SPACE, MOBILITY, AND CRISIS IN MEGA-EVENT ORGANISATION : tokyo olympics 2020's atmospheric... irradiations

This book advances an alternative critical posthumanist approach to mega-event organisation, taking into account both the new and the old crises which humanity and our planet face. Taking the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games as a case study, Tzanelli explores mega-event crisis and risk management in the era of extreme urbanisation, natural disasters, global pandemic, and technoscientific control. Using the atmospheric term ‘irradiation’ (a technology of glamour and transparency, as well as bodily penetration by harmful agents and strong affects), the book explores this epistemological statement diachronically (via Tokyo’s relationship with Western forms of domination) and synchronically (the city as a global cultural-political player but victim of climate catastrophes). It presents how the ‘Olympic enterprise’s’ ‘flattening’ of indigenous environmental place-making rhythms, and the scientisation of space and place in the Anthropocene lead to reductionisms harmful for a viable programme of planetary recovery. An experimental study of the mega-event is enacted, which considers the researcher’s analytical tools and the styles of human and non-human mobility during the mega-event as reflexive gateways to forms of posthuman flourishing. Crossing and bridging disciplinary boundaries, the book will appeal to any scholar interested in mobilities theory, event and environment studies, sociology of knowledge, and cultural globalisation. "This book advances an alternative critical posthumanist approach to mega-event organisation, taking into account both the new and the old crises which humanity and our planet face. Taking the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games as a case study, Tzanelli explores mega-event crisis and risk management in the era of extreme urbanisation, natural disasters, global pandemic, and technoscientific control. Capturing the atmospheric term 'irradiation': a technology of glamour and transparency, as well as bodily penetration by harmful agents and strong affects, the book explores this epistemological statement diachronically (via Tokyo's relationship with Western forms of domination) and synchronically (the city as a global cultural-political player but victim of climate catastrophes). It presents how the 'Olympic enterprises' flattening' of indigenous environmental place-making rhythms, the scientisation of space and place in the Anthropocene leads to reductionisms harmful for a viable programme of planetary recovery. An experimental study of the mega-event is enacted, which considers the researcher's analytical tools and the styles of human and non-human mobility during the mega-event as reflexive gateways to forms of posthuman flourishing. Crossing and bridging disciplinary boundaries, the book will appeal to any scholar interested in mobilities theory, event and environment studies, sociology of knowledge and cultural globalisation"-- Provided by publisher Cover Endorsement Half Title Series Information Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents Figures Acknowledgements Abbreviations Chapter 1 Introducing a Risky Experiment Serendipitous Events Adjusting the New Mobilities Paradigm Critical Atmospheric Mobilities and the Olympic Project The Structure of the Book Chapter 2 Pilgrimage in Tokyo Tokyo as a Cosmion: ‘Tracing’ Affective Mobilities Archipelago Imaginaries of (Im)mobility Space, Power Chrononormativity, and the Olympic Project Chapter 3 The Birth of the Japanese CineKiki Risk Assessment in Aleph Entanglements of Spirit/matter (Or, a Genealogy of Japanese Risk) Irradiation: Kiki as an Atmosphere Chapter 4 The Dreams of the Japanese CineKiki Dream Monitoring Ancestral Roots and Economic Networks Chapter 5 The Ceremonies of the Japanese CineKiki Emakimono Planetarianism Redux Host Selfie as Blueprint Utopianism: On to France 2024 Chapter 6 The Life and Death of the Japanese CineKiki Resolving Aimai: Mobility and Mortality Virulent Fields: Volumetric Poetics and Amplified Sounds/noises Chapter 7 The Journeys of the Japanese CineKiki: Bodies and No-Bodies Beyond Utopianism Style 1 – Homegenising Style 2 – Foraging Chapter 8 Conclusion: The Chronicles of a Biotechnical Crime Bibliography Index