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.
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.
DISORIENTATED AFFECTS: ENCOUNTERING QUEER TRAUMA THROUGH EXPERIMENTAL DOCUMENTARY FILM
(2025) Mosch, Regina
This arts-based PhD investigates microaggressions against queer bodies through an experimental documentary film art process. While the idea of a spectacular, very violent, and rupturing trauma experience begins to take on more nuanced perspectives through inquiries of feminist, post/de/anticolonial and queer scholarship, the particular fragmented, embodied and subjective affects of an exposure to microaggressions have as of yet not been fully understood within trauma studies. What do microaggressions do with queer bodies? How do they change their shape and distort their appearance, thus enacting oppression on and beneath the surface of queer bodies? Thisstudy uses experimental film aesthetics and a queer film-phenomenological lens informed by Sara Ahmed (2006) and Katharina Lindner (2018) to question dominant understandings of trauma as rupture and demands a sensibility to forms of violence that are invisible, intangible, fragmented or purely embodied. Introducing a queer politics of encountering and sharing trauma on a sensory level, this study particularly explores what the cumulative, piercing nature of microaggressions takes out of queer people’s grasp, yet also the potentials of aesthetic and practical disorientation for building new lines of thought and action. The co-creative exhibition over/exposed acts as the main vehicle to (de)construct spaces of queerness, co-creation and trauma in experimental documentary film. over/exposed negotiates trauma through various filmic, bodily and spatial surfaces; its encounters disorientate, twist and trouble co-creators, viewers and researcher as a queer politics of encountering and sharing trauma on a sensory level is assembled. Through an affective analysis of the 10 artworks as well as the co-creative process, this study reveals a new understanding of trauma as overexposure that brings attention to abrasions, frictions and subtle intrusions to queer bodies, the (power) relations within and beyond an artistic process and the significance of an instable and disorientated body for producing new knowledge.
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.
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.
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.
An examination of the filmmaking methods of Kenneth Branagh in his directorial film work on Thor, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit and Cinderella with specific reference to his status as auteur
(2017) Hamzah, Sahar
This thesis examines the methods that director Sir Kenneth Branagh employs in his approach to directing his films and questions whether the consistency of methods adopted by Branagh across the scope of his films and their recurring themes support the status of Branagh as an auteur. Much scholarly attention has been given to Branagh’s Shakespeare films, yet there is a deficit of such attention to his later work. Using personal and published interviews, empirical evidence of the films, and text-to-text analysis, the thesis focuses upon analysis of his later films Thor, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, and Cinderella. The thesis takes an approach based upon the criteria of Sarris (2008) and Leitch (2008) to determine whether Branagh could be classified as auteur based upon his directorial oeuvre. In doing so, the thesis identifies the key components of Branagh’s methods and style and investigates his rehearsal techniques, research into the history and intertextuality of his projects, relationships with actors, and whether he uses elements of mise-en-scène as cues to reveal intertextuality. The thesis discusses Branagh’s role in semiotic coding in his films, informed by the concept of selective perception, wherein viewers tend to recognise elements in media which align with their expectations (Klapper 1960). It argues that memory of the hypotexts plays a key role in film adaptations (Ellis 1982), that their ability to evoke recall is a means of communication (Grant 2002) which can be achieved through the use of elements of mise-en-scène, (Geraghty 2008) and that the viewer and director are collaborators in producing meaning in film (Wollen 1972). This study contributes to the field of adaptation by adding scholarly literature on the films of Branagh in his post-Shakespeare era and to the subjects of auteurship and audience recall achieved through use of camera technique, intertextuality and mise-en-scène.
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.
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.
I’M ACTUALLY AN ARTIST TOO… Artists who are arts managers
(2024-06-26) Murray, Sheila
This research investigates how artists might resolve their dual professional identities and continue to be artists when also working in arts management in order to earn a more secure living than is usually possible from art alone. In doing so, it asks how arts organisations could benefit more greatly from the creative practice of the artists they employ as arts managers. The study questions the assumption that artists who work as arts managers must have ‘failed’ in their artistic ambitions and argues that a more nuanced approach is necessary. Rather than artists abandoning their creative practice, and necessitating their identity as an artist being kept ‘invisible’ in the workplace, this thesis argues for both their art and artistic identity to be a visible part of their practice as managers. If this were to happen, it is argued artists and arts management would both stand to gain. The study adopted a qualitative methodology and involved a multi-method, three-phase approach. The first phase recorded data about the lived experiences of 30 participants working primarily as arts managers across a range of creative sectors. The second phase took the form of an intervention into their professional practice and asked a smaller group to make at least one artwork in the context of their work as arts managers. This included several individuals who work in a single arts organisation. The third phase investigated the data generated from an online group discussion attended by a smaller group of participants. As a former artist, arts manager and maker of contemporary jewellery, I took part in all three phases as a participant-researcher. The thesis concludes by arguing that arts organisations, and the artist-managers who work in them, need to bring about change through incremental steps, and by consensus. This change is not only to enable artist-managers to retain their creative practices and identity, but in order for the arts organisations where they work to benefit from the particular skills and knowledge artist-managers can bring. It is argued that this is best achieved through dialogue, rather than by keeping the two different, but interdependent practices separate. In this way, through the recognition and visibility of creative practice in the arts workplace, both would be strengthened.
THE INSTITUTIONALISATION OF WHISTLEBLOWING IN THE SCOTTISH HEALTH SERVICE: AN INTERPLAY BETWEEN ORGANISATIONS, MEDIA AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE
(2025) Burnett, Alexis
The act of whistleblowing has become a common, global phenomenon in recent decades, and the necessity to find satisfactory solutions has become a major focus for organisations world-wide. This is particularly important in the field of health, where the National Health Service has witnessed serious whistleblowing events to the detriment of healthcare staff and, perhaps more importantly, to patients. NHS Scotland is selected as a case study to explore the reconceptualization of whistleblowing as a normative organisational process. This research study contrasts with existing literature on whistleblowing, which has focused primarily on the treatment of healthcare whistleblowers at the hands of their managers and organisations, where the primary victim is the whistleblower, subjected to organisation reprisal. A qualitative research study has been undertaken, which includes interviews with NHS leaders, media coverage of high-profile whistleblowing cases and official whistleblowing-related documents. The primary theme of this thesis concentrates on whistleblowing institutionalisation as an emerging political process initiated by the Scottish Government. This thesis makes two main contributions to the issue of whistleblowing specifically in the Scottish health service. First, it provides evidence of the introduction of whistleblowing institutionalism through related policies and processes for the whole of NHS Scotland and associated organisations, including contractors. Second, it identifies media impact on public policy decision making in relation to whistleblowing with the discovery of a ‘whistleblowing’ specific frame. This frame provides empirical evidence of an influential media on the political landscape.
“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.
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.
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.
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).
A PAPER OF RECORD: CONVERGENCE AND COMMUNITY AT THE GLASGOW HERALD
(2025) Silver, Chrsitopher
Founded in Glasgow in 1783, the Herald is among the oldest continuously published newspapers in the English-speaking world. In the late 20th century, the paper sought to cast off its reputation as an organ of once powerful local elites; with the goal of becoming the preeminent national paper of record for Scotland. This transformation necessitated an expansion in the range and extent of the Herald’s journalistic output: with a particular emphasis on culture, high literary standards, and the role of specialist correspondents with the requisite expertise to scrutinise state and civil society institutions. These developments form part of a cultural turn in Scottish journalism, facilitated by structural modernisation and energised by prefigurative impulses that emerged in the context of growing demands for enhanced political autonomy, alongside a broader revival of national identity and culture in Scotland. However, a seemingly resilient and expanding national media system, consolidated in the post-war era, was unprepared for the advent of global media convergence. Thus in 2003 Newsquest – a wholly owned subsidiary of US conglomerate Gannett – purchased the Herald and went on to substantially retrench the title’s editorial operations, resulting in a significant reduction in the range and extent of its journalistic output. This project combines a study of documentary and oral history sources which together constitute a cultural history of the Herald. Based on analysis of these sources, this project shows how Herald journalists sustained an interpretive community which resisted the pressures of media convergence by restating journalistic values and valorising institutional memory, while foregrounding the cultural value of the title. This project also situates the Herald’s cultural history and its transformations within wider theoretical debates about community, the public sphere, and modernity. Drawing on these fruitful connections, this thesis concludes by conceptualising four distinct transformations in journalistic culture and practice. These findings are grounded in the Herald’s particular interpretive community, but they also underline the broader salience of the journalistic record amid the pressures and possibilities of global media convergence.
PROFESSIONALISED CARE: Relational Management at Alchemy Film & Arts
(2025-03-12) Tully, Kyla
The application of an ethic of care within arts management is of increasing interest to funders, managers, and policymakers invested in the European arts and culture sector as a facet of the perceived benefits of arts to community-building and regeneration efforts. The focus on the potential role of care as a value and a practice within arts management is most noticeable within the increased investment in socially-engaged art within community-centric projects and organisations due to its explicit focus on relationship-building, placemaking, and ultimately community care. Given the growing investment in arts work toward regeneration and maintenance in rural areas and localised communities, understandings of how care might be formalised within arts management practice in these community-centric contexts is vital for the management of individual creative and cultural projects and organisations, as well as the overall sector. The presented research within this thesis therefore investigates how an ethic of care can be incorporated within rural arts management practice alongside processes and expectations of professionalisation. The presented thesis critically examines the perceived importance of care within rural arts management and offers an illustrative perspective on the benefits, tensions, and complications around the relationship between care, management, and professionalisation within the context of rural arts. Alchemy Film & Arts, a cultural organisation based in the Scottish Borders town of Hawick specialising in experimental film and moving image, acts as a case for this exploration in the midst of a pivotal period of organisational development and navigation of precarious socioeconomic landscapes between 2020 and 2022. Through the application of ethnographic and creative research, the offered observations and findings explore the social and relational aspects of both work and management within the arts. The thesis concludes that practices of care within rural arts management are dependent on relationship-building and the context of place, and therefore cannot be fully standardised within processes of professionalisation and perceptions of professional practice. The theory of professionalised care is therefore introduced as part of the findings and observations as a structured yet adaptable way to facilitate the incorporation of ethics of care within rural arts management.
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.
RHIZOMATIC TRANSPOSITIONS: INCLUDING CREATIVE PRACTICE WITHIN WATER MANAGEMENT POLICY
(2024-06-26) Manley, Nicole Antoinette Lucie
Western ontology has traditionally viewed rivers as objects for the intentional purposes of human society. Water policy ensures that rivers are maintained to distribute water and protect against flooding. However, with climate change, the health of many rivers is decreasing, while risk of flooding from rivers is increasing. Water policies appear to be unable to change such negative trends, which are inter-related with poor and exploitative human/river relationships. To form a different relationship between humankind and rivers, this creative practice research develops creative practice based on nomadic ontology and psychosocial perspectives. The research develops a methodology that aims to transform the human/river relationship. Practice-led approaches are employed as an exploration of the artist’s creative practice, including 1) physical immersion in water, 2) underwater film, and 3) aerial photographic collage. Using personal reflective methods that critically analysed the artist’s affective experience, a transformative approach was developed, called the ‘Site of possibility’, which created a site of affective engagement between human and rivers that was different from daily habitual routine. Participatory methods included walking, poetry, mark-making and a creative interpretation of the dialogic method known as the ‘visual matrix’. Emerging differences in perception became Deleuzian ‘deterritorialization’, a shift of mind and heart through creative participatory practice. People’s habitual views of rivers became reterritorialized so that human/river relationships were transformed into a new awareness of human positionality in relation to rivers and, potentially, in relation to policy design directed at water. In three case studies, the Site of possibility creative approach proved successful in transforming people’s perceptions and positions in relationship in relationship to rivers in ways that could potentially inform water policy, creating a more bioegalitarian relationship between rivers and people. These findings show that creative practice approaches have potential to inform water policy and provide direction and guidance for systemic change to problems of governance for rivers.
SCREENING SCOTLAND’S STORIES: Film Adaptations in Twenty-First-Century Scottish Cinema
(2017) Munro, Robert
This thesis surveys book to film adaptations in Scottish cinema in the period 2000-2015. It is the first examination of this practice in a Scottish context which also analyses the operations of Creative Scotland, the public arts body responsible for funding and promoting screen production in Scotland. This thesis asks two central questions: what are the processes by which film adaptations are produced in Scottish cinema? And: do contemporary film adaptations in Scottish cinema engage materially and thematically with ‘the nation’? I do this to test whether or not film adaptation is particularly well suited to speak to a national cultural imaginary. I map out a corpus of film texts produced in the first fifteen years of the twenty-first century, and analyse a selection of those texts in the second half of the thesis. I consider the extent to which industrial and thematic discourses of ‘Scottishness’ are engaged with through and by these films. The understanding of these films as ‘Scottish’, and what that means for both their production and reception, nationally and globally, will be discussed. I argue that the importance of national branding in the production of film remains a crucial component of the global film industry, into which Scottish cinema aims for viability. I categorise my four case studies within the categories of arthouse and popular cinema, in order to better understand the ways in which these films are marketed to, and received by, local and global audiences. Furthermore, this thesis uses these film adaptations to consider the discourses prevalent in Scottish culture in the twenty-first century, by examining those pre-existing texts which are selected for cinematic adaptation. How does the success of prior adaptations shape the range of future texts, and therefore what is deemed viable in Scottish cinema? What recurring representative tendencies are to be found in those film adaptations? How do they relate to the socio-political discourses of their era? This thesis attempts to answers those questions, and in doing so examines how particular discourses are mobilised throughout industrial processes of production, distribution and exhibition, and are readable within the film texts themselves.