Communication & Culture, Joint Program with Toronto Metropolitan University
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Browsing Communication & Culture, Joint Program with Toronto Metropolitan University by Subject "activism"
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Item Open Access Networks of Feeling: Affective Economies of Queer & Feminist Film Festivals on the Canadian Prairies(2019-11-22) Petrychyn, Jonathan Robert; Bociurkew, MarusyaFilm festivals are full of feeling. As complex institutions, affective labour underpins the work of programmers and festival staff. As public events, films screened at festivals can be well-received pictures, poorly-reviewed flops, or events met with protest, controversy, and outbursts of public emotion. The relationship between these different types of emotion, affect, and feeling is a complex yet an often-overlooked aspect of film festivals. This dissertation develops a theory of affect through the history of the queer and feminist film festivals on the Canadian Prairies from 1985 to 2005. Drawing on the vast collection of public and private archives available on these festivals, as well as interviews and ethnography, I attend to the ways the regions network of film festivals have produced and have been produced by affect and how affects of dis/interest, disgust, shame, and happiness circulate within film festival networks. The circulation and production of different affects at various points in these festival histories have had profound effects on how these festivals organizefrom how organizers relate to each other and to their publics, to the kinds of funding they accept and the politics of their programming. I consider the ways in which these affects circulate and how such organizational and discursive affects underpin the network of relationships between gay, lesbian, womens, and racialized bodies within and around film festivals. I further consider the role lesbians and feminists of colour had in organizing this network of film festivals, the place of public and private funding and state institutions like the NFBs Studio D, and the intersections between queer and feminist film festivals and human rights activism. I argue that complex and diverse economies of affect structure film festival institutions and networks. These affective economies can be most clearly traced through film festival archives.Item Open Access Punk, Obamacare, and a Jesuit: Branding the Iconic Ideals of Vivienne Westwood, Barack Obama, and Pope Francis(2021-07-06) Moir, Aidan Marie; MacLennan, AnnePractices of branding, promotion, and persona have become dominant influences structuring identity formation in popular culture. Creating an iconic brand identity is now an essential practice required for politicians, celebrities, global leaders, and other public figures to establish their image within a competitive media landscape shaped by consumer society. This dissertation analyzes the construction and circulation of Vivienne Westwood, Barack Obama, and Pope Francis as iconic brand identities in contemporary media and consumer culture. The content analysis and close textual analysis of select media coverage and other relevant material on key moments, events, and cultural texts associated with each figure deconstructs the media representation of Westwood, Obama, and Pope Francis. The brand identities of Westwood, Pope Francis, and Obama ultimately exhibit a unique form of iconic symbolic power, and exploring the complex dynamics shaping their public image demonstrates how they have achieved and maintained positions of authority. Although Westwood, Obama, and Pope Francis initially were each positioned as outsiders to the institutions of fashion, politics, and religion that they now represent, the media played a key role in mainstreaming their image for public consumption. Their iconic brand identities symbolize the influence of consumption in shaping how issues of public good circulate within public discourse, particularly in regard to the economy, health care, social inequality, and the environment. Westwood, Obama, and Pope Francis are also texts used to promote the institutions they represent, and it is this aspect of their public image that illuminates the inherent contradictions between individual and institution underlying their brand identities. Interrogating the iconic identities of Westwood, Obama, and Pope Francis reveals how it is the labour and strategy behind the brand that creates meaning in consumer culture. Westwood, Obama, and Pope Francis are important figures for analysis because their iconic brand identities transcend the foundations of fashion, politics, and religion, and more significantly, demonstrate how branding as a promotional strategy is not unique to any particular realm or institution but a technique utilized by public figures regardless of the celebrity or elite status associated with their position.