Browsing by Author "Stadler, Jane"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Discipline and savagery : the spectacle of the post-apartheid South African school
    (2003) McDougall, Kathleen Lorne; Stadler, Jane
    In describing and evaluating a South African semiotic of order and disorder, this dissertation traces representations of school discipline through examples of colonial and apartheid to key contemporary discursive practices. In this interdisciplinary dissertation three contemporary sets of texts are analysed: the department of education policy document, Alternatives to corporal punishment (2001), news articles on school disruption from the Business Day, Mail & Guardian and the Sowetan newspapers (1996-2002), and photographs on delinquency and discipline taken by a group of Cape Town public secondary school students.
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    The informe in David Lynch's cinema : reading American film through the 'Philosophy' of Georges Bataille
    (2005) Macdonald, Robert; Higgins, John; Stadler, Jane
    This dissertation argues that several of American film-maker David Lynch's works employ a subversive textual operation in their representations of America and American life that is comparable, in both its approach and political significance, to the collapse of conceptual systems French philosopher Georges Bataille termed 'informe'. Each chapter of this thesis explores an aspect of American ideology that has been shaped within filmic conventions of genre, narration and representation, analysing how the informe in Lynch's films encourages awareness of difference; of other possibilities for representing human relations beyond these powerful circumscriptions of identity and ideology. In each analysis, the 'work' of the informe in the films under discussion is also linked to some of the prominent political concerns dealt with in Bataille's work. These include his focus on genuine human connectedness, eroticism and transgression, all of which are couched within a broader philosophical emphasis that emerges in his work on the need for balance in social existence between the 'heterogeneous' or 'sacred' aspects of society on the one hand, and the 'homogeneous' or 'profane' on the other.
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    Screening interiority : dream, the unconscious, emotion and imagination in cinematic language
    (2007) Rickards, Meg Frances; Marx, Lesley; Stadler, Jane
    The portrayal of film characters' inner experience ensures a level of audience engagement often precluded in primarily plot-driven narratives. Yet, there is a prevailing notion that interiority is the exclusive domain of literature. To counter this pedagogy, the thesis explores how filmmakers can externalise dream; the unconscious; emotional journeys, and the realm of the imagination through cinematic language. The study draws on a theoretical framework that incorporates psychoanalytic film theory, neo-formalism and literary theory, and which engages to some extent with authorship. The compatibilist methodological approach draws on these modes of analysis, while systematically bridging theory and practice. The thesis dovetails with a creative component - the screenplay of Zinzi and the Boondogle, a children's feature film. Through this case study, the thesis examines the largely undocumented relationship between film theory and analysis on the one hand, and screenwriting and film production on the other. The research explores a number of areas germane to the screenplay, starting by uncovering innovative ways in which dreams can illuminate character interiority. It finds that animation, in its ability to render visible the metaphysical, is a compelling means of screening inner processes. Jan Svankmajer blends live action filmmaking with animation to bespeak the interpenetration of the conscious and unconscious realms. Hayao Miyazaki uses anime to construct otherworldly realms that reflect adolescent girls' rites of passage. In films that draw on African storytelling, animation is shown to make manifest the imaginative realm. Finally, the adaptation of the screenplay Zinzi and the Boondogle into a novel tests ways in which cinema and literature can divergently - but equally - evoke characters' interior lives. The thesis counters the pedagogy which insists that film is suited only to external action. Rather, the research reveals potent cinematic means of evoking oneiric and fantasy lives - bridging the traditional chasm between film theory and praxis and inviting further meetings between these discourses.
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    Stealing Empire : debates about global capital, counter-culture, technology and intellectual property
    (2005) Haupt, Adam; Stadler, Jane
    This thesis examines the agency of marginalised subjects in the context of global capitalism and the information age. The key question that is addressed is whether transnational corporations have appropriated aspects of cultural identity, creative expression and technological innovation for their own enrichment - to the detriment of civil society. Where this is the case, this thesis considers what opportunities exist for issuing challenges to the power of global corporations. Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri's concept of Empire provides the theoretical foundation for examining cultural, technological and legal conflicts between the interests of citizens and those of corporations. Hardt and Negri theorise the ways in which former imperial powers continue to extend their military, economic and political power in former colonies. The authors argue that former imperial powers no longer compete with each other for the same resources because they now co-operate with each other through multilateral organisations and trade agreements. Ultimately, the key beneficiaries of these modes of co-operation are global corporations that tend to monopolise the production and distribution of technological and cultural products at the expense of the public interest and the functioning of democracy. This work considers the possibilities of responding to Empire and resisting globalisation through strategies that employ some of the same decentralised, network-based techniques that benefit global corporate entities. Hardt and Negri's concept of 'the multitude' as a multiplicity of singularities makes sense of the diverse struggles under discussion in this study, providing the conceptual basis for possibilities of multiple engagements with Empire that are not reductive and that do not exclude certain interest groups. This is an interdisciplinary project that uses case studies to analyse the relationships between law and policy documents, technological development, and the production of cultural texts (such as hip-hop music). Specifically, this work explores the MP3 revolution and Napster (version one); digital sampling in hip-hop; hip-hop activism on South Africa's Cape Flats and these activists' use of new media in their pursuit of social justice. It addresses concerns about the commodification of youth culture as well as debates about intellectual property and the United States' use of trade agreements as enforcement mechanisms that serve the interests of its own corporations. This thesis presents an overview of copyright and trade agreements in order to examine the vested interests that underlie them. In keeping with the focus on globalisation and cultural imperialism, US legislation - such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act - is discussed in relation to alternatives to proprietary approaches toward intellectual property, such as open source software and Creative Commons licenses.