Liberal Hypocrisy is Fueling American Inequality. Here’s How. | NYT Opinion

17 Nov 2021
It’s easy to blame the other side. And for many Democrats, it’s obvious that Republicans are thwarting progress toward a more equal society.

But what happens when Republicans aren’t standing in the way?

In many states — including California, New York and Illinois — Democrats control all the levers of power. They run the government. They write the laws. And as we explore in the video above, they often aren’t living up to their values.

In key respects, many blue states are actually doing worse than red states. It is in the blue states where affordable housing is often hardest to find, there are some of the most acute disparities in education funding and economic inequality is increasing most quickly.

Instead of asking, “What’s the matter with Kansas?” Democrats need to spend more time pondering, “What’s the matter with California?”

A ticket to the moon | DW Documentary

17 Nov 2021
In the 1960s, US airline Pan Am sold spots on a waiting list for a trip to the moon. With the Cold War raging, nearly 100,000 customers on both sides of the Iron Curtain reserved their tickets – and the filmmaker’s family was among them.

While the US and the Soviet Union fought over dominating space, citizens on both sides of the Iron Curtain were clamoring for their spots in the “First Moon Flights” Club. The grandfather of film director Veronika Janatková purchased one of these tickets to the moon in Prague back in 1969, and her family still owns it to this day. She tracks down several fellow would-be lunanauts and humorously tells their stories in this documentary, while recounting the notions people associated with space and continue to entertain today.

‘A Ticket to the Moon’ features exclusive clips from Eastern European film archives as well as interviews with Margaret Weitekamp, Curator of the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, and Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society. In addition, science fiction philosopher Ivan Adamovic and space historian Alexander Geppert speak about the relationship between cosmic utopias and the human need to dream. Austrian journalist Gerhard Pistor also talks about his involvement in helping prompt Pan Am to create the “First Moon Flights” Club in 1967.

Ari Berman: With Extreme Gerrymandering, the Republicans Are Rigging the Next Decade of Elections

17 Nov 2021
Republicans are set to claim the House majority in next year’s midterm elections with help from heavily gerrymandered congressional district maps in states nationwide that could shape politics for the next decade, securing Republican wins even as the party’s popular vote shrinks at the national level, says Mother Jones reporter Ari Berman. “The same states that are pushing voter suppression are also pushing extreme gerrymandered maps to lock in white Republican power for the next decade at the state and federal level,” says Berman

Climate Colonialism: Why Was Occupied Western Sahara Excluded from COP26 U.N. Summit in Scotland?

17 Nov 2021
Activists are criticizing the British government for excluding Western Sahara, occupied by Morocco since 1975, from the U.N. climate summit in Scotland. Meanwhile, Morocco is counting renewable energy developments in Western Sahara towards its own climate pledges. Sahwari activists and the Sahrawi government in exile known as SADR, the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, have described this as climate colonialism. Negotiators from Western Sahara independently announced a plan to reduce carbon emissions outside COP26, as the climate crisis has brought extreme weather conditions including drought, extreme heat and flooding to the region. In an interview last week in Glasgow, Scotland while COP26 was underway, Oubi Bouchraya Bachir, a representative of the Polisario Front for Europe and the European Union, estimated 30% of the solar energy produced by Morocco “will be produced from within the illegal context of occupation.” We also spoke with climate change consultant Nick Brooks, who has traveled to Western Sahara for decades to carry out archaeological and palaeo-environmental fieldwork and helped release the Sahrawi climate plan adjacent to the COP26. “They have been completely and systematically excluded from international processes of climate governance and climate finance,” Brooks said of the Sahrawi.

Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment | University of Oxford

We believe that to address climate change and environmental sustainability, it is essential to bring business into the conversation.

We are housed in the University of Oxford’s School of Geography and the Environment, ranked #1 globally in the QS World University subject rankings. We focus on environmental economics and policy as well as enterprise management, financial markets, investment and law.

Find out more About the Smith School

Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to Researching with Visual Materials

Review

Gillian Rose has provided a welcome overview of the state of the field. Visual Methodologies succeeds both as an introductory text, certain to be widely adopted in the classroom, and as a sophisticated refresher course for those who have followed the rapid maturation of this remarkable interdisciplinary discourse. Added material on the latest advances in digital technology brings this latest edition to the cutting edge of visual culture studies.

Review

Gillian Rose has provided a welcome overview of the state of the field. Visual Methodologies succeeds both as an introductory text, certain to be widely adopted in the classroom, and as a sophisticated refresher course for those who have followed the rapid maturation of this remarkable interdisciplinary discourse. Added material on the latest advances in digital technology brings this latest edition to the cutting edge of visual culture studies.

— Martin Jay

Visual Methodologies is an indispensable resource for anyone working with visual materials. It offers practical guidance and expert theoretical orientation on how to approach, think about, and interpret visual culture, ranging from archival photography and documentary film to websites and social media. An important aspect of this book is the attention paid to audiences and viewing publics, as well as to the ethical demands of visual research. In this new edition, Gillian Rose brings the book fully up to date with contemporary developments in media arts and digital culture, and explores the new possibilities for visual research made possible by developments in software and data analytics. Whether you are new to studying visual culture or a seasoned expert seeking to refine your approach, Visual Methodologies has you covered.

— Christoph Lindner

An indispensible book for teaching and understanding methods in visual culture. Clear, comprehensive, and lucid, it makes accessible the how, why, and what of different methodological approaches in ways that elucidate paths to better research and argument.

The constantly changing terrain of visual culture today makes many demands on scholarly and theoretical approaches, and this Fourth Edition does not disappoint, with updated concepts and an explanation of digital methods. As an introduction of methods in cultural studies, communication, and visual culture research, this book is unparalleled.  Essential reading for anyone writing an MA thesis of doctoral dissertation. — Marita Sturken

An essential book for all students, researchers and academics interested in visual culture. The book has always had an interdisciplinary research, making it an adaptable, meaningful text. With this new edition, the application of visual methodologies is made even more vital given its coverage of digital technologies and our expanded engagement with the image through complex and nuanced visualization of everything online. This extends not only our daily perception of the visual, but creates new ground through which to understand ourselves and our relationship to others. Visual Methodologies treats the emergence of this with passion, providing a theoretical and methodological framework that is accessible, engaging and exciting. — Dr Adrienne Evans

Through its previous editions Visual Methodologies has undoubtedly become a profoundly influential text. Through a series of telling and careful revisions it has been significantly updated in response to changing visual cultures. This edition refreshes and reinvigorates what was already a lively, revealing and vital text. Not least, this updated edition responds directly to changes in digital cultures and the new possibilities of visual engagement and communication. It is the ideal guide to teaching and researching with visual methods. — Dr David Beer

Gillian Rose has done it again. This indispensable guide to visual methodologies improves with each edition. Extensively updated and revised, there is a new emphasis here on the circulation of images through varied technologies and the potential for digital methods to reveal patterns in the movements, translations and social value of such images. The reader comes away not only with practical knowledge for designing research questions and methods, but crucially with an enhanced understanding of the theoretical foundations and ethical considerations which underpin the most valuable and insightful visual analyses. This is not simply a ‘how to’ methods book. — Dr Katy Parry

For the last 15 years, Rose’s Visual Methodologies has been an exceptionally influential and invaluable text for those wishing to engage with visual research methods, with each new edition evolving and building upon the strengths of the previous. This fourth edition is no exception. With an expanded coverage of new media, Rose’s revised work encompasses a comprehensive and detailed overview of imaginative approaches and engagements with visual materials that are readily accessible for undergraduate and postgraduate researchers. Moreover, this new edition effectively addresses many of those pressing questions often asked by student researchers, not only in terms of the practical aspects of using critical visual methods, but also in relation to the dissemination of research through visual techniques. In short, this fourth edition represents a welcome expansion of an already definitive introductory text on critical visual methods. — James Robinson

Remains the authoritative introductory text on the methods of visual research. Conveying the richness and excitement of visual culture research, Rose expertly navigates across a range of methodologies, explaining in detail their particular usefulness and limitations through practical examples. For anyone already familiar with Visual Methodologies, this fourth edition offers a significant reworking of previous content. This includes a discussion of digital methods for online imagery and expansion of digital media examples, the production and use of images for research dissemination and, most significantly, the inclusion of the cite of circulation within the framework that Rose presents for the analysis of visual culture. As such, Rose demonstrates the evolving nature of visual research and its methods, and reminds us of the passion involved in its study. A must buy for students and scholars alike. — Julie Doyle

One and half decade after its first edition, Visual Methodologies continues to position itself as a key reading for anyone who is looking for a solid, accessible and systematic introduction to the increasingly popular but complex domain of image analysis and visual culture research. Gillian Rose deserves much praise for her sustained and highly successful efforts to keep this core text in critical visual analysis as fresh and relevant as ever. This fourth edition includes discussions about the newest visual and digital technologies and their interrelated practices. But the author also thoroughly revisited and refined the book’s overall structure to better guide the uninitiated reader through this kaleidoscopic and somewhat confused area of study. — Luc Pauwels

Clear, comprehensive, theoretically informed, and now fully updated and revised, Visual Methodologies is an excellent guide to the rapidly growing field of visual research. — Theo van Leeuwen

There is simply no better resource or inspiration for conducting, analyzing, and disseminating visual research than Gillian Rose’s Visual Methodologies. Her theoretical clarity about visual culture and power relations is seamlessly woven into her discussion and evaluation of a wide range of research methods. The breadth, depth, and detail of the exemplary research upon which she draws to elucidate the different approaches increases with each revised volume, and the 4 Edition is no exception. Rose has given us a comprehensive, wise, and rigorous guide for doing visual research that will invigorate the field and its practitioners. — Professor Wendy Luttrell

There is now increasing use of visual methods in empirically-grounded research. This increased use may be attributable to new and accessible technologies for visualisation. It may also, Rose and others have argued, reflect increased awareness of the appropriateness of visual methods as a means of documenting and representing the social world.

The methodological insights provided by researchers’ experiences of applying visual methods are brought together in Rose’s compendium. This book is aimed at a wide readership: from new undergraduates, to postgraduate researchers and academics across both humanities and social science. It can be used as an introduction, a refresher, or for more in-depth debate.

Written in an accessible style, following a theoretical introduction and useful navigation section, each of the following eight chapters follows a common format. Different methodologies used to interpret visual culture are set out with examples, theoretical underpinnings, elaboration of the method, issues for discussion, critique, and finally a summary and further reading.

— Rosemary Lamport ― SRA Research Matters Published On: 2018-03-01

About the Author

My research interests lie broadly within the field of visual culture. I′m interested in visuality as a kind of practice, done by human subjects in collaboration with different kinds of objects and technologies.

One long-term project, which resulted in a book from Ashgate Press in 2010, looked at family photos. I approached family snaps by thinking of them as objects embedded in a wide range of practices. I interviewed women with young children about their photos, and also looked at the politics and ethics of family snaps moving into more public arenas of display when the people they picture are the victims of violence. The book explores the different ′politics of sentiment′ in which family snaps participate in both their domestic spaces in the public space of the contemporary mass media.

Other work is extending my interest in subjectivities, space and visual practices by exploring experiences of designed urban spaces. I completed an ESRC-funded project on this theme with Dr Monica Degen at Brunel University in 2009, in which we compared how people experienced two rather different town centres: Milton Keynes and Bedford. Monica Degen, Clare Melhuish and I started a new ESRC-funded project in the autumn of 2011. ′Architectural atmospheres, branding and the social: the role of digital visualizing technologies in contemporary architectural practice′ was a two-year ethnographic study of how digital visualizing technologies are being used by architects in a number of architects′ studio in London.

I′m also interested in more innovative ways to produce social science research, especially using visual materials. I was involved in organising the ESRC Seminar Series ′Visual Dialogues: New Agendas in Inequalities Research′ (2010-2012). Please visit the ′Visual Dialogues: New Agendas in Inequalities Research′ for more details. I′m also a member of the OpenSpace Research Centre.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ SAGE Publications Ltd; 4th edition (April 18, 2016)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 456 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1473948908
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1473948907
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.92 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.7 x 1.1 x 9.4 inches

Attenborough tells COP26 conference delegates: ‘The world is looking to you’ – BBC News

BBC News – Nov 1, 2021

Sir David Attenborough urged COP26 climate summit delegates to “turn tragedy into triumph” and tackle climate change. His speech, in which he said the fate of future generations was at risk, drew a standing ovation.

India steps up pollution fight in capital with power plant suspensions • FRA NCE 24 English

FRANCE 24 English– Nov 17, 2021

#India stepped up efforts on Wednesday to combat high levels of #pollution in New #Delhi that threaten the lives of residents and others nearby, ordering a temporary halt to operations of five power stations and longer school closures. FRANCE 24’s Diya Gupta reports from New Delhi.

Rep. Gosar Faces Censure for AOC Murder Video, Refuses to Apologize. Siste r Calls Him a “Sociopath.”

Democracy Now! – Nov 17, 2021

We speak with Jennifer Gosar, the youngest sister of far-right Arizona Congressmember Paul Gosar, who faces censure in a House vote today for posting an animated video on social media that features him murdering Congressmember Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking President Biden with swords. Gosar will be required to stand in the well of the House while the resolution is read. His colleagues will also vote to strip him of his assignments on the Committee on Oversight and Reform, alongside Ocasio-Cortez, and the Committee on Natural Resources. “He’s continuing to sing to that white supremacist base that he fundraises from,” says Jennifer Gosar, who has previously described him as a “sociopath.”

West Africa in History, Vol. 1: Before 1800: W. F. Conton

This book provides a fascinating summary of African history over 5000 years, from the Stone Age to the classical Greek and Roman era, through the ‘medieval’ period of the kingdoms of the Western Sudan and into the colonial era. This is far beyond the time span normally covered in history texts, and it empowers Conton to sweeping conclusions. The style and language are simple in this text, originally intended for West African secondary school students, but the concepts the author explores are universal and still very topical.

Writing from a very definite point of view, his reach in space and time is vast, drawing on historical evidence from around the globe, from ancient, classical, medieval and pre-modern sources and from local, oral traditions.

Unafraid of controversy, he confidently quotes Herodotus’ account of the early circumnavigation of Africa before he describes the slow, patient achievement of this objective by the Portuguese some 2,000 years later. He raises the possibility that the Yoruba may have actually come from Egypt, an “advanced civilization” which he maintains “probably had at least one [black] community.” He dwells at length on the “great” African empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhai, all the while backing up his history with sources, detailed maps and photographic evidence of the rich culture of ancient West Africa. This book provides a very useful background to the general reader interested in a fuller understanding of the region.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Allen and Unwin; 2nd Revised edition (January 1, 1969)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 174 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0049660047
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0049660045
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.42 x 9 inches