Patricia Pisters (ed.): Micropolitics of Media Culture: Reading the Rhizomes of Deleuze and Guattari (2001)

3 November 2009, dusan

This book focuses on the micro-political implications of the work of Gilles Deleuze (and Félix Guattari). General philosophical articles are coupled to more specific analyses of films (such as Fight Club and Schindler’s List) and other expressions of contemporary culture. The choice of giving specific attention to the analyses of images and sounds is not only related to the fact that audiovisual products are increasingly dominant in contemporary life, but also to the fact that film culture in itself is changing (‘in transition’) in capitalist culture. From a marginal place at the periphery of economy and culture at large, audiovisual products (ranging from art to ads) seem to have moved to the centre of the network society, as Manuel Castells calls contemporary society. Typical Deleuzian concepts such as micro-politics, the Body without Organs, becoming-minoritarian, pragmatics and immanence are explored in their philosophical implications and political force, whether utopian or dystopian. What can we do with Deleuze in contemporary media culture? A recurring issue throughout the book is the relationship between theory and practice, to which several solutions and problems are given.

Publisher Amsterdam University Press, 2001
ISBN 9053564721, 9789053564721
302 pages

publisher
google books

PDF (no OCR; some pages missing; updated on 2012-11-4)

Félix Guattari: The Three Ecologies (1989–) [FR, PT, DE, EN]

17 October 2009, dusan

Just as rare species are disappearing at an alarming rate, so whole areas of human thought, feeling and sensibility are becoming extinct through the power of an infantalizing mass media and the social exclusion of the old, the young and the unemployed. Extending the definition of ecology to encompass social relations and human subjectivity as well as environmental concerns, Guattari argues that the ecological crises that threaten our planet are the direct result of the expansion of a new form of capitalism and that a new ecosophical approach must be found which respects the differences between all living systems.

A powerful critique of capitalism and a manifesto for a new way of thinking, The Three Ecologies is also an ideal introduction to the work of one of Europe’s most radical thinkers. This edition of The Three Ecologies includes a chronology of Guattari’s life and work, introductions to both his general philosophy and to the work itself and extended notes to the original text.

French edition
Publisher Éditions Galilée, Paris, 1989
ISBN 2718603518
74 pages

English edition
Translation by Ian Pindar and Paul Sutton
Publisher Athlone Press, London, 2000
ISBN 0485004089, 9780485004083
174 pages

Google books (EN)

Les trois écologies (French, 1989, added on 2014-3-21)
As três ecologias (Portuguese, trans. Maria Cristina F. Bittencourt, 1990, updated on 2012-10-18)
Die drei Ökologien (German, trans. Alec A. Schaeret, 1994, added on 2016-4-27)
The Three Ecologies (English, trans. Ian Pindar and Paul Sutton, 2000, updated on 2012-10-18)

Philip Armstrong: Reticulations: Jean-Luc Nancy and the Networks of the Political (2009)

4 October 2009, pht

“Significantly advancing our notion of what constitutes a network, Philip Armstrong proposes a rethinking of political public space that specifically separates networks from the current popular discussion of globalization and information technology.

Analyzing a wide range of Jean-Luc Nancy’s works, Reticulations shows how his project of articulating the political in terms of singularities, pluralities, and multiplicities can deepen our understanding of networks and how they influence community and politics. Even more striking is the way Armstrong associates this general complex in Nancy’s writing with his concern for what Nancy calls the retreat of the political. Armstrong highlights what Nancy’s perspective on networks reveals about movement politics as seen in the 1999 protests in Seattle against the World Trade Organization, the impact of technology on citizenship, and finally how this perspective critiques the model of networked communism constructed by Hardt and Negri.

Contesting the exclusive link between technology and networks, Reticulations ultimately demonstrates how network society creates an entirely new politics, one surprisingly rooted in community.”

Publisher University of Minnesota Press, 2009
Volume 27 of Electronic mediations
ISBN 0816654905, 9780816654901
307 pages

Publisher

PDF (updated on 2014-9-20)