[URBANTH-L] ANN: Connective Mutations: Autonomy & Subjectivation in the Coming Century

[Angela Jancius]

Connective Mutations: Autonomy & Subjectivation in the Coming Century
A Seminar with Franco 'Bifo' Berardi
September 3-6, 2009 - New York City

Organized by 16Beaver (http://www.16beavergroup.org) & Minor Compositions 
(http:// www.minorcompositions.info)

The concept of the subject is crucial for radical philosophy of the second 
half of the twentieth century. Arguments and debates over the nature of the 
subject, the location and nature of the revolutionary subject have vastly 
shaped radical politics and organizing. The work of Felix Guattari and 
Gilles Deleuze changes the frame of this discussion, proposing the concept 
of subjectivation, or becoming-subject, as a framework to understand the 
multiple becomings and states of social encounters. This concept of 
subjectivation overlaps significantly with the concept of class 
recomposition developed in the 1960s and 70s by autonomist thinkers such as 
Sergio Bologna, Mario Tronti and Toni Negri. Both strains of thought focus 
on how forms of social antagonism and resistance give rise to new social 
positions and possibilities for collective becomings.

Today we find ourselves in a transformed condition, one created by 
techno-anthropological and connective mutations, marked by overwhelming 
flows of immaterial labor and information flows that threaten to exceed the 
limits of the body. Cyberspace may be infinite, but cybertime is not. This 
intensification and expansion of technological dynamics and automatisms 
makes problematic the very possibility of collective subjectivation. Have we 
reached a stated where the immersive flows of information, affect, and 
desire act to dampen or even preempt the emergence of new collective 
subjects?

This seminar builds upon the format of the "Continental Drift" seminars that 
Brian Holmes and 16 Beaver have conducted during the past several years. It 
will thus mix together presentations and discussions with Bifo along with 
interventions and dialogues with other invited contributors and collectives.

For more information: http://www.minorcompositions.info / 
http://www.16beavergroup.org Contact: stevphen at autonomedia.org

Franco 'Bifo' Berardi is a writer, media-theorist and media-activist. He 
founded the magazine A/traverso (1975-1981) and was part of the staff of 
Radio Alice, the first free pirate radio station in Italy (1976-1978). He is 
author of numerous books, including Precarious Rhapsody, Ethereal Shadows: 
Communications and Power in Contemporary Italy, The Panther and the Rhizome, 
Politics of Mutation, Philosophy and Politics in the Twilight of Modernity, 
and The Factory of Unhappiness. He is currently collaborating on the 
magazine DeriveApprodi as well as teaching social history of communication 
at the Accademia di belle Arti in Milan.


--
Stevphen Shukaitis
http://stevphen.mahost.org
www.ConstituentImagination.net
www.autonomedia.org
http://info.interactivist.net