Gilbert and Shortall 30th April 2007

On the 30th of April we have two distinguished speakers coming to talk to us at the Centre for Cultural Studies at Goldsmiths about two very interesting and pertinent aspects of contemporary Marxist thought. From 2.00 to 3.30 Professor Geoff Gilbert will be speaking about “The Meaning of Contemporary Realism: The Amortissement of Idiom in Daewoo,” and from 6.30 to 8.00 we have Felton Shortall, author of The Incomplete Marx, who will be presenting a talk entitled “The Structure of Marx’s Capital.” Both talks will take place in the Council Room of the Laurie Grove Baths at Goldsmiths.

Professor Gilbert will be addressing Georg Lukács’ work on literature, and will be considering it as “the last sustained attempt to energise the category of literary realism’ as both concept and project.” Through a critical appraisal of Lukács’ concern with the inauthenticity of reification and its possible supersession via a ‘realist’ critique, Professor Gilbert will be looking at a contemporary social realist novel (François Bon's Daewoo, 2004), and will be considering the resources that modern literature presents to us as a means for conducting a critique of contemporary capitalism.

Felton Shortall’s The Incomplete Marx (1994) charted the development of Marx’s thought through a close consideration of his writings in order to illuminate his unfinished final work, Capital. Claiming that Marx provisionally closed off a full discussion of class struggle in Capital in order to describe the capitalist economy as a stable whole, Shortall argued that an account of the disruptive effects of this struggle upon value should be interpolated into the texts. His talk on the structure of Marx's most famous and influential work will reprise these claims in the light of his subsequent research, and will indicate the extent to which Capital points beyond itself to a conclusion that it's author did not live to complete.

To recap:

2.00 to 3.30pm Professor Geoff Gilbert: “The Meaning of Contemporary Realism: The Amortissement of Idiom in Daewoo,”

6.30 to 8.00pm Felton Shortall, author of The Incomplete Marx, on “The Structure of Marx’s Capital.”

All Welcome

Lovecraft Thursday 26 April 2007

Thursday 26 April 2007
Weird Realism: Lovecraft and Theory
Goldsmiths, Room RHB142, 11am – 6 pm

'A philosophy should be judged on what it can tell us about Lovecraft...' (Graham Harman)

The Centre for Cultural Studies brings a unique one-day symposium dedicated to exploring H. P. Lovecraft’s relationship to Theory.

The event will not follow the ordinary format of the academic conference. Some written materials will be circulated beforehand, but there will be no papers delivered on the day. Instead, there will be structured discussions based on five of Lovecraft’s stories:

• 'Call of Cthulhu'
• 'The Shadow over Innsmouth'
• 'The Dunwich Horror'
• 'The Shadow out of Time'
• 'Through the Gates of the Silver Key'

Themes to be discussed include:

• The Weird
• Fictional systems
• Lovecraft’s pulp modernism
• Houellebecq’s Lovecraft
• Lovecraft and hyperstition
• Lovecraft’s materialism
• Lovecraft’s racism and ‘reactionary modernism’
• Lovecraft and schizophrenia
• Lovecraft and the transcendental
• Lovecraft and schizophonia

Participants so far include:

Benjamin Noys (Chichester) - author of The Culture of Death and Georges Bataille: A Critical Introduction
Graham Harman (Cairo) - author of Tool-Being and Guerilla Metaphysics. (Graham says that a philosophy should be judged on what it can tell us about Lovecraft)
China Miéville - acclaimed author of Perdido Street Station, The Scar, and other tales of the Fantastic.
Luciana Parisi (Goldsmiths) - author of Abstract Sex: Philosophy, Biotechnology and the Mutations of Desire
Steve ‘Kode9’ Goodman (UEA) - author of the forthcoming Sonic Warfare
Justin Woodman (Goldsmiths) - expert on the Chaos Magick appropriation of Lovecraft’s mythos
James Kneale (UCL) - author of ‘From Beyond: H. P. Lovecraft and the Place of Horror’
Mark Fisher (Goldsmiths) - k-punk weblog
Dominic Fox - Poetix weblog

Anyone wishing to attend should e-mail Mark Fisher. Registration is free but places are limited. If anyone wishes to lead discussion on any of the stories, please state in the email which story you would like to talk about.

Revolutionary Tourism Tuesday 10 April 07

This is the abstract of a talk I will present - with severe jetlag as I arrive from Hong Kong at 5am on the same day - at the annual conference of the Association of Social Anthropologists at the London Metropolitan University (Holloway Rd).

Its in the "Enchantment" Plenary

(Plen1) Location Henry Thomas Room

Date and Time 10th April, 2007 at 14:30

"Revolutionary Tourism:

The double visage of South Asia abroad is fantasy and sensation. On the one hand, the Hindi film glitz or traditional exotica of temples, rich fabrics, and pantomime handlebar moustaches. On the other, disaster, war, cotton-clad politicians discussing nuclear weaponry, Maoists, and pantomime handlebar moustaches. This doubled representation follows an ideological investment that eases and erases imperial guilt. From afar, it is clear (the wish is) that the vibrancy (temples, fabric) of South Asia has not been destroyed despite the (rarely or reluctantly acknowledged) impact of 300 plus years of colonialism and more recent structural adjustment programmes. Reassured by tourist brochures and travel reports that most of the temples and holy sites remain, the disasters are attributed to contemporary dysfunctions: poverty, corruption, mismanagement and revolutionaries. Such reasoning, sometimes explicit, affirms that South Asia's problems are South Asian, and that the departure of paternal colonial rule was perhaps premature: a self-serving ideological psychic defence, to be resolved by more 'development' aid. This paper addresses the ways a new revolutionary tourism trades on the same (the same?) double aspect - the exotic charge of 'alternative travel' means meeting with the Maoist adds a frisson of excitement to what was by now a standard brochure scenario. The Maoists themselves take part in this representation game - Everest turns Red. I have a Communist Party of Nepal souvenir visa stamp to prove it (1000 rupees)."

Mostly I will probably talk about terror and Kolkata though, having just spent time there full of stories, and some dismay at Comms killing Comms..

Auckland talk - 3 April 2007

Pantomime Terror: UK hip hop at war

(or paranoia in London: 'Lookout, he's behind you!')

4:10pm to 5:30pm

Venue: ALR5, Architecture - University of Auckland
A special seminar by Dr John Hutnyk, Goldsmiths College, University of London.

With terror alerts and constant announcements at train stations and airports where the Queen's subjects are called upon to 'report any suspicious baggage'; with stop and search security policing focused upon Muslims (and unarmed Brazilians shot on the underground); and with restrictions on civil liberties and 'limits' to freedom proclaimed as necessary, it is now clear that spaces for critical debate are mortally threatened in contemporary, tolerant, civilized Britain. This discussion addresses new work by diasporic world music stalwarts Fun-da-mental and the drum and bass outfit Asian Dub Foundation, relating to insurgency struggles, anti-colonialism and political freedom in the UK. The presentation will argue for an engaged critique of "culture" and assess a certain distance or gap between political expression and the tamed versions of multiculturalism accepted by/acceptable in the British marketplace. Examples from the music industry reception of 'difficult' music and creative engagement are evaluated in the context of the global terror wars and a new paranoia that appears endemic on the streets of London today...

John Hutnyk is a Reader and Academic Director of the Centre for Cultural Studies at Goldsmiths College, University of London and is the author of several books including "The Rumour of Calcutta", "Critique of Exotica" and "Bad Marxism: Capitalism and Cultural Studies".