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centrifuge A methodological figuration. An approach to study mediated subjectivations in social movements 6. August 2010 Marion Hamm Lucerne University (Switzerland). Inspiration 1: the Euromayday Project.
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centrifuge A methodological figuration An approach to study mediated subjectivations in social movements 6. August 2010 Marion Hamm Lucerne University (Switzerland)
Inspiration 1: the Euromayday Project • Since 2005, the figure of the precarious superhero-ic circulates in the Euromayday network. • Precarious superhero-ics transform their tactics of everyday life in precarious conditions into subversive superpowers to create collective sociabilities. • The figure of the precarious superhero-ic is mediated, narrated and enacted (Vanni). • These practices can be seen as technologies of the self, enhancing the production of political subjectivities. • They amount to a technique of knowledge production through collective reflection of experience: embodied, visualised, situated
Inspiration 2: Feminist figurations • the womanist (Walker 1984) • the lesbian (Wittig 1992) • the cyborg (Haraway 1990) • the inappropriate(d) other (Minh-Ha 1989) • the “eccentric subject” (De Lauretis 1990) • the mestiza (Anzaldua 1987) • the nomadic feminist (Braidotti 1994) • the angel (Irigaray 1993) • the halo (Thrift)
contents • I. feminist figurations • II. contextualising Centrifuge • III. describing centrifuge • merry-go-round • whirliwig • inertia • perspectivity • IV. applying centrifuge • ethnography • Theoretical framework / research questions • positioning • V. summary
I. feminist figurations Conceptual personae Theoretical operations transfiguring, transmuting, estranging, dissociating, de-centering
“Figurations are not pretty metaphors” (Braidotti 1994). They are: • … politically informed maps, which play a crucial role at this point in the cartography of feminist corporeal materialism in that they are redesigning female subjectivity. • … relational images; they are rhizomes • … expressing accountability for one’s locations • ... acting as the spotlight that illuminates aspects of one’s practice which were blind spots before • ... functioning like conceptual personae. • ... materially embodied stages of metamorphosis of a subject position towards all that the phallogocentric system does not want it to become • ...not flights of fancy imagined to distract us from the day to day but carefully considered trajectories that send us headlong into the complexity of living realities (St. Pierre)
Figurations are theoretical operations • a metaphorical practice of thinking that creates a distance to given canons and preformulated questions • thinking relational, not binary (theory-practice; discourse-body; cause-effect; structure-action; system-lifeworld) • subverts cartesian body-mind dualism • works through conceptual personae, politics of localisation • produces situated knowledge: places the researcher/philosopher/intellectual inside the theory • Circumvents and challenges the authority of „western rational humanist enlightenment discourse“ • A way for institutional feminist cyborg-ed monster researchers to create a position from where to apply leverage
What is a feminist cyborg-ed monster researcher? • Gender-power relations as an object of study and an institutional formation in which study is being performed • „woman“ at university still occupies position of the other • Academic discourse and habitus demands separation of activism and research • Academic field is structured by disciplinary boundaries • Boundaries around „Planet activism“ are built by levels of commitment – part-time activism can be suspicious. • Neighbouring others of „planet activism“: mass media journalists, police informers, researchers • Cyborg figurations empower positions of otherness as starting point for production of situated knowledge • For a woman activist-turned-academic, the cyborg-monster figuration allows to occupy a subject position in-between in research, writing and habitus.
Why figurations in studying media activism • Need to think of complex formations of media practices encompassing various types of media in relation to each other and to protest repertoires, everyday life and discourses in different urban and national settings • Social movement theorists focus on instrumental aspects of media for ressource mobilisation and framing purposes (Downing 2008) • Notions of media as technical instruments (Kittler), discursive or communicative vehicles (Ayass 2006) focus on one aspect, not the relations between aspects • Knowledge technique of figurations allows to develop and express an original methodological and theoretical approach to media practices of the euromayday project • Figurations allow to develop a situated point of view from where to engage with existing approaches AND interpret the euromayday materials I collected. • lets my thinking interact with social movement theory on a par
Why a figuration for methodology? • drowning in material • going off on tangents • can‘t let go of any part of my material • Material does not ‚fit‘ into the framework of social movement theory • Interdisciplinarity: resistance to subscribe to one clear theoretical model (sociologies of social movements, media, culture; actor-network; cultural studies; hegemony theory; discourse and practice theories...) • can‘t find „my“ language to formulate analytical questions, hypotheses and findings, or to describe my methodology • Need another imagination to explain what characterises my methodological approach.
Centrifuge: the image for my approach • The centrifuge as a technical apparatus works through three forces: centrifugal, centripetal and the force of inertia • Centrifugal forces keep leading the ethnographer into an ever expanding field. Media practices intersect with a whole way of life and a structure of feelings (Williams). I end up researching the thousandth website to confirm a minute detail that I won‘t even need in the text. • Centrifugal forces are counterbalanced by centripetal forces which pull towards the center of enquiry. Which are the centripetal forces that allow to analyse the cultural structure of media formations in social movements? • The force of inertia: causes the researcher / the objects in the field to go off on a tangent • Perspectivity: The perception of the effects of these forces depends on the position of the observer both in physics and in ethnography • Centrifuges are omnipresent in everyday life, science, work, leisure: a reminder of the situatedness of knowledge production.
II. Contextualising centrifuge situated knowledge everyday life work
in the factory Centrifuge
in agriculture milk centrifuge, Miele 1899
in biotechnology Centrifuge for DNA-Isolation
The centrifuge figuration... works as a reminder of the presence of everyday life and work and the power relations inscribed in them. This is crucial: • in the media practices of the euromayday movement of the precarious • Work and everyday live are made productive in media practices • Media practices are embedded in activists social relations, their spacial practices, their ideological models the organisating mobilising of social movements • in the process of knowledge production • institutional and non-institutional settings • Shaping the choice of theoretical and methodological approaches
III. describing centrifuge forces attributes processes
How the centrifuge works 3 forces are at work in a centrifuge: • centrifugal force • centripetal force • force of inertia 2 attributes: • perspective • Although the centrifugal force is not a „real force“, it works to make calculations
Definition: centrifugal force • Centri-fugal: from Latin words centrum - center and fugere - to flee • The centrifugal force is the apparent outward force that acts on an object moving in a circle and causes it to flee the centre of rotation • In physics, the term denotes the effects of inertia that arise in connection with rotation
Objects on a merry-go-round • If we place a ball near the center of a merry-go-round and set it in motion, the ball will whizz away from the center and into the playground. • If we place several balls, they will move in many directions. • The centrifugal force explains this movement away from the center.
Dripping paint onto a rapidly spinning turntable: The outward movement of the paint illustrates the centrifugal force.
Definition: Centripetal force • Centri-petal: from Latin words centrum - center and petere – aim at • The centripetal force is the inward force that acts on a rotating body in the direction of the centre of rotation
Examples for centripetal force • The passengers of the whirligig are moving in a circle around the center of rotation. The strings on their seats exert centripetal force towards the center of rotation equal to the centrifugal force causing them to flee the center of rotation. • When children are holding on to the rails of a rotating merry-go-round, they need to exert centripetal force equal to the centrifugal force in order not to fall off.
Funfairs and circusses Tony Blair last night vowed that violent protests by an "anarchist travelling circus" would not be allowed to prevent EU leaders holding summits. Two days of rioting, which left parts of Gothenburg city centre in ruins, shocked the ministers attending the summit and led to a review of security. (The independent, Sunday, 17 June 2001)
Definition: Inertia • (physics) the tendency of a body to maintain its state of rest or uniform motion unless acted upon by an external force • (physics) Newton‘s first law of motion: an object at rest will tend to remain at rest while an object in motion will tend to remain in motion unless acted on by an unbalanced force. The unbalanced force on the object will change the speed of object, the direction of the object, or both. The resistance from the object to change its state of motion is known as inertia. • inactiveness: a disposition to remain inactive or inert; "he had to overcome his inertia and get back to work" • (popular culture) Inertia is the name of a female lesbian superheroe from the fictional Marvel Universe. She has the ability to transfer inertia (momentum) from one person or object to another.
Break free from the logic of sinBreak free from the logic of workFree the Pigerman inside you Superhero-ic imbattibile Pigerman (Chainworkers, Euromayday 2005) Pigerman is something like half a tiger, but he is also half a cat. He commands the mega superpower of creative lazyness. Thanks to this power he won‘t even think of supporting the system From Italian pigro: lazy, idle, inertial
III.4 Perspectivity of centrifugal forces A ball is placed on the stagnant merry-go- round and pushed from b. to g. The ball moves in a straight line.
Perspectivity: Rotating merry-go-round In relation to the ground, the ball moves in a straight line. In relation to the merry-go-round, the ball moves at an angle What we see depends on our position as observers.
non-inertial frame of reference • The observers outside the merry-go-round are in an inertial frame of reference. They see the movement of the ball in relation to the ground. • The observers on the merry-go-round are in a non-inertial frame of reference. Their frame is accelerating (because it is moving in a circle). • In order to explain curved movement in a non-inertial frame, a force needs to be imagined. This force is the centrifugal force. • The ethnographer is in a non-inertial frame of reference. She does not seek an objective truth independent from context, but analyses cultural meaning-making and practices (Geertz, De Certeau, Hoerning) inside the moving context.
