Research Work Group – Aesthetic Negotiations of Difference: Ethnicity, Gender, and Migration
The processes of globalization leading to a greater variety and intensity of interpersonal situations might be articulated as a ‘culture of contact’. While novel development in social, scientific and economic technologies are enabled, these are accompanied by the necessity for institutions and individuals to reflect on and revise practices of group formation, habits of social behavior, and modes of perception. Aesthetic Negotiations of Difference is a KIM-based work group whose aim is to formulate a constructive, critical dialogue around topics of gender, ethnicity, migration, and representation through an interdisciplinary approach. It seeks to promote exchange amongst scholars, students, artists and the public.
ORGANIZATION: Christa Binswanger, Scott Loren
Workshop – TRANSition Art: Media, Bodies, Borders
As communication technologies and increased mobility across borders lead to a greater intensity of interpersonal situations, our current culture of contact is characterised by transitional spaces that are at once mediated and embodied. Within this context, figurations of the migrant and of migration have become objects of fixation (Thränhardt 1992; Bade/Münz 2002; Müller 2011): whether boats full of refugees arriving at the Italian coast, the national discourse on foreigner quotas, or Sex Tourism in Europe – the movement of bodies across borders continues to proliferate in daily social practices. But how well are practices of migration really understood? This one-day workshop addresses conventional perceptions on the topics of migration, media and gender. Pairing concepts of identity and otherness, gender and sexuality, national borders and mediated spaces, our first task is to move toward a consensus of what these terms mean, how they are related, and how their intersections are socially, economically and politically relevant.
Hosted by the research cluster Cultures, Institutions, Markets (KIM) at the University of St. Gallen’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences, the workshop provides a highly interactive, interdisciplinary and transcultural setting. Students will have the opportunity to work closely with international artists, exploring the realities of migration in Europe and how the lives of individuals are affected beyond conventional perceptions. With a combined focus on media and gender, the workshop’s critical approach to migration through the arts seeks to articulate paradoxes of embodiment in the politics of border crossing, while offering novel perspectives on the mediation bodies in spaces of transition.
CONTRIBUTORS: Noémi Kiss, Tanja Ostojić
PARTNER INSTITUTIONS: Palace St. Gallen, School of Humanities and Social Sciences (HSG), PHSG
ORGANIZATION: Christa Binswanger, Scott Loren
Research Colloquium – The Work of Art: Diplomacy and the Arts in Migration Society
INSTITUTION: School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of St. Gallen
course factsheet, introduction slides
Postdigital lmaginaries 