“Art Is in Our Heart”
“ART IS IN OUR HEART”: TRANSNATIONAL COMPLEXITIES OF ART PROJECTS AND NEOLIBERAL GOVERNMENTALITY _____________________________________________ A Dissertation Submitted to the Temple University Graduate Board _____________________________________________ in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy _____________________________________________ By G.I Tinna Grétarsdóttir January, 2010 Examining Committee Members: Dr. Jay Ruby, Advisory Chair, Anthropology Dr. Raquel Romberg, Anthropology Dr. Paul Garrett, Anthropology Dr. Roderick Coover, External Member, Film and Media Arts, Temple University. i © Copyright 2010 by G.I Tinna Grétarsdóttir All Rights Reserved ii ABSTRACT “ART IS IN OUR HEART”: TRANSNATIONAL COMPLEXITIES OF ART PROJECTS AND NEOLIBERAL GOVERNMENTALITY By G.I Tinna Grétarsdóttir Doctor of Philosophy Temple University, January 2010 Doctoral Advisory Committee Chair: Dr. Jay Ruby In this dissertation I argue that art projects are sites of interconnected social spaces where the work of transnational practices, neoliberal politics and identity construction take place. At the same time, art projects are “nodal points” that provide entry and linkages between communities across the Atlantic. In this study, based on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork in Canada and Iceland, I explore this argument by examining ethnic networking between Icelandic-Canadians and the Icelandic state, which adopted neoliberal economic policies between 1991 and 2008. The neoliberal restructuring in Iceland was manifested in the implementation of programs of privatization and deregulation. The tidal wave of free trade, market rationality and expansions across national borders required re-imagined, nationalized accounts of Icelandic identity and society and reconfigurations of the margins of the Icelandic state. Through programs and a range of technologies, discourses, and practices, the Icelandic state worked to create enterprising, empowered, and creative subjects appropriate to the neoliberal project.
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