You may have noticed that things look a little different here at D&R. After four-and-a-half years under the old blue, orange, and gray regime, I thought it was about time for a change.
The old template I was using started to seem, well, a little dated and generic, plus the star graphic that appeared in the upper left-hand corner began to smack of Texaco to me.
The new look makes D&R more visually consistent with the suite of sites that I maintain: The Differences & Repetitions Wiki; The Late Age of Print blog; and Bookworm, my academic website hosted at Indiana University. It's not just about preserving a consistent red, white, gray, and black color scheme, though. I'm also a fan of the Twitter feed that now appears prominently in the header.
So there you have it, the newly-designed D&R. I hope you like it! I may regret opening up this can of worms, but your comments on the new look are welcome. Gulp...
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Cultural Studies Review goes open access
D&R readers in North America may not be familiar with Cultural Studies Review (neé The UTS Review [1995-2002]), but it's one of the most innovative cultural studies journals around. Now it gets even better: CSR has gone open-access, with all of the journal's content freely available online. Definitely check out the current issue and, while you're at it, why not troll through the archive?
Cultural Studies Review 16.1 (March 2010)
Special Issue: Rural Cultural Studies: Research, Practice, Ethics
edited by John Frow and Katrina Schlunke
co-edited with with Clifton Evers, Andrew Gorman-Murray and Emily Potter
SPECIAL ISSUE CONTENTS:
POETRY:
ARTICLES:
REVIEWS:
Cultural Studies Review is a peer-refereed open-access e-journal published twice a year (in March and September) by UTSePress. This is the journal's first issue as a purely on-line publication. You can view the journal here: http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/csrj. Access is free, but you do need to register. Once you have done this, you can read the current issues, receive publication alerts for all future issues, submit articles for consideration on-line and, if you are willing, record your research interests for our referee database.
Register now, and keep up to date with the latest high-quality research and innovative writing in the realm of cultural studies. Queries: csreview@unimelb.edu.au
Cultural Studies Review 16.1 (March 2010)
Special Issue: Rural Cultural Studies: Research, Practice, Ethics
edited by John Frow and Katrina Schlunke
co-edited with with Clifton Evers, Andrew Gorman-Murray and Emily Potter
SPECIAL ISSUE CONTENTS:
Cultural Studies Review is a peer-refereed open-access e-journal published twice a year (in March and September) by UTSePress. This is the journal's first issue as a purely on-line publication. You can view the journal here: http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/csrj. Access is free, but you do need to register. Once you have done this, you can read the current issues, receive publication alerts for all future issues, submit articles for consideration on-line and, if you are willing, record your research interests for our referee database.
Register now, and keep up to date with the latest high-quality research and innovative writing in the realm of cultural studies. Queries: csreview@unimelb.edu.au
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Beyond computing -- CFP from Culture Machine
CALL FOR PAPERS
THE DIGITAL HUMANITIES: BEYOND COMPUTING
Special issue of Culture Machine, vol. 12; http://www.culturemachine.net
edited by Federica Frabetti (Oxford Brookes University)
The emerging field of the Digital Humanities can broadly be understood as embracing all those scholarly activities in the humanities that involve writing about digital media and technology as well as being engaged in processes of digital media production and practice (e.g. developing new media theory, creating interactive electronic literature, building online databases and wikis). Perhaps most notably, in what some are describing as a ‘computational turn’, it has seen techniques and methodologies drawn from Computer Science – image processing, data visualisation, network analysis – being used increasingly to produce new ways of understanding and approaching humanities texts.
Yet just as interesting as what Computer Science has to offer the humanities, surely, is the question of what the humanities have to offer Computer Science; and, beyond that, what the humanities themselves can bring to the understanding of the digital. Do the humanities really need to draw so heavily on Computer Science to develop their sense of what the Digital Humanities might be? Already in 1990 Mark Poster was arguing that ‘the relation to the computer remains one of misrecognition’ in the field of Computer Science, with the computer occupying ‘the position of the imaginary’ and being ‘inscribed with transcendent status’. If so, this has significant implications for any so-called ‘computational turn’ in the humanities. For on this basis Computer Science does not seem all that well-equipped to understand even itself and its own founding object, concepts and concerns, let alone help with those of the humanities.
In this special issue of Culture Machine we are therefore interested in investigating something that may initially appear to be a paradox: to what extent is it possible to envisage Digital Humanities that go beyond the disciplinary objects, affiliations, assumptions and methodological practices of computing and Computer Science?
At the same time the humanities are not without blind-spots and elements of misrecognition of their own. Take the idea of the human. For all the radical interrogation of this concept over the last 100 years or so, not least in relation to technology, doesn’t the mode of research production in the humanities remain very much tied to that of the individualized, human author? (Isn’t this evident in different ways even in the work of such technology-conscious anti-humanist thinkers as Deleuze, Guattari, Kittler, Latour, Negri, Ranciere and Stiegler?)
So what are the implications and possibilities of ‘the digital beyond computing’ for the humanities and for some of the humanities’ own central or founding concepts, too? The human, and with it the human-ities; but also the subject, the author, the scholar, writing, the text, the book, the discipline, the university...
What would THAT kind of (reconfigured) Digital Humanities look like?
We welcome papers that address the above questions and that suggest a new, somewhat different take on the relationship between the humanities and the digital.
Deadline for submissions: 1 October 2010
Please submit your contributions by email to Federica Frabetti: kikka66it@yahoo.it
All contributions will be peer-reviewed.
****************************************************
Established in 1999, CULTURE MACHINE (http://www.culturemachine.net) is a fully refereed, open-access journal of cultural studies and cultural theory. It has published work by established figures such as Mark Amerika, Alain Badiou, Simon Critchley, Jacques Derrida, Henry Giroux, Mark Hansen, N. Katherine Hayles, Ernesto Laclau, J. Hillis Miller, Bernard Stiegler, Cathryn Vasseleu and Samuel Weber, but it is also open to publications by up-and-coming writers, from a variety of geopolitical locations.
****************************************************
THE DIGITAL HUMANITIES: BEYOND COMPUTING
Special issue of Culture Machine, vol. 12; http://www.culturemachine.net
edited by Federica Frabetti (Oxford Brookes University)
The emerging field of the Digital Humanities can broadly be understood as embracing all those scholarly activities in the humanities that involve writing about digital media and technology as well as being engaged in processes of digital media production and practice (e.g. developing new media theory, creating interactive electronic literature, building online databases and wikis). Perhaps most notably, in what some are describing as a ‘computational turn’, it has seen techniques and methodologies drawn from Computer Science – image processing, data visualisation, network analysis – being used increasingly to produce new ways of understanding and approaching humanities texts.
Yet just as interesting as what Computer Science has to offer the humanities, surely, is the question of what the humanities have to offer Computer Science; and, beyond that, what the humanities themselves can bring to the understanding of the digital. Do the humanities really need to draw so heavily on Computer Science to develop their sense of what the Digital Humanities might be? Already in 1990 Mark Poster was arguing that ‘the relation to the computer remains one of misrecognition’ in the field of Computer Science, with the computer occupying ‘the position of the imaginary’ and being ‘inscribed with transcendent status’. If so, this has significant implications for any so-called ‘computational turn’ in the humanities. For on this basis Computer Science does not seem all that well-equipped to understand even itself and its own founding object, concepts and concerns, let alone help with those of the humanities.
In this special issue of Culture Machine we are therefore interested in investigating something that may initially appear to be a paradox: to what extent is it possible to envisage Digital Humanities that go beyond the disciplinary objects, affiliations, assumptions and methodological practices of computing and Computer Science?
At the same time the humanities are not without blind-spots and elements of misrecognition of their own. Take the idea of the human. For all the radical interrogation of this concept over the last 100 years or so, not least in relation to technology, doesn’t the mode of research production in the humanities remain very much tied to that of the individualized, human author? (Isn’t this evident in different ways even in the work of such technology-conscious anti-humanist thinkers as Deleuze, Guattari, Kittler, Latour, Negri, Ranciere and Stiegler?)
So what are the implications and possibilities of ‘the digital beyond computing’ for the humanities and for some of the humanities’ own central or founding concepts, too? The human, and with it the human-ities; but also the subject, the author, the scholar, writing, the text, the book, the discipline, the university...
What would THAT kind of (reconfigured) Digital Humanities look like?
We welcome papers that address the above questions and that suggest a new, somewhat different take on the relationship between the humanities and the digital.
Deadline for submissions: 1 October 2010
Please submit your contributions by email to Federica Frabetti: kikka66it@yahoo.it
All contributions will be peer-reviewed.
****************************************************
Established in 1999, CULTURE MACHINE (http://www.culturemachine.net) is a fully refereed, open-access journal of cultural studies and cultural theory. It has published work by established figures such as Mark Amerika, Alain Badiou, Simon Critchley, Jacques Derrida, Henry Giroux, Mark Hansen, N. Katherine Hayles, Ernesto Laclau, J. Hillis Miller, Bernard Stiegler, Cathryn Vasseleu and Samuel Weber, but it is also open to publications by up-and-coming writers, from a variety of geopolitical locations.
****************************************************
Monday, March 15, 2010
Differences & Repetions -- the wiki
Because I know blog readership has a tendency to ebb and wane, I thought I'd remind all of you about this site's companion, the Differences and Repetitions Wiki. I also have an exciting announcement to share.
I launched D&RW back in November 2007, initially as an experiment in collaborative and distributed or "rhizomatic" writing -- and antidote, I'd hoped, to the traditional, closed model of writing in the humanities. The first project, which is still active, began with an essay I drafted for a meeting of the National Communication Association. It explicates Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's enigmatic statement from their book, What is Philosophy?: "“We do not lack communication. On the contrary, we have too much of it. We lack creation. We lack resistance to the present.” Rather than letting myself have the final word, I decided to make it an open and ever-evolving project; anyone who wants to edit, add to, or otherwise improve upon the piece is welcome to do so, along the lines of Wikipedia.
Currently there are two more projects hosted on D&RW: my piece on cultural studies and the politics of academic journal publishing, a slightly revised version of which should be appearing imminently in the journal, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies; and my essay on audience labor and the Amazon Kindle e-reader. Although neither piece is set up for public editing, anyone is welcome to leave comments, questions, or feedback on the project site -- anonymous or otherwise.
More than two years after launching the D&R Wiki, I'm happy to report that "We Do Not Lack Communication" continues to evolve. A pretty robust dialogue has also cropped up around early fragments of the journal publishing and Kindle essays, which I'd be delighted to see multiply on the fuller versions. Of course, this is all thanks to the many contributions of the D&R community. Please keep them coming!
It's pretty clear to me that there many more possibilities for engagement on D&RW, compared to your run-of-the-mill academic journal. And so finally, the big announcement: if YOU have a writing project that would (a) be of interest to readers of this blog and that (b) you'd like to see hosted on D&RW, send me an email inquiry. Let's open this thing up even more!
I launched D&RW back in November 2007, initially as an experiment in collaborative and distributed or "rhizomatic" writing -- and antidote, I'd hoped, to the traditional, closed model of writing in the humanities. The first project, which is still active, began with an essay I drafted for a meeting of the National Communication Association. It explicates Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari's enigmatic statement from their book, What is Philosophy?: "“We do not lack communication. On the contrary, we have too much of it. We lack creation. We lack resistance to the present.” Rather than letting myself have the final word, I decided to make it an open and ever-evolving project; anyone who wants to edit, add to, or otherwise improve upon the piece is welcome to do so, along the lines of Wikipedia.
Currently there are two more projects hosted on D&RW: my piece on cultural studies and the politics of academic journal publishing, a slightly revised version of which should be appearing imminently in the journal, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies; and my essay on audience labor and the Amazon Kindle e-reader. Although neither piece is set up for public editing, anyone is welcome to leave comments, questions, or feedback on the project site -- anonymous or otherwise.
More than two years after launching the D&R Wiki, I'm happy to report that "We Do Not Lack Communication" continues to evolve. A pretty robust dialogue has also cropped up around early fragments of the journal publishing and Kindle essays, which I'd be delighted to see multiply on the fuller versions. Of course, this is all thanks to the many contributions of the D&R community. Please keep them coming!
It's pretty clear to me that there many more possibilities for engagement on D&RW, compared to your run-of-the-mill academic journal. And so finally, the big announcement: if YOU have a writing project that would (a) be of interest to readers of this blog and that (b) you'd like to see hosted on D&RW, send me an email inquiry. Let's open this thing up even more!
Friday, March 12, 2010
Why "postscript?"
I've been thinking lately about Deleuze's essay "Postscript on Control Societies," published in the book Negotiations. I'm wondering if anyone knows why the essay announces itself explicitly as a postscript.
Now, I realize that Deleuze frames the essay as a response -- or really a critical rejoinder -- to Michel Foucault's explication of the "disciplinary society" in Discipline and Punish. It may well be, therefore, that Deleuze offers the piece on control societies as a postscript to Foucault's work.
I am, however, mistrustful of that interpretation. I trace my suspicion mainly to the last few lines of the "control societies" piece. There, Deleuze states that it's the job of "young people" to "discover whose ends these [aspects of control societies] serve, just as older people discovered, with considerable difficulty, who was benefiting from disciplines" (p. 182).
It seems to me that Deleuze, rather than composing a postscript, is actually outlining a research program. This conclusion would also seem to follow from the proliferation of critical research on control, neoliberalism, governmentality, etc. So would it be more apt, then, to call the essay a "prolegomenon " on control societies? If so, then what might have been Deleuze's motivation for labeling the piece a postscript in the first place?
Now, I realize that Deleuze frames the essay as a response -- or really a critical rejoinder -- to Michel Foucault's explication of the "disciplinary society" in Discipline and Punish. It may well be, therefore, that Deleuze offers the piece on control societies as a postscript to Foucault's work.
I am, however, mistrustful of that interpretation. I trace my suspicion mainly to the last few lines of the "control societies" piece. There, Deleuze states that it's the job of "young people" to "discover whose ends these [aspects of control societies] serve, just as older people discovered, with considerable difficulty, who was benefiting from disciplines" (p. 182).
It seems to me that Deleuze, rather than composing a postscript, is actually outlining a research program. This conclusion would also seem to follow from the proliferation of critical research on control, neoliberalism, governmentality, etc. So would it be more apt, then, to call the essay a "prolegomenon " on control societies? If so, then what might have been Deleuze's motivation for labeling the piece a postscript in the first place?
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
Going mobile
Great news! A good Samaritan, whose handle is "creiercret," recently uploaded the free, Creative Commons-licensed PDF of The Late Age of Print onto the document sharing site, Scribd. Here's the link to the PDF if you're interested in checking it out. The book has already had more than 200 views on the site, I'm pleased to report.Late Age has been accessible for free online for almost a year, so why am I so excited to see it appear now on Scribd? Mainly because the site just added new sharing features, making it easy to send content to iPhones, Nooks, Kindles, and just about every other major e-reader you can imagine. In other words, The Late Age of Print's mobility-quotient just increased significantly.
I may have some more exciting, mobility-related news about the book, which hopefully I'll be able to share with you in the next week or so. I'll keep you posted. Until then, be sure to check out The Late Age of Print on Scribd, and why don't you go ahead shoot a copy off to your favorite e-reader while you're at it!?
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