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Subject: The Work of Jean Baudrillard - msg#00029List: culture.internet.nettime---------------------------------------------- Times Higher Education Supplement (London) March 16th 2007, p.14. Gone, but still breathing new life into his field. The work of Jean Baudrillard will continue to disturb the tranquil waters of modern sociology, says John Armitage. "He who knows how to breathe the air of my writings knows that it is an air of the heights, a robust air". So wrote German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. Similarly, one has to be suited to the atmosphere of the writings of Jean Baudrillard, the radical French sociologist and intellectual successor to Nietzsche, who died last week. If one can "breathe his air", one can gain remarkable insights in Baudrillard's work on postmodernity and hyperreality, social and media theories and, indeed, on Nietzsche himself. Or else, as many modern sociologists have discovered when faced with his major works such as Symbolic Exchange and Death (1976), Simulacra and Simulations (1981) and, most recently, The Intelligence of Evil Or The Lucidity Pact (2005), there is serious danger of an apoplectic reaction. Baudrillard is notorious for his trenchant political critiques of the writings of Michel Foucault on power and the feminist activities of the late Susan Sontag. Likewise, his development of the concepts of simulation and hyperreality and his remarks on the mass media world of The Matrix, on technology and postmodern science have been subjected to rigorous analysis and debate. Most infamous of all, perhaps, was his observation that the Persian Gulf War did not take place. Yet I would argue that it was his assault on modern sociology that really hits the mark and where, in fact, he had a singular and sometimes terrifying capacity to disturb its supposedly tranquil waters. For Baudrillard, the outsider, managed to expose everything from Marxist sociology and the near-pointlessness of political engagement to the foundations of contemporary social thought. How liberally one breathes the air when encouraged by him to confront the disappointments of the postmodern social system, depends upon how one responds to his sometimes-difficult works. Postmodern sociology, as Baudrillard appreciated and lived it, was a constant deliberation undertaken through the writing of highly provocative and stylised texts that are frequently rejected tout-court by the high priests of modern social theory. Baudrillard was a seeker after all things extraordinary who questioned the utilitarian foundation of both Adam Smith's classical and Karl Marx's radical social and economic thought by concentrating on the life and nature of commodities - the object - in contemporary consumer society. Any consideration of consumption had previously been expelled by contemporary Smithian and Marxist sociology obsessed with production and accumulation. From the understanding provided by his long, itinerant meanderings in the more or less prohibited social theory of Georges Bataille, Baudrillard learnt to observe the starting point of the economic and the object from a perspective very different from that of modern sociology. In fact, what Baudrillard revived and expanded on was the covert history of Bataille's "notion of expenditure", a radical theory that saw as deficient the writings of Smith and Marx, those sociological grandees associated with the introduction of concepts such as use value and exchange value. However, the reality of his insights were too much for modern sociology to swallow, particularly when he argued that in the postmodern society people are increasingly exchanging visual signs with one another. Value is no longer tied to an object's use value or exchange value, but instead to its sign value. Baudrillard demonstrated his true strength through his argument that the machinery of conspicuous consumption continues to be affected by symbolic values. These became for him increasingly the real gauge of social values because symbolic values are fundamentally linked to pre-capitalist forms of organisation that contemporary society likes to pretend that it has transcended. For Baudrillard, the failure of modern sociology was not necessarily its faith in its ideal type, the perfect society or even its blindness concerning symbolic exchange. Rather, its breakdown was and is its powerlessness in the face of the demise of both semiotics and the material world. In other words, each significant move in Baudrillard's writings, indeed, every stride he made away from semiotics and materialism and towards an understanding of the symbolic order was a kind of resistance to our sign-dominated contemporary society. Yet he did not automatically contest postmodern social principles. Instead, he was prepared to challenge their symbolic presence and characteristics, to set his analytical sights on the forbidden features of enchantment and seduction, brutality and abrupt reversibility that lie at the core of contemporary consumption and expenditure. In this sense, Baudrillard's postmodern sociology continues to provide a much-needed critique of semiotic society. For what had been outlawed more or less in principle up until his arrival on the modern sociological scene was the fact that the age of restricted production and accumulation was over and that the era of limitless consumption and expenditure had begun. John Armitage teaches media and communication at Northumbria University. He is the founder and co-editor, with Ryan Bishop and Douglas Kellner, of the journal Cultural Politics. Thread at a glance:
Previous Message by Date: click to view message previewBaudrillard - in memoriam [2x]Table of Contents: Paradox Funeral / =?ISO-8859-1?B?4CA=?=Jean Baudrillard Aliette <aliette-wZX4cNJlHJ2vvqpgdYmu+B2eb7JE58TQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Slight Revision: Baudrillard - in memoriam, for The Nouvel Observateur "Paul D. Miller" <anansi1-ihVZJaRskl1bRRN4PJnoQQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 01:07:44 +0100 From: Aliette <aliette-wZX4cNJlHJ2vvqpgdYmu+B2eb7JE58TQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: Paradox Funeral / =?ISO-8859-1?B?4CA=?=Jean Baudrillard Sorry, my message is too much long and more circumstantial for allow a writing in a bad English. My idea being that any one may be interested by Baudrillard's funerals can translate it and forward it, because his funeral= s were really very special and both sad and funny -ironically. That is an agreement from his thought. So it is in French (may be google translator can give an idea of what happened yesterday) : L'inhumation de Jean Baudrillard D=E9sormais, monsieur Finkielkraut aura tout mon respect. Je me suis toujours pos=E9 des questions sur la singularit=E9 de Alain Finkielkraut, qui nourrit une pens=E9e sociale extr=EAmement r=E9actionnaire du point de vue de ses go=FBts et des solutions =E9radicatrices qu'il propose sur les ondes de Radio France ou dans la Presse, et en m=EAme temps qui invita Baudrillard pourtant =E0 l'=E9poque o=F9 ce dernier =E9tait tr=E8s contest=E9 au titre d'un =E9ventuel anti-s=E9mitisme, qu'on attribuait =E0 tort =E0 ses th=E8ses r=E9versibles =E0 propos de l'Islam. Je me disais qu'il devait =EAtre extr=EAmement masochiste car chacun connaissant moindrement Jean Baudrillard savait que nul ne peut apprivoiser sa pens=E9e, seulement la d=E9fendre ou la rejeter. Bref, je ne savais pas vraiment que penser de Alain Finkielkraut, ni =E0 quoi il servait comme homme de media : maintenant je le sais. Alain Finkielkraut est un homme indispensable. Voici les circonstances et les faits. La tombe de Jean Baudrillard est dans la 8e division du cimeti=E8re du Montparnasse, quartier de Paris o=F9 de son vivant il r=E9sidait. Il a =E9t=E9 inhum=E9 le mardi 13 mars dans le plus grand d=E9pouillement de la c=E9r=E9monie, c= e qui n'avait rien d'=E9tonnant de sa part, ni que les condol=E9ances n'auraient pas lieu, si ce n'=E9taient la pr=E9sence nombreuse de ses fid=E8les amis, de ses amateurs respectueux (en bien plus grand nombre qu'on n'aurait pu le croire), des intellectuels, et de nombreuses personnalit=E9s, tous venus lui rendre hommage, parmi lesquels le ministre de la culture Renaud Donnedieu d= e Vabres, pris au d=E9pourvu devant tant d'int=E9r=EAt international soudain d=E9voil= =E9 par la Presse =E9trang=E8re, avouant en conclusion de sa br=E8ve allocution, incantation d=E9sempar=E9e au retour de l'avant-garde, suivie de : "J'aurais bien voulu parler avec Jean Baudrillard... Maintenant, il me reste =E0 le lire." Preuve qu'il se sentait dans un environnement compr=E9hensif pour l'entendre sans lui en vouloir (parce qu'on ne lui attribue aucune importance - et il le sentait bien). Ce n'est pas le seul paradoxe des v=E9rit=E9s r=E9v=E9l=E9es par la c=E9r=E9monie devant le public =E9berlu=E9, =E0 l'=E9coute de Alain Finkielkraut (surprise qu'il fut l=E0, mais ce qu'il dit nous permit de comprendre que c'=E9taient les dieux qui l'avaient envoy=E9), d=E9clarant qu'il ne se passait pas un jour sans qu'il ne lise Jean Baudrillard, dont toujours il tenait un livre ouvert sur son bureau ; mais (adoptant soudain un ton impatient et exc=E9d=E9) que d'un autre c=F4t=E9, fr=E9quenter la pens=E9e de Jean Baudrillard lui posait un grave probl=E8me personnel car : "le syst=E8me de l'objet, L'Am=E9rique, le soul=E8vement des banlieues, le onze septembre, l'Islam flamboyant, et nos villes infest=E9es d= e graffitis : =E7a... NON !" Ce qui fait tout de m=EAme beaucoup - rendant l'attrait d'autant plus =E9trange= . Quant =E0 Jacques Donzelot, avec Baudrillard complices d'activisme p=E9dagogiqu= e =E0 Nanterre, au temps du mouvement du 22 mars, en 1968, d=E9clarant =E0 son tour= , histoire de faire sortir le diable du b=E9nitier, comme on disait dans la campagne fran=E7aise autrefois, que lors d'une conversation r=E9cente =E0 trois avec une personnalit=E9, celle-ci leur avait pos=E9 la question (comme Donzelot ne parlait pas haut, je n'ai pas entendu distinctement qui, ni les circonstances exactes mais ce que j'ai bien entendu - et nous sommes plusieurs =E0 l'avoir entendu) : "Etes-vous d=E9mocrates ?" et Donzelot racontant qu'il se tourne alors vers Baudrillard : "Es-tu d=E9mocrate ?" ce dernier r=E9pondant au comble de l'=E9nigme pour leur interlocuteur, mais =E0 haute voix : "ce n'est pas une question qu'on pose =E0 un ami." ... Eclat de rire g=E9n=E9ral parmi les amis de Jean B. Si Jacques Donzelot r=E9ussit =E0 nous extraire de la tristesse g=E9n=E9rale, il reste que sans Alain Finkielkraut : qui aurait actualis=E9 la pr=E9occupation collective de Jean Baudrillard ? Et bien voil=E0, c'est fait, c'est Alain Finkielkraut qui l'a dit. Gr=E2ce =E0 lui, le parti =E9mergent de Baudrillard contre l'oppression sous toutes ses formes sort de l'ombre, toute ambigu=EFt=E9 =E9tant lev=E9e. Merci. Tant il est vrai qu'"il faut de tout pour faire bien faire un monde". Un peu plus loin, =E0 l'entr=E9e du cimeti=E8re, vers l'avenue Edgar Quinet, veillent d'un c=F4t=E9 Jean-Paul Sartre et Simone de Beauvoir, et de l'autre Roland Topor, parmi les tombeaux ici qui comptent au coeur de la modernit=E9 et de la post-modernit=E9 critique, et bien d'autres, dont celui de Charles Baudelaire. Etrangement encore, ce fut une des journ=E9es les plus pollu=E9es de la saison =E0 Paris. Le stationnement avait =E9t=E9 d=E9clar=E9 gratuit dans toute la ville, il faisait doux et il y avait du soleil, de sorte qu'apr=E8s la c=E9r=E9monie personne ne s'emp=EAcha de s'attarder pour =E9voquer les souvenirs, aux terrasses des caf=E9s... Il y avait ceux qui anticipaient leur d=E9jeuner avec un verre de vin, et ceux qui achevaient d'une tartine et d'un th=E9 leur petit d=E9jeuner interrompu plus t=F4t le matin, car l'enterrement eut lieu =E0 1= 0 heures pr=E9cises, ce qui faisait t=F4t pour qui venait de loin. Revenue des retrouvailles =E0 propos de l'inhumation de Jean, le tout en feed-back porta bas mon =E9nergie au travail. Au lieu de somnoler devant l'=E9cran de mon ordinateur, je me suis allong=E9e sur mon lit, choqu=E9e, =E9puis=E9e, incapable de dormir sinon rester dans un =E9tat de r=EAve =E9veill=E9, jusqu'=E0 la nuit... Voil=E0, c'=E9tait fini. L'enterrement de Jean Baudrillard se d=E9roula comme dans un r=EAve pataphysique. Cela lui aurait plu. Au moins, lui, il survivra par son oeuvre, tant de gens important restant =E0 devoir le lire, et les autres souffrant de le lire sans discontinuer, =E0 devoir encore en jouir de remettre =E0 plus tard de le comprendre. Jean notre grand ami cruel et tendre. De la part d'Aliette Guibert Exit / Any quotes extracts from McKenzie Wark posts on Empyre list : "What do you expect a 'successful' revolution to look like? It is paradise." (America, p98) "Ours is a crisis of historical ideals facing up to the impossibility of their realisation. Theirs is the crisis of an acheived utopia, confronted with the problem of its duration and permanence." (America, 77) "Americans can only imagine and combat an enemy in their own image. They are at once both missionaries and converts to their own way of life, which they triumphantly project onto the world." (TGWDNTP, 37) "One day they will rebuild Disneyland at Disneyworld." (Cool Memories II, 42) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 05:40:53 -0400 (EDT) From: "Paul D. Miller" <anansi1-ihVZJaRskl1bRRN4PJnoQQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: Slight Revision: Baudrillard - in memoriam, for The Nouvel Observateur Please use this one instead! Baudrillard: A Remembrance of Things Unpassed By Paul D. Miller aka Dj Spooky that Subliminal Kid I first met Jean Baudrillard at a conference Sylvere Lottringer of Semiotex= t(e) organized in Las Vegas several years ago. The idea of the conference = was about chance processes. Needless to say, with the Whiskey Casino as the= backdrop for the conference, and randomness as the main motif of the situa= tion, the soundtrack of the constant churning of slot machine wheels and pu= lleys, and the continuous movement of the attendees between speeches and ga= mbling, it all seemed totally appropriate. Baudrillard gave his speech dres= sed in a gold suit in simulation of Elvis, and I ran my speech through vari= ous software processes to turn it into the sound of water. When I look bac= k at the moment, it seems crystal clear that we were at the edge of an aest= hetic and philosophical ocean turn in how people put ideas together in the = era of hyper media. Since that time, simple things like wireless networks, = the ubiquity of the Ipod, global media events like 9/11 or the SARS virus, = have all brought home how prescient his thought was. The world knows Baudri= llard as the philosopher who gave us a cautionary tale about simulation, an= d if the events of today =E2=80=93 the war in Iraq, the economics of global= ization, Katrina=E2=80=99s destruction of New Orleans =E2=80=93 have told u= s that in no uncertain terms, we live in a world with a more and more tenuo= us grasp of the =E2=80=9Creality=E2=80=9D underpinning the myths of the pre= sent day. In a world where bleak man made landscapes and the psychological = effects of technological, social and environmental developments cannot be d= enied, his words were a beacon of how we can reason through the myriad ways= that we humans have displaced the natural world. For me as a just graduati= ng student in the early mid 90=E2=80=99s, Baudrillard seemed like a figure = who cut through the haze of post-everything American cultural malaise. I st= udied French literature at a time when it seemed that America was enthralle= d by the end of the Cold War =E2=80=93 my studies were populated with peopl= e like Derrida, Foucault, Deleuze, Guattari, Lyotard, Baudrillard, Althusse= r, Lacan, bounded by Badiou. Kristeva, Cixous, Irigaray, Wittig=E2=80=A6 Th= e list goes on but you get the point: these figures are part of a pantheon = where, perhaps, one of the common themes is a simple cry for new ways to pe= rceive how the mass media-landscape inadvertently invades and splinters the= private mind of the individual.=20 What Baudrillard did for me was make the world safe for doubt: doubt about = the intentions of governments, corporations, ideologies, and yes, people. L= ike J.G. Ballard or Bruce Sterling, his work hovered between descriptions o= f the world in present tense and the strange and uncanny networks that hold= together =E2=80=9Cthe real.=E2=80=9D For him, like the 'simulacrum' follow= ing DeBord's 'spectacle' where 'revolution' became synonymous with hypercon= sumerism and something everyone did against the name of 'freedom,' but that= =E2=80=99s freedom of choice, of course. I don't mean to say anything here,= I wonder about the doubting that once swayed the world, Today, I wrote this piece traveling on a flight between Tokyo and Istanbul,= and as I sit here and use a wireless network in the coffee lounge of the H= otel Buyuk Londra, I re-read him as doubting everything =E2=80=93 it=E2=80= =99s as if Baudrillard says never model a thought about anything unless yo= u can say it to yourself. The thought lingers, and links to a meta critiqu= e: it posits modern thought as withdrawn, proffered as kind of a peripheral= speech. At the birth of the 21st century, at the birth of the new New Worl= d, of suicide bombers, insane Presidents, multi-media equipped private armi= es and fundamentalist militas, his words bear reviewing: Baudrillard =E2=80= =93 a voice that says the seductions of reality are what we now hold dear.W= e speak the world. Reform, remix, re-engineer the consent of the Western w= orld. We need this analysis more than ever. Vietnam is now long gone. Flip = the script and think: for us children of the late 20th century, memory is a= scarce resource. In the rear view mirror - May 68 was almost forty years a= go and most of us young people have never thought of burning monks, Charima= n Mao, Stalin, or the origins of half of today=E2=80=99s problems. I think = back to an almost innocent moment in the mid 1990=E2=80=99s when Baudrillar= d with a gold suit, made people remember that the chance processes of the w= orld are what give us joy. With a simple flourish, I think that he set the = tone for many young artists, writers, and musicians, to remember a simple t= hing: that another world is possible. Tokyo/Istanbul 3/15/07 ------------------------------ ----- End forwarded message ----- Next Message by Date: click to view message previewthe ideal job for somebody or other[[[forwarded message below -- nettime mod (tb)]]] Dear Friends, This looks impersonal and spammish, but it isn't. I am writing to ask for your help because you are interested in open content and open licensing, and/or work on educational issues. I have two favours to ask. Thanks to funding from the Hewlett and Macarthur Foundations, Creative Commons is launching a new division called CC Learn, which will be devoted to open educational material and repositories - kindergarten through lifelong learning. CC Learn's goal is to break down the barriers - whether legal, technical or cultural - between different collections of open educational content. Our goal is to make material more "interoperable," to speed up the virtuous cycle of use, experimentation and reuse, to spread the word about the value of open educational content, and to change the culture of repositories to one focused on "helping build a usable network of content worldwide" rather than "helping build the stuff on our site." Please help us spread the news! Second, we need an Executive Director with experience in education to run the new division. The person would be located in San Francisco, working with the astounding CC staff. Details are here. http:// creativecommons.org/about/opportunities#ccl Please pass this information along to the networks you are a part of and encourage qualified people to apply. Save the world and advance learning through open content, in San Francisco, while surrounded by extremely cool people.. What more could one want? This is a really exciting initiative. Imagine a global network of open and free educational content, with curricula customized to different states or countries, with experimentation across multiple sites and multiple platforms, so that someone else can find things to do with my content that I never thought of... Imagine bringing into the open educational content community hundreds of thousands of teachers, students and volunteers. Imagine pursuing ease of discovery and use of educational material with the same ingenuity and dedication that we invest in making e-commerce systems work well or in allowing teenagers to flirt with each other on social networking sites.. Many of the pieces are in place, and there are great people working on the issue already, but there is a lot to do. Please help us by passing this along. (And if you can help fund it or donate to support it, so much the better!) Thanks so much, warm regards, Jamie ___________________________ James Boyle William Neal Reynolds Professor of Law Duke University Law School Science Drive & Towerview Box 90360 Durham, NC 27708-0360 919 613-7287 ph. Home Page & Essays http://james-boyle.com New Novel http://www.shakespearechronicles.com Center for the Study of the Public Domain http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd Financial Times Columns http://www.ft.com/techforum Creative Commons http://www.creativecommons.org Previous Message by Thread: click to view message previewBaudrillard - in memoriam [2x]Table of Contents: Paradox Funeral / =?ISO-8859-1?B?4CA=?=Jean Baudrillard Aliette <aliette-wZX4cNJlHJ2vvqpgdYmu+B2eb7JE58TQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Slight Revision: Baudrillard - in memoriam, for The Nouvel Observateur "Paul D. Miller" <anansi1-ihVZJaRskl1bRRN4PJnoQQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 01:07:44 +0100 From: Aliette <aliette-wZX4cNJlHJ2vvqpgdYmu+B2eb7JE58TQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: Paradox Funeral / =?ISO-8859-1?B?4CA=?=Jean Baudrillard Sorry, my message is too much long and more circumstantial for allow a writing in a bad English. My idea being that any one may be interested by Baudrillard's funerals can translate it and forward it, because his funeral= s were really very special and both sad and funny -ironically. That is an agreement from his thought. So it is in French (may be google translator can give an idea of what happened yesterday) : L'inhumation de Jean Baudrillard D=E9sormais, monsieur Finkielkraut aura tout mon respect. Je me suis toujours pos=E9 des questions sur la singularit=E9 de Alain Finkielkraut, qui nourrit une pens=E9e sociale extr=EAmement r=E9actionnaire du point de vue de ses go=FBts et des solutions =E9radicatrices qu'il propose sur les ondes de Radio France ou dans la Presse, et en m=EAme temps qui invita Baudrillard pourtant =E0 l'=E9poque o=F9 ce dernier =E9tait tr=E8s contest=E9 au titre d'un =E9ventuel anti-s=E9mitisme, qu'on attribuait =E0 tort =E0 ses th=E8ses r=E9versibles =E0 propos de l'Islam. Je me disais qu'il devait =EAtre extr=EAmement masochiste car chacun connaissant moindrement Jean Baudrillard savait que nul ne peut apprivoiser sa pens=E9e, seulement la d=E9fendre ou la rejeter. Bref, je ne savais pas vraiment que penser de Alain Finkielkraut, ni =E0 quoi il servait comme homme de media : maintenant je le sais. Alain Finkielkraut est un homme indispensable. Voici les circonstances et les faits. La tombe de Jean Baudrillard est dans la 8e division du cimeti=E8re du Montparnasse, quartier de Paris o=F9 de son vivant il r=E9sidait. Il a =E9t=E9 inhum=E9 le mardi 13 mars dans le plus grand d=E9pouillement de la c=E9r=E9monie, c= e qui n'avait rien d'=E9tonnant de sa part, ni que les condol=E9ances n'auraient pas lieu, si ce n'=E9taient la pr=E9sence nombreuse de ses fid=E8les amis, de ses amateurs respectueux (en bien plus grand nombre qu'on n'aurait pu le croire), des intellectuels, et de nombreuses personnalit=E9s, tous venus lui rendre hommage, parmi lesquels le ministre de la culture Renaud Donnedieu d= e Vabres, pris au d=E9pourvu devant tant d'int=E9r=EAt international soudain d=E9voil= =E9 par la Presse =E9trang=E8re, avouant en conclusion de sa br=E8ve allocution, incantation d=E9sempar=E9e au retour de l'avant-garde, suivie de : "J'aurais bien voulu parler avec Jean Baudrillard... Maintenant, il me reste =E0 le lire." Preuve qu'il se sentait dans un environnement compr=E9hensif pour l'entendre sans lui en vouloir (parce qu'on ne lui attribue aucune importance - et il le sentait bien). Ce n'est pas le seul paradoxe des v=E9rit=E9s r=E9v=E9l=E9es par la c=E9r=E9monie devant le public =E9berlu=E9, =E0 l'=E9coute de Alain Finkielkraut (surprise qu'il fut l=E0, mais ce qu'il dit nous permit de comprendre que c'=E9taient les dieux qui l'avaient envoy=E9), d=E9clarant qu'il ne se passait pas un jour sans qu'il ne lise Jean Baudrillard, dont toujours il tenait un livre ouvert sur son bureau ; mais (adoptant soudain un ton impatient et exc=E9d=E9) que d'un autre c=F4t=E9, fr=E9quenter la pens=E9e de Jean Baudrillard lui posait un grave probl=E8me personnel car : "le syst=E8me de l'objet, L'Am=E9rique, le soul=E8vement des banlieues, le onze septembre, l'Islam flamboyant, et nos villes infest=E9es d= e graffitis : =E7a... NON !" Ce qui fait tout de m=EAme beaucoup - rendant l'attrait d'autant plus =E9trange= . Quant =E0 Jacques Donzelot, avec Baudrillard complices d'activisme p=E9dagogiqu= e =E0 Nanterre, au temps du mouvement du 22 mars, en 1968, d=E9clarant =E0 son tour= , histoire de faire sortir le diable du b=E9nitier, comme on disait dans la campagne fran=E7aise autrefois, que lors d'une conversation r=E9cente =E0 trois avec une personnalit=E9, celle-ci leur avait pos=E9 la question (comme Donzelot ne parlait pas haut, je n'ai pas entendu distinctement qui, ni les circonstances exactes mais ce que j'ai bien entendu - et nous sommes plusieurs =E0 l'avoir entendu) : "Etes-vous d=E9mocrates ?" et Donzelot racontant qu'il se tourne alors vers Baudrillard : "Es-tu d=E9mocrate ?" ce dernier r=E9pondant au comble de l'=E9nigme pour leur interlocuteur, mais =E0 haute voix : "ce n'est pas une question qu'on pose =E0 un ami." ... Eclat de rire g=E9n=E9ral parmi les amis de Jean B. Si Jacques Donzelot r=E9ussit =E0 nous extraire de la tristesse g=E9n=E9rale, il reste que sans Alain Finkielkraut : qui aurait actualis=E9 la pr=E9occupation collective de Jean Baudrillard ? Et bien voil=E0, c'est fait, c'est Alain Finkielkraut qui l'a dit. Gr=E2ce =E0 lui, le parti =E9mergent de Baudrillard contre l'oppression sous toutes ses formes sort de l'ombre, toute ambigu=EFt=E9 =E9tant lev=E9e. Merci. Tant il est vrai qu'"il faut de tout pour faire bien faire un monde". Un peu plus loin, =E0 l'entr=E9e du cimeti=E8re, vers l'avenue Edgar Quinet, veillent d'un c=F4t=E9 Jean-Paul Sartre et Simone de Beauvoir, et de l'autre Roland Topor, parmi les tombeaux ici qui comptent au coeur de la modernit=E9 et de la post-modernit=E9 critique, et bien d'autres, dont celui de Charles Baudelaire. Etrangement encore, ce fut une des journ=E9es les plus pollu=E9es de la saison =E0 Paris. Le stationnement avait =E9t=E9 d=E9clar=E9 gratuit dans toute la ville, il faisait doux et il y avait du soleil, de sorte qu'apr=E8s la c=E9r=E9monie personne ne s'emp=EAcha de s'attarder pour =E9voquer les souvenirs, aux terrasses des caf=E9s... Il y avait ceux qui anticipaient leur d=E9jeuner avec un verre de vin, et ceux qui achevaient d'une tartine et d'un th=E9 leur petit d=E9jeuner interrompu plus t=F4t le matin, car l'enterrement eut lieu =E0 1= 0 heures pr=E9cises, ce qui faisait t=F4t pour qui venait de loin. Revenue des retrouvailles =E0 propos de l'inhumation de Jean, le tout en feed-back porta bas mon =E9nergie au travail. Au lieu de somnoler devant l'=E9cran de mon ordinateur, je me suis allong=E9e sur mon lit, choqu=E9e, =E9puis=E9e, incapable de dormir sinon rester dans un =E9tat de r=EAve =E9veill=E9, jusqu'=E0 la nuit... Voil=E0, c'=E9tait fini. L'enterrement de Jean Baudrillard se d=E9roula comme dans un r=EAve pataphysique. Cela lui aurait plu. Au moins, lui, il survivra par son oeuvre, tant de gens important restant =E0 devoir le lire, et les autres souffrant de le lire sans discontinuer, =E0 devoir encore en jouir de remettre =E0 plus tard de le comprendre. Jean notre grand ami cruel et tendre. De la part d'Aliette Guibert Exit / Any quotes extracts from McKenzie Wark posts on Empyre list : "What do you expect a 'successful' revolution to look like? It is paradise." (America, p98) "Ours is a crisis of historical ideals facing up to the impossibility of their realisation. Theirs is the crisis of an acheived utopia, confronted with the problem of its duration and permanence." (America, 77) "Americans can only imagine and combat an enemy in their own image. They are at once both missionaries and converts to their own way of life, which they triumphantly project onto the world." (TGWDNTP, 37) "One day they will rebuild Disneyland at Disneyworld." (Cool Memories II, 42) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 05:40:53 -0400 (EDT) From: "Paul D. Miller" <anansi1-ihVZJaRskl1bRRN4PJnoQQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: Slight Revision: Baudrillard - in memoriam, for The Nouvel Observateur Please use this one instead! Baudrillard: A Remembrance of Things Unpassed By Paul D. Miller aka Dj Spooky that Subliminal Kid I first met Jean Baudrillard at a conference Sylvere Lottringer of Semiotex= t(e) organized in Las Vegas several years ago. The idea of the conference = was about chance processes. Needless to say, with the Whiskey Casino as the= backdrop for the conference, and randomness as the main motif of the situa= tion, the soundtrack of the constant churning of slot machine wheels and pu= lleys, and the continuous movement of the attendees between speeches and ga= mbling, it all seemed totally appropriate. Baudrillard gave his speech dres= sed in a gold suit in simulation of Elvis, and I ran my speech through vari= ous software processes to turn it into the sound of water. When I look bac= k at the moment, it seems crystal clear that we were at the edge of an aest= hetic and philosophical ocean turn in how people put ideas together in the = era of hyper media. Since that time, simple things like wireless networks, = the ubiquity of the Ipod, global media events like 9/11 or the SARS virus, = have all brought home how prescient his thought was. The world knows Baudri= llard as the philosopher who gave us a cautionary tale about simulation, an= d if the events of today =E2=80=93 the war in Iraq, the economics of global= ization, Katrina=E2=80=99s destruction of New Orleans =E2=80=93 have told u= s that in no uncertain terms, we live in a world with a more and more tenuo= us grasp of the =E2=80=9Creality=E2=80=9D underpinning the myths of the pre= sent day. In a world where bleak man made landscapes and the psychological = effects of technological, social and environmental developments cannot be d= enied, his words were a beacon of how we can reason through the myriad ways= that we humans have displaced the natural world. For me as a just graduati= ng student in the early mid 90=E2=80=99s, Baudrillard seemed like a figure = who cut through the haze of post-everything American cultural malaise. I st= udied French literature at a time when it seemed that America was enthralle= d by the end of the Cold War =E2=80=93 my studies were populated with peopl= e like Derrida, Foucault, Deleuze, Guattari, Lyotard, Baudrillard, Althusse= r, Lacan, bounded by Badiou. Kristeva, Cixous, Irigaray, Wittig=E2=80=A6 Th= e list goes on but you get the point: these figures are part of a pantheon = where, perhaps, one of the common themes is a simple cry for new ways to pe= rceive how the mass media-landscape inadvertently invades and splinters the= private mind of the individual.=20 What Baudrillard did for me was make the world safe for doubt: doubt about = the intentions of governments, corporations, ideologies, and yes, people. L= ike J.G. Ballard or Bruce Sterling, his work hovered between descriptions o= f the world in present tense and the strange and uncanny networks that hold= together =E2=80=9Cthe real.=E2=80=9D For him, like the 'simulacrum' follow= ing DeBord's 'spectacle' where 'revolution' became synonymous with hypercon= sumerism and something everyone did against the name of 'freedom,' but that= =E2=80=99s freedom of choice, of course. I don't mean to say anything here,= I wonder about the doubting that once swayed the world, Today, I wrote this piece traveling on a flight between Tokyo and Istanbul,= and as I sit here and use a wireless network in the coffee lounge of the H= otel Buyuk Londra, I re-read him as doubting everything =E2=80=93 it=E2=80= =99s as if Baudrillard says never model a thought about anything unless yo= u can say it to yourself. The thought lingers, and links to a meta critiqu= e: it posits modern thought as withdrawn, proffered as kind of a peripheral= speech. At the birth of the 21st century, at the birth of the new New Worl= d, of suicide bombers, insane Presidents, multi-media equipped private armi= es and fundamentalist militas, his words bear reviewing: Baudrillard =E2=80= =93 a voice that says the seductions of reality are what we now hold dear.W= e speak the world. Reform, remix, re-engineer the consent of the Western w= orld. We need this analysis more than ever. Vietnam is now long gone. Flip = the script and think: for us children of the late 20th century, memory is a= scarce resource. In the rear view mirror - May 68 was almost forty years a= go and most of us young people have never thought of burning monks, Charima= n Mao, Stalin, or the origins of half of today=E2=80=99s problems. I think = back to an almost innocent moment in the mid 1990=E2=80=99s when Baudrillar= d with a gold suit, made people remember that the chance processes of the w= orld are what give us joy. With a simple flourish, I think that he set the = tone for many young artists, writers, and musicians, to remember a simple t= hing: that another world is possible. Tokyo/Istanbul 3/15/07 ------------------------------ ----- End forwarded message ----- Next Message by Thread: click to view message previewthe ideal job for somebody or other[[[forwarded message below -- nettime mod (tb)]]] Dear Friends, This looks impersonal and spammish, but it isn't. I am writing to ask for your help because you are interested in open content and open licensing, and/or work on educational issues. I have two favours to ask. Thanks to funding from the Hewlett and Macarthur Foundations, Creative Commons is launching a new division called CC Learn, which will be devoted to open educational material and repositories - kindergarten through lifelong learning. CC Learn's goal is to break down the barriers - whether legal, technical or cultural - between different collections of open educational content. Our goal is to make material more "interoperable," to speed up the virtuous cycle of use, experimentation and reuse, to spread the word about the value of open educational content, and to change the culture of repositories to one focused on "helping build a usable network of content worldwide" rather than "helping build the stuff on our site." Please help us spread the news! Second, we need an Executive Director with experience in education to run the new division. The person would be located in San Francisco, working with the astounding CC staff. Details are here. http:// creativecommons.org/about/opportunities#ccl Please pass this information along to the networks you are a part of and encourage qualified people to apply. Save the world and advance learning through open content, in San Francisco, while surrounded by extremely cool people.. What more could one want? This is a really exciting initiative. Imagine a global network of open and free educational content, with curricula customized to different states or countries, with experimentation across multiple sites and multiple platforms, so that someone else can find things to do with my content that I never thought of... Imagine bringing into the open educational content community hundreds of thousands of teachers, students and volunteers. Imagine pursuing ease of discovery and use of educational material with the same ingenuity and dedication that we invest in making e-commerce systems work well or in allowing teenagers to flirt with each other on social networking sites.. Many of the pieces are in place, and there are great people working on the issue already, but there is a lot to do. Please help us by passing this along. (And if you can help fund it or donate to support it, so much the better!) Thanks so much, warm regards, Jamie ___________________________ James Boyle William Neal Reynolds Professor of Law Duke University Law School Science Drive & Towerview Box 90360 Durham, NC 27708-0360 919 613-7287 ph. Home Page & Essays http://james-boyle.com New Novel http://www.shakespearechronicles.com Center for the Study of the Public Domain http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd Financial Times Columns http://www.ft.com/techforum Creative Commons http://www.creativecommons.org Loading Comments...
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