Dear Genevieve,
We've been talking for some time now about [[journeys]].
*[[Spark->chosen]]. [[Sync. Syncopate->De-link.]]. [[De-link.->bodies]]*
*The words we choose to use are connected to a complex entanglement of the embedded socio-cultural histories of the worlds we live in,
our subjective experience of the actions we have taken, and the experiences we have been subject to.
There is also the powerful subconscious effect of mirror neurones from the responses to the world we experience [[around us]] in the moment.
We frame this experience by the word-world we have [[chosen]].*
I own a number of books that I've been reading for years, and which I will never stop reading.
These books sit on my bookshelf or by my bed and I have never read their final pages, because I don't ever want to leave their [[company]].
One of these books is *Parables for the Virtual* by Brian Massumi.
In it, he describes the process of perception as a [[looping, cyclical process->drifting]] that draws on all [[your past]] knowledge in order to make sense of the world.
In other words, what we perceive about our surroundings is, in large part, a collection of things we already think we [[know]].
As I write this, it’s over a day [[later->safe]] and I find myself lurching from sleepy boredom to flowing tears.
A friend of mine was [[killed in 7/7]], the last major terrorist attack on London.
We spent a week looking for her before we discovered she’d died at the scene.
I remember feeling very well that week. The urgency ran through my body in what I suppose was adrenaline.
There was a group of us looking for her.
Every day, we met up to compare notes.
When there were no more hospitals to search in, we just met up every day. We said things to each other like,
“I don’t [[believe->lie]] she’s dead.”
“I would know it if she was dead.”
“It doesn’t [[feel->conscious]] like it would feel if she was dead.”
(I go through phases of talking about this. I learnt very quickly that [[‘news’]] is flattened in the age of accelerationism.)
*Speaking of crystallised memories of theories stashed in the dusty archeology of the mind, I am reminded of Marc Auge's theories of 'Non-Place' and 'Super-modernity'.
Non-place evokes a site of late capitalistic homogeneity - a hypermarket, an airport, [[a motorway->capitalism]].... an area more-or-less recognisable in any part of the world.
I have in my mind a smell - a sanitised smell, tinged with dust.
I have in my body a sense-memory of white space, despite there being numerous [[other]] bodies around me.
The spread of such created locales was a challenge to Anthropology from the 80's onwards, as it presented challenges to the Maussian sociological notion of place as unique to a culture localised in time and space.
I think these places have challenged our individual perceptions too, and perhaps fed in to our illusionary [[personal->new experience]] cosmologies.*
For the past few years I've also been interested in the journeys of people.
Specifically: the journeys of people called 'migrants', and how the discourse around 'migrants' and 'migration' has changed over the past decade or so.
Words like migrant, asylum seeker and refugee have become so emotionally charged, that their literal meanings have become surpassed by other ideas which are difficult to [[express]].
*Some Neuroscientists and Psychologists I worked with a few years ago developed a model called 'Interoceptive Predictive Processing'.
This model shows how [[Interoception]], or a sense of connection with one's internal bodily [[signals->day]] such as breath, heartbeat, guts, muscular tension, also informs our perception (-and the same in reverse).
This paucity of speed in processing rational thought, means that often a decision has been made in our body before it reaches our [[conscious]] brain.*
(All news has the same dopamine hit of [[allure]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the football results.)
(As I write these words, 3 days after the violence in Westminster, Facebook is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters.)
*Some of [[those words->around us]] were known in your body before your conscious brain got a handle on them. There were other words, too - a silent, unheard choreography that did not make it to the stage-light of your conscious mind.
Synapses, sparking, syncing, linking, de-linking, [[drifting]] off in to the unknown of future possibility.**Hi Mary,
As you sat there bringing to mind those carefully chosen words, a micro dance was taking place in your [[body.]]*
I started reading your latest email on the train home from Bristol. It was 22nd March 2017 and the news broke, as [[I->your past]] boarded my train, of a terrorist attack outside the Houses of Parliament.
Sitting in the Quiet Carriage – a compartment that people choose in order to avoid, as much as possible, the contaminating sounds of [[other]] people’s bodies – I refreshed [[Twitter->possibility]] until my phone ran out of power, reading the same fragments of information over and over again and saying nothing to my fellow, cloistered [[passengers]].
[[They]] would find out soon [[enough]].
with love
[[x]]
*How does virtual flocking carve and [[reform]] our inner synaptic [[cartographies->drifting]]?*
*(And people 'in touch' with their own interoceptive signals such as heartbeat are less likely to [[lie]])*
One of my favourite phrases is ‘this is a lie.’ It’s a paradox. Language is always lying, and it’s also our best attempt at truth.
[[Language]] is an imposition.
Language is a pretense.
Language is an illusion of logic or meaning or knowledge or sense.
Language is how we hide and language is how we are [[revealed]].One of my favourite phrases is ‘this is a lie.’ It’s a paradox. Language is always lying, and it’s also our best attempt at truth.
[[Language]] is a burden.
Language is a sham.
Language is an illusion of logic or usefulness or knowledge or sense.
Language is how we get lost and language is how we are [[exposed]].*We are [[missing->killed in 7/7]] [[out->enough]] on a very important piece of information for our Efference Copy (internal 'template' of expectation) here - that of communitas and the powerful subliminal information we get from mirror neurones when we are in relation with other bodies.
We are after all social animals and our bodies [[pass->They]] information to each other like wildfire too.
This can be fear. It can be anger.
But when we touch.... when we actually gaze in to the eyes of an Other... it is possible for our heart beats to sync.
[[Boom...ba-boom.... sync. link->drifting]].
This, can be something like [[Empathy]].*
One of my favourite phrases is ‘this is a lie.’ It’s a paradox. Language is always lying, and it’s also our best attempt at truth.
[[Language]] is a strain.
Language is a simulation.
Language is an illusion of logic or significance or knowledge or sense.
Language is how we run away and language is how we are [[found]]One of my favourite phrases is ‘this is a lie.’ It’s a paradox. Language is always lying, and it’s also our best attempt at truth.
[[Language]] is a lie.
Language is a posture.
Language is an illusion of logic or connection or knowledge or sense.
Language is how we are safe and language is how we are [[betrayed]].One of my favourite phrases is ‘this is a lie.’ It’s a paradox. Language is always lying, and it’s also our best attempt at truth.
[[Language]] is a [[game->enough]].
Language is an aspiration.
Language is an illusion of logic or love or knowledge or sense.
Language is how we meet each other and language is how we are [[alone->revealed]].I'm thinking about the disembodiment of the information we receive about migrants, asylum seekers and refugees.
Even those terms are impersonal and divisive.
I have learnt that any conversation about migration ossifies, almost immediately, into a heavily polarised debate based around [[division->other]] per se - otherness, pity, self-preservation in the face of a perceived, existential [[threat->new experience]].
... but if you disregard those categories and think instead about [['movement']] or 'people who move', this air of threat disappears.
It starts to become obvious that most types of [[movement->consumption]] and most people who move are celebrated.
Movement is [[capitalism]].
Mvement is wealth.
Movement is cultural curiosity.
Movement [[is-speed]] bettering yourself.
Movement is communication.
Movement is understanding more about the world.
Movement is [[welcome]], movement is [[aspirational->betrayed]] ....(All news has the same dopamine hit of [[excitement]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the status of Jennifer Aniston's relationship with her ex-husband.)
(As I write these words, 4 days after the violence in Westminster, Mumsnet is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters.) (All news has the same dopamine hit of [[romance]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the stability of interest rates.)
(As I write these words, 5 days after the violence in Westminster, 4Chan is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters.) (All news has the same dopamine hit of [[magic]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the new iPhone.)
(As I write these words, 6 days after the violence in Westminster, reddit is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters.) (All news has the same dopamine hit of [[fascination->glamour]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the government's message of economic recovery.)
(As I write these words, 3 days after the violence in Westminster, The Guardian online is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters[[.->enough]]) The [[question]] then becomes - for [[whom->day]], and under what [[conditions->chosen]]?
*Such places are places of movement- of the [[flow->drifting]] of trade, of capital, of people rushing to work or leisure, hurrying to purchase ideas and desires, pursuing a notion of liberation, a personal quest, an image from a brochure, a passage from A to B. T
hese are not places of lingering gazes, warm communitas or the cyclical flows of day to night, bodily needs, 'nature' time.
They are places with illusions of desire, not need; of suspension of the laws of nature, of holding the illusion of movement for [[aspiration->betrayed]] not necessity.*
This is an ending.
[[Start again?->Start]]
**[[References]]**The [[question->q2]] then becomes - how did you get here, and where are you going?The [[question->q3]] then becomes - what is here and what is there?The [[question->q4]] then becomes - who am I, and who are you?The [[question->welcome]] then becomes - will you [[leave->enough]], or will you [[remain->Start]]?
We've been talking about journeying between my practice (which is to do with language) and yours (which is to do with people - anthropology, and movement).
Of course both of us 'do' the other things, too: you do language, I do people.
But I've always felt more comfortable with words than anything else. Words weave a material that I can manipulate. Bodies are far less [[malleable->express]].
Today I am [[safe]].
Everyone I love is [[safe->your past]].
But it doesn’t feel like it.
My body is out of kilter with my brain, and both of them are out of kilter with the incessant beat of rolling [[news->new experience]].
[[Rolling->consumption]] news is non-knowledge.
It is two journalists standing on Westminster Bridge saying nothing new has happened.
It is two journalists reporting [[nothing->enough]] new, slowly, to fill the time until the next opinion.
It is the hammering of an [[unnatural->They]] rhythm.
It is a tap tap tap that taps the endocrine system out of [[sync->conscious]].
*It is not until an 'error signal' comes up- something that stands out as not fitting with our template of expectation, that we re-form that template in relation to our [[new experience->lie]].**Neo-liberalism promised to bring 'progress' through a plethora of worldwide 'Non-places'- freedom of movement, freedom to 'feel' equal.
Freedom of access to ...stuff.
But then Neo-liberalism relies on inequality to function. It also has the inherent hypocrisy of needing intense state regulation to [[survive->around us]].*
*Perhaps we could say that the only 'real' space is that [[mapped->welcome]] out by our bodies and senses- phenomenological space.
And that phenomenology, [[here->there to here]] at least, is often increasingly individualistic and at great odds with the experience of someone engaging in the necessary [[flocking->They]] of mass migration.*
I think this is a rich phrase, not only because it breaks down the mind/ body binary that none of us experience but all of us talk through, but also because it focuses on language, knowledge and feeling as [[processes->De-link.]] rather than states.(All news has the same dopamine hit of [[glamour]], whether tragic or comic. Items of news are regarded as temporary landmarks in the flow of the news consumer.)
(Voices reported on the inquest into 7/7 in the same breath as they reported on the marriage of Katie Price.)
(As I write these words, six days after the violence in Westminster, Twitter is full of people judging each other’s responses to the news. The nature of the news is immaterial. The nature of [[consumption]] is the only thing that matters.) *And, what [[potential->welcome]] does the embodiment of new patterns bring to that relationship in ourselves and others?*
Dear Genevieve,
We've been talking for some time now about journeys.
Getting from one place to the [[next]].
*Hi Mary,
As you sat there bringing to mind those carefully chosen words, a micro dance was taking place in your body.
Some of those words were known in your body [[before]] your conscious brain got a handle on them. *
*I am curious about the disembodied way in which we receive so much of our information about 'Migration', 'Refugees' and 'Asylum Seekers', as phenomena.
Fast scroll, flashing words, [[Click]]**I am curious about the disembodied way in which we receive so much of our information about 'Migration', 'Refugees' and 'Asylum Seekers', as phenomena.
Fast scroll, flashing words. Click. [[Click->c2]]. **I am curious about the disembodied way in which we receive so much of our information about 'Migration', 'Refugees' and 'Asylum Seekers', as phenomena.
Fast scroll, flashing words. Click. Click. [[Like]].*
*I am curious about the disembodied way in which we receive so much of our information about 'Migration', 'Refugees' and 'Asylum Seekers', as phenomena.
Fast scroll, flashing words. Click. Click. Like.
[[ANGRY FACE!]]*
*A flash of fear.
Ignore and move on.
A screen, an authoritative [[disembodied->killed in 7/7]] voice- telling us how we must feel about myriad voiceless bodies.
We gain a sense of virtual communitas through the frantic clicking of social media, editing our word-world; click click sync. It is like a [[virtual flocking]], forming and re-forming semantic framing at lightening speed.
But, where are our [[bodies]] in all of this?*Here to there, [[there to here]],
and all the in between places that mark the [[way]].
*Hi Mary,
As you sat there bringing to mind those carefully chosen words, a micro dance was taking place in your body.
Some of those words were known in your body before your conscious brain got a handle on them.
There were other words, too - a silent, unheard choreography that did not make it to the stage-light of your conscious [[mind]].*
*Hi Mary,
As you sat there bringing to mind those carefully chosen words, a micro dance was taking place in your body.
Some of those words were known in your body before your conscious brain got a handle on them.
There were other words, too - a silent, unheard choreography that did not make it to the stage-light of your conscious mind.
Synapses, sparking, syncing, linking, de-linking, [[drifting]] off in to the unknown of future [[possibility->welcome]].*
(colour:red)[Will you leave to read about (link: "Empathy")[(goto-url: "http://cultureofempathy.com/References/History.htm")]?]
[[back->Language]]
(colour:red)[Will you leave to read about (link: "Interoception")[(goto-url: "http://www.beinghuman.org/article/interoception")], or
link: "Interoceptive Predictive Processing")[(goto-url: "http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/40570/")]?]
[[back->know]] (colour:red)[Will you leave to think about (link: "Flocking")[(goto-url: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLoVrsAwgGI")]
[[back->ANGRY FACE!]] *On Movement: A Dialogue* is written by Mary Paterson and Genevieve Maxwell, 2017.
**Quoted texts:**
Auge, M., (1995) *Non-Places: Introduction to an anthropology of supermodernity* Translated from French by John Howe. Verso:London & New York
Massumi, B., (2002) *Parables for the Virtual* Duke University Press: Durham, North Carolina]
[[Start again?->Start]]*I am curious about the disembodied way in which we receive so much of our information about 'Migration', 'Refugees' and 'Asylum Seekers', as phenomena.
Fast scroll, flashing words. Click. Click. Like.
[[ANGRY FACE!]]*I feel there is also something about speed at play here.
Speed and its abstraction from embodied time.
Rapidly shifting [[urban landscapes->around us]]; the hyper-real, hyper-linked. Rapid (-ly shifting) information flows, simulated virtual memories.
A sense of 'not being able to keep up' with history, bodies struggling to negotiate relations of identity, place and time in relation to the inner pulse and rhythm of [[embodied knowing]].
Disorientated, we look for [[signs->lie]], and hold on to them like [[anchors->they]].Double-click this passage to edit it.It's stupid, of course. Firstly, you never leave the company of the words you remember - they stay with you, mesh with your memories, carve out the shapes of the [[word-world->Like]] that you create with future conversations.
Secondly, I haven't physically read any of these books for years.
Probably, I stopped physically looking at them around the same time that I decided I would never [[stop->enough]] reading them.
In other words, the physical restriction I put on myself (don't look at the last page) is just a mind game. It only works because it's an idea. The physical reality of the book (gathering dust on the shelf) is powerless in relation to the strength of my [[imagination]].