The meaning of life: Regimes of textuality and memory in Japanese personal historiography

Nozawa, Shunsuke

doi:10.1016/j.langcom.2006.10.002

Cited by 10 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 45 publications

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“…What is at stake is not, and cannot anymore be, “writing,” even when only “bare” alphabetic signs are inscribed, but rather an inscribed artifact. These integrated symbols are “discourse‐mediating materials” (Hull 2003:290), which correspond with what Silverstein (1996) calls “textual artifacts,” and Hull (2003) and Nozawa (2007) call “graphic artifacts.” The embodied state of inscribing suggests that this activity is not only produced via material objects and devices, but also produce s or partakes in the production of the same; inscribing does not only use signs, it also produces them (Harris 1995). As Hull (2003:292) reminds us, “anthropologists have long recognized that things are signs, but have often ignored that signs are things.” The notion of writing that arises via this perspective is that of an intersection of different semiotic modalities of cultural meaningfulness.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The accent is on inscribing practices in a museum's visitor book, which is a remarkably interesting site of sociocultural linguistic creativity and dynamics, because the communicative space it offers occupies an institutional location: the visitor book lies between‐and‐betwixt the visitors and the institution, and at the same time it also facilitates communication between the visitors themselves (who occur in the same site but not in the same time). The particularities of written communication in these specific circumstances attest to the social embeddedness and situatedness of writing (Blommaert 2004; Harris 2000; Hull 2003; Nozawa 2007), and help achieve the twofold aims of this inquiry: illuminating the relations between writing practices and language ideologies as these emerge in particular settings, and offering a critique of the notion of “writing” as a single, dematerialized mode of representation.…”

Section: Writing Situatedmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Writing Ideology: Hybrid Symbols in a Commemorative Visitor Book in Israel

Noy

2008

J Linguistic Anthropol

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This article joins recent ethnographies of written documents which shed light on embedded practices and codes in and through which writing is produced and consumed. The article explores the linguistic ideology of writing through examining inscriptions made in a visitor book in a war commemoration museum in Jerusalem, Israel. These settings supply a dual ideological framework, fusing the modern ideologies of authenticity and national commemoration. Under attention are the physical affordances and circumstances of the visitor book and how they contribute to an "authentic" mode of commemoration-cum-participation via inscribing, where language ideology and national ideology reinforce each other. The analysis suggests that the category "writing" is reductionist, and that under embodied sensibilities it should better be viewed as an array of textual, para-textual, and non-textual visual signs that are fused into the production of materialized hybrid inscriptions. Further, the situatedness and corporeality of inscribing practices carries far reaching semiotic implications, including the transformation of the ontic state of "texts" into that of symbols, calling for the rematerialization of inscribing. [handwriting, language ideologies, museum, commemoration, visitor book] Writing Situated I t is no news that writing can be an embodied and an embodying ideological practice in and of itself. This appreciation raises inquiries concerning the ecologies wherein writing amounts to an ideologically indoctrinating practice, and the codes that illustrate how writing is indeed charged. In this article I explore writing practices and the codes they produce in a particular cultural site, namely a commemorative visitor book, with the intention of showing how national ideology is inscribed and embodied in an institutional setting. That is, how in a particular setting inscriptions are produced, presented, and consumed as an ideological mode of linguistic communication, or more generally, as a value-laden system of signs.The exploration is a reaction to Keith Basso's (1974) formative proposal, urging for ethnographic explorations of written materials of sorts, and of the social practices and circumstances in and through which they have been produced. The exploration joins a recent move towards researching the sociosemiotics of writing-and of literacy at large-via ethnographic sensibilities and approaches. Such studies, pursued mostly by linguistic anthropologists (

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Writing Situatedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Writing Ideology: Hybrid Symbols in a Commemorative Visitor Book in Israel

Noy

2008

J Linguistic Anthropol

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“…However, the increase in daily maximum temperature from the present was corrected by multiplying it by a coefficient of 0.75. This is because the CCSR/NIES/FRCGC Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Model (AO-GCM) used in the present study tends to estimate the increase in temperature on the large side compared with other models, although within the scope of uncertainty (Nozawa, 2005). Moreover, even when such a correction is made, significant uncertainty exists in the projection of temperature increases in general (see, for example, IPCC, 2001b), and it should be noted that there is also a large quantitative uncertainty in the results of estimation of mortality due to heat stress in the present study.…”

Section: Preparation Of Preconditions (Scenarios) For Estimationmentioning

confidence: 94%

Assessing Mortality Risk from Heat Stress due to Global Warming

Toko

Honda

Emori

2007

Journal of Risk Research

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With gradually progressing climate change in the future, the frequency and scale of hot summers like those observed in various places around the world in recent years will undoubtedly increase, giving rise to strong concerns over increased risk of death due to heat stress. Based on this background, we have developed a method to assess future changes in mortality due to heat stress with the entire globe as the target, and performed trial calculations using this method. The purpose of this report is to draw people's attention to the possible severe consequences of climate change by presenting the severest estimates in the uncertainty range due to adaptation/acclimation expected in the future, so as to induce further analysis and discussion on policies and measures. For the trial calculations, future changes in temperature were derived from the results of simulation using an Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Model with the highest spatial resolution in the world at the time of the study. Population densities were assumed not to alter in the future. Assuming that no adaptation or acclimation takes place, when the rates of change of excess mortality due to heat stress are examined by country, the results of our calculations show increases of approximately 100% to 1000%. It is confirmed that the burden of climate change impact is quite unequal among countries, at least from the viewpoint of heat stress mortality. When considered together with present population densities, significant increases in excess mortality density can be seen in China, India, and Europe. These regions are characterized by large losses due to climate change in absolute quantitative terms. The need to consider the adoption of adaptation measures is therefore most urgent in these regions.

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“…Reporting, particularly internal reporting, was merely an occasion to have a discussion with the owners and with subsidiary managers around which projects could be worked and reworked. In this sense, while texts are the result of an entextualization process with superficially institutional purposes, their mere presence should occasion new contexts for talk and action (Haviland ; Nozawa )…”

Section: Mitigating the Powers In Powerpointmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Powers in PowerPoint: Embedded Authorities, Documentary Tastes, and Institutional (Second) Orders in Corporate Korea

Prentice

2019

American Anthropologist

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Microsoft PowerPoint is both the bane and banality of contemporary South Korean office work. Corporate workers spend countless hours refining and crafting plans, proposals, and reports in PowerPoint that often lead to conflicts with coworkers and overtime work. This article theorizes the excessive attention to documents in modern office contexts. Where scholars have been under the impression that institutional documents align with institutional purposes, I describe a context in which making documents for individual purposes and making them for work exist under a basic tension. Based on fieldwork in corporate Korea between 2013 and 2015, I describe how Korean office workers calibrate documents to the tastes of superiors who populate the managerial chain.These practices leave little trace of real "work" on paper, but they are productive for navigating complex internal labor markets and demonstrating a higher order value of attention toward others. These findings suggest that institutional and individual authorities are not competing projects inside organizations but become entangled in increasingly complex participatory encounters, even as they are channeled through a seemingly simple software like PowerPoint. [documents, expertise, authority, technology, South Korea] RESUMEN Microsoft PowerPoint es tanto la perdición como la banalidad del trabajo de oficina surcoreano contemporáneo. Los trabajadores corporativos gastan incontables horas refinando y elaborando planes, propuestas, y reportes en PowerPoint que a menudo llevan a conflictos con sus compañeros de trabajo y a horas extras de trabajo.Este artículo teoriza la excesiva atención a documentos en los contextos de oficina modernos. Donde los investigadores han estado bajo la impresión que los documentos institucionales se alinean con propósitos institucionales, describo un contexto en el cual crear documentos con propósitos individuales y crearlos por trabajo existen bajo una tensión básica. Basado en trabajo de campo en la Corea corporativa entre 2013 y 2015, describo cómo trabajadores de oficina coreanos calibran documentos a los gustos de los superiores que pueblan la cadena directiva. Estas prácticas dejan poco rastro de "trabajo" real sobre el papel, pero son productivas para navegar los mercados de labor internos complejos y demostrar un valor de más alto orden de atención hacia otros. Estos hallazgos sugieren que autoridades institucionales e individuales no son proyectos competitivos dentro de las organizaciones, pero se llegan a enredar en encuentros participativos cada vez más complejos, aun cuando se canalizan a través de un software aparentemente simple como PowerPoint. [documentos, experiencia, autoridad, tecnología, Sur Corea] A ssistant Manager So-yeon leaned over to my desk and doodled a cartoon pig in my field notebook. She was covertly depicting her direct boss, Team Manager Park,

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The meaning of life: Regimes of textuality and memory in Japanese personal historiography

Cited by 10 publications

References 45 publications

Writing Ideology: Hybrid Symbols in a Commemorative Visitor Book in Israel

Writing Ideology: Hybrid Symbols in a Commemorative Visitor Book in Israel

Assessing Mortality Risk from Heat Stress due to Global Warming

The Powers in PowerPoint: Embedded Authorities, Documentary Tastes, and Institutional (Second) Orders in Corporate Korea

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