Relative Intimacies

An examination of the introduction of a non-human actor into the field of intersubjectivity. Our most intimate spaces are increasingly sites of intersubjective relations. The widespread presence of technological networks in particular has made visible the ways in which agency and subjectivity are often distributed, engendering theories of hybrid subjects who might integrate the human with other biological or technological agents. These incursions into traditional notions of subjectivity not only destabilize our sense of autonomy but also explode the human sensorium, reminding us that it is only one of many viable systems for sensing, perceiving, and communicating. Relative Intimacies collects essays, conversations, and artworks to explore how technology now mediates our encounters and, in doing so, forms alternate, networked subjectivities. It asks how intersubjective intimacy might be theorized epistemologically, aesthetically, philosophically, and politically, and considers how such relative intimacy might connect physical matter and cybernetic systems or forge new subjectivities between constellations of actors. Bringing together academic, curatorial, and artistic perspectives, Relative Intimacies initiates points of contact between artificial, biological, and emotional intelligence. Contributors Cecilia Bengolea, Dora Budor, Lou Cantor, Constant Dullaart, Hal Foster, Kevin Gotkin, Camille Henrot, Sun-Ha Hong, Tobias Kaspar, Devin Kenny, Agnieszka Kurant, Lynn Hershman Leeson, John Miller, Frederick Cruz Nowell, X Zhu-Nowell, Samantha Ozer, Aleksandra Przegalinska, Farid Rakun, Tiana Reid, Patrick Urs Riechert, Isabel de Sena, Jenna Sutela, Elena Vogman, Emily Watlington

This book focuses on the role of conflict in psychological and social development.

"Drawing on a decade of fieldwork in the borderlands of northern Bangladesh and eastern India, A Thousand Tiny Cuts chronicles the slow transformation of a connected region into national borderlands and shows the foundational place of gender and sexuality in the meaning and management of threat in relation to mobility. It recasts a singular focus on border fences and border crossings to show, instead, that bordering is an expansive and accumulative reordering of relations of value. Devaluations-of agrarian land and crops, borderland youth undesirable as brides and grooms in their respective national hinterlands, disconnection of regional infrastructures, and social and physical geographies disordered by surveillance-proliferate as the costs of militarization across this ostensibly "friendly" border. Through a textured ethnography of the gendered political economy of mobility across a postcolonial borderlands in South Asia, this ambitious book challenges anthropological understanding of the violence of bordering, migration and citizenship, and transnational inequalities that are based on Euro-American borders and security regimes"--

This is an interdisciplinary volume exploring a range of historical, anthropological and literary ideas and issues in South Asian Borderlands. Going beyond the territorial and geo-political imaginaries of contemporary borderlands in South Asia, chapters in this book engage with the questions of sovereignty, control, policing as well as continuing affections across politically divided borderlands. Modern conceptions of nationhood have created categories of legality and illegality among historically, socially, economically and emotionally connected residents of South Asian borderlands. This volume provides unique insights into the interconnected lives and histories of these borderland spaces and communities.

In the highland region of Sullk'ata, located in the rural Bolivian Andes, habitual activities such as sharing food, work, and stories create a sense of relatedness among people. Through these day-to-day interactions—as well as more unusual events—individuals negotiate the affective bonds and hierarchies of their relationships. In Performing Kinship, Krista E. Van Vleet reveals the ways in which relatedness is evoked, performed, and recast among the women of Sullk'ata. Portraying relationships of camaraderie and conflict, Van Vleet argues that narrative illuminates power relationships, which structure differences among women as well as between women and men. She also contends that in the Andes gender cannot be understood without attention to kinship. Stories such as that of the young woman who migrates to the city to do domestic work and later returns to the highlands voicing a deep ambivalence about the traditional authority of her in-laws provide enlightening examples of the ways in which storytelling enables residents of Sullk'ata to make sense of events and link themselves to one another in a variety of relationships. A vibrant ethnography, Performing Kinship offers a rare glimpse into an compelling world.

The updated guide that helps psychologists utilize ethical principles and standards to conduct their work activities, avoid ethical violations, and preserve and protect the fundamental rights and welfare of those they seek to help.

Musical Intimacies and Indigenous Imaginaries explores several styles performed in the vital aboriginal musical scene in the western Canadian province of Manitoba, focusing on fiddling, country music, Christian hymnody, and step dancing. In considering these genres and the contexts in which they are performed, author Byron Dueck outlines a compelling theory of musical publics, examines the complex, overlapping social orientations of contemporary musicians, and shows how music and dance play a central role in a distinctive indigenous public culture. Dueck considers a wide range of contemporary aboriginal performances and venues--urban and rural, secular and sacred, large and small. Such gatherings create opportunities for the expression of distinctive modes of northern Algonquian sociability and for the creative extension of indigenous publicness. In examining these interstitial sites--at once places of intimate interaction and spaces oriented to imagined audiences--this volume considers how Manitoban aboriginal musicians engage with audiences both immediate and unknown; how they negotiate the possibilities mass mediation affords; and how, in doing so, they extend and elaborate indigenous sociability. Musical Intimacies brings theories of public culture from anthropology and literary criticism into musicological and ethnomusicological discussions while introducing productive new ways of understanding North American indigenous engagement with mass mediation. It is a unique work that will appeal to students and scholars of popular music, musicology, music theory, anthropology, sociology, and cultural studies. It will be necessary reading for students of American ethnomusicology, First Nations and Native American studies, and Canadian music studies.