124263 KO Critical Media Analysis (2015W)

The concept of the fetish in Cultural Studies simultaneously refers to cults, sexuality & consumption, to commodities, the definition of the (sexed) modern subject, erotic fixations, a constellation of relations, disavowal and domination and to the desire for authority that connects all of these. In this course we will focus on an in-depth study of core-definitions of fetishism by Freud and Marx and how these were elaborated in feminist/gender/queer-, postcolonial-, and postmodernist theories for cultural analysis. Considering fetishism as cultural discourse ; we will see how fetishism operates in CMA by focusing on 6 theoretical frameworks:

(1) Fetishism as a discourse of modernity
Origins: 19th cent. The Era of the Fetish: ethnology, religion, culture
Arnold's Culture & Anarchy

(2) Freud: Fetishism in Psychoanalysis & Sexology (Binet & Kraft-Ebbing)

(3) Developments in psychoanalytic-, feminist-/gender-/queer- theories:
masquerading women / pathologized men /queer performativity
Lacan, Rivere, Metz, Kristeva (abject & fetish), Bronfen

(4) Racial fetishism and disavowal / fantasy & colonial stereotyping/Othering
Bhabha, Hall, Mercer

(5) Marx: Commodity-fetishism & political cults

(6) Fetishism in consumerism, culture-industry, and pop-culture:
Baudrillard, CCCS-perspectives

We will discuss these concepts in detail, trace their interrelations and on a further level of analysis - explore how they can be employed as a toolbox for critical media analysis.