bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Malaria and hookworm co-infection and their effects on anaemia of pregnant women attending ante-natal clinic in University Teaching Hospital, Calabar, Nigeria
Authors: Umeh Jude Chimezie , Inyang-Etoh Paul Columba , Okpokam Dorathy Chioma , Otu-Bassey Iquo Bassey
Published: May 2018

Background: Malaria and hookworm infections independently have been known to cause anaemia. Coinfection of these two parasites can aggravated the morbidity of these infections with a resulting impact on anaemia especially in pregnancy.Aims and Objective: This work was aimed at assessing the prevalence of malaria and hookworm co-infection and their effects on anaemia among pregnant women in Calabar Metroplis.Materials and Methods: Giemsa stained film of venous blood was examined microscopically for malaria parasites while cyanmethaemoglobin method was used for haemoglobin level estimation. Stool samples were examined microscopically while Stoll’s technique was used in counting the ova of hookworm.Results: 19(6.3%) of the subjects were infected with hookworm, 45(15.0%) with malaria, while 9(3.0%) were infected with both parasites. Severe anaemia of 4(44.4%) was observed amongst the test (infected) subjects while the control (uninfected) subjects had a severe anaemia of 3(1.0%). The highest prevalence of co-infections of malaria and hookworm 4(38.6%) occurred among the age group of 26-30years (p=0.371). Subjects in their 3rd trimester had the highest prevalence of co-infection of 4(4.4%) (p=0.412). The highest prevalence of severe anaemia 1(100.0%) occurred among the age group of 16-20years (p=0.002).Conclusion: This work has shown a low prevalence of malaria and hookworm co-infection. The level of severe anaemia among infected pregnant women was more than that observed among subjects without any of the two infections.Asian Journal of Medical Sciences Vol.9(3) 2018 27-35
The influence of spironolactone on the serum electrolytes balance and renal cortical magnesium and calcium contents in cisplatin – treated rabbits
Authors: Abdel-Gayoum Abdelgayoum A. , Ahmida Mohamed H. S.
Published: May 2018

Background: Cisplatin is a widely used anticancer drug. Its use is known to induce nephrotoxicity and may be associated with disturbance of the electrolyte balance. Spironolactone, an antagonist of aldosterone, is frequently prescribed as a potassium sparing diuretic.Aims and Objective: The present study aims to investigate whether spironolactone can correct the cisplatin-induced electrolyte disturbance in the rabbit.Materials and Methods: Thirty two New Zealand rabbits were distributed into four groups. Animals of control (C); spironolactone (S); cisplatin (P); spironolactone and cisplatin (SP) groups were injected ip with saline; given spironolactone (20 mg/kg bw/day) orally for 5 days; injected ip with cisplatin (6.5 mg/kg bw); given both spironolactone and cisplatin, respectively. Serum, liver and kidney cortical homogenates were used for biochemical analysis.Results: Serum creatinine and urea levels of P were significantly (P<0.001) elevated and were severely raised in SP by 7-fold and 2.7-fold. The serum magnesium was increased in S and SP groups by 93.75% and 112%, respectively and was depressed in P by 18.75% compared to C. Serum potassium and calcium of P were significantly (P<0.001) depressed, whereas, serum calcium levels in the S and SP were significantly elevated. The liver magnesium and calcium of SP were elevated by 38.37% and 40.7%, respectively, whereas, kidney magnesium showed reduction in the S, P and SP by 36%, 24% and 19%, respectively and elevated in the SP group by 26.56% compared to S group. The kidney calcium was depressed in the S, P and SP by 30.89%, 40.0% and 28.2%, respectively compared to C.Conclusion: Cisplatin treatment depleted the serum and renal cortical magnesium. The serum calcium and potassium were reduced secondary to the magnesium depletion. The co-administration of spironolactone reversed the cisplatin-induced magnesium and calcium depletions in serum and renal tissue.Asian Journal of Medical Sciences Vol.9(3) 2018 10-16
Assessment of WHO ten steps towards successful breastfeeding among postpartum mothers in Karaikal: A hospital based cross-sectional study
Authors: Farhan Dr , Das Sarthak , Malik Archana
Published: May 2018

Background: Breastfeeding is the most essential, dynamic and profitable method of giving infants the perfect start in life. The Recent Rapid Survey on Children in India shows that 44.6% infants are now being breastfed within an hour of birth and 64.9 % of 0-6months old infants were exclusively breastfed.Aims and Objectives: To estimate the proportion of mothers who successfully breastfeed their children according to the WHO ten steps towards successful breastfeeding.Materials and Methods: A Cross-sectional study was conducted in Postpartum ward of JIPMER, Karaikal from 1st August to 31st September. Mothers aged 18- 49 years; given birth to healthy, singleton baby and stayed in hospital for minimum 24 hours after delivery were included in the study. The questions about breastfeeding practices based on “WHO ten steps of successful breastfeeding” were asked. Mothers knew seven steps or more(score ≥ 7) were considered as having successful breastfeeding.Results: Out of 205 only 32 (15.60%) mothers breastfeed their child successfully.There is significant difference between multiparous and primiparous mothers in Breastfeeding initiation within one hour of delivery(p=0.04) and Prelacteal feeding Practice (p = 0.003). The successful breastfeeding rate was higher among multiparous compared to primiparous mothers which is statistically significant (p=0.032).Conclusion: There is existence offaulty practice in breastfeeding process among post-partum mothers.The role of health professionals in encouraging optimal breastfeeding are remarkably low. Compulsory Implementation of BFHI in every hospitalby a Breastfeeding Committee, can be planned to increasing the breastfeeding rate.Asian Journal of Medical Sciences Vol.9(3) 2018 1-5
X Chromatin inactivation in Menopause: A study on Hindu caste Bengalee population
Authors: Mukherjee Koel , Chatterjee Diptendu , Bandyopadhyay Arup Ratan
Published: May 2018

Background: Menopause being a physiologic event and eventually the prime time to perform risk assessment of chronic diseases and initiate preventive health measures. Previous studies reported, later menopause is independently associated to increased risk of breast and endometrial cancer. The menopausal status is determined and influenced by intrinsic factors. Majority of the studies on menopause from Indian context, especially on Bengalee Hindu Caste population confined to socio demographic issues, attitudes, problems and quality of life. However, relatively little work is attempted to unravel the complex interplay of genetics and epigenetic mechanisms, the effect on menopause. In this background it seems to be an urgent need to understand menopause status objectively, to approach the interplay of genetics and epigenetic mechanisms of menopausal status by X chromatin inactivation.Aims and Objective: Best of the knowledge it is the first attempt to evaluate the prevalence of X chromatin inactivation in menopausal women among Bengalee Hindu Caste population.Materials and Methods: Sex chromatin inactivation was evaluated from 100 each pre and post menopausal women from the buccal smear of each individuals. After fixation and staining of altogether 20000 (twenty thousand) cells were scanned from the Bengalee Hindu Caste for a comparison of menopausal women and their menarcheal counterparts.Results: Result demonstrated significantly decreased (P<0.001) prevalence of X chromatin inactivation sites among the menopausal females in comparison to their menarcheal women counterpart.Conclusion: The present study vindicated possible association between the presence of sex hormone receptors and the prevalence of sex chromatin and also envisaged the role of X chromatin inactivation for early prognosis of menopause.Asian Journal of Medical Sciences Vol.9(3) 2018 41-45
Genetic Variation and Population structure: A study on four populations of Tripura, North East India
Authors: Das Priyanka , Sarkar Pranabesh , Chatterjee Diptendu , Bandyopadhyay Arup Ratan
Published: May 2018

Back Ground: Genetic polymorphisms of ABO and RhD blood group and Haptoglobin (HP) types have already been widely used to understand variation and population structure. The present study attempted to understand the variation and population structure on the basis of ABO and RhD blood group polymorphisms and Haptoglobin (HP) as serum protein polymorphism of four Tibeto-Burman speaker groups considered as aboriginal tribes of Tripura. Genetic studies on populations in north-east Indian have been performed less frequently than in the other parts of India, in spite of diversity among these populations. Aims and Objective: Best of the knowledge the present study is the first attempt on the variation and population genetic structure concerning the ABO, RhD and HP polymorphism of the four endogamous populations – Tripuri, Hrangkhawl, Rupini and Kolui tribal population of Tripura.Materials and Methods: Present study consisted of four hundred (400) participants 100 each from above mentioned population groups. ABO and RhD blood groups were done by antigen-antisera agglutination test and HP types were ascertained by Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis (PAGE) following standard techniques. Allele frequencies and Fst were calculated by using standard method.Results: Examination on ABO blood group revealed higher O allele among the two groups Tripuri and Hrangkhawl followed by A and B alleles. Among the other two groups, Rupini and Kolui, revealed higher A allele and B allele respectively. Higher D allele frequency in the RHD Blood group system has been found for each of the population group. On the other hand, Serum protein marker - HP types demonstrated higher HP*2 allele frequency than HP*1 alleles. Calculated very low Fst value (0.02-0.08) of three polymorphic markers (ABO, RhD and HP) were suggestive for low differentiation among these groups, indicating less admixture and prevailing endogamous nature of these population.Conclusion: Very low Fst values of three polymorphic markers were suggestive for low differentiation among these groups, indicating least admixture and prevailing endogamous nature of these population. The overall genetic difference revealed highest distance between Tripuri and Hrangkhwal and least distance between Rupini and Kolui.Asian Journal of Medical Sciences Vol.9(3) 2018 46-49
Updating Marx’s Concept of Alternatives
Authors: Ludes Peter
Published: May 2018

The analysis of Marx’s works will be prepared by outlining a more encompassing research project of intergenerational dialogues, in section 1. Section 2 will review Marx’s concept of an alternative, classless society, which was based, e.g., in the projection of rational planning within companies to a national economy - to be revised and updated. Section 3 will discuss how more realistic long-term intergenerational means of orientation and communication of alternatives can emerge. This diagnosis will imply two exemplary and complementary forces calling for alternatives, namely “the perceived risks facing humanity” (Beck) and the enhancement of human rights as global challenges requiring global institutions.
Did Somebody Say Neoliberalism? On the Uses and Limitations of a Critical Concept in Media and Communication Studies
Authors: Garland Christian , Harper Stephen
Published: May 2018

This paper explores the political-economic basis and ideological effects of talk about neoliberalism with respect to media and communication studies. In response to the supposed ascendancy of the neoliberal order since the 1980s, many media and communication scholars have redirected their critical attentions from capitalism to neoliberalism. This paper tries to clarify the significance of the relatively new emphasis on neoliberalism in the discourse of media and communication studies, with particular reference to the 2011 phone hacking scandal at The News of the World. Questioning whether the discursive substitution of ‘neoliberalism’ for ‘capitalism’ offers any advances in critical purchase or explanatory power to critics of capitalist society and its media, the paper proposes that critics substitute a Marxist class analysis in place of the neoliberalism-versus-democracy framework that currently dominates in the field.
A Note on the Ongoing Processes of Commodification: From the Audience Commodity to the Social Factory
Authors: Prodnik Jernej
Published: May 2018

Commodity-form played an important, if often overlooked role in the studies of capitalism. Processes of transforming literally anything into a privatized form of (fictitious) commodity that is exchanged in the circulation process are of fundamental importance for the rise and reproduction of capitalism. At the same time commodity, as the “cell-form of capitalism”, has played a crucial role throughout Marx’s oeuvre. The central aim of the paper is to demonstrate how commodity-form develops in his works (both as a part of his “global” argument and in the context of historical changes) and what role does it play in some of the key works of critical theory. Furthermore, it is analysed how this topic was approached in critical communication studies, especially in the political economy of communication. The latter is done especially through a reappraisal of the “blind spot debate” iniated by Dallas W. Smythe and the audience commodity thesis, which was raised in it. This long-lasting debate, which at least indirectly continues to this day, can be seen as an invaluable source for practices and ideas connected to both Marxian-inspired critical communication studies and to a serious analysis of the continuing commodification of different spheres of society and its increasing pervasiveness in contemporary life. In the last part of the text, these findings are connected to some of the recent neo-Marxist approaches, especially to the findings of the authors coming from the autonomist (post-operaist) movement. Insights of this intellectual strand can provide an understanding of the ongoing commodification processes, while also offering possibilities of convergence with Smythe’s approach.
Fiat Auto: Industrial Relations Lost in Globalisation
Authors: Caputo Paolo , Campenni Antonino , Della Corte Elisabetta
Published: May 2018

In the actual context of globalization, carmakers face a highly competitive market. The pace of technological innovation, the increase in international competition, the saturation of markets and the shortening of product lifespan are but some of the factors requiring a new organization of production. In order to face these radical changes, carmakers are implementing new strategies, not only by embracing the concept of globalization, but also by promoting changes in labour management practices, work organization and industrial relations. The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of Fiat’s new managerial strategies in response to increased global competition on the situation of the industrial relations, on the role of the Unions and on the condition of workers. These strategies include an intensification of work, shift and wage flexibility, plus a severe limitations of workers’ rights (including the right to strike). On the one hand, such a strategy was presented and justified to the workers and the public as an objective necessity of global economy, and was even submitted to a referendum; on the other, the process was conducted unilaterally, under the recurring threat of transferring production abroad if the workers and their Unions refused to accept the new method. This brought to a split of the Unions and dialogue was maintained only with collaborative organisations, causing the discrimination of the other Unions and a situation of great dissatisfaction amongst all the workers. Through the words of workers and Union activists, the research showed evidence of the failure of claims that new management strategy can ensure both productivity and a new form of workplace democracy in the post-fordist factory. Despite new labour-saving technologies, lean production organisation and the adoption of new metric systems (such as Ergo-UAS), car industry would need, more than in the past, the involvement and active participation of Unions and workers. On the contrary, the paper points out how Fiat’s actual form of production organization generates new tensions and increases employee’s discontent, likely to ignite industrial conflict.
The Coolness of Capitalism Today
Authors: McGuigan Jim
Published: May 2018

This paper is about the reconciliation of cultural analysis with political economy in Marxist-inspired research on communications. It traces how these two traditions became separated with the development of a one-dimensional and consumerist cultural studies, on the one-hand, and a more classically Marxist political economy of communications, on the other hand, that was accused of holding a simplistic and erroneous concept of ideology. The paper defends a conception of ideology as distorted communication motivated by unequal power relations and sketches a multidimensional mode of cultural analysis that takes account of the moments of production, consumption and textual meaning in the circulation of communications and culture. In accordance with this framework of analysis, the cool-capitalism thesis is outlined and illustrated with reference to Apple, the ‘cool’ corporation. And, the all-purpose mobile communication device is selected as a key and urgent focus of attention for research on commodity fetishism and labour exploitation on a global scale today.
Missing Marx: The Place of Marx in Current Communication Research and the Place of Communication in Marx’s Work
Authors: Erdogan İrfan
Published: May 2018

This study was designed (1) to test Marx’s theoretical statements on the nature of dominant ideas in a society by investigating the character of scholarly practices in academic publishing, and (2) to demonstrate the falseness of claims about Marx’s disinterest in communication by presenting and evaluating his writings on communication. The study combines quantitative and qualitative methods for data collection and analysis. It has two study populations and multiple samples. The first one includes the articles in communication journals cited by Thomson Reuters’ Social Sciences Citation Index. The second one contains all writings of Marx on communication. The findings indicate that (1) the articles are mostly functional to the ruling interests, (2) they mostly exclude Marx and critical issues that question the ruling material and immaterial mode and relations in communication and society, (3) most alternative approaches are controlled alternatives and overtly or covertly directed against Marx’s method and explanations. Regarding Marx’s interest in communication, contrary to the claims that he had no or minimal interest, Marx provided invaluable explanations about communication. Hence communication scholars should pay close attention if they want to understand the nature and function of communication in society and social change.
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Authors: (Special Issue) Marx is Back
Published: May 2018

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Dallas Smythe Today - The Audience Commodity, the Digital Labour Debate, Marxist Political Economy and Critical Theory.
Authors: Fuchs Christian
Published: May 2018

Due to the global capitalist crisis, neoliberalism and the logic of commodification of everything have suffered cracks, fissures and holes. There is a return of the interest in Marx, which requires us to think about the role of Marxism in Media and Communication Studies. This paper contributes to this task by discussing some foundations of contemporary Marxist media and communication studies, including a focus on the renewed interest in Dallas Smythe’s audience commodity category as part of the digital labour debate. Dallas Smythe reminds us of the importance of engagement with Marx’s works for studying the media in capitalism critically. Both Critical Theory and Critical Political Economy of the Media and Communication have been criticized for being one-sided. Such interpretations are mainly based on selective readings. They ignore that in both approaches there has been with different weightings a focus on aspects of media commodification, audiences, ideology and alternatives. Critical Theory and Critical Political Economy are complementary and should be combined in Critical Media and Communication Studies today. Dallas Smythe’s notion of the audience commodity has gained new relevance in the debate about corporate Internet services’ exploitation of digital labour. The exploitation of digital labour involves processes of coercion, alienation and appropriation.
Social Media and the Dialectic of Enlightenment
Authors: Juel Henrik
Published: May 2018

My reflections in this paper concern revitalizing the critical potential of certain core concepts of Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment (first published 1944) and bringing it to bear on the digital era in general and in particular on the phenomenon of modern social media. I find that the central philosophical critique of Dialectic of Enlightenment runs deeper than just a critique of contemporary (and perhaps now out-dated) media technique and cultural habits. It is a critical view of the process of civilization, economy and enlightenment as such, a critical view of the seemingly self-evident notion of pure reason, science and technology. What Horkheimer and Adorno are trying to capture and reflect is the very process of rationality backlashing into irrationality. We seem to have reached the era of mathematics and exact calculation, but this leaves us with no sense of control or meaningfulness, and in the face of crisis and systemic contradictions in the now global society we tend to regress and rely on older, more primitive forms of sense-making and coping: magic, mythology and metaphysics - even ritual behaviour. But these philosophical reflections, can they help us evaluate the role of today's social media?
Communicative Modelling of Cultural Transmission and Evolution Through a Holographic Cognition Model
Authors: Naeve Ambjörn
Published: May 2018

This article presents communicative ways to model the transmission and evolution of the processes and artefacts of a culture as the result of ongoing interactions between its members - both at the tacit and the explicit level. The purpose is not to model the entire cultural process, but to provide semantically rich “conceptual placeholders” for modelling any cultural activity that is considered important enough within a certain context. The general purpose of communicative modelling is to create models that improve the quality of communication between people. In order to capture the subjective aspects of Gregory Bateson’s definition of information as “a difference that makes a difference,” the article introduces a Holographic Cognition Model that uses optical holography as an analogy for human cognition, with the object beam of holography corresponding to the first difference (the situation that the cognitive agent encounters), and the reference beam of holography corresponding to the subjective experiences and biases that the agent brings to the situation, and which makes the second difference (the interference/interpretation pattern) unique for each agent. By combining the HCM with a semantically rich and recursive form of process modelling, based on the SECI-theory of knowledge creation, we arrive at way to model the cultural transmission and evolution process that is consistent with the Unified Theory of Information (the Triple-C model) with its emphasis on intra-, inter- and supra-actions.
Emergence and Evolution of Meaning
Authors: Díaz Nafría José M. , Zimmermann Rainer E.
Published: May 2018

The category of meaning is traced forward starting from the origin of the Universe itself as well as its very grounding in pre-geometry. Different from many former approaches in the theories of information and also in biosemiotics, we will show that the forms of meaning emerge simultaneously (alongside) with information and energy. Hence, information is always meaningful (in a sense to be explicated) rather than its meaning would show up as a later specification of information within social systems only. This perspective taken has two immediate consequences: (1) We follow the GDI as defined by Floridi, though we modify it somehow as to the aspect of truthfulness. (2) We can conceptually solve Capurro’s trilemma. Hence, what we actually do is to follow the strict (i.e. optimistic) line of UTI in the sense of Hofkirchner’s. While doing this, we treat energy and information as two different categorial aspects of one and the same underlying primordial structure.
The Potential and Limitations  of Twitter Activism: Mapping the 2011 Libyan Uprising
Authors: Lindgren Simon
Published: May 2018

This article aims to shed more light on the potentials and limitations of social media as a tool for activists. It does this by focusing on the use of one particular social media platform —  Twitter — during one specific period of a certain uprising: the first 24 hours of protests in Libya during the Arab Spring in 2011. Even though this study is thus limited, it represents an important step in the direction of analyzing what actually happens when social media is put to use in relation to concrete events. The identified social network patterns, as well as the content of the posts, resonate with what Enzensberger (1970) calls “emancipatory use of media”: The architecture is decentralized, network connections are distributed, and mobilization and self-organization is going on. It must be realized however, that seeds of such emancipatory use does not necessarily preclude “repressive use of media”.
Big Argumentation?
Authors: Faltesek Daniel
Published: May 2018

Big Data is nothing new. Public concern regarding the mass diffusion of data has appeared repeatedly with computing innovations, in the formation before Big Data it was most recently referred to as the information explosion. In this essay, I argue that the appeal of Big Data is not a function of computational power, but of a synergistic relationship between aesthetic order and a politics evacuated of a meaningful public deliberation. Understanding, and challenging, Big Data requires an attention to the aesthetics of data visualization and the ways in which those aesthetics would seem to depoliticize information. The conclusion proposes an alternative argumentative aesthetic as the appropriate response to the depoliticization posed by the popular imaginary of Big Data.
A Critical and Semiotic Approach to the Wonderful, Horrible Life Cycle of the Kony 2012 Viral Video
Authors: Andacht Fernando
Published: May 2018

Is it possible or plausible to represent horror and evil persuasively or authentically in these internet-multi-distributed times? And how can we account for a vast, belligerent reaction of public opinion when the representation of horror or evil is watched by an unprecedented, massive amount of people in North America and elsewhere in the YouTube realm? The unparalleled audience success of an unusually lengthy audiovisual narrative uploaded on YouTube whose subject matter is the quest for justice in East Africa was as remarkable as the diverse audience response of dismay, hope, joy and anger it elicited. The reaction was expressed in traditional print media (e.g. a special issue of The New York Times), in countless blogs and in YouTube – through assorted video-responses and written remarks, many of which were so disparaging that this function was disabled for the Kony 2012 video on YouTube. To try to account for the outpour of supportive viewers and of an increasingly negative response, I analyse its visual rhetoric and also some the critical remarks it triggered. The main strategy of the video consists in what I have described elsewhere as the “index appeal” of popular factuality programming (reality shows, docudramas, talk shows and documentaries), namely, the prevalence of allegedly involuntary signs aimed at producing intense emotions in viewers. Peirce’s semiotic theory of indexicality – as well as of iconic and of symbolic signs – is central to my analytical approach, as well as his critique of dualism. I also revisit a 1948 paper of two seminal figures in the pantheon of communication theory, P. Lazarsfeld and R. Merton. Their functionalist analysis of media effects posits a peculiar “narcotizing dysfunction” to account for the apathy produced in the audience despite the increasing intake of media information by the population. This paradoxical media effect posited by early functionalism, I think, is akin to what is harshly criticized over sixty years later about the significant impact produced by the Kony 2012 video on its vast public. Through the case study of a visual media narrative that gathered an audience as large as a populous nation in less than a week, and an equally impressive array of biting critical views in both traditional and new media, the article aims to account for its remarkable success and its ulterior proclaimed failure as a humanitarian campaign in the streets. I will do so by revisiting the early functionalist critique of mass media effects within the analytical framework of the action of indexical-iconic signs in the age of YouTube.
The 'Bollywoodization' of Popular Indian Visual Culture: A Critical Perspective
Authors: Kumar Keval Joseph
Published: May 2018

The roots of popular visual culture of contemporary India can be traced to the  mythological films which D. G. Phalke provided audiences during the decades of the ‘silent’ era (1912-1934).  The ‘talkies era of the 1930s ushered in the ‘singing’ /musical genre which together with Phalke’s visual style, remains the hallmark of Bollywood cinema. The history of Indian cinema is replete with films made in other genres and styles (e.g. social realism, satires, comedies, fantasy, horror, stunt) in the numerous languages of the country; however, it’s the popular Hindi cinema (now generally termed ‘Bollywood’) that has dominated national Indian cinema and its audiovisual culture and hegemonized the entire film industry as well as other popular technology-based art forms including the press, radio, television,  music, advertising, the worldwide web,  the social media, and telecommunications media. The form and substance of these modern art forms, while adapting to the demands of the new media technologies, continued to be rooted in the visual arts and practices of folk and classical traditions of earlier times.
“A Real China” on User-Generated Videos? Audio-Visual Narratives of Confucianism
Authors: Hao Jianxiu
Published: May 2018

Beneath the “Chinese successful story”, social stratification, class polarization, and cultural displacement have been accelerated. The Chinese Communist Party has not found a coherent solution to the challenges of reconciling social interests, since Communism has been more and more becoming mere “lip service”. However, it has been claimed that Confucian values can provide sources to dissolve the downsides of modernization in contemporary Chinese society. This study intends to investigate the revival of Confucianism, as a source for criticism and construction in Chinese socio-culture, as portrayed in user-generated videos which are produced/consumed by the largest Internet using population in the world, under the Chinese authoritarian regime which controls over communication. By means of a thematic audio-visual narrative analysis, this study has investigated 20 hours of Youku Paike videos published between 2007 and 2013. It has been detected:  (1) about one third of the user-generated videos can be interpreted as Confucian thematic narratives; and there is a slightly increasing trend portraying Confucian values; (2) Confucianism can become a source for the formation of a new online socio-culture, in the circumstances of China’s modernization and cyberization, to advocate social actors’ cultivation and humanity’s flourishing.
Revisiting the Political Economy of Communication
Authors: Garnham Nicholas , Fuchs Christian
Published: May 2018

This tripleC contribution is based on a  research seminar that took place at the University of Westminster on January 22, 2014. It featured a conversation with Nicholas Garnham that was chaired by Christian Fuchs. We publish here both the audio-recording as well as a printed version, for which the audio version acted as foundation, but that was entirely re-written.The task of the paper and the seminar was to revisit some of Nicholas Garnham’s ideas, writings and contributions to the study of the Political Economy of Communication and to reflect on the concepts, history, current status and perspectives of this field and the broader study of political economy today. The topics covered include Raymond Williams’ cultural materialism, Pierre Bourdieu’s sociology of culture, the debate between Political Economy and Cultural Studies, information society theory, Karl Marx’s theory and the critique of capitalism.
The Real of the Virtual: Critical Reflections on Web 2.0
Authors: Boikos Christos , Moutsoulas Konstantinos , Tsekeris Charalambos
Published: May 2018

Social media, as the heart of Web 2.0, is a relatively novel theoretical notion and social phenomenon, pertaining to a long series of academic subjects, such as digital culture, virtual communication, e-democracy, technological convergence, and online interactivity. Arguably, one of the most useful tools to adequately interpret and analyze this phenomenon is Critical Theory. The present article aims to comprehensively discuss and reflexively elaborate on the complex interrelationship between Critical Theory and Web 2.0 developments. This mainly involves the historicization of the relevant concepts and the identification of crucial sociological, philosophical and interdisciplinary issues that strongly demonstrate the essential ontological complicity between the real and the virtual. In addition, the analytical emphasis on recent social movements, such as the Arab Spring, reflexively depicts the new media as critical media, a characteristic feature that somehow stands in contrast to the participation of the internet in the circulation and accumulation of the Capital. Through contemporary Web’s inherent paradoxes, it is eventually shown that the social potential of the new media can indeed be realised, so that the internet serves the people and the public good.
Foundations of a Marxist Theory of the Political Economy of Information: Trade Secrets and Intellectual Property, and the Production of Relative Surplus Value and the Extraction of Rent-Tribute
Authors: Rigi Jakob
Published: May 2018

The aim of this article is to sketch a preliminary outline of a Marxist theory of the political economy of information. It defines information as a symbolic form that can be digitally copied. This definition is purely formal and disregards epistemological, ideological, and functional aspects. The article argues that the value of information defined in this sense tends to zero and therefore the price of information is rent. However, information plays a central role in the production of relative surplus value on the one hand, and the distribution of the total social surplus value in forms of surplus profits and rents, on the other. Thus, the hegemony of information technologies in contemporary productive forces has not made Marx’s theory of value irrelevant. On the contrary, the political economy of information can only be understood in the light of this theory. The article demonstrates that the capitalist production and distribution of surplus value at the global level forms the foundation of the political economy of information.
Digital Labour in Chinese Internet Industries
Authors: Xia Bingqing
Published: May 2018

Digital labour has been the subject of considerable research in recent years (Van Dijck 2009, Manzerolle 2010, Dyer-Witheford 2010). But relatively little research has considered professional workers in digital media. This research addresses this gap by focusing on professional workers in the Chinese Internet industries. This paper asks: How are these digital labourers involved in the digital media production? To what extent should we criticise this involvement? Based on detailed empirical research in China, I argue that the rapid growth of the Internet industries depends on exploiting these Internet workers, such as the workers in Chinese Internet industries—the new ‘sweatshop’ of the digital era. Chinese Internet workers have been subsumed in the global capitalist system as the new ‘sweatshop workers’. This paper shows that Chinese Internet workers suffer very poor working conditions, and argues that these working conditions are the result of exploitation, a concept explored via using Eric Olin Wright’s schema. This paper also argues that most of the Chinese Internet workers are in the lower middle-class class position, in which they are exploited by the upper classes. Their working conditions have seriously deteriorated and they are victims of inequality and injustice—although they also are able to exercise agency and resistance. This paper therefore calls urgent attention to the working conditions of these digital labourers.
From ‘Post-Industrial’ to ‘Network Society’ and Beyond: The Political Conjunctures and Current Crisis of Information Society Theory
Authors: Ampuja Marko , Koivisto Juha
Published: May 2018

This article critically discusses the intellectual and conceptual shifts that have occurred in information society theories (and also policies) in the previous four decades. We will examine the topic by focusing on the work of Daniel Bell and Manuel Castells, arguably two of the most important information society theorists. A key element in the academic shift from “post-industrial” (Bell) thinking to the discourse on “network society” (Castells) is that it has brought forward a different way of understanding the role of the state vis-a-vis the development of new information and communication technologies, as well as a new assessment of the role of the state in the economy and society at large. Against the Keynesian undertones of Bell’s ideas, Castells’ network society theory represents a neoliberally restructured version of “information society” that is associated with the rise of flexibility, individuality and a new culture of innovation. We argue that these changing discourses on the information society have served a definite hegemonic function for political elites, offering useful ideals and conceptions for forming politics and political compromises in different historical conjunctures. We conclude the article by looking at how the on-going global economic crisis and neoliberalism’s weakening hegemonic potential and turn to austerity and authoritarian solutions challenges existing information society theories.
On the Abolition of Academic Labour: The Relationship Between Intellectual Workers and Mass Intellectuality
Authors: Hall Richard
Published: May 2018

This article analyses the ways in which academic labour as a productive activity is subsumed inside the circuits and cycles of finance capital. These circuits are redefining universities as transnational associations of capitals, through which the concrete and abstract realities of academic labour are recomposed for value production and accumulation. One way of critiquing and moving beyond such a recomposition is through a reconsideration of academic labour as a fetishised form of labour, and subsequently framed in terms of the idea of “mass intellectuality”. The potential for mass intellectuality to enable liberation from the domination of capitalist social relations is contested, but the idea of socially-useful, living knowledge offers a mechanism for rethinking the value of academic labour, and pointing towards its abolition. Thus, the article asks whether it is possible to dissolve academic labour into the fabric of society as intellectual work, through which another image of society and social production becomes possible. Here the ideas of open co-operativism and fearless practice underpin a politics of alliance against capital that seeks to abolish the present state of things.
Customer Relationship Malevolence: A Reflection on Accounting, Marketing and Customer Valuation
Authors: Weir Kenneth
Published: May 2018

Ideas centring on knowing and understanding the customer have been core concerns of business since the 1960s. As a result, several attempts to understand the customer have been devised, leading to the generation of data collection systems and calculative technologies that try to provide numerical understanding of the customer, which now lies at the heart of contemporary customer management schemes. However, these technologies can produce several social consequences. This paper discusses valuation metrics used in customer management systems and outlines the negative issues that can result from widespread usage.
Dying for an iPhone: The Labour Struggle of China’s New Working Class
Authors: Chan Jenny
Published: May 2018

The presented sociological research analyses the ways in which the integration of the electronics manufacturing industry in global supply chains has intensified labour conflicts and class antagonism. The Taiwanese transnational corporation Foxconn Technology Group holds more than 50 percent of market share in global electronics manufacturing. Its 1.4 million employees in China far exceed its combined workforce in 28 other countries that comprise its global empire. I assess the conditions of a new generation of Chinese workers on the basis of the intertwined policies and practices of Foxconn, international brands (notably Apple), and the local government, as well as the diverse forms of collective actions workers deploy to defend their rights and interests. Within the tight delivery deadlines, some Foxconn workers leveraged their power to disrupt production to demand higher pay and better conditions. While all of these labour struggles were short-lived and limited in scope to a single factory, protestors exposed the injustice of “iSlavery,” garnering wide media attention and civil society support. Contradictions of state-labour-capital relations, however, remain sharp. In the authoritarian regime, notwithstanding the resilience of the Chinese state in the face of sustained popular unrest over the last two decades, my ethnographic study highlights the unstable nature of precarious labour in its hundreds of millions.The published audio is a recording of a talk in the University of Westminster's CAMRI Research Seminar on October 1, 2014, see also http://www.westminster.ac.uk/camri/ and http://www.westminster.ac.uk/camri/research-seminarsAn article related to this talk has been published open access in the Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Pun-Ngai/3981Biography:Jenny Chan was Chief Coordinator of SACOM (Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior) between 2006 and 2009. Educated at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong, she went on to pursue her doctorate in sociology and labour studies as a Reid Research Scholar at University of London. She was awarded the Great Britain-China Educational Trust for dissertation writing (PhD diss. 2014). In September 2014 she joined the University of Oxford as Departmental Lecturer in Contemporary Chinese Studies, the School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies. Her recent articles have appeared in Current Sociology, Modern China, The Asia-Pacific Journal, The South Atlantic Quarterly, Global Labour Journal, New Labor Forum, Labor Notes, New Internationalist and New Technology, Work and Employment.http://www.area-studies.ox.ac.uk/dr-jenny-chan
Creative Industries, Value Theory and Michael Heinrich’s New Reading of Marx
Authors: Pitts Frederick H.
Published: May 2018

This article utilises the new reading of Marx found in the work of Michael Heinrich to analyse the creative industries. It considers the role played in the production of value by the labour that takes place in the sphere of circulation. The specific focus is on creative industries such as graphic design, advertising and branding. It applies Heinrich's conceptualisation of 'social validation' to these sectors. This suggests that valorisation depends upon goods and services attaining commodity status by selling for money. Value is subject to this validation. The capitalist use of advertising, graphic design and branding guarantees the possibility of this validation. Using Heinrich, it reevaluates claims made about the creative industries and cognate fields in three main respects. First, it exposes as inadequate certain Marxist understandings of productive and unproductive labour and the place of circulation activities within this distinction. Second, it refutes autonomist Marxist claims as to the immeasurability of immaterial labour and the redundancy of the law of value. Third, it suggests that creative industries possess a significant role in a capitalist economy blighted by a necessity towards the overproduction of commodities.
Martin Heidegger’s Anti-Semitism: Philosophy of Technology and the Media in the Light of the "Black Notebooks". Implications for the Reception of Heidegger in Media and Communication Studies
Authors: Fuchs Christian
Published: May 2018

“Heidegger is the petty bourgeois of German philosophy, the man who has placed on German philosophy his kitschy night-cap […] When I see that even super-intelligent people have been taken in by Heidegger, […] I feel sickened to this day. […] Heidegger used to hold court at Todtnauberg and at all times would allow himself to be admired on his philosophical Black Forest plinth like a sacred cow. […] They made their pilgramages, as it were, into the philosophical Black Forest, to the sacred Martin Heidegger and knelt down before their idol”--- Thomas BernhardAbstract:In spring 2014, three volumes of the Schwarze Hefte (Black Notebooks), Heidegger’s philosophical notebooks, were published in the German edition of his collected works. They contain notes taken in the years 1931-1941 and have resulted in public debates about the role of anti-Semitism in Heidegger’s thought.This article asks: What are and should be the implications of the publication of the Black Notebooks for the reception of Heidegger in the study, theory, and philosophy of media, communication, and technology? It discusses Theodor W. Adorno’s and Moishe Postone’s contributions to the critical theory of anti-Semitism and applies these approaches for an analysis of Heidegger’s Black Notebooks.The analysis shows that the logic of modern technology plays an important role in the Black Notebooks. The paper therefore also re-visits some of Heidegger’s writings on technology in light of the Black Notebooks. There is a logical link between the Black Notebooks' anti-Semitism and the analysis of technology in Being and Time and The Question Concerning Technology. The first publication provides the missing link and grounding for the second and the third.Heidegger’s works have had significant influence on studies of the media, communication, and the Internet. Given the anti-Semitism in the Black Notebooks, it is time that Heideggerians abandon Heidegger, and instead focus on  alternative traditions of thought. It is now also the moment where scholars should consider stopping to eulogise and reference Heidegger when theorising and analysing the media, communication, culture, technology, digital media, and the Internet.Image source: By Willy Pragher (Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Media, Art and Politics: The Centenary of the First World War in Britain
Authors: Goodwin Peter
Published: May 2018

Peter Goodwin takes a critical look at how the media and arts in Britain have responded to the centenary of the First World War. He asks what this tells us about popular consciousness and the mechanisms of bourgeois ideology in Britain in the second decade of the 21st century.This contribution is a podcast of a Communication and Media Researach Institute (CAMRI) seminar that took place on January 21, 2015, at the University of Westminster.