1 Semester

36 hours

Hawthorn

HAC440

Nil

Credit Points: 25 Credit Points

Related Course/s:

A unit of study in the Bachelor of Arts (Honours) Cultural Studies Strand.

Aims & Objectives:

The aim of this unit of study is to show how the cultural and social theories examined in HAC440 can illuminate the processes of globalisation and its consequences.

Teaching Methods:

Seminars

Assessment:

Essays, Seminar Presentation

Generic Skills Outcomes:

• Critical and intellectual skills
• Project management skills
• Research and writing skills

Content:

The unit of study will focus on the spatial, global system of communications, of cultural hegemony and cultural resistance, of political and economic organisation, and of power. Of particular concern will be the relationship between European and non-European cultures, particularly Asian cultures, showing what is involved in people from one culture trying to characterise and understand people from a radically different culture. Analyses and critiques of Eurocentricism, theories and critiques of nationalism, critiques of 'orientalism', subaltern studies, theories of the global system of states, theories of power and efforts to develop new approaches to history and politics to deal with the complexities of social and cultural processes which have been revealed by the breakdown of Eurocentric grand narratives of progress will be looked at. To conclude, Australia will be examined within this context.

Reading Materials:

Barr, T, Newmedia.com.au: The Changing Face of Australia's Media and Communications, St Leonards, Allen and Unwin, NSW, 2000.
Buell, F, National Culture and the New Global System, John Hopkins University, Baltimore, 1994.
Deutsch, E, Culture and Modernity: East-West Philosophical Perspectives, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1991.
Castells, M, The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, 3 vols (especially vol. 1, The Rise of the Network Society).
Featherstone, M, Lash S, & Robertson R (eds), Global Modernities, Sage, London, 1995.
Frankel, B, From the Prophets Deserts Come, Arena, Melbourne, 1992.
Hardt, M & Negri, A, Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2000.
Harvey, D, Justice, Nature & the Geography of Difference, Blackwell, Oxford, 1996.
Hodge, B & Mishra, V, Dark Side of the Dream, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1991.
Pusey, M, Economic Rationalism in Canberra: A Nation Building State Changes its Mind, Cambridge, CUP, 1991.