Affective Politics & the Imagination of Everyday Resistance
Summer 2009
Wednesdays 4-6PM (July 15th to August 26th)
Bluestockings Bookstore
Lower East Side | 172 Allen Street (btw. Stanton and Rivington)
Instructors: Jack Z. Bratich & Stevphen Shukaitis
[Please see registration info at the bottom]
Recently, “affect” has been a key concept for research in politics, aesthetics, marketing, neuroscience, and sociology. This course seeks to draw together some of the more innovative work within this “affective turn,” focusing on the political composition of subjectivities, especially via cultural practices. After a survey of some conceptual foundations of affectivity, we explore its relation to group-formation, labor, technology, value, passions (fear, panic, trauma, joy, love), actions, and creativity. The course will feature guest speakers engaged in affective politics and involve group discussions on the affective nature of practices participants are involved in.
Registration for the course otherwise is required prior to the start of the seminar. Pre-register in person at Bluestockings. Course participants need to submit their payment prior to the first meeting (cash only).
There will be a maximum enrollment of 20 students for this course.
Readings and Requirements:
::Readings::
Readings are divided into core and supplementary readings. The core readings (noted with a star *, approximately 50 pages) will be used to form the basis of discussion of the topics for the given week. Supplementary readings are materials arguments will be drawn from and would be useful for pursuing particular topics further but are not necessary to read before discussion. Reading core materials is highly encouraged and will greatly aid in having engaging and interesting discussions.
Week 1: Intro: Affective Foundations & Subjectivity
* Massumi, Brian (2002) “Autonomy of Affect,” Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect Sensation
* Clough, Patricia Ticineto with Jean Halley, Eds. (2007) “Introduction,” The Affective Turn: Theorizing the Social. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Brennan, Teresa (2004) “Introduction” Transmission of Affect. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Spinoza, Baruch (1677) “Of Human Bondage, or the Strength of the Affects.” Available at http://frank.mtsu.edu/~rbombard/RB/Spinoza/ethica4.html.
Week 2: Labor & Value
*Affective capitalism: http://p2pfoundation.net/Affective_Capitalism
*Ahmed, Sara (2004) “Affective Economies” Social Text 22: 2
*Negri, Antonio (1999) “Value and Affect,” boundary 2 Volume 26 Number 2: 77-88.
Hardt, Michael (1999) “Affective Labor,” boundary 2 26:2: 89-100.
Mezzadra, Sandro. “Taking Care: Migration and the Political Economy of Affective Labor.” www.gold.ac.uk/media/mezzadra_taking_care.pdf
Prada, Juan Martin. “Affective Link. Policies of affectivity, aesthetics of biopower.” www.vinculo-a.net/english_site/text_curatorial.html.
Prada, Juan Martin. “Economies of Affectivity.” www.vinculo-a.net/english_site/text_prada.html
Week 3: Affect & Technology
*Pybus, Jennifer. “Affect and Subjectivity: A case study of Neopets.” http://aspen.conncoll.edu/politicsandculture/page.cfm?key=557
*Berardi, Franco “Bifo” (2009) “Info-labor and precarization,” Precarious Rhapsody: Semiocapitalism and the pathologies of post-alpha generation. London/New York: Minor Compositions: 30-55.
*Arvidsson, Adam (2006). “Quality Singles: internet dating and the work of fantasy,” New Media and Society 8:4.
Guattari, Félix. “Cinema of Desire,” Soft Subversions. New York: Semiotext(e)
Clough, Patricia Ticineto (2001) Autoaffection: Unconscious Thought in the Age of Teletechnology. Minneapolis, MI: University of Minnesota Press.
Week 4: Affect & Sad Passions
*Brown, Wendy “Resisting Left Melancholy” boundary 2 26:3. 1999 (9).
*Marazzi, Christian. “Who Killed God Pan?” ephemera: theory & politics in organization Volume 4 Number 3: 181-186.
*Feel Tank Chicago: http://feeltankchicago.net
Berardi, Franco “Bifo” (2008) Félix Guattari: Thought, Friendship, and Visionary Cartography. Trans. Giuseppina Mecchia. New York: Palgrave.
Massumi, Brian (2005) “Fear (The Spectrum Said).” Positions 13:1.
Dalla Costa, Maria (2002) “Door to the Garden.” www.generation-online.org/p/fpdallacosta1.htm
Berardi, Franco “Bifo” (2009) “Dark Desires,” Precarious Rhapsody: Semiocapitalism and the pathologies of post-alpha generation. London/New York: Minor Compositions: 30-55.
Week 5: Affect & Joyful Passions
*Hardt, Michael (1993) “Spinozian Practice: Affirmation and Joy,” Deleuze: An Apprenticeship in Philosophy. Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis Press.
*Shukaitis, Stevphen (2007) “Affective Composition and Aesthetics: On Dissolving the Audience and Facilitating the Mob,” Journal of Aesthetics & Protest. www.journalofaestheticsandprotest.org/5/articles/shukaitis/shukaitis.htm
Weinstone, Ann (2004) Avatar Bodies: A Tantra for Posthumanism. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Berardi, Franco “Bifo” (2009) “77: The Year of Premonition,” Precarious Rhapsody: Semiocapitalism and the pathologies of post-alpha generation. London/New York: Minor Compositions: 30-55.
Week 6: Affect, Creativity & Action
*Brennan, Teresa (2004) “Transmission in Groups” Transmission of Affect. Ithaca: Cornell University.
*Precarias a la Deriva (2006)“A Very Careful Strike – Four Hypotheses,” the commoner Number 11: 33-45.
*Lohmann, Peter and Steyaert, Chris (2006) “In the mean time: Vitalism, Affects, and Metamorphosis in Organizational Change,” Deleuze and the Social. Eds. Martin Fuglsang and Bent Meier Sorenson. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Grindon, Gavin (2007) “The Breath of the Possible,” Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations // Collective Theorization. Ed. Stevphen Shukaitis and David Graeber with Erika Biddle. Oakland, CA: AK Press: 94-107.
Week 7: Affective Resistance in the Open
*Free Association (2006) “What is a life?” Available at www.nadir.org.uk/whatisalife.html.
*Bratich, Jack (2009) “Subjectivity Rosa: Undercurrent Affairs,” Fifth Estate Volume 44 Number 1.
*Agamben, Giorgio (2004) The Open: Man and Animal. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
*Genosko, Gary. “Transversality,” Félix Guattari: An Aberrant Introduction. London: Continuum Press.
Foucault, Michel (1997) “What is Revolution?” The Politics of Truth. New York Semiotext(e).
Additional readings:
“Immaterial and Affective Labor: Explored,” ephemera: theory & politics in organization Volume 7 Number 1. www.ephemeraweb.org/journal/7-1/7-1index.htm
Abel, Marco (2009) Violent Affect: Literature, Cinema and Critique After Representation. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.
Ahmed, Sara (2004) The Cultural Politics of Emotion. New York: Routledge.
Berlant, L., Najafi, S., & Serlin, D. (2008). “The Broken Circuit: an Interview with Lauren Berlant,” Cabinet Magazine Issue 31: Shame, 85.
Bratich, Jack Z. (2008) Conspiracy Panics: Political Rationality and Popular Culture. Binghamton: SUNY Press.
Brook, Brook (2009) “The Alienated Heart: Hochschild’s ‘emotional labor’ thesis and the anticapitalist politics of alienation,” Capital & Class 98: 7-31.
Cote, Mark & Jennifer Pybus (2007) “Learning to Immaterial Labor 2.0: Myspace & Social Networks,” ephemera: theory & politics in organization Volume 7 Number 1.
Deleuze, Gilles. Lecture Transcripts on Spinoza’s Concept of Affect. www.gold.ac.uk/media/deleuze_spinoza_affect-1.pdf
Dowling, Emma (2007) “Producing the Dining Experience: Measure, Subjectivity and the Affective Worker,” ephemera: theory & politics in organization Volume 7 Number 1.
Duncombe, Stephen (2007) Dream: Re-Imagining Progressive Politics in an Age of Fantasy. New York: New Press.
Federici, Silvia (2004) Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body, and Primitive Accumulation. Brooklyn, NY: Autonomedia.
Federici, Silvia (2008) “Precarious Labor: A Feminist Viewpoint,” In The Middle of a Whirlwind: 2008 Convention Protests, Movement, and Movement. Los Angeles: Journal of Aesthetics & Protest Press. Available at www.inthemiddleofawhirlwind.info.
Gibbs, Anna (2002) “Disaffected,” Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies. 16: 3.
Gorton, Kristyn (2007) Psychoanalysis and the Portrayal of Desire in Twentieth-Century Fiction: A Feminist Critique. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen.
Guattari, Félix (1996) “Ritornellos and Existential Affects,” The Guattari Reader. London: Blackwell: 158-171.
Hansen, Mark (2004) “The Affect-Body,” New philosophy for New Media. Cambridge: MIT.
Hansen, Mark (2004) “The Time of Affect, or Bearing Witness to Life,” Critical Inquiry 30: 584-626.
Hochschild, Arlie (1983) The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Jarrett, Kylie (2003) “Labor of Love: An archaeology of affect as power in e-commerce,” Journal of Sociology 39:4, 2003.
Katsiaficas, George (2001) The Subversion of Politics: European Autonomous Movements and the Decolonization of Everyday Life. New Jersey: Humanities Press.
Negri, Antonio (1999) Insurgencies: Constituent Power and the Modern State. Trans. Maurizio Boscagli. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Negri, Antonio (2003) “Alma Venus: Love,” Time for Revolution. Trans. Matteo Mandarini. London: Continuum.
Panksepp, Jaak (1998) Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions. New York: Oxford University Press
Pruchnic, Jeff (2008) “The Invisible Gland: Affect and Political Economy,” Criticism Volume 50, Number 1: 160-175.
Redding, Paul (1999) The Logic of Affect. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.
Stoler, Ann Laura. “Affective States” Companion to the Anthropology of Politics. Ed. David Nugent and Joan Vincent. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Team Colors Collective (2009) “To Show the Fire and the Tenderness.” http://indyreader.org/content/to-show-fire-and-tenderness-by-teams-colors-collective-conor-cash-craig-hughes-stevie-peace-
Terranova, Tiziana (2004) “Communication Biopower,” Network Culture: Politics for the Information Age. London: Pluto Press.
Titchener, E.B. (1895) “Affective Memory,” Philosophical Review. Volume 4 Number 1: 65-76.
Vaneigem, Raoul (1994 [1967]) Revolution of Everyday Life. Trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith. London: Rebel Press.
Vaneigem, Raoul (1994) The Movement of the Free Spirit. Trans. Randall Cherry and Ian Patterson. New York: Zone Books.
Vaneigem, Raoul (n.d.) Collection of Desires. Richmond, VA: Paper Street.
More information:
For more information / readings: http://stevphen.mahost.org/affectivepolitics.html