At free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's new open access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.Precarious Creativity examines the seismic changes confronting media workers in an age of globalization and corporate conglomeration. This pathbreaking anthology peeks behind the hype and supposed glamor of screen media industries to reveal the intensifying pressures and challenges confronting actors, editors, electricians, and others. The authors take on pressing conceptual and methodological issues while also providing insightful case studies of workplace dynamics regarding creativity, collaboration, exploitation, and cultural difference. Furthermore, it examines working conditions and organizing efforts on all six continents, offering broad-ranging and comprehensive analysis of contemporary screen media labor in such places as Lagos, Prague, Hollywood, and Hyderabad. The collection also examines labor conditions across a range of job categories that includes, for example, visual effects, production services, and adult entertainment. With contributions from such leading scholars as John Caldwell, Vicki Mayer, Herman Gray, and Tejaswini Ganti, Precarious Creativity offers timely critiques of media globalization while also intervening in broader debates about labor, creativity, and precarity Frontmatter -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- 1. Precarious Creativity: Global Media, Local Labor / Curtin, Michael / Sanson, Kevin -- 2. Cybertarian Flexibility-When Prosumers Join the Cognitariat, All That Is Scholarship Melts into Air / Miller, Toby -- 3. Spec World, Craft World, Brand World / Caldwell, John T. -- 4. Film/City: Cinema, Affect, and Immaterial Labor in Urban India / Kumar, Shanti -- 5. The Production of Extras in a Precarious Creative Economy / Mayer, Vicki -- 6. Talent Agenting in the Age of Conglomerates / Roussel, Violaine -- 7. Transnational Crews and Postsocialist Precarity: Globalizing Screen Media Labor in Prague / Szczepanik, Petr -- 8. The Cost of Business: Gender Dynamics of Media Labor in Afghanistan / Sienkiewicz, Matt -- 9. "No One Thinks in Hindi Here": Language Hierarchies in Bollywood / Ganti, Tejaswini -- 10. Complex Labor Relations in Latin American Television Industries / Piñón, Juan -- 11. Labor in Lagos: Alternative Global Networks / Miller, Jade -- 12. Creative Precarity in the Adult Film Industry / Berg, Heather / Penley, Constance -- 13. Strategies for Success? Navigating Hollywood's "Postracial" Labor Practices / Warner, Kristen J. -- 14. Games Production in Australia: Adapting to Precariousness / Banks, John / Cunningham, Stuart -- 15. Redefining Creative Labor: East Asian Comparisons / Fung, Anthony -- 16. Unbundling Precarious Creativity in China: "Knowing-How" and "Knowing-To" / Keane, Michael -- 17. Revolutionary Creative Labor / Kraidy, Marwan M. -- 18. Precarious Diversity: Representation and Demography / Gray, Herman -- 19. The Precarity and Politics of Media Advocacy Work / Perlman, Allison -- 20. Internationalizing Labor Activism: Building Solidarity among Writers' Guilds / Banks, Miranda / Hesmondhalgh, David -- References -- Notes on Contributors -- Index
|