Subversion

This paper develops a pragmatist definition of street art acknowledging its essential subversiveness, while drawing implications at the level of street art’s political and social function. By developing an insight from Irvine (2012), the paper argues that street artworks turn inside out accepted norms of visibility in public spaces. Street artists challenge those norms by deploying carnivalesque strategies such as irony and misappropriation (Scott 1990). In this sense, street art is art intrinsically challenging dominant hierarchies of visibility through the use of carnivalesque strategies. By opposing advertising’s dominion over the city walls, they reclaim – one street at a time – the possibility of expressing themselves in public for those generally excluded.

This is the idea of the paper. It incorporates a slightly Marxist feminist perspective that basically works on the premise that we are all agents in the production cycle like cogs in a wheel and we have different roles to play to keep the production cycle going and all institutions and arrangements in society that we see are determined by economics. Men and women through their different roles in the cycle of production create a society which in turn shapes them. Marriage is a contract which has economic reasons and the family acquires the status of a hegemonic institution because it is instrumental in facilitating production and in furthering the interest and the material wellbeing of the state. The man works for the state, the woman works for the man and she also reproduces so in other words she brings in more workers or caretakers which will contribute to this cycle of production.
I have taken up Mahashweta Devi’s MO1084 and I am looking at how she is trying to disrupt the family as a hegemonic institution and critiquing its functioning just as a mere tool of the state which undermines individual growth and well-being of a person. So we have grieving mother Sujata who has lost her son to the Naxalite movement and she is the only one who is mourning his death. But not publicly. Because they belong to a particular social class, the Bengali bhadralok or the bourgeoisie their actions and reactions and even the dynamics within the family are determined and governed by their class consciousness. So the Brati the dead Naxalite son who has brought bad name to the family is reduced to a number 1084 and disowned in many ways by the family. They don’t discuss him, they obliterate him from their thoughts and they go on as if nothing has happened. Because that’s whats best for the family and the family name and the family business.
Except Sujata. She is torn between conforming to middle class standards and mourning over her dead son. And if she is seen to be grieving she allows herself to be labelled as strange, not dutiful enough to her husband and his reputation. So devi gives us a glimpse of this family where no true bonds exist either between the couples, all the married couples share a very perfunctory arbitrary relationship. They are just married to each other because it is socially correct to remain married. There is no bond between the children and the mother because they are in different camps playing the game of capitalist patriarchy.
SO through this model of a dysfunctional family devi exposes the decay and the damage which submission to the state machinery can cause to a family and how the family in turn because of its puppetlike existence can be detrimental to the well-being of the individual, how it can lead to estrangement and frigidity and ostracism and marginalisation and finally death.
And the paper of course attempts a very close reading of the text to substantiate and consolidate this argument.

Video games as the medium of art

The aim of the article is to discuss selected examples of art that uses video games as a source of aesthetic and formal patterns, as a ready-made material susceptible to subversion, and also as a means of expression and artistic creation. The analysis of this type of works allows us to distinguish three main areas of interaction between
art and video games: (1) works created by the technique of subversive appropriation, that is, the takeover and transformation/recontextualization of video game elements
(game art); (2) interventions in the form of game mods (art mods); and (3) art games.

Представлено на конференции "Личность и творчество А.И. Солженицына в современном искусстве и литературе. К 100-летнему юбилею А.И. Солженицына", 15–17 марта 2017, Государственный Институт Искусствознания.

Presented at "A.I. Solzhenitsyn and his work in contemporary art and literature", 15–17 March 2017, State Institute of Art Studies.

Although information is nothing new to war or confl ict, the speed at which it reaches a much wider target audience, and thus its potential impact and consequences, is changing due to the rapid development of information and communications technology. Regime change and information warfare have been around for a very long time in the history of organised human societies. An undertaken review of academic literature demonstrates a great interest today to these concepts in academic, policymaking and practical terms. The present article attempts to track the evolution of the Western conceptual and theoretical thinking on the use of regime change and information warfare, seeking to understand the factors that precipitate it. In the paper I address the following, what is the relationship between information warfare and regime change? The high level of information and communications technology development and persisting leadership globally have allowed the United States to engage in regime change and information warfare more eff ective, although not without risks. The author considers the most illustrative examples of such engagement and, based on them, concludes that we have seen a shift in motivation from an off ensive stance (the desire to spread infl uence) to a defensive one (the desire to prevent other international actors from gaining infl uence and power) on the global level. The theoretical method chosen for the analysis is phenomenology, as a means of the reading and analysis of a lived experience as well as a qualitative method will be used to analyse the data, where the goal is to capture the complexity of the object of study. KEYWORDS hybrid warfare, information warfare, political warfare, regime change, evolving global order, information operations

This paper focuses on the urban graffiti painted with a political message by different
movements of the Italian political radicalism in the cities of Rome, Florence, Massa,
Carrara, Verona and Udine. For the purpose of this article, during the period from June
2011 to June 2012, a total of 165 graffiti have been photographed, of which 83 painted by
neo-fascist groups, 72 by extreme left groups and 10 by anarchist groups. These three
macro communities, made of different subgroups, emerged as the most active in expressing
their antagonism towards the parliamentary parties with their graffiti that combine semantic
(words) and semiotic (images) elements. An analysis of the collected graffiti’s language
form, meaning and context allows for the identification of the variety of styles of
communication adopted by the different political antagonisms and the different contents of
their communication through graffiti as well as the key elements of their political identities.
Key words: political radicalism, graffiti, linguistics

This paper is invested in exploring the sensory affect that is created through censorship. It is invested in unravelling the complex interaction between the films of Anurag Kashyap and the institution of censorship, the sensibilities of which are capitalized and appropriated into the aesthetic effect of the film. It also looks at how such a deployment constructs the cult of a transgressive auteur. I argue that the deafening ‘beep’ that screams of the otherwise silencing practices of censorship is what guides the way to unraveling the subversion of censorship in the filmic text. Taking cue from Žižek’s Pervert’s Guide to Cinema (2006) which looks at cinema as the ultimate pervert art, telling us how to desire, this paper asserts that censorship doesn’t erase the profane, instead it points to its very utterance. I argue how Kashyap’s films’ profilmic text becomes the site of censorship standing out as material evidence to its very censoring. The ‘beeped’ or censored word becomes a provocation focusing attention onto itself by mobilizing its unspeakability through marketing the product as “controversial”. I posit that Anurag Kashyap capitalizes on this recognition. I look at the force of publicity that is created by censorship in Kashyap’s public discourse on censorship, in his negotiations with the CBFC (Central Board of Film Certification) from before the planned commercial release of his first directorial venture Paanch to his ongoing battle with the CBFC over refusing to use the court mandated no smoking warning in ‘Ugly’ (2014).

In what ways is comedy subversive? This vital new book critically considers the importance of comedy in challenging and redefining our relations to race and racism through the lens of political correctness.

By viewing comedy as both a constitutive feature of social interaction and as a necessary requirement in the appraisal of what is often deemed to be ‘politically correct’, this book provides an innovative and multidisciplinary approach to the study of comedy and popular culture. In doing so, it engages with the social and cultural tensions inherent to our understandings of political correctness, arguing that comedy can subversively redefine our approach to ‘PC Debates’, contestations surrounding free speech and the popular portrayal of political correctness in the media and society. Aided by the work of both Slavoj Žižek and Alenka Zupančič, this unique analysis adopts a psychoanalytic/philosophical framework to explore issues of race, racism and political correctness in the widely acclaimed BBC ‘mockumentary’, The Office (UK), as well as a variety of television comedies.

Drawing from psychoanalysis, social psychology and philosophy, this book will be highly relevant for postgraduate students and academic researchers studying comedy, race/racism, multiculturalism, political correctness and television/film.

Après un résumé et le commentaire du premier chapitre de l'ouvrage phare de J. Butler "Trouble dans le genre", ce paper propose une critique de quelques arguments ainsi qu'une application pratique de ses concepts pour analyser un cas de recherche empirique basé sur des témoignages.

Cours undergraduate : sociologie du genre

The necessity of questioning the privileged spaces of
power—be it personal, social, political, or religious—is a
demand intrinsic to philosophy’s very own structure. In
this paper, an identification of the thinking and the
practice of subversion with the essence of philosophy is
undertaken as a response to the challenge of intellectual
sterilization brought about by the insidious effects of an
omnipresent techno-capitalism and academic complicity.
In particular, I will discuss Jacques Derrida’s
deconstruction as a fertile example of a subversive ethos
that refuses to be complicit with the powers-that-be but
transgresses the complacent order of the present so as to
achieve an opening for a more just relation to the “other”
of thinking that has always been marginalized by history
and the philosophical tradition.

If philosophy is to remain true to its originary inspiration,
then, it must remain vigilant to the various moments and
forms of fossilizations of power and truth. The
achievement of a critical position ownmost to philosophy is
incumbent to us: i.e., as a radical refusal to be complicit
with the present effects of power and a continuous
cultivation of an ethos of writing and thinking that does
not concede its loyalty to anything, even to philosophy.

Keywords: Jacques Derrida, deconstruction, politics,
subversion, ethos of thinking

By taking Rivasi's exhibition "1984: Evolution and Regeneration of Writing" in Modena as case study, this essay explores the possibility of including graffiti within institutional contexts. It argues for the possibility of graffiti exhibitions under peculiar circumstances, namely when such an inclusion does not strip them of their subversiveness. Such a condition appears to be fulfilled when photographs and videos are showed rather than pieces taken from the street. In order to defend this claim, the essay proposes a new ontology of graffiti as performances.

En esta tesis se aborda la obra fotográfica de Steven Meisel (1954–), caracterizada por un posicionamiento activista dentro del mundo de la moda, en el que se inscribe, que lo hacen singular. En la hipótesis principal se señala cómo un discurso subversivo como el suyo aúna el enfoque comercial propio de la fotografía de moda y el artivismo. De este modo, en el análisis en profundidad de su producción se incluye un cuestionamiento sobre los impulsos que le han motivado a adoptar un discurso de este tipo, y se aborda comparativamente, entre otras, obras de LaChapelle, Knight, Leibovitz, Weber, Toscani o Avedon. También se alude a las teorías de Crane o Gans, que muestran la desarticulación de los modos de producción cultural, al tiempo que se compara las posiciones sobre el concepto mismo de arte en Krauss y Becker.
En el trabajo, estructurado en dos partes, se ha empleado una metodología inductiva y
correlacional que rastrea las correspondencias dadas entre las praxis plásticas revolucionarias y la fotografía de moda en una horquilla cronológica que va desde el invento del medio hasta la actualidad. Esto ha permitido identificar las connotaciones activistas, definir su dimensión plástica y creativa, además de estudiar su influencia sociocultural. Como conclusión, se afirma que su imaginario y estrategias creativas, cargados de crítica social, cultural y política, rebasan la mera función comercial propia de la fotografía de moda para establecerse en una alternativa creativa insurgente. Igualmente, el análisis semántico e iconográfico de su producción destaca el modo en el que sus imágenes interaccionan con conceptos y valores culturales diferentes según las temáticas que este autor trata.
This thesis deals with the photographic work of Steven Meisel (1954–), characterized by an activist stance in the fashion world, to which he belongs, making him unique. In the main hypothesis, we signal how a subversive discourse as his own brings together the commercial approach, characteristic of the fashion world, as well as artivism. This way, the in-depth analysis of his production includes a reconsideration of the impulses that have driven him to embrace such a discourse, and there is a comparative approach of, amongst others, the works of LaChapelle, Knight, Leibovitz, Weber, Toscani or Avedon. There is also an allusion to the theories of Crane or Gans, which show the dislocation of every mean of cultural production, whilst comparing the stands about the very concept of art of Krauss and Becker. The paper, structured in two sections, uses an inductive and correlational methodology that traces the correlations arising between the ground breaking aesthetic praxis and fashion
photography in the time spawn ranging from the invention of the medium up to presentdays. This has made it possible to identify the activist connotations, defining its plasticand creative dimension, as well as studying its sociocultural influence. To conclude, it’s claimed that its imaginary and creative strategies, loaded with social, cultural, and political criticism, surpass the mere commercial function intrinsic to fashion photography to stablish themselves in an insurgent creative alternative. Likewise, the semantic and iconographic analysis of its production outlines the way in which its images interact with concepts and cultural values that vary depending on the topic discussed by the author.

In this paper I will pursue the strategies used by literary critics to promote the potentially subversive poetry written during Romanian Communist last decade. Pretexting to break the tradition of aesthetical high modernism and pretending to address poetry in a more “realistic”, i.e. a more socialist friendly way, the authors I analyse (Mircea Cărtărescu, Florin Iaru, Traian T. Coşovei etc.) actually displayed certain subversive positions regarding the
Communist regime. The techno-industrial, societal modernity was officially seen as the work
in progress of the Romanian Socialist regime (1948–1989), therefore concepts such as ‘modernity’ and ‘reality’ used to be perceived as mere synonyms. Given these circumstances, he who criticised the Romanian modernity was in danger to be perceived as an enemy of the Communist project. Being aware of such presumptions concerning the
identity between ‘modernity’ and ‘reality’ (i.e. Socialist order), the Romanian literary critics tactically avoided portraying the poets of the 80s as attacking the ‘reality’/ ‘modernity’ for fear this attack would be perceived (and counter-backed) as an attack against the Communist
establishment. Consequently, the critics had to emphasize precisely the poets’ lack of “realism”, thus interpreting their poems as rather absurd, bookish and fantastic pieces (apparently non-dangerous topics for the Socialist order). After the fall of the Communism, the critics changed their discourse in order to underline the polemical, political, subversive
side of that poetry.

El final de la guerra civil en 1939 trajo consigo una dictadura fundamentada en la represión donde, junto a la muerte y exterminio del contrario, se planteó la aniquilación cultural del “otro”. Frente a las aspiraciones de aculturación, imposición y humillación
del contrario, la música jugó un papel fundamental como bálsamo moral en una situación de represión, detención y confinamiento forzado.
En el presente artículo se analizarán los patrones elegidos por los presos del franquismo para elaborar su resistencia musical y los empleos de ésta como subversión frente a lo establecido. Desde la metamorfosis de los textos hímnicos –recreación de poder y
superioridad del régimen– a la sátira del preso, pasando por los empleos del folklore en aquellas creadas exprofeso como alternativa de entretenimiento y denuncia de la nueva realidad a la que eran sometidos. La música como ofrenda a unos ideales, la música como elemento fundamental sobre el que mantener la identidad frente al arrebato de temperamentos y la música como causa de castigo serán algunos de los aspectos más relevantes que se traten a lo largo de este artículo

Never shackled by generic conventions, Shakespeare offers valuable insights into cultural norms and behavioural expectations of the Elizabethan period. With a woman on the throne, Elizabeth I's blurring of identity provoked issues regarding the role of woman in society and man's crisis of masculinity. His plays provide a fertile base for transgressing conservative gender codes and subsequently interrogates humanity's sexual appetite. A feminist reading of Shakespearean drama reaffirms his subversive challenge to hegemonic notions of womanhood. This essay will also employ 'Queer Theory', a post-structuralist approach, in order to examine how Shakespeare undermines rigid gender identities and confronts a societal framework that restricts alternative desires.

Neste breve e contundente ensaio, publicado em 2005 na França, Jacques Rancière, um dos mais importantes filósofos da atualidade, conduz o leitor por um passeio pela história da crítica à democracia para situá-la no cerne político do momento atual, procurando esclarecer o que há de novo e revelador no sentimento antidemocrático, uma manifestação tão antiga quanto a própria noção de democracia. Dessa forma, Rancière repensa o poder subversivo do ideal democrático e o que se entende por política, para assim encontrar o caráter incisivo de sua ideia.

O livro ganha edição em português pela Boitempo Editorial em um momento único da política brasileira, no contexto de um cenário eleitoral surpreendente, que sintetiza a efervescência social dos últimos anos, revelada com mais intensidade nas manifestações sociais de junho de 2013. A obra mostra-se atual também em relação ao debate que vem crescendo sobre participação e representação popular, democracia direta e o desejo de que a política signifique mais do que uma escolha entre oligarcas substituíveis. "É justamente essa recusa da hierarquia que tem a ganhar com a leitura deste livro de Jacques Rancière que, à luz dos clássicos como da experiência francesa e mundial, continua um trabalho sempre renovado, jamais concluso, de afiar o gume da democracia", afirma o filósofo Renato Janine Ribeiro no texto de orelha do livro.

Com uma narrativa que prima pela erudição e absoluta ausência de afetação, Rancière faz uma análise oportuna sobre as contradições dos Estados democráticos e lança uma crítica ao sistema representativo vigente a partir de uma afirmação polêmica: “Não vivemos em democracias. Vivemos em Estados de direito oligárquicos, em um admirável sistema que dá à minoria mais forte o poder de governar sem distúrbios”.

Nesse contexto, o ódio à democracia se apresenta como o ódio ao povo e seus costumes – à sociedade que busca a igualdade, o respeito às diferenças e o direito das minorias –, e não às instituições que dizem encarnar o poder do povo. Um ódio que, segundo Rancière, advoga que o “governo democrático é mau quando se deixa corromper pela sociedade democrática que quer que todos sejam iguais e que todas as diferenças sejam respeitadas. Em compensação, é bom quando mobiliza os indivíduos apáticos da sociedade democrática para a energia da guerra em defesa dos valores da civilização”.

Os porta-vozes desse ódio, defensores da ordem legítima e do direito ao poder àqueles destinados por nascimento ou eleitos por suas competências, habitam todos os países que se declaram Estados democráticos."Para eles, a democracia não é uma forma de governo corrompido, mas uma crise da civilização que afeta a sociedade e o Estado através dela", diz Rancière.“O novo ódio à democracia pode ser resumido então em uma tese simples: só existe uma democracia boa, a que reprime a catástrofe da civilização democrática”.

A disputa pelo consenso está, no entanto, em aberto. Para Rancière, começa pela compreensão de que a democracia não se fundamenta em nenhuma natureza das coisas e não é garantida por nenhuma forma institucional. Ou, como detalha Janine Ribeiro: "a democracia não é um Estado acabado, nem um estado acabado das coisas; ela vive constante e conflitiva expansão; não se reduz ao desenho das instituições, ou à governabilidade, ou ao jogo dos partidos, mas é algo que vem de baixo, desdenhado desde os gregos como o empenho insolente do povo em invadir o espaço que era de seus melhores, de seus superiores".

The civilian and military governments that were in power in Argentina between 1974 and 1983 were responsible for the genocide of approximately 30,000 perceived political and social undesirables, labelled as subversives, in what is known as the Dirty War (la Guerra Sucia). The Dirty War has consistently been seen as the product of a number of processes that extend back decades before the formal start of the war. Such processes include the development of some of Argentina’s more divisive social conflicts, as well as ideological and methodological influence received from the United States of America in its support for counterrevolutionary efforts in the Western Hemisphere. However, one process which has not been entirely considered despite its apparent impact on the development of repressive doctrine in Argentina is that of transatlantic Catholic nationalism which circulated between Argentina and France over the course of the twentieth century. By evaluating the intellectual roots of Argentina’s repressive doctrine, one will find that French Catholic influence over such doctrine, passing through turn-of-the-century Catholic nationalist figures and the French ‘warrior-scholars’ of the Algerian War, was more than a mere “Gallic polish” in the way some scholars have referred to it.

Two lavish, illustrated histories confronted and contested the Byzantine model of empire. The Madrid Skylitzes was created at the court of Roger II of Sicily in the mid-twelfth century. The Vatican Manasses was produced for Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria in the mid-fourteenth century. Through close analysis of how each chronicle was methodically manipulated, this study argues that Byzantine history was selectively re-imagined to suit the interests of outsiders. The Madrid Skylitzes foregrounds regicides, rebellions, and palace intrigue in order to subvert the divinely ordained image of order that Byzantine rulers preferred to project. The Vatican Manasses presents Byzantium as a platform for the accession of Ivan Alexander to the throne of the Third Rome, the last and final world-empire. Imagining the Byzantine Past demonstrates how distinct visions of empire generated diverging versions of Byzantium's past in the aftermath of the Crusades.

The article present four comparative studies of rabbinic narratives that refer to the 'other': woman, gentiles, slaves, etc:
(1) The Stories of Dama Ben netinah in the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmuds.
(2) The stories of Rabban Gamliel and Rabbi Eliezer and their slaves.
(3) The stories of Beruriah and Rabbi Meir.
(4) The story of the daughter of Rabbi Akiva.
The earlier versions of the stories tend to demonstrate a relatively positive attitude towards the other. The later version subvert this attitude, by suggesting minor but significant changes in the setting of the earlier version, or by presenting a mirroring story, that suggest a sturcutral opposition and inversion of the earlier story.

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is discussed as an especially influential text in the history of conspiracy theories or subversion myths.  The essay reviews the essential characteristics of conspiracy theories, summarizes the argument of The Protocols, and reviews their origins in the political context of the Dreyfuss Affair and the Taxil "Palladian Masonry" hoax of the 1890s.  It suggests several reasons why this theory, and not others floated at the same time, proved adaptable to the politics of other cultures in the following century and notes that it embodies a general movement in the West in which "evil elites" (rather than "evil outsiders") are seen as the most dangerous cultural threat.

VIDEOLOGY is part 1 of a critique of "realism" in film, visual art & literature. From Nam June Paik’s experimental TV to the subversive cinema of Alejandro Jodorowsky, Miike Takashi & Leos Carax; from Naked Lunch to the Cyberfeminist Manifesto; from film noir to the “murder of the Real.” Addresses the work of David Lynch, Marc Atkins, Christian Louboutin; Philippe Sollers, Anthony Braxton, Robert Smithson; Lettrism; Blade Runner; David Cronenberg, Terry Gilliam; John Waters, Derek Jarman, Peter Greenaway, Ken Russell; Billy Wilder, John Huston, Howard Hawks; Jean-Luc Godard; Dusan Makavejev; Robert Coover, Hunter S. Thompson; William Gibson, Stelarc, Nina Sellars, Shu Lea Cheang, Linda Dement, Megumi Igarashi.

O presente artigo se dispõe a discutir acerca das possíveis simbolizações a partir do evento de Gilberto Gil compor a música-tema da obra Sítio do Picapau Amarelo, de Monteiro Lobato. A discussão se baseia a partir da complexidade que envolve o ato de um músico negro, reconhecido inclusive pela sua luta pela valorização da negritude, compor uma música para uma obra que possui diversos elementos racistas, resultando em diversas possíveis subversões no ato. A reflexão se apresenta após uma breve apresentação da biografia de Gilberto Gil e de Monteiro Lobato, além do disco Refavela de Gil, que em seu relançamento a música foi inserida como uma faixa extra, e da obra Sítio do Picapau Amarelo. Espera-se fomentar um debate acerca da subversão de obras e símbolos profundamente inseridos no cotidiano brasileiros, permitindo outros olhares e significações.

Subversion is an ambiguous form of conflict in war and peace that does not rely on violence. From the perspective of the target, subversion is so ambiguous – and often gradual and long-term – that American diplomatic, security, and military planners find it difficult to identify, recognize, understand, and neutralize. Subversion has a logic and process of its own that permits identification for defense and offensive purposes to Phase 0. This paper summarizes a larger concept paper to explore subversion for defensive and offensive purposes.

Ce mémoire propose de suivre les traces de deux auteurs subversifs qui ont tenté, par leur œuvre, de renverser les codes littéraires et sociaux de leur époque. Imaginez deux cyniques modernes en vadrouille ; imaginez qu’ils se promènent rageusement et qu’ils accusent le paysage littéraire et social de leur époque. Imaginez-les éclaboussant la boue des ornières et se complaire dans le vil bourbier. Sur le chemin de la coutume et des codes, Genet et Céline, ont tous deux fait un pas de côté ; ils ont fait le choix de la marge, faute de pouvoir aller plus loin.
À travers ce mémoire, nous étudions précisément ces marges qu’ils habitent. Dans la première partie, nous proposons une étude sur la subversion formelle qu’opèrent les deux écrivains, chacun à leur manière. Dans la seconde partie, nous proposons une étude sur les thématiques que Genet et Céline foulent aux pieds. Pour différents qu’ils soient, tous deux ont joué des codes littéraires et sociaux ; tous deux ont choqué par une morale résolument cynique et nihiliste ; mais tous deux ont représenté des changements dans l’âme de leur époque.

The concept of ‘serious games’ indicates that there are games that can have an educational purpose on top of being entertaining. In this paper it is argued that all games, not just educational games, try to state something about the real world. Several manifestations of ideology in games are explored to illustrate this point. The threat of ideologically motivated rhetoric in games threatening the freedom of young game players leads many scholars to believe there is a need for a game literacy: the development of a skill that learns gamers to objectively evaluate this rhetoric.This discourse on game literacies falls together with discourse on new media literacies and is permeated with ideas pertaining to a technological imaginary. In this paper, the problematic conceptualization of this game literacy is addressed and it is argued that there is no such need for a game literacy.

Consumer-grade game engines such as Multimedia Fusion and RPG Maker have dramatically extended the reach of digital games as a medium. They have also spawned online communities, where conventions and canons of using these tools have evolved. These partly stem from the functional constraints of the game engines themselves and are institutionalized through manuals, examples, tutorials, and games made with them. However, some members of game engine communities actively seek to challenge these conventions by experimenting with the engines and finding ingenious ways to put them to unexpected uses. Such experiments can be regarded as a form of metacommentary on the engines’ capabilities and limitations. While arguably impractical and inefficient, they enrich the scope of what can be done with the engine and can contribute to its further development.

Through a comparative perspective, and within the theoretical framework of post-colonial feminism, the present thesis aims at analysing the strategies of subversion and transgression in selected novels by contemporary Algerian francophone female novelist Assia Djebar and African American woman writer Gloria Naylor. The research aims primarily at demonstrating that despite the distinct and distanced contexts of the two writers, the double marginality of their female group communities -a marginalization based simultaneously on race and gender- urges the two authors to use similar strategies to voice the concerns of long silenced and excluded minorities. The examination of novels such as Femmes d’Alger dans leur appartement (1980), L’Amour la fantasia (1985), Ombre sultane (1987), Vaste est la prison (1995), and La Femme sans sépulture (2002) by Djebar, and The Women of Brewster Place (1983), Linden Hills (1985), Mama Day (1988), and Bailey’s Cafe (1992) by Naylor, shows that the subversive and transgressive strategies employed by both Djebar and Naylor operate at the levels of both form and content. This reflects already in the linguistic dimension where Djebar and Naylor challenge the dominance of the major languages they are employing, i.e. respectively French and English. Indeed, by using oratures that disturb the written forms they are using, and by inscribing their texts at the crossroads of either different languages or linguistic variants, the authors create hybrid and decentralized narratives that are closer to the indigenous experiences they are trying to encode. Moreover, the author’s subversive use of monophonic and polyphonic narrative modes considerably contributes in liberating their heroines from the domineering voices that stereotyped and reduced them to silence. The thematic level also proves to be characterized by subversion and transgression. This appears in the authors’ treatment of some of the major issues discussed throughout their works.  The historical dimension is a case in point. Djebar and Naylor similarly undertake a process of (re)writing history in ways that secure a place for silenced women. Furthermore, the intertextual relationship that the examined novels entertain with canonized works and cultural productions shows how the two authors succeeded at appropriating the original works so to voice the concerns of their own groups. Though referring to them, the authors clearly refuse any colonization of their oeuvres by hegemonic and institutionalized works. The last but not least tackled theme is the female body. By bringing such issue to the fore, the authors significantly transgress established dogmas and traditions. Moreover, throughout their works, the female body emerges as an important entity that helps inscribing a wide variety of female experiences, and that contributes in the heroines’ process of liberation and self-affirmation. Indeed, from an element used to subjugate female characters, the female body subverted and reapropriated becomes at the hands of both Djebar and Naylor, a means of women’s subjectivation.

Aus Dokumenten der Leipziger Bürger- und Menschenrechtsgruppen Arbeitskreis Gerechtigkeit, Arbeitsgruppe Menschenrechte, Sonnabendskreis sowie der Redaktion der Samisdat-Zeitschrift Grenzfall in Berlin.
Erstmals wird die Revolution von 1989 als ein politisch gewollter Weg transparent gemacht. Ab 1987 können die Bürger- und Menschenrechtsgruppen als Wegbereiter der Friedlichen Revolution verstanden werden. Subversive Aktionen werden dokumentiert und die Auseinandersetzung der Bürgerrechtsbewegung in und mit der evangelischen Kirche. Entstehung und Funktion des Sonnabendskreises in Leipzig, einer bisher nicht betrachteten Organisationsform, werden dokumentiert. Über den Sonnabendskreis wurden Gruppen von Greifswald bis Großhennersdorf koordiniert, ca. 20 Samisdat-Redaktionen, 15 alternative Bibliotheken sowie ca. 20 weitere Friedens- und Umweltgruppen in ca. 50 Orten der ehemaligen "DDR". Tagesereignisse werden aus Originaltexten aus dem Bestande des Archivs der Initiative Frieden und Menschenrechte Sachsen e.V., aus Flugblättern, Pressemitteilungen, Tagebucheinträgen und teilweise aus Akten rekonstruiert.

En febrero de 1999, Martha Nussbaum publica en The New Republic un ensayo titulado “La profesora de la parodia” en el que arremete contra la teoría de Judith Butler. De acuerdo con Nussbaum, el problema de la obra butleriana –y del nuevo feminismo que ella representa– es que nos conduce a un peligroso quietismo político ya que, en lugar de abogar por cambios estructurales, reduce la política a la burla y la parodia. El objetivo de este artículo es reconstruir, analizar y poner en cuestión la crítica de Nussbaum. Para eso, se ofrecerá una lectura alternativa de la obra temprana de Butler que demostrará que lejos de implicar una retirada política, su noción de subversión puede ser un recurso fértil para pensar la transformación social.