Cultural Considerations
Medial Turn and Digitalization as a Threat to Discursive and Artistic Expression in Black Metal and Extreme Music
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Alicja Sułkowska
Black metal accomplished its medial recognition through an individual conception of narrative and visual expression. Because of these strong associations with certain raw and analog media-environment, the popularization of the Internet imposes radical changes on narrative and rhetoric factors in music and whole subculture with its rules and visual concepts. The main emphasis of the study is the determination of manner, in which new policies of recording labels, music magazines, and Bandcamp-like networks alter the understanding of artistic freedom in genres attached to ideological and performative elements in the age of the Internet. Based on exemplary and theoretic research in the field of extreme metal, the study focuses on the stylistic and discursive progression of early fan-zines and music into the epoch of digitalization. Investigating the underground press from a narrative and visual perspective, the paper fulfills its aim of exposing the complex structures of genre’s hierarchy, sender-receiver-models, and their digital abbreviations. On account of the theories from media and culture studies merged with sociology and psychology of media, the study enables the assessment of stylistic and ideological impact Internet reality had on forming of today’s pop-culture. The article calls attention to the modern comprehending of mass media society and the manner in which its evolution may influence the level of tolerance towards the extreme behaviors or radical message in popular culture.
Where is the Japanese Wave?: Why Japanese Pop Music is Unable (or Unwilling) to Match K-pop's Global Popularity
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Dorothy Finan
Exemplified by superbrand and boyband BTS, Korean pop music (or K-pop) is continuing to ride the so-called "Korean Wave". American broadcast and digital media platforms are scrambling to fill their screens with the latest polished productions direct from South Korea. K-pop even proudly featured at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. But with the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics steadily approaching, where exactly is the "Japanese Wave" of globally popular Japanese music? Iwabuchi (2002) argued that Japanese cultural products such as animation succeeded partly due to their "culturally odorless" nature- they didn't seem "Japanese" to overseas consumers. However, this presentation examines two types of pop performers in Japan and Korea respectively, both known as "idols", to argue that, Japanese popular music's downfall is actually its very 'cultural odor', its overtly branded "Japanese-ness" that relies on the "Weird Japan" brand established by cultural products of decades previous. This presentation follows existing comparisons of J-pop and K-pop (Jung and Hirata, 2012; Lie, 2012) in arguing that the economic trajectories of Japan and Korea, as well as the contrasting structures of each country's music industries are vital to understanding the absence of a "Japanese Wave", but additionally incorporates the examination of media discourses about each country's "brand" to argue that such discourses are an indispensable part of any political economy perspective.
Locating the Davao Film Culture: An Exploration of the Relationship of Geography and the Cinema of a Regional City Center
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Sarah Isabelle Torres
Using Lefebvre’s (1991) Spatial Triad, this study explores the relationship of geography and cinema and asks the question: how does geography shape the film culture of a regional city center located at the periphery of a country’s capital? This research aims to locate the contemporary film scene of the city in question, Davao City, Mindanao, Philippines through contextualizing the politics and culture of its tri-people. This study shows that primarily because of local filmmakers’ affection and sense of place, progressive films focusing on the tri-people and their struggles mainly due to issues on land have been born. To further understand the city’s film culture, this study maps the following areas: 1) filmmakers and cineastes, 2) films, 3) film festivals, 4) financial stakeholders, 5) institutions, and 6) screening places. From these, the researcher learned that although the local film community has established itself for decades, problems on audience, funding, and institutional support continue to persist. Aside from mapping, this study also explores Davao’s political, economic, and cultural position within the regional and the national arenas.
