Stuart Hall Library Reading Group discussion post 8 December 2011

Thanks to everyone who attended this month's reading group. A recording of the discussion will soon be available via the library website. You can also listen to recordings of our previous reading group sessions.

We discussed Raqs Media Collective's ‘X notes on practice: stubborn structures and insistent seepage in a networked world’, from Seepage (Berlin: Sternberg Press, 2010) pp.101-116.

‘The Raqs Media Collective was founded in 1992 by Jeebesh Bagchi, Monica Narula and Shuddhabrata Sengupta. Raqs Media Collective make contemporary art, have made films, curated exhibitions, edited books, staged events, collaborated with architects, computer programmers, writers and theatre directors. The Collective are based in Delhi, New India. Raqs remains closely involved with the Sarai program at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies www.sarai.net, an initiative they co-founded in 2000’.

http://www.raqsmediacollective.net/

This text was chosen not because it presents new or original ideas, but because it offers a reminder to be aware of our own work and practices, of the ‘connectedness’ of the worlds we inhabit. It also favours agency and action – the current occupy movement is a good example of what the Collective are discussing.

In the text, the The Collective identifies and describes ‘five marginal figures’ to inform and inspire their practice:
‘The Alien navigates a boat at sea’
‘The squatter builds a tarpaulin shelter’
‘The electronic pirate burns a CD’
‘The Hacker network liberates software’
‘Workers protect machines in an occupied factory’

They summise, p.109 ‘She [the cultural worker] would need to take a lesson in breaking borders…from the migrant, in standing her ground and staying located from the squatter, in placing herself as a link in an agile network of production…from the pirate, in sharing knowledge and enlarging a commons of ideas from the hacker, and in continuing to be autonomously productive from the workers occupying the factory’.

It could be argued that this is a ‘manifesto of idealism’, full of possibilities, and its positivity is inspiring. However, in what ways can these acts translate into everyday actions by the artist or cultural worker operating within an institution/organisation? How feasible is it to expect or gain autonomy in such an environment?

Do the figures provide an alternative way of thinking about globalisation, as the Collective suggest?

The group was unanimous in its enjoyment of the text. The concepts articulated were open enough to be applied not just to artists. Its imaginative yet clear prose style was appreciated. The discussion turned quite quickly to everyday experience of 'connectedness' and the way in which it effects/affects our lives.

The whole text of Seepage is available online at:

http://bit.ly/sRc1Dg

This will be our last meeting until the Spring/Summer. During the break we welcome feedback about the group. Please contact us at library@iniva.org.

Happy holidays!

Stuart Hall Library Reading Group Discussion Post, 10 November 2011

Thanks to everyone who attended this month's reading group. A recording of the discussion will soon be available via the library website. You can also listen to recordings of our previous reading group sessions.

We discussed Les Back’s ‘Listening with the eye’ from The art of listening. (Oxford; New York: Berg Press, 2007) pp.97-115.

The text was chosen because it presents an alternative view of understanding photography, and provides a good example of the way in which different disciplines approach a particular practice.
More information on Les Back here:
http://www.gold.ac.uk/sociology/staff/back/

The discussion was probably the most impassioned we’ve had so far at the reading group; members felt that there were real critical and ethical issues at stake in the sociologist’s approach to photography. Back considers the possibilities for dialogue between the researcher and the ‘subject’, arguing that images can, ‘contain voices that present yet inaudible. We have to listen for them with our eyes’. (Back, 2007: 100)

One theory was that the About the Streets project, which took place in Brick Lane, London in 2002 and was being described in the chapter, was more about exploring the ethics of sociological enquiry than engaging critically with photography as an art form. Others enjoyed the open, human-centred approach to the narratives of the people who posed for the photographs. Some took issue with what they saw as the ‘naivety’ of the writing, and the perceived lack of critical analysis in the text. What became clear was that the standpoint of each individual evoked a particular, strong response to the text, which lead to an intense and exciting discussion.

Next meeting: Thursday 8 December, 6.30-8.00: Raqs Media Collective. ‘X notes on practice: stubborn structures and insistent seepage in a networked world’ in Seepage. Berlin: Sternberg Press, 2010. pp.101-116.
You are welcome to visit the Library to make a photocopy of the text. If you are having any problems obtaining a copy, please contact us and we will make this available to you. Email the library for further information or to book your place:

library@iniva.org

Stuart Hall Library Reading Group Discussion Post, 13 October 2011

Thanks to everyone who attended this month's reading group, our first this Autumn. A recording of the discussion will soon be available via the library website. You can also listen to recordings of our previous reading group sessions.

We discussed 'Melancholic Migrants', a chapter from Sara Ahmed's The Promise of Happiness (Durham; London: Duke University Press, 2010) pp.121-159.

This text was chosen because it provides an interesting perspective on the individual migrant, concepts of multiculturalism, and ideas of happiness relating to affect studies. In the introduction Ahmed describes ‘the happiness turn’ (p.3) in which there has been an increase in research into happiness and ‘well being’ in the past decade, particularly in the disciplines of social policy and psychology. It has influenced David Cameron’s political discourse, and the Conservative party pledged to conduct a survey to measure the nation’s happiness [Stratton, Guardian.co.uk, 14 November, 2010, accessed 12.10.2011]. Also, its themes are closely linked with Iniva’s current exhibition, Entanglement: the Ambivalence of Identity.

More about Iniva's exhibition here: http://www.iniva.org/exhibitions_projects/2011/entanglement

The discussion illustrated the way in which theories of identity touch individual lives, and therefore became general. Group members were able to give examples of 'migratory experience', either their own, or that of their parents, or as travellers to other locations (temporary migrants!).

Some points for discussion:

- Is there any truth in the Trevor Phillips quote at the beginning of the chapter p.121 that, ‘Multicultural communities tend to be less trusting and less happy...’?

- How valid do you think Ahmed’s overriding argument is – that the 1st generation migrant suffers loss (of the old way of life) but that the obligation is to integrate?

- Ahmed’s conception of the migrant seems to be of a particular type. Do you think that differences in migratory experiences are sufficiently taken into account in her argument?

- What do you think of the readings of films and books chosen to illustrate Ahmed’s argument? Do you think it matters whether the reader has seen them in terms of making sense of the argument?

Next meeting: Thursday 10 November, 6.30-8.00: Les Back. ‘Listening with the eye’ in The art of listening. (Oxford; New York: Berg Press, 2007) pp.97-115.

A copy of the text is available in the Stuart Hall Library. If you are having any problems obtaining a copy, please contact us and we will make this available to you. Email the library for further information or to book your place: library@iniva.org

Stuart Hall Library Reading Group Discussion Post, 9 June 2011

Thanks to everyone who attended June's reading group, our last before the summer break. A recording of the discussion will soon be available via the library website. You can also listen to recordings of all our previous reading group sessions.

The reading for June was Frances Dyson's 'Atmospheres', in Sounding New Media: Immersion and Embodiment in the Arts and Culture (2009). We chose this text as part of our developing interest and broadening our knowledge of new media. The text's focus is on the work of Catherine Richards. You can find out more about her work here:
www.catherinerichards.ca/

These were some of our points for discussion:

- Can human beings meaningfully interact with technology? (ie. with the machines themselves?)

- Is ‘digital space’...equivalent to physical space, and digital presence...equivalent to actual presence’? p.161 [discussion of code]

- Arguably, the work is characterised by representation (theory) and metaphor, rather than (lived) experience. Also, can Richards fully determine how the work is experienced by the viewer or, as with other types of authorship, can there only be intention?

- P.158 ‘In the discussions of posthumanism...two rhetorical threads stand out: the first focuses on the transcendent private space of virtual or immersive environments, the second expands this space of “being-in” to theorize artificial life and “digital being” in general’.

- P. 159 The posthuman makes more sense ‘as a field of relations’ rather than a state of being.

- Dyson discusses the paralells and differences between writing and code: ‘although the computational worldview is similar to grammatology in not presuming the transcendental signified...it also does not tolerate the slippage Derrida sees as intrinsic to grammatology. Nor does code allow the infinite iterability and citation that Derrida associates with inscriptions.’.

- P.162 Dyson describes the artist Catherine Richards as channelling ‘ideas about embodiment, the senses, and notions of the self through her own “philosophical”, or rather “aesthetic machines”.

- P.171 ‘Neurotheologians’/spiritual neuroscience: “the study of correlations of neural phenomena with subjective experiences of spirituality... “ [Wikipedia definition] – Could Richards’ work evoke feelings of spirituality in the viewer?

- P.171 in her discussion of Richards’ work I was scared to death/I could have died of joy, Dyson considers the idea of s(t)imulating human emotions: ‘The glowing, pulsing brains seem to be alive [...]they appear to be communicating, bringing to mind countless scenarios of consciousness disembodied, or, more recently, downloaded. – Does ‘responding’ to stimulus, as this artwork promises correspond with (human) feeling?

- P.175 ‘Not only have machines failed to deliver, but the future is always “not-me-now” and “not-me-here”, and this very negative constellation is shadowed by the cumulative history of our experience with machines that aare always in the process of becoming obsolete’. – Arguably, the relationship of humans to machines can only ever be disappointing; the promise of ‘a better future’ is unlikely to be fulfilled.

- P.178 However, the replacement of posthuman ‘immersion’ with ‘resonance’ describes the responsiveness/changes to the human inidvidual in relating to and interacting with technology: p.179 ‘In short, the posthuman subject is not so much disembodied by technology [...] as simultaneously etherealized and “retuned”.’

- P.181 As Richards comments: “If you are immersed in a signal, you start to resonate...to the system. So for me the question is: ‘Who has the power of the pulse – whose pulse is everybody syncing to?’

This meeting was our last until we come together again after the summer break, in October. Check the reading group web page or email library@iniva.org for details.

Have a great summer!

Stuart Hall Library reading group discussion post, Thursday 12 May

Thanks to everyone that attended this month's reading group discussion. For those unable to attend a recording of the discussion will soon be available via the library website. You can also listen to recordings of all our previous reading group discussions and download a copy of suggested texts for future meetings.

The reading for May was Siobhan Shilton's ‘Transcultural encounters in contemporary art: gender, genre and history’ in Michelle Keown, David Murphy and James Procter (eds.) Comparing postcolonial diasporas. Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. pp.56-80.

We chose this text as part of our ongoing interest in visual arts in relation to the politics and repercussions of colonialism and neo-colonialism. Also, we were aware that few of the texts we have read and discussed in our meetings so far have addressed gender issues. We are also interested in the way that researchers study and approach people and issues relating to cultures other than our own, especially in the context of the use of language and theory.

Key points for discussion:
- Is there a difference between ‘transculturation’ and 'apropriation'?

- P.56 ‘Chapter is concerned with gender and diaspora space’.

- P.57 Shilton defines ‘transcultural’ in the context of art as that which ‘renegotiates the realtionship between cultures in ways that avoid attempts either to unify or hierarchize them...’

-‘Transculturation’ can be seen as a reciprochal, selective process of cultural adaptation/adoption/absorption (concept derived from Mary Louise Pratt)

- P.58 ‘Veiling’: Both artists address this issue, which Shilton calls ‘an overdetermined sign...’ Arguably, what is significant about the veil is: a) how it has become an political issue, and,
b) The majority of voices that are heard expressing opinions and judgements about it in ‘the west’ are men, and is this part of (from a feminist viewpoint) a continuing assumption that they assume ‘ownership’ over women’s bodies?

- P.65 Shilton uses the phrase ‘radical otherness’ to describe Khattari’s work. ‘Other’ in relation to who? Khattari is not ‘other’ to herself and so the question arises as to why those designated as ‘non-Western’ must constantly define themselves in relation to the way others see them?

- P.65 Shilton refers to Khattari’s use of the performance tradition by feminists of the 1960s; she comments: ‘[...] when the traditional space of the gallery...were male-dominated’. - Are galleries are still male-dominated today? - Shilton’s theorising is from the standpoint of an ‘objective viewer’ when in fact she is implicated in the ‘othering’ of the artists she is discussing.

- P.69 Shilton asserts that Satrapi uses the ‘bande dessinee’ graphic novel form, and adheres to many of its traditions; Satrapi also ‘shares its structure, and certain tropes with many Francophone narratives of immigration, exile and ‘return’.

- Shilton concludes that Khattari’s work and Satrapi’s text focus on ‘distinctively visual processes of transculturation’.

Next meeting 8, 9 June at 6.30-8.00: Frances Dyson. ‘Atmospheres’ in Sounding new media: immersion and embodiment in the arts and culture. Berkley, CA: University of California, 2009. pp.158-181.
A copy of the text is available in the Stuart Hall Library. If you are having any problems obtaining a copy of the book then please contact us and we will make this available to you. Email the library for further information or to book your place:

library@iniva.org

Zines

It seems to be a very zine-tastic time at the moment in the library. Last week Sonia attended the It's Your Write event at the Museum of Childhood organised by The Papered Parlour . Sonia presented a talk along with The Women's Library, to discuss our respective zine collections. It was a fantastic event with extremely positive feedback and it was a great chance to promote our zine collection to fellow zinesters and the uninitiated. Please do check The Papered Parlour website for further information as recordings and documents of the evening will be uploaded shorttly. And continuing our current zine frenzy, we are getting excited about the 2011 London Zine Symposium taking place this Sunday. The event takes place Sunday 17th April 12-6pm at The Rag Factory, Heneage Street, London, E1 5LJ. The full programme of events including workshops, stalls, and the radical history of Brick Lane is now available on their website. With over 60 zine and comix distros on the day we are looking forward to buying lots of new zines for our library collection. We hope to see some of you there!

We gonna pop a cap(ital) in your (cl)ass: Karl Marx’s Capital volume III

Stuart Hall Library reading group discussion post

Thursday 14th April

Malik, Suhail. 'We gonna pop a cap(ital) in your (cl)ass: Karl Marx's Capital volume III' in Nav Haq and Tirdad Zolghadr (eds.) Lapdogs of the bourgeoisie: class hegemony in contemporary art. Sternberg Press, 2007. pp.53-68

Thanks to everyone that attended this month's reading group discussion. For those unable to attend the audio recording of the discussion is now available to download via the library website here. You can also listen to all previous audio recordings and download a copy of our reading list from the website.

If you are interested in attending future reading group discussions then please contact library@iniva.org

We welcome all attendees to the discussions, and the Stuart Hall Library reading group is open to everyone, whether you are in formal education, academia, artistic practice or have a general interest.

Please note that as of next month we will be changing the time of our reading group meeting. The sessions will now run from 6:30pm-8pm starting Thursday 12th May.

Key questions and points for discussion:

• Is there a class struggle between artists, owners, and institutions? Malik argues that '[...]the politics of class struggle in art will be to...recover the primacy of the artist as producer[...]'

• p.59 According to Malik, 'the real action is now happening between dealers and gallerists- and the producers of the commodities who are becoming less and less important agents.' Do you think this is true?

• p.66 'You can see why conceptual art is a great benefit because you just get rid of the commodity thing and start circulating freely.' Does conceptual art disrupt the idea of art as commodity? What is the 'use-value' of art?

• Malik claims that the 'inflation of the art market will change the arts.' Do you think this statement is true?

• p.68 Malik concludes ' I just don't see the bourgeois or for that matter the proletariat as the relevant figure for understanding capital today.' Do you agree, as the audience member asks, that the relation between one class oppressing another no longer exists?

Next Meeting

Our next meeting will take place Thursday 12th May 6.30-8pm in the Stuart Hall Library. We will be discussing Shilton, Siobhan. 'Transcultural encounters in contemporary art: gender, genre and history' in Michelle Keown, David Murphy and James Procter (eds.) Comparing postcolonial diasporas. Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. pp.56-80

A copy of the text is available in the Stuart Hall Library. If you are having any problems obtaining a copy of the book then please contact us and we will make this available to you.

Email the library for further information or to book your place: library@iniva.org

The cultural biography of things: commodification as process

Stuart Hall Library reading group discussion post

Thursday 10th March

Kopytoff, Igor 'The cultural biography of things: commodification as process' in Arjun Appadurai (ed.) The social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge UP, 1986 (reprint 2003), pp. 64-91

Thanks to everyone that attended this month's reading group discussion. For those unable to attend a recording of the discussion is now available via the library website here. You can also listen to recordings of all our previous reading group discussions and download a copy of suggested reading materials.

Key questions and points for discussion

• What did you think of the text - any initial thoughts?


• Koytoff defines commodity as 'an item with use value that also has exchange value' p.64 - do you agree?


• According to Kopytoff, commodities are subject to value judgements and are also subject to historical cultural shifts in value. They are also subject to classification and taxonomic practices. (p.64;70)


• Commodities and people are viewed as being at either end of a continuum, but individiuals have and continue to be 'commoditized'/commodified under the term slavery.


• P.65 Kopytoff's description of enslavement asserts that the processes of commoditization of an individual are short and occur at the early stages of enslavement: individuals 'acquire a new social identity'.


• Questionable as to whether a slave has a social identity, as commodification leads to dehumanisation, etc. Perhaps a further question to ask is what differentiates a 'free' human being from a commodity.


• P.66 'In doing the biography of a thing, one would ask [...]: what, sociologically, are the biographical possibilities inherent in its status[...]? Where does the thing come from and who made it? What has been its career so far[...]?


• P.69 Is 'saleability', as Kopytoff state, 'the defining factor of a commodity in the West'?


• P.69. Kopytoff notes differences in other societies where commodification and exchange may be based on 'gift giving' or 'relations of reciprocity'


• P.68 Kopytoff states that commodities area a 'universal cultural phenomenon', that 'exchange' is a 'universal feature of human social life[...]'


• P.73 'Commoditization as becoming', an ongoing process of 'expansion' and 'diversification', plus the availability of more items for exchange, for example Apple's multiple versions of similar products.


• Is it possible for art making/practice/the artists to avoid commodification and systems of exchange?


• P.90. Kopytoff characterises the identity and status of things as 'uncertain' and shifting. Does this mean that our 'value'/status/rights as human beings shift?

Next meeting

Our next reading group will take place Thursday April 14th. We will be reading Malik, Suhail. 'We gonna pop a cap(ital) in your (cl)ass: Karl Marx's Capital volume III' in Nav HAq and Tirdad Zolghadr (eds.) Lapdogs of the bourgeoisie: class hegemony in contemporary art. Sternberg Press, 2007. pp.53-68.

A copy of the text can be found in the Stuart Hall Library. To find out more about the reading group or to reserve a place please email the library library@iniva.org

All that is solid melts into air but I can't change anything

Stuart Hall Library Reading group discussion post



Thursday 10th February





Dimitrakaki, Angela. "All that is sold melts into air but I can't change anything": on the identity of artists in the networks of global capital' in Jonathan Harris (ed.) Identity theft: the cultural colonisation of contemporary art. Liverpool UP, 2008, pp.221-245.

Thanks to everyone that attended our reading group discussion. Unfortunately due to technical problems we were unable to record the discussions from the evening. Previous audio recordings can be found here

Key questions for discussion

• What did you think of the text?

• Dimitrakaki seems to be asking, 'what is the role of the artist in the age of globalisation?'

• p.224 Interesting quote from Rashid Araeen about the 'logic of multiculturalism', and 'how the dominant culture can accomodate those who have no power in such a way that the power of the dominant is preserved.' How far do you think that multiculturalism has been about acknowledging difference without questioning or changing exisisting power structures?

• p.240 '[...]today identity has become suspect, and this happened as it exchanged the 'soft' realm of culture for the 'hard' realm of non-cultural politics'. Diitrakaki then asks, 'What fills identity's negative space'?

• p.240 Would you agree with the statement, '[...]art appears to be disempowered in a milieu where power is reportedly everywhere[...], including the institutions where this powerless art circulates'.

• p. 241 '[...] we are witnessing the return to a subject in terms of economic relations [...]' and Dimitraki sees this as the interrelation of aesthetics and politics. What does this locate us as thinking subjects (who might be artists)?

• Dimitrakaki acknowledges the historical and cultural shifts that have taken place, the forces of globalisation, ie. p.239 ' the persisten and meticulous transference of meaning from the economic to the cultural subject', and in addition I would argue that September 11 was an ideal justification for the demonisation of 'cultural difference'. - Arguably cultural difference has never been seen as harmless, particularly in the West.

Next meeting

Our next reading group will take place Thursday 10th March 2011.

We will be reading Kopytoff, Igor 'The cultural biography of things: commodification as process' in Arjun Appadurai (ed.) The Social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge UP, 1986 (reprint 2003), pp.64-91

To reserve a place please contact us library@iniva.org

Our newly updated list of upcoming texts for discussion is now available here

Race Revolt zine launch

Race Revolt zine launch

On Thursday 27th January we were very excited to launch the new issue of Race Revolt zine in the library. Ever since May last year when we launched our library zine collection, we have been hoping to collaborate in some way with Race Revolt as the zine is a personal favourite of the library team. We wanted to engage with the themes raised in each issue and hoped that the Stuart Hall Library would be a space for discussion and interaction as well as a chance to introduce the zine to new audiences.

Race Revolt compiles contributions on race politics by feminists and queers; the zine began in 2007 'as an intervention into the silences around race in queer, feminist and activist communities.' To launch Issue 5 of Race Revolt we invited editor Humaira Saeed , along with contributors to the zine: Yasmine Brien, Su Real , and Melissa Steiner, to discuss their contributions to the zine.

The evening was a fantastic opportunity to collaborate with one of our favourite zines and to interact with the specific points and issues. Each presentation was also grounded in personal and accessible language which is extremely refreshing and something I've really enjoyed in our series of zine events in the library.While it's not to say that zines and zine culture can't be intellectualised or theorised, it's so much more engaging to hear writers and artsists talk in extremely personal ways, particularly as many attendees at our zine events are new to the world of zine cultures. It was particularly exciting to overhear a member of the audience discussing the event afterwards saying "I didn't know zines were that easy to make. I want to make one now!"

If you weren't able to attend but would like to hear these presentations for yourself then audio recordings from the event are now available here

Thank you to all our guests and to everyone who attended. It's so encouraging to hear all your positive feedback and to see such excitement for zines and zine culture. We hope to continue our series of zine events this year so please stay tuned for further info. And an extra big thanks to Charlotte Cooper for her extremely generous donation of zines for the library collection!

Copies of Race Revolt can be found in the Stuart Hall Library, as well as online via the Race Revolt website.

Our library users might also be interested in the related race Revolt event Towards New Forms of Queer Belonging. This event sees a series of workshops and roundtable discussions challenging the ways in which gay rights are being used in nationalist, anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim rhetoric and ask what an effective form of queer solidarity might look like. For the full schedule of events please visit the Race Revolt website.