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Media Rituals rethinks our accepted concepts of ritual behaviour for a media-saturated age. It connects ritual directly with questions of power, government, and surveillance and explores the ritual space which the media construct and where their power is legitimated. Drawing on sociological and anthropological approaches to the study of ritual, Couldry applies the work of theorists such as Durkheim, Bourdieu and Bloch to a number of important media arenas: the public media event; reality TV; Webcam sites; talk shows and docu-soaps; media pilgrimages; the construction of celebrity. In a final chapter, he imagines a different world where the media's ritual power is less, because the possibilities of participation in media production are more evenly shared.
We are born, live, and die with technologies. This book is about the role technology plays in sustaining narratives of living, dying, and coming to be. Contributing authors examine how technologies connect, disrupt, or help us reorganize ways of parenting and nurturing life. They further consider how technology sustains our ways of thinking and being, hopefully reconciling the distance between who we are and who we aspire to be. Finally, they address the role technology plays in helping us come to terms with death, looking at technologically enhanced memorials, online rituals of mourning, and patterns of grief enabled through technology. Ultimately, this volume is about using technology to reimagine the art of life.
Winner of the Book of the Year Award for the Conference on Christianity and Literature.--Thomas H. Luxon, Dartmouth College "CHOICE"
Science as well. Finally, all those who were mesmerized by the Thomas/Hill hearings, the Gulf War coverage, and other recent media events will find it enlightening and instructive.
This work offers a multifaceted exploration of new rituals, such as Celebrating Kwanzaa and of the ways entrenched rituals, such as Mardi Gras, gift giving, and weddings have changed. Moreover, it examines the influence of both cultures and subcultures.
From Marx to Murakami and Beethoven to Bacon, 'Daily Rituals' examines the working routines of more than a 160 of the greatest philosophers, writers, composers and artists ever to have lived. Filled with fascinating insights on the mechanics of genius and entertaining stories of the personalities behind it, it is irresistibly addictive and utterly inspiring
More than 150 inspired—and inspiring—novelists, poets, playwrights, painters, philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians on how they subtly maneuver the many (self-inflicted) obstacles and (self-imposed) daily rituals to get done the work they love to do. Franz Kafka, frustrated with his living quarters and day job, wrote in a letter to Felice Bauer in 1912, “time is short, my strength is limited, the office is a horror, the apartment is noisy, and if a pleasant, straightforward life is not possible then one must try to wriggle through by subtle maneuvers.” Kafka is one of 161 minds who describe their daily rituals to get their work done, whether by waking early or staying up late; whether by self-medicating with doughnuts or bathing, drinking vast quantities of coffee, or taking long daily walks. Thomas Wolfe wrote standing up in the kitchen, the top of the refrigerator as his desk, dreamily fondling his “male configurations”.... Jean-Paul Sartre chewed on Corydrane tablets (a mix of amphetamine and aspirin), ingesting ten times the recommended dose each day ... Descartes liked to linger in bed, his mind wandering in sleep through woods, gardens, and enchanted palaces where he experienced “every pleasure imaginable.” Here are: Anthony Trollope, who demanded of himself that each morning he write three thousand words (250 words every fifteen minutes for three hours) before going off to his job at the postal service, which he kept for thirty-three years during the writing of more than two dozen books ... Karl Marx ... Woody Allen ... Agatha Christie ... George Balanchine, who did most of his work while ironing ... Leo Tolstoy ... Charles Dickens ... Pablo Picasso ... George Gershwin, who, said his brother Ira, worked for twelve hours a day from late morning to midnight, composing at the piano in pajamas, bathrobe, and slippers.... Here also are the daily rituals of Charles Darwin, Andy Warhol, John Updike, Twyla Tharp, Benjamin Franklin, William Faulkner, Jane Austen, Anne Rice, and Igor Stravinsky (he was never able to compose unless he was sure no one could hear him and, when blocked, stood on his head to “clear the brain”).
This wide-ranging and accessible book offers a stimulating introduction to the field of media anthropology and the study of religious ritual. Johanna Sumiala explores the interweaving of rituals, communication and community. She uses the tools of anthropological enquiry to examine a variety of media events, including the death of Michael Jackson, a royal wedding and the transgressive actions which took place in Abu Ghraib, and to understand the inner significance of the media coverage of such events. The book deals with theories of ritual, media as ritual including reception, production and representation, and rituals of death in the media. It will be invaluable to students and scholars alike across media, religion and anthropology.
Survivor. The Bachelor. Extreme Makeover. Big Brother. Joe Millionaire. American Idol. The Osbournes. It is virtually impossible to turn on a television without coming across some sort of reality programming. Yet, while this genre has rapidly moved from the fringes of television culture to its lucrative core, critical attention has not kept pace. Beginning by unearthing its historical roots in early reality shows like Candid Camera and wending its way through An American Family, Cops, and The Real World to the most recent crop of reality programs, Reality TV is the first book to address the economic, visual, cultural, and audience dimensions of reality television. The essays provide a complex and comprehensive picture of how and why this genre emerged, what it means, how it differs from earlier television programming, and how it engages societies, industries, and individuals. Topics range from the construction of televisual "reality" to the changing face of criminal violence on TV, to issues of surveillance, taste, and social control. By spanning reality television's origins in the late 1940s to its current overwhelming popularity, Reality TV demonstrates both the tenacity of the format and its enduring ability to speak to our changing political and social desires and anxieties. Contributors include: Nick Couldry, Mary Beth Haralovich, John Hartley, Chuck Kleinhans, Derek Kompare, Jon Kraszewski, Kathleen LeBesco, Justin Lewis, Ted Magder, Jennifer Maher, Anna McCarthy, Rick Morris, Chad Raphael, Elayne Rapping, Jeffrey Sconce, Michael W. Trosset, Pamela Wilson.