May 2012
6 posts
5 tags
A Wee Thought
Here’s a wee thought, on a Thursday afternoon. Narratives presented to us by culture help us structure and give meaning to our lives - whether they be large cultural stories about the value we give to things like celebrities, personal appearance, sports teams, etc., or more literally, narratives such as those furnished by TV shows and films - but we seem not to care about the ontological...
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On Egolessness - by Chogyam Trungpa
There are two stages to understanding egolessness. In the first stage, we perceive that the ego does not exist as a solid entity, that it is impermanent, constantly changing, that it was our concepts that made it seem solid. So we conclude that the ego does not exist. But we still have formulated a subtle concept of egolessness. There is still a watcher of egolessness, a watcher to identify with...
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Centralization of Social Networks, Capitalism, and...
Check out this excerpt from an article in The New Inquiry which confronts the issue of centralization of power in social media:
A decentralized network is flat; no single node on the network is able to control and dominate all the others, and every node is independent and can publish whatever information it likes. But this apparent diversity is sustained at another level by centralization:...
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On Facebook and Identity in Light of Capitalist...
This, from an article by Rob Horning in The New Inquiry (www.thenewinquiry.com)
In The Culture of New Capitalism, Richard Sennett described some of the ramifications of the transition to post-Fordist production methods, which shift enterprise risk onto workers and demand that they be more flexible and to repeatedly prove their worth. He suggests that “if institutions no longer provide a...
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An Oldie, But A Goodie (from "The Birth of...
Here is a portrait of Nietzsche that I made. And here is a quotation from The Birth Of Tragedy:
The beautiful appearance of the world of dreams, in whose creation each man is a complete artist, is the precondition of all plastic art, and also, in fact, as we shall see, an important part of poetry. We enjoy the form with an immediate understanding; every shape speaks to us; nothing is...
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From "Postmodern Theory: Critical...
“In all societies prior to modern society, exchange is conducted through a series of symbolic transactions not yet coded as ‘value’. Value emerges only with capitalism which distinguished between use value and exchange value in its system of political economy. This system constitutes a fundamental rupture with the complex system of symbolic exchange and inaugurates and exchange...
April 2012
6 posts
13 tags
The Manifesto (Continuation) (This Is Going To...
We are all familiar with the concept of performance. A performer, or a group of performers, behaves in a certain way for an audience, so as to evoke or bring about an experience which in some way deviates from that of quotidian reality, or non-performance.
The most obvious medium of performance is that of theater: in theatrical events (plays, movies, TV shows, etc.), humans (or...
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Writing As Performance Art: The Beginning Of A...
Renee Magritte’s La Trahison Des Images (The Treachery of Images) features a tobacco pipe, beneath which are displayed the words Ceci n’est pas une pipe (“This is not a pipe”). This famous painting has intrigued and confounded no small number of people in the eighty-three years since its creation. What is the brown object which attends the text, if not a pipe?
Until I did a bit of research,...
6 tags
And the time will come . . .
Life is so much better when I remember that we’re all one being. #Fuckyeahunifiedconsciousness
…but seriously, believing myself to be a distinct entity, one with significant qualitative differences from other people, just feels so wrong. Everything becomes more fun, playful, and light when I fully embody the principles of Hindu Vedanta in my thought and mannerisms.
Just putting this...
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Of Performed Minds: Jean Baudrillard and Marshall...
Great bit about Baudrillard and hyperreality, the source of which has been lost, unfortunately.
Baudrillard in particular suggests that the world we live in has been replaced by a copy world, where we seek simulated stimuli and nothing more. Baudrillard borrows, from Jorge Luis Borges’ “On Exactitude in Science” (who already borrowed from Lewis Carroll), the example of a...
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Blanchot-Inspired: On Language and Reality
Words and stories have no seminal root in the explicable, in what we might identify as the real. This is because they are the real, and they are unrooted in anything beyond themselves - words are self-signifying insofar as they are the basis for human knowledge. Words categorize and qualify experience; in doing this, they create experience. I believe that to use language effectively is to use it...
10 tags
Epiphantom: The New New
Hello, all!
I’d like to make a formal, public gesture declaring my commitment to this website as a space for theoretical writings. This blog post is that gesture.
I have created a custom domain for what was formerly tinyspirits.tumblr.com. You are currently looking at writings.epiphantom.com (the parent website, epiphantom.com, is intended as a display of the things I do and make, and the...
February 2012
5 posts
11 tags
Umberto Eco and The Useful Fiction of A...
Barbara Ellmerer, Amanita
Barbara Ellmer is a Swiss-based painter who “paints objects of her subconscious manifestation with the unconstrained flip of her wrist and a surreal color pallet” (quotation culled from this interview, in which she brilliantly elucidates her methodology and philosophy of art). Her work intrigues me, as it offers an aesthetic perspective on transcendental...
8 tags
“Instead of the old defending tested old ideas and the young, new, untried...”
– Eric Gans, from his essay “Differences” (published in the Johns Hopkins University Press Vol. 96, May 1981)
7 tags
Why Study Writing And Literature?
Hola, tumblr!
So, erm. I’m applying to graduate school right now. It’s rather intimidating. I can’t help but feel as if the decision I ultimately make about where to obtain my Master’s degree is possibly the most important choice I’ll have ever made in my life. Anxiety, ambivalence, and indecision have led me to drag my feet a bit - however, things are on their way,...
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Umberto Eco and The Useful Fiction of A...
This photograph was taken by Josef Albers in Anahuacali, Mexico. My (admittedly tiny amount of) research has not provided me with a date for it. I think that’s heaven up there, obscured by the wall to our left.
OH! BUT THIS IS SOMEWHAT NOT ENTIRELY PROBABLY UNRELATED:
As the result of a work environment which permits me to wear headphones most of the time, and the subsequent overexposure...
January 2012
1 post
9 tags
October 2011
1 post
10 tags
May 2011
1 post
4 tags
April 2011
8 posts
this is not philosophy
So instead of copying an excerpt from a philosophical treatise or bit of critical theory, or offering some sort of intellectual analysis of a strange grouping of ideas, I am going to make a list of things that make me happy. Because there is more to life than the deeply theoretical, and also because I am feeling a bit sad - and I have little tolerance for sad-feelings, so this is to cheer myself...
2 tags
The Conclusion of my Thesis!
While the genealogy here ends with Kathy Acker, it radiates into the future of literature in the form of other writers, writings, and theorists that adopted a stance on reading similar to the one espoused in the meta-narratives of each text considered in this paper. A profoundly important question underscores these works when considered in conjunction with one another: if the meaning of reading...
theavantgardener-deactivated201 asked: Dots and Loops plus noise canceling headphones really helped to quell my exasperation during my bus commute this morning. I find the textures on that album to be refreshing, and they really captured my full attention pretty quickly. I'll dig a little deeper into the Stereolab catalogue after I give D&L a few more listens. Thanks, Emma. So, what's the topic of your senior thesis?
I’ve been too busy with my senior thesis to actually write in this thing, but I’m still alive, I promise!
theavantgardener-deactivated201 asked: Where would be a good place for one to begin with Stereolab?
7 tags
“What is ‘familiarly known’ is not properly known, just for the...”
– GWF Hegel
March 2011
14 posts
7 tags
theavantgardener-deactivated201 asked: I was at my friend's guitar shop the other day and he had two Lanikai baritone ukes in stock. I played around with one for awhile and was pretty surprised how enjoyable it was. Now if only he'd stock Celtic harps...
This is not a question, yet I will proceed to click the "Ask" button.
This is not a question, yet I will proceed to click the "Ask" button.
11 tags
From Kevin S. Fitzgerald's "The Negative...
In his seminal work The Flowers of Tarbes, or Terror in Literature, Jean Paulhan asked, “What is literature?” In response to this question, Blanchot published late in 1941 the essay “How is Literature Possible?” (BR 49-60).[1] With this essay, Blanchot commenced upon an investigation into the ontology of literature that...
theavantgardener-deactivated201 asked: I'm intrigued by your baritone ukulele. I don't think I've ever seen one before. Can you tell me a little bit about it? How did you come about becoming a baritone ukuleleist?
8 tags
flapjacksblog asked: What is your favorite Cartoon Network show?
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February 2011
19 posts
17 tags
From Samuel Beckett's "Watt"
Here he stood
.
Here he sat
.
Here he knelt
.
Here he lay
.
Here he moved
,
to and fro
,
from the door
to the window
,
from the window
to the door
;
from the window
to the door
,
from the door
to the window
;
from the fire
to the bed
,
from the bed
to the fire
;
bed to the fire
,
fire to the bed
;
from the door to the fire
,
from...
theavantgardener-deactivated201 asked: It would only be fair for you to tell me how your day is going, wouldn't it?
30 tags
WORDS
Those are hands with words on them. I’m putting it here because this is is a post about !!!LANGUAGE!!!
I am very interested in this man’s work, specifically, what he calls “poverty of the stimulus”, an idea about language acquisition in childhood.
Basically, the idea of poverty of the stimulus is based on Noam Chomsky’s hypothesis that every human being has...
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