[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]
Re: MEMESIS CRITIQUE
I have to admit to a nasty feeling. I thoroughly enjoyed Richard Barbrook's
demolition of the Memesis statement.:
> But, at
> best, the Memesis statement is a piece of bad
> poetry. At worst, it is an apology for the
> defunct neo-liberalism and tired post-
> modernism of the last decade. The Memesis
> statement presents a 'Californian Ideology'
> for Europeans: radical rhetoric hiding
> conservative ideas.
I am in almost complete agreement on the points made. In fact I made
several of them a week ago. Has there been a technical problem affecting
the distribution of my statement or are we talking past each other,
rather than communicating - which would be a pity.
One of the reasons why I was not quite as explicit as Richard Barbrook is
the following: I regarded the statement as coming from a different genre.
It is hopeless as an academic expose. But we might be able to discuss it
profitably if we look at it from a different angle. It is quite typical
of the melange you get when the Media, Philosophy, Computer Science and
the Arts are mixed into a project like the present one.
This produces cyborg-theory which *can* be ripped apart by any moderately
competent analyst, but -
Why not take it at face value, once we are agreed upon the fact that it
is bad poetry? What is the point of this particular form of bad poetry?
Is there something we can learn from it? I should think so. This is why I
introduced Kathryn Bigelow's SQUIDs. Here you have memes (sort of). They
occupy a particular place in our cognitive-phantasmagoric economy.
Recognizing this might tell us something about the extension and limits
of this framework.
h.h.
