the potential in music

While Baudrillard would contend that the rapid acceleration of images overwhelmes us creating a culutre of apathy and non-reflection, I disagree. It is true that we are overwhelmed with images, but as our zine project has clearly shown, a positive, albiet provisional, political moment is possible in the midst of the bombardment, and reflection is possible. Perhaps a new type of reflection, one in which the usage of multiple images and mediums as its strength, is a postmodern tool. Through the disarticulation of raw materials (Kipnis), tactile shock (Benjamin) can be achieved and be an innovative method of inspiring change. Hegemonic discourse seems daunting and untouchable at times, however through the ideological problematic (White), cracks and fissures are exposed providing opportunities for an oppositional discourse (Kipnis).
Personally, I see music as the medium holding the most potential in using bombardment as a tool to induce a new type of reflection. Sound can be a sense riddled with multi-layered and overwhelming components, politically and emotionally inspiring as well as extremely personal. In a way, asocial conteplation is one of music's strenghts, for although it is a mass cultural product, it is exremely private, provide a perfect political atmosphere. Because of these characteristics, music has immeasurable strength insofar as it can express numerous ideas, actions, information(s) and emotions simultaneously. It has far reaching effects in that while many people say they political does not interest them, everyone loves music. A possible way of utilizing this into pop cultural practice would be to leave blank cd's/mixed tapes in random places on campus and around the city.

hmmm.....

I have been working on a paper in my Sexuality class for awhile now, and I have been trying to think of a way to politicize religious art in a way that is not offensive. Is that possible? Is religion too touchy to touch? It reminds me of how people will argue with anyone except their family, when it seems most obvious that if anyone is going to listen to you, it should be the people who you know best. Religion is much like heterosexuality in that it constantly is reinforcing itself through social control and reminding people of its importance when really, if it was so all-knowing, powerful and natural shouldn't it be confident enough to shut the fuck up and not condemn anything that appears to deviate from it? There is a quote from a book that I wrote down in my journal a few years ago that I go back to every once and awhile:

"There are always those who take it upon themselves to defend God, as if Ultimate Reality, as if the sustaining frame of existence were something weak and helpless...they should direct anger at themselves. For evil in the open is but evil from within that has been let out. The main battlefield for good is not the open ground of the public arena but the small clearing of each heart. Meanwhile, the lot of widows and homeless children is very hard, and it is to their defense, not God's, that the self righteous should rush." - Life of Pi

Anyways, apparently I am a preacher at heart, but my point is that it is so difficult to make people see beyond what they base their entire life upon. How do you disarticulate something that millions of people would die for? I mean, riots were started over cartoons in a newspaper last year...this is serious shit to fuck with. But I honestly think it still has to be fucked with because so many problems stem from it. I found one example of what I think successfully refunctions religious doctrine in regards to a specific issue, and it is funny as hell. Check it out. Sorry about the sermon guys.
Oh, something else interesting that I found in my travels, apparently Ted Haggard, the president of the NEA (National Evangelical Association) which has over 30 million followers, and a congregation in Colorado of 14,000 members just resigned. He is a real prize...he wanted a cultural war on homosexuals and abortion rights and believes in biblical inerrancy and biblical literalism (is that not the most terrifying thing you have EVER heard??!?). Anyway, he stepped down because his male prostitute who he has been paying to have sex with him for the last three years just came forward. After denying it for awhile, then failing a polygraph he admitted that he was guilty of 'sexual immorality'. Oh, sweet irony.

poop food?

Zine culture has massive potential in regards to underground politics, it is unfortunate that most people have not even heard of them. Coming from a small town, I'm sure that most people who I went to school with (or were taught by) would have trouble seeing the possibility of a revolutionary moment in zine culture, but then again most of them think that something happened to homosexuals at a young age to 'make them that way' and that Ralph Klein and George Bush are the kind of fellows we should be thankful are in charge (Oh lordisa, that is some scary ass shit). Ok, so obviously I have some unharboured bitterness towards my town that has nothing to do with the theory in this course, but that i feel the need to share anyway.
I enjoy the fact that in zine culture, everyone can be a writer/expert as Benjamin states. It is unfortunate that zines could be seen as a hipster fad taken up by emo kids who need yet another outlet for their angsty poetry about their white middle class oppression (ex: you weren't there dad. you fucker. i had to walk three blocks home from band practice carrying my $700 guitar. its heavy. and my ipod ran out of batteries on the way. woe is me. no one sees just how deep i am. and that hurts.). I believe that this usage of zine culture takes away from the politics of the movement, resulting in an all around disrespect of all zines in general. The personal has the capacity to make the most political impact, for if someone relates to what you are saying they are more likely to act. However, it is complicated to ensure that politics remain entwined in the personal and does not become self indulgent and irrelavent to wider 'society'. Nevertheless, beings political moments are provisional and constantly in the process of being resignified, the politicization of art has far reaching albiet momentary effects in zine culture.
For me the most difficult aspect of the zine assignment is bridging the gap between theory and practice, or academics and the mainstream even in regards to the content. Are we supposed to only assume our audience is the 30 people in our class, or aim for them to have further reaching effects?

nucking futz i say...

The other night shortly after getting home from the midterm, my girlfriend came over distraught and frustrated over an advertisement she had seen in the lrt station. Apparently, Pro-Life Edmonton has huge posters up across the traintracks at university station. I suppose it makes sense beings funding is still being given generously to the christian religious right, but still, it prompted a conversation about action regarding this issue. I looked online and was unsuccessful at finding a Pro-Choice coalition in edmonton, but I very well may have not been looking hard enough. We racked our brains thinking of some way to refunction this irritating poster, in order to at least let it be known to those who are unaware that there is indeed opposition to this movement (it never occurred to me that that may be an issue, but at dinner the other night I brought up the posters and someone at the table said, "Pro-Life...what the hell is that?? I'M SO HAPPY TO BE ALIVE???"...I was like, umm no it's actually about abortion...). And this was not a person who I consider to be uneducated or unaware at all; needless to say I was shocked. Anyways, I have been schemeing in my head about a stealthy culture jamming adventure that may need to take place...I suppose it isn't the most genius thing for me to announce my criminal aspirations in such a public space, but i'm just so pissed off. It feels like we are regressing, and it depresses me that I'm not clever/ambitious enough to really do anything about it. I don't think I am artistic enough to politicize aesthetics really...my immeditate solution was to spray paint 'are you fucking kidding me?' beside the poster, but I would prefer my act of refunctioning to be slightly more intellectual and more appreciated than something a 12 year old punk could do when drunk for the first time. Plus, how would I get across the tracks? I don't have a death wish. Haha. So...if anyone has any input on this issue it would be awesome to hear it, even if it's just sharing a moment of frustration. That is my rant. Enjoy.

mimi, oh mimi

In Mimi White's article she continually speaks of a conflict and tension within the hegemonic discourse, or an 'ideological problematic'. This slipperiness of meaning allows for a range of voices to be heard (through advertising for example). However, is the 'range of voices' actually representative of those from oppositional discourses, or is it simply the predominant ideology commodifying other viewpoints, or worse, paying lip service to other perspectives in order to squelch any growing resistance? Also, despite the fact that White insists we do have agency, it seems to me that change seems more difficult than ever considering the uneven development. If there are so many traces from the future and the past here in the present social formation, and we (obviously) are not one giant homogenous population, where can change begin? Clearly I am having a glass half-empty day here, because Baudrillard seems to be making the most sense to me- and that is pretty fucked. I cannot help but feel that the constant bombardment of images hinders our ability to take any clear action...and that even if action is taken its purpose can always be twisted into something reverse discourse-esque thereby making it reinforce the very thing we were fighting. Blah. Yes, that was a full sentence.
I suppose that is where provisionality comes in. Re-fuctioning is not an attmept to get 'outside' of ideology, but to rework the raw materials that we are given. Even a momentary disruption is better than none at all. The glass is filling up folks. Oh- and I thought I had an idea of what a conscious subject was, but perhaps I have no idea. Maybe I was being too practical and just thought of the conscious subject as a more provisional identity...like...oh, I just read a stop sign that read "STOP RAPE" and it sort of jolted me out of my monotonous leisure-less unquestioning life...therefore i was 'conscious' for a moment. That sounds a lot stupider than it sounded in my head, but does that makes sense? If anyone could fill me in that would be grand.

seeking conscious subjects

Kipnis states that a left popular culture would have the task of refunctioning already existing antagonistic discursive moments into moments that are unassimilable into the ruling bloc. However, in the current climate of raging capitalist hegemony, I wonder if anything can remain unassimible. I believe that every moment of a populist intervention must be provisional, creating conscious subjects (provisionally), for eventually it will become commodified and distance from the moment will occur. Ultimately, the point of a left popular culture is change, and in order for this to occur, individuals must be interpellated into not only the dominant discourse, but also into a left populist discourse. Kipnis uses Laclau’s version of populism in which one (dominant) class cannot completely absorb ‘the people’, hence the more radical the rearticulation of the antagonistic moment, the harder for a hegemonic discourse to survive without populism. I keep wondering if these provisional left pop culture interventions must be done consciously and intentionally, or if they could occur accidentally. Does Kipnis intend to make all people conscious subjects, or does it take a conscious subject to take part in a left popular culture? Baudrillard would interject here and say that we are not conscious subjects, for due to continuous bombardment of images we ‘the mass’ has decelerated and become a giant apathetic body of matter incapable of being moved. Or, he may criticize a populist intervention as simply more simulacra, further perpetuating our hyper-reality. Personally, I would like to believe that all are capable of being conscious subjects, even if it is merely a temporary moment of as Benjamin would say, tactile shock.

slow it down!

According to Walter Benjamin in "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction", the term "shock" refers to a tactile sensation that should be 'cushioned by a heightened sense of mind', however it is the times when there is no cushion to be found that we remember. A few years ago I watched a documentary called "Tarnation" which was so brilliant, yet eerie, that to this day it is difficult to express or explain the film because I cannot pinpoint anything specific about why it was so memorable. I was stuck with a tight feeling in my chest, a light head and a fluttering stomach- and not in a 'i'm-floating-on-air-because-i'm-so-twitterpated' sort of way. What caused the images to register on my body in such a way, I believe, was the fragmented and montage style of the film (the main character had chronicled his life via video clips, photographs, drawings, phone messages and assembled them together in a narrative type fashion). The speeding and slowing of the images and sounds, as well as the sheer humanity of the piece left me no time to reflect but only to feel. Not only does the film rely on "shock", it is as John Fiske states 'excessive' (a device which magnifies ideological norms in order to bring them to attention in order to disrupt them), however I cannot pinpoint what norm it would be hyperbolizing- it seems as if he is hyperbolizing his whole existence in order to create an empathetic viewer.
Perhaps the reason the film resonated in such a way, was because I watched it alone, so I wonder, is that 'simultaneous contemplation'? It certainly was asocial, and others watched the exact same images as I, so does the 'simultaneous' mean the image(s) are being seen by many at once, or simply that the same image is being viewed?
Also, in regards to Benjamin's usage of the term 'apperception', what I understand it as is since sound and film have occurred in art, we have a heightened sense of our surroundings. Does this mean our material surroundings, or the surroundings of the art (for example in a movie, we as the audience are the 'experts', therefore are conscious of more than the characters)? It seems the only thing clear to me about apperception at this moment is my confusion. If anyone can clarify that would be fantastic.

empowering nihilism

I have always believed that empowerment is a positive thing, and part of what makes music such a powerful and personal medium. Empowerment has far reaching and immeasureable effects, which can range from coalition building for human rights to destroying a whole race. So the question I ask is, is empowerment always a positive thing? If after listening to a certain song, speaker, character on a television program or watching the news I feel empowered to the extent that I am going to join a movement of cultural cleansing, is that a good thing?
In regards to the lecture Thursday and specifically to 50 cent, maybe he knew he was an ideological effect and was downright frustrated with that fact, and one day said 'Hey...I am going to make a profit and become ridiculously famous by hyperbolizing the numerous negative stereotypes and discourses that have been put on the African American man by the white man for centuries'. Or perhaps he happened to be discovered and signed by Eminem and the best producer in the business, Dr Dre, who manufactures his beats and promotes him endlessly, making him the next big thing. Maybe it was somewhere in between, either way, it really is irrelavent because at the end of the day the question that keeps coming back to me is: With the amount of conflict and tension in our world today, do we really need more hateful messages spreading, promoting and encouraging sexism, homophobia, rape, addiction and violence?
Perhaps I am trapped inside feminist ideology, but if it is impossible to escape ideology, I feel that the ideological effects that feminism has on me fits who I am and what I believe at this point in my life (or this week anyway). This does not mean that when I am in a social atmosphere I am incapable of enjoying this type of music, yet, it is for the most part on a superficial and often beat-driven level. However in an academic space, especially in a women's studies classroom, I find that my deconstruction and frustration towards 50 Cent is magnified.
Taking into account the historical and cultrual context in which his music is situated, I am glad that instead of being ghettoized, the black under class has a voice of power. I only wish that instead of continuing to promote oppression of others and spreading a self-indulgent and dangerous message to youths of all races and ethnicities, he spoke with a little more social consciousness (like for example, K'naan or K-OS...lyrics found below).

K'NAAN LYRICS

www.thedustyfoot.com
IF RAP GETS JEALOUS
So good things come to those who wait,
Sure, I've waited about pop pop pop pop- thats 4 cousins shot.
I got grudges, lets discuss this
My music needs no touch ups, I've got a long record of fuck ups trust me,
you dont know a past as weird as mine or a life as hard as mine,
i had to hustle, chop, sell drugs, grind whatever you wanna call it is fine
But just listen and dont pre-judge- I dont want anyone dismissin me for another thug or some shit like that,
No sir, if i fall i'm gon' get right back, I got circumstances,
But let me stop dancin around the issue and tell you straight forward, i'm poor
A refugee been imprisoned and survived a war,
I come from the most dangerous city in this universe, ur likely to get shot at birth
So how can rap quench my thirst?
...And if rap gets jealous, cuz i rock heavy It dont worry me, mother fuckas gon' get it
If rap gets jealous, cuz of where i'm headed, I used to be public enemy dont forget it...
Thats what it is, its pain, know what i'm sayin'?
i dunno man its like you spend years developing ur artistry u know what i'm sayin, perfecting ur skill and u cant do shit with it,
thats gotta be fucked up, know what i'm sayin? its gotta be fucked up
just imagine like you build a fucking castle and you can't live in it thats what it is,
you can't live in it! and you got problems you got family to feed, i got family to feed,
moment of truth right?

SMILE
(an integral part of our community, we smily while we bleedin)
...(shot) with my girlfriend (when) when we was younger,
i was scarred yo- but i survived tho,
death, it came easy, the gang needs me, never let em see me down smile whil ur bleedin
Smile, when ur strugglin, Smile, when ur in jail, Smile, when ur dead broke, Smile, and the rents due, Smile, you aint got friends now, Smile, cuz no one knows you, Smile...despite the war, despite the pain yo- never let em see you down, smile while you bleedin...
...i can't blow it- i got judges tellin me my life's key they will throw it, nu uh no sir,
i plan to have a chauffer and it seems to me this choppin crack is really goin nowhere,
therefore i'm resurrectin', they call me with more injection, i infect you with the rhythm...
There are a few things u gotta take into account i'm not an entertainer i've never been a clown,
I was born where mothers give birth while they frown...
I never really thought i'd make it to 14...war is no place for a child- especially if he's rollin with an AK and a smile, he had witnesses- his own mother in a bloody towel but please please never let em see you down, smile while you bleedin'

the ongoing battle with false consciousness...

After reflecting on the lecture on Thursday, at first I was rather idealistic and honestly thought for a second that the pluralism (diversity of thought) and demystification (people no longer being smitten by the commodity) that Adorno and Horkeimer spoke of was a viable option that we, as a culture, could (and would!) reach. Then within seconds my doubt of humanity struck, and I was left with the more postmodern and realistic assertion that complete consciousness raising is nearly impossibe, for culture is not a giant mass of fixed subjects who all move together in perfect unison but rather as Mimi White says is permeated with uneven development. This uneven development (simultaneous traces of social formations past, present and future) causes constant tension and conflict in culture, mostly due to the instability of the subject. I find myself feeling like a hypocrite some days, and other days I embrace the fact that I must negotiate my surroundings differently in order to get by (is a hypocrite still a hypocrite if she knows it??). Of course I feel a sense of satisfaction and smugness in intuitively just 'knowing' what a TV character is going to say or do...is my comfort in standardization of the culture industry always a crime? On the other hand I also find myself completely bored, disgusted and frustrated with white-heterocentric-patriarchal hegemonic discourse that is impossible to escape. It is exhausting but necessary to deconstruct ourselves on a continual basis. We must use our agency to navigate through culture and be aware of the competing discourses and ideological problematics that make our world so complicating and overwhelming, but so engaging and worthwhile at the same time. The fact that false consciousness is finding some resistance, even if it is fleeting and temporal, and has not become completely reifying to us as a culture provides me with a sense of hope.

the vision...oooo...aahhh

My vision for this blog, keeping in mind the article on textuality, is the development of a space for networking ideas, discussion and debate. I see blogs (when used constructively and to their potential) as a safe space for coalition building and as said in the article 'intervening in discourses of the everyday and cultivating rhetorical tactics that make interruption and resistance an important part of any conversation'. While that is a tall order for anyone to take, I think that the the privacty in which blogs can be developed, as well as the anonymity (to an extent), and the opportunity for personal creativity, makes it a strong medium for this type of idea/concept/frustrations sharing. Hopefully throughout the semester all of us will get to know eachother a lot better (for better or worse) and will work together as a group to challenge eachother and everything else we come across!
cheers!