2019/05/20 by Shirin Saeidi, Amirhossein Vafa · 6 citations
Social Sciences · Psychology · #Contemporary and Historical Greek Studies #Islamic Studies and History #Turkey's Politics and Society #Sociology #Context (archaeology) #Criticism #Isolation (microbiology) #Politics #Agency (philosophy) #Disappointment #Aesthetics #Citizen journalism #Gender studies #Media studies #Epistemology #Social science #Social psychology #Political science #Psychology #Law #History
paper · doi:10.1177/0305829819840800
published in Millennium Journal of International Studies 47(3), 417-443 (SAGE Publishing)
openalex publication_date 2019/05/20 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
In this article, we theoretically conceptualise the renegotiation of participatory action and activism through the formation of intellectual space that is self-reflective and upheld by what we metaphorically describe as mirrors between parallel worlds. Rethinking what activism is and how an individual relates to their social group is dependent on different levels of self-reflection, self-criticism and competing scales of insertion of other people’s struggles into one’s own political vision in an effort to intellectually rectify the local tensions that emerge in a post-revolutionary context where people are disconnected from global-level activism. A significant aspect of this analysis is our interlocutors’ imaginative capacity to draw from other people’s experiences through cultural and visual artefacts and integrate them into their own life history with the intention to address national or group-specific dilemmas. While some have drawn attention to the importance of noting how spaces for activism are remade in the post-revolutionary context due to such sentiments as disappointment, we instead examine the formation of conceptual spaces of activism within the context of isolation in contemporary Iran. Empirically, we bring together a political analysis of the novel Bevatan by Reza AmirKhani, and interviews conducted with English literature students in Shiraz.