Politics of Togetherness in Dance: The Affective Persistence of somatic Collectivity under post-Fordism.

The last decade of scholarship in dance has produced a number of literary contributions which account for the need to theorize the radical potential of dance as a site for political activism in the context of global social and economic crises. As a practitioner, teacher and theorist in dance and performance, working in a UK university, I am interested in exploring the potential of somatics to resist a seemingly utilitarian incorporation of somatic principles into the agenda of neo-liberalism under post-Fordist conditions. In this article, I refer to somatics as an umbrella term to discuss practices related to the dance field including protests, walks, flashmobs and choreographic explorations of performative participation. While these practices might not be widely recognized as somatic practices, I argue that all operate at a somatic level and point to an ever-shifting relationship between the individual, the collective and the social environment. I reflect on a number of theoretical ideas pertaining to the relations between the development of somatics and the intensification of cultural capitalism in contemporary western society. In doing so, I aim to theorize somatics as critical and political practices of collective forms of being and working together. Drawing on instances of collective embodiment, I argue for the politicization of somatic practices as it relates to ideas of affect, ethics and time. I suggest that embodied expressions of collectivity as politicized somatics can develop valid tactics to counter what I observe to be a mimetic phenomenon between dance practices and capitalism. A situation that has been only exacerbated by the Covid 19 pandemic. I propose the concept of somatic collectivity as a way to describe the critical potential of collective embodiment found in dance and its expanded field of practices.

A Pound of Flesh: Human Remains, Ethics and Museums in Tertiary Education

<p>The collection and display of human remains has long been accepted within many cultures and religions. However, in contemporary Western society the practice has become contentious, and acquisition by museums has all but ceased. Among academic and museum communities, debate and discussion on the problem have been centred almost entirely on indigenous repatriation claims and Body Worlds exhibitions, to the exclusion of other aspects of what is in fact a much broader issue. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the question of whether human remains can ever justifiably be collected and held by museums. The focus of the study is the situation of health science disciplinary museums within tertiary education, with specific and detailed reference to the W.D. Trotter Anatomy Museum and the Drennan Pathology Museum at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. Three interconnected aspects of the topic are considered in order to answer the primary question. The first is an examination of the codes of ethics and professional practice that govern the treatment of human remains; the second reviews the justifications commonly given for the use of human remains; and the third aspect considers the role museums play in tertiary education. Documentary sources, exhibitions and interviews were analysed to address these issues and corroborate evidence. Examined together, these three areas of investigation bring a fresh focus on whether the acquisition and retention of human remains can be justified, at least within certain parameters. This study concludes that in the particular educational context of the health science teaching museum there is a strong justification for continued acquisition and display, albeit in a highly regulated and clearly defined ethical environment, of human remains. A key outcome of the research is that the most important consideration across all three areas of investigation, and for all groups working with human remains, was the concept of respect. Definitions and expressions of respect differed depending on context and professional boundaries, but within specific ethical parameters it is possible to determine that the collection and retention of human remains can be justified.</p>

A Pound of Flesh: Human Remains, Ethics and Museums in Tertiary Education

<p>The collection and display of human remains has long been accepted within many cultures and religions. However, in contemporary Western society the practice has become contentious, and acquisition by museums has all but ceased. Among academic and museum communities, debate and discussion on the problem have been centred almost entirely on indigenous repatriation claims and Body Worlds exhibitions, to the exclusion of other aspects of what is in fact a much broader issue. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the question of whether human remains can ever justifiably be collected and held by museums. The focus of the study is the situation of health science disciplinary museums within tertiary education, with specific and detailed reference to the W.D. Trotter Anatomy Museum and the Drennan Pathology Museum at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. Three interconnected aspects of the topic are considered in order to answer the primary question. The first is an examination of the codes of ethics and professional practice that govern the treatment of human remains; the second reviews the justifications commonly given for the use of human remains; and the third aspect considers the role museums play in tertiary education. Documentary sources, exhibitions and interviews were analysed to address these issues and corroborate evidence. Examined together, these three areas of investigation bring a fresh focus on whether the acquisition and retention of human remains can be justified, at least within certain parameters. This study concludes that in the particular educational context of the health science teaching museum there is a strong justification for continued acquisition and display, albeit in a highly regulated and clearly defined ethical environment, of human remains. A key outcome of the research is that the most important consideration across all three areas of investigation, and for all groups working with human remains, was the concept of respect. Definitions and expressions of respect differed depending on context and professional boundaries, but within specific ethical parameters it is possible to determine that the collection and retention of human remains can be justified.</p>

Death, A Notion

<p>Contemporary Western society has all but abolished the need for a formal grieving process with death becoming an avoided, feared, and shameful topic. In a brutal revolution from the omnipresent death of the past, death is now unfamiliar and displaced. An all-consuming society rushing to beat mortality by finding new ways to extend one’s lifespan, becoming increasingly secularised and refusing to permit the ugliness of death within the collective happiness of today’s society. This results in places for remembrance and acceptance becoming scarce, with silence and stillness becoming confused and conflicted with the noise of cars and footsteps. Therefore the void between life and death grows larger, increasing in depth and stature as awareness fades. This thesis raises the question of interior design and architecture as a key participant in the discussion of death in contemporary western society. The fractured relationship between death, bereavement and society is analysed in order to establish how societal attitudes and the perception of death has shifted. More precisely the research explores the specificity of an interior spatial design needed to assist the grieving process associated with the loss of a loved one, both at an individual level, and as a collective experience thereby seeking to create a plane of resonance between the land of the living and the obverse, the land of the dead.</p>

Death, A Notion

<p>Contemporary Western society has all but abolished the need for a formal grieving process with death becoming an avoided, feared, and shameful topic. In a brutal revolution from the omnipresent death of the past, death is now unfamiliar and displaced. An all-consuming society rushing to beat mortality by finding new ways to extend one’s lifespan, becoming increasingly secularised and refusing to permit the ugliness of death within the collective happiness of today’s society. This results in places for remembrance and acceptance becoming scarce, with silence and stillness becoming confused and conflicted with the noise of cars and footsteps. Therefore the void between life and death grows larger, increasing in depth and stature as awareness fades. This thesis raises the question of interior design and architecture as a key participant in the discussion of death in contemporary western society. The fractured relationship between death, bereavement and society is analysed in order to establish how societal attitudes and the perception of death has shifted. More precisely the research explores the specificity of an interior spatial design needed to assist the grieving process associated with the loss of a loved one, both at an individual level, and as a collective experience thereby seeking to create a plane of resonance between the land of the living and the obverse, the land of the dead.</p>

Technology and Truth. Reflections on Russia, America, and Live Not By Lies

The main thesis of the author of the essay is that in contemporary Western society the objective and subjective truth is created by the people. This is the key to what the author calls technological and technocratic society for which truth and reason are no longer the goals that the man should be striving for in his thoughts and behavior. In a technocratic society the reality itself is created and thus accordingly the term “lie” loses its meaning. Anything can potentially be viewed as a useful step in the process of creating something new and “efficient” for those who above all value the strengthening of their own control (over people, nature, etc). Subjects acting in the framework of technological society deny any identifications and technologically determine themselves what man, nature and society is, – right down to the basics of our biological existence. This approach overturns such notion as absolute truth, establishing relevant truth. In contemporary Western society subjective and objective truth is created. The author examines in detail how this approach is used by the United States in their international policy to achieve dominance. He also considers Russia to be the only great power that is prepared to choose a different line of development due to its historical development. The possibility of such choice is capable to prevent final Americanization of Europe, which, should it happen, would lead to the “mankind as a whole losing its past”, as Simone Weil predicted.

Maja Lunde: între apocalips și speranță

Born in 1975, the Norwegian Maja Lunde, widely known as a gifted children’s writer, surprised the literary world by her first novel, The History of Bees (2015), an ambitious dystopian book meant to put into question some of the greatest challenges our contemporary world has to face: the climatic changes and the threatening idea of a future and hypothetic disappearance of bees. Even if some critics considered her writing dangerously close to non-fiction or an expression of the so called “cli-fi” (“climate fiction”), Lunde proves to be a convincing author, perfectly capable of expressing deep fears of our contemporary Western society, but also able to offer her readers a symbolic solution to many of the major problems of the present. These preoccupations are also to be found in her second novel, The End of the Ocean (2017), where Maja Lunde perfectly succeeds in dealing with some another stringent nowadays issues, namely desertification and water shortages.

Technology Creating a New Human: The Alchemical Roots of Transhumanist Ideas

The aim of this article is to present a critical discussion of the influence of technology on humans and culture in contemporary Western society. Transhumanism is a philosophical and social movement that believes that the essential features of human life could be transformed and enhanced by applications of science and technology. In this article, I will compare transhumanist ideas about perfecting humans to the views of Roger Bacon, one of the representatives of European mediaeval alchemy. Such a treatment provides a historical background for transhumanist ideas and helps answer the moral and philosophical problems that humans are faced with due to modern technological development. Despite the fact that several transhumanist theoreticians treat it as a secular alternative to religious ideas, we can see that Christian eschatology plays a major role. Both in alchemy and transhumanism, scientific and theological aspects have been inseparably intertwined. Transhumanism can be seen as a continuation of the alchemical project in the twenty-first century. Modern science has added new tools to realise the goal of alchemical perfection. Transhumanism characterises very well the fact that the practices and theories of alchemy changed over time and adapted to changed contexts.

Breaking into the Foam: Peter Sloterdijk's Philosophy of Dwelling and Richard Stark's Parker Novels

This article brings together the crime fiction novels of Richard Stark (a pseudonym of Donald Westlake) and the philosophical ideas of Peter Sloterdijk. Influential and yet critically neglected, Stark's ‘Parker novels’ feature an amoral and unchanging thief named Parker who infiltrates and exploits an array of settings for his criminal activities. Two of the main recurring situations in these novels involve Parker either breaking into and searching the home of a rival or using an empty home as a temporary hideaway. This article argues that Parker's approach to homes invokes elements in Sloterdijk's theorization of dwellings, including his broad theory that contemporary Western society is arranged in a manner reminiscent of bubbles in a ‘mountain of foam’, as well as his specific ideas about how contemporary dwellings function as spheres that aim for both individualistic privacy and access to mobile networks. The article draws upon these theories to explore how Stark's novel Flashfire represents Parker's attempts to establish a private sphere for his own use in Palm Beach, Florida, a process which ultimately exposes the limits of the ‘foam’ that composes his world of heists and brutal practicality.

La réception des notions philosophiques de trace, d’arkhé et de document dans l’œuvre d’Alain Nadaud

The reception of the notions of trace, arkhé, and document in the work of Alain Nadaud (Abstract)This paper intends to point out the philosophical features in the novels of the French writer Alain Nadaud and their links with the philosophical theory concerning the concepts of trace, arkhé and document elaborated by Jacques Derrida in the second half of the XX century. This subject, related to the contemporary socio-historical concept of post-truth, reveals the originality and the up-to-date tendency in the novels of Alain Nadaud. This paper uncovers new important aspects of his work by proposing a solid philosophical interpretation of its main theoretical principles. In particular, it uncovers the philosophical reasons at the origin of his writing, which is based on the historical research method. Furthermore, it reveals the sense of dystopia of his novels and relates it with the most recent socio-philosophical analysis of contemporary western society.