Browsing by Author "Irwin, Ron"

Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
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    Authenticity, Commodification of the Self, and Micro-Influencers: An in-depth analysis into the online identity construction of South African micro-influencers within the Western Cape
    (2022) Bull, Joshua; Chuma, Wallace; Irwin, Ron
    The aim of this paper was to engage with the ways in which micro-influencers within the Western Cape construct their online identities on Instagram. Theories of critical political economy of the media, self-branding, and the commodification of the self were applied to the context of micro-influencer identity construction as a means of understanding the mediated relationships between influencers, the brands they collaborate with, the platform Instagram, and the ways in which these relationships effect the construction of their online identities. This study made use of individual interviews with micro-influencers, as well as a micro-influencer focus group session in order uncover the main themes in relation to the influencers' perceptions of their online activity. A qualitative content analysis was also performed on content posted by the sample of micro-influencers that coded for the influencers' uses of platform affordances, photographic content, and their identity construction within their images based on concepts of gender representation in the media by Goffman (1979) and Gill (2000). Central to the micro-influencers' notions of success on the platform, and their perceptions of processes of identity construction, was the concept of authenticity. However, the authenticity referenced by the influencers, focused more on processes of fostering the perception of authenticity within the minds of their audience towards the self they perform online, as opposed to acting in accordance with one's true self. It was also found that their performative online identities were predicated on processes of the commodification of the self. In this sense, the construction of the influencers' profiles was dictated by processes of the commodification of the self, and the influencers understanding of how to create the perception of authenticity within the minds of their followers towards their online self.
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    Harrow : a collection of fiction
    (2004) Cilliers, Charles; Irwin, Ron
    The subject matter of the two stories and one short novel in this dissertation, if one could call it that, vary widely. There are, however, overridig themes of fantasy and surrealism throughout, for each of the narratives ask of the reader to disengage from certain axioms of how the world works. The first story, The Other Ellis, deals with a character's struggle to come to terms with the possibiligy that he may be the only person hearing hidden messages in the music of a particular composer. He becomes convinced that the composer has a terrible secret. The major portion of work for this dissertation, Slumber, is a short novel that explores a science fiction theme, but is written in a style closer to suspense/horror. Once the first chaper closes, each successive chapter presents the reader with a different viewpoint character who wakes from frightful nightmares, which seem to have a primary antagonist: a murderer with eerie, unearthly power.
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    Lazarus in heels
    (2013) Perry, Susan; Irwin, Ron
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    A magic prison
    (2013) Buchanan, Emily; Irwin, Ron
    When Megan’s aged and addled father goes missing in Lahaina, Maui, where he has been living most of his adult life, she must decide whether and how she should help to find him. As a child, she knew him only through their two weeks together each December; as a young adult, she had to deal with the consequences of his alcoholism and her stepsister’s accusation that he molested her. Now Megan is fortyone, married to Steven and the mother of a young daughter, Jess; but she is her father’s only child and her stepmother needs her help. As Megan returns to Maui she recalls her Christmases with her father. Both good and bad memories are evoked as she searches for him: from the delights of snorkelling, the horrors of a cock fight, and the stories of the locals, to the beauty of the tropical landscape. We follow her as she visits the once-isolated community of Hansen’s disease sufferers at Kalaupapa, on Molokai; tracks down her stepsister where she is working at the landmark Pioneer Inn, and walks through the historical sites of ancient Lahaina, once the home of Hawaiian royalty. We discover what it is like to work at a commercial luau and how she became a chef on Kauai.
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    Obsession
    (1999) Irwin, Ron
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    A prisoner's tale : a novella
    (1996) Irwin, Ron; Coetzee, John M
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    There must have been a storm
    (2004) Turner, Joanne; Irwin, Ron
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    This man country
    (2005) Jackson, Abigail Naomi; Irwin, Ron
    This collection of short stories explores how ordinary individuals in extraordinary situations negotiate issues of race, gender, sexuality, and longing for home. Set in New York, the Caribbean, and South Africa, they reflect the history and culture of Caribbean immigrants and their children. These stories are meant to entertain and shed light on routinely unexplored areas of human experience: those of women, girls, homosexuals, immigrants, and working class people. The title, This Man Country, refers to how Caribbean people in my grandparents' generation thought of America as "this man country," a place where they would stay temporarily to connect with their children, make money, escape from their lives at home, among other reasons.
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    Writers Researching: Fact and Fiction
    (2014-09-29) Irwin, Ron; Moffett, Helen; Beukes, Lauren; Makholwa, Angela; Dowling, Finuala
    What is the relationship between research and the writing process and between historical ‘truth’ and fictional ‘truth’? Are there boundaries which should not be crossed? In this course writers will talk about the research that resulted in their recent novels. Ron Irwin, author of Flat Water Tuesday, will discuss how he researched people, places and real events and the challenges associated with turning the events of one’s own life into a novel. Helen Moffett, one of the trio behind the Girl Walk In series, will explain how she and her co-authors research and write erotica novels, providing insight into collaboration, champagne and condoms. Award-winning Lauren Beukes will describe how she ‘kinks’ reality in relation to the real-world research that informed The Shining Girls and Zoo City. Angela Makholwa will explore the process of writing the criminal mind, including interviews with a serial killer for Red Ink, and research about women who killed their husbands for Black Widow Society. Readers always assume that everything that happened in your book happened to you, complains Finuala Dowling, so what’s the point of trudging uphill for five hours in search of one sentence? Referring to both Homemaking for the Down-at-Heart and her latest manuscript, The Fetch, she discusses the price of authenticity.