[csaa-forum] Re: wanting to be effluent

[Diane Powell]

Hi Andrew, on spreading fear, Howard sure pushes the buttons of the 'E'
team currently running the ABC. I read in the Oz this morning that at MD
Russell Balding has been insisting that journalists and programmers
declare their political allegiance and declare what political party they
belong to, if any, in their annual performance reviews.
 
Di
-----Original Message-----
From: csaa-forum-bounces at darlin.cdu.edu.au
[mailto:csaa-forum-bounces at darlin.cdu.edu.au] On Behalf Of Andrew
Murphie
Sent: 14 October 2004 13:29
To: csaa-forum at lists.cdu.edu.au
Subject: Re: [csaa-forum] Re: wanting to be effluent


Hi All,

I must admit I wonder if many of these "reasons" aren't, despite their
reality as phantoms, phantoms nevertheless.

Perhaps it is difficult to talk about the current economies of fear (all
concerning "security" - economic, territorial, the family - I would add
"cognitive security") because this fear stalks the academic world as
much as anywhere and we could no longer point fingers elsewhere in
blame, but would have to challenge ourselves at this level. Fear - and a
whole complex machinery surrounding its production and maintenance -
seemed to me to be the clear election winner, the milieu of the
election, and Howard's singular achievement in office. I mean he's made
himself the button to push whenever he likes, and the content is just an
afterthought. Fear provides the reasons most things were said or not
said, done or not done - or maybe I'm just a scared-y cat and everyone
else is thinking clearly ...

If it's not just me, ...  the importance of new, alternative economies
of affect that some in the list have mentioned - Bifo mentioned "love"
recently. I must say I was shocked.

A




On 14/10/04 12:41 PM, "Brett Neilson" <b.neilson at uws.edu.au> wrote:




>Yes francis - I see no necessary direct link at all - things are 
>Incidentally my comment re houses was about people in general be they
in
>Liverpool,  Balmain,  Bankstown or wherever - after all  people are
just 
>trying to make lives for themselves, and why shouldn't they? ( and I
don't 
>believe they are all 'dupes' ( or dopes)).
>Jeannie
>BTW I have the latest Freedom catalogue if anyone wants a quick rundown

>---- Original Message -----
>From: "Francis Maravillas" <Francis.Maravillas at uts.edu.au>
>To: "CSAA discussion list" <csaa-forum at lists.cdu.edu.au>
>Sent: Tuesday, October 12, 2004 6:54 PM
>Subject: Re: [csaa-forum] RE: wanting to be effluent
>
>
>I agree, Jeannie. There seems to be a perception that people who have
nice 
>a house can't be critical, progressive or 'leftish'. Class/cultural 
>capital distinctions do not necessarily correlate with political 
>positionalities (or voting behavior) - and even Bourdieu acknowledges
that.
>
>Francis


Hey Jeannie,

I agree with Francis too and strongly so. But shouldn't this point be 
pushed a little more to say that class cannot be reduced to consumption,

taste, or cultural capital. Not that anyone on the list has made that 
conflation but the discussion did drift immediately to consumption, an 
important topic but not the only one at stake.

If the category 'aspirational' has any analytical grip in the wake of
the 
election (and I'm open to the suggestion that we have to invent new 
concepts) it is in the intersection between complex processes of social 
recomposition (based partly, as Melissa notes, in the changing relations

between work and non-work) and an ossified geography of political 
representation. Where are the marginal seats? That is a key question in 
analysing the election. And, at that point, there is a need to
reintroduce 
an argument about the spatial order of the city (recognising the passage
of 
that order beyond simple centre/periphery distinctions). Not to isolate
the 
processes of class recomposition to certain areas but to understand how 
they intersect the zero-sum game of representative democracy.

I am impressed by what Amanda says about the need for a politics of 
empathy/affect within and between changing class relations/conflicts.
For 
me the starting point for this would have to be the distrust of
politicians 
and the disengagement with representative democratic processes (watching

Idol instead of the debate, etc.). Perhaps there is room for opening and

dialogue with those of us trying to understand how democratic processes 
might operate beyond (or even underneath) representation. But this will 
have to involve multiple engagements, through ethnic communities perhaps
or 
everyday practices on particular sites.

Often this may be prepolitical but it can also involve a different kind
of 
politics, a politics of relation. Either way it is important to
understand 
how the political emerges. And how it functions in a complex media 
environment with a multiplication of channels and possibilities for 
connection. But here I feel we are reaching the limits of cultural
analysis.

Brett









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-- 
"I thought I had reached port; but I seemed to be cast
back again into the open sea" (Deleuze and Guattari, after Leibniz)

Dr Andrew Murphie - Senior Lecturer
School of Media and Communications, University of New South Wales,
Sydney, Australia, 2052
web:http://media.arts.unsw.edu.au/homepage/Staff/Murphie/
fax:612 93856812 tlf:612 93855548 email: a.murphie at unsw.edu.au
room 311H, Webster Building

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