MIT Press

When Marina Abramović Dies

admin — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 16:01:00 +0000

As someone with only one semester of art history under my belt, I find myself both interested and intimidated by the politics and practice of performance art. After reading this exhaustive biography of performing art legend Marina Abramović (who just wrapped up a stunning retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York), my intimidation has been replaced by a strong desire to see Abramović’s work.

When reading about an iconic figure such as Abramović, the private aspects of her otherwise very public life are the most interesting artifacts to glean. Through complete cooperation from Abramović and many of her friends and family members, James Westcott produces a marvelously comprehensive history of the artist's childhood in Yugoslavia and the beginning of the career that would revolutionize the use of the body as an artistic vehicle in the 1970s. The downside of writing about such an icon is that, while there is no shortage of fascinating material, one must organize it in such a way as to not overwhelm the reader. Westcott does just that, dividing Abramović’s life into three distinct parts: her early years, her work with fellow performance artist and former romantic partner Ulay, and her recent foray into solo performances.

For readers familiar with Abramović’s body of work, the book will most likely open your eyes to some of her earliest projects, and will offer interesting insight into her more famous pieces. One such example is her 1975 performance of Rhythm 0, where she laid out seventy-two items for museum patrons to use on her however they wished. These items included a loaded gun, which a man put in her hand and pointed at her neck. The author seamlessly weaves together interviews, archival photo footage, and factual information to make Abramović’s life as vibrant on the page as it is in reality.

Above all, Westcott proves to be an incredibly detailed biographer. Near the end of the book, readers understand where some of this attention to detail stems from; he recently served as a transcriptionist for some of Abramović’s marathon performances, writing hundreds of pages at her insistence to describe her hours of sitting or standing during certain pieces. The result of Westcott’s well-researched writing style and Abramović’s openness and commitment to storytelling and making art, When Marina Abramović Dies becomes an enthralling look at the world of performance art, a strong-willed and endlessly creative woman, and what happens when those two things collide for over forty years.

Written by: Alyssa Vincent, July 31st 2010

Rule of Law, Misrule of Men

admin — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000

By Elaine Scarry

MIT Press

In Rule of Law, Misrule of Men Elaine Scarry, a professor at Harvard, argues that the well being of the populace is the chief reason for a military. A proposition not much debated. She goes on to argue that after 9/11 the Bush administration did not focus on protecting the populace in the U.S., but instead focused on attacking people in other countries. She points out that U.S. military resources are so far beyond other countries (the U.S. spends more than the rest of the world combined on military) that opponents know they can’t use standard military measures, so they must resort to unconventional warfare and actions prohibited by international law. The U.S. doesn’t need to resort to that, but did under Bush. Scarry details multiple violations of international law in the process.

On the homefront, the acts of people should be private and those of government public. Instead the Bush administration reversed that theory by probing into the intimate details of citizens with the Patriot Act while the acts of the government were made private (e.g., secret renditions for torture, lies about yellow cake and weapons of mass destruction, prohibitions on pictures of dead American soldiers.) The Bush administration has been characterized as the most secret. They had a lot to hide.

It was not the Congress who stood up for the American people against these travesties, nor (by and large) did the courts. According to Scarry, the people stood up. Librarians across the country refused to turn in records. Town councils in 406 cities and eight states passed resolutions that they would not follow the Act. Two town councils issued indictments against Bush and Cheney, and promised to arrest them if they came into their jurisdiction. After ninety-two towns asked for impeachment proceedings, thirty-five articles of impeachment were introduced into Congress by Dennis Kucinich and Paul Wexler for both Bush and Cheney.

Rule of Law, Misrule of Men outlines many misdeeds of the Bush administration, but the greatest of these is torture—illegal without exception. The author names those responsible and those few who stood up. The Bush administration crossed the line. Failure to hold them accountable is, in itself, a domestic and international crime.

The actions of Bush put the entire concept of Rule of Law in the United States into question. It is not enough that Obama says he won’t do the same. The Rule of Law requires that the law doesn’t change from one president to another. One lawless president gives permission to others. To uphold the Rule of Law, the Bush administration must be held accountable in a court of law for their war crimes, urges the author. The United Nations, other countries, and international and domestic organizations have taken steps toward such accountability. No action has been forthcoming from the U.S. government, however.

What does all this have to do with women? Violence against women has become recognized internationally as torture since it meets the definition of intentional infliction of a high level of pain and suffering for no legitimate reason. Often, the activities that go on in the home are the same, or worse, than that which goes on in war zones. If torture can be legalized, can violence against women? The word patriotic comes from the same root as patriarchy–patri meaning father. Feminists have long said the root of the problem is patriarchy. So long as that is the organizing principle of society, women cannot achieve equal rights regardless of the Rule of Law.

Written by: Dianne Post, July 25th 2010

Beyond Barbie and Mortal Kombat: New Perspectives on Gender and Gaming

admin — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 10:36:00 +0000

By Yasmin B. Kafai, Carrie Heeter, Jill Denner, Jennifer Y. Sun

MIT Press

As I opened this collection, I had just finished shaking my head at a picture a man I know well posted of himself grinning vividly, arms around a young woman clad in a chain mail bikini top at a gaming conference. This “booth babe” photo rests comfortably within the confines of his MySpace page. I cracked the spine of this volume considering how I felt about the girl, the picture, the medium, and my own experiences as feminist scholar who is also an avid gamer. This book, I realized, is a timely addition to a conversation that ended too abruptly, and continuing from the first watershed edition of this conversation is very relevant at this particular moment in gaming culture.

I often felt guilty that I took on a “typical” female character in World of Warcraft. I do not play a warrior; I play a hybrid character that engages combat from afar and heals others. Although I love my character, I constantly feel un-feminist when gaming from such a culturally feminine position. These are the sorts of questions and conversations we are ready to have rather than simply an analysis of the demographics in gaming, and Beyond Barbie and Mortal Kombat moves us in this direction.

The editors rightly explain that the impetus for the collection is to go beyond the gaming analysis that evolved in the early ‘90s and the simple attention to both how many women were playing and how many women characters were bikini clad within the games. The moment of clucking a tongue at the buxom Lara Croft has passed us and gaming; gaming culture and its impact has reached a far more complicated moment in need of analysis, and this volume attempts that discussion.

In their introduction, the editors argue that a more complete discussion of the multi-billion dollar industry as a whole is an important element to a full analysis of the phenomena and impact of this cultural entity. This includes not only how many women play games, but what sorts of games and how the industry has responded to them—not just as players, but as designers or those who provide input into the industry.

One important element the book covers is that with the rise of more complex gaming is the rise of gaming communities, opening a clear avenue for a more enlightened and nuanced discussion of gender in gaming. (A conversation my online gaming community has frequently addressed in our private forums.)

This book would make an excellent text in a multi-media classroom as it deftly handles the past research, includes contemporary scholars who are the top of the field, and carefully paints a comprehensive picture of not simply game design, game players, and plot lines, but also of the industry as a economic whole, one that employs a wide range of labor. The book takes on hearty conversations of where gender plays into that labor and as a result, reinforces the gaming industry as a cultural staple and microcosm of larger social theoretical space.

The book also does well to not rely solely on quantitative research for its evidence or argument, and a collection of interviews with references to authors from the past research the book seeks to add to helps to paint a more qualitative conversation of the industry that is often solely measured in profits, percentages, purchases, or players.

Written by: Dr. Julie E. Ferris, April 16th 2009

The Design of Climate Policy

admin — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 11:58:00 +0000

Edited by Roger Guesnerie, Henry Tulkens

MIT Press

The Design of Climate Policy is an aberration of sorts; it is definitely not of the fare I usually review. The book is one in a series that explores policy issues in economics largely from European researchers and scholars. This text provides some fascinating insight, considering that the European Union is notable for its effort to stem climate change. The European Union fell considerably short of its goal, however, by setting emission targets too high, and not taking into account the lack of systematic enforcement in climate policies.

For environmentalists, this book is a must read, especially if you consider the "cap and trade" system of the Kyoto Protocol inadequate. A caveat: no ordinary dilettante will have the stomach to read this without a background in calculus and some familiarity with the international agreements on climate change and carbon emissions.

My favorite piece was the succinct article from Resources for the Future's William Pizer entitled "Economics versus Climate Change." Pizer believes that a coordinated international agreement is not necessary, and may even be initially counterproductive to effective action on climate change. He also places developing countries in the context of this debate. Pizer says, "[There is] a view that emission caps, however generous at the outset, could eventually be used to limit development and growth, and that climate change is simply not a priority when viewed alongside poverty, hunger, and education. I worry that the strength of this view among developing countries may be underestimated among economists theorizing about global trading."

I cannot help but agree. This is a point that needs to be considered when developing climate policy. I have to admit, though, that this book is for economists and by economists. It is regretful how often the sort of useful information contained in this book becomes diluted in the hands of policy advisors.

Written by: Anita Sonawane, March 6th 2009

Digital Media and Democracy: Tactics In Hard Times

admin — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 10:45:00 +0000

Edited by Megan Boler

MIT Press

Brittany: I came to this collection with a lot of skepticism, mostly because I’ve grown quickly weary of the narrative about cyberactivism as a fun, accessible substitute for real-time work. I didn’t grow up with a particular activist model, but working as a communication and media scholar in recent years, my response to technology has been lukewarm at best, particularly when it is touted as a surrogate for working with people. Almost immediately, I was pleasantly surprised to find this collection of essays balanced and thorough, with an emphasis on media literacy as a necessity for successful activism and a rather open-ended approach to using certain media tools depending on the context. The range of articles could appeal to a wide variety of activist folk and media minds, so while dense, I’d recommend this collection to anyone with more than a passing interest in media activism.

Allyson: One of the things that really caught my attention was the repeated references to Jodi Dean's chapter, "Communicative Capitalism: Circulation and the Foreclosure of Politics." I was fascinated by her focus on the problems of social media: the way signing online petitions makes us think we’re doing world-changing activist work, the way reading selected blogs from an RSS feed means that we’re possibly limiting our access to other news and opinions we wouldn’t know of otherwise, the ways in which the massive amount of information available can actually inhibit access to said information, the ways in which online forms of “activism”—such as blogging—can distract us from other forms of work that might be more meaningful and effective.

It seems to me that a lot of the contributors to this collection disagreed with Dean's views, or that they found them too pessimistic. While I agree that Dean's article is pessimistic, I don't disagree with her. In fact, it's the sort of thing I think I needed to read, and it's the chapter in this collection that stands out in my mind above all the rest. Dean's article was a real wake-up call for me to think about how I approach technology, activism, and feminism. At the time I read the chapter, I was already working with ways to have a stronger offline feminist presence. I was getting my offline activism together, and Dean's chapter helped me get going. Her writing is pessimistic, but in a way, it's also inspirational. I think it depends what you take from it. Since I was already looking to expand my activist work, I was preconditioned to be receptive her ideas, and the piece really resonated with me.

Brittany: For me, the most resounding piece was Robert Deibert’s essay on the militarization of the Internet, tiered connectivity services, and the OpenNet Initiative. One of my greater frustrations—both with myself and other activists and media makers with whom I have worked—has been a lack of understanding of how the Internet was developed, the infrastructure behind it, and the myth of the web’s openness. In my view, it’s like any other system you want to use to benefit yourself and others: you have to understand the backend, who’s in charge, and who enables your work so that you also know who could effectively shut it down. I don’t think it’s an article for everyone, but it does speak to issues about how Internet access is blocked in certain countries and daunting user agreements many of us (myself included) have been known to sign for certain software that makes much of how we’d actually utilize the product illegal.

The article also has a nice, if too short, section on hactivism, the idea of staging digital sit-ins, and doing a sort of civil disobedience in a virtual space. I wondered if others would read about these tactics and find that normalizing technology and the social web makes those things less daunting and, ultimately, more successfully utilized by activists.

Allyson: Reflecting on these essays, and the ways in which I define my feminism and my activism, I realize that blogging, in fact, led me to activism. That is, getting involved online inspired me to get involved with the offline world. There is something about authoring a blog that is narcissistic and narrow, especially because smaller blogs with a limited readership don’t get a whole lot of debate in the comments. But oddly enough, that was sort of the thing I needed. I needed to have a space to write, and just be in my own thoughts. Yes, that could have been accomplished by a regular paper journal, but while a blog is somewhat self-centered, it also has a social component, even if that social component is somewhat limited. Blogging provided me the kind of balance I needed to both write and put myself out there. And by having a space to get all those thoughts out, it helped me (and still helps me) refine my feminism, to figure out my motivations and what I want to do. It’s because of blogging that I decided what kind of feminist volunteer work that I wanted to do.

These essays got me thinking much more not just about being an offline activist, but about the depths of my activism. Various authors in this book discuss tactical media, which is an idea I never encountered before. We see the positives and the negatives of tactical media described in Digital Media and Democracy, so I really started thinking about my own practices, and whether I was being "too" tactical or not—that is, I was focusing on one issue at a time, as it happened, without any sort of deep commitment or ideological foundation. After reading this book, I recognize the value in tactical media, and I have also reshaped my activist approaches to combine tactical approaches with more sustained commitments.

Brittany: I think we both came out of reading this book with a lot of renewed hope and some new ideas about how to take academic lessons and apply them to our personal, everyday politics. Again, a dense read, and I still think that the essays, offered together, provide a much-needed overview of the sometimes-awkward marriage between activism and media, as it exists today.

Written by: Brittany Shoot, Allyson Whipple, October 14th 2008