Glimpse

Film scholars often label cinema that features strange spaces and odd narratives as ‘liminal’. Without further explanation, however, the term is somewhat of a blunt instrument that tends to provide overly neat explanations that are perhaps too broadly abstracted from the larger cultural and creative context. Some cinematic genre statements of ‘liminality’ derive from predominantly historico-materialist framings that see the notion as primarily about politically contingent space/place-based notions of borders, rather a subjective sense of ‘strangeness’ derived from a complex combination of the political, the social, and the personal. Eva Näripea’s description of the cinema of 1960’s Soviet Estonia as an innately liminal phenomena and her accompanying assertion that liminality is an inherent part of local Estonian identities, is perhaps somewhat problematic as an underpinning for a genre statement. This essay explores why and how liminality may indeed seem to serve as a kind of genre for Estonian films as Näripea suggests, but perhaps not for the (historico-materialist) reasons she argues.

This paper explores how operations of the mechanical uncanny in the iconic techno-dystopian film, The Terminator, directed by James Cameron in 1984, facilitate a deepening of apperception among sci-fi viewers regarding the perils of naïve technological progressivism. Some significant aspects of the film which have hitherto gone uncriticised pertain to the relationship between bodily discipline and the mechanical uncanny. In the Terminator, we see the extents to which the disciplinary mechanisms of modernity render our bodies docile, and the ways by which our bodies become organized according the logics of a totalizing mechanistic ethos. Therefore, in The Terminator, the uncanny effect created through uncertainty regarding who is human and who is replicant, may not seem so sophisticated or so subtle, but I insist that the uncanny effect leaves the viewer poised with an uncertain affect pertaining to the contents of their own humanity.

Silence, an intangible something, through silencing creates, reveals, and transforms. It provides a space to examine psychological well-being as it removes the anchor tethering us to the temporal existence of our logical mind. From silence comes sound, and from sound silence. Neither mutually exclusive, sound and silence co-create one another, inextricably bound together through intentional force. The artistic expression of silence, as both ephemeral and ambiguous, allows for a personal transformative experience of opening to an authentic self. Music holds the power to envelop us within its sensorial embrace, enabling emotions to swell to the surface thereby creating a pause where self-revealment becomes possible. Existentialist ideology suggests the innate terror of nihilism clouds the human psyche, giving credence to our fear of non-existence. However, failure to leave the external noise and enter the silence between the notes resorts in a disillusionment of being, where the false self will ultimately crumble under the pressure to maintain its façade. Between the notes fosters introspection, allows an opening to well-being. It is here, in that silent space, that the authentic self can be discovered.

In this paper, I focus on the representation of motherhood from a two-fold perspective by choosing the bestselling Turkish baby diapers advertisements as a case study of broadcasting in Turkish media. The first perspective analyzes the representation of motherhood by applying the concept of “Male Gaze” by Laura Mulvey, according to whom a woman is objectified by the male gaze and becomes a bearer of meaning rather than a maker of meaning. Further, the themes emerging from a careful reading of representations of women in advertisements of baby diapers are discussed. The second perspective consists of looking at discursive strategies of the term “motherhood” by problematizing the fact that baby diapers are always identified with women, thereby also reducing them to commodities in the market. The second perspective applies Julia Kristeva’s “The Semiotic Chora” to reveal the myths about motherhood created by the ruling ideology of the males, and to seek possible alternatives through that perspective.

If you figure out how machines learn, then you will figure out how the brain works, and what the brain’s functions are. Such an idea is widespread among philosophers and computer scientists who agree with a functionalist reductionist point of view of consciousness. This theory leads to hold that the more accurate the simulation of cognitive behavior is, the more the math behind it must be true – when true means what really happens in our brain. In this article, we aim to show that, on one hand, brain simulation is nothing more than just another simulation, and it offers very little help to understand – nor to produce – the vivid experiences (qualia) of cognitive functions. On the other hand, we would like to emphasize that when it succeeds at predicting a mechanism with less ambiguity and more accuracy than without a simulation nor direct observation, it really develops the knowledge of our brain. As long as brain simulation follows scientific principles, it should be regarded as valuable, even though the knowledge it brings to science must not be confused for the real phenomenon. Brain simulation, like all simulation, cannot fill any reality or epistemic gap. It is a consolation prize.

Animation, defined as a process utilized to suggest motion to image or drawings, has evolved towards different techniques and styles offered by the industry. Its esthetic nature meets a progressive technologization of art and creativity, and therewith it responds to esthetics enrichment not only in animated object, but also in its creation process. The possibility to have an expanded form in techniques and formats has therefore prompted it to explore and to enrich various elements of its visual narrative. One of the most prominent elements has been the application of vertical format, while also acknowledging the consumption of digital content in smartphones. MOJITO LAB of ARPA/BUAP has focused on this technique as a line of research for 2D animation. This article herein presents some areas with considerable interest in the impact of vertical format in animation as follows: 1) The antecedents of vertical format in both still and moving image; 2) the relation between vertical format and digital media generated by smartphones; 3) observations based on the image analysis of 2D animation utilizing vertical format which provides esthetic qualities to visual narrative language of 2D animation.

In this article, I examine the idea of the portrait from two viewpoints: the ‘classical’ portrait as it appears in Jean-Luc Nancy’s post-phenomenological philosophy, and the recent self-portrait photographs or ‘selfies’ on social media. First, I consider the portrait’s value in Nancy’s theories of art: for him, portraits hold an important position among the genres of visual art, since they present themselves as distinctive images by extracting the innermost force of the portrayed person. Secondly, I take up the philosophical and political implications of Nancy’s notion of the portrait vis-a-vis the contemporary selfie culture. I suggest that, instead of emphasizing the model’s singularity as traditional artistic portraits do, the flow of selfies tends to create similarity. I begin by clarifying Nancy’s paradoxical claim that the human portrait may resemble a person only on the condition of not representing him or her. After this, I inquire about the philosophical position of selfies as constructed portraits that make visible the absence of the self. However, as I argue, they do this in a sense that differs from Nancy’s account of the portrait. As a result, I propose that the repetition and circulation of selfies has remarkably changed our view on the significance and, finally, the ontology of the portrait.

As digital cinema becomes increasingly dematerialized, in the vein of milestones such as Avatar (2009) and Gravity (2013), the role of CGI and other digital film technologies shift from a complement/corrective of filmed images to a means of creating images proper. In these films created without celluloid, without physical decors, and, increasingly, even without a camera, the insistence on retaining artifactual film formal techniques, codes, and devices from analog cinema is nonetheless striking: camera movements are simulated, lens flares are rendered digitally in the absence of lenses, editing proceeds according to classical codes of continuity, etc. This paper investigates the simulation of analog film forms and ‘dispositifs’ in digital cinema through the question of perception: what does it mean to perceive a camera that is not actually there? Or more generally, when are these simulated devices meant to be apparent, and when are they meant to be imperceptible? In order to approach these questions, this paper will look at cases in which perceptual objects may go unregistered, cases in which perceptual objects are rendered more perceptible by virtue of their digital simulation, and cases in which perceptual objects are meant to be perceived otherwise, in order to posit a skeuomorphic sensibility that links analog and digital cinema through experience.

This paper analyzes the phenomenon of the new in the context of social media using the interpretative phenomenological approach based on interviews with social media users. The new, which is mostly used as an adjective (a property), in this paper is treated as a noun (an object), a phenomenon of perception described in three aspects: (1) as the future in presence, (2) as the opposite, (3) as a value. Usually, the new is associated with time, but in the context of social media perception, it rather appears as a value-saturated phenomenon. Two opposing attitudes can be distinguished: on the one hand, the new is seen as a desired progress, on the other hand, it includes an alienation from the being. This alienation also prevents us from seeing the new media as it is.

Keeping aside discussions about theories of depiction of photography and the epistemic value of photography from the viewer’s perspective, I reconsider this techne from the photographers’ entire act of photographing. It presents the quest of the possibility to regain the world by the art of photography, especially in a situation where human consciousness of the living environment is overwhelmed by the photographic effects. The nature of the current technological environment—while disguising the manifestation of pure humanity, in the sense that it is the externalization of technology due to human nature—is completely destructive. Today, trying to save or regenerate philosophy should be nothing more than seeking a way for human beings to refuse being incorporated as an automaton in an endless track of automated reproduction processes. As one of those who wish to find a way to reconstruct the relationship between humans and nature or to reveal that human existence can only be established in such correlation, I seek a way of breathing human freedom, momentarily disputing this automated living and social environment. In other words, to regain or to play the art of photography, to unsettle what usually works as concrete support for the cognitive transformation making us unconsciously think of the technological environment as something inevitable and natural. It would be presenting a temporary retreat and a more positive way forward.

This article critically reflects on Stiegler’s re-interpretation of Heidegger’s views on the relationships between existential temporality, the understanding of being and technology within the context of the latter’s notion of enframing, reconceptualized as an explicitly planetary phenomenon: the technosphere. Stiegler replaces Heidegger’s ontological conception with an organological one, arguing that the latter fails to understand these phenomena from the crucial perspective of thermodynamics, i.e., of the question of entropy and negentropy, which has never been addressed by Heidegger. What I particularly aim to show is that Stiegler’s organological re-intepretation of enframing as the technosphere and of existential temporality in terms of ‘quasi-causality’ (per Deleuze) may profit from being put in the broader, geothermodynamic context of Earth System Science, and considered from the perspective of Schneider & Sagan’s ‘gradient theory’, as being driven by what may be called the planetary ‘thermodynamic imperative’ with Jeffrey Wicken.

Disputes among conflicting “schools of thought,” located predominantly in philosophy departments in universities throughout the world, have degenerated into an academic, bookish philosophy that threatens to replace the discourse of wonder with the jargon of specialists. An elite process of inbred, intellectual decay renders all schools to a discourse that restricts philosophical discourse to print media, professional / professorial standards replace open-ended discussion, and “publish or perish” deflates the value of discourse. Literacy becomes the benchmark of understanding, and illiteracy is equated with lack of understanding. A tyranny of the articulate dismisses the wisdom of ordinary discourse, and the book itself becomes a coffin whose colophon page is a gravestone inscribed with the date of death of the corpse text within. Escape from this inevitable condition can be found in a return to the ordinary, common language and direct realism of the everyday human through a process of mediation, unmediation, and immediation.

In the world we live in, we encounter news everywhere. Authentic or not, fragmented or complete, audiences are being exposed to vast amounts of information, and it seems impossible to limit news intake, even when we want to. In a recent cross-country research based on data gathered from 35 countries (Toff, Kalogeropoulos et al. .2020), it was found that people avoid the news for factors varying between nations. This paper attempts to look into news consumption and avoidance patterns among Jordanians by posing several questions. Their entry points to news, preferred news mediums, the extent to which they are incidentally exposed to information, consciously or unconsciously, as well as if there were news avoidance patterns amongst them. These questions were explored through examination of a limited number of respondents from different generations, genders, and academic backgrounds and by deploying a Q methodology approach executed through card-sorting exercise with a think-aloud protocol and an in-depth one to one interview. The results indicated that Jordanians use multiple entry points to news, and the majority of them regard social media as a source of news. Neither gender, generation, nor the level of education seems to be a determining factor. The study revealed the existence of news avoidance trends. Education appeared to have no impact on the motives behind them.

In this article, the author seeks to understand how any information society generates clusters of information that act to secure and reinforce ecologies of consumption for media conglomerates and its circle of consumers. Empirical case studies would show that news information may not be based in the larger realities of all the players involved. Societies may be described in such situations as desiring their ends by means of segmented branching, but more empirically, by imperatives of survival and growth. Pseudology comprise the only sustaining principle of discourse for such a world immersed and fragmented by its local interests and their recognizable patterns of behavior as they are retrospectively conditioned by media.

Today, new insights into our interdependency with biotic masses, ecological ensembles, and technological and cultural practices in a growing world society all create the need to redefine human subjectivation. Since the so-called individual cannot be separated from these different involvements without endangering his/her existence, we should rethink our self-understanding in terms of the ‘undivided’ person and recognize that this concept expresses a misleading negation of our inevitable participations. It should therefore be replaced by the modified term ‘dividuation’, which endeavours to indicate our multidirectional and often ambivalent forms of entanglement and involuntary co-constitution by technological, cultural or even non-human ‘others’. The ever-specific dividuation has to be recognized and moderated in order to keep up our cohesion and psychophysical metastability.

Inaccurate interpretation of negotiated nonverbal communication during an intimate encounter has serious moral and legal repercussions. Reciprocity between bodies allows one to assess the intention of the other. However, when the intended message is miscommunicated through the sender’s embodied action or misperceived by the receiver, a sexual assault can ensue. Understanding, conveying, and responding to behavioral gestures indicative of agreement or refusal to consent, is an emotional quagmire that has received global attention through sociopolitical movements such as #MeToo. Despite the desired cogitation of a pre-reflexive intentioned message, reciprocal navigation of a shared intimate space shifts within the corporeal/intercorporeal relationship, such that a habituated behavioral response, autonomic bodily responding, and socialized dating norms all have the potential to sabotage the essence of the original message. Seeking legal retribution is compromised in its application of objectified parameters to an ambiguous, subjective human interaction. While programs promoting slogans such as “Just Say No” are well intentioned, the complexity of human behavior, unconscious processes, and subjective perception, all suggest that communicating a refusal to consent extends far beyond the verbal utterance of saying “No.”

This article discusses fundamental contradictions regarding the social role of the new media. Avantgarde identifies the emergence of the new media with the possibilities of liberating the man and achieving true individuality, while dystopia qualifies it as the suffocation of individuality, as ballast that levels out and averages a man, as a threat to human freedom. The media technology is for the avant-garde the embodiment of the enriched self and expanded capacities of selfhood, while for dystopia, the media technology is directed against selfhood, since its effects start and end with the creation of alienation, with the distortion of selfhood directed against the fundamental attributes of humanity. On the contrary, for the avant-garde, the breach of media background awareness of the artistic expression has marked the definite parting with the age of alienated artistic practice. According to their most profound beliefs, staggering in the chains of figurative and narrative expressions, art has always served a different purpose, religion, pedagogy, politics, and ideology. Hence, the turn towards the demands and logic of the self-serving media marked the rise from the state of alienation to the state of true achievement, to the emancipation of artists and the art.

This study offers a systematic, exhaustive and updated investigation of the declaration of the state of alarm and the processing of personal data relating to the health of citizens affected and/or potentially affected by the exceptional situation resulting from COVID-19. Specifically, it analyses the distinction between the state of alarm and the states of exception and siege and the possible effect on the fundamental right to the protection of personal data in exceptional health crisis situations and the effects that this declaration may have on the applicable regulations, issued, at a Community level. Next, and taking into consideration all the general and sectorial regulations applicable to data protection and health, we proceed to the analysis of the legitimate bases and the exceptions that, applicable to situations of health emergency such as the present one, enable the processing, taking into account the nature of the person who intervenes as the controller, making special emphasis on the public interest pursued by the Public Administrations and on the vital interest of the interested party.

This paper examines Friedrich Kittler’s infamous assertion that “media determine our situation” in conjunction with his less-discussed proclamation that the “day is not far off when … the history of communications technologies will literally come to an end” with the advent of artificial intelligence. It explores what Kittler might have meant by suggesting that there could be a situation without media to determine it. First, I survey Kittler’s statements about the end of media. Second, I consider existing interpretations of the end of media and judge them to be inadequate. Finally, I present a reading of the end of media as a horrific event in which the technologically-mediated conditions for subjectivity collapse. This, I suggest, provides support for the notion, advanced by Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, that Kittler came ultimately to find his media theory abhorrent and thus devoted his last years to studying ancient Greece rather than artificial intelligence.