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The Hills are Really Alive!: Sacred Mountains and the Renewal of Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Japan
No full textWe are all no doubt familiar with the song from the musical “The Sound of Music” to the effect that “The hills are alive with the sound of music”. In most Western cosmological visions the hills of course are not alive: they are largely heaps of rocks to be climbed, mined, or simply regarded as landscape features. This is not however the case in a good deal of traditional Japanese thought, associated both with Shinto and with Buddhism. In the form of indigenous Japanese religion known as Shugendo, mountains were (and remain so for adherents and priests known as yamabushi – literally “those who lie down on the mountain”) objects of veneration and worship. However, the basis of such worship was and is the seeking of the mastering of ascetic powers, and that the act of mountain climbing can lead to purification and enlightenment. Any ecological factors were a by-product of these practices and the rituals associated with them, not a primary goal. However other traditions less-known also exist in which the unity of human religiosity and ecology are intimately inter-twined. This paper will examine one such case – that of the cult centered on Mount Kurama in Kyoto Prefecture and its complex theology and practices which link the mountain to the generation of forms of ecological knowledge that are central to the maintaining of human-nature relationships. The paper will explore this system of beliefs, relate it to Japanese conceptions of nature, and will examine the ways in which mountains are indeed regarded as alive: as entities in themselves, as the generators and regulators of climate, and as the habitat for both animals and spirits that are sources of energy for the management of the wider environment, so disrupted by industrialization and pollution. This becomes not so much as case of “thinking like a mountain” as “acting with the mountain” as a force of empowerment for ecological preservation and restoration
Legacy Sites and the Implications of Exploitation of Indigenous Lands
No full textThere are approximately 15,000 defense-related abandoned uranium mines located in 14 states with an estimated 75% on federal and tribal land. Of those locations, over 500 abandoned mines and 1100 features are in the Four-Corners region. Uranium mill tailings, often referred to as legacy waste, comprise the largest volume of any category of radioactive waste in the Nation. U.S. agencies have invested resources to understand the latest science and technology to improve the long-term management strategies for the clean-up of uranium mill tailings sites; however, what often gets left at the hindsight is how land disturbance as a result of extraction has unjustly positioned Indigenous People to respond to the unique challenges this presents in their communities. In this talk Dr. Joseph will 1) briefly discuss the historical implications of nuclear defense industries on Indigenous People, 2) expand on the science and engineering behind the evolution of the management of legacy sites, and 3) discuss how Indigenous-driven methodologies and policy can be used as a tool to protect impacted lands
The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice
No full textDue to a recording recording error, the video begins partway through Dina Gilio-Whitaker\u27s presentation
Multiple normativities: Language, gender, sexuality and men’s induction into the U.S. military during World War II
No full textDeparting from traditional treatments of hetero- and homonormativity as singular formations (Duggan 2003, Lewin 2009, Warner 2003), this paper argues that normative demands and their regulatory consequences can be as variable and flexible as are depictions of compliance, resistance or refusal (Menon, 2008, Pêcheux 1982). To this end, this paper focuses on the conversations taking place at military induction sites during WWII by means of which military personnel determined whether candidate for induction should be barred from military service because of their (alleged) homosexuality. The military personnel had not been given uniform criteria for making these assessments. Each evaluator made his own judgements about the sexuality of each candidate that he interviewed. So details of embodiment, vestment, language use, of allure that disqualified some candidates could also be ignored as other candidates were admitted to service with problem. As a result, 5,000 of the 16 million men who entered the induction system were entry to service for reasons of inappropriate sexuality. Had consistent surveillance criteria been applied, that figure should have been closer to 160,000 rejections.
Through the use of a scavenger methodology (Leap in press, following Halberstam 1998), this project has assembled a diverse collection of narratives about World War II induction experiences from military personnel and induction candidates, men and women from diverse social backgrounds. A close reading (Levine 2015) of these narratives provides the basis for the analysis proposed here. Importantly, among other findings, the candidate and military personnel narratives agree that multiple normative stances -- what is or is not evidence of acceptable sexuality -- does not weaken regulatory power of normative rule, whereas multiple responses to normativity can be the first toward a manipulation
Grammatical language forms used by non-binary transgender* individuals in the LGBT*QIA+ community in Berlin, Germany
No full textThis is a first study of grammatical gender forms used by gender non-conforming transgender* individuals in the LGBT*QIA+ community in Berlin, Germany. Within the diverse LGBT*QIA+ community, gender non-conforming transgender* individuals are a heterogeneous group, in which gender identity may be expressed linguistically in a great variety of ways. This work is our first attempt to investigate such grammatical gender forms in hopes to document and preserve them as part of a rich queer linguistic tradition in a single but very culturally diverse city, Berlin.
For our investigation into grammatical gender forms, the target group is gender non-conforming transgender* individuals currently living in Berlin, Germany. We invited 12 participants (22 ˗ 38 years old) who have lived in Berlin, Germany, for at least two years (ranging 2 ˗ 10 years). All the participants are fluent English speakers and use the English language to communicate with each other (English being their native or non-native language). Two research methods have been used in this study: Systematic Self-Observation and an Interview Questionnaire.
We have found that non-conforming transgender* individuals in Berlin, being linguistically heterogeneous, employ a great variety of ways in order to express non-binary or non-conforming gender identity. We have investigated the following six major topics concerning the diverse ways to queer linguistic gender: (i) Queering conventionally gendered language forms; (ii) using gender-neutral forms to queer familial terms; (iii) queering pronouns; (iv) using the playful and affective animal role play; (v) queering language to describe babies and young individuals; and (vi) language mixing.
Grammatical gender forms used by gender non-conforming transgender* individuals in Berlin are highly interesting to investigate because they create and use new lexicon items and so-called queer grammar to avoid linguistic gender binaries, a topic which is drastically understudied in the linguistic literature. These linguistic innovations are an integral part of LGBT*QIA+ communities by producing new roles, positionalities, and ways of establishing the LGBT*QIA+ membership
Dating your significant other: Hegemonic, Alternative and Marginalised Masculinities
No full textBy analysing two hundred Tinder profiles of Spanish heterosexual men and two hundred Grindr profiles of Spanish queer men, this article examines these men’s online gendered and sexualised self-representation strategies. In this light, this study builds upon Schipper’s (2007), Blair and Hoskin’s (2015) and Hoskin’s (2019) rethinking of the possibilities for masculinity and femininity, and their role in gender hegemony. This study develops their argument further by (a) giving closer attention to the interplay of femininities and masculinities; (b) informing how heterosexual and queer men think about themselves in relation to their sexual identities as they construct and navigate their on-line social identity; (c) showing discourse evidence of how heterosexual and queer men move through and produce masculinity and femininity by engaging in masculine/feminine practices. In so doing, this study contributes to the existing literature giving evidence of the ways these men discursively position themselves in relation to occupying the feminine/masculine position. All in all, the paper attempts to cast light on the (d-)evaluating discursive strategies these Spanish heterosexual and queer men deploy when creating their profiles. Importantly, the analysis gives evidence of how occupying the masculine or the feminine position goes hand in hand with the devaluation and policing of femininity. Furthermore, the analysis calls attention to the contradictory gender ideas present in their personal profiles and this, in turn, sheds further light on the ways they construct multiple masculine identities to negotiate their sexual gendered identities
A Historical Sociolinguistic Perspective on Bilingual LGBTQ+ Communities
No full textThere has been extensive work on the role of bilingualism and multilingualism in speaker identity construction. There has been sociolinguistic ethnographic work that looks at the intersection of bilingual and queer identities (cf. most recently, Holly R. Cashman’s Queer, Latinx, and Bilingual, 2018). My research interests lie in the historical sociolinguistic setting of this interaction. Specifically, I am interested in the language practices of LGBTQ+ communities in metropolitan areas of historical linguistic conflict with the state. Presently, Montréal, Canada (French/English) and Barcelona, Spain (Catalan/Spanish) are my areas of focus. My intentions, broadly speaking, are to examine the impact of social and political implications of language choice on how LGBTQ+ individuals engage with their identities in the social narrative. By the time of the conference, I intend to be fleshing out my methodology after preliminary contact with the archives where I will be collecting data