Oana Pârvan | Goldsmiths, University of London (original) (raw)
Books by Oana Pârvan
Rowman & Littlefield International , 2020
The Tunisian revolution raises important questions regarding the articulation of resistance and p... more The Tunisian revolution raises important questions regarding the articulation of resistance and political subjectivity in the context of global governmentality.
By drawing from political theory, philosophy, ethnography and readings of local street art, this book restores the radical significance of the political event as an instance of possible collective action. Using the 2011 Tunisian revolution as a starting point for a broader discussion, this book analyses the processes of Orientalisation of non-Western examples of collective action and critiquing the narrative frame of the 'Arab Spring'.
By focusing on the aspect of autonomous mobilities and transformations, occurred within a beyond the Tunisian space, Oana Parvan is able to answer key questions including, how moments of political rupture (such as revolutions) are interpreted by the wider public and how mobility across the Mediterranean rearticulates the distribution and recomposition of political theory categories such as class.
She narrates how the Tunisian revolution can be inscribed into a long history of dispossession (colonial, regional, neoliberal) and resistance; and the culture and practices of the Tunisian revolutionaries have spread in the country and abroad (seen as a way to think beyond the methodological framework of the nation-state). This work builds on research fieldwork and the analysis of Tunisian street art (mostly of the Ahl Al Kahf collective), drawing from migration-centred ethnographic work in order to suggest a reconstruction of the event.
By applying theoretical reflections inspired by continental philosophy, media theory and autonomy of migration theory, this work develops an event-based theoretical reflection able to contribute towards rethinking contemporary Orientalism, self-representation and political subjectivity.
Articles by Oana Pârvan
Journal of World Popular Music, 2021
Based on a first-hand account of the SSO#5 event, the authors discuss the challenges of grounding... more Based on a first-hand account of the SSO#5 event, the authors discuss the challenges of grounding the organization of an international academic event in the local environment of Naples, a Southern Italy city with a strong sound system tradition. An ethnographic account of the Italian and Naples scene, including interviews with local sound system pioneers, will provide the context. The overarching intention animating the planning of the event was to acknowledge the way academic research can interact with local and global grassroots music movements in a transformative way, establishing connections, nurturing skills and promoting mutual recognition. More specifically, the event was aimed at amplifying the value of the already-existing scene, turning up the self-confidence of its practitioners and boosting the acknowledgement of sound system practice as an academic research field. This was achieved through the active involvement of local practitioners and activists in the conception of the event, to achieve the mutual trust and respect between participants from different backgrounds, which made the event itself a form of practice-as-research in terms of adding to an ongoing learning process.
https://recursivecolonialism.com/manifest/, 2020
Riffs.A Popular Music Studies Journal, 2018
Politics. Rivista di Studi Politici, 2019
Taking the case of Tunisia’s Dignity Revolution, this article examines the structural connections... more Taking the case of Tunisia’s Dignity Revolution, this article examines the structural connections between the growing global category of those designated ‘surplus life’ by the neo-imperial economy – and by extension, condemned to social and often actual death – and the preconditions of revolution.
The article raises an interrogation around the global subjects of struggle, on their mobility practices and the motivations that drive them to move, both within and against the national constituted order. The Tunisian Dignity revolution offers a privileged standpoint to identify the interweaving of colonialist and capitalist logics, while representing, at the same time, an extensive archive of resistance strategies, across the east/west borders. What do the Tunisian rioter, the ‘undocumented’ migrant or the ‘terrorist’ say about the recomposition of class and the capital restructuring of a post-colonial state, during and after the 2011 revolutionary climax?
MetaMute, 2017
Taking the case of Tunisia's Dignity Revolution, Oana Parvan examines the structural connections ... more Taking the case of Tunisia's Dignity Revolution, Oana Parvan examines the structural connections between the growing global category of those designated 'surplus life' by the neo-imperial economy – and by extension, condemned to social and often actual death – and the preconditions of revolution.
The ‘Arab Spring’ possesses an unexplored discursive dimension made of stratified stereotypical a... more The ‘Arab Spring’ possesses an unexplored discursive dimension made of stratified stereotypical approaches and assumptions linked to the ‘Arab’ world and its horizons of political agency. In the aftermath of the Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings, in a period of renewed censorship and instability, multiple actors coming from citizen journalism and activist/artistic backgrounds collaborate in experimenting post-revolutionary counter-power.
The drive to reappropriate the revolutionary narrative and give continuity to its legacy in the ‘transitional’/post-dictatorship period is marked by an all pervading intertwining of art and counter-information, in collectives focusing on media (such as Egyptian Mosreen), street art (such as Tunisian Ahl al Kahf), journalism (Inkyfada) or theatre (Corps Citoyen) projects, as well as for the emerging independent video-makers (such as Tunisian Ridha Tlili). My article intends to interrogate their interaction with the dominant representation of the uprisings.
Conference Presentations by Oana Pârvan
International Workshop Margins, Marginality, Marginalization and Contestation in North Africa and... more International Workshop
Margins, Marginality, Marginalization and Contestation in North Africa and Middle East,
Paris 8 University
I will focus on the aspect of the class composition connected to this event and raise questions around many terms that can be employed to refer to the pioneers of this revolutionary movement.
In doing so, my intention is to connect a specifically Tunisian lineage of resistance – one that weaves together the politics of the anti-colonial fellaga, of the defiant mobility of the harraga and of the segregated communities of the houmani – with some reflections on the political relevance of instances of collective action originated from spaces of marginality.
Each of the terms I will be exploring is intended to shed light on a particular feature of the revolutionary body.
My reflection will start from Philip Rizk’s theorization of the Lumpenprecariat (Rizk, 2014) and the thematisation of the politics of the poor in the practice of the Ahl Al Kahf and Zwewla collectives. Furthermore, I will analyze the term underclass in order to start the reflection on the category, which finds itself outside of the working class in terms of formal labor. Aradau and Huysman’s revisited concept of mob (Aradau & Huysmans, 2009) will account for the centrality of the mobility practices, for the criminalization and, more importantly, for how these people have fearlessly stretched the margins of the political.
I will then develop the idea of vanguard in direct connection to the 2016 Kasserine protests, based on a critique of vanguardism and on the concept of vanguard-function (Nunes, 2013; 2014).
Joshua Clover’s work on the surplus population and riot (Clover, 2016) will then introduce the reflection on the contemporary reserve army and the conflicts between capital and labor through the lens of the struggles around production as opposed to the struggles around circulation, such as the riot. Finally, Sylvia Wynter’s liminal (Wynter, 1992; 2003) will help me imagine the nature of the collective invention that this revolution was a result of, by illustrating the specific type of knowledge that the liminal is a depositary and a constant innovator of; and by stressing out the importance of a highly dynamic “counter-world” ramified in between the articulations of the hegemonic.
With this reflection on terms, for which I will draw from all these different knowledge practices, my aim is to avoid a teleological view of politics, and to rather underline the specificity of contemporary political collectivities and of their ongoing resistance practices.
Mobilising New Economic Futures, 7 July 2018 After the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 many of t... more Mobilising New Economic Futures, 7 July 2018
After the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 many of the social and political phenomena which touched upon the previously socialist block have been framed in terms of transition from communism or the rule of the party to capitalism and democracy.
Going beyond a mere reading of the post-89 period in terms of transition, this paper focuses on the post-communist history of one country, Romania, with the intention to shed light on some of the processes that marked the past 29 years. I briefly address the environmental degradation, the deindustrialization, the shift in property regime for real estate, but - most importantly - the massive exodus or production of diaspora that affected the Romanian population. My goal is to reflect on how theories of accumulation by dispossession (Harvey) and more recent focuses on a global history of primitive accumulation might account for the transformation that Romanians experienced after 1989.
Bloomsbury Festival, 22 October 2017
In their New Left Review project and the 1968 Manifesto, Stuart Hall and his colleagues were fram... more In their New Left Review project and the 1968 Manifesto, Stuart Hall and his colleagues were framing and confronting what they called the 'new capitalism', merging political theory and practice, abstraction and contingency, in an attempt to produce transformative, subversive analysis.
My paper intends to reflect on the relationship between theory and struggle, drawing inspiration from the work of Stuart Hall, and from the political drive that opened up a new space of reflection, that of the 'cultural studies'.
The urgency is that of building a theoretical and methodological tool kit that can account for contemporary resistance and facilitate its growth and connectivity, as well as help orient the transformative potential of our researches.
Journalism and Analysis by Oana Pârvan
Rowman & Littlefield International , 2020
The Tunisian revolution raises important questions regarding the articulation of resistance and p... more The Tunisian revolution raises important questions regarding the articulation of resistance and political subjectivity in the context of global governmentality.
By drawing from political theory, philosophy, ethnography and readings of local street art, this book restores the radical significance of the political event as an instance of possible collective action. Using the 2011 Tunisian revolution as a starting point for a broader discussion, this book analyses the processes of Orientalisation of non-Western examples of collective action and critiquing the narrative frame of the 'Arab Spring'.
By focusing on the aspect of autonomous mobilities and transformations, occurred within a beyond the Tunisian space, Oana Parvan is able to answer key questions including, how moments of political rupture (such as revolutions) are interpreted by the wider public and how mobility across the Mediterranean rearticulates the distribution and recomposition of political theory categories such as class.
She narrates how the Tunisian revolution can be inscribed into a long history of dispossession (colonial, regional, neoliberal) and resistance; and the culture and practices of the Tunisian revolutionaries have spread in the country and abroad (seen as a way to think beyond the methodological framework of the nation-state). This work builds on research fieldwork and the analysis of Tunisian street art (mostly of the Ahl Al Kahf collective), drawing from migration-centred ethnographic work in order to suggest a reconstruction of the event.
By applying theoretical reflections inspired by continental philosophy, media theory and autonomy of migration theory, this work develops an event-based theoretical reflection able to contribute towards rethinking contemporary Orientalism, self-representation and political subjectivity.
Journal of World Popular Music, 2021
Based on a first-hand account of the SSO#5 event, the authors discuss the challenges of grounding... more Based on a first-hand account of the SSO#5 event, the authors discuss the challenges of grounding the organization of an international academic event in the local environment of Naples, a Southern Italy city with a strong sound system tradition. An ethnographic account of the Italian and Naples scene, including interviews with local sound system pioneers, will provide the context. The overarching intention animating the planning of the event was to acknowledge the way academic research can interact with local and global grassroots music movements in a transformative way, establishing connections, nurturing skills and promoting mutual recognition. More specifically, the event was aimed at amplifying the value of the already-existing scene, turning up the self-confidence of its practitioners and boosting the acknowledgement of sound system practice as an academic research field. This was achieved through the active involvement of local practitioners and activists in the conception of the event, to achieve the mutual trust and respect between participants from different backgrounds, which made the event itself a form of practice-as-research in terms of adding to an ongoing learning process.
https://recursivecolonialism.com/manifest/, 2020
Riffs.A Popular Music Studies Journal, 2018
Politics. Rivista di Studi Politici, 2019
Taking the case of Tunisia’s Dignity Revolution, this article examines the structural connections... more Taking the case of Tunisia’s Dignity Revolution, this article examines the structural connections between the growing global category of those designated ‘surplus life’ by the neo-imperial economy – and by extension, condemned to social and often actual death – and the preconditions of revolution.
The article raises an interrogation around the global subjects of struggle, on their mobility practices and the motivations that drive them to move, both within and against the national constituted order. The Tunisian Dignity revolution offers a privileged standpoint to identify the interweaving of colonialist and capitalist logics, while representing, at the same time, an extensive archive of resistance strategies, across the east/west borders. What do the Tunisian rioter, the ‘undocumented’ migrant or the ‘terrorist’ say about the recomposition of class and the capital restructuring of a post-colonial state, during and after the 2011 revolutionary climax?
MetaMute, 2017
Taking the case of Tunisia's Dignity Revolution, Oana Parvan examines the structural connections ... more Taking the case of Tunisia's Dignity Revolution, Oana Parvan examines the structural connections between the growing global category of those designated 'surplus life' by the neo-imperial economy – and by extension, condemned to social and often actual death – and the preconditions of revolution.
The ‘Arab Spring’ possesses an unexplored discursive dimension made of stratified stereotypical a... more The ‘Arab Spring’ possesses an unexplored discursive dimension made of stratified stereotypical approaches and assumptions linked to the ‘Arab’ world and its horizons of political agency. In the aftermath of the Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings, in a period of renewed censorship and instability, multiple actors coming from citizen journalism and activist/artistic backgrounds collaborate in experimenting post-revolutionary counter-power.
The drive to reappropriate the revolutionary narrative and give continuity to its legacy in the ‘transitional’/post-dictatorship period is marked by an all pervading intertwining of art and counter-information, in collectives focusing on media (such as Egyptian Mosreen), street art (such as Tunisian Ahl al Kahf), journalism (Inkyfada) or theatre (Corps Citoyen) projects, as well as for the emerging independent video-makers (such as Tunisian Ridha Tlili). My article intends to interrogate their interaction with the dominant representation of the uprisings.
International Workshop Margins, Marginality, Marginalization and Contestation in North Africa and... more International Workshop
Margins, Marginality, Marginalization and Contestation in North Africa and Middle East,
Paris 8 University
I will focus on the aspect of the class composition connected to this event and raise questions around many terms that can be employed to refer to the pioneers of this revolutionary movement.
In doing so, my intention is to connect a specifically Tunisian lineage of resistance – one that weaves together the politics of the anti-colonial fellaga, of the defiant mobility of the harraga and of the segregated communities of the houmani – with some reflections on the political relevance of instances of collective action originated from spaces of marginality.
Each of the terms I will be exploring is intended to shed light on a particular feature of the revolutionary body.
My reflection will start from Philip Rizk’s theorization of the Lumpenprecariat (Rizk, 2014) and the thematisation of the politics of the poor in the practice of the Ahl Al Kahf and Zwewla collectives. Furthermore, I will analyze the term underclass in order to start the reflection on the category, which finds itself outside of the working class in terms of formal labor. Aradau and Huysman’s revisited concept of mob (Aradau & Huysmans, 2009) will account for the centrality of the mobility practices, for the criminalization and, more importantly, for how these people have fearlessly stretched the margins of the political.
I will then develop the idea of vanguard in direct connection to the 2016 Kasserine protests, based on a critique of vanguardism and on the concept of vanguard-function (Nunes, 2013; 2014).
Joshua Clover’s work on the surplus population and riot (Clover, 2016) will then introduce the reflection on the contemporary reserve army and the conflicts between capital and labor through the lens of the struggles around production as opposed to the struggles around circulation, such as the riot. Finally, Sylvia Wynter’s liminal (Wynter, 1992; 2003) will help me imagine the nature of the collective invention that this revolution was a result of, by illustrating the specific type of knowledge that the liminal is a depositary and a constant innovator of; and by stressing out the importance of a highly dynamic “counter-world” ramified in between the articulations of the hegemonic.
With this reflection on terms, for which I will draw from all these different knowledge practices, my aim is to avoid a teleological view of politics, and to rather underline the specificity of contemporary political collectivities and of their ongoing resistance practices.
Mobilising New Economic Futures, 7 July 2018 After the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 many of t... more Mobilising New Economic Futures, 7 July 2018
After the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 many of the social and political phenomena which touched upon the previously socialist block have been framed in terms of transition from communism or the rule of the party to capitalism and democracy.
Going beyond a mere reading of the post-89 period in terms of transition, this paper focuses on the post-communist history of one country, Romania, with the intention to shed light on some of the processes that marked the past 29 years. I briefly address the environmental degradation, the deindustrialization, the shift in property regime for real estate, but - most importantly - the massive exodus or production of diaspora that affected the Romanian population. My goal is to reflect on how theories of accumulation by dispossession (Harvey) and more recent focuses on a global history of primitive accumulation might account for the transformation that Romanians experienced after 1989.
Bloomsbury Festival, 22 October 2017
In their New Left Review project and the 1968 Manifesto, Stuart Hall and his colleagues were fram... more In their New Left Review project and the 1968 Manifesto, Stuart Hall and his colleagues were framing and confronting what they called the 'new capitalism', merging political theory and practice, abstraction and contingency, in an attempt to produce transformative, subversive analysis.
My paper intends to reflect on the relationship between theory and struggle, drawing inspiration from the work of Stuart Hall, and from the political drive that opened up a new space of reflection, that of the 'cultural studies'.
The urgency is that of building a theoretical and methodological tool kit that can account for contemporary resistance and facilitate its growth and connectivity, as well as help orient the transformative potential of our researches.
Other Modernities. Journal of Literary and Cultural Studies, University of Milan., 2023
Book Review: Black Noise: Technologies of the Sound Diaspora by Brian D’Aquino
Race & Class, 2020
"Umanitá in Rivolta: la nostra lotta per il lavoro e il diritto alla felicitá" (Humanity in Revol... more "Umanitá in Rivolta: la nostra lotta per il lavoro e il diritto alla felicitá" (Humanity in Revolt: our struggle for work and the right to happiness) is Soumahoro's first book. He develops the arguments he has been making on television and in print into a compelling political manifesto, part autobiography, part political theory, and part call to action, nurtured by 'the stories of tens of thousands of people who pay a very high price every day in order to be free and happy' (p. 12).
Recursive Colonialisms: Technology, Culture, Politics, 2025
Chimeras. Inventory of Synthetic Cognition, Eds. Ilan Manouach, Anna Engelhardt, Athens: Onassis Foundation., 2022
Nights of the Dispossessed: Riots Unbound, Eds. Natasha Ginwala, Gal Kirn, and Niloufar Tajeri, Columbia Books on Architecture and the City: Chicago, 2020