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digest 2006-04-14 #001.txt
litsci-l-digest Friday, April 14 2006 Volume 01 : Number
163
In this issue:
SUB 06: EO Wilson and the Future of Life
SUB 06 Cracking the Code: Image and Individual Circa 1955
SUB 06: Confronting Urban Sprawl
SUB 06: Hyper-Sensitivity. Sensory Evolution in Futurism and Dada
SUB 06: *Couched in Aggression: Darwin*s legacies for Freudian
theories of Creativity.*
SUB O6: Becoming-Posthuman: Machinic and Synesthetic Involutions on
a Nature-Culture Continuum
SUB 06: Andre Breton and Eidetic Perception
Digest and archive....
CFP: Interdisciplinary Grad Student Conf at Duke
SUB 6: The Purloined Machine: Lacanian Psychoanalysis and French
Cybernetics
SUB 06 Embodying Literature: Outlines of a Somatic Theory
SUB 06 Phenomenological Contributions to an Environmental Ethics
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2006 20:14:29 -0400
From: "Zuelke, Karl"
Subject: SUB 06: EO Wilson and the Future of Life
A paper proposal for the 2006 SLSA conference:
=20
E.O. Wilson and the Future of Life
=20
E.O. Wilson began one of the preeminent scientific careers of the latter
=
half of the 20th century as an entomologist, but his work and thinking =
have evolved to where he stands as one of the most persuasive and urgent
=
environmentally conscious voices of our present moment. He notes in The
=
Future of Life that we "bulge-headed paragons of organic evolution" are
=
"chipping away at the miracles around us." Wilson has famously =
predicted that humankind's grappling with the environmental crisis will
=
be the main challenge that we face in the 21st century. Unfortunately,
=
as S. Blackmoor notes in his review of Biodiversity II, a collection of
=
environmentally engaged essays edited by Wilson and others, "It seems =
horribly likely that a future reviewer of Biodiversity III will note =
that we are increasingly well informed about a problem that we seem =
unwilling or unable to engage with."
In several of his recent works, including Consilience: The =
Unity of Knowledge, The Diversity of Life and The Future of Life, =
Wilson has outlined a program of action whereby humankind might behave =
in ways that could still engage with and rescue the critical =
biodiversity and environmental health of the earth, and beyond that, he
=
has suggested a number of important ways by which human beings might =
re-imagine their relationship to the biosphere which would facilitate =
this critical behavioral about-face. Far from being angry or =
pessimistic, Wilson has thought in deep and positive ways of the =
possibilities for emerging from the environmental crisis, and his =
thinking has embraced the realities of economics, sociology and global =
politics that have traditionally stood as conceptual impediments to a =
global ecological reintegration of the cultural with the natural. In =
this paper I propose to explore E.O. Wilson's environmental politics, =
paying special attention to his notions about the roles that science and
=
technology will play in helping humankind through what he terms the =
"environmental bottleneck" we are currently negotiating, and just as =
importantly, I will also touch upon his ideas concerning the ways that =
spirituality and reverence for life impact the decisions we will make in
=
these extraordinary times.
=20
Key words: E.O. Wilson, environmental action, biodiversity, biosphere, =
ecology
=20
=20
Karl Zuelke
College of Mount St. Joseph
karl_zuelke@mail.msj.edu
=20
=20
=20
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 00:24:49 -0400
From: Isabelle Wallace
Subject: SUB 06 Cracking the Code: Image and Individual Circa 1955
My paper grapples with the implications of an apparent parallel
between=20=
shifting conceptions of the individual and image in the West,
focusing=20=
particular attention on the fact that the mid-1950=92s bears witnesses =
to=20
two important, and I claim, related developments in the spheres of=20
aesthetics and genetics. In particular, my paper links Watson and=20
Crick=92s discovery of DNA=92s structure to Jasper Johns=92 =
contemporaneous=20
discovery of a code at the heart of Abstract Expressionist painting. =20
Treating Johns=92 dispassionate analysis of Abstract Expressionist=20
brushwork as the pictorial equivalent of Watson and Crick=92s analysis =
of=20
our own genetic code, I consider both the existence and implications
of=20=
this mutual unveiling and analysis, and ask what conclusions can be=20
drawn on the basis on this un-remarked synchronicity.
Isabelle Loring Wallace
Assistant Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art
Lamar Dodd School of Art, University of Georgia
iwallace@uga.edu
Key Words: Visual Art, Genetics, Jasper Johns
- -
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 00:02:13 -0500
From: "Michael Bryson"
Subject: SUB 06: Confronting Urban Sprawl
Proposed Presentation for SLSA 2006 (New York):
=20
"The Historian and the Photographer: Confronting Urban Sprawl in Data =
and Image"
=20
Sprawl is bad, and everybody knows it. Or is it? In his provocative =
new book, _Sprawl: A Compact History_ (2005), historian Robert =
Bruegmann tracks the evolution of urban and suburban space, and argues =
not only that sprawl is an old rather than recent phenomenon, but also =
that it might be a good thing. Bruegmann contrasts his empirical =
analysis of population density gradients and settlement patterns with =
various anti-sprawl arguments which, he contends, often rest upon =
arbitrary aesthetic values, class bias, and lack of historical =
perspective.
=20
While Bruegmann successfully contextualizes and problematizes the debate
=
over sprawl, his analysis has significant gaps, particularly the failure
=
to acknowledge the present and future environmental impact of sprawl. =
Artistic explorations of urban space can provide corrective vision to =
this ecological myopia. In an ecocritical meditation on _Sprawl_, I =
pair Bruegmann's ideas with the photography of Terry Evans, whose =
_Revealing Chicago: An Aerial Portrait_ (2005) provides a fascinating =
bird's-eye perspective on the character and transformation of the =
Chicago region's urban, suburban, and rural landscapes. Ultimately, =
while _Revealing Chicago_ does not make an explicit argument for or =
against sprawl, it forces us to confront our tacit assumptions about =
growth, community, technology, nature, and progress in the urban =
environment.
=20
Keywords: sprawl, urban space, photography, ecocriticism, ecology
=20
A-V request: computer projector with internet access
=20
Michael A. Bryson=20
Associate Professor of Humanities=20
Evelyn T. Stone University College=20
Roosevelt University=20
430 S. Michigan Ave.=20
Chicago, IL 60605=20
Email: mbryson@roosevelt.edu=20
Website: http://faculty.roosevelt.edu/bryson=20
Office: 312-281-3148=20
Fax: 312-281-3132
=20
+-+-+-+-+-+
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links and unsubscribing info:
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- -
+-+-+-+-+-+
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 06:29:59 +0000
From: "Arndt Niebisch"
Subject: SUB 06: Hyper-Sensitivity. Sensory Evolution in Futurism and
Dada
Hyper-Sensitivity. Sensory Evolution in Futurism and Dada
Keywords: Futurism, Dada, media technology, sense perception, evolution,
cybernetics
The avant-garde was obsessed with the re-configuration of the human
sensorium. Especially the leader of Italian Futurism F.T. Marinetti and
the
Dadaist Raoul Hausmann engaged in a discussion of new and immediate
forms of
perception that correlated to modern media technologies. On both sides,
these ideas of tactile, hypersensitive forms of perception were
understood
as a new evolutionary step. Both artists aimed in their projects for an
advancement of the physiological capabilities of human beings. In my
paper,
I will discuss Marinetti??s project of a tactile art, ?¨Tattilismo,?Æ
that is
based on the phantasmagoria of emerging radio-technology, and Raoul
Hausmann??s theory of sense perception that rather addresses his project
of
constructing a light-sound modulator (optophone) than actual biological
conditions. It is central to the Futurist as well as Dadaist approach
towards an evolution of the senses that this augmentation of
physiological
possibilities connects to emerging technologies and already feeds into a
kind of cybernetic paradigm that simultaneously describes biological and
technological processes.
Arndt Niebisch
Johns Hopkins University
Department of German
Graduate Student
- -
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 12:20:51 +0100
From: Vanessa Jane Corby
Subject: SUB 06: *Couched in Aggression: Darwin*s legacies for Freudian
theories of Creativity.*
Paper Proposal SLSA Annual Conference 2006, EVOLUTION: BIOLOGICAL,
CULTURAL, AND COSMIC
Key Words: Psychoanalysis, History of Art, Creativity, Evolution,
Visual Art
'Couched in Aggression: Darwin's legacies for Freudian theories of
Creativity.'
'Couched in Aggression,' is a transdisciplinary paper written from
the dual perspective of an artist and art historian. It mobilises tools
of the social history of art and psychoanalysis to question the means by
which these disciplines construct narratives for or 'story' (White &
Epston, 1990) experience to make sense of their objects of study. In so
doing the paper turns it's attention to the ideologies that shaped the
genesis of psychoanalysis. 'Man and Human Nature,' (1955) written by
anthropologist Ashley Montagu situates the writing of Sigmund Freud
within the theory of Darwinian evolution that characterised late
Victorian thought after the publication of 'The Origin of the
Species,' (1859). Via a critique grounded in Hobbes (1660) belief in
the 'nasty brute' nature of man Montagu pays particular attention to
Freud's emphasis on aggression. The Death Drive (1920) has served as
the modus operandi for key theorisations of artistic practice for
contemporary art historians and cultural theorists (Pajaczkowska, 1995,
Fer 1996). With reference to the work of German Jewish American artist
Eva Hesse (1936-1970) the lineage Montagu constructs for Freud enables a
space in which to question whether theory has been complicit in the
pathologisation of artists and their practices.
Dr. Vanessa Corby, Lecturer Art History and Visual Culture, University
of Central Lancashire, UK. vjcorby@ulcan.ac.uk
- -
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 13:20:00 +0200
From: Manuela.Rossini@unibas.ch
Subject: SUB O6: Becoming-Posthuman: Machinic and Synesthetic
Involutions on a Nature-Culture Continuum
Hi,
Very broadly speaking, our proposed panel will address issues of
creative
involutions in technologically enabled collaborative performance,
literature
(SF)and philosophy. The panel consists of only two persons so far and is
thus
still open to 1-2 more presenters. We'd be happy to make changes in the
title
or give slight tweaks to our talks in off-list conversations with
potential
co-panelists.
Best,
Manuela Rossini + Sher Doruff
Panel title:
Becoming-Posthuman: Machinic and Synesthetic Involutions on a
Nature-Culture
Continuum
Manuela Rossini, Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, University of
Amsterdam, m.s.rossini@uva.nl
A Critical-Posthumanist Incredulity Towards Grand Evolutionary
Narratives
Hegemonic celebrations of the becoming-biological of non-organic life
and the
concomitant becoming-technological of biological life in postindustrial
societies are closely tied to a view of evolution as linear progress to
the
better of humankind. Within this discourse, the computing of the world
is but
the ?´natural?? outcome of the co-evolvement of humans and tools ?± a
development
that seems inevitable precisely because it is cast as the exponential
continuation of biological evolutionary dynamics. The future is
?´naturally??
technological because this is what evolution desires for itself. Such a
?Æbio-technological vitalism?Æ(Ansell-Pearson) voices a deeply
anthropocentric
(and anthropomorphised) conception of life??s becoming that not only
follows the
imperatives of neo-liberalist capitalism, but indicates a profound
amnesia
about humanity??s past, its emergence from bacterial symbionts. As a
corrective
to such deterministic, teleological and speciesist techno-theorising, I
will
draw on endosymbiotic (Margulis) and developmental systems theory
(Oyama) as
well as machinic biophilosophy (Deleuze/Guattari) and feminist
?¨neo-materialism?Æ(Braidotti). Foregrounding what I call
?¨sym(bio)pathy?Æ,
contagion, metamorphic processes, involution, transversal communication,
diagrammatic operations, spatio-temporal rhythms, and affective
intensities
between self and other as what has always been the name of the game of
life on
earth, this paper wants to contribute to opening up lines of flight to
many
possible worlds and becomings. Paul di Filippo??s ribofunk will serve as
a
literary example of what this could mean.
Keywords: posthumanism, symbiosis, biophilosophy, involution, di Filippo
Sher Doruff, Waag Society, Amsterdam, sher@waag.org
Involuntary and Elicited: Synesthetic Involution
One of the essential conditions for idiopathic or pathological
synesthesia cites
the experience of cross-sensory fusion as ?¨involuntary and elicited?Æ
(Cytowic),
alluding to an autonomic perception. Cytowic??s criteria aids in
distinguishing
clinical synesthesia from its metaphorical cousin in which modal
sensations are
fused for literary, aesthetic or epistemological advantage. Statistics
citing
the occurrence of pathological synesthesia in humans varies wildly,
ranging
from 1 in 20,000 to 1 in 200 with a looming prospect that cross-modal
transfer
is present at birth and outgrown or backgrounded as the brain matures
(Baron-Cohen; Cytowic). As elicited perception feeds back into the
involuntary
movements of dynamic, mnemonic matter, synesthetic experience suggests a
tendency towards the processural involution of diachronic emergence.
This paper
will address cross-modal referencing in relation to a molecular model of
creative involution (Deleuze and Guattari) affected by a
dia(bio)grammatic loop
of lived experience (Massumi). The dynamic structural coupling of
digital
modalities in improvised translocal composition situates the discourse
of
creative involution in performing art practice. Non-euclidean dimensions
may be
animated, involuntarily elicited, in the cross-modal processing of
technologically enabled LiveArt. Specific genres of collaborative,
distributed
composition provide peculiar evidence of synesthetic, transversal
expression
and will be cited as examples.
Keywords: synesthesia, involution, diagram, distributed
- ----------------------------------------------------------------
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 09:05:33 -0500
From: pmowris@mail.utexas.edu
Subject: SUB 06: Andre Breton and Eidetic Perception
Surrealists looked to scientists other than Sigmund Freud. In 1933,
Andr?à
Breton described new possibilities for artistic creation by describing
how
recent studies in psychophysiology support radical forms of perception.
Breton??s specific uses of eidetic perception theories by scientists
like E.R.
Jaensch, Georges Dwelshauvers, or Pierre Quercy has not received any
attention
from art historians. This scientific discovery arose from studies in
which
scientists presented children with an image or an object that they
examined for
fifteen seconds. The scientists then removed it from the child's visual
field.
This action did not produce an image in complementary colors (an
afterimage),
but produced a crisp image with colors that matched the object. The
child??s
mind, unsullied by culture, is fresh enough to retain a sharp mental
image of
an object after its disappearance. One did not need to have the object
before
him/her in order to see it. Breton??s use of eidetic theory posits the
concept
of unified visual consciousness in the Surrealist project. This paper
will
present these rather apocryphal perception theories, detail Breton??s
specific
uses of them, and will conclude with a discussion of the repercussions
these
theories have for analyses of Surrealist art and theory.
Peter Mowris
PhD Student, The University of Texas at Austin, College of Fine Arts
pmowris@mail.utexas.edu
Keywords: Surrealism, visual art, perception theory
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 11:29:48 -0400
From: "Wayne Miller"
Subject: Digest and archive....
Hi all,
I'm trying to address this just to digest readers, but it may get
routed to all. As especially digest readers may have noticed, Duke's
email list software is showing its age. We'll soon have a new system
here at Duke, so hang on!
The digest sometimes comes through truncated, and emails sometimes show
up doubled, displaying both a text version (with some special markup
characters) and the HTML (with all the html tags displayed as well).
If you would like to see a cleaned-up and always complete version,
please refer to the archive (entries may be delayed a day or so):
http://www.law.duke.edu/sls/archive/
The archive can be searched as well:
http://www.law.duke.edu/sls/
Best,
Wayne
Wayne Miller
Director, Educational Technologies
Duke University School of Law
(919) 613-7243
Fax: (919) 613-7237
wmiller@law.duke.edu
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 11:51:27 -0400
From: "Wayne Miller"
Subject: CFP: Interdisciplinary Grad Student Conf at Duke
*********** PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY**************
CALL FOR PAPERS
Thinking Through New Media
Interdisciplinary Graduate Student Conference
June 7-8, 2006 :: Duke University
Sponsored by the Humanities, Arts, Sciences, Technology Advanced
Collaboratory (HASTAC); Information Science + Information Studies
(ISIS); and the Renaissance Computing Institute (RENCI).
Duke University is pleased to announce that it will be hosting an
international graduate student conference dedicated to the
interdisciplinary study of new media technologies and their impact on
art, culture, science, commerce, society, and the environment. The
purpose of the Thinking Through New Media workshop is to build a
graduate student community around new media scholarship and to
introduce participants to HASTAC (pronounced "haystack"), ISIS, and
RENCI. Conference organizers are currently encouraging students from
all academic disciplines to submit 20-minute papers exploring their
own research into the study and/or creation of new media
technologies. Applicants whose papers are not accepted for
presentation will be invited to present their work at a digital
poster session during the first day of the conference. Students need
not submit papers to attend the conference.
Graduate students wishing to submit papers must email paper titles, 1-
page abstracts, and 2-page applicant CVs by Monday, May 1, to
isis-info@duke.edu . Acceptance decisions will be returned to
applicants by
Monday, May 8. Final paper drafts are due to isis-info@duke.edu by
Wednesday, May 31.
All participants traveling from beyond the Triangle (Raleigh-Durham-
Chapel Hill) area may apply for scholarships to subsidize their
travel and lodging expenses when they register for the conference.
All scholarship applications must be received by Sunday, May 7. All
participants are encouraged to submit biographical statements and
portraits to isis-info@duke.edu by Sunday, May 21.
Online registration, conference schedules, travel information, and
other details will be available very soon at the conference website
at http://isis.duke.edu/events/TTNM. For any additional information,
please send inquiries to isis-info@duke.edu.
Casey Alt
Administrative Director, Information Science + Information Studies
017 Franklin Center, Box 90400
2204 Erwin Road
Duke University
Durham NC 27708-0400
Email: caseyalt@duke.edu Phone: (919) 668-1932
AIM: caseyalt@mac.com Fax: (919) 684-8749
Web: http://caseyalt.com ISIS: http://isis.duke.edu
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 11:29:16 -0400
From: schmidg@fas.harvard.edu
Subject: SUB 6: The Purloined Machine: Lacanian Psychoanalysis and
French Cybernetics
The Purloined Machine: Lacanian Psychoanalysis and French Cybernetics
This paper suggests to re-read Lacan??s seminal article "The Seminar on
'The
Purloined Letter'" against the background of French cybernetics and its
material culture. Special attention is devoted to the system of symbol
chains
and networks that introduced the first publication of Lacan??s article
in 1957.
I will argue that, besides Wiener??s and Ashby??s visions of
cybernetics, the
mathematical theory of communication as well as game theory were of
crucial
importance to Lacan??s discourse on the symbolic order. I will show that
important aspects of this discourse were a result of abstracting from
much more
specific questions concerning technology. In his teaching, Lacan showed
some
quite explicit interest in the details of cybernetic machine technology.
In his
1954/55 seminar on Freud??s theory of the ego, he repeatedly referred to
cyborg
devices such as Grey Walter??s turtle robots and Albert Ducrocq??s
electronic
fox. However, Lacan turned away from the materiality of these machines
when it
came to prepare his 1957 article for publication. I suggest that this
purloining of the machine does not just reflect Lacan??s interest in
language,
but also his reliance on arguments made by Alexandre Koyr?à with respect
to the
priority of theory, not practice in the history of science.
Keywords: machine, psychoanalysis, cybernetics, game theory, scientific
instruments
Henning Schmidgen
schmidg@fas.harvard.edu
Department of the History of Science
Harvard University
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 11:47:33 -0400
From: Ellen Esrock
Subject: SUB 06 Embodying Literature: Outlines of a Somatic Theory
Embodying Literature: Outlines of a Somatic Theory
A reader's somato-viscero-motor system can provide the basis for a
creative
engagement with verbal texts. Three points articulate this argument:
One:
Readers can be characterized in terms of their disposition to engage the
world through inner bodily responses. These are somatically- disposed
readers. Two: Somatically-disposed readers engage verbal texts in such
a
way as to use the reader's somato-viscero-motor responses not only as an
affective reaction to what is given verbally but also as a productive
means
of creating a fictional/ represented world, its characters, affective
structures, and other components. This creation occurs through two
means,
what I call a simulation and a transomation. Three: The kind of
linguistic
affordances that verbal texts offer to the somatically-disposed reader
can
be understood on a broad spectrum. At one end are highly specific
textual
cues, and at the other are coarser-grained opportunities for the reader
to
participate somatically in the construction of a verbal reality.
KEY WORDS: embodiment, poetics, empathy, reader response, synesthesia
----------------------------------------
>>> "Michael Bryson" mbryson@roosevelt.edu
4/14/2006 1:02:13 AM
SUB 06: Confronting Urban Sprawl
Proposed Presentation for SLSA 2006 (New York):
"The Historian and the Photographer: Confronting Urban Sprawl in
Data and Image"
Sprawl is bad, and everybody knows it. Or is it? In his
provocative new book, _Sprawl: A Compact History_ (2005),
historian Robert Bruegmann tracks the evolution of urban and
suburban space, and argues not only that sprawl is an old rather
than recent phenomenon, but also that it might be a good thing.
Bruegmann contrasts his empirical analysis of population density
gradients and settlement patterns with various anti-sprawl
arguments which, he contends, often rest upon arbitrary aesthetic
values, class bias, and lack of historical perspective.
While Bruegmann successfully contextualizes and problematizes the
debate over sprawl, his analysis has significant gaps,
particularly the failure to acknowledge the present and future
environmental impact of sprawl. Artistic explorations of urban
space can provide corrective vision to this ecological myopia.
In an ecocritical meditation on _Sprawl_, I pair Bruegmann's
ideas with the photography of Terry Evans, whose _Revealing
Chicago: An Aerial Portrait_ (2005) provides a fascinating
bird's-eye perspective on the character and transformation of the
Chicago region's urban, suburban, and rural landscapes.
Ultimately, while _Revealing Chicago_ does not make an explicit
argument for or against sprawl, it forces us to confront our
tacit assumptions about growth, community, technology, nature,
and progress in the urban environment.
Keywords: sprawl, urban space, photography, ecocriticism,
ecology
A-V request: computer projector with internet access
Michael A. Bryson
Associate Professor of Humanities
Evelyn T. Stone University College
Roosevelt University
430 S. Michigan Ave.
Chicago, IL 60605
Email: mbryson@roosevelt.edu
Website: http://faculty.roosevelt.edu/bryson
Office: 312-281-3148
Fax: 312-281-3132
