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The times of social distancing and movement restrictions caused by Covid-19 have been marked by significant changes in all aspects of life. Due to preventive pandemic measures direct access of audiences to cultural institutions was unabled and performative arts moved to an online, virtual environment physicaly distancing performers from the audience. In this paper, we discuss adaptations that took place in the domain of culture and arts offering a virtual, technologically mediated experience, deprived from some dimensions of senses, emotional engagement, interaction and communication in vivo. Our research, therefore aims to inform on audiances’ aesthetic experience which was on the one hand devoided of bodily, situated performances, or on the other hand taking place with reduced number of spectators in an open space sites during the social distancing times. Key issues we focus on are transformations of performing arts in terms of audience participation and similar kinds of modifications that were not merely an answer to a current crisis, but a shift towards the new hybrid models of digital culture overcoming classic conceptual oppositions such as real-virtual, individual-collective and mass-elite. Our insights on performative arts and new media spheres hybridisation process as well as audiences’ altered position during social distancing times are based on literature in the field of sociology of culture and arts, esthetics and mediology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crisis of Fordism has resulted in the changed regime of accumulation, i.e. in the establishment of a new form of economy that is marked with evolution of the “general intellect” and the great importance of knowledge in terms of economic growth. This was recognised in sociology and economic science and has led to the development of the “post-industrial” and “post-Fordist” society theories, as well as the “knowledgebased economy” theory. As regards to the latter, we shall see in the paper how its apologetic narrative is subjected to a critique by the cognitive capitalism theory that represents an alternative viewpoint on the character of the contemporary economic relations and considers the proclamation of the existence of knowledge based economy unjustified since such assertion implies another kind of economic arrangement. Other than elaborating the cognitive capitalism theory, we explain in the paper the differences between the industrial capitalism and new capitalism and the changes related to the organisation of production, economic role of state, nature of work and technology, and, among other things, changes related to the position and autonomy of the workers. Still, the main problem of the paper not only pertains to the economic questions but also to the broader question on the role of knowledge in the society. On the basis of assessment of the role of different types of knowledge in contemporary society, we come to the conclusion that preconditions for becoming of “knowledge society” have not been established yet and that the dominant economic logic represents the main obstacle to its actualization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Paper discusses feminist contributions to contemporary media critique and research, focusing in particular on two fields: primarily on stereotypes of gender roles and identities, and secondly on ideological character and agency of the media in support to patriarchal social relations. By introducing gender perspective we intend to highlight the significance of research of gender and feminist approaches within critical media theory considering its unjustified marginalization. Our research uses analytical framework allowing inquiry into three interrelated aspects of the problem: women as media workers, representation of women in the media and changes in representation practices in the internet era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Socio-political dimensions of consumerism and consumer resistance strategies which respond to dominant ideology and global capitalist corporations are the main topics of this paper. Sociological analysis aims to investigate the relations between consumption as omnipresent contemporary phenomena with the development of specific identities and the semantic level of individual consumer acts or possessions. Whether in the case of articulated activist movements, internet based campaigns to boycott certain products or adoption and promotion of alternative lifestyles, we argue in favor of growing response of active and informed consumers. “Political consumers” embody power that is achieved by expressing direct resistance to globalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the relationship between media technology of communication and freedom of the press and expression in information society. By opposing the arguments of optimistic and pessimistic theoretical positions, which on a fundamentally different way are considering the relationship of media technology and social change in a globalized world, I discuss how the production of social phenomena is at work in the information age, illuminating the issues of freedom of thought and action in a new way. I investigate whether the range of information available in the media, along with the free channels of communication and creating your own content with the help of user friendly technology are making us more competent for political and social activism. My goal is to show that new sophisticated strategies of information overproduction are developed in a democratic environment saturated with media which lead to the need for an expanded definition of the right to information, here defined as: the right to freedom from information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]