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Research on sexual harassment in professional settings has enabled a conceptualization of transgressive behaviour by naming, defining, and mapping the phenomenon. Yet, the problem shows little sign of being eliminated. This article mobilizes a perspective of dis/organization to shed new light on the continuous (re)production of sexual harassment, suggesting that organizational contradictions create tension within which sexual harassment is enabled and (re)produced. The study employs a tension-centred research approach and draws on empirical data from two different professional settings in Denmark, namely academia and the military. Attending to the tension that arises in the organizing of these professional settings, the article identifies four contradictions that enable sexual harassment. Connecting these findings to the work of Butler, the article argues that navigating such contradictions is deeply entangled in the un/doing of professional subjects, thus making it a sensitive matter, not least for newcomers striving for intelligibility in a new professional setting. In addition to this contribution to the field of sexual harassment research, the article proposes the concept of un/doing as an analytical tool to critically examine tension and contradictions in the realm of dis/organization.

Courses on the Bible, gender, and sexuality offer many opportunities to promote social justice in the classroom. Instead of emphasizing course content, this article focuses on practical strategies and tactics that incorporate social justice into the everyday teaching of these courses. Drawing on feminist, queer, and affect theory, as well as practical experience, I propose and discuss four questions for assessing classroom practices and materials: Is it welcoming?, Does this joy need to be killed?, Does it work?, and Is it fun? The article also addresses topics such as course design, the selection of readings, assessment, and course pacing from the perspective of teaching for social justice.

Trabajo de fin de Grado. Grado en Estudios Ingleses. Curso académico 2020-2021, El presente estudio examina el personaje de Sophia Burset en la primera temporada de Orange Is the New Black (2013), traducida como Naranja Es el Nuevo Negro (2013), como una aguafiestas feminista, quien muestra las dificultades de ser una mujer transgénero en sociedad, especialmente en el entorno violento del sistema penitenciario de Estados Unidos. Esta tesis posee un doble planteamiento. En primer lugar, presenta a este personaje según las teorías feminista y queer de Sara Ahmed y Judith Butler. En segundo lugar, analiza los subtítulos en castellano de esta temporada, concretamente el episodio 1x03 “Lesbian Request Denied” (“Solicitud de Lesbianismo Denegada”), para discernir que los subtítulos en español median la construcción de Burset y que, en lugar de presentarla como aguafiestas, se le introduce como figura de entretenimiento para el público español.

By drawing on CDA, pragmatics and FG, this thesis aims at analyzing Facebook dialogueconcerning racism in Denmark in order to contribute partly to the academic discussion ondiscomfort awareness - the moral potential of the killjoy confronting people with their implicitbias - partly to the question of the deliberative potential of social media. The analysis shows thatthe killjoy confrontation is in practice surrounded by a host of elements complicating thequestion of it’s potential: Discourses and positions of identity politics, presupposed discursiveideas, diverging ideas of communicative purposes, diverging normative orientations regardingthe communicative practice and diverging moral horizons are suggested to influence the successof the killjoy in the Facebook context. Whether this actually affects the involved participantscannot be concluded on the basis of the examination, but it proves a nuanced basis for such apotential follow-up study. The analysis illustrates the difficulty of providing unequivocalconclusions to the question of the moral potential of the killjoy and thus proves the point that amore nuanced, pragmatic and context based approach to the awareness discomfort discussion isneeded. The analysis suggests that although the communicative practice surrounding the killjoymight look unconstructive, users show a certain degree of deliberative normative orientationsmaking the examined discussions more than an echo chamber suggesting Facebook in this regardto be more than just a platform for affirmation of existing views.

Ce mémoire examine le potentiel des joies fécondes, à travers la prose de l’auteure italienne Goliarda Sapienza. Nous verrons comment l’arrimage des désirs réflexifs à des luttes émancipatrices est au centre de son roman d’apprentissage L’Art de la joie. Il s’agira de baliser une caractéristique essentielle de l’émotion joyeuse : sa capacité de dilatation physiologique, individuelle et collective. De ce fait, nous affirmons que la joie et le bonheur agissent comme de véritables synonymes antinomiques. Reconnaissant l’immense pouvoir induit par la joie, nous proposons une réconciliation de la raison et de l’émotion, à contre-courant des injonctions du bonheur et de la psychologie positive. Dans l’importance qu’elle accorde aux doutes, au combat et à la peine, nous verrons aussi comment Sapienza fait figure de rabat-joie, posture rhétorique de résistance développée par Sara Ahmed, qui dénonce l’illusion des dogmes aliénants., Through the prose of the Italian author Goliarda Sapienza, this master’s thesis examines the potential of fecund joy. We will see how the alignment of reflexive desires with emancipatory struggles is central to his novel, L’Art de la joie. We shall examine the guiding, essential characteristic of joy: its capacity for physiological growth and expansion, on an individual and collective level. As a result, we affirm that joy and happiness act as actual contradicting synonyms. Recognizing the immense power induced by joy, we propose a reconciliation of reason and emotion, contrary to the admonition of happiness and positive psychology. In a rhetorical resistance developed by Sara Ahmed, who denounces the illusion of alien dogmas, we will see how Sapienza appears to be a damper by examining the importance she attaches to doubts, struggles and pain.

Hans Christian Andersen is staged as a national icon in contemporaryDanish political and cultural contexts, where certain affective perceptions of theDanish community are attached to him and his authorship. In this article, we discuss the content and function of some of these constructions by use of cultural studies scholar Sara Ahmed’s term killjoy (The Promise of Happiness). It is our main argument that while Andersen’s oeuvre represents a complexity of meanings, this complexity is sometimes lost when certain interpretations are extracted from his texts. Our analytical focus is on such polarized receptions and readings of Andersen and his authorship, and it is our aim to accentuate the complexity of the intermediate layer where different values are negotiated. Thus, we argue that Andersen’s own texts contain a killjoy-potential that can be brought to the fore through analysis of his texts and different stagings of him.

Le Lindy Hop et les danses Jazz africaines américaines du début du XXe siècle font aujourd’hui l’objet d’une sous-culture internationale. Leur popularité se nourrit en grande partie de la mise en valeur de leur joie et d’un cadre social hospitalier. Bien que cette culture soit aujourd’hui majoritairement investie par des danseurs non africains-américains, elle bénéficie d’une relation privilégiée avec plusieurs aînés, anciens habitués du Savoy Ballroom de Harlem, le lieu mythique où la danse s’est initialement développée. À leur côté, les processus de recréation, d’actualisation et de transmission de ces danses historiques présentent le terrain complexe d’une appropriation culturelle, celle d’un savoir situé afrocentrique et de la représentation de sa joie inhérente. À partir du paradigme épistémologique de la théorie critique, féministe et intersectionnelle du point de vue, cette recherche examine la démarche de traduction transculturelle, où le sens des récits des aînés et l’expression de leur affect en viennent à être substitués par des stratégies racialisées d’équivalence et d’identité et des rapports savoir/pouvoir non examinés. L’analyse s’est particulièrement centrée sur une lecture du cadre idéologique de la sous-culture, de sa « volonté de savoir » et du rapport « mythologique » (Roland Barthes) des danseurs à l’histoire et à l’authenticité. Le terrain s’est défini par une approche interdisciplinaire, multisite, ethnographique et phénoménologique située, représenté par trois études de cas localisées. Une observation participante a eu lieu dans le plus grand rassemblement international annuel de danseurs au Herräng Dance Camp suédois (1). Elle a mis en lumière un système de référence dominant et hégémonique qui perpétue les bases d’une marginalisation sociale et racialisée, malgré l’importance donnée à l’africanité de la danse et la promotion de valeurs d’ouverture, de participation, de communauté et de liberté proactive. Cette communauté culturelle, caractérisée par une volonté libérale de « bonne pratique » sociale, a aussi été le contexte d’émergence de figures « killjoy » (Sara Ahmed) (2) mettant en évidence l’homogénéité sociale structurelle de la sous-culture. L’affirmation féministe noire de ces dernières a également permis de contextualiser et de situer la dynamique politique, raciale, genrée et économique du récit des Anciens et de leur expérience du Harlem Renaissance qui a donné naissance à la danse. À partir d’une posture éthique et critique contre-hégémonique, soutenue par une articulation de la pensée d’Hannah Arendt et de la théorie postcoloniale, la conclusion de la recherche s’est réalisée autour d’une recherche-action participative dans l’école de danse Cat’s Corner à Montréal (3). Elle a été le terrain d’une remise en cause appliquée d’un système culturel et pédagogique stabilisé par un régime hégémonique de la blanchité. Les résultats se sont concrétisés dans une réforme pédagogique de l’enseignement des danses Jazz, fondée sur une approche plus holistique et non conformiste de leur tradition et sur l’intégration d’une éthique renouvelée de la relation., An international contemporary subculture has formed around the practice of Lindy Hop and the African-American Jazz dances of the beginning of the XXth century. It has gained popularity by its focus on the joy of dancing and a welcoming social environment. Although today this culture is predominantly represented by non African-American dancers, the scene has developed a close relationship with a few elders who used to be regulars at the Harlem Savoy Ballroom, the legendary place where the dance initially flourished. Informed by the lived experience of these elders, the process of reenactment, actualization and transmission of the historic dances is a complex one, involving the cultural appropriation of afrocentric situated knowledge as well as the representation of its joyful nature. Adopting the standpoint theory paradigm with an intersectional approach, this dissertation examines the processes of transcultural translation through which the elders’ narrative and their politics of emotion are substituted with an altered meaning. The cultural dynamic involves racialized strategies of equivalence and identity and an unexamined power/knowledge relation. The analysis focused on the ideological foundation of the subculture, the foucaldian “will to knowledge” and the dancers’ “mythological” (Roland Barthes) relationship with history and cultural authenticity. Drawing on an interdisciplinary approach and a situated phenomenology, three case studies were conducted through a multi-site ethnography. A participant observation was carried at the Swedish Herräng Dance Camp (1), the biggest international annual gathering of dancers. Despite the importance given to the Africanist origins of the dance and the promotion of liberal values like openness, participation, community and proactive freedom, the investigation highlighted a dominant and hegemonic reference system that perpetuates the basis of a social and racialized marginalization. This cultural community, characterized by an attention to “good practice”, was also the context for the emergence of “killjoys” (Sara Ahmed) (2) highlighting the structural social homogeneity of the subculture. The Black feminist claim of these “killjoys” also pointed to the need to contextualize and situate the political, racialized, gendered and economic dynamic of the elders’ narrative in their experiential account of the Harlem Renaissance that gave birth to the dance. Ultimately, this dissertation sought to posit an ethical and counter-hegemonic critical standpoint, articulating the political thought of Hannah Arendt and postcolonial theory. Throughout its process of analysis, a participative action research was carried out at the Montreal’s Cat’s Corner Swing Dance School (3). It led to collectively challenge the pedagogical conventions of the dance rooted in the hegemonic order of whiteness. The results of which formed around the beginning of an extensive educational reform, founded in a more holistic and open approach to the tradition of the dance and in a renewed ethic of care.

Drawing upon the perspective of the cultural studies of emotions, this article examines the reception of political satire and the re-contextualization of humour. More precisely, it investigates the multiplicity of tensions that come into play in the production, erasure, rediscovery, and reception in BelarusianInternet media of politically oriented Russian television humour mocking the Belarusian president Alyaksandr Lukashenka. The very phenomenon of comical representation aims at triggering a particular type of viewer response: laughter.But what if there is no laughter? To study this phenomenon, the concept of unlaughter, coined by Michael Billig, is drawn upon. Resonating with Sara Ahmed’s term killjoy, it helps to uncover inequalities reproduced in the circulation of humour. Who laughs and who is laughed at? The article looks at the construction of subjects and objects of laughter, as well as the emotions helping to shape the two. The extent to which the particular case discussed in this article might be illustrative of a broader function of political humour and unlaughter in creating and challenging power differentials is considered.