April 22, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Composing a worthwhile Earth Day post takes more energy than I have today, so instead I’ll link to Jeremy’s Earth post at Struggle Forever! It articulates a thought I often feel on this day (surrounded as I get by students eager to maternalize the planet) but in a way that resonates with the weirdness of the last week, with its bombs, explosions, and highly mediated manhunts.
A few snippets:
The Earth is not your mother . . . S/h/it is a monstrous assemblage . . . Earth Day is a dark holiday. It is a reminder, not of the beauty of nature or the miracle of life, but of the horrors that we have wrought upon the rocky surface of this planet . . .
And the picture says a great deal:
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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Earth Day, end times | Leave a Comment »
April 19, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Here’s what I’m slated to teach this summer, for 3 weeks beginning May 20.
Ecology – Film – Philosophy
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Posted in Media ecology | Leave a Comment »
April 7, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
The list of advisors for this new book series in Ecocritical Theory and Practice shows just how the field of ecocriticism has internationalized over the last two decades. I’m pleased to be part of it.
Ecocritical Theory and Practice Book Series
Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group
Ecocritical Theory and Practice highlights innovative scholarship at the interface of literary/cultural studies and the environment, seeking to foster an ongoing dialogue between academics and environmental activists. Works that explore Continue Reading »
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged ecocriticism | Leave a Comment »
April 4, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Says NASA:
“It turns out that roughly 70% of the Universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 25%. The rest – everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter – adds up to less than 5% of the Universe. Come to think of it, maybe it shouldn’t be called “normal” matter at all, since it is such a small fraction of the Universe.” [italics added]
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Posted in Spirit matter | Tagged cosmology, dark energy, dark matter, speculative realism, time | 4 Comments »
March 25, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
The following provides an updated diagram and some further notes pertaining to my three-part article “What A Bodymind Can Do.” The earlier parts can be read here: part 1, part 2, part 3. (Please note that this version has corrected a minor error in the originally posted article, and added a bit more information at the end.)
“What A Bodymind Can Do” was an attempt to map the possibilities of human perception, action, and realization by synthesizing Shinzen Young’s systematization of mindfulness meditation practices (primarily Buddhist, but with reference to others) with a process-relational framework rooted in Whiteheadian process metaphysics and the triadic phenomenology of C. S. Peirce.
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Posted in Spirit matter | Tagged bodymind, Buddhism, categories, experience, Mahayana, meditation, mindfulness, Peirce, Shinzen Young | 2 Comments »
March 11, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
While it’s been out for several months now, the current issue of Imaginations: Journal of Cross-Cultural Image Studies, a special issue on Sighting Oil, deserves more press than it’s gotten.
The journal is housed at the University of Alberta, which makes it particularly well situated to critically observe the development of Alberta’s infamous Tar Sands. The issue features several critical as well as visual essays on oil (including one by Allan Stoekl on peak oil), tar sands and pipeline politics, visual representation, “dark ecology,” BP and its Gulf Oil Spill, and much else.
(And here’s one thing we’ve been doing about it: Vermont towns say no to Tar Sands oil.)
Posted in Eco-culture | Tagged oilpocalypse | 2 Comments »
March 7, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
In Media Res is calling for guest curators on the theme of the representation of environmental issues in the media. The deadline (alas) is March 11.
See the call here.
H/t to Ecomedia Studies.
Posted in Media ecology | Tagged ecomedia, environmental communication | 1 Comment »
February 25, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Here are my introductory comments to the 2010 documentary Waste Land, delivered yesterday at the Fleming Museum in Burlington and shown in connection with the exhibition High Trash, which runs until May 19.
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Posted in Cinema, Visual culture | Tagged art, capitalism, documentary, film, recycling, trash, Vik Muniz | 3 Comments »
February 23, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Society & Space has an interview with the authors of Take Back the Economy, the final book co-written by the geographical-political theory duo J. K. Gibson-Graham, this time with co-authors and Community Economies collaborators Jenny Cameron and Stephen Healy.
Gibson-Graham were Katherine Gibson and Julie Graham, authors of The End of Capitalism (As We Know It) and A Postcapitalist Politics. Graham passed away in 2010.
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Posted in Politics | Tagged Gibson-Graham | 1 Comment »
February 23, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
A few cousin blogs have already mentioned Figure/Ground’s interview with Steven Shaviro, which I recommend for those interested in Whitehead, speculative realism, media theory, and other themes explored on this blog.
Shaviro has insightful things to say about Isabelle Stengers’ role in reviving an interest in Whitehead, Gilbert Simondon and his (and Whitehead’s) relevance for ecological thinking, and Francis Fukuyama’s neo-conservative critique of the academic tenure system.
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Posted in Academe, Philosophy | Tagged Shaviro, Simondon, tenure, Whitehead | Leave a Comment »
February 8, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
Brian Leiter is sharing the results of a survey on his blog to see which academic publishers are considered “best” in his field of philosophy. I find surveys like this useful — at least when carried out somewhat scientifically and systematically (which Leiter’s isn’t and doesn’t claim to be) — and I think these particular results are not too different from what an equivalent survey in other humanities fields might find.
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Posted in Academe | Tagged academic publishing, publishers | 2 Comments »
February 4, 2013 by Adrian J Ivakhiv
On e²mc we’re thinking through the various meanings of “media ecology.”
The first, chronologically, is the medium theory of Harold Innis, Marshall McLuhan, Walter Ong, and others — sometimes called the Toronto School of communication theory. Neil Postman’s “New York school” can be considered a more critical and pessimistic adjunct to this tradition.
As a second tradition I’ve lumped together Continue Reading »
Posted in Cultural politics | Tagged Boyle, cultural environmentalism, culture jamming, Lessig, McLuhan, media ecology, mental environmentalism, Situationism | 1 Comment »
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