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The “Other” in Nineteenth-Century French Automata: Technology, Domestication, and Imperialism
No full textAutomata – mechanical, self-moving representations of animals and humans – have been studied by historians mainly to account for their popularity in the European Enlightenment, where they influenced conceptions of how matter takes on life and agency in a mechanistic world. However, automata continued to be built well into the nineteenth century, particularly in Paris. Through analyzing and contextualizing the construction and reception of nineteenth-century French automata – from their commercialization to associations with industrialization, domestication, and colonial anxieties – these self-moving machines emerge as a uniquely evocative mode of representation in a French worldview that was quick to embrace a technologically mediated view of themselves and “others.” Through working across histories of science, technology, luxury, labor, colonialism and art, I show why these nineteenth-century automata began to represent the “other” to Europeans as moving sculptures dressed as exotic songbirds, orientalized turcs, and eventually submissive négres. These dynamic objects speak to the commercialization of a particular nineteenth-century European fantasy of domestication and imperialism in a racialized, mechanized world
Sharpen the Blade or It/You\u27ll Rust 刀锋不磨人生修
No full textThis work is composed by a variety of materials. A worker is depicted in a blue uniform and has a microphone in his hand, connected to a machine which is placed on a cart and is pushed by a boy. “Do not lag behind” is written on the boy\u27s leg in Chinese. Below the worker is a woman. She is in a red coat and gazes at the viewer, appearing like a Western nun. Sharpen the Blade or It/You\u27ll Rust is written in Chinese calligraphy as the title. Slogans during the Cultural Revolution like Pointing toward the bourgeoisie are written on the work. (Yifan Shang \u2725)https://digital.kenyon.edu/zhou/1592/thumbnail.jp
Othonis de Rocha Dominus Athenarum: Life, Documents, and Testimonies of the First Lord of Athens (c. 1170 – c. 1234)
No full textThe Audience at the Noor Islamic Cultural Center (NICC) Presentation
No full texthttps://digital.kenyon.edu/celmath128images/1014/thumbnail.jp
Telling a Cautionary Tale: Film\u27s Tragic Story of the American Sex Worker
No full textThrough the medium of American cinema, this paper explores narratives about sex workers and their perceived deviance. By using the charmed circle and modern scholarship and analysis of the rescue industry around sex trafficking, one central theme was able to be extrapolated and analyzed from the sample of films (Rubin 1984; Tzburczy 2019; Hua 2011). Gayle Rubin\u27s charmed circle and its accompanying text outline the means through which sexuality is socially constructed and give a visual aid to understanding what sexual behavior can be excused by society and which types of sexual behavior must be condemned by society. Story-driven media is a powerful tool for studying social phenomena, as it is both reflective and generative of public opinion and interest (Becker 2007). This study uses a grounded theory approach to analyze a set of empirical data from viewing 30 popular American films that featured sex work and sex workers and systematically identify themes and subthemes that contribute to a larger central narrative about sex work. Then, this paper analyzes the cautionary tale these films tell, identifying sympathetic victims against the backdrop of disposable sex workers
African Prince- Around Grave, Backs to Camera
No full texthttps://digital.kenyon.edu/communitywithin/1220/thumbnail.jp
Desk Board 桌板
No full textNine pieces of paper with Manchu scripts are put on five pieces of oval white paper. They are placed on a desk board, which is likely made of bamboo. (Yifan Shang \u2725)https://digital.kenyon.edu/zhou/1594/thumbnail.jp
Otem in Paradise
No full textOtem in Paradise is a surrealist novella that blurs the boundaries between animate and inanimate objects and traces their origins and futures in deep time. Central to the story are fish-shaped dinner plates, made from plastic, which Otem, the main character, has grown up with. At Otem’s request, these fish-plates attempt to teach her how to breathe underwater as her sea-dwelling ancestors did. Although coming from a desire to understand these animals, Otem’s wish is also rooted in an Edenic fantasy whereby she returns to a more ‘natural’ and ‘calm’ state by becoming more fish-like. The story, however, rejects this logic, and instead blurs the lines between the natural and the industrialized. As it traces the fish-plates’ origins to plant and animal matter that was converted to oil over the course of millions of years, the narrative slowly blurs the line between the material and semiotic, ultimately concluding with a future in which plastic units of language have constructed the geological landscape of the earth. Deriving inspiration from Timothy Morton’s emphasis on the pathways and origins of objects in The Stuff of Life, Otem in Paradise envisions a radical new way of relating with nonhumans
