This dissertation interrogates the nature of composers as aesthetic agents re-orienting from the socio-cultural contexts of the Weimar Republic (1919-1932) to those of the Third Reich in Germany (1933-1945). Work in the sociology of culture, sociology of arts and sociology of music has focused on cultural consumption, including music, as bound up in the reflexive projects by individuals and groups to constitute and reconstitute their social reality. Within my research I focus on the creation of cultural artefacts, in this case ‘works’ in the Western art music tradition, as central to processes of aesthetic agency where composers are engaged in reflexive projects of constituting and reconstituting their social reality and acting within those constructs. To begin the opening historical chaper, ‘Mortification of Modernism’, uses Goffman’s work in Asylums (1968) to contextualize the cultural policies and activities of the Weimar Republic, considered the classical era of modernism, as a home world from which those involved in modernist ventures developed presenting cultures supported by bespoke institutions established in the early post WWI years. During the waning years of the Republic and the rise of National Socialism, these support structures, including the individuals that made up the cooperative networks of modernism, were destroyed removing most connections to the Weimar Republic modernist home world. In the first years of the Third Reich through numerous denunciations, dismissals, policies, etc. the presenting culture of Weimar modernists was mortified through abasements, degradations and humiliations. Having identified – through qualitative mapping of concert programmes, music reviews and festival participation – composers involved in modernist circles in the Weimar Republic, their career paths and compositional outputs were traced throughout the years of the Third Reich to interrogate the aesthetic agency of composers in light of significant situational and perspectival incongruity. The dissertation then considers each of five composers in depth in separate chapters – Paul Hindemith, Rudolf Wagner-Regeny, Ernst Pepping, Heinrich Kaminski and Wolfgang Fortner. The five were selected based on four criteria: a high degree of activity in Weimar modernist circles (festivals, concerts, societies); continued presence in Germany for a significant portion of the Third Reich; continued professional activity as composers during the Third Reich; access to relevant source material both secondary (biographies, reviews, stylistic analyses, etc.) and primary (scores, letters, diaries, authored texts, etc.) from the subjects. The data illumines complex repertoires of adaptive strategies these individuals engaged in – with, through and to musical products – and how music is not only shaped by wider socio-cultural contexts, but how its construction is a primary resource for agents to respond to and structure the socio-cultural contexts around them. Key findings include the constitution of music as resource for showing both complicity with and subversion against the Nazi Kulturpolitik; as a resource for proxy presence in multiple social spaces (private homes, concert halls, opera houses, etc.) affording the construction and dissemination of composer identity and philosophy; as a technology of self for personal therapy; and in total as a resource for weltanschauung - world-building activity where composers construct and re-construct their social realities through musical creation – music as an active tool in and reflexive resource for individual social reality.

There is a crisis in mathematics education (National Research Council, 1989). This crisis has caused stakeholders to question the purpose of mathematics education. Teaching mathematics for social justice is a pedagogy that uses mathematics as a tool to expose students to issues concerning power, resource inequities, and disparate opportunities between different social groups to illicit social and political action (Gutstein, 2006). This study uses action research to explore the effects of incorporating social justice issues in mathematics with affluent, middle school students. Findings indicate that integrating social justice issues into mathematics affected some students’ cognitive and affective domains and in some cases led to empowerment and action. The study also found that students’ perception of responsibility, their age and personal connections along with the amount of teacher direction may have affected students’ development of social agency. These findings help to inform teachers’ practices and contribute to literature on critical mathematics.

There is a crisis in mathematics education (National Research Council, 1989). This crisis has caused stakeholders to question the purpose of mathematics education. Teaching mathematics for social justice is a pedagogy that uses mathematics as a tool to expose students to issues concerning power, resource inequities, and disparate opportunities between different social groups to illicit social and political action (Gutstein, 2006). This study uses action research to explore the effects of incorporating social justice issues in mathematics with affluent, middle school students. Findings indicate that integrating social justice issues into mathematics affected some students’ cognitive and affective domains and in some cases led to empowerment and action. The study also found that students’ perception of responsibility, their age and personal connections along with the amount of teacher direction may have affected students’ development of social agency. These findings help to inform teachers’ practices and contribute to literature on critical mathematics.

The ways that young people learn to engage in democratic and other mechanisms for community involvement is a product of how they are socialized into the institutions they inhabit and how they incorporate this socialization into their ongoing construction of identity. In order to become active and agentive members of their society, young people must learn to view themselves as able to productively engage in social practices and social change. Conventional schools are structured in ways that limit opportunities for marginalized students to develop agentive and active social identities. This study suggests that students may construct more agentive identities if they have opportunities to frame their life circumstances and actions in political and historical terms.This project has studied how high school students may construct expanded subject positions as a result of participating in a culturally relevant and explicitly political youth development program. The Project for Conscious Education and Activism (PCEA) incorporates critical and culturally relevant pedagogy with participatory action research. Embedded in a required senior year social studies course, the PCEA provides students a chance to perceive their roles as sociohistorical actors. This two-year ethnographic case study examined shifts in students' academic identities and social agency. Increasing identification with school subject matter fostered intellectual empowerment that often extends beyond the context of school to effect broader social identities. Findings detail the ways that participants can come to see their actions as socially and historically grounded, eventually coming to think of themselves as social actors.Conventional typologies of civic engagement tend to leave out ways that youth of color and those from poor communities resist and address debilitative social disinvestment. But neither do young people tend to think of their actions as constituting social or civic action. Many shifts in subjectivity were apparent as PCEA participants began to frame their actions as intentional intervention in social injustice, becoming "civic" attempts to improve conditions in their communities. As young people learn to see their actions in relation to political and institutional patterns, they may both expand their social agency and increasingly frame their actions as contributing to social justice.

Sabe-se que a profunda ligação existente entre deuses e o soberano do antigo Egito é tida como um dos elementos mais significativos na legitimação do poder faraônico, notadamente divinizado naquela civilização. Valendo-se desse contexto e se aproveitando do período Amarniano como um estudo de caso privilegiado (Antigo Egito, 1353 a.C. - 1335 a.C.), o trabalho visa examinar a rearticulação que Amarna propôs a essa relação. Uma rearticulação que implicou em um reposicionamento do rei e em uma readequação do panteão politeísta, privilegiando o deus Aton. Esse processo não se esgota em uma simples abstração mental, ao contrário, ele se textualiza sobretudo nos dois hinos ao deus Aton, e se materializa em imagens do período. A respeito destas, além de tomá-las como fonte primordial de análise, buscaremos permitir que a sua metodologia tradicional de trato dê lugar a uma reflexão mais abrangente, baseada em sugestões da teoria da agência que visam entendê-las como imagens construtoras e modificadoras das realidades nas quais se inserem. / It is known that the deep connection between gods and Ancient Egypts sovereign is considered as one of the most significant elements in pharaonic discourse legitimacys construction, notably divinized in that civilization. Based on the Amarna period (Ancient Egypt, 1353 BC - 1335 BC) this research aims to study the reticulation to this relationship proposed on that period. A reticulation that implied on kings repositioning and on a polytheistic pantheons readjustment, privileging the god Aten. This process is not exhausted in a simple mental abstraction, on the contrary, it is textualized, especially in the two hymns to the god Aten, and materialized in images of that period. Regarding these images, besides taking them as analysis primary source, we will also seek to allow its traditional treatment methodology to lead into a more comprehensive reflection, based on suggestions from the Agency Theory that aim to understand images as a constructive power, being able to modify the realities in which they are inserted on.

This study intends to present a critical outlook to the position of an architect: Vedat Dalokay as a social agent. In this respect, it examines him through his multidimensional identity. Within this framework, the purpose is to interpret Dalokay, who formed his identity as a practicing architect, an administrator, a mayor, a politician, a writer and a literature admirer. In this respect, the thesis questions his unique personal standpoint in terms of: commodity production (as a typical member of the society reproducing the system), creative agency (caused by the architecture&amp / #8217 / s already existing capacity of symbolic representation with the architectural object) and social agency (generating projects for the construction of the community). Focusing on these dimensions, the survey proceeds over this togetherness, in order to decipher the role of Vedat Dalokay as a catalyst in the social transformation processes, in the light of social, economic and political conditions of Turkey.

In this practice-led exploration, I investigate the aesthetic potential of household waste. With household waste as the object of investigation, I explore the cultural signification of waste in terms of the role it plays in art practice. I look into the found object, bricoleur culture and the sculptural process of assemblage. By considering how assemblage allows for the inclusion of waste materials, the lowly status of household waste leads my art practice to a do-it-yourself approach. This approach of incorporating waste materials into artworks shifts the focus from the physical state to the conceptual meaning of waste. The shift that occurs when the waste object is displaced into art is central to this research study, owing to the capacity of these objects to connote meaning. I refer to this capacity as the social agency of waste materials. My investigation pertains to how art practice may alter or enhance the meaning of household waste. The physical cycle of waste, the constant change in use value that is promoted by consumer society and the process of conceptual adaptation instil a nomadic quality in household waste. I view the nomadic quality of waste as a means to activate viewer participation. I investigate, in particular case studies, how the interrelationship of installation art, site-specificity and community-based art may contribute to an experiential mode of viewing. I apply the lens of phenomenology and contemporary environmental aesthetics to interpret how viewers engage with art installations. My investigation of confrontational art installations has informed the approach of my own creative research. To convey the nomadic quality of waste, I have developed a series of quasi-functional sculptural artworks that act as mechanical modes of movement to signify an industrial influence of consumerism. Through community art practice as an interrelated field of research, the community members of Rietondale, particularly the school learners from workshops I presented, influenced my approach to my own art practice as I had sought to influence theirs. This mini-dissertation serves as a reflection on the coinciding thought process, material journey and collaborative initiative of a practice-led exploration of the aesthetics of household waste. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Visual Arts / MA / Unrestricted

Esta pesquisa analisa, do ponto de vista etnográfico, os visitantes da Pinacoteca do Estado, em São Paulo. Embora seja o museu de arte mais antigo da cidade, a Pinacoteca se encontra, junto a outras instituições culturais da região da Luz, no meio de processos de revitalização por meio da cultura. Tais processos fazem parte de fenômenos urbanos globais que vêm redefinindo o papel dos museus no contexto urbano e relacionando-os com processos econômicos mais abrangentes. No entanto, a presente pesquisa busca um afastamento das análises que entendem os museus como parte de uma cultura de consumo e vê seus frequentadores apenas como consumidores. Contudo, não se propõe aqui uma antropologia do consumo, que em que pese a notável superação de uma abordagem moral do tema se baseia numa ruptura entre sujeito e objeto e compreende as relações materiais apenas como formas de representação de classificações e divisões culturais mais profundas de grupos sociais. Tenta-se, na verdade, compreender o comportamento dos visitantes da Pinacoteca em suas formas de sociabilidade, bem como a relação desses visitantes com os objetos de arte tendo como base uma perspectiva antropológica da arte e da cultura material. Tal perspectiva permite conceber as obras de arte como pessoas, o que dinamiza e complexifica as relações com objetos materiais. Assim, analisa-se, situacionalmente, as relações dos visitantes da Pinacoteca de modo que, por meio das obras de arte e dos laços de sociabilidade, as interações sociais possam ser ampliadas e, em vez de ocasião para distinção simbólica e social, a visita possa ser entendida como oportunidade de construção pessoal. / This research analyzes, from an ethnographic point of view, the visitors of Pinacoteca do Estado, in São Paulo. Although it is the oldest art museum in the city, the Pinacoteca is, along with other cultural institutions in the region of Luz, amid processes of revitalization through culture. These processes are part of global urban phenomena that come redefining the role of museums in the urban context and relating them to broader economic processes. However, this research seeks a departure from the analyses that understand museums as part of a culture of consumption and see their visitors only as consumers. Nevertheless, it is not proposed here an anthropology of consumption in spite of the remarkable overcoming of a moral approach to the subject which is based on a split between subject and object and understands the material relations only as forms of representation of deeper classifications and cultural divisions of social groups. Actually, we try to understand the behavior of Pinacotecas visitors in their forms of sociability, as well as the relationship of these visitors with the objects of art based on an anthropological perspective of art and material culture. This perspective allows conceiving artworks as people, which dynamizes and complexifies relations with material objects. Thus, we analyze, situationally, the relationship of the Pinacotecas visitors so that by works of art and the bonds of sociability, social interactions can be expanded and instead of occasion for symbolic and social distinction, the visit can be understood as an opportunity for personal construction.

Photographs traverse the world in many forms and for many purposes. They follow and trace movements and networks of people, and have become essential objects in linking the past, present, and future of migrating communities. Vernacular photographs found in the home, encompass a substantial field of neglected knowledge and should be accorded greater attention and analysis in social science research. Vernacular images in academic research are often described as ordinary and mundane, their representational aspects are perceived to be repetitive and unremarkable (portraits, family snapshots etc.). However, this thesis argues that vernacular photographs are privileged objects and it is their universality and social embeddedness that elevates their significance in social science research. Unlike public or institutionalised photographic archives, vernacular archives operate within active social contexts and are alive with social agency. In this thesis, I use Alfred Gell’s anthropological theory of Art and Agency as the framework for conceptualising the social agency of photographs. To support these claims, this research examines the personal photographs found in the vernacular archives of a Gujarati migrant group in Christchurch, New Zealand. The photographs presented by members of this group are found at the centre of their social lives, mirroring their experiences and relationships in visual form. I use the Chakra Wheel as a visual metaphor to symbolise the nature of this group and their photographs. This metaphor speaks directly to the phenomenon of transnationalism and acknowledges that, for migrant communities, these transitioning processes are complex and elaborate, where the foundations of kinship and homemaking are constantly shifting. Vernacular photographs are at the centre of these transnational exchanges and networks, shifting from place to place, creating tangible and virtual threads between individuals, families, villages, and communities. They anchor these relationships at various sites, such as the wall in the family home, in albums, wallets, and on the internet. Vernacular photographs mirror these complex processes, and silently record and embody the social lives of people in a visual way. The mirrored reflection of the vernacular photograph can be both objective and subjective. By using the vernacular photograph as a research medium, in ethnographic research, we can get closer to the lived reality of people’s social lives. To emphasise the privileged position of vernacular photographs, I have chosen to use the methodology of photo-elicitation to position the photograph at the centre of enquiry. The methodology used in this thesis borrows some essential concepts from the discipline of phototherapy. Phototherapy claims that photographs can open up an exploration of us and others and, when the participant has primary agency, the affective force of the photograph is powerful and insightful. This thesis strongly supports these assumptions. Phototherapy uses photographs to explore the thoughts and unconscious processes of individuals. I argue that, in social research, photographs can also be used to explore and ‘open up’ the social world, by positioning the participant as the prime authority of their images, and their images as the vehicle of engagement and communication. By using vernacular photographs in this way, I look at both ‘on the surface’ and ‘below the surface’ of the image, making links with Barthes’ photographic theory and his concepts of ‘studium’ and ‘punctum’. In this thesis, the participants are the curators of their own personal archives. Their photographs give an emic view of their world, emphasising the importance of their migrant history, ancestors, village home, community, and cultural identity. Their photographs mediate agency between persons and places: keeping alive personal and spiritual relationships in the here and now; reinforcing essential familial knowledge systems; and assisting in creating and maintaining community identity and belonging.

Esta pesquisa analisa, do ponto de vista etnográfico, os visitantes da Pinacoteca do Estado, em São Paulo. Embora seja o museu de arte mais antigo da cidade, a Pinacoteca se encontra, junto a outras instituições culturais da região da Luz, no meio de processos de revitalização por meio da cultura. Tais processos fazem parte de fenômenos urbanos globais que vêm redefinindo o papel dos museus no contexto urbano e relacionando-os com processos econômicos mais abrangentes. No entanto, a presente pesquisa busca um afastamento das análises que entendem os museus como parte de uma cultura de consumo e vê seus frequentadores apenas como consumidores. Contudo, não se propõe aqui uma antropologia do consumo, que em que pese a notável superação de uma abordagem moral do tema se baseia numa ruptura entre sujeito e objeto e compreende as relações materiais apenas como formas de representação de classificações e divisões culturais mais profundas de grupos sociais. Tenta-se, na verdade, compreender o comportamento dos visitantes da Pinacoteca em suas formas de sociabilidade, bem como a relação desses visitantes com os objetos de arte tendo como base uma perspectiva antropológica da arte e da cultura material. Tal perspectiva permite conceber as obras de arte como pessoas, o que dinamiza e complexifica as relações com objetos materiais. Assim, analisa-se, situacionalmente, as relações dos visitantes da Pinacoteca de modo que, por meio das obras de arte e dos laços de sociabilidade, as interações sociais possam ser ampliadas e, em vez de ocasião para distinção simbólica e social, a visita possa ser entendida como oportunidade de construção pessoal. / This research analyzes, from an ethnographic point of view, the visitors of Pinacoteca do Estado, in São Paulo. Although it is the oldest art museum in the city, the Pinacoteca is, along with other cultural institutions in the region of Luz, amid processes of revitalization through culture. These processes are part of global urban phenomena that come redefining the role of museums in the urban context and relating them to broader economic processes. However, this research seeks a departure from the analyses that understand museums as part of a culture of consumption and see their visitors only as consumers. Nevertheless, it is not proposed here an anthropology of consumption in spite of the remarkable overcoming of a moral approach to the subject which is based on a split between subject and object and understands the material relations only as forms of representation of deeper classifications and cultural divisions of social groups. Actually, we try to understand the behavior of Pinacotecas visitors in their forms of sociability, as well as the relationship of these visitors with the objects of art based on an anthropological perspective of art and material culture. This perspective allows conceiving artworks as people, which dynamizes and complexifies relations with material objects. Thus, we analyze, situationally, the relationship of the Pinacotecas visitors so that by works of art and the bonds of sociability, social interactions can be expanded and instead of occasion for symbolic and social distinction, the visit can be understood as an opportunity for personal construction.