Be quick, even when standing still.

                As I began think about the concept of Rhizome in A Thousand Plateaus, I was reminded to three musical artists that chose to write in a similar style as Deleuze and Guattari:  The Blood Brothers, the Refused, and At the Drive-In.  All three of the groups for their seminal albums (Crimes, The Shape of Punk To Come: A Chimerical Bombation in 12 Bursts, and Relationship of Command, respectively) chose to write their own lyrics and music separately as individuals and then come together and write albums that are more than the single person’s thoughts.  They are rhizomes of music, connection points where thousands of plateaus are sent out to many different disciplines of music, art, and literature.  For an example, see below:

(For an interesting read, give the break up announcement for Refused.  It is one of the best break-up notices that I have ever read:  http://www.burningheart.com/refused/refmanifest5.htm)

                Onto Rhizomes – What are they?  How they produce interesting and logical positions within our own academic communities?  How do we root ourselves with them, while simultaneously create new and interesting frontiers in our academic discourses? 

                Rhizomes are the intersection points between two or more arenas of thought that create “plateaus.”  They are the connection points that allow for growth in an area of thought by assimilating with the thoughts of another area of thought.  For instance, originally psychology laid firm claim to the works of Freud and Jung, but over time they have become literary focus points that are heavily relied upon though being less credible in psychology.    Any given rhizome is ever changing and goes though changes in perception every day; we change our view of the connection between the works of Freud and their literary notions constantly.  “A rhizome ceaselessly establishes connections between semiotic chains, organizations of power and circumstances relative to the arts, sciences and social struggles” (7).  Rhizomes are the pivot points between discourse communities and their ideas, the outside world, and other, more distant arenas of thought.  Rhizomes can also be destroyed, not just changed, “A rhizome may be broken, shattered at a given spot, but it will start up again on one of its old lines, or on new lines” (9).  The old idea that there is nothing new under the sun gets a new and frightening connotation.  Even if we are thinking new things they are only rhizomes that have been explored before and will be pushed to another spot on the network, pushed to new lines.  Basically rhizomes “connects any point to any other point, and its traits are not necessarily linked to traits of the same nature; it brings into play a very different regimes of signs, and even nonsign states” (21).  Rhizomes are not trees, they are allowed to connect soil to the tree, trees to other trees, the sky to the tree, veins within the tree, but they are never the tree itself; “The tree imposes the verb “to be,” but the fabric of the rhizome is the conjunction, “and…and…and…” (25). 

                Within “1914: One or Several Wolves” we see that Deleuze and Guattari are seeking a notion that establishes the notion of a misuse of rhizome.  They use Freud’s study of the Wolf-Man to understand when a rhizome can be used poorly.  Without summarizing, Freud’s use of psychoanalysis on this particular patient had gaps in which Deleuze and Guattari choose to explore their validity, and to sometimes point and laugh at the misdiagnosis.  Where “Introduction” is a dense exploration of the term from multiple facets and dimensions, “1914” is meant to explore the validity of their term in a historical and critical context.  To me it stands up, but I have been known to be wrong. 

                In “Conclusion,” we are confronted with dense and heavily coded paragraphs pertaining to the terms in the book.  Rhizome is therein defined once again as a connection point, “the line no longer forms a contour and instead passes between things, between points” (505).  However, a facet is added to the mix: that of lines.  The plane of knowledge is defined in three different and particular lines.  “Not only the segmented lines that cleave us, and impose upon us the striations of a homogeneous space, but also the molecular lines, already ferrying their micro-black holes, and finally lines of flight themselves, which always risk abandoning their creative potentialities and turning into a line of death… (fascism)” (506).  Therefore we have lines that separate us (segmented lines), lines that make thoughts disappear (molecular lines), and lines that end thought (flight lines).  All of these are the effects of the change, creation, or destruction of a rhizome. 

Dark Passengers

“Why?  Simply because I am interested in the past?  No, if one means by that writing a history of the past in terms of the present.  Yes, if one means writing the history of the present.”

                This is a fitting quote to end the first chapter of Discipline & Punishment.  It ends the graphic nature of the first chapter with a look at the philosophical and practical desires of Foucault in this volume.  He frames his thoughts and writing, like many of his contemporaries, under the banner of New Criticism; or at least as we understand it from the definition given last week.  However, what does this utilization of New Criticism do to the thoughts pertained within his work? 

                One of the claims that Foucault makes within ‘the spectacle of the scaffold’ is that as the penal system grew and became more attuned to the system that we know today, the severity of punishment for religious crimes went down.  In other words, as we approached the model of the contemporary penal system, crimes religious in nature (blasphemy, adultery, etc.) were sentenced to more lenient punishments.  However, one question that is implicit in the text throughout the text is the idea of the soul as the prison of the body.  Foucault addresses the matter somewhat indirectly throughout the text, offering up ideas that the physical nature of body can be punished much more easily than the soul.  Readers are confronted by thick descriptions of the horrors that can come from the tortures executed upon the body, but he does not get into the dark recesses of the mind and soul until later in the book.  He states that the punishment upon the body was enough for strong men to wither and die when the proper amount of time and pain was induced upon the criminal, but this connection between soul as prison and Foucault’s analysis comes at a timely point in history. 

                Although we, as a species, have been interested in our criminals, both fiction and non-fiction, from Judas to Brutus, Bluebeard, Jack the Ripper, and Magneto.  They interest us and have been a source of dark entertainment for thousands of years.  However, within the past century that dark entertainment has moved from interest to a desire for real understanding not only of their crimes but also of their emotional, religious and mental states.  For instance, the classical example of Russian Realism follows a fictional murderer, Raskolnikov, as he deals with his crime mentally and wrestles constantly with his soul.  Although though this was a work of fiction, Dostoyevsky is able to weave a complicated and engrossing narrative of a man soulfully dealing with his own choices and how those choices begin to destroy him.  No punishment that the court could levy on Raskolnikov would be worse than the guilt his soul feels as he struggles with his crime. 

                In the 20^th century, we are presented with multiple instances where we are entranced and addicted to the criminal’s plight against his own soul.  In Cold Blood and The Executioner’s Song are the first, and probably best, examples that come to mind.  Each work presents their criminals not only as a man, something that seems to be lacking in earlier versions of our society, but also as soulful victims of their own pitiless existence.  They are men who feel for their victims and are more distraught by their crimes than anyone else, a characteristic that is somewhat absent in the mythos of the criminal before this era.  Perry, one of two killers from In Cold Blood, is seen as an artist, a tortured soul.  He is the quintessential criminal as a tortured soul.  He is saddened by his actions and his soul is therefore more of a prison than the actual bars in front of him.  Truman Capote latched onto this idea and was able to exploit it to amazing cerebral depth within his work.  However, this work also illustrates another view of criminals within our society: the criminal act and the obsession that follows in its wake.

                Perry, on his way to the gallows, shakes the hand of his arresting officer and says “I am glad you could make it.”  These acts drove that officer to alcohol and his eventual death ten years later.  He became obsessed with what this act meant to him.  We, as a society, often deal with this obsession and it has become manifest in many different ways.  It can range from the whimsical (Dexter, buying Charles Manson LPs) to clinical (reading books about serial killers or other criminals, watching documentaries) to pathological (needing to meet criminals, erecting monuments or attending reenactments) to criminal (copycat crimes, crimes to prove themselves worthy of the mantle left behind).  This obsession is not new, but the manifestation of and the way that we individually deal with it has become much more open to options throughout the last few decades.  We are fascinated with criminals and that does not seem to be something that is going away any time soon.

                Foucault makes note of this, the entire first section is his own version of trying to understand criminals and how they operate within the common penal system.  However, he does give us enough evidence to understand that the soul, particularly the reason centers of a common man, can provide prison enough.  Then that prison can become an obsession of sorts for those that are trying to understand themselves, particularly their own dark passengers.  Foucault writes to understand the present, and in doing so unlocks some interesting thoughts about society’s obsessions and penal codes, most importantly that as laws became secular our understanding of the soul as a prison became more fluid and much darker. 

Annotated Bibliography Pt. Three

Gur-Ze'ev, I(2005). Adorno and horkheimer: diasporic philosophy, negative theology, and counter-education. Educational Theory, 55(3), 342-365. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=17562760&site=ehost-live.

This article explains in more detail the background philosophy that Horkheimer and Adorno are espousing in "The Culture Society."  What I found fascinating about this article is the depth that it went into about their use of different religious notions throughout their careers.  From what I understood these two authors were enamoured by the Agnostic world early in their careers but as their notions changed to Diaspora Theory their writings and thoughts garnered a distinct Jewish background.  This is an interesting sentiment.  The feeling I get from the "Culture Society" was a almost anti-religious feeling, not Agnostic, but just passively anti-religious.  By understanding their background and how they were approaching their own writing, through this article by Gur-Ze'ez, I was able to better understand the thoughts espoused by Horkheimer and Adorno.

Benzaquen, A. (1998). Thought and utopia in the writings of adorno, horkheimer, and benjamin. Utopian Studies, 9(2), 149-161. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=4788827&site=ehost-live.

This article extends the last article that I posted.  In this article readers are given an explicit view of the Jewish theology that inspired Horkheimer and Adorno.  It is interesting to note that many philosophers from the Frankfurt school also subscribed to these theories.  These included a ban on pictures and their objection to writing the word "Utopia," which is similar to Jewish scholars' objection to writing their lord's name.  These religious notions are looked at intently and are examine not only in Horkheimer and Adorno's works but also in Benjamin's.  One of the most important things about this article is that it sums up the idea of Critical Theory in one sentence: "Critical Theory is the activity of theorizing in the present in order to allow for a better future."  This was so crystal clear that I had to include it in my bibliography.  Also this exposed me to the ideas of geistige, spiritual renewal in German, and immanence, the principal that guides the explanation of every event as repetition, are two of the most essential terms I have seen in these readings yet. 

Annotated Bibliography Pt. Two

Bansky, (2010). Exit through the gift shop [DVD].

As I was reading the Benjamin article I was struck by the discussion of transfering old art into new platforms and how it somewhat loses its autotomy in the process.  This film by underground London street artist Bansky is a great representation of that principle in action.  Bansky, and other street artists like Shepard Fairey, expose part of their process which includes helping along a new artist that does nothing but reappropriate old portraits and make them his own. It is a facinating document mostly because you do know whether Banksy is telling the truth or elaborating on a lie.  The whole film becomes an almost post modern piece of literature that laughs at the established art world and how it interacts with outside society.  For me this is a good extension of the articles we are looking at this week.  This film really helped me to visualize many of the thoughts that are going on in these pieces.

Levy, B(2004). War, evil, and the end of history. (1 ed.). Hoboken: Melville House Publishing.

This was one of the first pieces of French philosophy that I read.  I am not only bringing in this book because it is a fracinating piece of contemporary philosophy but because Bernard-Henri Levy draws heavily on the Frankfurt school as he struggles with his thoughts on war, journalism, the white space of history, and repeating the same day over and over again.  His concept of Uchronia, which was coined in the 1900s, is adapted to talk about literature and the constant wars that upset the society in which we live.  It is a fantastic extension of the thoughts we are discussing in class and is a great entry point for contemporary philosophy.  If anyone would like to read some of this I can copy off the pertinent pages. 

From Commodore To Pocket Pets

Looking back on my life with technology is an interesting prospect.  The first time that I remember being utterly connected to technology was an old Commodore 64 that lived under the stairs in my house.  It was a constant item of contention between my sisters and I; we all wanted to play the video games that were on those old 3.5 inch discs.  We would all try to wake up early in the morning on Saturdays and try to get to the computer first.  I often lost and would wait till later in the afternoon to play my casual game of Spy Hunter.  However, this was not only a gamer experience but it was also the first computer I wrote a school report on. 

Growing up in the eighties and nineties was an interesting time for growing up with technology.  I don’t remember a period of my life where television was not a part of my daily activities until after I was eighteen.  My parents stole cable from the time I was eight to the time I was twelve and that allowed me cultural as well as secular views of the world to counterbalance the strict religious upbringing that I had.  MTV in the early nineties and the “kids” show Animaniacs were, oddly enough, both a huge influence on my cultural development.

From there, my family, although poor, were always trying to be on the cutting edge of technology.  My mother, an IT help person, always wanted to have the newest hardware to work on at home.  However, she never knew how to work with it.  I did.  I always did know how to fix things on the computer and even now that is a skill that I cherish whenever my wife comes running for help with her Mac.    

Gaming was a huge culture when I was growing and I always seemed to be behind the times.  My friends in my neighborhood were constantly playing video games starting with Mario Bros. then Driver then Gran Turismo then Grand Theft Auto and ending up with Halo.  I always tended to be reading books and sticking to the computer games that I liked, so I was always the worst in that group of friends.  The only console game that I really ever got into was Tony Hawk and I still maintain that I can beat most people at that one. 
             
Around 2001 I started buying music.  This was a dramatic moment in my life, the technology was ripe with change and I was standing in the mist of change.  Music was changing and the rise of Emo in 2003 had a profound effect on me.  I bought music with every paycheck that I got from my supermarket job.  I read reviews and scoured the shelves of record stores looking for the most interesting and unique titles that I could find.  However, in 2005 something changed in my life with music technology: I bought a vinyl record player.  This was around the time that vinyl was coming back into style as a legitimate vinyl format.  It also helped that one of my roommates at the time was huge collector and helped me to see the light.  My first purchase was Styx’s Kilroy Was Here.  Yes, the one with “Domo.”  I quickly started buying more recent bands on vinyl.  The real turning point in my collection was going to England in 2006.  For a music lover, particularly one that has just gotten into vinyl, England was an oasis.  One of my favorite moments was walking into an OxFam store, our equivalent of DI, and finding about $2,000 worth of records for $10.  I couldn’t understand why I had found such a treasure trove of records but then the cashier told me that the biggest radio DJ in Dublin had sent all his excess to this one OxFam store.  Suffice it to say I came home with about 50 pounds of vinyl in my suit case that trip and about the same on the next.  

 The technology surrounding music changed so rapidly throughout the last decade that many people just had to try and keep up.  I was one of them.  I got into downloading and dealt with DRM.  I watched the rise and fall of Napster, Limewire, and The Pirate Bay.  I never used them, except Napster early in 1999.  Unlike the majority of people that went through this same period I always got my music legally.  I purchased a lot, but working at a radio station helped to make my record collection larger, much, much faster.  My work at the radio brought me to new technologies and actually working with hardwiring.  In 2008 I helped to move the radio station at Weber State from one building to another.  This was an enormously difficult task and I worked through some of the wiring with our station engineer.  Music was always something that I loved and the world of technology always bled through it.

There have been lots of other areas I could talk about in terms of technology that has influenced my life.  I mean really, the last two decades have given us a wonderful amount of technology to wonder over from terrifying (Star Wars missile program, ICBMs, biological weapons) to fun (Ieverythings, console games, IMAX movies) to completely inane (pocket pets, the resurgence of 3D movies, USB albums).  However, these few moments in my life really defined my life with technology: fun but insightful and focused on making my life more interesting.