Studi e ricerche

Postcolonial Publics: Art and Citizen Media in Europe

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open access | peer reviewed

Abstract

Postcolonial Publics: Art and Citizen Media in Europe presents a collection of sixteen chapters that explore the themes of how migrants, refugees and citizens express and share their political and social causes and experiences through art and media. These expressions, which we term ‘citizen media’, arguably become a platform for postcolonial intellectuals as the studies pursued in this volume investigate the different ways in which previously excluded social groups regain public voice. The volume strives to understand the different articulations of migrants’, refugees’, and citizens’ struggle against increasingly harsh European politics that allow them to achieve and empower political subjectivity in a mediated and creative space. In this way, the contributions in this volume present case studies of citizen media in the form of ‘activistic art’ or ‘artivism’ (Trandafoiu, Ruffini, Cazzato & Taronna, Koobak & Tali, Negrón-Muntaner), activism through different kinds of technological media (Chouliaraki and Al-Ghazzi, Jedlowski), such as documentaries and film (Denić), podcasts, music and soundscapes (Romeo and Fabbri, Western, Lazzari, Huggan), and activisms through writings from journalism to fiction (Longhi, Concilio, Festa, De Capitani). The volume argues that citizen media go hand in hand with postcolonial critique because of their shared focus on the deconstruction and decolonisation of Western logics and narratives. Moreover, both question the concept of citizen and of citizenship as they relate to the nation-state and explores the power of media as a tool for participation as well as an instrument of political strength. The book forwards postcolonial artivism and citizen media as a critical framework to understand the refugee and migrant situations in contemporary Europe.

Keywords New media • Politics • Romania • Reni Eddo-Lodge • Coloniality • Anticolonialism • Borderscape • Postcolonial theory • Performance and spatial politics • Postcolonial France • Eastern Europe • Citizenship • Structural racism • Activism • Memory • Intellectual • Estonian art • Crisis ordinariness • Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie • User-generated content • Participatory art and public spaces • Literature of migration • Artivist engagement • Hostile environment • Refugee Tales • Postsocialism • Relation • Humour • Black Italian women intellectuals • Flesh witnessing • Citizen media • Racism • Decoloniality of knowledge • Palestine • Social engagement • African-European • Italy • Bowie • Failure • Diaspora • Black portraitures • Documentary auto-ethnography • Rhythm • Post-socialism • Warsan Shire • Celebrity • Visibility • Black intellectuals • Colonialism • Black comedians • Decolonial citizenship • Multimodal narration • Cinema • Discrimination • Postcolonial Europe • Slavery • Relay • Postcolonial • Counter-publics • Renaming • Intersectionality • Teju Cole • Research • Migrant Voices • Social media • Border culture • Blackness • Mainstream media • Decoloniality • Visual art • Knowledge • Borders • Digital activism • Activist curating • Justice • Radio • Podcasts • Theatre and refugees • Conflict news • Syria war

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-677-0 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-677-0 | ISBN (PRINT) 978-88-6969-678-7 | Pubblicato 26 Gennaio 2023 | Lingua en

Copyright © 2023 Bolette B. Blaagaard, Sabrina Marchetti, Sandra Ponzanesi, Shaul Bassi. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.