{"id":826,"date":"2014-09-22T13:40:06","date_gmt":"2014-09-22T01:40:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/?p=826"},"modified":"2014-09-22T13:42:06","modified_gmt":"2014-09-22T01:42:06","slug":"mega-month-of-activity-for-august-research-roundup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/2014\/09\/22\/mega-month-of-activity-for-august-research-roundup\/","title":{"rendered":"Mega-month of activity for August research roundup"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"terrors<\/a>

Associate Professor Joe Grixti’s book Terrors of Uncertainty has been re-released, along with other classic humanities texts, as part of the Routledge Revivals series<\/p><\/div>\n

From Gothic and horror fiction to e-waste and the grand successes of The Naturalist<\/em>, it\u2019s been another very busy month for EMS research and scholarship \u2013 check out our news in this latest Research Roundup!<\/p>\n

\u2022 Dr Erin Mercer co-edited a special issue of M\/C – A Journal of Media and Culture<\/em> on the Gothic, and published\u00a0an article on the difficulties faced by contemporary New Zealand writers attempting to use the Gothic genre without reactivating colonialist tropes of haunting Maori, skeletal remains and a Gothicised New Zealand landscape. In the issue\u2019s editorial, titled \u2018Gothic: New Directions in Media and Popular Culture\u2019 Dr Mercer and co-editor Dr Lorna Piatti-Farnell of AUT discussed the continuing importance of the Gothic mode in contemporary culture and how that mode is constantly evolving into new forms and manifestations. They argued that the \u201cmulti-faceted nature of the Gothic in our contemporary popular culture moment is accurately signaled by the various media on which these special issue essays focus, from television to literature, animation, music, and film. The place occupied by the Gothic beyond representational forms, and into the realms of cultural practice, is also signaled, an important shift within the bounds of Gothic Studies which is bound to initiate fascinating debates. The transformations of the Gothic in media and culture are, therefore, also surveyed, so to continue the ongoing critical conversation on not only the place of the Gothic in contemporary narratives, but also its duplicitous, malleable, and often slippery nature\u201d. Check out the special issue at http:\/\/journal.media-culture.org.au\/index.php\/mcjournal\/showToc\/current<\/a> along with Dr Mercer\u2019s article on Supernaturalism and Settlement in New Zealand Gothic Fiction \u2013 tantalisingly titled \u201cA deluge of shrieking unreason\u201d at http:\/\/journal.media-culture.org.au\/index.php\/mcjournal\/article\/viewArticle\/846<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Dr Radha O\u2019Meara and Dr Alex Bevan were co-organisers of a\u00a0symposium entitled Loops and Splices: Changing Media Technologies, on August 1st 2014. The symposium explored a recent turn in media scholarship that uncovers the overlooked and under-examined media technologies that contribute to historical and contemporary practice. Papers looked at how different media technologies have functioned in relation to historical and social practices, aesthetic traditions and specific cultural moments. Keynote speaker Prof Ian Christie (Anniversary Professor of Film and Media History at Birkbeck College, University of London) presented on \u2018Denying depth: uncovering the hidden history of 3D in photography and film.\u2019 English and Media Studies staff were also well represented as presenters at the symposium (more below). You can see EMS staff member Dr Sy Taffel\u2019s blog about the symposium at http:\/\/mediaecologies.wordpress.com\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Dr Sy Taffel presented a paper entitled \u201cArchEcologies of Ewaste\u201d at the Loops + Splices Symposium. The paper explored how media archaeology and media ecologies can be complementary methods in examining a range of issues pertaining to materiality and the damaging effects of the toxic digital detritus that we discard. He focused particularly on ewaste in New Zealand, where there currently is no mandatory (or even free) nationwide ewaste collection scheme, unlike in the EU where the WEEE directive mandates that all ewaste is recycled in high tech local facilities. More than 80,000 tonnes of ewaste annually enter New Zealand\u2019s landfills, adding noxious elements like mercury, arsenic and lead to the soil and water table. Dr Taffel argued that ideas from media archaeology (a way of exploring past technology with a view to creatively reassembling and reusing technology rather than seeing earlier products as obsolete) combined with media ecologies (a reincorporative model of cyclical technological redesign) could point us towards a new age of \u2018repair\u2019 ethos, where waste was reduced and new designs resulted from the creative clash of old and new. You can see Dr Taffel\u2019s presentation at http:\/\/prezi.com\/iap-xqlsvb2o\/archecologies-of-e-waste\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0Dr Kevin Glynn presented on \u201cTechnologies of Indigeneity: M\u0101ori Television and Convergence Culture,\u201d a research focus that has emerged out of his Marsden-funded project working with Dr Julie Cupples (University of Edinburgh) on \u2018Geographies of Media Convergence: Spaces of Democracy, Connectivity and the Reconfiguration of Cultural Citizenship.\u2019 Dr Sy Taffel reports on his blog that \u201cthe paper focused on New Zealand media representations of the Urewera raids of 2007, and a more recent case where Air New Zealand, who prominently feature Maori iconography in their branding, terminated an interview with a woman for having a ta moko (traditional body markings), which they claimed would unsettle their customers. The paper explored impacts associated with the introduction of Maori TV and social networking software such as Facebook and Twitter on the ability of Maori to represent themselves and partake in mediated debates surrounding cultural identity\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0Dr Allen Meek presented at Loops and Splices on \u201cTestimony and the chronophotographic gesture.\u201d The paper addressed the role of gesture in Holocaust testimony. Specifically it looked at some sequences from Claude Lanzmann\u2019s long documentary film Shoah<\/em>. Dr Meek\u00a0argued that most scholarship has tended to discuss this film in terms of the transmission of the trauma of the Holocaust from the survivor to the viewer. Instead, he drew on the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben\u2019s essay on gesture to develop a different reading of Shoah<\/em>. Agamben argues that photography and the moving image have taken the autonomy of human gesture away from the individual person. When human gestures and movements are recorded they become a form of visual information that can be used for purposes of political control and economic exploitation. Dr Meek\u2019s paper showed how Holocaust testimony forms part of a larger history of recorded gesture in the cinema that we need to consider if we are to understand its relation both to the Nazi system of power and to our recording and viewing of testimony today.<\/p>\n

\u2022 In other recent research highlights, Associate Professor Joe Grixti’s book\u00a0Terrors of Uncertainty: The Cultural Contexts of Horror Fiction<\/em> has been re-released as part of Routledge’s ‘Revivals’ series of classic and important books. Routledge Revivals is a programme designed to reissue a wealth of out-of-print and unavailable titles written by some of the leading academic scholars of the last 120 years. To date, the programme includes titles by the likes of Sir Andrew Motion, Hermione Lee, Zygmunt Bauman, Karl Jaspers, Malcolm Bradbury, Simone Weil, Emile Durkheim, Charles Kindleberger and W. Arthur Lewis, now along with our own Head of School of English & Media Studies, Dr Grixti. Terrors of Uncertainty<\/em> covers horror fiction from Frankenstein\u00a0and\u00a0Dracula\u00a0to\u00a0Psycho\u00a0and\u00a0The Chainsaw Massacre, illustrating how horror fiction has provided our culture with some of its most enduring themes and narratives. In selecting the text for reissue Routledge notes that: “Considering horror fiction both as a genre and as a social phenomenon, Joseph Grixti provides a theoretical and historical framework for reconsidering horror and the cultural apparatus that surrounds it. First published in 1989, this book looks at shifts in the genre\u2019s meaning \u2013 its fascination with excess, its commentaries on the categories and boundaries of culture \u2013 and at interpretations of horror from psychology, psychoanalysis, sociology, cultural and media studies”. Terrors of Uncertainty<\/em>\u00a0brings together a provocative range of perspectives from across the disciplines, which combine to raise important questions about the relationship between fiction and society, and the way in which we use fiction to resolve or evade our fears of uncertainty. Available in both hardcopy and e-book\u00a0at:\u00a0http:\/\/www.routledge.com\/books\/details\/9781138794511\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Essential New Zealand Poems: Facing the Empty Page<\/em>\u00a0was recently published by Random House featuring work by a number of staff and PhD students from the School of English and Media Studies: Dr Ingrid Horrocks, Dr Jack Ross, Tim Upperton, Sarah-Jane Barnett, and Aleksandra Lane. Ingrid Horrocks and Aleksandra Lane were named by reviewer Philip Matthews in the Dominion Post<\/em> as two of half a dozen of \u201cthe best of a new and younger generation\u201d of poets to whom readers should \u201cPay attention now and in the future\u201d (Your Weekend, Dominion Post<\/em>, 5 July 2014, p. 27). \u00a0For more information, go to the publisher’s site at\u00a0http:\/\/www.randomhouse.co.nz\/books\/siobhan-harvey-harry-ricketts-and-james-norcliffe\/essential-new-zealand-poems-9781775534594.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 A launch event for Essential New Zealand Poems \u2013 Facing the Empty Page<\/em> held at PNCC Library on 7 August featured local poets Johanna Aitchison (former Visiting Artist and Tutor) and Tim Upperton (Tutor and current PhD stuent) in conversation with Harry Ricketts, poet, academic editor, reviewer and cricket writer. Johanna, Tim and Harry discussed and read from the recently published ‘Essential New Zealand Poems’ edited by Siobhan Harvey, Harry Ricketts and James Norcliffe (another former Massey University School of English & Media Studies Visiting Artist).<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0A creative essay by Dr Ingrid Horrocks which forms a key part of Maddie Leach\u2019s collaborative conceptual art project if you find the good oil let us know<\/em>, features until September as part of the Walters Prize exhibition at the Auckland Art Gallery.\u00a0See our previous post on this fascinating artwork and Dr Horrocks’ involvement here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Associate Professor Lisa Emerson along with Massey colleagues from Education and Communication ran multiple workshops in the lower North island for tertiary teachers on Literacy in the Transition to Tertiary Education. These presentations are based on their research, funded by the government\u2019s Teaching and Learning Research Initiative (TLRI) fund, on transitioning into tertiary study through academic literacy development, and were supported by Ako Aotearoa.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Dr Thom Conroy launched his book, The Naturalist, on Friday 15 August \u2013 the book then spent several weeks at Number One in the NZ Bestseller list. See previous post here<\/a>. See also: Thom\u2019s interview with Kim Hill, available at: http:\/\/www.radionz.co.nz\/national\/programmes\/saturday\/audio\/20145074\/thom-conroy-channeling-dieffenbach<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Senior Tutors Joy Green and Tim Upperton launched their books as part of the Kete Series \u2013 Manawatu Poetry at the PNCC Library on Poetry Day \u2013 Friday 22 August 2014. This series, published by HauNui Press features Joy\u2019s and Tim\u2019s poetry collections as well as that of Leonel Alvarado, School of Humanities. See more here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Dr Thom Conroy spoke on the Intersection between History and Fiction in Historical Fiction<\/a> at Te Papa, 28 August.<\/p>\n

\u2022 On August 25, two final-year undergraduate Bachelor of Communication students from CoHSS participated, with Associate Professor Elspeth Tilley, in an applied communication research project involving collaboration with Massey\u2019s Joint Centre for Disaster Research, the Department of Conservation and Geological and Natural Sciences. The\u00a0project, which involves gathering data on Mt Ruapehu to help understand and improve lahar warning and mountain safety communication effectiveness, was reported on Radio New Zealand’s Our Changing World Science and Environment program, see more here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Associate Professor Angie Farrow won\u00a0won ‘Best Drama Script’ for her new play ‘Leo Rising’ <\/a>at the Auckland Short and Sweet Festival 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Gothic and horror fiction to e-waste and the grand successes of The Naturalist, it\u2019s been another very busy month for EMS research and scholarship \u2013 check out our news in this latest Research Roundup! \u2022 Dr Erin Mercer co-edited a special issue of M\/C – A Journal of Media and Culture on the Gothic, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[90,12,2,89,1,91,99,13],"tags":[25,175,116,117,111,174],"class_list":["post-826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-academic-writing","category-creative-writing","category-dmp","category-english","category-expressive-arts-subject","category-media-subject","category-research","category-theatre","tag-creative-writing-2","tag-english","tag-literature","tag-media-studies","tag-research-2","tag-theatre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=826"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":866,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826\/revisions\/866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}