INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE SOCIÉTÉ, MÉDIAS ET POLITIQUENOVEMBER 1ST 2014

Medias et les nouveauxmouvements sociaux

DR. BIANCA MITULECTURER IN JOURNALISM AND MEDIA

UNIVERSITY OF HUDDERSFIELD

Social Movements “Old” movements - they arose throughout the 19th century: the labor, agrarian, nationalist movements, etc.

“New” movements - human rights groups, anti-racist groups, anti-austerity measures, homosexual rights groups, etc.

(e.g. Thorn, 1997; Melucci, 1996, Eyerman and Jamison, 1991; Cohen and Hrato, 1992)

Reclaim the Streets

Occupy Wall Street

UK Student Protests (2010)

The Greek protests (2010-2012)

Romanian Protests - 2010

Roșia Montană

Carnivalesque An expression of a ‘second life’ of the people Of the people – not given by the state. ‘the world turned upside down’ – distortion and disorder. Social class and status reversed – the fool as king for a

day/mockery of those in power. Gender boundaries and expectations subverted – dressing

up/loosening of identity. Revelry and humour - ‘the belly laugh’/laughter as

corporeal and communal. Celebrating the grotesque – propriety and order rejected.

Bakhtin (1984)

Carnival…

Can be seen as resistance, as a collective response to challenge power.

John Fiske

“Refusal to accept the social identity proposed by the dominant ideology and the social control that goes with it” (Fiske, 1987, p. 240).

The opposition of popular pleasure to social control.

Resistance of audiences to dominant messages.

The Mask

The idea of becoming unidentifiable magnifies commonality and enables collective action,

Being faceless protects and unites, Who we are is not so important as what we

want, Our words, dreams, hopes, demands are more

important than our biographies, Collective “masking up” attracts attention

to the cause

(Holmes, 2003).

Humour and Irony Laughter gets on the

nerves of the authorities Irony can surprise people

and stimulate reflection.

BUT they can threaten the

clarity of a movement

(Graham, 2008)

Conclusions

In recent times the carnivalesque has been revived.

Laughter and irony have become tools for the new generation of activists.

The social aim of the carnival has disappeared and his purpose is now commercial.

Carnival was the idea of lots of different people going all together in the street. Today we have a compilation of individual isolated actions.

References

Bakhtin, M. (1981). The Dialogic Imagination. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Bakhtin, M. (1984). Rabelais and his world. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Burke, P. (1978). Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe, London: Temple Smith.

Conboy, M. (2002). The Press and Popular Culture. London: Sage. Dentith S (2002). Bakhtinian thought. An introductory reader. London:

Routledge. Docker, J. (1994). Postmodernism and Popular Culture: A Cultural History.

Cambridge, UK: Press Syndicate of University of Cambrdge. Fiske, J. (1987). Television Culture. London & New York: Routledge. Graham, St. J. (2008). Protestival: Global Days of Action and

Carnivalized Politics in the Present. In Social Movements Studies, 7. 2: 167-190.

Lachmann R (1988-1989). Bakhtin and carnival: Culture and counter-culture. In Cultural Critique 11.1: 115-152.

Strinati, D. (1995). An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture. London & New York: Routledge.

Thank you!