[-empyre-] incompatible [?] research practices

[Gabriel Menotti]

Hey!

Sorry if I didn't made myself clear. What I meant to say is that this
is the fourth forum in which the same people are gathered to discuss
the same topic - "incompatible research practices". The first was one
workshop organized in November 2011; the second, a one-day seminar
during Transmediale; the third, a "peer-reviewed newspaper" launched
during the event. Some info about the initial workshop and the PDF of
the newspaper can be found at http://darc.imv.au.dk/incompatible/.
Probably they will publish the videos of Transmediale at some point.

All of these activities were organized in the context of the reSource
project, to which this debate is not connected. Previous participation
is not really necessary to follow or contribute to the upcoming
threads, which should address diverse challenges in new (or marginal/
anomalous/ problematic/ etc) forms of academic research. Someone
please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that the formats of
discussion so far were so tight (and the background of the
participants so diverse) that it was not yet possible to come up with
common questions and well-developed conclusions (one good attempt at
this was made by the people from Aarhus University in the end of the
seminar, trying to think through issues of methodological/ thematic
compatibility as a matter of academic hospitality). Explanations about
the guest's individual concerns and projects can be read in their
articles in the newspaper.

Personally, I'd be happy to move the topic of research practices away
from Transmediale's theme of incompatibility (or "in/compatibility").
It is a very seductive and malleable term, easy to be approached and
included in a lot of different discourses. This apparent advantage
seems to carry a huge downside. In the few days of the festival, the
term was so throughout abused that it became meaningless pretty
quickly.

Taking a step in getting rid of the concept, one could ask how
relevant (or: operationally useful) it is to frame any issue (or:
technical challenge) as a dilemma of compatibility. Of either
belonging or not? Being part or being apart? Isn't this a sort of
teenage anxiety? (Here some joke relating peer-reviewing to
peer-pressure could fit :P).

Best!
Menotti

PS: On another level, this month's debate could have to do with
reprises and subtle changes in meaning due to drastic changes in
context.


Em 7 de fevereiro de 2012 14:21, Johannes Birringer
<Johannes.Birringer at brunel.ac.uk> escreveu:
>
> dear gabriel and all
>
> you mentioned in your introduction that you wish to spin off or go deeper into a discussion ...
>
> "in/compatible research (remake)"
>
> inspired by something at the Transmediale called "“reSource for Transmedial Culture”
> - and since perhaps many of your readers or subscribers here will not have been at this event or the
> postgraduate workshop you also mention, I'd like to ask whether you could give us a bit more
> background and context information.
>
> You seem to speak of obstacle protocols for "first activities" (what are
> these? research of a compatible or incompatible nature? obstacles to the research? framework  definitions?
> institutional support?  can you give an example of who practices incompatible
> research and what for, and who underwrites incompatibilities?), and hope to open up the workshop
> (can you tell us what the workshop did) to a month long forum; second activities, yes?
>
> greetings
> Johannes Birringer
> dap-lab
> http://www.brunel.ac.uk/dap
> _______________________________________________
> empyre forum
> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre