[D-G] Celebrity Deathmatch: D&G vs Badiou

[james]

Looking back, it's not so long.  Just felt long I guess...


On Tue, 8 Feb 2005 17:57:30 +0100, james <spatium at gmail.com> wrote:
> Glen
> 
> I have heard numerous complaints about the scale of Badiou's events.
> Maybe the problem is that his what counts any given situation as
> "One", is always on the scale of the State.  In this way, the event
> can only render visible what is repressed by the State?
> 
> You said: " In this case the 'State' would be a closer
> approximation to Badiou's event." Wouldn't it be closer to say that
> the event re-presents the void of the State?  I guess I'm seeing that
> void as a point of subjectificaiton, in that it is an organization of
> power that serves as the origin of a passional line, or fidelity.  The
> State serves as a kind of analyst for the militant, allowing him/her
> to express (as subject of enunciation) but only insofar as he/she also
> becomes the subject of the statement: "the more you obey the
> statements of the dominant reality, the more in command you are as
> subject of enunciation in mental reality, for in the end you are only
> obeying yourself!  A new form of slavery is invented, namely, being
> slave to oneself..."  Truth is subjective: enuciation; and it is
> universally valid: statement.  Fidelity as self-slavery.
> 
> And so: "precisely because the sign breaks its relation of
> significance with other signs and sets off racing down a positive line
> of flight, it attains an absolute deterritorialization expressed in
> the black hole of consciousness and passion.  The absolute
> deterritorialization of the cogito." (Beckett's cogito?)  However,
> subjectification always "repudiates the absoluteness" without falling
> back on the old regime.
> 
> Sorry this is so long, and probably full of holes.
> 
> I am intrigued by your idea of fear as part of the event.  Can you say more?
> 
> On Tue, 8 Feb 2005 11:32:33 +1100 (EST), Glen Fuller
> <g.fuller at uws.edu.au> wrote:
> > Hi James,
> >
> > I think you may have something there. Two sides of the same
> > enunciation. Badiou's militant is D&G's legislator-subject? Though I
> > dunno if it is absolute deteritorialisation in either account, can you
> > say more about this please. And what do you mean by negative and
> > positive?
> >
> > Something that bugs me about Badiou's approach is the question of
> > scale. Why should an event necessary be on such a normatively
> > miraculous scale? That is one difference between badiou's event and
> > D&G's point of subjectification. I still don't understand how Badiou
> > escapes from the problem of his militant's constant (micro-fascist)
> > becoming-majoritarian or maybe it isn't a problem for him?
> >
> > "The subject of enunciation recoils into the subject of the statement,
> > to the point that the subject of the statement resupplies subject of
> > enunciation for another proceeding." (ATP, 129)
> >
> > This cyclical movement, resonating around a point (of subjectification)
> > captures the active-passive swing (moving and being moved, ala 'tool'
> > and 'weapon' of nomadology) between denotating a state of affairs to
> > becoming expression. The self becomes its own 'state' (a simulacra
> > of 'itself') that resonates with the State (or whatever vertical
> > hierarchy in question). In this case the 'State' would be a closer
> > approximation to Badiou's event. What I don't understand is how
> > this 'State'/event is necessarily a good thing. Why can it not be lived
> > by reactionary right-wing nutters as much as being immanent to the
> > experience of exploited 'third-world' workers? Both experience a
> > perceived injustice, the experience of injustice is collective, both
> > can be mobilised into action, and so on...
> >
> > If 9/11 could be considered an event, which fidelity to this event --
> > militant material practice -- axiomatises the truth of a universal? The
> > neo-con response -- neo-colonial business as usual -- does not attempt
> > to do this at all, but they deploy the conservative refrain running
> > through popular culture synthesising heterogeneous affective elements
> > into hegemonic stratifications. Is fear not part of the event? Which
> > leads to the question, paraphrasing Deleuze from LoS, are the people of
> > New York and the US not worthy of what happen to them?
> >
> > Ciao,
> > Glen.
> >
> > PS Chris, I am still thinking about Massumi paper!
> >
> >
> > > Has the Badiou-Deleuze comparison died out?  In any case, I wanted to
> > > ask: has anyone noticed that Badiou's event seems similar to Deleuze
> > > and Guattari's "point of subjectification" mentioned, for instance, on
> > > page 127 of ATP?  It leads to the negative deterritorialization of a
> > > postsignifying semiotic.  Could one say that both Badiou and D&G are
> > > formulating the revolutionary potential of absolute
> > > deterritorialization, Badiou=negative D&G=positive?  Or is that
> > > pushing it too far?
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 09:09:18 -0500, Chapman <chapman0603 at rogers.com>
> > wrote:
> > > > Glen, I've just read your post. It's given me much to chew on,
> > Merci. I'm
> > > > going to take the wekend to find LoS and do some reading.
> > > >
> > > > In the meanwhile I have to ask you if you've read
> > Massumi's 'Involutionary
> > > > Afterward'? There he unpacks a bit of the virtual / actual
> > relationship. To
> > > > be gross abt it, I think the distinction has to do with the
> > difference
> > > > between two acts of interpretation: sorting out 'actual'
> > differences through
> > > > forming royal analogies by noticing similarities that differ and
> > empirical
> > > > veridity or the virtual differences held together by common
> > analogies,
> > > > things that sample a common, measurable property.
> > > >
> > > > I see you discuss traffic between the actual and the virtual in
> > your last
> > > > post, intuit that they are in some manner connected and informing,
> > but I
> > > > think that this passage / connection is still indebted to Lacan, a
> > way of
> > > > entering into language as the subject making surplus? My gut tells
> > me that
> > > > the 'passive syntheses of conjugation' necessary for the 'schizo'
> > (good) is
> > > > in dismantling this connection between the actual and the virtual,
> > allowing
> > > > them to run parallel and in themselves. I probably owe that thought
> > to
> > > > Massumi.
> > > >
> > > > Thanks,
> > > >
> > > > Chris.
> > > >
> >
> > --
> > PhD Candidate
> > Centre for Cultural Research
> > University of Western Sydney
> >
> > Read my rants: http://glenfuller.blogspot.com/
> >
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