After Globalization: Transnational Cultural Developments since 2020

Dear Colleagues,

In the years since the world slammed its borders shut in 2020, globalization has been in question as supply-chain crises have demonstrated the limits of just-in-time global production. While the economic integration of the financial sector means we are all as interdependent as ever, the unilateral actions of nation states such as Russia and China, as well as the sanctions introduced by the United States and its allies, have put collective governance and global trade in jeopardy. While many see the end of an era in these developments, there can be no doubt that the time has come to deepen some of the inquiries around the concept of globalization in order to evaluate the efficacy and relevancy of this model in the 21^st century. This Special Issue of Arts aims to achieve as much by getting beyond the early theoretical developments of the globalization model, such as global cities and cultural flows, in order to elaborate how the globalization of culture has fared in recent years. Are international cultural festivals, art fairs, and biennials a means of spreading an imperial model of cultural consumption to emerging economies, or have new voices from the Global South disrupted our normative assumptions? Is the market a successful means of measuring our collective interaction in the arts, or have divergences in the cultural sphere opened up separate circuits of cultural distribution that leave us more divided than ever? Has the proliferation of platforms such as Zoom, Instagram, and TikTok increased our mutual understanding or isolated all of us into our own digital echo chambers?

This issue welcomes contributions from all corners of the world and all fields of the arts and design in order to develop a multi-faceted interdisciplinary exploration of the state of global cultural production and consumption today. As museums have begun to return artefacts to their countries of origin in recognition of the colonial power dynamics that brought them into their collections, and the visibility of artists of color and minorities has increased globally, it is time to inquire whether power dynamics have shifted in the cultural sphere and, if so, how. Considering the emergence of intangible cultural heritage as a category for protection by the United Nations opens up new questions of how economic globalization might threaten traditional lifeways, even as they become more recognized than ever. These shifts have significant consequences for the visual and performing arts, architecture, design and cultural heritage studies that this Special Issue hopes to explore.

If you intend to submit work to this Special Issue, please send a 200-word Abstract to John Zarobell ([email protected]) by April 15, 2023. Please note that there is a two-stage submission procedure. The editor will first collect abstracts of 200 words by April 15, 2023. Before May 1, he will invite selected abstracts to be submitted as full papers for peer review by July 15, 2023. Journal publication is expected in November 2023, depending on the revision time needed after peer review.

Dr. John Zarobell
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Arts is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• contemporary art
• performance studies
• architecture
• design
• world music
• globalization
• Global South