This thesis analyses Bawuk, a short story published in 1975 by Umar Kayam in the context of the New Order period in Indonesia (1966-1998). This thesis discusses in what ways are gender ideologies...Show moreThis thesis analyses Bawuk, a short story published in 1975 by Umar Kayam in the context of the New Order period in Indonesia (1966-1998). This thesis discusses in what ways are gender ideologies infused within fictional character building, as the subjectivity of a fictional character is objectified and controlled by its author. On the one hand, I look into Bawuk as it encompasses the cultural, social and political dominant narratives about the female gender in Indonesia in the sixties. On the other hand, this research ultimately questions the limits of linear literary interpretation by offering a different proposition to look at Bawuk, rooted in aesthetic literary theory. Through analysing gender narratives within this novel, my research integrates literature as a fully active agent of political ideologies as well as a space for transforming and re-appropriating gender constructs.Show less
The national celebration 400 jaar VOC marked the 400 year anniversary of the foundation of the Dutch United East India Company (VOC) in 2002. This thesis investigates how the meaning of the VOC...Show moreThe national celebration 400 jaar VOC marked the 400 year anniversary of the foundation of the Dutch United East India Company (VOC) in 2002. This thesis investigates how the meaning of the VOC is fixed through notions of past, present and future, as well as the continuity between these moments, in three exhibitions that took place in the context of the celebration: De Kleurrijke Wereld van de VOC (The Colourful World of the VOC) at the Scheepvaartmuseum (Maritime museum) in Amsterdam; Upstream, with specifically the work of artist Shilpa Gupta (Mumbai, b. 1976) in Amsterdam and Mumbai; and Dutch Masters from Indian Collections, an initiative of the Royal Netherlands Embassy, on view in Mumbai. I trace the positions of these exhibitions within the celebration, and, following Michel Foucault’s power-knowledge and Gloria Wekker’s application of Edward Said’s term of the cultural archive to the Dutch context, employ a discourse analysis. I argue that what is absent from the accounts of relations between past, present and future of the VOC in the three exhibitions, except for Gupta’s statements, is the idea that 400 jaar VOC also means 400 years of Dutch colonialism, which influence dominant meaning-making processes in Dutch society today. The recognition of colonialism as structure of thinking forming a relationship between past, present and future is equivalently lacking in statements criticizing postcolonial theory today in the Netherlands.Show less
The purpose of this research is to show how Asian countries appear to be aestheticized in documentary photographs, often considered as reliable evidence of reality, and to understand to what extent...Show moreThe purpose of this research is to show how Asian countries appear to be aestheticized in documentary photographs, often considered as reliable evidence of reality, and to understand to what extent this is influencing the knowledge “Western” countries have on Asia. Starting from the analysis of current theories on photography and art, I will see how they can be applied to documentary photography, regarded as a practice that only aims at informing the public. Then, tracing back to colonial photography, I will show how documentary photography appears to present an aesthetic of its own, which has had a fundamental role in the structuring and circulation of fantasies, sentiments and ideas between “Western” countries and Asia. Besides, I will determine to what extent this aestheticization of Asian countries has been fostered by contemporary magazines, such as National Geographic. Finally, through the analysis of some of the most iconic images by the documentary photographer Steve McCurry, I wish to show how in the name of artistry, the documentary practice is failing in providing the viewer with visual documents.Show less
