Jen Webb

BOURDIEU'S CONCEPT OF REFLEXIVITY AS METALITERACY

For Bourdieu, the extent to which agents can attain knowledge of, and negotiate, various cultural fields is dependent upon, and explicable in terms of, two epistemological types. The first is a practical sense (the ‘logic of practice’), while the second involves a sort of conscious comprehension that he names ‘reflexivity’. Bourdieu defines reflexivity as an interrogation of the three types of limitations (of social position, of field and of the scholastic point of view) that are constitutive of knowledge itself. But the reflexive relation to the habitus, the demands and influences exerted by cultural fields, and ones own practices within those fields, cannot be understood simply as something that is obtained by the subject; rather, any reflexive relation to the doxa and illusio of the field must be a constitutive part of that field. This paper identifies a number of principles taken from Bourdieus work that clarify how, where and why the reflexive ‘surpassing’ of literacy might occur. But we also suggest, contra Bourdieu, that only fields that are informed or characterized by the scholastic point of view are likely to be characterized by the set of conditions constitutive of reflexive knowledge; and that the scholastic point of view is therefore, simultaneously, both a potential impediment to, and a condition (almost necessary) of the production of reflexive knowledge.

Some Kind of Virus: The Zombie as Body and as Trope:

‘Zombies are cool’, said a graduate student at a recent seminar. ‘Zombies are vile’, said a film studies lecturer. ‘Zombies are whitey’s way of expressing the terror of alterity’, said a presenter at a recent conference. All true, perhaps. There are many points of attraction in the zombie character, and in a period when zombies seem to be permeating popular culture and emerging in scholarly literature, there are perhaps as many ways of approaching and evaluating zombies as there are people who approach and evaluate. Those ‘people’ include novelists, movie-makers, cultural theorists, adolescents, philosophers, and the mass of fans, each of whom has a solid idea about what constitutes a zombie, what constitutes a seminal zombie text, and why it is worth researching zombies. Because the idea of zombie travels so widely, and across so many fields, it has become a very familiar character, one that participates in narratives of the body, of life and death, of good and evil; one that gestures to alterity, racism, species-ism, the inescapable, the immutable. Thus it takes us to ‘the other side’ – alienation, death, and what is worse than death: the state of being undead. But what is this thing called zombie? Although they are, of course, a fantasy, we know enormous amounts about them – their tastes, appearance, biology,

The visible and the invisible: legacies of violence in contemporary Australian Aboriginal contexts

Australias history begins over 50,000 years ago, but a little over 200 years ago, this history was officially erased through the violence of settlement/invasion, and a new history was written into the official record. This paper addresses the particular “invisibility” that has, since, been the experience for Indigenous Australians in two modes. The first is the invisibility that was introduced by the legal fiction of “terra nullius” and sustained by two centuries of colonialism; the second is the invisibility occasioned by the erasure from official discourse and history of the differences between the 500 (or more) cultural groups that inhabited Australia, differences of culture, language, tradition, beliefs and worldview. Drawing on Pauls experiential knowledge and the findings from the fieldwork he undertook as part of his doctoral research and from Jens cultural research into ways of seeing and the politics of being, we offer an account of the simultaneous visibility and invisibility of the indigenous people of Australia in an attempt to render particular views, values, perspectives and identities not only visible but also capable of being recognised as present and as valid on their own cultural terms.

Policies and Practicalities: Examining the Creative Writing Doctorate

Abstract The creative arts disciplines constitute an important growth area for research higher degrees (HDR), and in recent decades they have built a body of knowledge and set of practices associated with them. There is little empirical work, however, which investigates how examiners of creative arts theses arrive at the commentary presented in their reports. This essay debates key issues around the examination of doctoral theses in creative writing. Drawing on their extensive experience in supervising and examining doctorates in the UK and Australia, the authors address issues such as standards, rigour and ethics in examination, examiners’ capacity to evaluate work produced through a range of research methodologies, and the need to understand and apply the often very different policies adopted by individual universities. Examination policies and practices vary, but the flow of students and teachers between countries, and the scarcity of qualified examiners, raise common questions about standards and consistency. Collaborations with both local and overseas colleagues have begun to build knowledge about these similarities and differences, which will be instructive for those of us involved in reviewing policy or shaping practice, and which certainly makes more transparent the diversity in our sector.

Understanding the Value and the Impact of the ‘Shock’: Examining the Creative Writing Doctorate

The creative arts disciplines are comparative newcomers to the academy, and newer yet to what is formally classed as research. However, they have been very successful in establishing research degrees and attracting students who are keen to pursue practice-led research projects. What is less well established is how we examine the results of doctoral studies in, and through, the arts. Creative writing is comparatively young as a research discipline in universities, with dedicated doctoral programmes in writing only emerging over the past decade or two. As a consequence, there is still considerable uncertainty about the quality of examination in the discipline. Questions that emerge in the limited literature on creative arts examination include: what constitutes a contribution to knowledge that is presented in the form of a creative artifact; in what ways does a creative research doctorate differ from a more conventional output; and how can we examine a creative writing doctorate in a way that accommodates the differences and preserves the integrity of the creative and critical elements of the thesis? In this paper we draw on findings from our recent research on the topic to discuss current approaches and questions of standards in the Australian and British contexts.

Communication Technology and Cultural Politics

The ‘new’ communication technologies occupy a highly contingent place in social consciousness: at once central to our everyday lives, and yet capable of generating anxiety and uncertainty. This article traces some aspects of the relation of everyday people to new media technologies and evaluates the reception and impact of new technologies in their public contexts. Drawing on the thinking of writers such as Slavoj Z izek and Jonathan Crary, we argue that both the fears and celebrations of the media have a considerable lineage. We critically address issues of technological determinism, particularly examining the connection between new media technologies and the politics of global relations.

Poetry Meets Pedagogy

In 2011 Jen Webb met with Michael Rosen, the fifth Children’s Laureate for the UK, to interview him about his approach to poetry. Although the conversation remained focused on poetry, it constantly slid off into the domain of pedagogy. Perhaps this is not surprising.

‘exactly like where you are right now… only much, much better’: art and human rights in UNAUSTRALIA

Paradise: it could be another name for Australia. Actually, there’s no ‘could be’ about it, certainly not according to the tourism operators (‘Beautiful One Day, Perfect the Next!’; ‘There’s No Place Like It!’). Everyone knows that it’s paradise here. Europeans tell me: ‘I’d love to live in Australia, only it’s so far away’. Just like heaven: everyone likes the idea of it, but they don’t want to live there permanently. Of course it’s paradise. It’s a first-world nation with good coffee and perfect beaches; there are shrimps on the barbie and easy Internet access; there’s a strong housing market and more or less universal health care; and its society is based on democratic principles (albeit not always fully applied in practice). For Europeans, as for North Americans, Australia is exactly like where they are right now, only much much better. Yet Australia’s paradise is grounded on a regime of rules and refusals. Listen to the government as they cry God (and let slip the dogs of war); as they threaten artists and asylum seekers, queue jumpers, gay marriage advocates, stem cell researchers and so on and so on, and base those threats on morality, Christian values, tradition and so on and so on. John Howard’s Australia is an orderly paradise. It is predicated on the fundamental notion of the balance of principles, male and female balanced, good and

Poetry and the Conditions of Practice: A Field Study

Webb reports on a field study into an aspect of what Bourdieu titled the “field of cultural production” (1993). Bourdieu is one of the few sociologists who has closely analysed the “universe of belief” that is the creative field, mapping the processes and practices, institutions and individuals, who inhabit that universe, and the illusio that maintains their investment in a field that offers no economic returns. However, he has paid little attention to contemporary poetry and the changes in conditions of entry, possible locations, formal practices, or modes of capital available to its participants. This chapter breaks with what Bourdieu called “the preconstructed”, providing a new map of the field, and particularly a new understanding of the poetic habitus, and of the ways in which contemporary agents navigate the sub-field of poetry production.

Examining the Creative Arts Doctorate in Australia: Implications for supervisors

Abstract One of the significant roles performed by the higher degree research (HDR) supervisor is to assist students to prepare their dissertations for examination. At a time when there is increasing interest in how the academy manages the transition of creative arts HDR candidates from apprentice to peer, there is also concern about the processes, practices, and policies associated with this largely under-researched area of research training. In a recent national Office of Learning and Teaching funded project, we investigated the policy expectations, expert and peer beliefs and expectations, and examiners’ practice around HDR examination, and canvassed the creative arts academic community for their recommendations on best practice in the examination of creative arts doctorates. An unexpected finding was the role of the HDR supervisor in relation to these key areas, and the impact of supervisors upon the examination of students’ theses. This article presents our findings with special reference to the role, understandings, and aspirations of HDR supervisors in the context, and process, of preparing their students for creative arts HDR examination.