Arts & Culture
Arts & Culture
Fair Observer's exploration of human creativity in all forms including literature, theater, film, opera, art, sculpture, music, dance, cuisine and travel.
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360° Analysis / China Press Freedom / Hu Jintao / Karl Marx / Politics / Professor Zhan Jiang / BRIC / Arts & Culture / AsiaBy Zhan JiangChina’s idea of the free press differs from the Western idea of an independent fourth column. Professor Zhan Jiang looks at how a Marxist model of press freedom can be developed under the existing system. During and after the 18th Party Congress, party and state leaders restated that China should be ruled by law and governed according to the Constitution. They also said that the supervision of power should be tightened, including oversight through public opinion by news media. “Four Rights” The 17th Party Congress report of 2007, mentioned citizens’ “Four Rights” — the rights to stay informed about, participate in, express views on, and oversee...
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360° Analysis / cyber attacks / Lenta.ru / Politics / Russia Internet / Svetlana Bocharova / Europe / BRIC / Arts & CultureBy Lenta.ru -By Svetlana Bocharova As the Russian Internet is actively moving from the periphery to the avant-garde of socio-political life, the government brands it “the main threat to the wellbeing and stability” of Russia. Analysts from the human rights group Agora have released a new report about Internet freedom in Russia. The full text of the document can be found on the site eLiberator. According to the head of Agora, Pavel Chichikov (who also curates the topic of internet freedom in the Presidential Council on Human Rights), the project was designed to monitor violations by the government and consult Internet users and sources. The number of Internet freedom violations is growing...
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360° Analysis / Alessandro Sallusti / Il Giornale / Italy / Media Freedom / Ossigeno per l’Informazione / Politics / Silvio Berlusconi / Steven Ellis / Europe / Arts & CultureBy Steven EllisAmong other threats to press freedom, journalists in Italy continue to face potential prison time for defamation, a situation which is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon. When Italy’s highest tribunal upheld a 14-month prison sentence last fall for criminal libel against Alessandro Sallusti, editor of the newspaper Il Giornale, the move not only drew international condemnation, but raised hopes that it might prompt long-overdue reforms to Italian defamation law. Like many European countries, Italy allows those aggrieved by the publication or broadcast of allegedly defamatory statements to pursue remedies through a civil action or to file a criminal...
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360° Analysis / Iraq Invasion / Iraq War / Poetry / Reel Festivals / Reel Iraq 2013 / Arts & Culture / Middle EastSarah Zakzouk’s review of Reel Words, an evening of Iraqi and British poetry in London commemorating the ten-year anniversary of the Iraq war. Reel Words, an evening of poetry in translation, was but a small element of the Reel Festivals lineup. This year’s festival, Reel Iraq, was comprised of a series of cultural events marking the ten-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq by US and UK forces. Dubbed ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’, America and Britain’s stated mission was to liberate the Iraqi people from despotism, and disarm Saddam Hussein of ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’. Serving as a poignant reminder of the consequences of the invasion,...
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360° Analysis / Chris Ogbondah / Nigeria Media Freedom / Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC) / Politics / ThisDay / Arts & Culture / AfricaAlthough Nigeria’s civilian government has adopted many methods of suppressing the free media from its military predecessors, Chris Ogbondah argues that the crushing brutality of the dictatorship years has subsided – albeit with disturbing exceptions. This is the last of a two part series. Read part one here. Physical attacks on media houses, as well as the assault and killing of journalists, highlight the recurring violence against Nigerian journalists and partly explains why the Paris-based media watchdog, Reporters Without Borders (RSF), listed Nigerian police as one of the worst 40 press predators in the world in 2010. For example, on August 30, 2003, security officers of...
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Argentina / Buenos Aires / Joseph Knobel Freud / Julián Chappa / Psychoanalysis / Psychologist / Sigmund Freud / Focus Article / Arts & Culture / AmericasJulián Chappa talks to the great nephew of Sigmund Freud. A glimpse at the Freud family and its legacy. This is the last of a two-part series. Read part one here. Julián Chappa: You have three relatives in Buenos Aires who share the surname Freud. Could you please tell us a litlle bit more about them? Joseph Knobel Freud:I have many more relatives who have the surname Freud in Buenos Aires. Those three are the ones who are directly related to me. In fact, my mother Clara Freud had a sister who had two children that currently live in Buenos Aires. It is fair to say that I don't have a very strong relationship with them, but they are my cousins nonetheless. My mom also...
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360° Analysis / Belarus / Media Freedom / Politics / Turkmenistan / Uzbekistan / Europe / BRIC / Arts & CultureMore than two decades after the fall of the USSR many of its former republics failed to establish a democratic and open media landscape, ranking among the worst in media freedom indexes. At a Minsk café on a blustery day just before New Year’s in 2010, Franak Viačorka hesitated before switching on his phone. The former journalism student was on the run from the Belarusian authorities for organizing and blogging on antigovernment demonstrations that erupted after the disputed December 19 presidential vote that saw the reelection of the man who had occupied the seat for the previous 16 years, President Aleksandr Lukashenko. Viačorka called his father on Skype via his cell phone...
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360° Analysis / India / Politics / Rape / sexual violence / Social Attitudes / BRIC / Arts & Culture / AsiaThe recent public outcry against the treatment of women in India is a song we’ve heard too many times before. Karl Marx once famously said that history repeats itself “first as tragedy, then as farce”. The gang-rape atrocity of a 23-year old woman in Delhi on 16 December 2012 for the most part appears nothing but a “tragedy”. The brutality of the incident in Delhi and the public mourning of that woman’s tragic death has set Indian society on a path on introspection of the treatment of women and on a mission to change the country’s legal system’s inefficacy in reporting and prosecuting sex attacks. The uncomfortable truth for India and Delhi,...
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360° Analysis / Abuja Inquirer / African Independent Television (AIT) / Insider Weekly / Nigeria / Politics / SSS / Arts & Culture / AfricaThirteen years have passed since democratic rule was installed in Nigeria. However, the country is still struggling to establish one core democratic value: media freedom. Change or Continuity? “In 13 years of democratic rule, the culture of democracy is still far from taking firm root in Nigeria. Its tenets are breached with sickening regularity….” “Since the return of democratic rule in 1999, the Nigeria police have scarcely shown that it is willing to play by the rules of democratic norms. It still applies bare-knuckle tactics where it is not called for.” The above words are those of editorial commentaries of the Guardian Nigeria and ThisDay, Nigeria’s...