The following text is from the notes that I took during our first session:
Administrative:
Meeting Time: Thursday evening… I will use the following poll to decide on the final time.
Meeting Location: We did not decide whether we would prefer to meet in the University or outside: Please answer this poll to make that decision.
Content:
During this first session, we discussed how the reading group (at least in this term) will attempt to guide researchers by engineering collaborative readings of fundamental, seminal, or radical texts that might provide novel perspectives on or collisions with our various areas of research. Towards this end, we each presented our research area and some readings that we were already interested in. The following is a list of those research areas as I notated them. **I am not providing the names of the researchers as A. I did not actually get everyone’s names into my notes and B. I do not want to inaccurately represent any of your research areas — considering that these summaries are based on the quick notes I took and my own ability to synthesize and summarize those impressions.
- Landscape in virtual (specifically video game) environments. Interested in the permanence of, extension of, or reflection of socio-political tropes as visually manifested through the construction of landscapes (specifically non-urban?) within video game settings. Related to traditions of landscape painting and the social/political ideas which are revealed within art historical paintings. While I am not sure of this as a research objective, it seems to me that this research area is also open to an analysis of current ideologies as they are similarly reflected in these current landscapes.
- User-Centric Systems – Interested in the development of interfaces which are focused on user requirements. Such interfaces might utilize brain scanners and might employ 3D environments. Also interested in 3D printing as a possible outcome of such an interactive system.
- Character Tropes as apparent in Poetry — specifically e-literature. Possible combinations of Media Theory and Social Theory.
- Socially Engaged Art Practice as realized (specifically) on digital platforms. Wants to look at Vital Phenomena and their relationship to meme development. Reflects online community construction and online social experience. Personally, I immediately think of Bourriaud’s relational aesthetics and Claire Bishop’s critique thereof. Furthermore, I consider Bourriaud’s (perceived) hostility towards digital practices. Due to the interest expressed in “vital phenomena,” I think this research may also benefit from the consideration of emergence, autopoiesis and systems theory. **of course, that is just what my notes say.
- Death in Gaming and the Art of Failure. This research in interested in the role that difficulty as well as death play in the creation of specific artistic experiences within the video gameplay experience.
- Selfies! …. and possibly phenomenology? My excitement about selfies negated my ability to take more detailed notes of the exact intended approach to selfies expressed here. (oops! Sorry!!!)
- Media Art in East Asia – specifically the politics of media art in the region, the potentials and the potential ramifications of media art practice as carried out in the region. The role of media art in political activity in east asia. <– also interested in phenomenological approaches.
- Ludology and Musicology – specifically, this research is interested in the ludic properties of live music performance, play (ludic) and play (instrumental). The role of ludic play in the act of performance. (also “liveness,” but I think not in terms of non-human agency — i.e. the a-“live”-ness of the non-human actors — but instead the act of playing — in real time — as in live performance).
- Politics and Art specifically from the perspectives of theories on new media art and cognitive capitalism.
- Cultural Sociology: enacting cultural studies through (new) materialism and emergence philosophies. (also new media theory)
- Cyborgology based framework for contemporary art analysis, understanding the artist and the viewer as cyborg – in terms of our ongoing relationship to technologies. How do the particularities of our current technologies inform artistic practice (medium, form, theme, and structure)?
WHEW!!! What a fantastic series of research areas we present!! Despite this seemingly broad landscape, we noted the following areas of inquiry (or perspectives of inquiry) which seemed to permeate our various research questions — or had the potential to interestingly inform our various questions: **these categories are loose (at best) with probably a lot of cross over between them…
- Critical Theory / Political Theory
- Phenomenology
- Network/Complex Systems/Cybernetics (Information) Theory
- Philosophy of Art
As such, I have identified the following philosophers/texts which might be of interest. Some of these texts may be overly basic and thus lend the potential for reading secondary texts which build on or respond to the primary text. This list is the result of our first meeting as well as discussions I have had with members around and outside of our actual session. Please fill out the survey to indicate your level of interest in any of these writers. Please also note that the survey gives you the option to vote for an author (but not the texts I selected) or to indicate that you would like to explore secondary readings related to the suggested text. In either case, please fill out the question comment section to indicate your suggested texts. Finally, if there are authors or texts which are not in the survey and which you would like to read — please add them in the comments to this post.
Emergence at the Edge 