Outline: In this project I will be using the Robinson Library as my territory as I feel it is a good example of Modern building which is now essentially a Post Modern centre of knowledge. Aims: o To provide an exposition of Modern and Postmodern architectural styles and why they were introduced. o I will provide additional material about other libraries e.g. some from the baroque period to explore whether Modern architectural styles are detrimental or complementary to a centre of knowledge. o To explore the Postmodern idea of communications leading to a networked society. o To show that the rise of information technologies has led to the dilution of information and knowledge. o To show that computerised communication systems are creating an increasing alienated society. Sources: The key critical thinker I will be examining will be David Harvey and his book ‘The Condition of Postmodernity’. Other sources will include: Lyotard, Jean – Francois: The Postmodern Condition Castells, Manuel: The Rise of the Network Society Jacobs, Jane: The death and life of great American cities McGuigan, Jim: Modernity and Postmodern culture I will be using books from the Robinson Library, internet resources, information from magazines/newspapers and photographs taken in the Robinson Library and around Newcastle city centre to illustrate my project report.
Category: Abstracts
Territory. I began by looking at computer games as my original territory, but this shifted as I progressed with my research to incorporate the wider realm of technology in more general terms. Concepts From my original territory I identified the concepts of Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence as my primary areas of research. I then furthered this to also explore the scientific rational project, with the growth of technology as a branch of this, and I further extended this to include the inhuman aspect of technology and a possible human disenchantment with this. Method. I began by exploring the nature of virtual environments and the interactions between the player controlled character and other intelligent aspects of the environment such as other characters or the surroundings themselves. This however led me to look at the fundamental concepts underlying the creation of virtual environments and artificial intelligence. I began to see the ‘rise in technology’ that was becoming prevalent within contemporary society and looked to find a philosophical background in which to interpret this theory. Philosophical Ideas. I looked at Heidegger who saw that technology was a means to achieve a certain purpose. However I also found the thoughts of Max Weber interesting, who saw technology as an area of disillusionment to people within modern society. He saw that very few people truly understand the world of technology around them and so we become disenchanted with our technological aspects of society. Also Lyotard saw the ‘Inhuman’ aspect of technology and the attitude of humanity towards it. Conclusions. I look to reconcile the modern world of computer generated virtual worlds with the different attitudes towards technology within general society.
OBJECTIVES – To look at what is thought to be the Italian Mafia in Twenty First Century Southern Italy in the light of philosophical theories. – Take specific aspects of the Mafia thought such as the attitudes towards death, silence and their own identity in an attempt to understanding the conditions that must be upheld by a Mafioso. SOURCES -G.W.F Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage that features in The Phenomenology of Spirit. -Karl Marx and Frederick Engel’s Communist Manifesto -Thoughts presented in these texts in reference to the Mafia through the eyes of Bataille, Deleuze and Nietzsche. -Secondary reading in both Marx and Hegel. -Contemporary Italian and British Newspaper articles. -Contemporary BBC Internet Website news articles. -True Life Crime books written on the Mafia. TERRITORY -Exploration into the Sicilian Mafia; Cosa Nostra, through the means of contemporary documentation of the events involving the Cosa Nostra as a whole and more specifically particular Mafiosi . TRANSITION OF CHANGE Section 1- How the birth of the Cosa Nostra in Sicily which was born out to a class struggle to which the theories of Marxism can be applied has, over the years moved towards being an organisation which incorporates notions that can be more aptly applied to Hegelian thought. Section 2 – The transition of change of the self consciousness of a Mafioso who desires to become a Capomafia in reference to Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage.
ADVERTISING. • Mass media intended to raise public political action. • Rise of capitalism lead to the increased importance of advertising revenue. • Mass-media serves market ends not public ends. This means public service programming suffers and entertainment increases. • Adorno and Horkheimer. The loss of public sphere and the rise of intellectualised entertainment. • Ideologies of consumerism define contemporary society. • Consumerism also defines and standardises values and morality. • Baudrillard. Advertising has altered the conditions of reality. • Advertising devalues the natural and exalts the consumption of commodity signs. NEWS AND PROPAGANDA. • Local newspapers eliminated in favour of national press. A national consciousness and fair representation. • Lack of alternative sources means that the news is a powerfully influential medium. • Controlled by government and commercial interests. • Causes biased reporting. Worthy and unworthy victims. • Knowledge is the greatest power in society. A manipulative tool. • BBC important for returning power to the masses. CHILDREN AND MORAL PANICS. • Children’s educational programming suffered due to lack of revenue like public service programming. • Children continually targeted. Programming reduced to merchandising. • Predominantly violent. How does this affect children’s developing morals? • Moral panics and scapegoats. Violence and James Bulger. • Exclusion of youth and Subcultures. • Can subcultures exist in such a powerfully regulated society. TECHNOLOGY. • Technology has altered understanding of human condition and reproduction. • Body is dematerialised. A sign of ideologies. • Life is advertised. Life is a commodity. • Beck. These fears develop in a risk society. • What does the advertising and purchasing of life mean for society and class segregation?
TERRITORY: Lost In Translation. Sofia Coppola’s beautifully written and emotively shot film Lost in Translation contains many themes that are very pertinent to philosophical discussion. The isolation of the leads Charlotte and Bob (Scarlett Johansson and Bill Murray) is palpable, enhanced to moments of hystericization in the mise-en-scene. The film follows the tentative growth of the protagonist Charlotte and the unhappily married film star Bob. CONCEPTS: Deleuzian film theory Sartrean theory of the imagination Deleuze’s analysis of film views it as a consciousness. I aim to attempt to analyse my territory in such a way. I will also attempt to analyse Acts of Faith a film for the Short Film Society in this manner. I hope that this will lead to a more profound understanding of the philosophy of film. A new way of broaching the territory without recourse to classical analysis. PRIMARY SOURCES: Deleuze, Gilles, Cinema One, 1986; Deleuze, Gilles, Cinema Two, 1989; Sartre, Jean-Paul, The Psychology of Imagination, 1972
Territory: Derrida’s theory of deconstruction provides us with a position of duplicity that operates within the language of reason. This allows us to escape from the condition of falleness. In relation to this I will explore Heidegger’s: ‘end of philosophy’. Derrida’s deconstructionist theory is a theory that is applied to feminine writing. Cixous argues that when we read deconstructively it invites us to recognise ourselves. For Cixous, the feminine is the embodiment of duality and as a result she is open to the other. Cixous argues that writing is woman’s because woman admits that there is another. As a writer of philosophy and fact as well as fiction she maintains that one must write in the present with an acceptance of inevitable death. Heidegger argued that to live authentically one must contemplate one’s inevitable death. To see death without dying allows us to live and frees us from all censors and judges in life. Themes: Derrida’s deconstructionist theory in relation to feminine writing and how femininity is open to the other due to an admittance of difference. Feminine writing and how it sketches an alternate possibility to self other relations in being/becoming. Heidegger and his notion of the ‘end of philosophy’ and that philosophy was nothing more than the ideology of the western ethos and true philosophical questions are based on ‘being’. Application: I intend to explore my territory and themes in relation to the feminist critique of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, focusing on her translation of Derrida’s work on deconstruction and how this deconstruction is a political safeguard.
• Our bodies are our mind’s access to the outside world. This tool for spatial interaction is increasingly abused in our current times. Why has it become so apparently unimportant to us? Image, as opposed to our tactile relation to the outside world, has realised new status. In exploring this the image we ourselves create will be looked into. • The key subject to be discussed in this project is how our mentality towards clothes has changed through the ages. My territory will be the body but more specifically, the body’s interaction, as an image, with others in an attractive or repellent way. We use the body, now more than ever, in a fleeting and ephemeral way. • Lacan – recognition of our bodies as our own from birth to adulthood. Tangibility and testing of our own bodies in infancy. • Descartes – measure and quantify. Removal of reality and questioning and reasoning of the unknown. • Debord and Baudrillard – false images as expressions of the spectacle of society – a manifestation that resides and guides our society through mediation of images as part of a capitalist society. • Harvey – space-time compression. Reduction of our ability to live in normal realms of space and time. Recalling of the past and other cultures in post-modern design as a stability to the culture we are currently a part of. FASHION – a constant flux showing examples of the state of society. Acceleration and deceleration of trends with changing rate of living. DIVORCE OF THE BODY FROM THE MIND
Tibet is situated alongside the mountain range of the Himalayas and consequently it has an average land height of 10,000 ft above sea level. The large plateaux is largely uninhabitable, however for thousands of years the Tibetan people, who are partially nomadic have made Tibet their home. The climate and landscape make life hard, with a limited diet and primitive technology the Tibetans rely heavily on their Buddhist religion which permeates every part of life. Tibet has had a chequered history with other countries however it is widely agreed that in 1950 when Chinese forces invaded the northern region of Amdo, Tibet was a free, independent country. The Communist Chinese government believed that Tibet in fact was part of “The Motherland” and was in need of “liberation.” Over half a Century later, and 1.6 million Tibetans have been killed by starvation, imprisonment and torture, conflict, execution and forced abortions. The Chinese all but wiped out any evidence of the once integral Buddhist religion during the “Cultural Revolution” and imprisoned any Tibetans who were suspected of “holding on to the past.” The spiritual leader the Dalai Lama was forced to flee his country in 1959 fearing for his life at the hands of the Chinese and has lived in nearby Dharamsala in India ever since. During their occupation the Chinese have made very good use of the new territory they now occupy, the Tibetan people are now outnumbered by Chinese settlers, valuable mineral resources have been exploited to the Chinese benefit and nuclear weapons tests have been carried out on Tibetan soil. One of the most important factors in Buddhism is the belief in reincarnation, all our actions in this life go towards determining the kind of life we will have next and it is this reason that the Chinese were able to take over Tibet so easily. The Tibetan people believe that to obtain a favourable rebirth they must respect every other living creature, from a worm in the ground to a Chinese soldier. They are a peaceful people and even when looking in the face of their oppressors remain composed and dignified. In my project I will be referring to the ideas of religious fundamentalism, and what the implications have been for the Tibetans during the Chinese occupation. At what point do the losses of military conflict outweigh the gains of following a doctrine? Also has the Dalai Lama done enough for his people? I will also be looking at the power of testimony in my project, comparing that of Robert Antelm and a Tibetan monk Palden Gyatso. How did they relate to their tormentors and using Hegel’s master and slave dialectic, can we learn anything from them? Finally I will be looking at the invasion itself with reference to Max Weber’s “Theodicy of Domination.” Is there evidence to confirm his ideas and can Tibet use his findings to try to rectify their situation. I hope to give a detailed insight to the plight of the Tibetan people, how they came to be in this situation and how we might be able to help.
Foucault differentiates the forms of control over society in Discipline and Punish into two categories: sovereign and disciplinary. This study transposes these concepts of power to the dynamics of the capitalist economy. Sovereign power is exerted in the Post-War World by governments and international organisations. It seeks to make the world safe for the free flow of capital by removing any major obstacles which become apparent. Disciplinary power is exerted by the constant pressure to make all decisions according to the maximal advantage of profit; to the supremacy of the desire to be as efficient as possible in the service of thee capital. The basic structures of the economy are the hierarchical organisations of business. At every level of these orders there is constant pressure exerted from (1) above in the form of pressure to extract the maximum surplus value for the holders of the capital and from (2) below in the desire for promotion to a higher rank, so that one attains a closer proximity to the benefits of the capital (a share of the profits). When we see an apparently immoral decision being taken by an individual within this structure, it become hard to say that it has been committed by that person and he is wrong. This is because the structure of our society essential dictates that immoral decisions will be made in a world where the only absolute is the ubiquity of the profit motive.
Objectives • I want to look at how much of yourself you have to sacrifice in order to become what you want to be: how much you have to sacrifice your talents for the record company, the fans and even the other band members. • I want to explore how far commercialism has embedded itself in the music industry. • Is it possible to create and release music with any real amount of integrity? • What does it mean to ‘sell-out’? • How can a band keep ‘it’ about ‘the music’? • What does ‘the music’ entail? How Done • I will look at and compare the record contracts of a major label and an indie label. • I will look at Marx’s views on commercialism and capitalism and how they affect culture. • I will assess how much control bands have over their music and what they could do to keep it about ‘the music’ so that they do not ‘sell-out’. What Achieved • By doing this I will have more of an understanding of what kind of balance there needs to be with the band and the record company in order for the music to be heard by enough people without it loosing its integrity.
An exploration into punk, its roots, its philosophy and where it is now.
Outline of Place: What is and what makes a person an ‘outsider’? An investigation of selected ‘outsiders’ with reference to and analysis of Albert Camus’ Outsider and The Rebel, Jean-Paul Sartre’s Nausea, theory of existentialism and the sociology of deviance; why some people choose to be outsiders or rebel against society. I will be looking into the reasons of why some people simply cannot be part of society. Typical outsiders keep to themselves; they are existentialist types and stay out of people’s way, looking out mainly only for themselves; refusing to be emotionally attached in any way. Camus’ character Meursault, in The Outsider, has the mind and curiosity of a child, he does not understand the rules of life, he does not act accordingly as people would expect one to act in society. He cannot however get away with it like a child could; the distraction of things in a room is overpowering when he should be listening to people and behaving a proper way. He is condemned for this and sentenced to death, as he is unwilling to pretend any emotions or defend himself with little white lies in the court of justice. One must however not compare this to Socrates, who refused to deny his beliefs for the sake of life; it an absurd attitude this outsider has towards society that inevitably dooms him. Aim: This project will be a piece by piece report and examination of these selected texts, with philosophical reasoning applied as to why these outsiders simply do not fit into society and are not considered to be the norm. Their thinking and mentality will be examined; what exactly this indifferent, unsocial attitude signifies and why it is this way. Answers to absurd behaviour and this completely different perspective of life will result through this investigation. Criticisms by and for authors will feature as well as points of views. References: Main Texts: Camus, Albert The Outsider & The Rebel, Sartre, Jean-Paul Nausea & selected texts on Existentialism, Analysing Texts and Commentaries: Becker, Howard Outsiders: Sociology of Deviance, Thody, Philip Albert Camus 1913-1960, Wilson, Colin The Outsider, A selection of definitive websites will be used also.
Territory & Objectives: My project investigates the way in which we impose received value systems upon the world around us, and how those standards are also mapped upon the individual body as carrier of those principles of the dominant societal mode thus affecting our relationships with one another. It shows that living within the context of capitalism shapes the criteria of these docile evaluations, and demonstrates how this system of evaluation self-referentially recourses to fortify the capitalist social system through flux and change. Discussion will move on to consider in detail how locally received examples of information disseminated by globally operating media cartels act to coerce individuals’ lifestyle investment in the authority of the system. This will be orientated by the appraisal of lifestyle magazines, exploring how the discourses of desire within the grand schema of capitalism set standards of normative criteria which are employed in a self-policing system of adherence to what it means to be a good consumer. These various lifestyle aspects by various publications persuade the individual, critically disengaged, to regard themselves as the aspiring capitalist critically engaged in the labour of consumption and therefore active in the formation of their lives and their relationships with other people. Rather than promoting multi-cultural, inter-disciplinary engagement in the process of being, the imperative to consume, saturated throughout commercial repertoires, in fact causes and substantiates rival economies and inequalities between individuals, between factions and at the level of global market forces. Further, the effect of tying consumption, through advertising, to normative standards set, makes it almost impossible to recognise the specificity of an individual. Rather, we evaluate ourselves and others against normative standards which discourage empathy for our fellow man, a state of affairs which may have dire consequences. Finally then, this paper will suggest what possibilities remain for communication between us with a view to the reformation of a networked community in response to the alienation and apathy of the individual in high capitalism. Change: The way in which advertising has tied consumption to normative values which are themselves set with the imperative to consume in mind. The overall effect is to diminish greatly one’s scope for specificity, and to create conflicts of interest. Sources: Foucault, M., The History of Sexuality I: The Will to Knowledge, Penguin, 1998; Foucault, M., The Archaeology of Knowledge, Routledge 1994, Bristol; Foucault, M., Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Gordon, C., Pantheon Books 1989, New York; Blanchot, M., Literature and the Right to Death, The Station Hill Blanchot Reader, Station Hill Press 1999, Barrytown; Marx, K., Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx: Selected Writings, Ed. McLellan, D., Oxford University Press 1977
Using the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari I will discuss the revolutionary potential of music. I will so do with reference to the Black movement in America. My main aim is to show how, through the music of blues and jazz, Blacks constructed a culture of resistance; giving rise to their freedom and subsequent status as citizen in America. I will look at … the deterritorialising power of music: how traditional blues and jazz improvisation deviate from formal musical structures to produce new forms of expression, and how the oppressive routine, and identity of the slave may have been ruptured by the singular effects of such music. … how blues and jazz incorporates both African and Western references to form an intensification of multiple heterogeneous and non-heterogeneous relations that are productive of different modes of thought and experience. … how Blacks found a distinct voice through their music, and how this led to their becoming other than slave, and to their emancipation.
A production by Gemma Madden featuring: – an exploration into the rise of marxism – a study into theatre from the greeks to Marx – Brecht’s new theatre and its aim to change the world – the decline of political theatre today ‘a view into the rise and fall of political theatre’
“Using the BBC sitcom the office as a stereotype; a philosophical analysis of the changing conditions power and resistance embrace in the corporate workplace.” Key Concepts/ Words: – Power, ethics, morality, will, resistance, autonomy, freedom, motivation, existence, capitalism, fordism, post-fordism, hybridisation, bureaucracy, red-tape, bio-power, hierarchy, top-down, bottom up, modernity, postmodernity, globalisation. Objectives: – Using the office as a model, I intend to investigate some of the pivotal questions of power, resistance and autonomy which arise when humans interface in the corporate environment. Sources: – Sourcing from books, library journals and internet journals. Original and secondary writings of Nietzsche, Foucault, Heidegger and Machiavelli. – the office first and second series, also related internet sites. – Background reading of business ethics and the condition of postmodernity. Change: – The paradigm shifts between modernity and postmodernity, Fordism and flexible accumulation. How factors such as technological advance, globalization and the drive for ‘the American dream’ affect human behaviour in the business environment. The gap between humans and things: – Man and technology. – The gap between man and the material world. – Man and globalization.
TITLE- Outline and consider how the philosophical concepts of power within institutions, according to Foucault, may be useful in assisting us to understand the change in power struggles between modern football clubs (as institutions) and their players (as individuals) compared with clubs first formed. Evaluate how this balance of power has shifted from the intuitions to the individual in the last hundred years and argue to what extent this relationship is also evident between the Football Association and Premier League. AIMS/OBJECTIVES- To show how Michel Foucault’s characterization of power in his works Power/Knowledge, The History of Sexuality and The Birth of the Clinic can be used a basis to explain the power struggles that exist between football clubs and their players. Show the factors/changes in rules of game that led to the balance of power shifting from club to players as a result of specific legal milestones such as the Eastham case or Bosman case which arguably laid the foundations for players to contest the supreme power of clubs. How this change has come about and to what extent The Football Association, as an oppressive institution, is to blame. In Foucault’s essay The Subject and Power, he outlines what he calls anti-authority struggles that will always develop between individuals and institutions and can be explained in terms of power struggles when the individuals reject the way in which certain institutions. Consequently, can power struggles in football, therefore, be explained in terms of this anti-authority struggle postulated by Foucault. Outline the changes in philosophical concept of power and how the definition has been adapted for to explain relations of power within institutions. Power promotes a delusion of one’s self-importance in the world, and this egotism leads to the illusion of the social effectiveness of power as an instrument that is used to control others. I will use the notion of change to show how change is fundamental when philosophically explaining the concept of power struggles within football institutions, because power is defined as the control of change and accordingly power is greater when there is control over change. CHANGE-In the 1880s football clubs had overall power (oppressive power as Foucault puts it) over players but today players (as individuals resisting to this power) now have power over clubs. Not only this, but the Football Association previously exercised similar power over the Premier League but now the Premier League has also become more powerful. FIELD OF EXPLORATION- How Foucault’s notion of power within institutions, as portrayed in his works power/knowledge, The History of Sexuality and The Birth of the Clinic, is relevant to the power relationship between the Football Association and the Premier League and between football clubs and players.
Territory: Prague Objective: To suck out one’s innermost self in order to take on solid form Method: Through the unquestioning belief that the golem exists, a psychic explosion occurs which ‘whips our dream-consciousness out into the daylight, creating a ghost whose countenance, gait and gestures inevitably reveal the symbol of the collective soul to each and every one of us…’ For More Information: consult Gustav Meyrink Reward For Capture: 2000 Kĉ
At the end of the nineteenth century Nietzsche was already pointing to dynamic becomings and complexity in the ontology of the human being. For him we are not entities with a transcendent being but an immanent field of forces that are always bound up in different processes. In the past century, advances in computing, mathematics and science have made it possible to study complex and dynamic systems that were dismissed as anomalies under linear models. Bodies are no longer studied in isolation but in dynamic systems that can alter their states, sometimes creating new and surprising features. We move away from singular objects to the study of quasi-objects and folds that can only be considered within their given system. The CApitalist system resembles this state of constant flux and change. There is a constant flow of abstract value and the persistence deterritorialization and reterritorialization of labour power. Within capitalism nothing exists outside of the system and decodings are brought back within a capitalist axiom. Philosophers such as Deleuze and Guattari, Serres, Simondon and DeLanda have taken theories of catastrophe, chaos and folds and reterritorialized them on to the social to explore human activity and phenomena. What emerges is biotechnics; the human is bound up in what DeLanda calls”nonorganic life”. I wish to examine Nietzsche’s process of becoming alongside recent theories of flux, chaos and complexity in the context of our state of “self” within capitalist structures to explore the processes that contribute to our stabilising of the “self” and to determine whether, on an ontological and immanent level, we are continually becoming a different self.
Objectives • To consider what ‘I’ means: what it consists of and what we want/hope it to mean (e.g. consisting of a soul etc.). • To consider what I myself am as an individual and what I believe I ought to be. • To consider what kind of world I am living in and what kind of world I feel I ought to be living in. • To try and distinguish between what I believe I ought to be and the influence society has on this. How Done • I will look at Plato’s view of what a human being is made up of. • Also the way everyday people see the human person and the reasons for this. • I will assess myself: who I am, and from this discover what I have to change or enhance in order to become what I ought to be. What Achieved • By doing this I will be able to attempt to move from the place I am in now to the place I want or ought to be in. • This ‘place’ being not just existent inside myself, but also being in the physical world as a real place. • However, this real place as the world would not be changed only physically, but also in its ideals.