Tronti blogweave

For your quick or leisurely perusal, the compilation of Long Sunday's recent symposium on Mario Tronti's "The Strategy of the Refusal", and some remarks.  The multitudinous, but alphabetised, contributions:

»Jon Beasley-Murray, The new barbarians
»Eric Beck, Minor refusals
»George Ciccariello-Maher, Class and subalternity
»Jodi Dean, Two questions on Tronti [follow-up]
»Roger Gathman Fantasy sites and the conquistadors of the planet
»Nate Hawthorne, Notes on "The Strategy of the Refusal"
»John Holloway, Adorno meets Tronti
»Doug Johnson, Intellectuals, the refusal of power, office workers' unions
»Brian Lamb, I would prefer not to bore you
»Craig McFarlane, Refusing to engage
»David McInerney, Tronti and Althusser
»Angela Mitropoulos, When will this labour end?
»Brett Neilson, Five theses on Tronti
»Stephen Squibb, Strategy of refusal of strategy
»Keith Tilford, How no can you go? Part I [Part II]

The preamble to the Long Sunday symposium, which includes links to related texts.  The relevant essay by Tronti is here, and a quick link to Long Sunday's Tronti folder. 

There were also a number of related posts elsewhere:  Destructive Creation, Northanger, Going Somewhere, Philosophy.com, pas au-delà, Attitude Adjustor. (Those are the most directly related to the discussion, though I wouldn't be surprised if I've missed some.)  And, not least, there is always the ongoing reading at Leggiamo Tronti.

My immense gratitude to all those who contributed their writings, readings and questions - those who simply took the time to read along with, and specifically those, such as Matt, who spent much time coding and uploading.

Already, Jon has the ball rolling for another reading, and I'm hoping that blogweaving continues, mutates and grows.  Not only because it creates a shared conversation that cuts across various blogs without converging along the one line, but also because - in ways that have yet to be fully explored - it marks an autonomy of writing, reading and research from the university that, particularly in times such as these, becomes an imperative.  Needless to say, what we read and write is related to how we read and write, no less than it is to the diificult questions of who, how and why this 'we' might appear, in that process.

Many thanks for the adventure.

Comments

[Eric]

And thank you for having the idea, for putting it all together (and you too, Matt), and for your excellent post. I had a lot of fun writing, reading, and responding to all the great contributions.

[Jodi]

Angela,
I like very much your gesture to an autonomy of writing. When I speak to some other academics about blogging I get odd responses along the lines of 1) it's a waste of time and a hobby; 2) if it's not a waste of time then I am risking having my ideas plaigarized. Clearly these options are two sides of the same coin, a coin of the professionalized university. My response is nearly always to emphasize thinking and writing outside of such professional academic constraints.

[HJ]

Not an expert, a mere dilettant, and a recent discoverer of LS, but I wanted to ask, have you considered the idea of a symposium deliberately addressing an impossibly big topic, from all your various disparate perspectives? Such as "is an alternative to neoliberal capitalism possible/viable/imaginable today?". Especially if approached simultaneously byt the different writers, this would undoubtedly produce many different lines of thought, and would perhaps forge new ideas and connections, as well as serving as an initial introduction to many facets of dissent.

The prompt from this came from my initial disinterest tout court in Tronti and a refusal to work- too narrow and too vain; though I of course appreciate the immense value in going to great detail on a particular topic or writer; how about a dialectic of fine grain and big picture in consecutive symposia?

[Matt]

Alas, this 'writing despite the university' meme may just have been copyrighted by the person from whom it was first lifted. We'll have to check.

For the record, she or he was also quick to state that she or he was "far from jubilant" about "the current state of electronic culture." "Especially," e went on to say, "given the depressing statistics about the "digital divide" and the fact that (as you yourself point out in pointing out the well-bred pedigree of your blog participants) its intellectual exchange is talking place 'within' (or alongside) sites of 'higher learning.'"

Nor did e "identify the future of philosophy with virtual exchange, unmoored from the rigors and protocols of an institution that grants disciplinary certification." Rather e was thinking "of something else, not yet invented, as Derrida might have said (and frequently did on the issue of technology)."

Now that I think about it, I have no idea how copyrighting this thought would be possible, without also foreclosing the horizon.

[roger]

I'll add to the chorus of thanks to Matt and Angela. My initial feeling was that the text and theme had been long surpassed by history, but this turned out to be so untrue!

[Keith]

Ditto on the double thanks to Matt and Angela. This was an extremely worthwhile adventure, and I look forward to the next one.

[Squibb]

yes, cheers all around, and thanks to matt and angela.

[Nate]

I want to add my thanks to the gratitude chorus, to Angela and Matt and everyone else involved. I enjoyed it very much and found it very helpful.

[s0metim3s]

Jodi, that really is a fascinating response, and worthy of a whole lot of time 'wasted' thinking it through - this whole fixation on time, definitions of the "wasting" of it, how time is valued, etc.

And just maybe, Matt, it's not a question of being jubilant about the net or not, so much as wondering how time gets re-worked here, ie., good and bad.

[Matt]

no I definitely agree.

[Andrew]

"My response is nearly always to emphasize thinking and writing outside of such professional academic constraints."

I really appreciate this and the extra-academic (wasteful) writing (blogging) all y'all do.

Thank you.

[when]

Off topic, but what is that picture of? Keep it up.

[Jon]

The image: Fractal Recursions.

[s0metim3s]

Now you're wierding me out, Jon. How did you backtrack a graphic I (thought) I renamed from an imagesearch?

yes Jon, do tell.

(these were all the rage back in college, during the 90s, I recall)

[Jon]

You may have renamed it, but it's still the fifth hit on the first page of a google image search for "fractal."

Voilà.

[Matt]

Ah, broccoli romanesco.

http://www.printculture.com/item-861.html

[s0metim3s]

Ain't it strange how things move around ;)

[Timmi]

I'll add to the chorus of thanks to Matt and Angela. My initial feeling was that the text and theme had been long surpassed by history, but this turned out to be so untrue!

[Antonio Peduzzi]

cari amici e compagni,

sono italiano, e sono uno studioso dell'operaismo e dell'autonomia del politico. Ho pubblicato "Lo spirito della politica e il suo destino" (Roma, Ediesse, 2006), un testo da me dedicato al problema dell'autonomia del poolitico. Leggetelo, forse può esservi di aiuto a capire meglio il pensiero dell'amico Mario Tronti.