In Shah of Shahs, Kapuściński describes a street exchange between two men, a protester standing at the edge of a large crowd, and a policeman. Until now, he reminds us, the policeman would scream at the man to go home; he and the rest of the crowd would turn tail. But then suddenly, things change. ‘The policeman shouts, but the man doesn’t run. He just stands there, looking at the policeman…he doesn’t budge. He glances around and sees the same look on other faces…Nobody runs though the policeman has gone on shouting: at last he stops. There is a moment of silence. We don’t know whether the policeman and the man of on the edge of the crowd already realize what has happened. The man has stopped being afraid – and this is precisely the beginning of the revolution…the policeman turns around and begins to walk heavily back toward his post.’

You can read the rest here

I had a dream last night. An odd, farcical dream that Matt Saye released a Mummy on the Centenary campus. Said mummy roamed the streets of Shreveport turning anyone who looked into his eyes into a zombie-like drone with the same ability. Somewhere in my subconscious, I’m still in my grandparents’ house trying to get them out and to the airport so we can abandon the city. My grandfather, god bless him, won’t stop staring out the window to see exactly what’s going on.

I blame my mood this morning on the frantic pace of that dream, and that I didn’t sleep well due to the Australian Open flashing over my eyelids. Never actually resting makes me irritable, but I figure I should use that.

There was not enough Martin Luther King for MLK day yesterday. I did see many an homage from friends, but overall there was not much actual discussion on the man and his legacy as far as I can tell and, to be perfectly honest, there should be. Especially at this moment. The optimistic part of me remembers that, thanks to Dr. King, I am able to learn and teach at a premier university, that I’ve seen an increase in the number of students of color in the time I’ve been at the university, and, for God’s sake, my president is black. However, if we’re honest with ourselves, we know we haven’t gone far enough.

For every me, Obama, and minority student in any university, there are multiple children, of all races and genders, who believe that an education, hard work, and dedication won’t amount to much. That even with all their efforts, their dreams may go to naught. . . and some of them are right. As much as we believe, and in many cases assume, the equality of persons, the fact of the matter is that race, gender, class and other interpersonal differences do affect the experience of people in this country and in other countries across the globe. While it may be true that we are all equal through our creation, the circumstances we find ourselves in when we land on this rock change and, in some cases, eliminate certain possibilities for who we are and what we can be. If our abstract equality is what would have saved us, it would be insignificant that Jesus becomes flesh in the Biblical narrative. The spirit/soul/’person’/whathaveyou is still always placed into a vessel with determinate properties which changes the landscape for the one who occupies it.

All the me’s and especially the you’s who like to remind me about how everything is achievable (because you’ve overcome YOUR circumstances), are not the rule, we are the exceptions. We are fortunate that we have been able to discover opportunities for the improvement of our lot on this rock. The fact of the matter is, others are not that fortunate. (and this is a matter of fortune. the equality we refer to in people is the result of our recognition that, in reality, we should start on the same playing field. The fact is that the accident of our birth already locks us into certain positions that create difficulties that are insurmountable for some.) We still have work to do, and that work involves making sure that others in a similar situation to ourselves have a greater possibility of finding opportunities for personal growth and success. We’re not supermen who fought the odds. Somewhere along the line, someone gave us an opportunity to prove ourselves and we took it. Others deserve the same chance.

So, in all my frustration, I thank the fates that I have the luxury of being able to be frustrated at the world while sitting comfortably in a heated apartment, typing on one of two portable computers that I own. I’m thankful to Dr. King because his work has helped propel us this far and because his optimism and belief that we would one day “get to the promised land” overshadows my pessimism at our current state and makes me hope and want to work for a better day to come. What I’m asking of myself and others is that we keep in mind that all our political squabbles, our Facebook rants, our lovely opinions that we hold so dear are located in a peculiar space in global culture. There are still others whose voices never make it to the ether because they don’t have a vessel to carry them there.

If we are to be true to the legacy of Dr. King, it is up for us to do as he did. To make ourselves means and not ends, ways of helping others to the possibility of opportunity as others have done before us. I’m thankful to all those people who have seen me along my way. Who’ve encouraged me, scolded me, pushed me, and, more than anything, saw enough in me to give me a chance to even get this far. It’s my hope that I have the strength to see past myself as far as they have and that we collectively are not only capable of making others’ dreams a reality, but reminding people that more than they imagine is truly possible.

I appreciate coming home more now than I used to. While it’s certainly true that “you can’t go home again” in the strict sense, the differences and variations you experience when you return. My relationships with friends take on a new character, gaining depth and sometimes disappearing. In some cases you meet up and connect with people you were never able to relate to before, for whatever reason. Old haunts shut down and new places to gather have to be found, shifting how the interactions happen.

More apparent to me as I get older are the ways in which I’m connected to the community and my family that were previously overlooked. Midnight church service was a particular treat this time as I was able to reconnect with a slew of the kids I grew up with. There were about 4 generations of altar servers present and the same span of kids from the youth group. I’m still getting used to the fact that the kids I remember from their births and as toddlers are graduating high school, in college, or raising children of their own. On the home front, every trip let’s me identify just where a lot of my quirks emerged. As I notice ways that my dad and I are just alike, I think I feel a bit closer to who he is and have a greater sense of the bond we’ve developed as he’s raised me. The same with my mom. As much as we like to think of ourselves as creatures of our own fashioning, the traits and ticks we inherit are readily apparent on observation.

I’m sad to be leaving but won’t be gone long. There’s my annual summer visit and, hopefully, familial visits to Chicago or meet ups elsewhere. I’m still not convinced I would live in Shreveport again, but I’d definitely like to be closer.

The Speculative Turn has been made available here in both its physical (for purchase) and electronic (free pdf) forms. While I’ll be purchasing a copy, and suggest you do as well, this is an excellent opportunity for those who wouldn’t normally purchase a book of contemporary philosophy or are just window shopping to have a go at it on the free. The more I consider it, the open source publishing model seems to be the right approach. God willing and I ever complete a book, it will be released this way.

Contributions come from the usual suspects: Harman, Shaviro, Bryant, Latour, Stengers, and Protevi, with contributions from some of the old guard of Continental Philosophy (Žižek, Badiou, Delanda). It serves as a coming out party of sorts for a mode of thinking that’s really beginning to establish itself as a significant contribution to contemporary philosophy.

And that’s why I like seeing all this automata, from people who have contrived to straddle the space between the over-mixed blandness of the art world and the lively, vibrant certainty of subcultures. The interest in materials, the love of small pleasures, the geeky fascination with how things work: they work against the tendency of made things to end up in dumpsters, and especially they avoid that tendency for art to become saleable, showable detritus made by people who have been stuffed with unreadable theory, who don’t, apparently, feel that vibrancy.

via Cabinet of Wonders: A Plethora of Automata, but Lasting Forever.

The comment about theory is a bit cynical, but I appreciate the inclusive definition of art as artifice, something created that has an intrinsic beauty generated by the creators desire for it to have its particular form.   Apparently you can get lost making your way through youtube videos of various automata. I may give that a try.

I agree with Levi repetition is generative of positive results. Besides the assassination of the Other, which Levi describes better than I can, there’s a slackening in tension over the quality of writing and ideas. While I’m still not satisfied with my prose and am certain that others have said what I wanted to say with more dexterity, this process has helped form a greater familiarity with what it is I do want to say, shown me places where I need more development, and has eased my anxiety towards writing in general. On the technical side of things, I’ve begun to see where my expressions fall a little flat and have developed a seething disdain for the repetitive phrasing that my proofreaders have chastised me for.

To reiterate my comments in my briefs review of Toward Speculative Realism, it helps to see the writing process as a site of intellectual and technical development. Graduate school is, in a sense, Triple-A academia. It’s a training ground for early experience, to give you the chance to “get reps in” to sharpen your ideas and their expression. The student-you develops into the philosopher/student/writer-you with repetition over time. As a friend of mine once told me, “You’ve just got to learn that you suck, and start to get better.” You practice, see flaws, accept them, and improve.

As a last note, I’d also mention that posting publicly is an important part of the process. I haven’t had to deal with many of the downsides yet, since only a few people check in here, but the push into making oneself known as a writer in the public space is helpful in itself. For my fellow introverts, I promise its liberating. Yelling into a canyon and hearing an echo is better than never having yelled at all.

My encounter with Kane’s story ended up being quite a personal affair as his characterization of Louis throughout the novel vividly captures the experience of coming of age around a host of strong personalities while attempting to forge one’s own identity. This central theme makes the work ideal for those of us in all periods of life (except for maybe the alphas among us) as this conflict is repeated throughout our maturation from young adult-hood to old age. In a period where we seem obsessed with the formation and authenticity of our identities, viewing it through Kane’s mind is a welcome exercise.

I’ve described the book to my girlfriend as “Chuck Palahniuk for more intellegent readers”, as the text is littered with images and phenomena that inhabit our surroundings but are little discussed. We are exposed to a host of subcultures and seldom told tales through the collection of eccentric personalities that populate the world of the novel: The Mexican Revolution, Exhibitionist Performance Artists, Shady Canadian Business and Publication schemes that give the novel a quality of the fantastic, but never go so far as to make the scenarios unrealistic. Instead, the events of the novel take on a magical quality in real space that gives depth and breadth to what could have been more mundane interactions.

In my view, the crowning achievement of Kane’s novel is the personalization of the characters and their interactions. Little tics like Matteo’s repeated touching of/for his mohawk (watch for it), add to the personality of the characters in a way that makes them more real. The standout moments are in the segments of one on one dialog (JAck and Matteo, Louis and Roxanna) that are a jambalaya of wit, deception, cleverness, concealment, and exposure. They fall somewhere between fencing and passionate sex (which aren’t really that far apart when you think about it). The language and ideas expressed by each of the characters opens itself to engagement with your own thoughts and feelings; carrying you along with Louis (and others) on their journeys as a companion rather than a spectator.

I recommend this book as more of a ride than a text. A happening where one always senses something novel on the horizon and is propelled forward to see what’s on the other side.

In the first place, Harman’s book is an excellent introduction to Object Oriented Philosophy, his own variety of Speculative Realism. We begin during his graduate study and the development of his reading of Heidegger in Tool-Being and trace the emergence of his advocacy of a return to metaphysics, the peculiar “vicarious causation”, and his incorporation of insights found in Whitehead, Latour, and others. The importance of this aspect of Harman’s work should not be underestimated as it provides us with a unique opportunity to get a real sense of the path that Harman’s thought has taken from his time in DePaul, his work in Cairo, and the many travels that cross these periods. This historical dimension of the text is what has lured me deeper into the text, beyond my engagement with his arguments.

In his essay, The Revival of Metaphysics in Continental Philosophy, Harman makes an especially illuminating statement concerning the historical proclivities of the Continental genre:

If the strength of continental philosophy’s historical awareness is its ability to preserve great past thinkers against the trivial claims of passing fashion, the weakness is equally obvious: continental philosophy is simply unable to treat past philosophers as contemporaries. Past philosophers do not join us in confronting a shared world against which all of us measure our insights, but swim in a historically conditioned ether that refers only itself. It would make no sense to engage in debate with, say, Nicholas of Cusa on some specific issue without first situating this issue in his entire written corpus, mastering Latin, and so forth. Any past philosophy is too self-enclosed to serve as a possible model of the world, and too seamless to be harvested for specific insights.

This position of Harman’s and his project of treating the heroes of the discipline as fellow engineers in the production of concepts, of inhabiting historically distinct periods of a shared world of experience, is invaluable for the development of the field. I feel that it is safe to argue that, while an understanding of the history of philosophy is essential for those of us who take the vocation of philosophy seriously, we are often, as students and professionals, confined to extolling the benefits of the past without engaging in the development of the present. The masters, being masters, are our superiors and are required to be treated accordingly. . . unless something about your past leaves you open to ad hominem attack (see the endless debates on Nietzsche’s mental illness and Heidegger’s Nazi involvement). While it is true that the achievements of the past should be treated with reverence, it is also important to learn how to find our own role in the philosophical project. Harman’s book is an excellent guide for how this is done.

I share a similar affinity for the advice posts of Harman’s blog, that have been a godsend in my process of transitioning from coursework to the development of a dissertation project. For students in a similar position as myself it is helpful to observe the process of another, not as a template for one’s own development, but as a demonstration that the path from student to professional is a process must unfold itself over time. We see this progression in the development of Harman’s writing from his early graduate papers through his beautifully composed “Bruno Latour: King of Networks”, which ends in a poetic redeployment of Heidegger’s Parmenidean borrowing “For here too, the gods are present.” (Graham really has mastered the punctuated ending.) In this transition we see the subtle ways in which academic writing can transform into a more polished, confident tone of experimentation with thoughts and perfection of old modes and motifs. For myself, this aspect of the work stands as a reminder that we are not born Whiteheads, Heideggers, or Harmans, but become such in our continued work and effort.

Harman hints at as much in his preface, where he explains that the introductions to his essays are not meant to “dramatize his own story, but to reassure young readers about their own.” It is in this sense that I write my review as a way of saying “Thank you” to Graham for sharing his work and experience, and as a recommendation to others to explore this text as an opportunity to engage with a significant philosophical achievement that is in process in our midst. OOO has had the dual effect, it seems, of re-energizing the conceptual engagement of philosophers with metaphysics and process through the problems it poses and through the medium in which it is developing. It would be equally interesting, I think, to observe and consider the way in which OOO’s engagement with the blogosphere (do we still use this term?) has realized their work, both in the sense of bringing it to bear on contemporary philosophical discourse and as a demonstration of the type of scheme that they theorize. In either case, I would recommend Harman’s work and give a preemptive nod to the upcoming The Speculative Turn, including work by Levi Bryant, Steven Shaviro, Zizek, Delanda, Protevi, and a host of other exciting figures in the current conversation.

Philosophy aside, many of the presenters highlighted the civil tone of the discussion and productivity of the disagreements. Referencing remarks from Graham Harman and Shaviro’s panel, Michael Halewood referred to this in his closing comments as a lack of “denunciation” among the presenters. The consensus is that the aggressive maneuvers some thinkers take in simply rejecting the positions of their opponents are detrimental to our conceptual development.

The tone of warmth and acceptance, and the variety of the people in attendance, confirmed my intuition of the type of personality and engagement process thought generates through its methodology emphasis on the affective nature of our experience. One of the features of Whitehead’s work that lures me in is his insistence on a world replete with feeling, generating concern for other “things” in our mutual encounter. My sense has been that this approach should generate more caring personalities, sensitive to difference and the benefits of a genuine engagement with others. This weekend demonstrated to me that there is definitely something to that thought.

Hello Everything on USTREAM: A seminar featuring Graham Harman, Ian Bogost, Levi Bryant and Tim Morton. With Eleanor Kaufman and Nathan Brown. ..