistic findings in the three performances. In terms of postmodernism, the research focuses on intertextuality; deconstruction; simulacra and simulation; split and shifting subjectivity; parody, pastiche, irony and the mixing of the genres. In relation to identity politics, the piece takes a postmodern view, covering cultural theories relating to gender, sexuality, class and race. The overarching objective in combining these different knowledge paradigms is to create a series of open, polysemantic texts which can be read in different ways by different viewers. Thus, it is hoped that the pieces can be shown successfully outside of an academic context and be open to readers other than an 'expert-spectator' audience of academics and artists. None of these artistic or theoretical constructions is innovative in itself. However, this research represents a modest contribution to knowledge through the subtly new ways it combines the paradigms of cultural theory, dramatic new writing and performance art with the generic artistic models of the murder-mystery, the Cinderella narrative, drag cabaret and blackface minstrelsy. It also provides substantial new insights through critical reflection upon process and products, exploring the play between artistic aims, principles of composition and audience response.
East Meets West: The Perception of Japanese and Chinese Theatres in the Context of Edinburgh International Festival Programming Policy
(Queen Margaret University, 2007) Hsieh, Chia-che
East Meets West: The Perception of Japanese and Chinese Theatres in the Context of Edinburgh International Festival Programming Policy aims to explore the issues around intercultural translation and whether or not intercultural theatre can even truly represent non-domestic texts without distortion. In order to explore this in detail, this thesis uses as its research target an in-depth analysis of two productions produced at Edinburgh International Festival (EIF). Edinburgh International Festival was chosen as an appropriate cultural platform for this discussion due to its international recognition. In order to reveal the Eurocentric-oriented ideology within the Festival's policy and discuss the implications of this Eurocentric ideology for possibilities of intercultural translation, the thesis will explore the changes in programming policy by different EIF Festival Directors since 1947. Edward Said's 'Orientalism' is used as major reference regarding the Eurocentric ideology, and the concept of Western interculturalism. Several occidental and semi-western views are explored with relation to Broadway production on oriental themes in order to further explore Said's idea of Orientalism. The thesis shows how this idea is present in the EIF's context, based on an in-depth analysis of two intercultural productions of 'Macbeth': Ninagawa and Kunju. The aim is to show how these two productions represent a Western audience's voice. Since the question of identification is one of the major concerns in intercultural theatre practice, the thesis discusses the issues of identity and analyses potential for indigenous Asian theatre forms to engage in intercultural exchange in a way that would be built on equality rather than changing those forms to suit Western audiences' understanding. Accordingly, two intercultural productions of Ninagawa and Kunju 'Macbeth', which were presented on EIF's stage in 1985 and 1987 respectively, and their performance texts will be analysed in terms of the implication of EIF's programming policy on Japan's and China's theatre works presented at the Festival. The resulting research outcomes indicate that equal exchange and authentic representation between different cultures may be impossible.
Female identity and the British female ensemble drama 1995-1998
(Queen Margaret University, 2007) Ball, Victoria
This thesis focuses upon a distinctive form of 'feminine-gendered' fiction, that of the British female ensemble drama, that has proliferated across televisual schedules since the late 1970s and which has received little academic attention. Although not a discrete genre, the female ensemble drama is nevertheless identifiable as a distinctive form of 'feminine-gendered' fiction that is largely written and/or produced by women, which diegetically focuses on particular communities of female characters and which is predominantly aimed at female audiences. The purpose of this text-based analysis of the female ensemble drama is to engage with a central concern of feminist television criticism, that of the gendered identity of this particular media form and the constructions of gender within it given its association with women at these three sites of production, text and audience. While I provide a historical overview of the development of this form of drama in relation to its textual precedents I isolate a particular moment in the history of this form of drama, that of the late 1990s, for closer analysis. Firstly I isolate the late 1990s to provide knowledge and understanding of the way in which the 'feminine' identity of this form of drama has contributed to its academic neglect within this socio-cultural period. Secondly I provide a close textual analysis of the constructions of 'women' within three female ensemble dramas in order to engage with and explore the textual negotiations they embody surrounding discourses of feminism and post feminism, de- and re-traditionalization in this particular period. While these themes have begun to be addressed in feminist television criticism they have largely been explored in relation to constructions of femininity in American dramas. This analysis then, allows for an exploration of these discourses in relation to a regional form of British drama. It is through investigating the academic neglect of this form of drama; providing a historical, thematic and aesthetic overview of the female ensemble drama as well as a detailed analysis of three of the female ensemble dramas of the 1990s that I contribute knowledge and understanding of this particular regional form of 'feminine-gendered' fiction to the field of Feminist Television Studies.
Does anybody like being disabled? A critical exploration of impairment, identity, media and everyday experience in a disabling society.
(Queen Margaret University, 2010) Cameron, Colin
I offer a critical exploration of tensions experienced by disabled people in the construction of positive identities in everyday contexts in which self-understanding is shaped both by social structural relations of inequality and unique individual experience. The empirical evidence I use to develop and support my thesis involves data I have generated using a variety of data collection tools, through a series of interviews, conversations and observations carried out with sixteen disabled people across Scotland and England. I argue that while certain barriers to participation in ordinary community life may be being removed, perceptions of impairment as something ‘wrong’ with the bodies of disabled people remain embedded in dominant disability discourse. There is a structural purpose underlying the continued representation of impairment as misfortune, involving the ascription of a negative role – the disabled role – to those whose bodily configurations pose a challenge to requirements of conformity. Drawing on insights generated in my research, and building on an idea originally proposed by John Swain and Sally French in 2000, I have developed a clarified affirmative model of disability. This I intend as a tool to be used by people with impairments in making sense of the disabling social relations they encounter in everyday contexts, to be used alongside the social model in gaining knowledge to unsettle mainstream assumptions which can only recognise impairment as personal tragedy.
Speaking in an alien voice: A womanist comparison of the use of language by Scottish and West African female playwrights.
(Queen Margaret University, 2012) Ojediran, Oludolapo
This study explores specific thematic pre-occupations in the works of selected eight women writers from two different geographical and cultural milieus (West Africa and Scotland) with a specific focus on similarities in which these writers use language as a means of exploring women's positions within their respective societies. The second layer of the study's enquiry lives within the realm of exploration of womanist discourse, as originally developed by Alice Walker, and a possibility of applying this discourse beyond African American and African shores, as a transracial and transcultural model for creating new readings of dramatic discourse by women writers who come from different generational, racial, cultural and geographical environments. In total, sixteen plays ranging from 1970 to 2008 have been examined by means of close reading and comparative analysis, and against the backdrop of Alice Walker's womanist theory. The study's focus has been on the ways in which language is employed in these plays to develop womanish characters, to use Walker's term, capable of overcoming limitations of their position in societies that confine and silence them within domestic realms. This study shows that while womanist theory per se may be seen as confined to African American discourse, some of its elements such as audaciousness, community, spirituality and capability may find successful application in such two different cultural models as West Africa and Scottish shores.
Reading against the veil: Gender and politics in popular cinema of post-revolutionary Iran
(Queen Margaret University, 2012) Dadar, Taraneh
This thesis examines gender in the popular cinema of post-revolutionary Iran. It argues that a distinctly feminine discourse gradually emerged in post-revolutionary Iranian cinema and became very visible in the reformist period (1997-2005). This research covers the period between the establishment of the Islamic Republic and the end of the reformist period (1979-2005). Drawing on Stuart Hall (1981), this thesis considers popular culture, and popular cinema by extension, as a site of cultural struggle and focuses on gender representation as a major locus of post-revolutionary socio-political negotiation. Reading Iranian cinema in terms of an art/popular spectrum, the thesis examines four case studies from films that have been commercially successful, and have mobilised generic or formal conventions through their controversial gender representations. Three of these case studies, The Bride (1992), Red (1999) and Hemlock (2000) examine femininity in post-revolutionary popular cinema, while The Snowman (1995) has been included for its transgressive representation of masculinity.
Undoing Scotland after devolution in Liz Lochhead's dramatic adaptations of classical texts on page and stage
(Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, 2014) Paraskevova, Minka
The thesis studies the female voice in the local culture in the post-devolution dramatic adaptations of the Scottish Makar Liz Lochhead. It acknowledges the dramatist's idiosyncratic approach of fusing poetry and drama in order to question the new internationalist national model in Scotland resembling the main features of anti-colonial nationalisms post 1990s. Central to the thesis is the question of local female voice in the current national debate and whether and to what extent it problematizes the relation between feminism and nationalism in the new civic model introduced after devolution as an internationalist in Scotland. Lochhead's idiosyncratic voice of a poet and dramatist is interpreted as a non-feminist and non-nationalist with a specific focus on individualised female dramatic representations. The complex semiotic interpretation of the constructed dramatic images by the playwright in her post-devolutionary adaptations of the classics shows a problematic reading of gender difference as cultural identity which appears with distorted features in the political revisions laden with self-satire. She applies metonymic use of female characterisation in order to reflect upon the changes in the cultural, political and linguistic climate, which results in a shift from a post-colonial dramatic discourse to a socio-linguistic one in the understanding of Robin Lakoff about a highly politicised and performative language and identity. The female voice in the local culture is frequently silenced and partially invisible, thus excluded from the political/national debate. However, Lochhead's subject often re-asserts itself through silent resistance and body visibility to refer to the instability of male political voices and sometimes to ironize their lack of individual identity.
“It’s Complicated”: Facebook and Political Participation in Italy and the UK
(Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, 2015) Casteltrione, Isidoropaolo
Drawing from an extensive and unique data set acquired by combining a cross-national comparative approach and a mixed methods methodology, this thesis examines the contributions of Facebook to citizens' political participation in Italy and the UK. In the last decade there has been a proliferation of academic studies investigating the links between digital technologies and citizens' political participation, with an increasing number of publications focusing on social networking websites (SNSs). Within this specific sub-field, research has produced contrasting evidence. Some scholars stress the positive impact of the Internet and SNSs on political participation (i.e., optimists), while others minimise their mobilising power, emphasising their tendency to reinforce existing participatory trends (i.e., normalisers) or highlighting their limited or even negative influence on political participation (i.e., pessimists). The present research differs from the majority of investigations in this area in three ways. Firstly, the data for this study were gathered mostly in a non-electoral period and thus the contributions of Facebook to citizens' political participation were assessed independently of the electoral process, which usually occasions a rise in political participation. In addition, this research tackled two conceptual weaknesses characterising many Internet and political participation studies: the failure to consider political participation as a multidimensional phenomenon and the over-generalised approach to Internet and SNS usages. It did so by differentiating between political communication and political mobilisation activities, and three Facebook non-political usages, i.e., information, interpersonal communication, and social recreation. Thirdly, in response to the lack of cross-national comparative studies in this subject area, the contributions of Facebook to citizens' political participation were examined in the different contexts of Italy and the United Kingdom. This thesis makes four main contributions to the field of political communication, and more specifically to the strand of research examining the impact of digital technologies on political participation. The first contribution is the Particularised Model of Facebook Political Participation. The model identifies a number of factors mediating the links between Facebook and political participation, demonstrating the relevance of both external, context-related factors related to the British and Italian media and political landscapes, and more personal, subjective ones such as self-presentation, pre-existing levels of political engagement, and the nature and size of the Facebook network. Secondly, this study sheds light on the ways that Facebook functions as a political platform, establishing that dynamics typical of both new and traditional media are in action on this SNS, and that Facebook holds the capacity to activate a virtuous circle, thereby generating an information-led mobilisation. The third contribution is the Dual Routes of Exposure Model which offers clarification on the alleged tendency of digital technologies to promote selective exposure and, consequently, political fragmentation and polarisation, and shows that Facebook can operate as a potential antidote to such trends. The fourth contribution is to the polarised debate between optimists, normalisers, and pessimist, with the present research further highlighting the sterility of such a debate and indicating potentially fruitful approaches for the development of the field.
Understanding the problem of cultural non-participation: Discursive structures, articulatory practice and cultural domination
(Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, 2016-03) Stevenson, David John
This thesis employs a discursive methodology to analyse the policy problem of cultural non-participation. In so doing it seeks to answer the questions of what the problem is, why a problem exists, and what the existence of the problem does 'in the real' (Bacchi, 2009). The study draws on primary data generated in the form of policy texts, speeches and 42 in-depth qualitative interviews with individuals working in or for publicly funded cultural organisations in Scotland. Employing the methodological approach of problematisation (Foucault, 2003a [1981]), the study offers a close analysis of the discursive logics upon which the construction of the problem relies. In so doing it is asserted that the problem construction functions as an articulatory practice (Laclau & Mouffe, 1985) that not only constitutes and organizes social relations but also supports asymmetric relations of power and allows inequality in society to be represented as both inevitable and sensible (Rancière, 2004). Beginning with a discussion of how cultural participation has been constructed as an object of enquiry, the thesis moves on to consider how cultural non-participation is constructed as a problem across the discursive planes of politics and professional practice. Having made visible the discursive logics of the problem construction, the discussion then examines the contingent historical conditions under which the existence of certain subjects, objects, and the intelligible relations between them became possible. Arguing that the Arts should be understood as a discursive institution, it is proposed that the subject identity of the non-participant is not only a necessary part of the discursive logic of this institution, but also provided the ideal boundary object (Star and Griesemer, 1989) around which the legitimacy of the relationship between the Arts and the state could, in part, be based. Drawing on the work of Jacques Rancière (1991; 2004; 2004), it is argued that the manner in which those labelled as non-participants are subjectified obscures their agency and in so doing suppresses their capacity to speak within the field of cultural policy. As such, the field of cultural policy remains characterized by asymmetric relations of power and dominated by those who lay claim to the discursive identity of cultural professionals. The result is state subsidised practices that while doing little to influence individual patterns of behavior, through performing inclusion and equality contribute to the maintenance of a status-quo in which state support will only be provided to individuals who accept the values of those who exercise the most power in the field.
The profession of public relations In Saudi Arabia: a socio-cultural perspective
(Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh, 2017) Almahraj, Yazeed
This thesis examines public relations in Saudi Arabia as an occupational group. The thesis investigates the knowledge public relations practitioners possess, and how Saudi culture and public communication factors affect public relations practitioners. The thesis offers insights into the cultural background of the country, public communication and public relations practice in Saudi Arabia. Moreover, it provides an analysis of theories of the profession and the relationship between the profession and public relations occupation. For the purposes of this research, in-depth unstructured interviews were used to collect data from 27 practitioners. A constructivist paradigm was utilised to examine the Saudi practitioners' perceptions of knowledge, culture, public communication. Moreover, the thesis has followed a socio-cultural approach and theories of the profession to investigate the empirical data. The thesis has several contributions to knowledge. Firstly, it brings an understanding of the role of the state in the process of professionalization. Using Vygotsky's theories the thesis has found that educational institutions influence PR practice and this results in lack of progress and limited opportunities for change, learning and career movement. Secondly, the thesis found that there is disconnection between theories that are taught in universities with PR programmes and PR practices. The thesis found that there is a problematic nature of abstract knowledge, which determines the disconnection between communication theories and PR practice. Moreover, there is a disconnection between the practice immersed in culture and that cultural practices are stronger than professional practice. Finally, the thesis has contributed to the literature by finding out that ethics in Western countries are regarded as something that is developed by a professional body in a way that relates to society, however in Saudi Arabia the Muslim values and ethics are implemented directly in the work context and ethics is not developed by a professional body.