Politics of Affect
Brian Massumi
'The capacity to affect and to be affected'. This simple definition opens a world of questions - by indicating an openness to the world. To affect and to be affected is to be in encounter, and to be in encounter is to have already ventured forth. Adventure: far from being enclosed in the interiority of a subject, affect concerns an immediate participation in the events of the world. It is about intensities of experience. What is politics made of, if not adventures of encounter? What are encounters, if not adventures of relation? The moment we begin to speak of affect, we are already venturing into the political dimension of relational encounter. This is the dimension of experience in-the-making. This is the level at which politics is emergent.
In these wide-ranging interviews, Brian Massumi explores this emergent politics of affect, weaving between philosophy, political theory and everyday life. The discussions wend their way 'transversally': passing between the tired oppositions which too often encumber thought, such as subject/object, body/mind and nature/culture. New concepts are gradually introduced to remap the complexity of relation and encounter for a politics of emergence: 'differential affective attunement', 'collective individuation', 'micropolitics', 'thinking-feeling', 'ontopower', 'immanent critique'. These concepts are not offered as definitive solutions. Rather, they are designed to move the inquiry still further, for an ongoing exploration of the political problems posed by affect.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
1. Navigating Movements
Mary Zournazi
2. Of Microperception and Micropolitics
Joel McKim
3. Ideology and Escape
Yubraj Aryal
4. Affective Attunement in the Field Of Catastrophe
Erin Manning, Jonas Fritsch and Bodil Marie Stavning Thomsen
5. Immediation
Erin Manning, Christoph Brunner
6. What a Body Can Do
Arno Boehler
In Lieu of a Conclusion
In these wide-ranging interviews, Brian Massumi explores this emergent politics of affect, weaving between philosophy, political theory and everyday life. The discussions wend their way 'transversally': passing between the tired oppositions which too often encumber thought, such as subject/object, body/mind and nature/culture. New concepts are gradually introduced to remap the complexity of relation and encounter for a politics of emergence: 'differential affective attunement', 'collective individuation', 'micropolitics', 'thinking-feeling', 'ontopower', 'immanent critique'. These concepts are not offered as definitive solutions. Rather, they are designed to move the inquiry still further, for an ongoing exploration of the political problems posed by affect.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
1. Navigating Movements
Mary Zournazi
2. Of Microperception and Micropolitics
Joel McKim
3. Ideology and Escape
Yubraj Aryal
4. Affective Attunement in the Field Of Catastrophe
Erin Manning, Jonas Fritsch and Bodil Marie Stavning Thomsen
5. Immediation
Erin Manning, Christoph Brunner
6. What a Body Can Do
Arno Boehler
In Lieu of a Conclusion
