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This thesis examines strategies of anticipation in contemporary post-cinematic art. In the Introduction and the first chapter, I make the case for anticipation as a cultural technique for the construction of and adjustment to future scenarios. This framing allows analysis of constructions of futures as culturally and media-historically specific operations. Via anticipation, constructions of futures become addressable as embedded in specific performative and material economies: as regimes of prediction. The hypothesis is that cultural techniques of anticipation do not only serve to construct particular future scenarios, but also futurity, the very condition for the construction of futures. Drawing upon the philosophical works of, in particular, Vilem Flusser, Jacques Derrida and Elena Esposito, and the theory of cultural techniques, I conceptualize anticipation through the analysis of post-cinematic strategies. I argue that post-cinematic art is particularly apt for the conceptualization of anticipation. The self-reflexive multi-media interventions of post-cinematic art can expose the realisms that govern regimes of prediction. Three cultural techniques of anticipation and their use as artistic strategies in post-cinematic art are theorized: enactment, soft montage and rendering. Each of these techniques is examined in its construction of futures through performative and material operations in art gallery spaces. The second chapter examines strategies of enactment in post-cinematic installations by Neïl Beloufa. My readings of Kempinski (2007), The Analyst, the Researcher, the Screenwriter, the CGI tech and the Lawyer (2011), World Domination (2012) and Data for Desire (2014) propose that enactment allows for an engagement with futures beyond extrapolation. With Karen Barad's theory of agential realism, the construction of futures becomes graspable as a political process in opposition to a mere prolonging of the present into the future. The third chapter focuses on the strategy of soft montage in works by Harun Farocki. I interpret Farocki's application of soft montage in the exhibition Serious Games I-IV (2009-2010) as a critical engagement with anticipatory forms of organizing power and distributing precarity. His work series Parallel I-IV (2012-2014) is then analyzed as a speculation on the future of image production technologies and their role in constructing futures. The final chapter analyses the self-referential use of computer-generated renderings in works by Hito Steyerl. The installations How Not To Be Seen (2013), Liquidity Inc. (2014), The Tower (2015) and ExtraSpaceCraft (2016) are read as interventions in the performative economies of contemporary image production. I argue that these works allow us to grasp the reality-producing and futurity-producing effects of rendering as anticipatory cultural technique. My thesis aims to contribute to the discussions on a 'turn towards the future' in contemporary philosophy and cultural criticism. My research thus focuses on the following set of questions. What can we learn about the operations of future construction through encounters with post-cinematic art? How are futures and future construction framed in such art? What realisms do future constructions rely on? And how can anticipation as a cultural technique be politicized and democratized?

Text in English / The ‘doing’ of gender in our society is constructed along the lines of power, knowledge and being. Power structures angle knowledge and understanding of transgender people and transgender lives in a way that relegates them almost to the museum to be observed as a spectacle or exotic objects. The emphatic frames of man and woman, even in South Africa where the Constitution is considered and understood to be liberal and generous, the life of a transgender body is an Other life. One is either male or female; any other form of doing and being gender suffers peripherisation and classification as special, different, strange or any other exteriorising definitions. This dissertation attempts to question the power or the tyranny of categorisations and classifications of man and woman, drawing from various discourses such as the medico-legal discourse classification. It further looks at how gender is being performed by transgender people. Further it aimed at gaining an in-depth understanding of the experiences and challenges of transgender people with regards to doing gender within a gendered society. The findings within the dissertation tells us, that the performativity of gender is not a neutral space, but enacted by various power structures and those who live outside the norms such as the transgender people, they are subjected to precariousness. It this dissertation seeks to contribute to an unmasking of some easy but harmful assumptions about gender and sexuality. Gender and sexuality may not be taken for granted and assumed according to fixed templates but they are fluid, mobile and flexible beyond the limits of convention. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology (Research Consultation))

Dans l’industrie du vêtement d’Istanbul, les carrières sont courtes et le taux de renouvellement des ouvriers est élevé. La combinaison entre production flexible et accords de sous-traitance dans un environnement urbain informel amène un nombre croissant d’ouvriers à assumer des fonctions entrepreneuriales équivoques. Ces acteurs sont au cœur de cette thèse de doctorat. Pour maintenir leurs positions ces ouvriers temporaires sont souvent contraints de devenir de petits intermédiaires précaires qui redéfinissent les distinctions entre production et distribution. Basée sur des données empiriques recueillies grâce à un travail de terrain en profondeur à Istanbul, mon travail doctoral questionne sous un angle anthropologique les dynamiques changeantes de l’industrie du vêtement d’Istanbul à différentes échelles et le rôle des petits entrepreneurs dans la formation de ces dynamiques à travers leurs pratiques et leurs innovations. Alors que les petits entrepreneurs sont essentiels, ils sont rarement irremplaçables. Pour explorer ces questions, cette recherche trace les liens entre les différents débouchés de l’industrie du vêtement d’Istanbul et examine comment leurs processus de valuation respectifs sont entremêlés. Durant les dernières décennies, dans l’ombre des exports officiels vers l’Europe occidentale, le « commerce à la valise » vers des pays voisins, ainsi que le marché domestique se sont développés. En « joignant les deux bouts », les petits entrepreneurs de l’industrie du vêtement d’Istanbul sont des courroies de transmission entre ces marchés aux échelles transnationale et locale. Les étudier offre de nouvelles perspectives sur les contextes industriels modernes et le fonctionnement des marchés globaux. / In Istanbul’s garment industry, careers are short and worker turnover is high. The combination of flexible production and subcontracting agreements in an informal urban environment propel an increasing number of workers to assume equivocal entrepreneurial functions. These actors are at the core of this dissertation. In order to maintain their positions, irregular workers are often forced to become precariously positioned small brokers who reshuffle the distinctions between production and distribution. Based on empirical material gathered through in-depth fieldwork in Istanbul, my dissertation questions from an anthropological perspective the shifting dynamics of Istanbul’s clothing industry at different scales and the role of small entrepreneurs in shaping these dynamics through their skillful practices and innovations. While small entrepreneurs are essential, they are rarely irreplaceable. In order to explore these issues, this dissertation traces the connections between the various outlets of Istanbul’s garment industry and scrutinizes how their respective valuation processes are intertwined. Over the last decades, in the shadow of official exports to Western Europe, the so-called suitcase trade to neighboring countries as well as the domestic market have flourished. By “making things fit” and “making ends meet,” Istanbul’s small entrepreneurs are conveyor belts between these markets at both the transnational and local scales. Studying them offers new insights into modern industrial settings and the workings of global markets.

This thesis explores precarization of work and subject formation in seven post-referendum Brexit novels through theories of cognitive capitalism and biopolitical production. The analysis is anchored in Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s reconceptualization of Michel Foucault’s notion of biopolitics. Hardt and Negri combine the concept of biopolitics with contemporary theories of cognitive capitalism and immaterial labour, to illuminate how subjects are subsumed into a system of biopower in which capitalistic production has become biopolitical production. I argue that the Brexit novels examined in this thesis demonstrate how the intrinsic bond between production and life shapes the characters’ relationship to the referendum. As the characters are caught between individual goals and communal values, in a system that demands that they take sole responsibility for their own success while also being responsible democratic citizens, the referendum produces conflicted subjects that experience deep internal and external conflicts in relation to Brexit.

Ce mémoire s’intéresse à l’expérience du travail à la pige chez les technicien·ne·s en cinéma et télévision au Québec. Dans un contexte de transformations de l’industrie audiovisuelle, de discours sur la dégradation des conditions de travail dans ce secteur et de mutation générale des rapports de travail, nous tentons de saisir la façon dont ces travailleur·se·s particulièrement atypiques et invisibles vivent leur métier et leur statut. Plus précisément, nous documentons l’expérience concrète et quotidienne de la précarité d’emploi qui est souvent associée à ce milieu et proposons un ancrage empirique à ce concept. Pour ce faire, nous avons réalisé dix entretiens semi-dirigés avec des technicien·ne·s de différents corps de métier. À partir de l’idéaltype d’intégration professionnelle et du concept de rapport au travail et à l’emploi développés par Paugam (2000), nous analysons ce corpus et observons deux types d’intégration propices à l’émergence de formes diverses de précarité : l’intégration « incertaine » et « laborieuse », qui témoignent de rapports ambivalents à plusieurs aspects du travail et de l’emploi. Ces constats informent sur le contenu possible de la précarité qui est généralement associée à l’emploi atypique. Dans une deuxième portion d’analyse, nous révélons une série de stratégies individuelles de gestion de la précarité, mettant en relief l’importance des réseaux de relations et la diversification des activités dans le contrôle de l’instabilité d’emploi. On note à cet égard une tendance à la responsabilisation individuelle face aux risques du travail précaire, qui ne sont que partiellement absorbés par la protection sociale étatique et syndicale. Au terme de ces analyses, nous proposons des pistes de réflexion sur les liens qui unissent la hausse du travail atypique et le travail précaire en audiovisuel. Les transformations du rôle de l’État et la construction d’une nouvelle rationalité néolibérale sont mobilisées pour éclairer notre exploration de l’expérience individuelle et de l’organisation du travail en cinéma et télévision. / This thesis examines the experience of freelance work among film and television technicians in Quebec. In a context of transformation of audiovisual industry, of speeches on the deterioration of its working conditions and a constantly changing world of work, we propose an analysis of the reality of these particularly atypical and invisible workers. More specifically, we focus on their concrete and daily experience of job precarity which is often associated with this industry, proposing an empirical base to this concept. To this end, we interviewed ten audiovisual workers from diverse technical departments. Firstly, based on the concepts of professional integration « ideal type » and « relationship to work and employment » developed by Paugam (2000), we analyze this corpus and observe two types of professional integration: the « uncertains » and the « laborious », which inform on the different forms of precarity and shows the ambivalence toward it. Secondly, we present various individual strategies developed by these workers to deal with precarity, pointing out the importance of networks and diversification of economic activities in the job instability control. In that regard, we note a trend toward individual accountability and responsibility for the risks of precarious employment, which are partly absorbed by state and union protection. To conclude, we share a few thoughts on the links between flexible and atypical work and precarity in the audiovisual industry. We explore the transformation of the state’s role and the rise of a neoliberal rationality in light of the individual experience and work organization in film and television industry.

Malgré un intérêt grandissant pour les méthodes de recherche participative, peu d’écrits abordent les défis et les opportunités reliés à la participation à ce type de projet. Ce mémoire documente le démarrage d’un projet de développement partenarial entre des acteur·rice·s au Liban et au Canada (Québec) en contexte de crises multiples employant une méthode de recherche-action participative féministe transnationale et décoloniale. Il s’inscrit dans le projet de recherche plus large appelé projet GIPS (2021-2024) mené par R. Caron en collaboration avec des chercheur·e·s, des femmes migrantes et des représentant·e·s d’organismes. Ce mémoire présente les résultats d’une analyse thématique transversale de données recueillies auprès des acteur·rice·s dans le cadre de leur participation aux activités de démarrage du projet GIPS (octobre 2021 à juin 2022) par des méthodes ethnographiques d’observation participante, un questionnaire qualitatif (N=9) et une analyse documentaire. Des défis et des opportunités reliés à la communication, au budget, à la distance, au temps, à la diversité des acteur·rice·s et à la mise en application d’un cadre féministe transnational et décolonial en recherche ont été identifiés. La matrice de domination de Collins (2000) issue de la théorie féministe intersectionnelle mobilisée comme cadre d’analyse révèle la plus faible place occupée par les femmes migrantes dans la phase de démarrage du projet. Malgré les leviers d’action déployés par les acteur·rice·s pour les impliquer, des tensions inhérentes à la solidarité transnationale et aux contraintes structurelles persistent et appellent à la reconnaissance des spécificités propres à un cadre féministe transnational et décolonial en recherche partenariale. / Despite a growing interest in participatory research methods, little has been written about the challenges and opportunities of participating in this type of project. This master’s thesis documents the start of a new partnership development project between actors in Lebanon and Canada (Quebec) in the context of multiple crises employing a transnational and decolonial feminist participatory action research method. It is part of a larger research project called the GIPS project (2021-2024) led by R. Caron in collaboration with researchers, migrant women and representatives of organizations. This research project presents the results of a cross-sectional thematic analysis of data collected from stakeholders as part of their participation in the GIPS project's start-up activities (October 2021 to June 2022) using ethnographic methods of participant observation, a qualitative questionnaire (N=9) and documentary analysis. Challenges and opportunities related to communication, budget, distance, time, diversity of actors, and a transnational and decolonial feminist approach to research were identified. Collins' (2000) matrix of domination mobilized as an analytical framework from intersectional feminist theory reveals the weaker place occupied by migrant women in the start-up phase of the project. Despite the levers of action deployed by the actors to involve them, tensions inherent to transnational solidarity and structural constraints persist and call for the recognition of the specificities of a transnational feminist and decolonial approach in partnership research. / على الرغم من الاهتمام المتزايد بأساليب البحث التشاركي، لم يُكتب سوى القليل عن التحديات والفرص في هذا النوع من المشاريع. توثق أطروحة الماجستير هذه بداية مشروع تطوير شراكة جديد بين الجهات الفاعلة في لبنان وكندا (كيبيك) باستخدام طريقة بحث العمل التشاركي النسوي العابر للقومية والمناهض للاستعمار. إنه جزء من مشروع بحثي أكبر يسمى مشروع GIPS (2021-2024) بقيادة روكسان كارون R. Caron بالتعاون مع الباحثين والباحثات والمهاجرات وممثلي وممثلات المنظمات. تهدف أنشطة بدء المشروع إلى توثيق تجارب النساء المهاجرات اللائي يعشن في أوضاع هشة في لبنان وكيبيك في سياق أزمات متعددة. يعرض هذا المشروع البحثي نتائج التحليل الموضوعي المقطعي للبيانات التي تم جمعها من أصحاب وصاحبات المصلحة كجزء من مشاركتهم/ن في أنشطة بدء مشروع GIPS (أكتوبر 2021 إلى يونيو 2022) باستخدام الأساليب الاثنوجرافية لملاحظة المشاركين/ات، والاستبيان النوعي (N = 9) والتحليل الوثائقي. تُظهر نتائج البحث التحديات والفرص المتعلقة بالاتصال، والميزانية، والمسافة، والوقت، وتنوع الجهات الفاعلة، والنهج النسوي العابر للقومية والمناهض للاستعمار. تكشف مصفوفة كولينز (2000) للسيطرة التي تم الاستعانة بها كإطار تحليلي من النظرية النسوية التقاطعية عن المكانة الأضعف التي تحتلها النساء المهاجرات. على الرغم من استراتيجيات العمل التي نشرتها الجهات الفاعلة لإشراكهن، لا تزال التوترات الملازمة للتضامن العابر للقومية والقيود الهيكلية قائمة وتؤدي إلى صياغة توصيات لمتابعة المشروع.

It is widely acknowledged that poverty has declined globally over the last few years. In fact, this idea has become so ingrained in our society that it is almost taken for granted and assumed as an incontestable fact. The question that remains unanswered is where all the poor are now. Are they living a prosperous life or are they tinkering on the edge of poverty? This research study focuses on the precarious non-poor, who are the people surviving just above Upper Bound Poverty Line used by Statistics within South Africa. Although they are not ‘officially poor’ they are still a group that is often overlooked or ignored within the global development community since they are not poor enough to warrant intervention yet not secure enough to demand action. As the research study will show through using a mixed-method approach, they are far from being prosperous and in fact, still struggling to survive. The quantitative findings are based on a statistical analysis of the General Household Survey (2011) that overlaps with the latest Income and Expenditure Survey (2011). It gives valuable background to the problem that was also used during the qualitative phase of the research study to inform the sample choice and interview guide. The quantitative analysis shows that the precarious non-poor is not a unique problem, and as a group, they are found across South Africa. The qualitative findings are based on in-depth interviews conducted in Cape Town, Western Cape and Newcastle, KwaZulu Natal. Framed by the capability approach, set out by Amartya Sen, and a focus on basic capabilities such as employment, education and housing, the results show that the precarious non-poor lack access and choice in terms of capabilities and the opportunity to realise them into functionings. The precarious non-poor in this study are mostly employed within insecure, uncertain or underpaying jobs, underpinned by a social support program, living in neighbourhoods where they feel unsafe while trying to secure a better future for themselves and especially their children. In fact, they are probably no better off than their poor counterparts with prosperity remaining out of reach. / Sociology / Ph. D. (Sociology)