This thesis addresses the twin questions of technology and the human, ultimately questioning the validity of either category and pointing toward their dissolution in transhumanism. Starting with a discussion of the question of technology in organization studies, the thesis takes issue with the way in which discussion has focused on the technology- object pole of a dualism at the neglect of the human subject that occupies the opposing pole. Following a methodological call for symmetry the thesis reconsiders the question of technology in light of its human other and visa versa. Working with the ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche and Deleuze and Guattari, the thesis suggests that there is a problem with maintaining a distinct conception of the human, separated a priori from questions of technology and language. In seeking to avoid an essentialism either of the (technological) object, or the (human) subject, the thesis reconsiders the question of the human, language and technics through an examination of the work of William S. Burroughs. Combining Burroughs' ideas with those of Deleuze and Guattari, a conception of the 'transhuman' is developed which, in opposition to a transcendental humanism, articulates the immanent implication of technology and language in the production of subjectivity, and points to the more radical potentials of new technology in figuring alternative modes of subjectivization and social organization.

This thesis presents a comparative study of cultural policy in Britain and Italy. It provides a historical reconstruction of the cultural, legal and administrative contexts for cultural policy-making in the two countries, with a view of highlighting how cultural policy priorities have changed over time. The discussion of the growing popularity, in Italy, of notions of the cultural heritage as an engine for local economic development and as a resource that can allow the government to find the resources it needs to finance infrastructural works is given particular emphasis. Indeed, this probably represents the most original contribution made to the field of cultural policy research, in that Italy is a much under-researched country, and extant literature in English is almost non-existent. The main argument that the discussion aims to substantiate is that, despite being rooted in very different cultural and administrative traditions, both the British and Italian cultural policy debates seem to display a growing popularity of an instrumentalist rhetoric, which justifies public subsidy of the cultural sector on the grounds of the alleged beneficial impacts of the sector in the social and economic spheres. The main contribution of the thesis to the current understanding of instrumental cultural policy is therefore to offer plausible explanations for this recent trend. The thesis argues that the current situation, both in Italy and the UK, can be best understood in the light of the global phenomenon of neo-liberal globalisation, and the tendency for policy-transfer between countries that it tends to promote.

This study examines the theoretical contradictions of 'cultural democracy' in Britain and the United States. Cultural democracy here refers to the claim that community participation in cultural activities (artistic production and consumption) leads to participation in a democratic society. In Britain 'cultural democracy' has been associated especially with the 'community arts' movement of the 1970s and 1980s. Using Gramsci's theory of 'hegemony' as a framework for analysis, I will argue that the theoretical inconsistencies of 'cultural democracy' in the 1970s and 1980s can be traced back to a fundamental contradiction in British and U.S. cultural policy, between 'materialist' and 'idealist' conceptions of culture. This contradiction has resulted in moments of crisis in British and U.S. cultural policy, followed by periods of 'unstable equilibrium'. In support of this argument I will focus on four of these moments of contradiction and crisis. First I will develop my hypothetical model of contradiction, crisis and equilibrium in relation to the British community arts movement in the 1970s and 1980s. Then I will apply this model to three successive 'moments of crisis' in British and U.S. cultural policy: the 'civilising mission' of the late nineteenth century public cultural institutions in Britain and the U.S., particularly the settlement house; the U.S. federal arts projects of the 1930s; dilemmas of access and accountability in recent media policy. I will conclude by exploring some alternative theoretical formulations of the relationship between 'culture' and 'community' and their possible application to cultural policy and cultural democracy.

This thesis examines the recent development of the policy discourses of creativity in England and Korea. It aims to analyse the values that the word „creativity‟ represents in policy terms, challenge their underlying assumptions, and explore how the idea of creativity has been implicated in each country‟s cultural policy formations. It also provides a critical examination of the similarities and differences between the two countries. In so doing, this thesis attempts to challenge the absence of cultural policy research on creativity and provide a meaningful scholarly contribution to the existing field of cultural policy studies. In order to provide a comprehensive and critical analysis of the emergence and development of the creativity discourses in England and Korea, the study employs a social scientific method of relational thinking that draws on Pierre Bourdieu‟s field theory. By challenging the existing tradition of cultural policy discussion that is either implicitly or explicitly informed by a dichotomous thinking between intrinsic and instrumental values of culture, the study proposes a new critical approach to understanding and examining the complex dynamics of cultural policy issues surrounding the idea of creativity in policy terms. Based on the Bourdieusian heuristic tool of relational thinking, the thesis explores how the idea of creativity has become politically reconstructed so as to serve specific interests, values and dispositions that correspond to a particular political position, rather than a recognised field of cultural or creative practices. By closely examining the policy contexts of the government‟s creative education initiatives Creative Partnerships in England and Korea Arts and Culture Education Service in Korea, the thesis suggests that there are distinctive parallels between the English and Korean cases; not simply in the developmental trajectory of creativity discourses, but also in the broader aspect that relates to the shaping of cultural policy formations and recent paradigm shifts in cultural policy thinking. The study examines the extent to which these commonalities can be interpreted as an instance of „policy convergence‟ between the two countries.

It has been a while now since his untimely passing on the 25th September,2003. Edward Said was one of the most prolific public intellectuals of the 20th century and his model of the intellectual is still a source of inspiration and respect. The present thesis engages in the debate around the intellectual and his/her relationship to the public sphere. It argues that Said’s thoughts in ‘Traveling Theory’ provide not only a theory of critical consciousness but also a politically empowering tool by use of which intellectuals are able penetrate spheres. Political public spheres have always been the defining spheres of intellectual figures throughout history. This triggers the starting point of connection; it suggests that Said’s model of the public intellectual represents a residual figure of the man of letters. It argues that both the man of letters and public intellectuals, in different epochs, were made to suffer the consequences of the transformations of the public spheres. Yet, Said’s model strikes a balance between the professional and the amateur. The political tool in the traveling theory acts here as a defining element of the intellectuals’ practice in achieving some form of balance between those spheres. Said’s theatre of thought has shown an indefatigable commitment to a connection between spheres; academic, public and political. It is through his politics of humanism that he beautifully conflates ideas and ideals. His politics in the struggle for Palestine is in fact a politics of truth, coexistence and reconciliation. This also manifested itself in his political writings, beginning from Question of Palestine and continuing until Freud and the non-European. Finally, it is his intellectual legacy and his legacy as a public intellectual that makes him so relevant to the recent Arab Spring. Having looked back at two years of his life (1967-1993) and recalled his spirit when looking at Arab intellectuals’ interventions in the Arab Spring, one can clearly glimpse Said’s underlying alternatives, which reverberated in some of the Arab intellectuals as a model of the intellectual who can act beyond ideology.

This thesis examines the dress and personal appearance of members of the middle and lower classes during Late Antiquity. Although members of this social stratum are often represented in Late Antique written sources, their clothing is rarely described in any detail, nor can artistic depictions be relied upon to illustrate their garments realistically. Information has therefore been assembled on garments and garment fragments from over 52 museum and archaeological collections, in order to assess the ways that cloth and clothing was made, embellished, cared for and recycled during this period. Together with knowledge gained by making and modelling exact replicas based on extant garments, this has enabled both the accurate depiction of the dress of ordinary people during this period, and the more precise interpretation of Late Antique descriptions and depictions of the clothed figure. By further assessing this information using different theoretical approaches including that of ‘object biography’, this thesis goes on to explore the ways in which cultural meaning is invested in clothing, and what this tells us both about the people who made, wore and used it, and about the society of which they were a part.

This thesis takes Assmann’s theory of cultural memory and applies it to an exploration of conceptualisations of dreams and dreaming in the early Roman Empire (31 BC – AD 200). Background information on dreams in different cultures, especially those closest to Rome (the ancient Near East, Egypt and Greece) is provided, and dream reports in Greco-Roman historical and imaginative literature are analysed. The thesis concludes that dreams were considered to offer a possible connection with the divine within the cultural imagination in the early Empire, but that the people of the second century AD, which has sometimes been called an ‘age of anxiety’, were no more interested in dreams or dream revelation than Greeks and Romans of other periods. This thesis outlines, defines and applies the newly developed concept of cultural imagination, developed from cultural memory, to its examination of dreams and dream reports in Greco-Roman literature. Using the concept of cultural imagination in preference to discussing ‘belief’ is shown to have advantages for the study of ancient religion, as it allows the historian to discuss religious ideas that may or may not have been widely ‘believed’ but which were present within the imagination of the members of a particular society.

In the past few years a number of critical studies have been entirely or partly devoted to an analysis of the role played by the Mediterranean in British literature and culture during the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries. These studies include Robert Aldrich's The Seduction of the Mediterranean (1993), James Buzard's The Beaten Track (1993), and John Pemble's The Mediterranean Passion (1987). In Paul Fussell's Abroad: British Literary Traveling Between the Wars (1980), which may be considered a precursor to these, the author observes that "to sketch the history of the British imaginative intercourse with the Mediterranean in modern times is virtually to present a survey of modern British literature"; he goes on to stress that "the Mediterranean is the model for the concept south, and it is a rare Briton whose pulses do not race at the mention of that compass direction". It is the concept "south" in this statement, situated in the area of literary and cultural studies, which constitutes the focus of this thesis.

Since the first General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in 1947, France has insisted that cultural products are different from other traded goods and should be exempted from ongoing liberalisation of international trade – a principle known as the ‘cultural exception’. This exclusion allows France to implement policies in favour of its cultural industries, particularly a highly complex system of quotas and subsidies for the film industry which it maintains is essential to counter US market dominance and maintain cultural diversity. Over the past decade, the launch of video-on-demand services has revolutionised how films are delivered and consumed. Policy-makers have attempted to keep pace with these developments, expanding the scope of French support schemes accordingly. Adopting a mixed methods approach, this thesis analyses cultural diversity in the French film industry in detail, incorporating for the first time both the cinema and video-on-demand sectors and combining qualitative and quantitative data to understand the impact of French policies on diversity. Quantitative analysis reveals strong evidence of diversity in both sectors but that, while digital channels offer greater variety of choice, cinema is more balanced between films of different geographic origins. Employing a consistent approach to policy development in both channels, policy-makers have failed to take into account these and other differences, or to target measures at the emerging threats to diversity in the digital environment – potentially undermining the French defence of the cultural exception on diversity grounds. There is a surprisingly superficial use of the term cultural diversity in trade circles, leading to the conclusion that a more sophisticated approach is needed. Refining French policy in line with empirical data and actively using that evidence to demonstrate policy success will be a necessary part of this more sophisticated approach if France is to successfully defend the cultural exception in future trade negotiations.

This thesis provides an overview of the cult of Mithras from the late third to early fifth centuries across the entire Roman world. It seeks to illustrate what developments occurred in the cult during this period and how it subsequently came to an end. In doing so, it elucidates alterations in the environment and architecture of mithraea, the patrons and adherents of the cult, and Mithraic ritual practices. It demonstrates that by the fourth century the cult of Mithras had become increasingly localised, with a significant degree of variation evident among different Mithraic communities. Furthermore, it will be shown that, contrary to the traditional narrative, the end of the Mithras cult was not the product of an Empire-wide persecution by Christian iconoclasts, but a more gradual process that occurred over a long period of time. Additionally, it explores whether adopting a sociological approach, as has been suggested by other scholars in the past, can be used to explain how the transformations evident in the cult may have contributed to a decline in the commitment of Mithraic adherents in the fourth century. This study contributes to the wider field of research on the late antique period in three ways. Firstly, it is to my knowledge the only analysis of a non-Christian cult in Late Antiquity to cover the entire Roman Empire and thus hopes to contribute to a greater understanding of the sacred landscape in this period. In particular, it sheds some light on areas which are generally understudied in this regard, such as the Rhine and Danube frontiers. Secondly, it seeks to place the end of a cult in this period in its sociocultural context, rather than focusing only on the evidence from cult sites alone as previous studies have often done, thus providing a more nuanced explanation for why this occurred. Finally, through comparing the Mithras cult to other cults in this period it also shows that there is little to support any notion of a uniform 'decline of paganism' in late antiquity, with various cults experiencing divergent rates of decline which began at different times.