A New Political Ecology: Guattari, Stengers, Latour (ACLA 2012 DUE NOV 15)

full name / name of organization: 
Esra Atamer
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In Three Ecologies (1989), Felix Guattari draws attention to the deterioration of modes of life along with an increasing ecological disequilibrium that threatens the planet. The standardization of behavior and consumerism combined with the mass media effects corresponds to an impoverishment of what Foucault called "savoir-faire." Resonating with this concept, Guattari extends the question to the effects of capitalism's capture that destroys both mental and environmental ecologies. In her suggestive dialog with Guattari, Isabelle Stengers correlates this ontological impoverishment with the emergence of bêtise: the form of capitalist subjectivity. Following Guattari, Stengers, and Latour, this seminar aims to complicate and extend the question of political ecology. It draws attention to the recent political shift associated with political ecology in the works of the aforementioned thinkers.

Possible topics include but are not limited to:

Knowledge Economy
Otium and Negotium
Intrusion of Gaia
Apprenticeship
Oikos/Milieu
Dispositif
Ecosophy
Capitalist Sorcery
Contribution Economy
Quasi-Objects and Actants
Capital
Enclosure of the commons
Cosmopolitics

Authors are invited to send their abstracts (250 words) to eatamer@gmail.com

Due date is November 15, 2012.