Since at least the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the concept of “political Islam” or “Islamism” has drawn the attention of political analysts in Western countries.1 Since the 9/11 attacks, however, much policy attention has focused on combating a specific tactic—the use of violence through terrorism— rather than on countering the ideology of Islamism. Because Islamist ideology can and does lead to violence, but not always, and not necessarily in a linear manner, the use or absence of “violence” is not the right criterion to distinguish a Muslim “moderate” from an Islamist “extremist.” The Islamists’ rejection of a free and open society, of universal human rights, of equal rights between men and women, of religious equality in the civic sphere, of genuine pluralism: these considerations are at least as serious as the possibility that terrorism might be used as a tactic in pursuit of Islamist ends.
{"title":"Elham Manea’s The Perils of Nonviolent Islamism: An Indispensable Contribution to Our Understanding of a Complex Phenomenon","authors":"Ayaan Hirsi Ali","doi":"10.3817/0321194126","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0321194126","url":null,"abstract":"Since at least the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the concept of “political Islam” or “Islamism” has drawn the attention of political analysts in Western countries.1 Since the 9/11 attacks, however, much policy attention has focused on combating a specific tactic—the use of violence through terrorism— rather than on countering the ideology of Islamism. Because Islamist ideology can and does lead to violence, but not always, and not necessarily in a linear manner, the use or absence of “violence” is not the right criterion to distinguish a Muslim “moderate” from an Islamist “extremist.” The Islamists’ rejection of a free and open society, of universal human rights, of equal rights between men and women, of religious equality in the civic sphere, of genuine pluralism: these considerations are at least as serious as the possibility that terrorism might be used as a tactic in pursuit of Islamist ends.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"53 1","pages":"126 - 134"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80668253","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Albert Camus’s short story “Jonas, or The Artist at Work” was originally drafted in 1953 as “La Vie d’artiste.”1 The published story, included in 1957’s Exile and the Kingdom, dramatizes the rise and fall of a Parisian painter. Both the story’s title and its biblical epitaph recall the book of Jonah. Having had success with early paintings, Jonas buys a small Parisian apartment with large vertical windows, suggesting the ribs of Jonah’s whale, which is soon filled with a host of admirers who come to dote upon the new sensation. Jonas spends his days in the main room trying to paint, a baby in one hand, the constantly ringing telephone nearby, and hangers-on everywhere. In spare moments, he struggles to answer a growing correspondence of petitioners. Soon, Jonas finds himself expected to comment on all of the issues of the day, with “Just as you say” becoming his compliant mantra.2
{"title":"Solitaire/Solidaire: Camus, Contemplation, and the Vita Mixta","authors":"S. Matthew","doi":"10.3817/0921196031","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0921196031","url":null,"abstract":"Albert Camus’s short story “Jonas, or The Artist at Work” was originally drafted in 1953 as “La Vie d’artiste.”1 The published story, included in 1957’s Exile and the Kingdom, dramatizes the rise and fall of a Parisian painter. Both the story’s title and its biblical epitaph recall the book of Jonah. Having had success with early paintings, Jonas buys a small Parisian apartment with large vertical windows, suggesting the ribs of Jonah’s whale, which is soon filled with a host of admirers who come to dote upon the new sensation. Jonas spends his days in the main room trying to paint, a baby in one hand, the constantly ringing telephone nearby, and hangers-on everywhere. In spare moments, he struggles to answer a growing correspondence of petitioners. Soon, Jonas finds himself expected to comment on all of the issues of the day, with “Just as you say” becoming his compliant mantra.2","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"28 1","pages":"31 - 53"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"90515134","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Since as long ago as the twelfth century, England has been organised into parishes for it was one of the most well-organised and prosperous realms of the Middle Ages. Parish churches have been a constant feature in the English landscape right up to the present: their towers loom out of the misty Somerset fens, their spires peep valiantly between the monstrous London skyscrapers or lurk behind a Grantham shopping centre. Whether in Scunthorpe or Woking they proclaim higher values than the market: something or someone who calls us to account. They assert a spiritual depth to reality.
{"title":"Is the Parish Church Worth Saving?","authors":"A. Milbank","doi":"10.3817/0921196145","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0921196145","url":null,"abstract":"Since as long ago as the twelfth century, England has been organised into parishes for it was one of the most well-organised and prosperous realms of the Middle Ages. Parish churches have been a constant feature in the English landscape right up to the present: their towers loom out of the misty Somerset fens, their spires peep valiantly between the monstrous London skyscrapers or lurk behind a Grantham shopping centre. Whether in Scunthorpe or Woking they proclaim higher values than the market: something or someone who calls us to account. They assert a spiritual depth to reality.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"125 1","pages":"145 - 148"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73541880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
On January 6, 2021, Trumpism imploded. Following the general election of November 3, 2020, a grassroots movement had staged rallies across the nation to contest the election result, while Trump and his backers mounted a largely farcical parallel legal campaign to overturn it. On January 6, Congress assembled to finalize Joe Biden’s election as the forty-sixth U.S. president. For the first time, Trump himself now personally organized and led a rally targeted at overturning the putative electoral result. Urged on by the president, his supporters marched on the U.S. Capitol. Once there, they entered the Capitol building. The Capitol Police were overwhelmed by the massive crowd, and windows were broken to gain access. In places, it seems police simply stood aside and even waved protestors through open doors, contrary to the rhetorical designation of the event as a “storming” or “siege” of the Capitol. Some protestors even entered the inner sanctum, the floor of the Senate. Some committed minor acts of vandalism. Others wandered around like tourists, staying within velvet ropes and reporting later that they believed they had permission to be there. The principal act of violence that occurred was the fatal shooting of a female protestor by a security officer.1
{"title":"Trump l’Oeil: Ceci N’est Pas un Coup d’État","authors":"Mark G. E. Kelly","doi":"10.3817/0321194163","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0321194163","url":null,"abstract":"On January 6, 2021, Trumpism imploded. Following the general election of November 3, 2020, a grassroots movement had staged rallies across the nation to contest the election result, while Trump and his backers mounted a largely farcical parallel legal campaign to overturn it. On January 6, Congress assembled to finalize Joe Biden’s election as the forty-sixth U.S. president. For the first time, Trump himself now personally organized and led a rally targeted at overturning the putative electoral result. Urged on by the president, his supporters marched on the U.S. Capitol. Once there, they entered the Capitol building. The Capitol Police were overwhelmed by the massive crowd, and windows were broken to gain access. In places, it seems police simply stood aside and even waved protestors through open doors, contrary to the rhetorical designation of the event as a “storming” or “siege” of the Capitol. Some protestors even entered the inner sanctum, the floor of the Senate. Some committed minor acts of vandalism. Others wandered around like tourists, staying within velvet ropes and reporting later that they believed they had permission to be there. The principal act of violence that occurred was the fatal shooting of a female protestor by a security officer.1","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"11 1","pages":"163 - 165"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74611231","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
“We don’t know how to make cities for our bodies and our children’s bodies. When I say body, I mean a moving body, not a static one. If cities don’t resemble you, you become lost.” So says Lebanese film director Borhane Alaouie in a 2007 interview. Indeed, Alaouie’s film work as a whole can be read as an ongoing exploration of the relationship between characters and place, beginning with his 1974 masterpiece Kafr Kassem, in which a Syrian village is explicitly credited with playing the role of the eponymous Palestinian village; encompassing his 1978 documentary film It Is Not Enough That God Is with the Poor, about the Egyptian architect Hassan Fathi and his drive to discover a specifically Arab architecture suitable to the postcolonial context in which he worked; and extending to his fictional films set in Lebanon. Alaouie’s statement also applies to the works of a number of other Arab filmmakers from the late 1960s to the present who have used explorations of individuals and their urban environments to address questions of identity and subjectivity and their relationship to history and community.
“我们不知道如何为我们的身体和孩子的身体建造城市。我说的物体是指运动的物体，而不是静止的物体。如果城市不像你，你就会迷失。”黎巴嫩电影导演博哈内·阿拉维在2007年的一次采访中如是说。事实上，阿拉维的电影作品整体上可以被解读为对人物和地点之间关系的持续探索，从他1974年的杰作《Kafr Kassem》开始，在这部电影中，一个叙利亚村庄被明确地认为扮演了同名巴勒斯坦村庄的角色;其中包括他1978年的纪录片《上帝与穷人同在还不够》(It Is Not Enough That God Is the Poor)，该片讲述了埃及建筑师哈桑·法特希(Hassan Fathi)探索一种适合他工作的后殖民背景的阿拉伯建筑的努力;并延伸到他以黎巴嫩为背景的虚构电影中。阿拉维的说法也适用于其他一些阿拉伯电影制作人的作品，从20世纪60年代末到现在，他们利用对个人及其城市环境的探索来解决身份和主体性以及他们与历史和社区的关系的问题。
{"title":"The City in Early Alternative Arab Cinema","authors":"N. Yaqub","doi":"10.3817/1221197057","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/1221197057","url":null,"abstract":"“We don’t know how to make cities for our bodies and our children’s bodies. When I say body, I mean a moving body, not a static one. If cities don’t resemble you, you become lost.” So says Lebanese film director Borhane Alaouie in a 2007 interview. Indeed, Alaouie’s film work as a whole can be read as an ongoing exploration of the relationship between characters and place, beginning with his 1974 masterpiece Kafr Kassem, in which a Syrian village is explicitly credited with playing the role of the eponymous Palestinian village; encompassing his 1978 documentary film It Is Not Enough That God Is with the Poor, about the Egyptian architect Hassan Fathi and his drive to discover a specifically Arab architecture suitable to the postcolonial context in which he worked; and extending to his fictional films set in Lebanon. Alaouie’s statement also applies to the works of a number of other Arab filmmakers from the late 1960s to the present who have used explorations of individuals and their urban environments to address questions of identity and subjectivity and their relationship to history and community.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"19 1","pages":"57 - 78"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75516461","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In her book The Perils of Nonviolent Islamism,1 the Yemeni-Swiss political scientist Elham Manea, an associate professor at the University of Zurich, takes us back to her childhood, where she talks with nostalgia and sorrow about the popular, peaceful Islam that prevailed at that time in many Muslim countries. She writes about the colorful women’s clothing in Sana‘a, the unveiled women in Rabat, and how these colors and this freedom were replaced, covered by the black veil. She speaks with sadness about the loss of tolerance that was compounded by brutality and war, and she asks: What happened? These changes are a consequence of the project of political Islam: the Islamization of society.
{"title":"On the Question of Moderate Islam","authors":"Kacem El Ghazzali","doi":"10.3817/0321194117","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0321194117","url":null,"abstract":"In her book The Perils of Nonviolent Islamism,1 the Yemeni-Swiss political scientist Elham Manea, an associate professor at the University of Zurich, takes us back to her childhood, where she talks with nostalgia and sorrow about the popular, peaceful Islam that prevailed at that time in many Muslim countries. She writes about the colorful women’s clothing in Sana‘a, the unveiled women in Rabat, and how these colors and this freedom were replaced, covered by the black veil. She speaks with sadness about the loss of tolerance that was compounded by brutality and war, and she asks: What happened? These changes are a consequence of the project of political Islam: the Islamization of society.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"55 4 1","pages":"117 - 125"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77037769","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper will analyze the fundamental importance of religion in contemporary Egyptian politics, as illustrated by the conflict between liberalism and Islamism leading up to the nation’s first election and the protests in the year following the election of the Islamist Mohammed Morsi that led to the overthrow of the regime. Also to be analyzed is the authoritarian regime of Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, which was initially thought by many to be the rescuer of liberalism but which has proven to be extraordinarily repressive to both members of the Muslim Brotherhood and liberals alike, while simultaneously claiming to offer governance informed by Islam.
{"title":"Turmoil in Egypt: Faith, Nationalism, and the Apparent Inadequacies of Liberalism","authors":"Beau Mullen","doi":"10.3817/0321194111","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0321194111","url":null,"abstract":"This paper will analyze the fundamental importance of religion in contemporary Egyptian politics, as illustrated by the conflict between liberalism and Islamism leading up to the nation’s first election and the protests in the year following the election of the Islamist Mohammed Morsi that led to the overthrow of the regime. Also to be analyzed is the authoritarian regime of Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, which was initially thought by many to be the rescuer of liberalism but which has proven to be extraordinarily repressive to both members of the Muslim Brotherhood and liberals alike, while simultaneously claiming to offer governance informed by Islam.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"66 1","pages":"111 - 116"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74652594","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Renaud Girard is an American-born French journalist, the author of several books on world affairs, especially the Middle East. In this trenchant commentary1 on the Afghan debacle, he recognizes the defeat for what it is, bluntly invoking the collapse of the imperial German army at the end of the First World War. Is that an overstatement or an unflinching naming of the collapse of an order? Girard brings a realist eye to the factors that have contributed to the current situation, asking us to understand them and their consequences, as the Taliban proceed from city to city, heading toward Kabul.
{"title":"The Consequences of Afghanistan: Comments on Girard","authors":"R. Berman","doi":"10.3817/0921196163","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/0921196163","url":null,"abstract":"Renaud Girard is an American-born French journalist, the author of several books on world affairs, especially the Middle East. In this trenchant commentary1 on the Afghan debacle, he recognizes the defeat for what it is, bluntly invoking the collapse of the imperial German army at the end of the First World War. Is that an overstatement or an unflinching naming of the collapse of an order? Girard brings a realist eye to the factors that have contributed to the current situation, asking us to understand them and their consequences, as the Taliban proceed from city to city, heading toward Kabul.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"22 1","pages":"163 - 165"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77939357","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Whether appearing as a dramatic setting or as a “protagonist” in itself, Hong Kong’s urban space has inspired the imagination of filmmakers of different generations and artistic orientations. If architecture is the primary denominator of a city’s spatial identity,1 the cinema offers a repertoire of visual vocabularies through which this identity is articulated, contested, and transformed in time. “Space” here connotes both the diegetic configuration of setting and locale, and the non-diegetic realm of identity-making invoked by the cinematic medium. Space has also been used as a conceptual tool in critical discourse on the dynamics between the cinematic imagination and the urban space.2 Its long tradition of martial arts films and costume dramas notwithstanding, Hong Kong cinema displays an inherently urban quality that speaks through its subject matter, fictional personae, and the spatial aesthetics that have become an imprint of “Hong Kong-made films.” While critical attention to the relationship between the cinema and urban space tends to favor popular action films from the 1980s and afterward, filmmakers’ self-conscious engagement with the urban space can be traced further back. The black-and-white films of the 1950s and 1960s, for instance, frequently insert location shots at the beginning to authenticate the predominantly studio setting. The most commonly used scenes are panoramic views of high-rise buildings, motorways, rail stations, and different types of modern transportation. Mostly appearing in the credit sequence, these shots display an inner logic that amounts to a self-narrative of the city that varies from a critical self-distancing from the capitalist city in left-wing films to a celebratory embrace of capitalist modernity in right-wing films.3 The symbolic reinvention of the urban space as an experiential realm of identity-making, therefore, has been a leitmotif in Hong Kong films for a much longer time than it is commonly assumed.
{"title":"The City in Flux: Toward an Urban Topology of Hong Kong Cinema","authors":"V. Lee","doi":"10.3817/1221197035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/1221197035","url":null,"abstract":"Whether appearing as a dramatic setting or as a “protagonist” in itself, Hong Kong’s urban space has inspired the imagination of filmmakers of different generations and artistic orientations. If architecture is the primary denominator of a city’s spatial identity,1 the cinema offers a repertoire of visual vocabularies through which this identity is articulated, contested, and transformed in time. “Space” here connotes both the diegetic configuration of setting and locale, and the non-diegetic realm of identity-making invoked by the cinematic medium. Space has also been used as a conceptual tool in critical discourse on the dynamics between the cinematic imagination and the urban space.2 Its long tradition of martial arts films and costume dramas notwithstanding, Hong Kong cinema displays an inherently urban quality that speaks through its subject matter, fictional personae, and the spatial aesthetics that have become an imprint of “Hong Kong-made films.” While critical attention to the relationship between the cinema and urban space tends to favor popular action films from the 1980s and afterward, filmmakers’ self-conscious engagement with the urban space can be traced further back. The black-and-white films of the 1950s and 1960s, for instance, frequently insert location shots at the beginning to authenticate the predominantly studio setting. The most commonly used scenes are panoramic views of high-rise buildings, motorways, rail stations, and different types of modern transportation. Mostly appearing in the credit sequence, these shots display an inner logic that amounts to a self-narrative of the city that varies from a critical self-distancing from the capitalist city in left-wing films to a celebratory embrace of capitalist modernity in right-wing films.3 The symbolic reinvention of the urban space as an experiential realm of identity-making, therefore, has been a leitmotif in Hong Kong films for a much longer time than it is commonly assumed.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"118 1","pages":"35 - 55"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79538030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Spike Lee’s celebrated documentary about Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006), two of the most memorable interviewees recounting their experiences are denoted, somewhat curiously, as “cultural activists.” Although Lee is celebrated as one of the leading U.S. auteurs of the last thirty years—and, without a doubt, its most influential Black feature filmmaker—he considers his documentaries a key part of his oeuvre. Levees, for instance, garnered both numerous prizes and widespread acclaim for documenting the storm, its ambiguous context, and its devastating aftermath.1 In making its eponymous case that it was not the storm but the sadly predictable failure of the levees that devastated the city, the film weaves a broad, and colorful, social and political tapestry by mixing sundry cinematic elements: stock news footage; exterior, often shocking, shots of the city contemporary to the filmmaking (in 2005–6); and stylized interviews, some made on-site and some in front of bright pastel backgrounds that obscure the location of the interview.2 Tellingly, these stylized interviews do not always feature conventional experts like academic historians, scientists/engineers, or local politicians to play the familiar role of documentary’s tried and somewhat true talking heads. Rather, throughout, Lee also offers nonexperts (or nonconventional experts) who recount their experiences during and after the hurricane and subsequent flood. Often these subjects are designated as residents of this or that parish (a county like St. Bernard or Jefferson) or neighborhood (like the Lower Ninth Ward or Pontchartrain Park). But a good number carry the aforementioned title of cultural activist—an unusual moniker underscoring a number of facets of New Orleans, its multifarious municipal traditions, and its pluralistic polities.
{"title":"Disputations from the Damaged City: Spike Lee’s If God Is Willing and da Creek Don’t Rise (2010) and the Taking Place of Civil Society in Post-Katrina New Orleans","authors":"J. Fisher","doi":"10.3817/1221197101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3817/1221197101","url":null,"abstract":"In Spike Lee’s celebrated documentary about Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006), two of the most memorable interviewees recounting their experiences are denoted, somewhat curiously, as “cultural activists.” Although Lee is celebrated as one of the leading U.S. auteurs of the last thirty years—and, without a doubt, its most influential Black feature filmmaker—he considers his documentaries a key part of his oeuvre. Levees, for instance, garnered both numerous prizes and widespread acclaim for documenting the storm, its ambiguous context, and its devastating aftermath.1 In making its eponymous case that it was not the storm but the sadly predictable failure of the levees that devastated the city, the film weaves a broad, and colorful, social and political tapestry by mixing sundry cinematic elements: stock news footage; exterior, often shocking, shots of the city contemporary to the filmmaking (in 2005–6); and stylized interviews, some made on-site and some in front of bright pastel backgrounds that obscure the location of the interview.2 Tellingly, these stylized interviews do not always feature conventional experts like academic historians, scientists/engineers, or local politicians to play the familiar role of documentary’s tried and somewhat true talking heads. Rather, throughout, Lee also offers nonexperts (or nonconventional experts) who recount their experiences during and after the hurricane and subsequent flood. Often these subjects are designated as residents of this or that parish (a county like St. Bernard or Jefferson) or neighborhood (like the Lower Ninth Ward or Pontchartrain Park). But a good number carry the aforementioned title of cultural activist—an unusual moniker underscoring a number of facets of New Orleans, its multifarious municipal traditions, and its pluralistic polities.","PeriodicalId":43573,"journal":{"name":"Telos","volume":"3 1","pages":"101 - 123"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80178578","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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