Category: Performance

• The fetishizing of physical occupation

  Probably one of the foremost criticisms of the US Occupy movement.

  Too much in-camp micro-organisation, as Jason Hickel points out in his review of Occupy! Scenes from Occupied America (Verso) here, and too few attempts to make broader links with  the labour movement (says Nikil Saval, one of the book’s contributors), or lower class occupants of the city and immigrants (says Audrea Lim).

  Only a short read but it’s worth considering the main point; the fetishizing of political protest and failure to consider the millions of others outside of and beyond the confines of Zuccotti Park in New York and many other centres of the movement across the USA and the wider Western world. Grasping these kinds of actions less as coherent, long-run ‘movements’ and more as socio-political ‘events’ might go some way to understanding how they can often appear to fail. Especially in the face of widespread opposition in the media, across the political spectrum and in the general public. What we see there  (‘direct democracy’) – singular, unique, specific – doesn’t fit in with what we see here  (‘delegative democracy’) – routine, general, oblique. It requires action of a different kind, or simply a downgrading of the ‘pivotal’ nature of these events.

  2012.08.19

• Nowhereisland

  First sighting of nowhereisland: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-18894755. For more, click here.

  2012.07.21

• 2.8 Hours Later

  Like zombies? How about real-world multiplayer games? And how about apocalyptic narratives like those seen in the film 28 days later?

  Coming to a UK city near you soon, it seems. This city-wide ‘zombie chase game’ (at only £24 a pop!) challenges participants to negotiate the half-dead world, racing from bolt-holed survivor to bolt-holed survivor. All in the hope of reaching the zombie disco on your successful completion. That is, of course, if you avoid exposure to ‘zombie gore’…

   

  2012.06.17

• Elden, Harman, Latour

  Stuart Elden’s Progressive Geographies is one of a few academic blogs I return to on a near-daily basis. Surfing from personal insights into the academic work process to book releases, video links and conference details, Elden provides a rich stream of content across Political, Geographical and Philosophical spheres. There are recurring figures most weeks; Henri Lefebvre, Michel Foucault, Martin Heidegger, Immanuel Kant and Peter Sloterdijk pop up frequently. As does Graham Harman; a feverish blogger himself over at his Object-Oriented Philosophy page. Elden’s latest post is a re-blogged interview with Harman over at The Loyal Opposition to Modernity that can be read here. As Harman is a big reader of Bruno Latour, he brings his name up in conversation, alluding to his appeal to anthropologists, geographers and sociologists over philosophers. Harman also talks of his lethargy with purely relational concepts (in metaphysical terms and then political arenas). In particular Harman says;

  Now that relations and events have become king in continental philosophy, these battles have largely been won. Rather than endlessly using these theories to beat up the decreasing number of reactionary holdouts, we ought to take a closer look at the problems with relationality itself.

  ‘Metaphysical essentialism’, he says later, ‘is politically harmless, but epistemological essentialism is not’. So two problems with essence? The idea that it can be directly known (rather than obliquely), and is eternal (a-historical).

  Another great quote is on Deleuzian thought within Continental Philosophy:

  We are well into the “Deleuze is compatible with everyone and foresaw everything” phase, the lack of a challenging outside, which always announces the closing decadence of any philosopher’s vogue; Derrideanism got this way by the early 1990’s. And now the Deleuze industry is finally on the point of overheating and excess inventory, and soon there will be layoffs and plant closures.

  Latour, as Harman argues, is certainly no Deleuzian (too much flux not enough formation). Harman’s Prince of Networks, from 2009, is a good starting point for thinking about Latour as a philosopher, and how Harman’s own Object-Oriented Philosophy can work with Latour’s Actor-Networks. It’s available as a free pdf from here, but also well worth buying.  

  2012.06.02

• Digital Play, Politics and Epistemology

  Good looking conference at Utrecht University courtesy of the Centre for the Study of Digital Games and Play, 7Scenes and the Waag Society. Here’s what the organizers have to say about it:

  With the advent of digital and mobile technologies scientific knowledge production has changed profoundly. As interactive, affordable, networked and ubiquitous technologies they invite people to engage with, alter and probe scientific ‘facts’. Play is essential to think about this new kind of engagement with science. It offers citizens powerful ways to become involved with and knowledgeable about scientific practices and offers subversive and exciting possibilities to actively contribute to and transform them. During this conference we therefore want to look at current citizen science developments through the lens of play. We will explore how the playful potential of digital media and cultures strengthen citizen’s scientific engagement and knowledge about their environment; and how the relationship between professional and laymen knowledge production is shifting through the ludic use of digital technologies.

  Although the conference is invitation only for the first two days (25/26th June) there is an open public event on the 27th in Amsterdam featuring keynotes from, amongst others, Jeffrey Warren.

  2012.05.22