[-empyre-] Magma

joseph tabbi jtabbi at gmail.com
Mon Apr 13 02:49:14 EST 2009 

Michael, you ask, about e-lit: does it arrive JIT ('just-in-time')?

Certainly it emerges in the time of neo-liberal politics and
economics, and that affects the work and also its institutional
organization.

I do suspect that creative and scholarly work increasingly is produced
from compulsion. "De-Christianized Christian guilt" - there's a lot of
it around and I wouldn't be surprised if it's a motivating factor.

Another, more measurable factor, is the way scholarship now gets
measured: credentializing and peer review is the big thing that
everyone worries about, but it's not really about review by 'peers.'
That still goes on and it's the only way one knows if the work is
being read, viewed, experienced, and communicated. But as yet there's
no good way (in literature, at least) for that peer-to-peer activity
to translate into institutional recognition - the kind that sustains a
literary career and keeps one's spirits up. So in the absence of a
strong professional or guild conscience, we get all kinds of schemes
for weighing the value of work published in tiered research venues, a
really tiresome exercise that's now next to impossible to avoid: the
'outcomes' document circulated by Sally Jane is again relevant here.

I remember a conversation in my Chicago apartment about twelve years
ago, between two writers who have sinced achieved careers in e-lit.
Both had begun by publishing with independent literary presses, but
they had just discovered that, if they framed a short piece of prose
(literally, put the page in a metal frame) and presented it as an art
installation, their channels of distribution suddenly expanded
dramatically. The Internet, and e-media generally may have offered
more ways to "frame" literary work, though we've yet to see if there's
a market for e-lit. But it is safe to say, that with at most two or
three exceptions e-lit is NOT establishing itself in literature and
creative writing programs (which have emerged arguably with the
disappearance of a market for literary fiction, essays, and poetry).
Either there are new programs in the digital arts and humanities, that
aim to develop disciplinary "frames," or practitioners seek venues in
programs for the arts and the gallery circuit.

(The ELO, recognizing this latter trend, hosts exhibitions along with
paper presentations and readings at its bi-annual scholarly
conferences: I think my e-lit colleagues and I need to do more
outreach to those hundreds of NYC galleries mentioned early in this
thread.)

So the work, generally, is migrating toward the arts and markets which
have been proactive in creating new audiences, sponsors, and outlets
for displaying work.

What has not developed, yet, is a way to make the work of e-lit unique
and collectible, the way many art objects are, or printed books for
that matter.

But this is of course where Warhol comes in. And Fluxus. And Walter
Benjamin. e-lit is becoming the 'work' of art in the age of digital
reproduction - and the word, 'work,' implies more an activity and
lifeway, than the individual auratic 'work' or the multiple,
mechanically reproducible 'work.'

Such digital literary 'work' is sustained by networks. Not
'communities' since  we don't have the common interests and prejudices
and exclusions that hold communities together, traditionally. What we
have are individuals who use networks to advance their interests and
positions.

So I guess I see whatever comes 'after,' as taking a network form, one
way or t' other.

Somewhere Hardt & Negri said of the State, that it could not just
engage networks (money networks, terrorist cells, and so forth); the
State in their view needed to BECOME a network.

I suspect something similar needs to take place in contemporary
literary production.

(Credit where it's due: the phrase 'just-in-time' was applied to cult
studies by John Durham Peters in an essay he presented to the German
"Network" for American Studies a few years ago in Bonn, Germany; that
essay is set to go live on www.electronicbookreview I hope in a month
or so, so the phrase was on my mind.)

Joseph


>
> Joseph
>
>
> I appreciate your connection of Neoliberalism with the discipline of cult
> studies, and really love your identification of “Just-in-Time” or JIT
> scholarship, which has for the most part transformed the University in what
> I might argue are some truly wonderful ways.  Yes, for the 90s and parts of
> this millennium, scholarship has had an urgent temporality at its core.  The
> tones of post-structuralist and psychoanalytic writing are desperate and
> crisis-laden: it is almost as if Derrida and Lacan are about to leap into a
> volcano.  De-Christianized Christian guilt suffuses the atmosphere, making
> it imperative that we find something important and canonical to say about
> this phantom split subject who is at all moments about to disappear, or who
> has already disappeared: how would we know?  Again, I raise the question of
> a post-postmodernism, and ask your take on what comes next culturally, now
> that history appears to have re-condensed.  Might the external referent come
> back into vogue?
>
>
>
> As for the functional separation of Art/commerce, I would ask your take on
> Warholian “Business Art.”  I don’t think you are advocating a return of the
> Wildean, but am intrigued to see what you envision happening with these
> unique yet integrated realms, especially as regards the promising field of
> e-lit.  Also, is e-lit Just in Time?  Timely?  What is its “market,” its
> role in Nick’s parallax view?  Does it also court problems of chic?
>
> *******************************************
> Michael Angelo Tata, PhD  347.776.1931-USA
> http://www.MichaelAngeloTata.com/
>
>
>
>
>
>> Date: Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:37:55 -0700
>> From: editor at intertheory.org
>> To: empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Enter...the Octo-Mom
>>
>>
>> absolute ingenuity! octo-mom is the symptom, the product and the
>> side-effect of our market/culture parallax...! when everything is genetic
>> Code, we are equal in the sense of gross organic wealth, but then they will
>> (and do) tell us all Code is not created equal...they tell us some Codes are
>> inherently better suited to a particular milieu, some Codes are impaired,
>> and so on, as a function of the market/culture/nature scaffolding... so we
>> enter the era of genetic interventionism octo-reproduction...designer Code
>> for designer Environments it is!?
>>
>> NRIII
>>
>>
>> Nicholas Ruiz III, Ph.D Editor, Kritikos http://intertheory.org
>>
>>
>> --- On Sun, 4/5/09, Michael Angelo Tata, PhD <mtata at ipublishingllc.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > From: Michael Angelo Tata, PhD <mtata at ipublishingllc.com>
>> > Subject: [-empyre-] Enter...the Octo-Mom
>> > To: "Soft Skinned Space" <empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
>> > Date: Sunday, April 5, 2009, 1:02 AM
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > #yiv895117554 .hmmessage P
>> > {
>> > margin:0px;padding:0px;}
>> > #yiv895117554 {
>> > font-size:10pt;font-family:Verdana;}
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > Given Nick's reflections on the nature of the gift, and
>> > of the given in general (for example, the phenomenological
>> > donne of sense experience), I am left to wonder what happens
>> > if we retain the theory of the gift central to Derrida's
>> > thought, yet replace the "God" of the Old
>> > Testament (the creator who demands an impossible sacrifice
>> > from Abraham, one which becomes the extreme form of the
>> > gift, here a violent oblation defying an ethical order and
>> > necessitating an appeal to "absolute duty" and
>> > "absolute responsibility") with the DNA of
>> > biology. What does the gift become under these
>> > circumstances? What becomes of the interrupted
>> > economy of the gift, as it suspends the ethical in
>> > the Augenblick of faith's leap?
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > As for reciprocity, for Derrida, there is a
>> > fundamental dissymetry between myself and the Other, as
>> > well as among myself and the "other others" with
>> > whom I share social concourse: the gift I am expected to
>> > hand over to the deity is one which will not be
>> > reciprocated, but refused, causing me to be
>> > remunerated in a posthumous order where spirirual
>> > riches accumulate, but only if I forget. With DNA in
>> > the place of the Other, does this dissymetry remain, or is
>> > the playng field leveled?
>> >
>> > For Derrida, to give is to forget that one has given: but
>> > can we forget our investments?
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On another note, I am struck by the coincidence of the Wall
>> > Street crisis and the Octo-Mom's uterine crisis.
>> > Like an investment scheme, she has taxed the system
>> > by producing too much debt (all those mouths to feed,
>> > that shabby house that needed to be replaced, etc.).
>> > How many embryos were implanted? How many babies
>> > came out? Is Wall Street an Octo-Mom, or is she merely
>> > am emblem of excess in a time of defecit?
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > *******************************************
>> > Michael Angelo Tata,
>> > PhD 347.776.1931-USA
>> > http://www.MichaelAngeloTata.com/
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > > Date: Sat, 4 Apr 2009 14:59:42 -0700
>> > > From: editor at intertheory.org
>> > > To: empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> > > Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Eddies, Whirlwinds, Trade
>> > Winds
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > In Derrida's "Given Time", the gift is
>> > seen as that which may theoretically interrupt economy...but
>> > in practice the gift cannot help itself; it serves to
>> > reproduce the relations of exchange through the act of
>> > reciprocity...such reciprocity of exchange seems to be the
>> > basis of human relations...
>> > >
>> > > In terms of our lives today, internationally, many
>> > expect the gift of electronic credit and finance, and true
>> > to form, are expected to return its terms in full
>> > spatio-temporal reciprocity...and with interest...where did
>> > we go wrong? Why not simply, gifts, wrapping paper and bows
>> > for all, with no strings attached?
>> > >
>> > > So, we 'give' more, and perhaps, expect more
>> > too, and increasingly...the ineluctable march of
>> > 'progress'...is this the way of God or the
>> > Devil...or some other Way...at the risk of tautology or
>> > paradox: did we create exchange (the exchange of currency
>> > takes many forms (e.g. dollars/euros, DNA contributions in
>> > reproduction, posturing and innuendo in strategies of
>> > nuclear deterrence, etc.))...if all this true, human culture
>> > may be but a side effect of some greater process of
>> > 'crescere,' that expansion and coming to be of
>> > creative Exchange, no?
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > nick
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > Nicholas Ruiz III, Ph.D Editor, Kritikos
>> > http://intertheory.org
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > --- On Wed, 4/1/09, Michael Angelo Tata, PhD
>> > <mtata at ipublishingllc.com> wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > From: Michael Angelo Tata, PhD
>> > <mtata at ipublishingllc.com>
>> > > > Subject: [-empyre-] Eddies, Whirlwinds, Trade
>> > Winds
>> > > > To: empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> > > > Date: Wednesday, April 1, 2009, 8:35 PM
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > #yiv1848887985 .hmmessage P
>> > > > {
>> > > > margin:0px;padding:0px;}
>> > > > #yiv1848887985 {
>> > > > font-size:10pt;font-family:Verdana;}
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > Greetings,
>> > > > all! I’m quite excited to
>> > > > share this panel with such an eminent bunch, and
>> > look
>> > > > forward to undertaking some important reflection
>> > upon what
>> > > > the cultural ramifications of the current Wall
>> > Street
>> > > > debacle might be, both domestically and globally.
>> > Basically,
>> > > > I’ve written a book about Warhol which is
>> > currently
>> > > > forthcoming from Intertheory, so hopefully
>> > Warhol’s own
>> > > > relation to commerce, as well as the role he has
>> > been slated
>> > > > within pomo-ism proper by people like Jameson,
>> > will become a
>> > > > part of the discussion.
>> > > >
>> > > > Aside from
>> > > > Warhol, the place toward which my mind
>> > immediately turns as
>> > > > I think about what Nicholas refers to as the
>> > Immaculate
>> > > > Deception is Camille Paglia’s identification of
>> > Jacques
>> > > > Derrida as a junk-bond salesman in her “Junk
>> > Bonds and
>> > > > Corporate Raiders” (part of Sex, Art, and
>> > > > American Culture). I think
>> > > > my mind races to this piece of writing because it
>> > does raise
>> > > > the important question of the potential
>> > bankruptcy of theory
>> > > > in general (a risk that does not seem to plague
>> > > > philosophy quite the same way).
>> > > >
>> > > > Glancing anew at Derrida’s The Gift of
>> > > > Death, I take immense pleasure in the text’s
>> > flow, the
>> > > > beautiful post-structural play of surfaces that
>> > carry me
>> > > > away on currents of semantic glissement: perhaps
>> > she’s
>> > > > right, but without comprehending that the
>> > problematic she
>> > > > formulates is wrong because theory is nor
>> > philosophy, what
>> > > > it can give transcends the gross objectivity of a
>> > fact or
>> > > > datum. Still, there is
>> > > > Derrida’s love of counterfeit money in Gift
>> > > > and Given Time.
>> > > > How does this tropism speak to Madoff’s
>> > > > antics? To the culture that will
>> > > > flourish in the wake of collapse and that has
>> > flowered all
>> > > > along during these golden years of HELOC madness
>> > and
>> > > > Home Depot grand openings? To
>> > > > the “cultural logic” of late capitalism in
>> > general, and
>> > > > the late, late gerontic capitalism of today’s
>> > > > world?
>> > > >
>> > > > Places my
>> > > > mind travels to next:
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > The
>> > > > marvelous bankruptcy of American culture in
>> > > > general—especially in its postmodern
>> > instantiation. Something for nothing, nothing for
>> > > > nothing.
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > The Dotcom
>> > > > crash of the early millennium as prefigurement to
>> > the
>> > > > present real estate crash: the no-there-there of
>> > the virtual
>> > > > reasserts itself in the financial sector.
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > 9/11 and the
>> > > > return of a historically meaningful present,
>> > pace
>> > > > Baudrillard’s post-history: what is
>> > > > post-postmodernism? Are we
>> > > > experiencing it now?
>> > > > Specifically, what comes next, after irony? The
>> > Pecker
>> > > > paradigm.
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > “Yes We Can” becomes “Yes You Can”; the
>> > Obama
>> > > > slogan becomes a Pepsi mantra (or is it the Obama
>> > mantra
>> > > > becomes the Pepsi slogan?). Where do we go with
>> > this
>> > > > mutation?
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > On a recent
>> > > > trip to Geneva, I stumbled across a department
>> > store
>> > > > (Manor-La Placette) built on the original site
>> > of
>> > > > Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s boyhood home: a little
>> > placard,
>> > > > tender yet bearing the weight of history, read
>> > something to
>> > > > the effect of “Ice est né le petit
>> > Rousseau….’ How do we read this repurposing of
>> > > > Rousseau in light of his “Discourse on the Arts
>> > and
>> > > > Sciences”? How do we connect
>> > > > the cultural bankruptcy Rousseau outlines with
>> > recent Wall
>> > > > Street hijinks? Commerce and
>> > > > culture alike straddle an abyss of currency and
>> > meaning:
>> > > > what does each realm have to say to the other
>> > regarding risk
>> > > > and venture?
>> > > >
>> > > > Alright: this little poetic scatter catalogues
>> > my
>> > > > various points of inception. I
>> > > > am looking forward to reading everyone else’s.
>> >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > *******************************************
>> > > > Michael Angelo Tata,
>> > > > PhD 347.776.1931-USA
>> > > > http://www.MichaelAngeloTata.com/
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > > > Quick access to your favorite MSN content and
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