Politics of Affect E-Book

Brian Massumi

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 323

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

'The capacity to affect and to be affected'. This simple definition opens a world of questions - by indicating an openness to the world. To affect and to be affected is to be in encounter, and to be in encounter is to have already ventured forth. Adventure: far from being enclosed in the interiority of a subject, affect concerns an immediate participation in the events of the world. It is about intensities of experience. What is politics made of, if not adventures of encounter? What are encounters, if not adventures of relation? The moment we begin to speak of affect, we are already venturing into the political dimension of relational encounter. This is the dimension of experience in-the-making. This is the level at which politics is emergent.

In these wide-ranging interviews, Brian Massumi explores this emergent politics of affect, weaving between philosophy, political theory and everyday life. The discussions wend their way 'transversally': passing between the tired oppositions which too often encumber thought, such as subject/object, body/mind and nature/culture. New concepts are gradually introduced to remap the complexity of relation and encounter for a politics of emergence: 'differential affective attunement', 'collective individuation', 'micropolitics', 'thinking-feeling', 'ontopower', 'immanent critique'. These concepts are not offered as definitive solutions. Rather, they are designed to move the inquiry still further, for an ongoing exploration of the political problems posed by affect.

Politics of Affect offers an accessible entry-point into the work of one of the defining figures of the last quarter century, as well as opening up new avenues for philosophical reflection and political engagement.

Leseprobe

Copyright © Brian Massumi 2015

The right of Brian Massumi to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2015 by Polity Press

Polity Press

65 Bridge Street

Cambridge CB2 1UR, UK

Polity Press

350 Main Street

Malden, MA 02148, USA

All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-8981-4

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-8982-1 (pb)

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-8985-2 (epub)

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-8984-5 (mobi)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Massumi, Brian.

    The politics of affect / Brian Massumi.

        pages cm

    Includes bibliographical references and index.

    ISBN 978-0-7456-8981-4 (hardcover : alk. paper) – ISBN 0-7456-8981-7 (hardcover : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-0-7456-8982-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) – ISBN 0-7456-8982-5 (pbk. : alk. paper)    1.  Affect (Psychology)    2.  Political psychology.    I.  Title.

    BF531.M324 2015

    128′.3–dc23

                                                                        2014043773

The publisher has used its best endeavours to ensure that the URLs for external websites referred to in this book are correct and active at the time of going to press. However, the publisher has no responsibility for the websites and can make no guarantee that a site will remain live or that the content is or will remain appropriate.

Every effort has been made to trace all copyright holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publisher will be pleased to include any necessary credits in any subsequent reprint or edition.

For further information on Polity, visit our website: politybooks.com

Preface

The ‘politics of affect’: the phrase is somewhat redundant. Affect, as it is conceived in this book, is not a discipline of study of which the politics of affect would be a subdiscipline. It is a dimension of life – including of writing, including of reading – which directly carries a political valence.

The interviews that follow do not purport to present a comprehensive treatment of the field of affect. Neither do they present an introductory encapsulation – although it is hoped that the dialogic format renders the ins and out of affect more immediately accessible than the academic format. They are an invitation to voyage. Their aim is to map a passage for thinking through the intensities of feeling that fill life, and form it, across its ups and downs. Thinking through affect is not just reflecting on it. It is thought taking the plunge, consenting to ride the waves of affect on a crest of words, drenched to the conceptual bone in the fineness of its spray. Affect is only understood as enacted. This book hopes to enact affect conceptually for the reader through its stream of words.

The account developed here makes no claim to objectivity or general applicability. What would an objective or general approach bring to the singular qualities of life that compose its affective dimension? Stilling. Dullening. Dead disciplinary reckoning. The aim is not to convince with claims of validity, but rather to convey something of the vivacity of the topic: to invite and to incite the reader towards thought experiences pitching off-chart from the pages of the book, on a course of their own beyond its ken. To ‘think through’ affect is to continue its life-filling, life-forming journey. A concept, Gilles Deleuze once said, is lived or it is nothing.