This paper aims at first, an analysis of discourse on evolutionary trends in surveillance theory ... more This paper aims at first, an analysis of discourse on evolutionary trends in surveillance theory to provide a theoretical framework for the antecedents of such law as the U.S Patriot Act to be enacted. Specifically, current legal debates that border on its constitutionality, or lack thereof, as well as the implications on the privacy of American citizens especially, will be employed to show the magnitude of the abrogation of constitutionally guaranteed rights by federal or local law enforcement officials.
The idea here is not a cataloguing or history of Blaxploitation movies as an ostentatious Hollywo... more The idea here is not a cataloguing or history of Blaxploitation movies as an ostentatious Hollywood profit making model; it is neither the project herein to unpack hip hop as art form(s) and its existential modes. Rather, it is to project the iconography subsumed in the character Shaft as an embodiment of Black Male masculinity and identity, insofar as it has sought expression and performance, in the discursive, imaginative and perceptive fields constitutive of, but not limited to, the geo-spatial nation-state formulation of the United States. Also, to map out a clear foundation for the exploration of subsumptions in that iconography to find elements that are resurgent in the performance of hip hop that was to follow circa two decades later; this excursive field will be negotiated with Freudian psychoanalytic apparatus related to melancholia.
Finally, as a scholar of the African Diaspora here at University of California, Berkeley, a new trajectory of the discipline pursued by African American Studies Department, discourses will be at once located within the context of the United States, but also tangentially veer into the cross-contextual realms as are necessitated for “Diasporic” relevance. Brent Hayes Edwards’ book; “The Practice of Diaspora: Literature, Translation, and the Rise of Black Internationalism” and Stuart Hall’s “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” will be injected, particularly as relates to his concepts of Identity (re)formation, Detours and Misrecognition to engage with the last of the Shaft trilogy, (the second being Shaft: The Big Score) “Shaft in Africa,” which amply captures a filmic imagination of the internationalized or globalized black male identity in a marsh of cultural contexts. So also, will the work of Ajun Appadurai, Disjuncture and Difference , and related scholarly material employed to untangle possible internationalized constellations of the Shaft iconography.
This paper illuminates the Uncanny Valley Theory with foregrounding in Freudian attempts at the g... more This paper illuminates the Uncanny Valley Theory with foregrounding in Freudian attempts at the genealogy of what we nomenclature “Uncanny,” early into the last century. The intent herein is to argue that it is the human species’ self-taunting conundrum of mirroring our perceptions of imperfections, fantasies of ‘Doubles’ with comparative omnipotence and otherworldliness of the (sub) conscious among other things, that has pushed us over the ledge into the Uncanny Valley, hence Posthumanism. Additionally, two films: Solaris (1972) and Teknolust (2003) will be engaged to elucidate the concepts—philosophical, psychological and scientific—in contemporary discourse of the above issues of an evolving ‘human crisis.’
Leshu Torchin’s scholarly intervention, Creating the Witness: Documenting Genocide on Film, Video... more Leshu Torchin’s scholarly intervention, Creating the Witness: Documenting Genocide on Film, Video and the Internet (University of Minnesota Press, 2012) proffers a mapping of the geographies of images, still and moving, their instrumentalization, both as evidence and testimony, and their materiality, functionality and transformative potentiality to create publics, discourses around genocide, spheres and magnitudes of witnessing. Torchin scrupulously interrogates witness creation that employs images and modes of exhibition and remediation, which imbed the project of enlightenment, investing in publics “knowing,” the object being that knowing will engender action, right action, on human rights abuses that score the marks of the nomenclature, Genocide.
Shaft is a movie adaptation of a 1970 novel by Ernest Tidyman. Directed by Gordon Parks, this Bla... more Shaft is a movie adaptation of a 1970 novel by Ernest Tidyman. Directed by Gordon Parks, this Blaxploitation picture captures the transition between the Civil Rights and Black Power eras and is set against the backdrop of Black inner-city life in postindustrial America. Although Shaft projects the message of personal liberation, Park's film illuminates the urban or inner city ghetto malaise. To understand Shaft, I intend to explore the imperatives surrounding the movie industry, particularly Hollywood, that catalyzed the rise of Blaxploitation movies (Hollywood movies starring mostly Black cast in the 1970s), and also launch into the broader structural and cultural issues that framed blackness or African American representation in movies. This paper will deal broadly with the aforementioned issues and narrow on the themes of masculinity of the African American male, and also survival, and in particular, attempt to contextualize the community that produces “Shaft”. The community mentioned refers to the inner city ghettos aptly illustrated by the New York in which Shaft lived, and which was portrayed in the film.
This paper aims at first, an analysis of discourse on evolutionary trends in surveillance theory ... more This paper aims at first, an analysis of discourse on evolutionary trends in surveillance theory to provide a theoretical framework for the antecedents of such law as the U.S Patriot Act to be enacted. Specifically, current legal debates that border on its constitutionality, or lack thereof, as well as the implications on the privacy of American citizens especially, will be employed to show the magnitude of the abrogation of constitutionally guaranteed rights by federal or local law enforcement officials.
The idea here is not a cataloguing or history of Blaxploitation movies as an ostentatious Hollywo... more The idea here is not a cataloguing or history of Blaxploitation movies as an ostentatious Hollywood profit making model; it is neither the project herein to unpack hip hop as art form(s) and its existential modes. Rather, it is to project the iconography subsumed in the character Shaft as an embodiment of Black Male masculinity and identity, insofar as it has sought expression and performance, in the discursive, imaginative and perceptive fields constitutive of, but not limited to, the geo-spatial nation-state formulation of the United States. Also, to map out a clear foundation for the exploration of subsumptions in that iconography to find elements that are resurgent in the performance of hip hop that was to follow circa two decades later; this excursive field will be negotiated with Freudian psychoanalytic apparatus related to melancholia.
Finally, as a scholar of the African Diaspora here at University of California, Berkeley, a new trajectory of the discipline pursued by African American Studies Department, discourses will be at once located within the context of the United States, but also tangentially veer into the cross-contextual realms as are necessitated for “Diasporic” relevance. Brent Hayes Edwards’ book; “The Practice of Diaspora: Literature, Translation, and the Rise of Black Internationalism” and Stuart Hall’s “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” will be injected, particularly as relates to his concepts of Identity (re)formation, Detours and Misrecognition to engage with the last of the Shaft trilogy, (the second being Shaft: The Big Score) “Shaft in Africa,” which amply captures a filmic imagination of the internationalized or globalized black male identity in a marsh of cultural contexts. So also, will the work of Ajun Appadurai, Disjuncture and Difference , and related scholarly material employed to untangle possible internationalized constellations of the Shaft iconography.
This paper illuminates the Uncanny Valley Theory with foregrounding in Freudian attempts at the g... more This paper illuminates the Uncanny Valley Theory with foregrounding in Freudian attempts at the genealogy of what we nomenclature “Uncanny,” early into the last century. The intent herein is to argue that it is the human species’ self-taunting conundrum of mirroring our perceptions of imperfections, fantasies of ‘Doubles’ with comparative omnipotence and otherworldliness of the (sub) conscious among other things, that has pushed us over the ledge into the Uncanny Valley, hence Posthumanism. Additionally, two films: Solaris (1972) and Teknolust (2003) will be engaged to elucidate the concepts—philosophical, psychological and scientific—in contemporary discourse of the above issues of an evolving ‘human crisis.’
Leshu Torchin’s scholarly intervention, Creating the Witness: Documenting Genocide on Film, Video... more Leshu Torchin’s scholarly intervention, Creating the Witness: Documenting Genocide on Film, Video and the Internet (University of Minnesota Press, 2012) proffers a mapping of the geographies of images, still and moving, their instrumentalization, both as evidence and testimony, and their materiality, functionality and transformative potentiality to create publics, discourses around genocide, spheres and magnitudes of witnessing. Torchin scrupulously interrogates witness creation that employs images and modes of exhibition and remediation, which imbed the project of enlightenment, investing in publics “knowing,” the object being that knowing will engender action, right action, on human rights abuses that score the marks of the nomenclature, Genocide.
Shaft is a movie adaptation of a 1970 novel by Ernest Tidyman. Directed by Gordon Parks, this Bla... more Shaft is a movie adaptation of a 1970 novel by Ernest Tidyman. Directed by Gordon Parks, this Blaxploitation picture captures the transition between the Civil Rights and Black Power eras and is set against the backdrop of Black inner-city life in postindustrial America. Although Shaft projects the message of personal liberation, Park's film illuminates the urban or inner city ghetto malaise. To understand Shaft, I intend to explore the imperatives surrounding the movie industry, particularly Hollywood, that catalyzed the rise of Blaxploitation movies (Hollywood movies starring mostly Black cast in the 1970s), and also launch into the broader structural and cultural issues that framed blackness or African American representation in movies. This paper will deal broadly with the aforementioned issues and narrow on the themes of masculinity of the African American male, and also survival, and in particular, attempt to contextualize the community that produces “Shaft”. The community mentioned refers to the inner city ghettos aptly illustrated by the New York in which Shaft lived, and which was portrayed in the film.
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Finally, as a scholar of the African Diaspora here at University of California, Berkeley, a new trajectory of the discipline pursued by African American Studies Department, discourses will be at once located within the context of the United States, but also tangentially veer into the cross-contextual realms as are necessitated for “Diasporic” relevance. Brent Hayes Edwards’ book; “The Practice of Diaspora: Literature, Translation, and the Rise of Black Internationalism” and Stuart Hall’s “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” will be injected, particularly as relates to his concepts of Identity (re)formation, Detours and Misrecognition to engage with the last of the Shaft trilogy, (the second being Shaft: The Big Score) “Shaft in Africa,” which amply captures a filmic imagination of the internationalized or globalized black male identity in a marsh of cultural contexts. So also, will the work of Ajun Appadurai, Disjuncture and Difference , and related scholarly material employed to untangle possible internationalized constellations of the Shaft iconography.
To understand Shaft, I intend to explore the imperatives surrounding the movie industry, particularly Hollywood, that catalyzed the rise of Blaxploitation movies (Hollywood movies starring mostly Black cast in the 1970s), and also launch into the broader structural and cultural issues that framed blackness or African American representation in movies. This paper will deal broadly with the aforementioned issues and narrow on the themes of masculinity of the African American male, and also survival, and in particular, attempt to contextualize the community that produces “Shaft”. The community mentioned refers to the inner city ghettos aptly illustrated by the New York in which Shaft lived, and which was portrayed in the film.
Finally, as a scholar of the African Diaspora here at University of California, Berkeley, a new trajectory of the discipline pursued by African American Studies Department, discourses will be at once located within the context of the United States, but also tangentially veer into the cross-contextual realms as are necessitated for “Diasporic” relevance. Brent Hayes Edwards’ book; “The Practice of Diaspora: Literature, Translation, and the Rise of Black Internationalism” and Stuart Hall’s “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” will be injected, particularly as relates to his concepts of Identity (re)formation, Detours and Misrecognition to engage with the last of the Shaft trilogy, (the second being Shaft: The Big Score) “Shaft in Africa,” which amply captures a filmic imagination of the internationalized or globalized black male identity in a marsh of cultural contexts. So also, will the work of Ajun Appadurai, Disjuncture and Difference , and related scholarly material employed to untangle possible internationalized constellations of the Shaft iconography.
To understand Shaft, I intend to explore the imperatives surrounding the movie industry, particularly Hollywood, that catalyzed the rise of Blaxploitation movies (Hollywood movies starring mostly Black cast in the 1970s), and also launch into the broader structural and cultural issues that framed blackness or African American representation in movies. This paper will deal broadly with the aforementioned issues and narrow on the themes of masculinity of the African American male, and also survival, and in particular, attempt to contextualize the community that produces “Shaft”. The community mentioned refers to the inner city ghettos aptly illustrated by the New York in which Shaft lived, and which was portrayed in the film.