Open Cultural Studies

Zbenovich, Claudia

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0178

AbstractThis article seeks to explore the ways in which Russian–Soviet educational discourse survives in Israeli universities by bringing its underlying cultural messages to Israeli students. It focuses on the interpretation of educational discursive perceptions and practices of Russian-speaking professors who teach at Israeli universities. The study suggests considering the manifestation of the Russian–Soviet educational scenario through its enforcement in the Russian linguistic repertoire of meta-class talk, in which the professors report on the educational modes of in-class interaction. The analysis reveals that immigrant university teachers adopt communicative strategies imbued with key Russian–Soviet educational messages making them a cultural resource in the Israeli academic context. Concomitantly, however, the professors’ voices seem to be opposed to local Israeli cultural perception and practice. The study therefore seeks to uncover how enacted patterns of educational style reflect the cross-cultural condition of the academic context. It adopts the communicative–pragmatic perspective and focuses on key cultural educational scripts, rhetorical argumentation strategies, and the realization of speech acts in the university interaction.

Jones, Bethan

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0169

AbstractSince they first aired in the 1990s, Twin Peaks and The X-Files have been enduring hallmarks of cult television. This reputation only increased with the news that the shows were to be revived and, perhaps unsurprisingly, media discourse surrounding the revivals harkened back to the shows’ peaks. Yet this discourse also drew heavily on concepts of generational fandom and nostalgia. This article is interested in how and why fans of The X-Files and Twin Peaks use nostalgia to discuss their relationship with the shows and their own fandom. Drawing on qualitative research conducted with fans, this article identifies three forms of nostalgia specifically related to reboots, remakes or revivals: spatiotemporal nostalgia, textual nostalgia and communal nostalgia.

Tack, Saartje

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0171

AbstractSeveral European countries have taken measures to discourage or ban physicians from issuing virginity certificates to migrant women, with the stated aim of protecting these women from oppression. Arguments against the practice are centred around questions of medical ethics, gender inequality, and autonomy. What underpins these arguments is an evaluation of whether women have a choice in matters related to their sexuality. This article shows that the reasons provided for why virginity certificates should not be issued can similarly be applied to the prescription of erectile dysfunction medication, yet the latter practice remains largely unquestioned. It argues that the discrepancy in approaches to both practices points to an a priori understanding of migrant women as non-agentic, grounded in racial gendered norms, and that agency is mobilised as a biopolitical tool to Other migrant women and communities. Current approaches towards virginity certificates thus replicate the oppression of the migrant women they (cl)aim to liberate.

Darwish, Noor; Haider, Ahmad S.; Saed, Hadeel

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0174

AbstractPeople with visual impairment need a special form of audio-visual translation (AVT) to have access to multimedia products such as series and movies. Audio description (AD) is an AVT mode that describes what is happening in the images through words. It is a necessary accessibility tool that allows the blind and visually impaired to visualize scenes through spoken material. This study examines the types of information covered in the AD of the Jordanian Netflix drama series ‘Madrast Al-Rawabi LilBanat’ (AlRawabi School for Girls) following a corpus-assisted approach. Subsequent to watching the series and transcribing the verbal AD content, the researchers conducted frequency and concordance (KWIC) analyses using the Wordsmith 6 (WS6) software package to identify the categories of information covered in the AD. The findings showed six categories, namely description of characters, description of actions, interpersonal interactions, description of settings, emotional states, and on-screen texts. This study recommends conducting further research on AD in the Arab world to expand the accessibility services provided by official TV channels and streaming platforms.

Qassem, Mutahar; Sahari, Yousef

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0184

AbstractDue to linguistic and cultural variations between the source language (SL) and the target language (TL), the tourism industry may struggle to communicate effectively with tourists from various linguistic and cultural backgrounds. The translation industry could contribute significantly to the growth of the tourism industry by removing linguistic and cultural barriers, facing those with different cultural and language backgrounds. Given this issue, this study targets 27 postgraduates enrolled in translation training programs at Saudi universities with an average age of M = 27.471 (SD = 4.8319) and examine their performance on inverse translation (Arabic to English). The authors use a translation task, a tourism-based knowledge questionnaire, and a scale of difficulty to gather the data. Findings reveal shortcomings in the postgraduates’ translation of the promotional translation material and adherence to the source text style. The participants’ responses to the questionnaire show a lack of know-what and know-how in tourism translation. Training in tourism translation and the design of tourism translation courses should be based on the interdisciplinary nature of the field in order to adequately prepare translator trainees for the tourism translation industry.

Razor, Sasha

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0182

AbstractThis article examines Wanda L Frolov’s cookbook, Katish: Our Russian Cook (1947) as a transitional text that navigates the food diplomacy of World War II and the Cold War “Red Scare.” The book narrates the story of two women from different parts of the world and walks of life – an American widow and a refugee widow from Russia – who lived together in Southern California during Prohibition. The plot is presented through the point-of-view of one of the characters, Sis, as she recounts her childhood memories, while recipes come in clusters triggered by specific vignettes. Using irony, exoticisms, and literary and cultural allusions, the cookbook embodies the journey of the Russian character from her home country to the United States through American recipes. In Katish: Our Russian Cook, Frolov created an original character who asserts herself in the female space of the kitchen while adjusting to a new country. This adjustment is reflected in the hybrid Russian–American menu, which represents a radical departure from the three decades worth of auto-ethnographic cookbooks produced by the white émigrés in the United States. Frolov’s mode of representation of the Russian identity is fused with consumer potential as a positive force, while the child’s eye view of the story obfuscates the refugee trauma narrative. Released before the advent of television cooking shows and food editor conferences, Katish: Our Russian Cook mapped the local Los Angeles culinary scene in the 1920s and contributed to the development of the culinary memoir writing genre. Published first during the Cold War and republished by Ruth Reichl in 2001, it serves as a pertinent example of American integration and domestication of Russianness.

Kocak, Can

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0170

AbstractSince How I Met Your Mother (HIMYM) ended in 2014 with its ninth season, there have been multiple attempts to create a new series based on a similar premise – one parent telling their kid(s) how they met their other parent. How I Met Your Dad (HIMYD), which was planned to begin in 2014 right after HIMYM’s final, was not picked up by any network, while How I Met Your Father (HIMYF), which started airing in 2022, is continuing a successful [Upon its release, the show, whose premiere was watched in 420 K households, held the fifth place on the TV time charts and went on to stay on the list for four more weeks (The Entertainment Strategy Guy).] run, currently in its second season. This article compares the narrative and narration of the first episodes of these three series, including themes, recurring jokes, sound and visual effects, introductions of important characters and the “missing” parent, as well as the use of cameos. By doing this, it aims to delve into the reason behind why one of these reboot attempts was favoured over the other. The answer is provided as the difference between the amount of fan service in HIMYD and HIMYF, with the latter establishing more direct connections with HIMYM. In addition to becoming a rather common tendency by creatives, this article claims that fan service also seems to be used by networks and production companies as a way of ensuring audience engagement.

Yang, Jing

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0176

AbstractAmerican travel writing on China, The Journals of Major Samuel Shaw, the First American Consul at Canton With a Life of the Author, not only reflects the image of China in the mid-Qing dynasty from a Western perspective, but also presents the self-conception and identity construction of early Americans. Shaw’s understanding of China prior to his arrival in China was influenced by public opinion, his community, and his reading experiences, leading him to approach his observations of China through a complex filter of romantic imagination and grandiose expectations, and commercial incentives, as well as malicious misinterpretations. While in China, his idealized vision of the Chinese market was tempered by his critical stance toward the Qing government and legal culture, which were closely linked to American interests. Shaw’s journals deconstructed the image of China as a utopia and marked an important turning point in the history of American perception of China. This study explores the trajectory of this transition and reflects on the discursive construction of American national identity in the process, tracing Samuel Shaw’s evolving perceptions of China and his influence on American politicians, businessmen, and the general public.

Kacane, Ilze; Şentürk, Yıldırım; Rovira Martínez, Marta

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0183

AbstractThe article is based on the data obtained from the qualitative research on intergenerational dynamics of cultural socialization representing 31 family cases in Latvia, Catalonia (Spain), and Turkey. It is aimed at exploring in what ways young people’s (age range 14–25) cultural intelligence is shaped and how the degrees of openness to inter-group communication are developed. The article focuses on the everyday interactions of young people around their neighbourhoods, by examining their reported perceptions and modes of participation. It also explores the experience of young people with cultural diversity, and cultural interactions as a cultural capital, including how intergenerational relationships and dynamics take part in the formation of cultural intelligence of young people. The research findings on the transmission of cultural intelligence demonstrate that openness and experience are crucial in adapting to various forms of intergroup communication, such as intercultural processes, culturally diverse environments, and interactions with people from different cultures. Consequently, expanding cross-cultural experiences and broadening experiences can effectively challenge and redefine stereotypical biases, ultimately reaching broader segments of societies and enhancing effective communication both within the home country and beyond.

Jarrah, Shatha; Haider, Ahmad S.; Al-Salman, Saleh

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0179

AbstractVideo game localization is the process of adjusting a current video game to make it available, usable, and culturally appropriate to the target audience. This study aims to investigate the strategies that translators use in localizing PUBG and Free Fire video games into Arabic. The data were extracted from interfaces and in-game captions of the two video games. Due to space constraints, a representative subset of the collected data was then selected and analysed according to the translation strategies proposed by Díaz-Cintas, and Remael (2014). The analysis showed that the localizers have more often used transposition and literal translation strategies. They also tried to adapt the text to suit the target-language culture as much as possible. The findings of this study will be helpful to translators, localizers, and trainers. By adopting the most relevant translation strategies outlined in this article, game localizers will hopefully be better equipped with the mechanisms of video game localization. The current piece of work calls for investing more research efforts towards exploring and targeting a broader array of video game genres in Arabic.

Anastasova, Ekaterina

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0175

AbstractThis article presents the problem of identity construction among Eastern European immigrants to the USA after so-called “democratic changes.” It is based on the intercultural rather than multicultural approach which considers both the immigrants’ interactions with the host society and their individual choices in constructing identity and selecting a lifestyle. The article is a case study analyzing a “success story” of a person of Bulgarian–Russian origin who immigrated to the USA in the 1990s and built up his identity on the basis of a Russian national narrative. This narrative is rooted in Russian history, classic literature, and art, i.e., in high Russian culture. It serves as a framework for shaping the immigrant’s lifestyle as a whole and permeates the material culture of his home, reflecting the migrant’s perception of what is genuine Russianness. Family relations as well as friendships and relations with people frequenting his house are also aligned with ideas expressing the dominant motifs of the national narrative as it exists in the immigrant’s mind and imagination. Material for the chapter is drawn from fieldwork conducted by the author in 2015–2017 in New York and Long Island.

Kotorri Dushi, Arlinda

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0168

AbstractThe aim of this article is to analyze the impact of cultural identity centrality on stress, burnout, probability to leave the job, and job performance in the context of cultural transformation requirements, which is common in transnational business services. The key contribution of this analysis consists of controlling for the effects of migration experience and migration plan neglected so far in the relevant literature. This study also includes the first-time use of a random sample of 200 Kosovan call center employees. Findings indicate that individual identity centrality and organizational identity centrality are positively associated with stress and burnout. National identity centrality, however, reduces stress and burnout, but it is statistically significant only in the burnout model. As expected, empirical results suggest that migration experience reduces stress and burnout, while migration plan increases employee performance. Further results indicate that the probability to leave the job is enhanced by perceived job stress and reduced by perceived job satisfaction.

Ytre Arne, Synne

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0167

AbstractIn his botanical writings, Jean-Jacques Rousseau repeatedly returns to the idea that botanising exercises our faculty of attentive observation and teaches us to “see well.” Through botanical practice, we learn to transfer our attention from the self to what lies outside it and, specifically, to perceive other individual realities as they really are. To Rousseau, seeing well is not a matter of mere accuracy, but of disinterestedness and attention to the particularities of others, and the perceptual competences that he thought we might attain from botany have parallels in moral perception. Teasing out some of these parallels, this article’s main objective is to establish that the botanical gaze that Rousseau cultivates in his final years is moral in character and that it promotes wisdom and virtues indispensable to the moral education of man.

Kanevskaya, Daria

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0173

AbstractIn the twenty-first century, multicultural encounters have become an experience that is familiar even to the youngest. In superdiverse trilingual Luxembourg, over 50% of the population are foreigners, and many of them do not speak the titular language of the country. Multicultural classrooms are studied very closely, but Russian-speaking students, a new but exponentially growing addition to the cultural mix, have not been studied yet in their journey of school integration. There is a gap between the parents and the teachers regarding perception of the content of the studies and family aspirations. Instruction in the Luxembourgish language, usually unfamiliar to Russian families, is not the only obstacle for a child to make good progress at school. The Slavic family group and the Cyrillic alphabet, different holiday calendar and traditions, as well as differences in behavioural patterns and educational models complicate the perception of implicit school rules both for the children and their parents. In this short ethnographic study, based on five in-depth semi-structured interviews with parents, qualitative data were analysed in order to single out the main challenges that Russian-speaking families face while adapting to the public Luxembourgish preschool, the first contact with Luxembourgish language and community life.

Urie, Andrew

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0180

AbstractIn this experimental article, I employ what I term a neo-Heideggerian approach that entails harnessing a selective amalgamation of the thought of Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) as a hermeneutical energy, which I direct towards my account of a series of personal psychogeographic experiences that have entailed encounters with an enchanted social space otherwise obscured within the working-class suburb of Scarborough, Ontario (Canada). I engage this neo-Heideggerian hermeneutical energy not as a professional philosopher but rather as a working culturalist interested in exploring how Heidegger’s thought can be made “to do” in the contemporary multicultural world. Accordingly, I seek to redeem his thinking from crass accusations of being commensurate with a white-inflected blood and soil nationalism.

Buchatskaya, Julia

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0181

AbstractIn this article, I will focus on the study of the living space in houses of Russian-speaking emigrants in 1990s–2000s in Germany. I will discuss the “home” in several aspects: in a wide sense as a place on Earth where people’s life goes on, as physically built environment where a family dwells, and as objectified everyday life in the interiors. The choice of objects and furnishings for a “Russian” house in Germany cannot be classified, but it is unique and is associated with the biographies of the owners, the history of each individual family, as well as the history of moving to Germany. The “Russian” house in Germany turns out to be a complex phenomenon: it can be seen as a safe space, escape from the outside world, and offering emotional comfort. It is a place for representation of family and personal values, the owners’ identity, and preferences. It is also a scene where scenarios of relationships between a person and objects unfold. The objects that a person places in his/her house appear as objectified memories of life events and other people, reflecting the importance of family and interpersonal relationships expressed in gifts, photos, children’s drawings, and crafts. In a new place, people are no longer limited to a set of typical furnishing patterns that were dictated by a shortage of goods and ideas in the country of origin. House owners show their personality, trying to make their home different from that in the place of origin and introduce a non-standard style of European interiors in their homes, yet unwittingly they often reproduce stereotypes and fragments from their previous houses where they lived before migrating.

Kacane, Ilze; Hernández-Serrano, Maria Jose

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0165

AbstractDigital (video) calls have become a significant tool during the challenging times marked by the COVID-19 pandemic. The article focuses on the perceived functionality of video calls for maintaining social contacts and overcoming loneliness in celebrating family festivities limited by physical distance policies. The qualitative study conducted at the end of 2021 in Latvia and Spain examines families’ cultural socialisation via digital tools and, based on data obtained from semi-structured in-depth interviews, assesses the users’ digital experiences in celebrating Christmas and the New Year from retrospective and prospective standpoints. The obtained data revealed that although digital interactions were acknowledged as an alternative means for ensuring togetherness, preserving and facilitating emotional connection, and experiencing a feeling of belonging and shared identity, they were perceived as the context of exception. The findings complement existing studies that the pandemic contributed to bridging the digital gap among generations with coordinated and negotiated conceptions of the functionality of digital tools. Video calls ensured a sense of social and emotional connectedness and inspired the appearance of virtual celebration ideas.

Drechsler, Stefan

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0166

AbstractIn relation to the major topic of the present volume, this article is intended to provide new methodological and iconographic insights into the cultural adaptation and integration of European iconographic motifs in the medieval western Scandinavian arts and culture, as well as the relations between the iconographic detail and its surrounding texts. At the same time, this article offers a new approach to existing research on the basis of two methodological theories hitherto little investigated in iconographic research: cultural syncretism and interpicturality. In archaeology and media studies, these approaches are used to interpret cultural–historical artefacts that were created for one and then reused in a new context which may alter their meaning. The present article seeks to explain how both meaning and appearance of a single motif change between the vernacular texts it accompanies, and how the working methods of the illuminators differ between manuscripts. As a qualitative example, the investigation will focus on a complex iconographic motif that is found in six Icelandic manuscripts from the fourteenth century, namely the feature of animal heads as extensions on throne seats. Although little studied in the context of manuscripts, this is a motif widely used throughout the Middle Ages and with various secular and religious connotations. In particular, this is linked to the specific narrative roles that iconographic details play in relation to the written text and generally to the physical objects that carry both text and iconography: the manuscripts.

Protassova, Ekaterina; Yelenevskaya, Maria

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0186

AbstractFood preparation and consumption is an essential part of culture. Leaving their homeland and finding themselves in a society with eating habits different from theirs, migrants face a dilemma of adapting their diets to those customary in their new place of residence or trying to maintain their food habits. Relying on the ethnographic method and applying thematic and critical discourse analyses, this article explores how Russian-speaking migrants discuss changes in their foodways and what role Russian food stores play in the life of immigrant communities. Material for analyses was drawn from fieldwork conducted in Finland, Germany, Israel, and Switzerland. It includes in-depth interviews, immigrants’ essays, and group discussions. We also studied culinary discussion groups on Facebook and documented linguistic landscape related to food consumption in the diaspora. Among the salient themes in the discourse dealing with eating habits abroad are food nostalgia, trying out familiar recipes with new products, evaluating traditional dishes of the host society, and re-evaluating Russian cuisine, searching for the right food in the new country and trying to showcase the best of one’s own cooking to other people. Immigrants’ discourse about food and the labels on the food products available in “Russian” stores outside Russia reveal frequent use of paroemias and quotations and allusions to Soviet and post-Soviet popular culture. Russian-speaking immigrants’ reflections about their old and new foodways reveal that they are an integral part of search for a new hybrid self-identity.

Grinevskaya, Irina

2023 Open Cultural Studies

doi: 10.1515/culture-2022-0172

AbstractThis essay is dedicated to the life and interests of Baron von Falz-Fein who died in 2018 at the age of 106. Having emigrated with his family in childhood, he preserved interest in his Motherland throughout his life and spent considerable time and effort to promote Russia’s ties with “White Emigrants.” He also contributed to the return of various historical documents and objects of art that had been taken abroad in the upheavals of the 1917 revolution and World War II. Throughout his life, he accumulated a substantial collection of Russian art acquired from various countries of Europe. Displayed in his house, these objects of art reflected life trajectories of émigrés, and his narratives shared with the author reveal the importance of people’s diplomacy in changing Russia’s attitudes to her diaspora. The prominent figure of the Baron, his friendships, diverse interests, and sports achievements are grandly present in the objects he possessed. His language presents considerable interest for linguists, adding to our understanding on how contact languages influence Russian spoken abroad, and which elements of the language system are robust and which are particularly vulnerable. The essay is richly illustrated with photos made by the author.