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Unit 1: Human Rights

Introducing human rights

What are human rights?
Human rights belong to everyone. They are the basic rights we all have
simply because we are human, regardless of who we are, where we live or
what we do. Human rights allow
us to flourish, reach our potential and ‘Human rights are not a privilege
participate fully in society. Human conferred by government. They are
rights cover many aspects of everyday every human being's entitlement by
life ranging from the rights to food, virtue of his humanity.’
shelter, education and health to Mother Teresa
freedoms of thought, religion and
expression.


Human rights are underpinned by core values or principles, including
fairness, respect, equality, dignity, autonomy, universality and
participation. Human rights issues, values and principles are expressed
through internationally agreed laws. These laws exist as a vehicle for making
core human rights values real in people’s lives.


Where do human rights come from?
The ideas behind human rights have been present throughout history in many
different societies and civilizations. However, the modern concept
of human rights emerged in the
‘Human rights are inscribed in the twentieth century as a response to
hearts of the people; they were there the events of the Second World
long before lawmakers drafted their War, particularly the mass crimes
first proclamation.’ committed during the Holocaust.
Mary Robinson, Former United States came together in 1948 at
Nations High Commissioner for the United Nations to agree the
Human Rights ‘Universal Declaration of Human
Rights’

(UDHR) – the most famous, most translated, and probably most

important, human rights document.

The fundamental rights and freedoms outlined in the UDHR are expressed in
international human rights treaties that are legally binding on states that agree
to them, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In total
there are nine core UN human rights treaties (see below).


The nine core UN human rights treaties are:


• The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
• The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
(ICESCR)
• The Convention Against Torture (CAT)
• The Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against
Women (CEDAW)
• The Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD)
• The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
• The International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all
Migrant Workers and Members of their Families (the UK has not
signed this Convention)
• The International Convention for the Protection of all Persons from
Enforced Disappearances (not yet in force; the UK has not signed this
Convention)
• The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD)
(the UK has signed, but not yet ratified, this Convention)



Countries have also come together to agree regional human rights
treaties such as the European Convention on Human Rights, the
American Convention on Human Rights and the African Charter on
Human and People’s Rights. These treaties contain some, but not all, of
the rights expressed in the UDHR.


Many countries also have their own domestic human rights laws – for
example, in the UK we have the Human Rights Act. For more information
on the different types of human rights laws, please see BIHR’s ‘Protecting
human rights in the UK’. For more information about the history of human
rights, please see BIHR’s ‘human rights timeline’.

What kinds of rights are protected by human rights laws?

There are many human rights, which reflect different areas of our lives –
spanning civil, political, economic, social, cultural and environmental aspects.
All human rights are indivisible, interrelated and interdependent
– restricting one right has a negative impact on other rights, while taking
steps to fulfil a right facilitates the enjoyment of other rights. For example,
restricting the right to health by not providing an adequate healthcare system
may impact on other rights in a negative way such as the right to life.
Enhancing the right to education through an effective education system for all
can support the enjoyment of other rights such as the right to work.


Different human rights laws focus on different rights – for example there is an
international treaty that covers civil and political rights (such as freedom of
expression, and the right to liberty), and a separate international treaty
encompassing economic, social and cultural rights (such as rights to education
and health). Some international treaties
focus on particular rights, such as the Convention against Torture.
Other international treaties protect the rights of specific groups, for example
women, children and disabled people. The existence of these treaties does
not give these groups any additional rights, but recognises the particular
discrimination and difficulties some groups face in claiming their human
rights.


Can human rights ever be taken away or limited?
No one can have their human rights completely ‘taken away’ – even if they
have not met their responsibilities or have compromised the rights of others.
Some human rights are absolute, which means they can never be limited or
restricted, in any circumstances – for example the right not to be tortured or
treated in an inhuman or degrading way. However, the majority of human
rights are not absolute and can be limited or
restricted in certain circumstances. For example, if someone writes hate
speech inciting murder against an ethnic group, their freedom of expression
may be limited to ensure the safety of others. Social services may decide to
remove a child from their home and place them in care if they have evidence
that they are being abused by their parents, thus restricting the right to
respect for family life. The conditions under
which human rights can be restricted or limited are set out in the
relevant human rights laws.

If human rights cannot be taken away, then how come there are so
many human rights abuses happening in the world? The fact that we all
have human rights does not mean that they are always respected. It is evident
that human rights abuses and violations
continue to occur in different parts of the world, including in the UK. In
order to make human rights a reality in all people’s lives, it is essential that
people know what their rights are and know how to claim them. It is equally
vital that those responsible for protecting and respecting
people’s rights are aware of their obligations and are held to account for
human rights abuses. Therefore, states and people within them must know
what their rights are, what responsibilities they hold, and how these can be
maintained, protected and fulfilled.


Who is responsible for upholding human rights?
The primary responsibility for upholding human rights lies with states. The
human rights responsibilities of states are often broken down into
obligations to respect, protect and fulfil rights.


• The obligation to respect means that states must refrain from
carrying out human rights abuses (for example not taking away
someone’s life arbitrarily, thus respecting the right to life)
• The obligation to protect means that states must protect
individuals and groups against human rights abuses by other actors (for
example, protecting the right to life by making sure that life- sustaining
medical treatment is not withdrawn unfairly)
• The obligation to fulfil means that states must take positive steps to
make human rights a reality in people’s lives (for example improving the
healthcare system, to ensure that lives are saved wherever possible –
thus taking steps towards fulfilling the right to life)


Human rights provide minimum standards below which states cannot go, and
also set goals for the constant improvement of these minimum standards.


Do individuals hold responsibilities to each other?
Human rights recognise that we all live alongside each other, and everyone
else has rights too. This is why the majority of rights are non- absolute and
can be limited or restricted in certain circumstances. If we compromise
others’ human rights, we are subject to laws that may limit our own rights as
a result. For example, if we commit a crime we may be sent to jail, thus
restricting our right to liberty. But more than this,

human rights can be viewed as part of the relationships we have to each

other and society as a whole, and therefore we have an ethical responsibility
to respect each other’s rights – even when in some instances those rights
conflict with one’s own. The state is ultimately accountable for balancing
these sometimes conflicting rights.


Which human rights laws apply in the UK?
The main source of human rights law in the UK is the Human Rights Act,
which came into force in 2000. This Act incorporates most of the rights that
are contained in the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law.
The UK signed up to the European Convention in 1951. The UK has also
signed all of the core international human rights treaties (see above), except
for the Migrant Worker’s Convention and the International Convention for
the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearances. Please see
‘Human rights protection in the UK’ for more details of how human rights
apply in the UK.


Why are human rights relevant to the UK?
Human rights belong to everyone in the UK and are relevant to many of the
situations people experience and the decisions people make on a daily basis.
The Human Rights Act
provides a crucial safety net for ‘Where, after all, do universal
protecting us all, particularly when we human rights begin? In small
are facing disadvantage or discrimination, places, close to home …’
or are at our most vulnerable. The Human Eleanor Roosevelt
Rights Act also provides a useful
framework for public authorities –
including central and local government departments, hospitals, state
schools and social services departments – within which decisions can be
made and competing rights and interests can be balanced.


However, in the UK we tend to only hear about human rights being
used by those who may have compromised other people’s rights, such as
criminals and terrorists. Although these groups still retain their core human
rights, many of their rights will be restricted. But we rarely hear about how
the Human Rights Act has been used, for example, to protect older people
who are being abused in care homes, to ensure that
disabled children are provided with transport to get to school and to
protect women from domestic violence. There are many other examples of
how the Human Rights Act has been used to improve the lives of people in
the UK, both in and outside of the courtroom. Please

see BIHR’s report ‘The Human Rights Act – Changing Lives’ (2006) for
just some examples.


Human rights – changing lives in the UK
A disabled woman was told by her occupational therapy department that
she needed a special (‘profile’) bed to allow carers to give her bed baths. She
requested a double bed so that she could continue to sleep next to her
husband. The local authority refused her request, even though she offered to
pay the difference in cost between a single and a double bed. A stalemate
ensued for 18 months until the woman was advised by the Disability Law
Centre to invoke her right to respect for her private and family life under
the Human Rights Act. Within three hours of putting this argument to the
authority it found enough money to buy the double profile bed for her.
Please see BIHR’s report ‘The Human Rights Act – Changing Lives’ (available on
our website) for further examples


Where can I find out more about human rights?
Please visit BIHR’s website, www.bihr.org.uk, for a range of information
resources about human rights.


Liberty’s ‘Your Rights’ website (www.yourrights.org.uk) and the website of
the Equality and Human Rights Commission
(www.equalityhumanrights.com) are also useful sources of information on
human rights in the UK. You can find out more about international human
rights on the website for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights,
www.ohchr.org, or on Amnesty International’s website, www.amnesty.org.


Please note that BIHR is unable to provide advice to individuals about
human rights. Our website lists a range of organisations that provide
advice. The Equality and Human Rights Commission has a helpline for
discrimination and human rights issues and is a useful starting point for
advice about human rights. Their helpline numbers are:


England: 0845 604 6610 (textphone: 0845 604 6620)

Wales: 0845 604 8810 (textphone: 0845 604 8820)

Scotland: 0845 604 5510 (textphone: 0845 604 5520)

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Preamble

Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all
members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have
outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy
freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest
aspiration of the common people, Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have
recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be
protected by the rule of law, Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly
relations between nations, Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter
reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person
and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and
better standards of life in larger freedom, Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to
achieve, in cooperation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and
observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms, Whereas a common understanding of
these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge, Now,
therefore, The General Assembly, Proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a
common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual
and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching
and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures,
national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both
among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their
jurisdiction.

Article 1

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason
and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of
any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social
origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the
political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs,
whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Article 3

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person. Article 4

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all
their forms.

Article 5

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 6

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

Article 7

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the
law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration
and against any incitement to such discrimination.

Article 8

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating
the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

Article 9

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile. Article 10

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial
tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 11

1. Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until
proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees
necessary for his defence.
2. No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which
did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it
was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable
at the time the penal offence was committed.
Article 12

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence,
nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law
against such interference or attacks.

Article 13

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each
State.

2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his

country.

Article 14

1. Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

2. This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely

arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the
United Nations.

Article 15

1. Everyone has the right to a nationality.
2. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his
nationality.

Article 16
1. Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality
or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights
as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.

2. Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending

spouses.

3. The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is
entitled to protection by society and the State. Article 17

1. Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.

2. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Article 18

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to
change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or
private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

Article 19

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold
opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any
media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 20

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
2. No one may be compelled to belong to an association. Article 21

1. Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country,
directly or through freely chosen representatives.
2. Everyone has the right to equal access to public service in his country.
3. The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be
expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal
suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

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Article 22

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization,
through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and
resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity
and the free development of his personality.

Article 23

1. Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable
conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

2. Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

3. Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration
ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and
supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
4. Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Article 24

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours
and periodic holidays with pay.
Article 25

1. Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of
himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary
social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability,
widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
2. Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether
born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.

Article 26

1. Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and
fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional
education shall be made
generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of
merit.
2. Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the
strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. 1t shall promote
understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups,
and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
3. Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their
children.

Article 27

1. Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy
the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

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2. Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests
resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

Article 28

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set
forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

Article 29

1. Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of
his personality is possible.

2. 1n the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such

limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of

securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others
and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare
in a democratic society.
3. These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and
principles of the United Nations.

Article 30

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right
to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and
freedoms set forth herein.

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What Is Globalization?

Globalization is a process of interaction and integration among the people, companies, and
governments of different nations, a process driven by international trade and investment and aided
by information technology. This process has effects on the environment, on culture, on political
systems, on economic development and prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies
around the world.

Globalization is not new, though. For thousands of years, people—and, later, corporations—have
been buying from and selling to each other in lands at great distances, such as through the famed
Silk Road across Central Asia that connected China and Europe during the Middle Ages. Likewise, for
centuries, people and corporations have invested in enterprises in other countries. In fact, many of
the features of the current wave of globalization are similar to those prevailing before the outbreak
of the First World War in 1914.

Map of the Silk Road

But policy and technological developments of the past few decades have spurred increases in cross-
border trade, investment, and migration so large that many observers believe the world has
entered a qualitatively new phase in its economic development. Since 1950, for example, the
volume of world trade has increased by 20 times, and from just 1997 to 1999 flows of foreign
investment nearly doubled, from $468 billion to $827 billion. Distinguishing this current wave of
globalization from earlier ones, author Thomas Friedman has said that today globalization is
“farther, faster, cheaper, and deeper.”

This current wave of globalization has been driven by policies that have opened economies
domestically and internationally. In the years since the Second World War, and especially during
the past two decades, many governments have adopted free-market economic systems, vastly
increasing their own productive potential and creating myriad new opportunities for international
trade and investment. Governments also have negotiated dramatic reductions in barriers to
commerce and have established international agreements to promote trade in goods, services, and
investment. Taking advantage of new opportunities in foreign markets, corporations have built
foreign factories and established production and marketing arrangements with foreign partners. A
defining feature of globalization, therefore, is an international industrial and financial business
structure.

Technology has been the other principal driver of globalization. Advances in information
technology, in particular, have dramatically transformed economic life. Information technologies
have given all sorts of individual economic actors—consumers, investors, businesses—valuable new
tools for identifying and pursuing economic opportunities, including faster and more informed
analyses of economic trends around the world, easy transfers of assets, and collaboration with far-
flung partners.

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Globalization is deeply controversial, however. Proponents of globalization argue that it allows poor countries
and their citizens to develop economically and raise their standards of living, while opponents of globalization
claim that the creation of an unfettered international free market has benefited multinational corporations in
the Western world at the expense of local enterprises, local cultures, and common people. Resistance to
globalization has therefore taken shape both at a popular and at a governmental level as people and
governments try to manage the flow of capital, labor, goods, and ideas that constitute the current wave of
globalization.

To find the right balance between benefits and costs associated with globalization, citizens of all nations need
to understand how globalization works and the policy choices facing them and their societies.
Globalization101.org tries to provide an accurate analysis of the issues and controversies regarding
globalization, without the slogans or ideological biases generally found in discussions of the topics.

http://www.globalization101.org/what-is-globalization/

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Globalization, its impact on mass

media
February 24, 2014 by Maha Sohail Butt

Technological advancement has not only shattered social boundaries of the world, it has brought
tremendous transformation in all fields of life. Marshall Mcluham, a Canadian theorist propagated the
idea of Global Village in 1960.To him the world has shrunk to a village due to advancement in the
fields of science and technology. Peoples of the world now live in close proximity. They share their
joys and sorrows with one another. They benefit from the inventions and discoveries made by other
people. It is the media that creates the experience of global shared time, especially by informing
people around the world about “events” that they can share. Communications give people a chance to
contact other people in distant locations whatever the time. Globalization of any country is reflection of
that country. As Globalization produce winners and losers. A casual look at the world reveals that
there is competition everywhere. The rush in every area of life divides the world into winners and
losers. At present media is the only source which is easily accessible by all walks of people through
various electronic appliances i.e. TV, Radio, Internet, News Papers and now mobile phones also used
by people to aware of events every time. Globalizing TV shows and films may influence people,
shaping the way they understand their social identities, their cultural communities, and wider world in
which they live.
Media revolution has converted the whole world into a global village. Cable TV networks are one of its
tools and people’s love for such medium cannot be denied. In Pakistan cable TV is gaining popularity
day by day and has eclipsed all other forms of entertainment. Several channels are delivering modern
scientific information at no cost that we cannot afford due to our limited resources. Simply, turning on
TV sets, we can be aware of the latest developments around the globe. We can watch the landing of
man on the moon, working of robots at Mars and miracles of genetic engineering in the field of
medicine. This cutting edge of technology has provided us the opportunity to move from a stagnant
phase of ignorance to a modern era of revolution and logic. As we are living in rapidly and constantly
changing times, change is around us, about us, within and without us.
It is because of globalization that world is fast shrinking. This would be a reason for students to take
advantage of the situation and study wherever their interests take them. In Pakistan our universities
conduct only popular courses. Hence if a student has passion for a subject such as astronomy, he will
not be able to do so in Pakistan. In this case he would have to study overseas. Now, with a single
click on internet when we look at all the universities in the world as possible places of study, we will
have more choices. Now by utilizing and getting benefit from Newspapers, we can easily know that
what is happening in other parts of the world. In Pakistan it goes beyond the range of television and
reaches the remotest regions of the country. Salesmanship is the key to modern business and the

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newspaper is an effective means of advertising. Another function which the press performs today is
that of a watchdog. Ads are also a useful source of information regarding rent and sale. Thus, we can
learn about wars, revolutions, earthquakes, floods etc in different parts of the world. We learn about
the different functions the UN is performing in various fields of economic uplift and international trade
and relations between states. The editorials of popular newspapers are useful commentaries on
national and international affairs. They tell us about social matters like debates, public meeting affairs,
transport problems, price levels ,art, literature, religion and so on every now and then.
General health programs get easily publicity like campaigns for child health, family planning,
awareness about AIDS,TB and Bird Flu. Television can be used to teach uneducated people. We can
have programs for teaching the basic details of languages. Such programs can be extremely useful
for our villagers and the working class people in the cities.
Since the last decade the media in Pakistan has become very vibrant because of the privatization of
TV channels, independent press and uncontrolled internet access to general people. Pakistan is a big
country of more than 150 million people. So it offers a huge market to multinationals and local
companies to sell their products. These facts are very provocative for the international companies to
sell their products and services in Pakistan. The multinationals companies like coca cola, KFC,
MacDonald, Nestle and many more are already doing business in Pakistan. The purpose of the media
is to inform people about current ,new affairs and to tell about the latest gossip and fashion. It tells
about the people who are geographically divided.
Mass media helps to reveal the news of people’s misery so that concerned authorities can take
necessary steps. The whole world has become a global village due to media. Today the powerful
effects of media have spread in every society of all over the world. Now with the advancement in the
field of science and technology, we are globally interconnected and communicate with other
countries. There are a group of computers that can communicate with each other connecting million
of other computer networks in the world. World Wide Web is collection of millions of changing
documents on computers all over the world. These documents may contain the books, magazines,
pictures, films and information one needs. The different websites that run into millions, offer
information in the sciences,arts,religion,education,commerce,industry,agriculture,law and almost
every topic or subject. The internet has surely brought countries and nations closer, it has functioned
to help in the development of the world into global village.
We in Pakistan can especially promote science and technology only if we are globally interconnected
with other countries in the world by making the use of different technologies and Communication. We
can likewise learn about new books, magazines, films, music and other arts and literary writings in
different countries in English and other international languages. Because of this Interconnectivity we
watch and hear about all scenes of destruction, we can learn how we can make our national and
personal life better. We can fix and determine our true destinations and aims in life with this
information and guidance.

Published in The Nation newspaper on 24-Feb-2014

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http://nation.com.pk/national/24-Feb-2014/globalization-its-impact-on-mass-media

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Does mass media shape our thinking?

Mass media has infiltrated almost every aspect

of everyday life from culture to education and
has the power to indirectly transform our
thinking. There is an abundance of information
available to everyone and anyone has the right to
contribute. This right shows great progress
toward an equal and basic human right to have
freedom of speech. However, Stroud (2012, p.
149) reminds us of the Deweyan pragmatism
that suggests “laws might be conditions for free speech, but they do not create such speech.”
Furthermore, the open system of new media can easily be manipulated and generations of
today have a responsibility to be aware of the risks involved with misinformation; “don’t
believe everything you read” is now crucial advice in an always online world (O’Neill, 2003).
Media can be contributed to by any organisation with access to the internet and the content
produced is often riddled with agenda setting and other questionable practices. Throughout
history governments and corporations mastered the art of mass propaganda long before the
concepts of new media and cultural digitality.

MASS MEDIA
The modern terminology of mass media or new
media is in itself a loosely defined concept. It
covers the technology, medium and implicit
entity of contemporary media. One could argue
that old media had a similar ambiguity in its
definition. However, new media is now
infinitely more complex in its nature. For the
sake of this presentation it’s assumed that mass media is both the content and the source of
media and new media technology is the various medium formats, underlying systems and
mode of consumption. The fact media even requires a subjective definition is indicative of
the many layers of alignment required for media to act in favour of the public interest. The
challenge is put forward by Stroud (2012, p. 150) that new media communication must figure
out practical ways to foster an assertive yet open-minded orientation and uphold a democratic
society.

CULTURE
Media has changed the fabric of our culture. Herman and Chomsky argue that the media
effectively “marginalises democratic society through agenda
setting on behalf of dominant elite groups in society” (cited
in Cinque 2012, p.25). This agenda has been formed through
a complex history of mass media where it often worked as a

 18

propaganda machine for those in power. The subversive objective of such an agenda has
always been to create a passive and complacent society in one form or another. Whilst in
modern culture the methods of control are less obvious, it’s clearly active in popular culture
where the power of capitalism has effectively delivered a culture of consumerism. The
increased commodification of information in new media suggests that our culture has adopted
the agenda of corporations in power. Many individuals are willingly trading in their capacity
to think for themselves for the latest iPhone, Ray-bans and other products sold via the media
with a promise and misrepresentation of happiness.

POLITICS
Contemporary democracy contradicts itself at a fundamental level and media plays a
powerful role in achieving this effect. New media technology has enabled users to create and
bypass the traditional mass media corporations and transmit their own point of view (Cinque
2012, p.29). However, the dominant ideology is that the public would sooner “Broadcast
[themselves]” (Jarrett, 2008) than voice their concerns through the political channels of the
real world. Electoral voting appears to be the
only event which provokes official action
and this too has been infiltrated by the social
media campaigns of political candidates. The
question has to be raised then, who is
holding the government accountable whilst
in office if the public is busily distracted
with protests on social media instead of out
in the streets?

ECONOMY
We live in a world now that is always open for business and this expectation is carried home
with the people behind even the biggest of corporations. Transnational companies and the
economy in general utilise new media as a stream of agenda setting. As already mentioned,
one side of corporate interest is to sell a desire for more products and facilitate the maximum
profit for the least amount of substance. At the other end of the business are the various staff
employed to act out the company’s profit driven agenda. New media technology has forever
altered the culture of the workplace even at the entry point of employment. Sánchez Abril et
al. (2012, p. 117) found employers were able to conduct background checks on employees
using social networks as “a secret backdoor
for illegal employment discrimination.” This
anonymous surveillance of staff extends into
employment and has upset the balance of
work, rest and play. The expectation and
workplace culture is now that we must always
be available to answer the beckoning of more
work.

 19

EDUCATION
Companies and government are eager to equip schools with the latest technology under the
guise of a tool to modernise education. However, as mentioned earlier, not everything is as it
seems and it seems to be the case more often than not with government and transnational
corporations. Current policy suggests that Year 1 is an appropriate time to begin assessment
of the students’ understanding of technology (Australian Curriculum and Assessment
Reporting Authority [ACARA] 2014).
Introducing technology and new media to
students from such a young age seems to be just
another land grab of potential influence. Students
at this age are even more susceptible to the lures
and influences of propaganda (Valkenburg &
Cantor 2001, p. 66). Therefore it makes little
sense to increase a child’s media exposure
unnecessarily.

EVERYDAY LIFE
Everyday life has become oversaturated by the messages from a coincidental alliance of
media, politics, economy and culture. Mass media, where it was once a separate and distinct
channel of propaganda, is now an active and integrated influence within our everyday lives.
The message of control may stem from an organisation with an agenda to promote products
or policies. However, media has demonstrated the modern model of distribution holds the
true power to shape our thinking. With enough repetition this infiltration can make any
society change its own culture and continue the media cycle. As a society we can no longer
rely on political bodies to guarantee information is delivered via the media in the interest of
public good. The individual must and should take responsibility to challenge and decode their
media exposure (Cinque 2012, p. 30). The resistance to mass media influence will succeed
with a greater awareness of its undeclared invasion.

http://www.awinterg.com/blog/13-does-mass-media-shape-our-thinking

 20

Chile the most globalized economy in Latin America,

says Ernst & Young
Retrieved and adapted from http://en.mercopress.com/2012/01/25/chile-the-most-globalized-economy-in-
latin-america-says-ernst-young

Chile has emerged as the most globalized economy in Latin America and moved up to 25th place in
the world, according to global consulting firm Ernst & Young. Chile is among the countries to
improve their position despite global economic uncertainty, the firm’s annual Globalization Index
found.

“Unlike other countries, the policies of Chilean governments have promoted openness in
times of turbulence, taking the sufficient precautions so the economic turmoil does not hit
the country hard,” Cristián Lefevre, senior partner of Ernst & Young Chile, told El Mercurio.

The globalization measurement is based on five factors: foreign trade, capital movement,
exchange of technology and ideas, labour movement, and cultural integration.

Chile’s greatest strength in 2011 was the arrival of foreign capital, which ranked fourth
globally, behind Ireland, Hong Kong and Belgium. Chile also scored high in foreign trade.

Technology and cultural integration were cited as the country’s weakest points, with both
ranking well below Singapore and Hong Kong, the leaders in those categories.

In Latin America, however, Chile remains the pacesetter. Mexico is the closest nation to
Chile in terms of globalization, coming in the 36th position, followed by Colombia (43),
Brazil (47), Ecuador (49) and Argentina (50).

“We have gone further than other nations who opened themselves later to the world
economy,” Lefevre said. “In fact, today Chile is one of the countries that has the most trade
agreements worldwide, including among relevant economies like the US, the European
Union and China.”

In 2012, Chile looks poised to continue its ascension with emerging markets projected to be
the biggest contributors to the predicted global growth of 3.4%. The world growth projection
was weighed down by the developed economies of the United States (2.4%) and the
European Union (0%), according to the Ernst & Young report. The World Bank has predicted
4.1% GDP growth for Chile this year.

With developing countries expected to continue this pattern of global growth, Ernst & Young
reported that over the long-term, developing countries could contribute 70% of total global
growth, overtaking current developed nations.

Ernst & Young’s Globalization Index takes the 60 countries with the highest GDP and ranks
them based on performance in the mentioned categories. The firm also surveys a thousand
business executives to discover global trends and concerns for incorporation in the report.

 21

Among the trends from 2011 were continued developments in globalization despite a
stressed economy. The chief concern going forward, according to the business leaders, is the
threat of protectionism.

Ninety percent of the executives consulted reportedly fear an increase in protectionist

policies, especially if the global economy were to face another recession.

James Turley, chairman and CEO of Ernst & Young, admits that the threat of protectionism
is real, but points out that globalization continued to grow in 2011 despite economic
concerns.

“Businesses and governments have to continue to make the case for globalization as a
positive force for economic and social good and avoid any descent into protectionism,”
Turley told the press.

By Payton Guion – The Santiago Times

 22

Understanding
Gender
For many people, the terms “gender” and “sex” are used interchangeably, and thus incorrectly. This
idea has become so common, particularly in western societies, that it is rarely questioned. We are
born, assigned a sex, and sent out into the world. For many people, this is cause for little, if any
dissonance. Yet biological sex and gender are different; gender is not inherently nor solely connected
to one’s physical anatomy.

Biological Gender (sex) includes physical attributes such as external genitalia, sex chromosomes,
gonads, sex hormones, and internal reproductive structures. At birth, it is used to assign sex, that is,
to identify individuals as male or female. Gender on the other hand is far more complicated. It is the
complex interrelationship between an individual’s sex (gender biology), one’s internal sense of self as
male, female, both or neither (gender identity) as well as one’s outward presentations and behaviors
(gender expression) related to that perception, including their gender role. Together, the intersection
of these three dimensions produces one’s authentic sense of gender, both in how people experience
their own gender as well as how others perceive it.

The Gender Spectrum

Western culture has come to view gender as a binary concept, with two rigidly fixed options: male or
female, both grounded in a person’s physical anatomy. When a child is born, a quick glance between
the legs determines the gender label that the child will carry for life. But even if gender is to be
restricted to basic biology, a binary concept still fails to capture the rich variation that exists. Rather
than just two distinct boxes, biological gender occurs across a continuum of possibilities. This
spectrum of anatomical variations by itself should be enough to disregard the simplistic notions of a
binary gender system.

But beyond anatomy, there are multiple domains defining gender. In turn, these domains can be
independently characterized across a range of possibilities. Instead of the static, binary model
produced through a solely physical understanding of gender, a far richer tapestry of biology, gender
expression, and gender identity intersect in a multidimensional array of possibilities. Quite simply, the
gender spectrum represents a more nuanced, and ultimately truly authentic model of human gender.

Falling Into Line

Gender is all around us. Like water surrounding creatures in the sea, we are often unaware of its
ever-present nature. Gender is actually taught to us from the moment we are born. Gender
expectations and messages bombard us constantly. Upbringing, culture, peers, schools, community,
media, and religion are some of the many influences that shape our understanding of this core aspect
of self. How you learned and interacted with gender as a young child directly influences how you view
the world today. Gendered interactions between parent and child begin as soon as the sex of the
baby is known. In short, many aspects of gender are socially constructed, particularly with regard to
gender expression.

Like other social constructs, gender is closely monitored and reinforced by society. Practically
everything in society is assigned a gender—toys, colors, clothes and behaviors are just some of the
more obvious examples. Through a combination of social conditioning and personal preference, by
age three most children prefer activities and exhibit behaviors typically associated with their sex.
Accepted social gender roles and expectations are so entrenched in our culture that most people
cannot imagine any other way. As a result, individuals fitting neatly into these expectations rarely if
ever question what gender really means. They have never had to, because the system has worked for
them.

 23

About Gender-expansiveness
“Gender-expansive” is an umbrella term used for individuals that broaden commonly held definitions
of gender, including its expression, associated identities, and/or other perceived gender norms, in one
or more aspects of their life. These individuals expand the definition of gender through their own
identity and/or expression. Some individuals do not identify with being either male or female; others
identify as a blend of both, while still others identify with a gender, but express their gender in ways
that differ from stereotypical presentations. A gender-expansive person’s preferences and self-
expression may fall outside commonly understood gender norms within their own culture; or they may
be aligned with them even as one’s internal gender identity doesn’t align with the sex assigned at
birth.

This diversity of gender is a normal part of the human experience, across cultures and throughout
history. Non- binary gender diversity exists all over the world, documented by countless historians and
anthropologists. Examples of individuals living comfortably outside of typical male/female
expectations and/or identities are found in every region of the globe. The calabai, and calalai of
Indonesia, two-spirit Native Americans, and the hijra of India all represent more complex
understandings of gender than allowed for by a simplistic binary model.

Further, what might be considered gender-expansive in one period of history may become gender
normative in another. One need only examine trends related to men wearing earrings or women
sporting tattoos to quickly see the malleability of social expectations about gender. Even the
seemingly intractable “pink is for girls, blue is for boys” notions are relatively new. While there is some
debate about the reasons why they reversed, what is well documented is that not until the mid-
twentieth century were notions of pink for girls or blue for boys so firmly ensconced. You can make
the case that “pink is the new blue!”

Gender And Privilege

When someone is “typically gendered,” they benefit from gender privilege. For individuals whose
biological sex, gender expression, and gender identity neatly align, often referred to as “cisgender,”
there is a level of congruence as they encounter the world around them. Like many forms of social
privilege, this is frequently an unexamined aspect of their lives. Forms they fill out, the clothing stores
in which they shop, or identification papers they carry bring few if any second thoughts. Yet for a
transgender or otherwise gender-expansive person, each of these, and many more examples, is a
constant reminder that they move about in a culture that really does not account for their own
experience. Social privilege comes from an assumption that one’s own perspective is universal;
whether related to race, or language, or gender, privilege comes from being part of the “norm.” Or, as
Dorothy Soelle aptly described it: Privilege is being able to choose what you will not see.

To understand this more intuitively, think about the last time you were in a public setting and needed
to use a restroom. For cisgender individuals, this rarely presents a problem or question (issues of
cleanliness notwithstanding!). Yet for an individual who does not fit into narrowly defined expectations
of gender presentation or identity, restroom use can present a whole host of challenges, sometimes
even becoming a matter of life and death. The daily need to make judgments about what one does, or
wears, or says based on other people’s perceptions of their gender is a burden that many people
never encounter. These everyday reminders of being different are also constant reinforcement of
being “other”.

Gender Terminology
Given the complexity of gender, it is not surprising that an increasing number of terms and phrases
are developing to describe it. Below are some of the key terms you might encounter:

 24

Biological/Anatomical Sex. The physical structure of one’s reproductive organs that is used to assign
sex at birth. Biological sex is determined by chromosomes (XX for females; XY for males); hormones
(estrogen/progesterone for females, testosterone for males); and internal and external genitalia
(vulva, clitoris, vagina for assigned females, penis and testicles for assigned males). Given the
potential variation in all of these, biological sex must be seen as a spectrum or range of possibilities
rather than a binary set of two options.

Gender Identity. One’s innermost concept of self as male or female or both or neither—how
individuals perceive themselves and what they call themselves. One’s gender identity can be the
same or different than the sex assigned at birth. Individuals are conscious of this between the ages 18
months and 3 years. Most people develop a gender identity that matches their biological sex. For
some, however, their gender identity is different from their biological or assigned sex. Some of these
individuals choose to socially, hormonally and/or surgically change their sex to more fully match their
gender identity.

Gender Expression. Refers to the ways in which people externally communicate their gender identity
to others through behavior, clothing, haircut, voice, and other forms of presentation. Gender
expression also works the other way as people assign gender to others based on their appearance,
mannerisms, and other gendered characteristics. Sometimes, transgender people seek to match their
physical expression with their gender identity, rather than their birth-assigned sex. Gender expression
should not be viewed as an indication of sexual orientation.

Gender Role. This is the set of roles, activities, expectations and behaviors assigned to females and
males by society. Our culture recognizes two basic gender roles: Masculine (having the qualities
attributed to males) and feminine (having the qualities attributed to females). People who step out of
their socially assigned gender roles are sometimes referred to as transgender. Other cultures have
three or more gender roles.

Transgender. Sometimes used as an umbrella to describe anyone whose identity or behavior falls
outside of stereotypical gender norms. More narrowly defined, it refers to an individual whose gender
identity does not match their assigned birth gender. Being transgender does not imply any specific
sexual orientation (attraction to people of a specific gender.) Therefore, transgender people may
additionally identify with a variety of other sexual identities as well.

Sexual Orientation. Term that refers to being romantically or sexually attracted to people of a
specific gender. Our sexual orientation and our gender identity are separate, distinct parts of our
overall identity. Although a child may not yet be aware of their sexual orientation, they usually have a
strong sense of their gender identity.

Gender Normative/Cisgender. Refers to people whose sex assignment at birth corresponds to their
gender identity and expression.

Gender Fluidity. Gender fluidity conveys a wider, more flexible range of gender expression, with
interests and behaviors that may even change from day to day. Gender fluid children do not feel
confined by restrictive boundaries of stereotypical expectations of girls or boys. In other words, a child
may feel they are a girl some days and a boy on others, or possibly feel that neither term describes
them accurately.

Conclusion
Perhaps the most fundamental aspect of a person’s identity, gender deeply influences every part of
one’s life. In a society where this crucial aspect of self has been so narrowly defined and rigidly
enforced, individuals who exists outside its norms face innumerable challenges. Even those who vary
only slightly from the norm can become targets of disapproval. Yet this does not have to be the case
forever. Through a thoughtful consideration of the uniqueness and validity of every person’s
experiences of self, we can develop greater acceptance for all. Not only will this create greater
inclusion for individuals who challenge the norms of gender, it will actually create space for all
individuals to more fully explore and celebrate who they are.

 25

*Photo credit: Jonathan Kos-Read

https://www.genderspectrum.org/quick-links/understanding-gender/

 26

The Gender Identity Law in Chile

Retrieved and adapted from https://www.outrightinternational.org/sites/default/files/Chile0714ForUpload.pdf

The Human Rights Committee has held repeatedly that an individual’s gender identity
cannot be a ground for discrimination. The success of the Gender Identity Law (Bulletin No
8924-07) currently in Congress is a positive step for the government protecting against
discrimination the basis of gender identity. The law articulates the right to change the gender
and name of a person in the Public Identification Record, when it does not correspond or is
not congruent with the true gender identity of the applicant. The objective of the law is to
establish adequate regulation, in accordance with constitutional and international laws, with
regards to equality, nondiscrimination, the right to identity, and the general protection of
human dignity, rights, and fundamental liberties. Identification documents are essential to
access education, employment, healthcare benefits, and numerous other critical resources.
Refusing to conform to social norms and gender stereotypes results in transgender people
regularly encountering violence and discrimination and as a result, possessing a gender
identity document that contains a gender different from the one an individual presents with
can oscillate from uncomfortable to life-threatening. Discrimination, violence, and
vulnerability exist even more for transgender people in

The proposed law provides that “all people, without the necessity of judicial or
administrative authorization, and without having a detrimental effect in what is established in
this law the right to amend his or her birth certificate and change of gender and name when it
doesn’t correspond with his or her Gender Identity.” And the law, “especially leaves
established that to certify gender identity and to ask that the name or gender of person be
changed that the Court will not require pharmaceutical, psychological, psychiatric, nor
surgery treatments for the person.” The bill is now pending final debate in the Senate. The
Committee should strongly encourage the government to pass this legislation to ensure
transgender individuals can enjoy their rights under the Covenant.

 27

Boys, Dance, and Gender Stereotypes in the Arts by Andrew Swensen

Retrieved from https://musedialogue.org/articles-by-genre/performing-arts/giving-dance-its-due/boys-dance-and-missing-out-on-an-art-
form-of-purest-expression/

I came to dance only recently in a life now in its middle age. My encounter with it
seems strange because I have waited so long, too long, before gaining awareness of an entire
art form. All my adult years have involved participation in one art or another — music, film,
literature, theater — but for a variety of reasons, I never really gave dance proper attention.
My loss.

Billy Elliott, as performed by David Alvarez

(Photo:http://www.billyelliottour.com/us-
tour)

For reasons rooted in rather silly

gender expectations and stereotyping, boys
typically do not dance. At high school
dances, the girls are the ones who know the
moves of the day. The boys stand on the
other side of the room glued to the wall and
holding some drink, so that they do not have
to look awkward having nothing useful or
appropriate to do with their hands. Then there are the dance lessons in gym classes. I am still
trying to wrestle with the emotional anguish of square dancing, an obligatory unit during the
school year. And of course classical dance is out of the question. Yes, boys believe
themselves to be pre-programmed to resist ballet. Call it the Billy Elliott Dilemma: If you
actually want to dance, make sure that you hide it.

I am not sure how much the situation has changed since my childhood, but it still
lingers in some form or another. We have no reality shows that follow fathers taking their
sons to dance studios, and the enduring appeal of Billy Elliott suggests that we see Billy as an
anomaly and not a norm.

Now wiser than I was while not dancing at the prom, I find it all completely absurd.

These thoughts started percolating this past summer when I was reflecting on dance as
an art form and came across the campaign, “Why Dance Matters” (with an active Facebook
page here). Why does dance matter? Dance is expression. Dance is beautiful. Yet those
answers do not distinguish dance specifically from other arts, and I want to be more specific.
If it is expressive, how does it express the human experience in ways that other art forms do
not, or at least better than other art forms? If it is beautiful, how does its beauty distinguish
itself?

 28

Mad Hot Ballroom

(Photo:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mad_Hot_Ballroom.jpg)

Dance is dialogue in movement. We converse through dance,

though not in words, and it represents an exploring ground for social
interaction. Through the ages, societies observe ritual and rite
through dance; group conversations take the form of wedding dances,
funeral dances, and fertility dances. Certainly dance has had plenty of
gender “rules,” but it seems that there was always a role for
everyone. When did dance get saddled with gender taboo for boys? Or at least in our culture,
for not all cultures are this way. The Argentinians, for example, seem to be tangoing up a
storm down there. And if you have ever seen Maori men dance, you can rest assured that they
are secure in their gender identity while dancing. Yet the issue should not be the anxiety over
some notion of “masculinity,” and we should not fall prey to just force-fitting dance into
existing gender identities and roles, often homophobic ones. Rather, dance, like so many arts,
might offer us a path to the other side of gender stereotyping.

I find it odd that we have essentially muted half our population. I am not the first to
press the issue (e.g. a nice piece from Dance Advantage), and of course we have good Billy
Elliott, defying the expectations of his upbringing in the heart of British coalmining country.
Billy may have been pushing a wave to come, according to a 2009 article from The Guardian,
which notes a 83% rise in dance enrollment among boys in Britain. I could not find any
reliable statistics for the U.S., but having spent a lot of time around young dancers (yes, I am
a Dance Dad) I see precious few boys out there on the floor. One can also have a look at the
wonderful documentary film Mad Hot Ballroom, and see how resistant the boys are, at least
initially. Yet of course the film also points to an opportunity for liberation from gender
stereotypes, such that the energy among the boys and their engagement in this art form is
clearly real and substantial.

It is hard to say how art forms develop gender stereotypes, but it is unfortunate. After
all, it took until 1997 before the Vienna Philharmonic admitted its first woman member. Of
course no one is keeping boys out of dance, but some gender expectation seems to be a
barrier still. Dance is about speaking with movement and without words. A good number of
us are missing out on a conversation that matters, and we should change that.

 29

What Is Art? Favorite Famous Definitions, from Antiquity to Today

“Art is not a thing — it is a way.”

BY MARIA POPOVA

Retrieved and adapted from https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/06/22/what-is-art/

After the recent omnibus of definitions of science by some of history’s greatest minds
and definitions of philosophy by some of today’s most prominent philosophers, why not turn
to an arguably even more nebulous domain of humanity? Gathered here are some of my
favorite definitions of art, from antiquity to today.

Henry James in his short story The Middle Years:

“We work in the dark — we do what we can — we give what we have. Our doubt is our
passion and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art.”

Leo Tolstoy, in his essay “What Is Art?”:

“Art is not, as the metaphysicians say, the manifestation of some mysterious idea of beauty or
God; it is not, as the aesthetical physiologists say, a game in which man lets off his excess of
stored-up energy; it is not the expression of man’s emotions by external signs; it is not the
production of pleasing objects; and, above all, it is not pleasure; but it is a means of union
among men, joining them together in the same feelings, and indispensable for the life and
progress toward well-being of individuals and of humanity.”

Frank Lloyd Wright, writing in 1957, as cited in Frank Lloyd Wright on Architecture, Nature,
and the Human Spirit: A Collection of Quotations:

“Art is a discovery and development of elementary principles of nature into beautiful forms
suitable for human use.”

 30

Steven Pressfield in The War of Art, one of 5 essential books on fear and the creative
process:

“To labor in the arts for any reason other than love is prostitution.”

Charles Eames, cited in the fantastic 100 Quotes by Charles Eames:

“Art resides in the quality of doing; process is not magic.”

Elbert Hubbard in a 1908 volume of Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Teachers:

“Art is not a thing — it is a way.”

Oscar Wilde in The Soul of Man Under Socialism:

“Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.”

Thomas Merton in No Man Is An Island:

“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.”

Francis Ford Coppola in a recent interview:

“An essential element of any art is risk. If you don’t take a risk then how are you going to
make something really beautiful, that hasn’t been seen before? I always like to say that
cinema without risk is like having no sex and expecting to have a baby. You have to take a
risk.”

André Gide in Poétique:

“Art begins with resistance — at the point where resistance is overcome. No human
masterpiece has ever been created without great labor.”

Friedrich Nietzsche, made famous all over again by Ray Bradbury in Zen in the Art of
Writing:

“We have our Arts so we won’t die of Truth.”

Michelangelo Pistoletto in Art’s Responsibility:

“Above all, artists must not be only in art galleries or museums — they must be present in all
possible activities. The artist must be the sponsor of thought in whatever endeavor people
take on, at every level.”

Federico Fellini in a December 1965 piece in The Atlantic, not currently online:

“All art is autobiographical; the pearl is the oyster’s autobiography.”

Hugh MacLeod in Ignore Everybody: and 39 Other Keys to Creativity:

“Art suffers the moment other people start paying for it.”

 31

The Greek philosopher Aristophanes, writing in the 4th century B.C.:

“Let each man exercise the art he knows.”

And, lastly, my own take in a recent piece I wrote for the National Endowment for the Arts:

“This is the power of art: The power to transcend our own self-interest, our solipsistic zoom-
lens on life, and relate to the world and each other with more integrity, more curiosity, more
wholeheartedness.”

 32

What do we mean by Art? By Marilina Maraviglia

Retrieved and adapted from https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/07/what-do-we-really-mean-by-art/

Mark Rothko, an American artist who described himself as an “abstract painter”, once said
that he was not the kind of person interested in the relationship of form, color or similars. He
didn’t define himself as an abstractionist, but rather as a person interested only in expressing
basic human emotions such as doom, tragedy, ecstasy and so on. This was one person’s
vision of art, but what do we mean by art today? Why is defining the concept so difficult?

This article is an exploration of the meaning of art and an attempt to understand the
relationship between art and artists, with some useful insights via interviews with both
traditional and digital artists.

1. What Is Art? Link

This question pops up often, and with many answers. Many argue that art cannot be defined.
We could go about this in several ways. Art is often considered the process or product of
deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It
encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations and ways of expression, including
music, literature, film, sculpture and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a branch of
philosophy known as aesthetics. At least, that’s what Wikipedia claims.

Art is generally understood as any activity or product done by people with a communicative
or aesthetic purpose—something that expresses an idea, an emotion or, more generally, a
world view.

It is a component of culture, reflecting economic and social substrates in its design. It

transmits ideas and values inherent in every culture across space and time. Its role changes
through time, acquiring more of an aesthetic component here and a socio-educational
function there.

Scott Marr

Everything we’ve said so far has elements of truth but is mainly opinion. According to
Wikipedia, “Art historians and philosophers of art have long had classificatory disputes about
art regarding whether a particular cultural form or piece of work should be classified as art.”

The definition of art is open, subjective, debatable. There is no agreement among historians
and artists, which is why we’re left with so many definitions of art. The concept itself has
changed over centuries.

The very notion of art continues today to stir controversy, being so open to multiple
interpretations. It can be taken simply to mean any human activity, or any set of rules needed
to develop an activity. This would generalize the concept beyond what is normally
understood as the fine arts, now broadened to encompass academic areas. The word has many
other colloquial uses, too.

 33

In this article, we mean art as a form of human expression of a creative nature.

2. The Evolution Of The Concept Of Art Link

While the definition of art has changed over the years, the field of art history has developed
to allow us to categorize changes in art over time and to better understand how art shapes and
is shaped by the creative impulses of artists.

Having a solid grasp of art history, then, is important. I spoke with Alexander Daniloff and
Jonathan Ball about the concept of art through history and about whether tracing a line
through traditional and contemporary art is possible.

Alexander Daniloff is a Russian artist who lives and works in Italy. His focus is painting,
although he has worked in several media. Lately, he has worked on children’s illustrations.
He has participated in various events and illustration competitions and has illustrated three
books. He has held numerous individual and group exhibitions in Italy, Russia, Holland,
Spain, Finland and the US.

Jonathan Ball is the creative behind Poked Studio, an innovative company committed to
developing creative visual solutions. That’s not all: among its services, Poked Studio offers
illustration; Web, graphic and blog design; 3-D rendering and visualization; motion graphics;
children’s book illustration; Flash websites; and games.

Question: Can we trace a line from traditional to contemporary art?

Alexander Daniloff: I don’t think we can say anything without falling into controversy, even
me. I have a traditional view and prefer artwork that speaks for the artist or period. I can’t
explain what contemporary art is, or at least what it’s meant to be. Yes, you can trace a line
from traditional to contemporary art, but not a straight one. Perhaps it is a parabola that goes
up and then down, or a spiral. We don’t know. All we can say is that the art market has
developed, which affects the art itself. With what we call contemporary art, words and
explanations are always worth more.

Visual arts have been transformed by articles and critical essays; meanwhile, the works
themselves have become mute. In the theater, the curators and critics have taken up the front
row. This is my view on the difference between contemporary and traditional art.

I personally prefer art measured in human dimensions: art that whispers and doesn’t shout, art
that covers me and makes me fly and does not crush. But I must confess, some of these
modern things attract me; for example, mural painting (graffiti) and abstract things.

Trips to real and mythological ages and changes in theatrical costumes and decor are a part of
Alexander Daniloff‘s style. The style gives his paintings a special grace, showing both the
festive and dramatic sides of life on stage. The style is also infused with a sweet irony that
shakes up the painting. Precision, flexibility in design and subtle color harmony free up the

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artist’s movement between different artistic conventions, playing with light and shadow, line
and color.

Jonathan Ball: Yes, most definitely [we can draw a line from traditional to contemporary art].
Many of the same techniques are used, just in slightly different ways and with different tools.
The same principles apply, however you create art.

I see a line particularly running through the stylized form of Japanese art such as Hokusai and
contemporary stylized graphic illustration.

Question: Compared to the evolution of traditional art, how would you describe the
development of digital (or new media) art?

Jonathan Ball: Digital art has obviously developed much more quickly than the thousands of
years of hand-crafted techniques. A whole generation has been brought up on “Photoshop”
and other tools, whereas earlier generations used pen and pencil.

Still, I believe that digital art is still in its infancy. Despite what seems an enormous amount
of progress in computer hardware, general computing and even the computing available to
most design studios is just not fast enough to easily reproduce art on the scale and level of
detail possible with traditional media. Go to any national gallery, and you will see works on
an enormous scale. Try reproducing a 10-foot canvas with the resolution of a hand-painted
work of art in a 3-D program, and you’ll find it can’t cope. In fact, most programs will
struggle to render a detailed picture at, say, 300 DPI at just A4 size.

While a painting may appear to be just splotches and blobs, when you go up to it close, the
patterns are beautiful by themselves, full of color, intensity, saturation and texture. Go close
to digital art or a TV screen and you’ll see a mess of distortion and artifacts.

Once screen resolution is on par with printed media, and once computer technology allows us
to easily create large, highly detailed work at speed, then digital will have caught up to
traditional media.

Most digital art of the early-21st century is designed to be viewed on low-resolution devices.
Much of this art will be obsolete when higher-resolution screens and devices are developed
over the next century. And much that has been stored only on hard drives will be lost forever
as drives fail and websites close or are redeveloped.

I find it a shame that so much great work is reproduced at such a limited resolution and scale
and not stored in a way that keeps it safe for future generations.

Jonathan Ball

Question: Tell us about your favourite art movement.

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Jonathan Ball: Difficult, because I like so many styles. But I find that if I’m in an art gallery,
I love contemporary painting because it holds so many surprises and is less predicable than
previous eras.

I love quirky contemporary illustration, particularly low-brow art forms and gothic-
mythology mixtures.

3. Aesthetics In Digital Art Link

Moving into the mid-20th century, the conceptual transformations that arose from new
approaches to art led to a crisis of aesthetics, as was manifested in new art media.

Alberto Cerriteño

While borrowing many of the conventions of traditional media, digital art can draw upon
aesthetics from many other fields. But various criticisms have been made against it: for
example, given the variety of tools at their disposal, how much effort do digital artists really
have to put into their work?

I asked Jan Willem Wennekes, also known as Zeptonn, for his opinion on this. He is a
freelancer who specializes in illustrative design and art direction, with a focus on eco-friendly
and environmental projects.

Jan Willem Wennekes: The question seems a bit ambiguous. On the one hand, there seems to
be a question about the effort required to create digital art. That is, some people may think
that using digital media to create art is easier than using traditional media. On the other hand,
there seems to be a question of whether digital art is an art form in itself (or maybe at all?).

With respect to the first question, I think that working with digital media (mostly the
computer, mouse, Wacom, scanner, software, etc.) does not have to differ from creating art in
other media. The computer and all the tools generated by the software are still what they are:
tools! You have to master those tools just as you have to master any other tools. For example,
if you do not understand how light works, you won’t be able to create artwork with correct
lighting, and so on. If you don’t know how the pen tool works in Illustrator, then you won’t
be able to create good artwork, just like a traditional artist who doesn’t know how to use a
pencil. You still have to master color theory and all the other things that are essential to
creating a good or stunning piece of art. In that sense, it doesn’t matter whether it is a
painting or a print. Simply put, you have to master all the tools and theory, just as you had to
master them before. And the better you master them, the better your artwork can be.

Jan Willem Wennekes

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Jan Willem Wennekes: Now, one can wonder whether digital art is a distinct art form. This is
a difficult question and not easy to answer. I think the difference here is that “digital art” is
more of a group term than just one art form. There are many types of digital art: some look a
lot like paintings, some look like photographs, some look like drawings, while others appear
quite new and unique (e.g. computer generated artwork). So in a sense, digital art consists of
both overlapping and new kinds of art. Photography was once viewed as a competitor to
portrait painting, but in the end it became its own art form, with many directions and fields of
interest. In effect, painting benefitted from the rise of photography, and each added to the
other and renewed interest in art in general. Nowadays, we don’t view photography as a
competitor to painting; we see them as different media, with different benefits and
drawbacks. I think the same holds for newer digital art forms.

Zeptonn’s work can be described as positive, eco-friendly, simple, wacky, colorful,

fantastical and illustrative. It is distinguished by its hand-drawn elements, sweet patterns and
curvy line work. And you might find a creature popping up here and there. For more, visit his
website or follow him on Twitter.

4. Art As We Know It Today Link

The 20th century was a turning point in our conception of art, which is mainly why
contemporary artists frequently reach for new concepts, break with tradition and reject classic
notions of beauty. All these factors have given birth to abstract art. The artist no longer tries
to reflect reality, but rather tries to give expression to their inner world and feelings.

The old definitions of art have become obsolete. Today, art is an evolving and global concept,
open to new interpretation, too fluid to be pinned down.

Dan May

I interviewed Nate Williams and Travis Lampe to explore new elements of contemporary art
and to answer the question, what new elements and principles are evident in today’s art.

Nate Williams, also known as Alexander Blue, is an artist, illustrator and designer from the
US. He has extensive experience in various facets of the illustration industry, and he has a
wide variety of clients. His illustrations are aimed at both adults and children. He has also
worked in the advertising world and in publishing, music, fashion, textiles, home decor,
merchandising, posters, press and social expression.

Travis Lampe is an illustrator who currently lives and works in Chicago. He worked as an art
director in advertising. After a two-year stint in Warsaw, he returned to Chicago and tried his
hand in the art and illustration scene. He enjoys making art and toys, and he has shown in fine
galleries throughout the US and in Europe.

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Question: How much influence does new media have on your work? What is your
relationship to digital art? Do you consider yourself a traditional artist?

Jonathan Ball: It has a lot of influence. I think because of my knowledge of programming, it

influences my work. I think in terms of modular parts and variables.

Nate Williams: “My definition of art is play, be curious, discover, express.”

Travis Lampe: I’m a traditional artist—I work in acrylic—but I wouldn’t be able to operate
without computers. When I design toys, for example, I use computers to scan and create
vector art from my original paintings. I don’t create digital art in and of itself, though. Purely
digital work can be beautiful, but for me there is value in having a tangible and unique
product, as opposed to a set of data.

No doubt, though, I’ve been influenced in my traditional art by being exposed to ideas that
I’ve discovered on the Internet. It’s a great place to find old-timey cartoons, for example.

Question: Travis, if the purpose of art was once to create beauty and to imitate nature, today
the concept has evolved dynamically and is constantly changing. In your opinion, how has
the Internet and new ways of communicating influenced the development of visual arts, its
conceptual premises and its physical execution?

Travis Lampe: The Internet most influences the development of art simply by exposing more
people to more art. Unfortunately, a lot of it is really, really crappy, as you would expect.
Anyone with a ballpoint pen and digital camera can post their art for the world to see. And
that’s okay. I think the cream just naturally rises to the top. Ideas are still what’s important,
far more so than technical skill, and the Internet hasn’t changed that at all. I’ve seen a lot of
ballpoint pen art that I really like.

As far as physical execution goes, it’s evolved the way it always has: as soon as a new
medium arrives, there’s a scramble to use it in new and creative ways. I don’t know that the
Internet has affected the physical execution of art so much as computers themselves have. It’s
just made it easier to disseminate.

Travis Lampe

More communication is great for PR and in that way is a great help to artists. And more
communication should equal more ideas bouncing around, which ideally should result in
better conceptual thinking. But most of the “communication” is fluff. And I think there’s a
threshold beyond which the constant connectedness ceases to be helpful. Artists need some
disconnected time for the creative ideas to coalesce. Successful artists are the ones who are
disciplined and able to balance all of this, I guess.

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Question: Would you say that art and the new, social Web have a connection? Are social
media a viable way to improve artistic communities?

Jonathan Ball: Of course. Art has a connection to anything in our environment that influences
its creators. As far as social media goes, I think being able to communicate better is always
an improvement.

Travis Lampe: Social media is great for sharing results; it’s allowed me to connect with and
see the work of other artists who I admire on a constant basis. And it makes working long
hours in a basement a bit less of a lonely enterprise when you can show the world what
you’ve done the moment you’ve finished. On the other hand, social media are a constant
distraction. When I want to get work done, I disconnect. So I love it and hate it equally.

5. New Media Revolution And Its Relationship To Artists Link

Visual arts comprise many forms of art—painting, drawing, sculpture, music, literature and
performance art being the most widely recognized. However, with the technological
revolution, others forms have emerged.

Leandro Lima

So, what exactly is the relationship between these new forms of expression and contemporary
artists? Max Kostenko and Pino Lamanna kindly answered my questions, giving us insight
into the topic.

Max Kostenko is a Russian illustrator. He specializes in 3-D digital illustration and character
design. He works as a freelancer for many Russian studios and agencies worldwide, such as
Kotetkat and Lemonade.

Pino Lamanna, also known as SchakalWal, is an illustrator and graphic designer from
Germany who specializes in corporate design, character design and typography.

Question: Please introduce yourself and your work. How did you get started in the field?

Max Kostenko: My name is Max Kostenko. I’m 23 years old, and I am an artist and
illustrator from Moscow. I have been doing illustrations for about one year. Before, I worked
for three years as a Web designer in various Moscow Web studios.

Pino Lamanna: Hi. My name is Pino Lamanna. I am a 27-year-old half-Italian, half-German

digital artist living and working in the city of Wuppertal, in Germany.

I currently work as a freelance designer, specializing in unique branding, handmade

typography and character design. Most of my work is highly influenced by graffiti and street
art, old-school cartoons and the music I listen to. My aim is to create stylish, unique and
useful designs with an urban twist.

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I took my first steps as a designer as a little kid, drawing comic strips with my own
superheroes. Later, in my teenage years, I became interested in the graffiti and street art
movement.

The first thing that attracted me to digital art was photo manipulation. Through that, I was
introduced to Adobe Photoshop and several digital art communities. Later, I switched my
focus to illustration, branding and typography, which I think suits me best.

Question: Tell us a bit about your artwork. What software do you use? How hard was it for
you to learn?

Max Kostenko: In my work, I use only Photoshop. I started studying it when I wanted to start
working as a Web designer. But as years passed, I understood what I really wanted to work
on, because I found the job of designer boring, and so I started drawing some silly little men;
that is, I tried to understand many of the principles by drawing them. In Photoshop, I do not
use many tools to make my work look artistic—I just choose my normal round brush and
start drawing.

Max Kostenko

Pino Lamanna: Even though for the kind of work I specialize in, working in Illustrator or
other vector tools would be common, I create most of my work in Photoshop. That might
sound strange, but I can’t help it. There isn’t much of a difference at all, because Photoshop
has vector editing capabilities, too.

Once I am happy with my design, I copy and paste to Illustrator to create the final output.

I cannot say that mastering Photoshop was difficult, because working in it has always been
fun. The very first steps were kind of hard, though. I remember being overwhelmed by the
gazillion options. It was learning by doing. I did a lot of tutorials, which I found online, to
become comfortable with different techniques and methods.

Learning Illustrator wasn’t hard, either, because I was already used to the Adobe interface
and I knew a lot of stuff about vector editing from Photoshop. And of course, there are
tutorials for Illustrator everywhere.

Question: What is the main inspiration for your pieces? And how has the digital art
community influenced your work?

Max Kostenko: My inspiration comes in different ways: sometimes after watching a film,
sometimes from something I see in the street or on public transport. I always look for the
work of known artists: it stimulates me to grow and improve my skills. I became acquainted
with digital art through the Society of Digital Artists, and the first thought that came to mind
was, “I could never draw like that.” But then I gradually drew things like leaves. Still, I’ve
only began to walk the path of the artist and still have much to learn.

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Pino Lamanna: Inspiration can come from anything, whether a cloud in the sky, an old movie
or a box of sushi. My style has always been influenced by urban culture, music, movies,
cartoons, etc. As a matter of fact, the digital art community has influenced my work a lot.
Thanks to the Internet, I’ve gotten to know many interesting people and designers from all
over the world, and in the end those communities have helped define me as an artist.

Question: How would you describe your creative process? What are some of its most
important aspects?

Max Kostenko: The most important thing is a basic idea, I guess—a plan. If you have one,
you can start drawing. Sometimes I get in my head a general sense of the result, and so I
begin with the big shapes, placing them in a composition. When I’ve got the result, I start to
color it, the most difficult thing for me. At the end, I complete the final details.

Pino Lamanna: I always have pen and paper by my side, even in my bedroom. You never
know when ideas will pop in your mind, and you better save before you forget.

Brainstorming and sketching are crucial for me. If ideas pop up while working on my
computer, I’ll usually put aside all the stuff I am doing and try to directly realize that idea in a
design.

Pino Lamanna

When working for clients, research is very important. Without a detailed brief, finding a
design to match the client’s needs and expectations can be tricky. Therefore, I always ask
clients to fill out my design questionnaire.

Another important aspect of my creative process is patience. Often, I find a good flow and
can’t stop working on a particular design until I am happy (and exhausted). However, before
publishing, I always force myself to wait till the next day. I’ll often find things that need to be
changed, tweaked or tuned up, when I am looking at my work with a little distance.

Question: Have you ever gotten into traditional art? If so, tell us something about that
experience.

Max Kostenko: The thing is, I wasn’t trained in an art school. But since childhood, I have
liked drawing and thinking of stories. I’ve always drawn with a simple pencil. After school, I
tried to enter the Automotive Design College but was rejected… even having passed the
drawing exams marvellously well.

Pino Lamanna: As mentioned, I was into comic drawing as a kid, and I trained hard to create
the world’s most powerful superheroes and villains. I can remember only a single character
from these days: Super-Frog. (I know that’s lame, so don’t be mean!)

Later, I got some experience with graffiti and street art. Never made it to the All City Kings,
though.

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So, I don’t have much experience with traditional art, because my main focus for the last
couple of years has been on digital.

Question: How would you define your relationship to traditional art? Who is your favourite
artist?

Max Kostenko: I often visit the Tretyakov Gallery, and I can’t believe people could draw like
that on a canvas centuries ago. I am surprised every time by the talent of classical artists.

I like Russian landscape artists. Vasily Polenov and Ivan Shishkin are top in skills for me.

6. Communication And Self-Promotion In The New Web Link

The artist’s life is not as simple as it may seem. Standing out from the crowd is not easy,
which is why self-promotion is essential.

I queried Bob Flynn, Alex Dukal, Jayme McGowan, Chris Piascik and Irma Gruenholz for
their thoughts on the art of self-promotion; on how to spread ideas, concepts and a deeper
vision of their work; and on the impact of this kind of marketing.

Bob Flynn is a cartoonist who is interested in illustration, comics and animation. He currently
resides in Boston, where he works as an animator and game designer for the children’s media
company Fablevision. His work has appeared in publications such as Nickelodeon Magazine
and Improper Bostonian.

Alex Dukal is an illustrator who was born and raised in Patagonia, Argentina. From a very
young age, Alex has published comics and illustrations in the legendary Fierro magazine.

Back in his home town, he dedicated some years to painting and teaching illustration and
comics. After working for some time mostly in Web design, Alex decided to get back into
illustration. At the moment, he’s working mostly on children’s books and creating
illustrations for design agencies.

Jayme McGowan is a freelance artist and 3-D illustrator based in Sacramento, California. She
works with cut paper and posts her artwork in her project journal.

Question: Do you have a portfolio website? And which social networks are you currently on?

Bob Flynn: I have a website, but I’m very lazy about updating it. And I find I get less traffic
there compared to, say, my blog, which is infinitely easier to add to. A portfolio website is
more of a structured presentation, which is great for art directors and people looking to make
a professional assessment of your work. It’s often static, and it offers little to no opportunity
for two-way communication. You get little to no interaction with the art community except
for a friendly email or two a month. A blog is dynamic and opens that dialogue. I now think
of my website as a hub to help direct people where they need to go.

In addition to having a blog (my primary point of communication), I’m currently on Twitter,
Facebook, Flickr and, most recently, Google Buzz. Is being on all of them worth it? Probably.

 42

I’ve found that you really can’t be in too many places—though there is certainly a sanity
threshold. A different audience traffics each social space (with some overlap), so the way to
reach the most people is to be everywhere.

Twitter is currently the best place to track people in the industry and to communicate with
your peers—but not everyone is there. Facebook is where most everyone else is, although
juggling friends, family and business is admittedly cumbersome. You have to weed through
the clutter (I’m less a fan of its increasingly unwieldy interface), but you can certainly get
traction over there. Flickr is the most straightforward: upload artwork, leave and receive
comments. Buzz is new to the game and still hasn’t developed an identity of its own. But it’s
another place you should probably be.

I can track most job leads and connections back to a tweet here or a comment there. Not to
mention great friendships. Simply by spending time in these spaces, saying “Hi” and
participating in a positive way, you really can’t go wrong.

Driven by an obsession with off-beat cartoons that are grounded in optimism and tinged with
the grotesque, Bob Flynn keeps busy spinning nonsensical creatures into comics, illustrations
and animation.

Alex Dukal: Yes, I have had a portfolio online since 1998, and I currently use Facebook a lot,
Twitter not so much. I really like Flickr. I used Orkut when it first came out. I tried Google
Buzz and did not like it. Every now and then I take a look at Google Wave to see if it’ll ever
turn into something interesting. I have a Netvibes account that I hardly use. I have an account
on Dribble. As you can see, I like to test new tools.

Jayme McGowan: Yes, I have a website for my portfolio, and pages on Facebook, Flickr and
Etsy, and I recently caved and am now on Twitter as well.

Question: Do you write articles for your own blog or for other blogs and publications? Would
you consider either an effective way to get your name out there?

Bob Flynn: I regularly post artwork to my blog, and I have written a few Flash drawing
tutorials. Simply having an online presence is a good start, but think of the impact you could
have by sharing information, ideas and helpful tips. People enjoy reading about process, so
document your methodology as you work, and it will make for more interesting posts.

I wouldn’t be in this just to get my name out, though. If you’re all for show and self-
promotion, you risk turning people away. Participation is key: I enjoy reading about what
everyone else has to say. There’s more value in that, really.

Alex Dukal: I started writing little news on my website using Grey Matter, an old tool for
blogging. Then I switched to Textpattern, and finally I separated my portfolio and blog (now
in Blogger) as a matter of convenience. In the blog from time to time, I’ll write an article or
tutorial. Judging from the feedback I get, I’d consider it an effective method of promotion.

 43

Jayme McGowan: I have a blog where I post images of my work in progress and updates on
current projects I’m involved in. I use it to give readers some insight into my process. I think
it definitely gets people more involved in my work. Most of the visitors to my main portfolio
website were directed there either from my own blog or from someone who did a post about
my work on their blog. I think if you keep your blog up to date and post regularly, it will be
an invaluable tool for getting your name out there.

Question: What are the challenges of creating a self-promotion strategy? Have you
implemented a self-promotion strategy for yourself? Has it worked? If one is starting from
scratch, how long does it take for a strategy to start working in their favor?

Bob Flynn: To be honest, I can’t say I’ve ever architected a real strategy. You’re talking to a
guy who’s never even sent out a promo card. My approach has been to put myself out there
and see what happens. Sort of the like old adage, “Just be yourself”—that’s how you stand
out from the rest of the pack. I try to update my blog at least once a week to keep people
coming back. Keeping up with your website’s stats is a good way to see what’s sticking (i.e.
where your traffic’s coming from and what your most popular posts are).

Alex Dukal: Yes, of course, as a freelance artist, self-promotion is absolutely necessary. I

think the first challenge is having something to say, something to show, a reliable portfolio to
back up that promotion.

Personally, I placed my bet on a portfolio that shows my best work, something that
showcases the illustrations rather than the website interface and that makes it accesible and
simple. And then there’s the blog, which allows me to maintain other kinds of contact with
people: social networks, forums, contacts database, etc. It’s a big garden; one must water and
take care of it every day.

I think a strategy of this kind should be thought of in different phases. And you can’t expect a
miracle before six months (though miracles do happen).

Alex Dukal

Jayme McGowan: My self-promotion strategy is fairly simple and involves social networks,
as I mentioned earlier. When I got started creating a presence online, I came up with a plan
by looking at the networks that successful artists who I admired were involved in, and I tried
to do something similar. I was fortunate enough to generate interest in my work early on just
by posting photos on Flickr and becoming an active member of the Etsy community. Many
people who commission work from me say they found me on one of those two websites.

Now I use Facebook and Twitter (and my blog, of course) to keep people posted on what I’m
up to. But to succeed in promoting yourself on any of these networks, you have to be truly
interested in making friends and business contacts. You can’t just scream, “Hey, look at me!”
all the time without giving anything back. I guess I have a subtler approach to self-promotion:

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let people know what you’re up to from time to time, and trust that they’ll follow you if they
like what they see.

Question: Do you regularly submit your work to online galleries? Is that useful for gaining
credibility and getting feedback on your work?

Bob Flynn: I created an account on a great website run by Nate Williams called Illustration
Mundo a few years back, but I’ve never put my work in an online gallery (or paid for
anything of the sort). I guess I view my blog as having that purpose. Flickr is a kind of
gallery, though.

Alex Dukal: Not at all to both questions. Ten years ago, if someone invited you to show some
of your work in an online gallery, it was cute, flattering. Today, I think we have to be careful,
because the selection criteria is often not that great, and one must pay attention to those
details as well. If you display your work in the wrong place, it could have a negative result. In
principle, credibility should come from the work itself.

Jayme McGowan: I have a profile on Illustration Mundo, which is a great website that
functions mainly as a directory of illustrators, not a gallery per se. Honestly, I don’t
participate in any online galleries. I’m sure that’s a great way to get feedback from your
peers, but I don’t know that it will give you added credibility as a professional. I can maintain
only so many Web pages myself, so I try to limit them to the ones I get the most benefit from,
those where I believe art directors and buyers might find me.

Jayme McGowan

Chris Piascik is a freelance designer and illustrator who is active in the design community.
With six years of professional experience at award-winning firms in New England, he has
had work published in numerous books and publications, including the Logo Lounge series,
Typography Essentials and Lettering: Beyond Computer Graphics. He currently posts
drawings on his website daily.

Irma Gruenholz is a Spanish illustrator who specializes in clay and other materials, allowing
her to work in volume. Her work is used in books, magazines, advertisements and online
marketing.

Question: Are you an active participant in every social community you have joined? How
much time do you set aside to interact in social media? Do you commit to posting new work
and personal updates regularly?

Chris Piascik: I stay active in quite a few social communities. I admit that I have joined some
that I couldn’t keep up with though! I don’t really schedule time for social networking,
although that’s probably a good idea. Instead, I scatter it throughout the day, whether it’s
browsing Twitter on my iPhone while exporting a big file on my computer or procrastinating
the start of a new project. It’s all about multi-tasking! I think the biggest thing that has helped

 45

me with social networking is my daily drawings. I post a new drawing Monday to Friday on
Flickr, and from there I post it to my personal website, and those updates flow to my Twitter
and Facebook accounts.

Chris Piascik

Irma Gruenholz: Yes, I have a blog, and I participate in some social communities, such as
Flickr and Behance. Unfortunately, I don’t have much time for a very active presence. I
would like to devote more time because it is a good way to keep up with and see the work of
other artists.

Question: At the moment, which community is the most valuable for finding job
opportunities?

Chris Piascik: I think most of the networks out there have value. I do think Flickr works
really well, though. My Flickr page seems to get the most traffic out of all my websites.
Flickr is so vast that a lot of people use it for image research. I think my daily updates help
my work not get lost.

Irma Gruenholz: Based on personal experience, Behance is a good platform for showing your
work to art directors and art buyers. I’ve gotten some work through it.

Question: How important is crafting the messages you send out and keeping your website
looking professional?

Chris Piascik: I don’t censor myself that often. I think keeping things honest is a good thing.
My work has some personality; much of it has a loose quality—pairing that with a cold or
professional Web presence would seem odd. Expanding your social networks requires you to
be yourself… just as long as “yourself” is interesting!

Irma Gruenholz: Internet presence is very important for the artist. It is the best way to exhibit
your work to the rest of the world. So, keep your website updated, and make it easy to
communicate with people who want to follow your work.

Irma Gruenholz

Question: How do you make time for social networks? Are you committed only to websites
from which you can get some professional benefit?

Chris Piascik: I have completely given up sleep. I really just sprinkle it throughout my day.
It’s a nice way to start my day while drinking my coffee or eating some lunch. I wouldn’t say
that I limit myself only to websites that I benefit from, though my opinion is that all networks
help. Visibility is visibility. I use social networking to stay in touch with friends as well, so
it’s not strictly business for me.

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Irma Gruenholz: I have little time to devote to social networks, so I prefer to focus on
communities related to my profession.

FEATURED ARTISTS LINK

To grasp the meaning of art and how it has evolved over time, I interviewed Alexander
Daniloff and Jonathan Ball. To explore the aesthetics of digital art, I spoke with Jan Willem
Wennekes, who touched on some important points related to the differences between digital
artists and other artists and the nature of digital art itself.

I also feature Nate Williams and Travis Lampe, in an effort to learn more about their work
and their relationship to technology, including digital art tools and social media, and to
explore the way the Internet influences the development of art.

To better understand the relationship between contemporary artists and new methods and
tools for creating art, I’ve interviewed Max Kostenko and Pino Lamanna. I focused on their
creative process and professional experience, from their entry into the field right up to their
current sources of inspiration.

Finally, I interviewed Bob Flynn, Alex Dukal, Jayme McGowan, Chris Piascik and Irma
Gruenholz, asking their opinion of the challenges that artists face when promoting
themselves and their work in the new Web, trying to capture their experience with social
media and online art communities.

Each of these artists has a particular style and is an active member of the artistic community.
As such, they could be a source of inspiration to many. I hope their insights are helpful.

What about you? What does art mean to you?

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Why “World Music” isn’t

Retrieved and adapted from http://prospect.org/article/why-world-music-isnt

Balinese gamelan sounds like magic: part rain on the roof, hammering down in
relentless cascades as it does on this small, tropical Indonesian island; part sunlit shimmer, as
the quavering melodies float from the synchronized mallets of as many as 50 or 100
musicians in the gamelan orchestra. Balinese gamelan sounds impossible--fragile and
invigorating--and for those of us who hear it for the first time as adults, it is wildly
intoxicating. In its currently most common form, the boisterous kebyar, it is produced largely
on metallophones--metal gongs and xylophone-like instruments--often led by a breathy
wooden flute. It is the music of one island's cultural and religious ceremonies, distinct even
from its Javanese counterpart, being nearly always louder and faster than the stately court
compositions of the neighboring isle. Balinese gamelan is an art firmly tied to its place of
origin, but in the West these days it will most often be found listed under "world music," a
category that's billed as cutting across geographic boundaries and demonstrating a new cross-
fertilization among the world's cultures.

Like "jazz" or "blues," "world music" is a marketing rubric used by radio

programmers and record store buyers, which has caught on with the general public. But while
those older terms may be inexact--who is to say where blues leaves off and jazz or rock picks
up?--at least the material in each genre shares common traits, a 12-bar structure or
improvised solos, that give the category some meaning. World music is instead an odds-and-
ends bin of ethnomusicologists' finds and pop stars' patchwork projects. The grouping
expresses less about the music than about the marketing strategy--a strategy that as it
succeeds commercially is undermining the artistic invention it claims to promote, eclipsing
the truly original global collaborations that are out there.

Much of the "world music" of the guide books and record stores would better be
termed "other people's music." In this file, listeners can find such disparate sounds as
Balinese gamelan, Jamaica's choppy reggae rhythms, and the eerie simultaneous tones of a
single Tuvan throat singer. These aren't music styles that draw inspiration from around the
globe; many, in fact, grow out of ancient traditions and are connected to their homelands in
ways that most American and European pop isn't. This is a point world music promoters miss
entirely. "As cultural and political walls crumble," the liner notes to a Warner Bros./Reprise
World Music Sampler pontificate, "the universal impact of global grooves cannot be denied."
But in truth, such easy notions of globalism and universality do more to obscure than to
illuminate the meaning that these traditional musics have to their musicians and their
audiences.

Just as the labels "race," "rhythm and blues," and, more recently, "urban" have been
used by white marketers to lump together black popular music ranging from gospel-bred soul
to gangsta rap, so "world" is now used to describe everything non-Western to an American
audience. It's a tag designed to attract buyers who are eager for new sounds--and are
presumed to be uninterested in actually understanding them. Were we being honest, we
would call this music "exotica."

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An even greater part of what is being passed off as the new global fusion is simply
mix-and-match. A Western musician "discovers" a non-Western talent and plugs this artist's
work into a very conventional Western pop format. The unfamiliar sound adds spice, and the
New Age overlay of political correctness adds marketing steam. It's as if we were somehow
supporting Australian aboriginal rights by listening to Western rock that happens to have a
didgeridoo echoing the usual bass line. This is music marketed as much to Western
consciences as to Western ears--and it is equally unchallenging to both.

We probably have Paul Simon's Graceland to thank for it. With this 1986 album
Simon hit the timing jackpot. On Graceland, he enlivened the waning appeal of his pleasant,
inconsequential pop with the vocal charm of the a cappella Ladysmith Black Mambazo, a
group of black South African musicians, just as international opposition to apartheid was
coming to a head. In truth, the music has a freshness that lasts under repeated listenings:
Simon's signature gentle melodies mesh well with the rolling harmonies of Ladysmith and the
bouncy rhythms of mbaqanga, or "township jive." But the overall effect is soothing rather
than revolutionary. The song structures are unchanged from the basic radio-friendly verse-
chorus-verse of Western pop, the harmonies mostly predictable, the rhythms only slightly
altered from the familiar. This was no fusing of essential elements from different cultures, no
discovering of similarities between another music's meaning in its own context and the
meaning of your own.

No, the spirit propelling Graceland onto the charts and more recently onto dozens of
"best of the century" lists was more political than aesthetic, and while the cause was
undeniably worthy, that did not make the art any more exciting.

Simon's success brought us a host of second-rate followers--Dr. Didg, Dave

Matthews, and their ilk--who add an accordion, bodhran, or didgeridoo to their music and sell
the results as morally compelling. Unlike Simon, who did open the market for Ladysmith and
other groups similarly palatable to audiences raised on Western pop, his dullest (and,
unfortunately, most popular) imitators offer only a new kind of parochialism.

Their music is offensive on its own terms, and also because it has eclipsed the honest
collaborative work that is going on in the world--and, in fact, was being done by artists who
reached beyond their borders long before the world music category existed. Dizzy Gillespie
heard the rhythms of Africa distilled through the work of Cuban musicians and helped work
that syncopation back into American jazz in the 1940s. Brazil's Antonio Carlos Jobim
returned the favor in the 1950s, when he slid the cool tones of West Coast American jazz into
the rhythms of his native samba, and came up with the bossa nova.

Ten years later, when Jamaican bands, such as the Skatalites, discovered American
rhythm and blues, they incorporated the souped-up tempos and some of the instrumentation--
notably the horns--into their own version of an Afro-Caribbean sound and created ska. When
English punk bands heard the music Caribbean immigrants were making in their clubs in the
1970s, they brought those clipped beats back into rock, enlivening punk's original no-frills
sound with a rhythmic variety still heard on rock radio today.

 49

These artists came up with musics utterly distinctive and personal. Jobim wasn't just
duplicating a sound. What entranced him was the emotional essence of what the American
musicians were doing--a freedom-seizing attitude that spoke to his own condition--and that's
what he incorpo-rated into his music.

Today, too, there are serious artists for whom the global influence is subtle and
organic. We do live in a shrinking world, and not just because CDs of Bulgarian choirs or
Arab ululations can be purchased online; today's best global fusions arise out of a more
personal and intense engagement with what was once the music of elsewhere. But with the
flood of so-called "world music," these musicians are in danger of being overlooked. Take
Zap Mama, a Brussels-based vocal group that draws on the Bantu as well as the European
heritage of its leader Marie Daulne. Before Daulne was born, her family fled its native Zaire
after her Belgian father was killed in a political upheaval. She has made an unpredictable
peace between the gently percolating polyrhythms and cascading harmonies of her mother's
continent and the jazzy funk and playful soul of her father's world.

Even in Bali, art is reaching beyond its borders and with results far more intriguing
than simplistic add-a-sound ideas about world music would have suggested. Ketut Yuliarsi is
a Balinese gamelan composer who now writes, in the Western tradition, out of purely
personal inspiration and not in the age-old manner of composing for religious purposes. He
presents his works at the annual arts festival in Bali's capital, Denpasar, and his group
Bodiswara has played in Tokyo, Singapore, and Australia. But when he tries to have his
pellucid compositions performed around his home island, he is invariably asked, What ritual
is it for? What festival does that tune accompany? When he cannot name a purpose, more
often than not his work is refused.

The resistance he is facing is a good indicator of the musical challenge that daring
collaborations provoke. It recalls the confusion that reportedly greeted the bossa nova in the
1950s. The rhythm is wrong, it's not samba, Brazilian critics said. You're right, it's not samba,
Jobim answered them with the tune "Desifinado," which translates as "out of tune." But the
rhythm isn't wrong; it's just what it ought to be. The song was an international hit. Its lyrics:

If you insist upon classifying

My behavior as antimusical,
I, even lying, must argue
That this is bossa nova.
This is very natural.

Such art without boundaries is truly world music, whether or not the marketers get behind it.

The instruments pictured are the didgeridoo (opposite page), accordion, and bodhran.

 50

What's the difference between drama and theatre?

Retrieved and adapted from http://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2008/jan/09/whatsthedifferencebetweend

Like many playwrights, Edward Bond seems to think that one is superior to the other

Alison Croggon
Wednesday 9 January 2008 11.30 GMT
Last modified on Wednesday 30 December 2015 16.16 GMT
Drama is not theatre ... Edward Bond. Photograph: Eamonn McCabe

The playwright Edward Bond raised a few eyebrows recently by, among other things,
dubbing Brecht "the playwright of Auschwitz". His argument was so patently absurd that I
barely hiccuped. Instead, another statement caught my eye. Bond was speaking of a
production of his play The Woman, which he directed at the National: "I went back to see it
after it had been playing for a week and the actors were doing it as if it were Tom Stoppard.
They were doing 'theatre'. But drama is not 'theatre'." You could almost hear his disgust.

It seems that Bond has a very specialised definition of "theatre", one that comprehends the
entire art form as, heaven forbid, a kind of meta-Tom Stoppard play. But his comment gave
me pause, because this distinction between "drama" and "theatre" is one I've heard many
times before, and almost always from writers.

The implication usually is that, while "theatre" is a vacuous, commercial or essentially trivial
enterprise, Drama transcends theatre's vulgar origins and leaps into Art. As Mrs O'Neill said
of her husband, Eugene O'Neill was no mere playwright: he was a dramatist, and thus sat
with the gods. Drama, we are given to understand, is Serious. Through the landscape of
Drama stride the likes of Sophocles and Euripides and Shakespeare, lightning bolts of genius
in each hand, their brows corrugated with Olympian thought.

An impressive picture, certainly, and one can see at once why a jobbing playwright might
aspire to such divinity. But something inside me is irked by this picture. I love writers - why,
some of them are my best friends - but it does seem rather self-serving. There is, in any
successful production of even the most uncontroversially play-like play, rather more going on
onstage than just the words: there's an entire texture of sound, design and performance and,
crucially, there's an audience responding to it. If drama is just about the writer, then it might
as well stay on paper.

If I'm in categorising mode, which is lamentably seldom for a critic, I think of theatre as the
general noun, and of drama, like comedy, as a subset of theatre. Theatre has many mansions,
and writers are resident only in some of them.

Critic Hans-Thies Lehmann coined the term "post-dramatic theatre" to describe a shift in
practice away from a hierarchical model, with the writer (usually a dead writer) at the apex
and the director interpreting the writer's "intention". As an aside, it's probably rather easy to

 51

know a writer's intention if he or she is dead and unable to argue: like Humpty Dumpty's
vocabulary, it means just what you choose it to mean.

In the post-dramatic theatre, the place of the writer is less easily defined, with the creative
emphasis equally existing in the contributions of other theatre-makers. Companies like
Holland's Dood Pard are perhaps exemplary of this approach. But the term has also been
applied to the writer-centric theatre of playwrights such as Sarah Kane or Howard Barker.
Does this mean these writers are not dramatists?

After all, Shakespeare worked very much like Howard Barker, collaborating closely with his
own company. And Shakespeare had jugglers and singers between the acts to keep the
punters happy, which seems very unlike a divine dramatist. If Shakespeare is a dramatist,
surely Barker is too? And if Barker is a dramatist, can he be post-dramatic? Or is
Shakespeare himself suspiciously post-dramatic? What am I not getting here?

And returning to Bond: if drama isn't theatre, then what is it?

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4. Dance As Ephemeral Art

Retrieved and adapted from http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dance/#four

One of the features of dance as a performing art that has been often noted is that it
moves and it changes, both during the course of any given performance and over time. A
catchall phrase for this sort of impermanence – reflecting the lack of entirely stable art
“objects” in every case – has been to say that “dance is an ephemeral art”, although there are
alternative versions of what this means. (See Conroy 2012; see also Copeland and Cohen
1983 and Copeland 1993.) This does not mean that dance is insubstantial or unserious.
Instead, what it means is that there is something vital about dance performances and events
that disappears as it is being performed. As noted in Section 3, above, this may or may not
distinguish dance from theater or music, although dance does seem to rely less on recordings
and written notations in the making and performing of dances overall.

Dance critic Marcia Siegel famously wrote that dance “exists as a perpetual vanishing
point”, which means for Siegel that dance exists in “an event that disappears in the very act of
materializing.” (1972, 1). Siegel posits that dance has escaped the mass marketing of the
industrial revolution “precisely because it doesn’t lend itself to any reproduction…” (1972,
5). Conroy (2012, 158) acknowledges that the “safest” ontological intepretation of Siegel’s
claim would suggest that dance performances are one-time, transient events. If this is the case
it would mean that there is no enduring “type” that constitutes a dance work of art that is
“tokened” by various instancing performances. This would mean that the “classical
paradigm” discussed by D. Davies (2011b) and upheld by Goodman (1976) and by McFee
(2011b) is wrong. If we hold that some dance performances are transient but not others, then
the classical paradigm would still need to account for those performances that do not fit,
much like the ontology of music has had to deal with the ontology of highly or entirely
improvised jazz performances that seem to be “one-offs” and that are not preserved via
recording.

McFee (2011b) believes that the instability of dance works of art is a problem that is
due to poor preservation and reconstruction of dances rather than a feature that tells us
something meaningful about the nature of dance. He also thinks that dance notation might be
developed in the future to provide a workable way to preserve and reconstruct dances,
something that Van Camp and Franko suggest may not be possible (the specifics of their
claims here can be found in Section 2 of this entry, above). We can take this to be the
negative view of the ephemerality of dance.

A positive version of dance as an ephemeral art, however, is one that holds that we
ought to appreciate, rather than decry, dance’s ever-changing and disappearing nature as
something that makes a live performance of a dance that will not happen again the same way
into a vital experience for both the dance performers and the audience. The positive account
celebrates the live nature of the dance performance and helps to explain why kinesthetic
responses to dance performances are both relevant and powerful. It also suggests that
ephemerality is an aesthetic value for dance that gives dance the ability to provide a “you had

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to be there” sort of event. (See Bresnahan 2014 for an account of improvisational artistry in
live dance performance as a sort of agency that is consistent with this positive view.) Conroy
agrees with McFee that the phrase “dance is an ephemeral art” does apply to the difficulty of
preserving dances, but she also thinks it should be conceived as a statement of a danceworld
value; as a way of conveying “a communal attitude of tolerance for change with respect to
choreography that has been previously performed” (2012, 160).