Festival and Organization Studies

The present essay examines the festival as a form of organizing and as a metaphor for contemporary organizations. Drawing upon classical and contemporary perspectives on festival, we focus on social ambivalences and how these are enacted and mediated through festivals. Specifically, we argue that festivals mark a tension between linear and cyclical dimensions of social time. Next, we argue that formal institutional and communitarian principles are mediated through festival. Finally, we argue that festivals mark a tension between reflexivity and social critique on the one hand and mass spectacle on the other, and problematize the notion of bodily enjoyment as a form of social consciousness. We discuss the implications of these three ambivalences – in the notion of time, the notion of community, and the notion of reflexivity – for contributing to http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/orgstudies Organization Studies

Taking as my starting point the assumption that art is a social practice, and how it is made and perceived is always determined by the socio-political and economic context, I would like to propose that a festival be regarded as an art institution – and consider the implications of that perspective. The political ontology of the festival; the political and economic entanglements of curatorial practices; economic (self-)censorship and its recent manifestations at theatre festivals in Poland will be the main facets of my study. I will also enquire about how the festival today can be ‘taken over’, regained a space for critical activity. My consideration of the institutional practices of present-day festivals will be based on my own experiences as a curator; they will also be situated in the context of practicable institutional-critical activity as proposed by Gerald Raunig, and take as their point of reference the concept of an institution as a common good. The concept of the ‘performativeness of the art world’ formulated by Ana Vujanovic will be of primary importance to my study.

2014

"The Festivalisation of Culture explores the links between various local and global cultures, communities, identities and lifestyle narratives as they are both constructed and experienced in the festival context. Drawing on a wide range of case studies from Australia and Europe, festivals are examined as sites for the performance and critique of lifestyle, identity & cultural politics; as vehicles for the mobilization and cementation of local and global communities; and as spatio-temporal events that inspire and determine meaning in peoples' lives. Investigating the manner in which festivals are no longer merely periodic, cultural, religious or historical events within communities, but rather a popular means through which citizens consume and experience culture, this book also sheds light on the increasing diversity of contemporary societies and the role played by festivals as sites of cohesion, cultural critique and social mobility. As such, this book will be of interest to those working in areas such as the sociology, consumption and commodification of culture, social and cultural geography, anthropology, cultural studies and popular music studies. "

The nature and scope of festival studies is examined by compiling and analyzing a large-scale literature review of 423 research articles published in the English-language scholarly press. These have been annotated and their themes classified by reference to a pre-determined framework. Identification and discussion of three major discourses was enabled by this method, namely the roles, meanings and impacts of festivals in society and culture, festival tourism, and festival management. Conclusions focus on revealed research gaps and the need for greater interdisciplinarity to advance the field of festival studies.

Rethinking the Festival: Power and Politics. In "Method & Theory in the Study of Religion", n. 26 (1), 2014, pp. 44-73

2021

This thesis is based on an action research project with festival organisations and festival organising and is interested in key insights and practice models for changing meaning-making, routines, roles and resource flows and effectively doing what scholars of institutional theory call institutional work. The project is located in a central case study, the Muizenberg Festival, where I haved played a role as a coordinator, and have co-designed the festival process and platform between 2014 and 2019. It is further bolstered by research with several social-purpose festivals, from local and international case studies. The present socio-economic development discourse and practice prevalent in South Africa, and the developing South more generally, has been bounded and constrained by strategies that fail to address a milieu of institutionalised issues. If people cannot exercise agency on underlying institutionalised issues, alternative vehicles for organising in order to do such work are ne...

Are contemporary festivals an empty spectacle? George Steiner for one suggested in a 1996 address that closing down of the Edinburgh Festival would be 'rare but vivid mark of honesty within excellence'. The contemporary world no longer had a need for festivals as symbols of 'the credo of a community or the aspirations of a political regime,' he argued. 1 This critique of the festival as a 'meaning-free zone' seems to be linked with a kind of revulsion at the range of excesses often associated with the phenomenon of festival in the contemporary industrialized world, and the argument goes that these excesses tend to obscure and in fact diminish the 'original purpose' of festivals as we have understood it via various anthropological and sociological discourses.

International Journal of Culture, Tourism and Hospitality Research, 2013

Purpose -This paper introduces the eight articles on festival and events research in this special issue of IJCTHR.

Eventification as a social trend has spawned a boom in autonomous events and places (zones), like festivals and free cultural spaces. This is becoming not only an industry, but a social phenomenon, where social and political change emerges. Burning Man, Ruigoord, Boom, Christiania and the history of autonomous initiatives (Hakim Bey) are discussed in a context of psychological and social needs, escapism, and the experience economy.

Handbook of Festivals, New York: Routledge - J. Mair (Ed) - in press, 2018

To best echo its ethnographic nature, the details of a socially constructed grounded theory method investigation of attendee behaviour at community festivals are presented as a confessional tale. A preliminary project suggested social capital bridging between disparate visitors at community festivals does not always occur (Biaett 2012). From primary exploration a substantive theme emerged indicating lower levels of attendee social capital bonding and bridging corresponded to passive activity at community festivals. Supplementary inquiry saturated this theme, allowed it to evolve to a point of trustworthiness, and lead to the conceptualisation of organic festivity theory. This neoteric hypothesis asserts that the combination of physical collaborative creative activities, stimulation of senses, and cyclically aroused emotions at community festivals create a highly festive atmosphere giving rise to increased social capital bonding and bridging, peak liminal experience, communitas, and feelings of well-being for attendees.