【Leading-Edge Lecture 12】Sensible Politics: Visualizing International Relations
【Leading-Edge Lecture 12】
Title：Sensible Politics: Visualizing International Relations
Speaker：William Callahan（Professor of International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science）
Moderator：Chih-yu Shih（Professor, Department of Political Science, NTU）
Time: 11/17 15:30-17:30
Venue: Room 419, College of Social Science, NTU
Speaker:
William A. Callahan is professor of International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science; in 2020-21 he is a Taiwan Fellow at National Taiwan University. His recent books include Sensible Politics: Visualizing International Relations (OUP, 2020) and China Dreams: 20 Visions of the Future (OUP, 2015), and his documentary films include ‘Great Walls’ (2020), which asks why we hate Trump’s wall and love the Great Wall of China.
Abstract:
Visual images are everywhere in international politics. But how are we to understand them? In Sensible Politics, William A. Callahan uses his expertise in theory and filmmaking to explore not only what visuals mean, but also how visuals can viscerally move and connect us in “affective communities of sense.” The book’s rich analysis of visual images shows how critical scholarship needs to push beyond issues of identity and security to appreciate the creative politics of social-ordering and world-ordering. It challenges our Eurocentric understanding of international politics by exploring the meaning and impact of visuals from Asia and the Middle East. The presentation will discuss these conceptual issues through an analysis of two controversies of interest to IR specialists and policymakers: 1) the visual politics of the US-Mexico barrier and the Great Wall of China; and 2) Callahan's new project that looks at how China visualizes foreigners.
Organizer: Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences, National Taiwan University
Co-Organizer: Department of Political Science, National Taiwan University
