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Negations: the Manifesto
an Introduction to the Journal
J.L. Hinman
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For some time thinkers and social
critics have warned that the foundations
of modernity have collapsed. In reaction
to the current malaise the realm
of discourse in American public life
has been closed around one particular
social project: right-wing hegemony. With the
death of the left, the failure
of liberalism, the decline of the
arts, and the ultimate decline of
democratic values, new movements seek explanations
and solutions. Most of these, however,
consist of either uncritically imposing moralistic
agendas, or, denying that foundations are
possible. Negations
is a journal of
social criticism which seeks to expand
the realm of discourse in American
society through an interdisciplinary approach, drawing
upon critical theory and praxis in
the areas of art, history of
ideas, political and social philosophy, political
theology, and literary criticism. The editors
of Negations
feel that the most
acute analysis and praxis lie in
recovering the tradition of 20th century
social criticism. We have chosen as
springboards, points of departure, Albert Schweitzer,
Karl Jaspers, C. Wright Mills, and
Herbert
Marcuse.Specifically, what these thinkers have in
common is the realization that economic
forces render the public sphere synonymous
with the commercial sphere. Art, religion,
philosophy, ethics, political ideals, all else
is reduced to "matters of taste"
in the private realm. These vital
areas of life, therefore, play a
mitigated role in governing public discourse.
Moreover, the public sphere has come
to subsume the private; "matters of
taste" become commodified and are themselves
mere products. The process of civilized
life is reduced to producing and
consuming; serious public dialogue is reduced
to a form of entertainment. Non-commodified
needs, such as artistic expression, ethical
values, or reflections upon our ultimate
concerns, are marginalized. The closed realm
of discourse reduces analysis of the
cause of the crisis to a
litany of its effects; "cultural relativism,"
declining "family values," or a failure
of the educational system. The real
problem lurking behind these symptoms is
the inability of ultimate concerns to
affect the social
realm. The editors of Negations
draw upon
the tradition of 20th century social
criticism as a springboard to understanding
this critical period. In bringing together
ideas from the arts and humanities,
and from theology, we hope to
expand the realm of discourse in
such a way as to open
up new possibilities and move beyond
the current stalemate; a society of
warring camps polarized between postmodernism's endgame
and right-wing hegemony. As the Marcusian
term "Negations" implies, we hope to
negate the Negations of further possibility
which close the realm of discourse,
and we hope to create a
new synthesis out of diverse and
marginalized
views. We do not expect contributors necessarily
to write about Schweitzer, or any
of the four thinkers above, although,
we welcome such articles. In fact,
none of the submissions in this
issue are really about any of
the four. They are merely springboards
to begin the discussion. Nor do
we necessarily demand that all submissions
conform to our viewpoint. Negations
is
a forum for discussions about the
state of contemporary society, we use
these four thinkers, different as they
are, as points of departure for
discussion. It may strike some scholars
as odd that we choose such
disparate elements: Marcuse and Mills were
Marxists, but Mills withdrew from Marxist
thought, Jaspers was an existentialist, Schweitzer
a Christian rationalist. Yet, we choose
these four because, spanning the century
as they do, they provide a
broad range of criticism from different
perspectives and from different points in
the century, yet on certain matters
they are in general
agreement. Albert Schweitzer is best known, not
for social criticism, but for sacrificing
a brilliant theological career to work
in Africa as a doctor. His
classic work, Quest for The Historical
Jesus, set the stage for 20th
century theological interpretation of the historical
Jesus and eschatology. Schweitzer did write
a philosophy of civilization. His work,
The Decay and Restoration of Civilization,
is outdated, somewhat ethnocentric, and almost
quaint. Embedded within a simplistic discourse
on the superiority of rationalism, however,
are some ideas that are well
worth taking seriously. While he may
seem out of place among thinkers
such as Marcuse and Mills, he
anticipated much that they had to
say.Schweitzer's discussion of civilization begins with
the concept of civilization itself. Civilization
is, for Schweitzer, primarily a matter
of ethical values which produce a
free community, in which the full
potential of the individual can be
realized. This is not only an
unscientific definition, but it flies in
the face of the postmodern rejection
of the individual. On the other
hand, as Schweitzer points out, what
is thought of as "civilization" today,
comes from social scientists, who, in
their positivistic zeal to rid modern
thought of everything that cannot be
quantified, defined civilization in terms of
living arrangements and urban units. It
is not that we object to
the quantitative study of society, nor
do we envision social sciences without
a focus on living arrangements. Nevertheless,
the concept of civilization has been
reduced to that which can be
studied quantitatively, gutted of its content
and reduced to a mere form.
Civilization, understood as a value, fosters
a positive quality of life based
on freedom, but civilization has come
to be understood as a collection
of practical ends which must be
served for their own
sake. | ||
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In The Dacay...
(1923), Schweitzer warned
of the collapse of civilizing influences,
which were giving way to reductive
and calculating forms of thought. Today
there is a general feeling that
Western culture is declining through a
loss of moral values, but this
notion is most often heard as
right-wing campaign rhetoric, or a concern
of fundamentalists. To understand these concerns
in this way, however, is to
misconstrue the nature of the forces
at work. It is capitalism and
its technostructure which have dislodged civilizing
influences (and Schweitzer himself included capitalism
in the critique, 28). As long
as the economic structures are expanding,
the assumption is that civilization is
intact. The illusion of stability is
created because civilization has been confused
with two different things: first, with
its own infrastructure (or with that
of civil society), and secondly, with
the hierarchical trappings of power which
maintain the infrastructure. Modernity understands Civilization
as indoor plumbing, freeways, and home
shopping. Some postmodernists confuse civilization with
the imperialism which built the infrastructure.
Thus, civilization is often pitted against
environmental concerns, blamed for the exploitation
of the third world, or the
oppression of women, as well as
all the other problems of our
technological existence, (all of which are
really the consequences of loosing civilization,
or of never having achieved it
fully\'d1in other words, to end
oppression and to accept marginalized people
as fully participating members of society
is a civilizing influence; one which
has yet to be fully
achieved).Schweitzer's critique centered on the mode
of production necessary for maintaining a
burgeoning technological society, and the way
of life that mode fostered (29).
His analysis applied to the German
situation of factory life in the
1920s, but much of what he
had to say still bears consideration.
German workers were overworked, underpaid, uneducated,
and separated from the overall process
of production, so that their work
was meaningless and lacked any expression
of craftsmanship. Contemporary work is less
factory-oriented, but it is still overwork,
and in general social pressures guide
workers away from meaningful occupations. As
Schweitzer pointed out, the main compensation
for overwork is constant entertainment. Overworked,
underpaid, undervalued, undereducated, the worker is
diverted from any serious consideration about
the overall goals and ends of
life; from reading, and from intellectual
pursuits (28). The current situation is
merely an outgrowth of the former
mode of life. Entertainment is one
of the biggest growth sectors, (commodified
leisure) but it serves a diversionary
purpose in draining away time for
serious reading and reflection. Even in
1923 Schweitzer saw that these trends
were being designed into the economic
structures (29). Even "meaningful" occupations too
often reduce thought to mere calculation.
On this point Schweitzer anticipates
Jaspers.Karl Jaspers reflected upon the end
of Western civilization in Man In
The Modern Age,
likening it to
the end of Hellenism before the
dark ages (20). For Jaspers, the
current phase in modernity (the 1920s)
marked the turning point from human
pursuits such as discursive reasoning, thought,
understanding, and artistic production, to the
dominance of a highly organized super-structure
based upon reducing content to "technique."
Art becomes "mere amusement and pleasure (
instead of an emblem of transcendence),
science becomes mere concern for technical
utility (instead of the satisfaction of
a primary will to know), (137).
He warned that the growing tendency
to "wrap the world in apparatus,"
the building of a giant inter-connected
infrastructure based entirely on calculation, would
have a deleterious effect upon humanity.
According to Jaspers, society faces the
extinction of those qualities and aspirations
which have always defined humanity, such
as rational discourse and ethical norms.
These warnings seem quaint when one
considers that they were made before
regular air travel in the days
of radio. It may be that
at each stage in technical development,
society becomes more habituated to technique,
closed in a technological womb that
grows ever more content with closed
possibilities for qualitative change. The contemporary
litany of dangers, ecological destruction of
the planet, the failure of the
educational system, growing violence, and governmental
control, should bare out the realization
that society is complacent in the
face of growing peril. Jasper's notion
that discursive reasoning was being replaced
by technique anticipates the work of
C. Wright Mills in the
1950s.Mills was a sociologist, an influence
upon the early new left of
the '60s, and a critic of
the social sciences. He is best
known for his work The Power
Elite,
and for coining that popular
phrase of the 1960s, "military industrial
complex." In his work The Sociological
Imagination,
however, he reflects upon the
loss of the individual's power in
society, and his own profession's complicity
in the process. Mills was one
of the first thinkers to use
the term "post-modern" (which he hyphenated).
For Mills, writing in the '50s,
modernity had already passed away, post-modernity
had dawned. "The ideological mark...[of
the post-modern epoch] --that which sets
it apart from the modern age--
is that the ideas of freedom
and of reason have become moot;
that increased rationality may not be
assumed to make for increased freedom" (
167). As with Schweitzer, Mills reflects
that the technological structure separates people
from control over or reflection upon
the ends of their lives. "Caught
in the everyday milieux of their
limited lives, ordinary people cannot reason
about the greater structures'rational and
irrational'of which their milieux are
subordinate parts" (168). The individual learns
not to reason, but to rationalize
the goals and ends of life,
and his or her position in
the overall scheme of
things. Given...the ascendant trend of
rationalization, the individual 'does what he
can.' He gears his aspirations and
his work to the situation he
is in and from which he
can find no way out. In
due course he does not seek
a way out: he adapts. That
part of his life which is
left over from work he uses
to play, to consume, to have
fun. Yet this sphere of consumption
is also being rationalized. Alienated from
production, from work, he is also
alienated from consumption, from genuine leisure.
This adaptation of the individual and
its effects upon his milieux and
self results not only in the
loss of his chance, but in
due course of his capacity and
will to reason; it also affects
his chances and his capacity to
act as a free [person]. Indeed,
neither the value of freedom nor
of reason, it would seem, are
known to him.
(170). Mills ties this process directly to
commodification, the accumulation of technological and
commercial products, of "gadgets." The end
result, according to Mills, is that
society becomes filled with "cheerful robots,"
those who obey the programming of
technique and cannot seek alternatives (171).
Mills charged that the social sciences
help to further the aims and
methods of technique, hiding behind the "
scientific objectivity," unwilling to mount any
critique. Mills anticipates Herbert Marcuse's work,
written in 1964, One-Dimensional
Man.
Marcuse is far too complex to
present a full explication of his
thought in this manifesto. Only the
most cursory summation of one of
his major points will be attempted.
Marcuse, like Schweitzer and Jaspers, was
born in Germany. He escaped to
the United States in 1933 (on
the day Hitler took power). Marcuse
had been active in Marxist politics
since his early youth. He studied
with Heidegger and Husserl, and was
a close friend of the latter.
His thinking is grounded deeply in
that of Hegel, but he draws
more on the phenomenological tradition than
other Marxist thinkers of his time.
Marcuse was part of the "Frankfurt
School," a group of thinkers in
Germany which included Adorno and the
young Habermas. In the early '60s
he taught at San Diego, where
he rose to meteoric fame with
One-Dimensional Man.
He was lauded as
the great thinker of the '60s
counter-culture, so much so that Ronald
Reagan tried to have his credentials
revoked. Marcuse argues that the realm of
public discourse is closed around a
social project which features the constant
supply of "false needs" to eagerly
one-dimensional consumers (7-8). Any notion which
does not support the social project
is excluded from the public discussion.
Within the confines of consumer society
freedom becomes a concept reduced to
terms of commercial
transaction. ...The irresistible output of the The seductive nature of the consumer
life indoctrinates everyone into the social
project, precluding any serious discussion of
alternative forms of life, and excluding
that which cannot be reduced to
a product. Learning and thinking cease
to be matters of thoughtful content
and simply become a means of
better maintaining the project; constant expansion
of economic development. Alternatives are co-opted,
then sold as products
themselves. Lurking behind the accumulation of false
needs (technological version of bread and
circuses) is operational thinking. This is
what Marcuse means by "quantitative extension
of the given system" (quotation above). "
The trend [one-dimensional consumer society] may
be related to a development in
scientific method: operationalism in the physical,
behaviorism in the social sciences. The
common feature is a total empiricism
in the treatment of concepts; their
meaning is restricted to the representation
of particular operations and behavior...In
general, we mean by a concept
nothing more than a set of
operations...a positivism which, in its
denial of the transcending elements of
reason, forms the academic counterpart to
the socially required behavior" (12). The
positivist and reductionist tendencies of contemporary
scientific thought, which props up the
technostructure and furnishes it with "empirical
proof," works to eliminate all concepts
that cannot be quantified, and therefore,
eventually
commodified. We refer to this total process,
observed by Marcuse, Mills, Jaspers, and
Schweitzer, as "the commodification of life."
Whatever cannot be quantified, and then
reduced to commercial transaction, is deemed
unimportant, and relegated to the "subjective"
realm as "matters of taste," (Moltmann
309). Marcuse argues that positivism has
helped to foster the assumption that
what is, is what should be. "
What is," is the power of
science to render as quantifiable anything "
worth knowing." If a concept is
not quantified, it must be a
subjective matter of taste, and therefore,
cannot be included in the public
discussion. "What is," is the "negation"
of further possibility. Thus, our most
cherished aspirations, desires, and values become
consumer products or selling points. Engagement
with our existential concerns becomes the
psychic hot-line," personal significance and meaning
in one's life as an individual
becomes the purchase of a large
air-polluting automobile with "fine Corinthian leather"
upholstery, freedom becomes a huge drink
at the local convenience store, revolution
becomes a basketball shoe, and democracy
becomes a sound bite. Even thought
is commodified, the life of the
mind a mere product. Learning becomes
a score on the GRE, knowledge
becomes a diploma, thought becomes gathering
data and publication, all of which
indexes the "thinker" as a product
worthy of purchase by industry or
academia. The mercantile trappings of civilization
have become the thing
itself.Nor is the closed realm of
discourse only limited to advertising. The
media on all levels creates a
sense of the world as American
public discourse, the agenda dictated by
quantitatively derived economic necessity and the
demands of the infrastructure. The public
discussion about welfare, for example, rarely
delves into the moral obligation of
an economic system which requires that
certain groups be frozen out. If
vast segments of the population are
trapped in poverty, or forced to
migrate for work, if the manufacturing
based is shipped to the third
world and whole communities left with
the fast food industry as the
employer of first resort, that is
simply the law of supply and
demand; immutable, sacrosanct, economic cosmic Torryism.
Practically the only time one hears
moral values at work in a
discussion on social programs is when
the poor are subjected to a
badly misconstrued version of the Protestant
work ethic. The same situation can
be seen on the environmental front,
where the ecologists are the "special
interests," and corporations the victims of "
out of control" government
regulation. In his classic work Manufacturing Consent,
Noam Chomsky argues that the minions
of the media, reporters and editors,
internalize the economic and political interests
of the ownership (Chomsky). The ownership
of media in America, however, is
an ever shrinking and tightly closed
realm; ever more limited to Disney
and Murdock (Miller, 10). "...Such concentration
will tend to inhibit those news
departments lately swallowed up by this
or that gigantic advertiser'news departments
that were no great shakes to
start with, but that now will
seldom threaten the myriad interests of
their respective parent companies" (Miller, 10).
The new situation of media monopolization,
since the Reagan era, has become
so totally self referential, it threatens
to pull the audience into a
totally self contained world. Michael Eisner
described it this way, "the Disney
stores promote the consumer products which
promote the [theme] parks, which promote
the television shows. The television shows
promote the company..." (in Miller, 9).
Of course, television in general is
dummied up to reduce the level
of thought, and generally promotes a
way of life based on constant
entertainment and constant consumption. The one
serious reflection on the world which
is widely available, news, reflects the
assumptions of the social elites in
maintaining their project. The universe closes,
tightly bud-like, around the basic notion
of economic Torryism (what is, is
what should be). Any serious attempt
at qualitative change, or at presentation
of further possibilities for life, is
either co-opted or excluded
altogether.The very concept of "revolution" is
trivialized and commodified, so that to
rebel is to obey. When the
term "revolution" is taken seriously, it
is in connection with the right-wing
legislative agenda, or the tax revolt.
To use the term in this
way, however, is simply to call
for more of the same; more
capitalism, more right-wing ideology. When "revolution"
is used in connection with changing
society in such a way as
to bring about justice, promote free
thought, or find alternatives to an
oppressive cultural and social milieu, advertisers
connect the usage to selling products. "
The revolution," as it turns out,
is really about basketball. All one
need do is watch television (pay
attention to the commercials this time)
and one is inundated by an
army of black-shirted, would-be beats, each
with a three day growth of
beard, hawking everything from automobiles to
beer. "Break the rules. Stand apart.
Keep your head. Go with your
heart," says a t.v. commercial
for Vanderbilt perfume, 1994 (Frank, 12).
The revolution is about money. Thomas
Frank's article, "Dark Age: Why Johnny
Can't Dissent," (Baffler) documents the fact
that dissent and counter-culture are the
major growth industries, favorite targets of
advertising today (12-13). All aspects of
life are turned into commodities, even
dissatisfaction with commodification. This is nothing
new, however, it is exactly what
Marcuse predicted when he said that
dissent and counter-culture were merely the
carnation on the lapel of capitalism (
ODM,10). Nowhere is the commodified
rebellion more evident than in the
brave and trendy rebellion of the
ideological postmodernists, whose undermining of "logocentrism"
has only served to negate the
ability of the left offer a coherent
option.This is not to paint all "
postmoderns" with a broad brush. "Postmodernity"
is many things to many people,
as is "postmodernism." Much of it
offers insight for critique. In a
sense, postmodernism offers the best help
for the left. The projects of
modernity seem to have failed in
many ways. There is no getting
around the fact that 19th century
progress never made good on its
claims, and the most significant result
was a bigger pile of bodies.
Postmodernism offers a deeper understanding of
reality as socially constructed, although much
of this could be gleaned from
a reading of 19th century sociology.
Deconstruction does offer a method for
reading texts, and there are those
whose scholarship and dedication toward this
end is admirable. There are also
those who know a catchy slogan
when they hear it, and whose
critique of modernity does not go
beyond sloganism. Conversely, there is much
in modernity that was never grasped,
never tried, and never given the
proper opportunity. We reject that type
of postmodernism which is merely a
knee-jerk reaction against anything that came
before, and we especially reject that
style of postmodernism which lauds "difference"
at the expense of a unified
movement against
oppression.What is left of the left
has, like a character in a
Beckett play, been stuck in the
endgame of postmodernism. As with an
actual "endgame" in chess, the postmodernists
have worked the left into a
position in which they have few
moves left open to them, and
no longer command the pieces to
win the game; having eliminated any
notion of progress (indeed, having eliminated
the very ability to say that
one thing is better than another,
and having done away with the
self, the individual, ethics, ideals, class
analysis, class conflict, workers, solidarity, freedom,
conscience, humanity, humanism, spirit, and all
the other concepts which have motivated
decent, and revolutionary organizing, since the
peasant revolts of the 16th century).
This version of the postmodern attack
on the subject, the rejection of
individualism, reason, etc., have only served
to render the left apathetic, powerless,
and divided; and to feed the
process of
commodification. This kind of postmodernism attacks all
motivating values, such as moral values,
or the value of individualism, as
though they are the structures which
have created the modern malaise. They
attack the reduced forms as though
they are the ideals themselves. They
attack civilization, as though it is
the imperialism which comes from a
misconstrual of civilization, they attack the
one-dimensional false consciousness as though it
is the notion of the self.
The postmodern "attack on the subject" (
the rejection of the individual) began
with the new left in Paris,
May '68, and with the very
critique of bourgeois individuality voiced by
Marcuse and Mills. While these thinkers
wanted an ever freer individual, however,
one liberated from "false needs" or "
gadgets," Derrida and Foucault took the
opposite approach and turned to the
destruction of individuality (although, it can
be argued that their aim was
really a sneaky defense of individual
freedom). The effect was postmodern rejection
of the self (Ferry and Renaut
xxiii). Certain kinds of postmodernists will
be apt to criticize Mills and
the others on the grounds that
freedom is illusory, reason is logocentric,
and the self is a social
construct. Schweitzer would probably answer, "Those
born to slavery don't know to
miss their
freedom."On the other hand, we cannot
bring back the quaint 19th century
rationalism of Schweitzer. The postmodernists have
created a problem in the sense
that ridding the left of the
notion of progress, there is no
more forward momentum (if only that
were the only problem the left
faces). Nevertheless, the notion of "progress,"
is laden with too much baggage,
is too relative and general in
meaning. One person's "progress" is another
person's ecological disaster. We propose a
vocabulary and a means of problem
solving in lieu of talk about
progress. Rather than speaking of a "
march" of progress toward some teleological
goal, which is actually some relative
temporal value cast in the aura
of the eternal, perhaps we can
speak of "opening up" the closed
realm of discourse, of the emergence
of new possibility. If we cannot
have progress in history, Hegel's inevitable "
footprints of God in the sands
of time," perhaps we can have
Marcuse's "negation of the negation" (Katz,
200).The "negation of the negation" is
really a Hegelian term. Hegel didn't
really speak of the dialectic as "
thesis, anti-thesis, synthesis," but as a
series of concrete situations negating and
excluding possibilities. The fruition of possibilities
over existing situations is "the negation
of the negation." Marcuse took up
this notion, and in fact, a
collection of his essays is entitled
Negations.
There are two Marcusian terms
which must be understood in order
to make sense of the theory.
First, the transcendent critical principle (TCP),
and secondly, the revolutionary a priori.
TCPs are principles from beyond the
commodified closed realm of discourse, principles
which in themselves offer the basis
for critique, and which cannot be
commodified. Marcuse thought he found such
principles in art (Katz, 199-200). We
think there is an even larger
picture which can be understood through
a combination of all four
thinkers.For Marcuse, the revolutionary a priori
was an inherent basis for critique
which exists within art qua art.
Certain works, certain genres, even the
notion of art itself may be
commodified and pressed into service of
the closed realm of discourse, but
the revolutionary a priori can always
be teased out, and a critique
mounted. It is critique which breaks
open the closed realm and opens
up new possibilities, the negation of
the negation. If we can bring
values back into public discussion as
points of critique, perhaps they will
force an opening in the closed
realm of discourse. Rather than the
assumption that "what is, is what
should be," possibility introduces the notion
that "what could be is what
should be." The approbation of non-commodified
principles will, hopefully, alter the public
discussion in such a way as
to break open the closed realm.
The major metaphor for progress in
history was a "march forward," moving "
ahead." The metaphor we would like
to bring to the discussion as
a replacement is that of a
rose bud. The revolutionary a priori
is a bud-likeness. The possibilities for
change are inherent within the closed
realm, but they must be opened
up and caused to emerge to
fruition.Through the works of Schweitzer, Jaspers,
and Mills, one might enlarge upon
TCPs, and draw upon a range
broader than that of art alone.
Conversely, through Marcuse, one might search
out a revolutionary a priori in
the values and motivations which Schweitzer,
Jaspers, and Mills draw upon for
their solutions. For example, Schweitzer's appeal
to reverence for life furnishes an
example of a TCP. Schweitzer's notion
of the ethical content of civilization
might furnish a range of TCPs
from the realm of value. This
is the true importance of recognizing
Schweitzer's point about the ethical content
of civilization. Civilizing tendencies are applications
of values, moral and ethical, which
create living possibilities for the individual and
society. From each of our four thinkers
we derive a piece of a
possible solution. Schweitzer's solution was the
application of discursive reason and reverence
for life (as a specific example
of the ethical content which he
believed motivates civilization). Jaspers's solution lay
in a realization of humanity's existential
concerns in motivating the human spirit.
Mills' solution was the application of
reason to an analysis of the
goals and ends of life; which
manifested itself through a sociological analysis
critical of the social sciences. Marcuse
supplies the grand theory which is
complex enough to unite the whole
in a comprehensive
framework.One of the major problems with
this theory is in selecting the
values and in choosing between competing
values. Moreover, the postmodernist position informs
us of the culturally constructed and
relative nature of all values. The
problem of choosing between them should
supply a large portion of the
content of the journal. To bog
down in the mire of postmodern
constructivist relativism, however, need not be
the fate of our task. It
is not that postmodernism does not
furnish us with valuable insights, nor
is it the case that there
is nothing to the constructivist outlook.
It is simply that the relative
and socially constructed nature of value
should not dissuade us from the
discussion. Let us take a Kantian
approach. If we impose cultural constructs
upon our sense data, and thus
order the world, the world is
the world of our constructs. The
problem with the closed realm of
discourse is that it limits the
world by imposing certain constructs, and
excluding others, and the range is
constantly narrowed. If it is inevitable
that the values we hold are
merely cultural constructs, than let us
increase the possible range of constructs
available to
us.Therefore, as a journal, Negations
is
virtually unlimited in the range of
topics which might be selected. Anything
from media manipulation, to advertising, ecology,
welfare, literary criticism, historical analysis, cultural
criticism, almost all walks of life
are touched by
commodification. In general, we seek scholarly articles
from the arts and humanities and
the social sciences. we use the
rubric "interdisciplinary" to describe the range
of disciplines form which we seek
contributions, and by this term we
mean to indicate the openness of
the journal to publish a broad
range of disciplines. We welcome quantitative
work, but ask that it be
tied to
analysis.The range of topics will be
limited by the approach to commodification.
We ask that articles center on
one of two things, or both:
1) a critique of commodification (in
whatever manifestation it can be seen)
and/or; 2) a discussion of
transcendent critical principles. We hope that
this approach will contribute something to
the struggle for fundamental change. We
know that we face overwhelming opposition,
we are a mosquito trying to
drink the ocean, but we hope
that all who read this article
will lend their support in whatever
way they can. We also feel
that our contribution to scholarship itself
is not minimal. We feel that
scholarship need not hide behind objectivity,
but that critique, in so far
as it leads to understanding, is
the best approach of true scholarship.
We feel that the academic way
of life is in the greatest
peril from a commodified society; a
society which values only technique and
commodifies learning and thinking. We believe
that we can contribute in an
academic sense, and that the strength
of the academy is the best
defense against the forces of one-dimensionality.
We call for the support of
the reader, and the best support
the reader can give is to read our
journal.
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Sources
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main page issue index copyright notice submitting subscribing about the Journal email us at tim_wood@datawranglers.com If you're viewing Negations via another frame-based site, you can reach us directly at http://www.datawranglers.com |
Chomsky, Noam. Manufacturing Consent.
Pantheon Books.
1988.Ferry, Luc, and Alain Renaut. French
Philosophy of The Sixties: An Essay
On Antihumanism.
trans. Mary H.S.
Cattani. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press,
1990 (originally 1985 by Gillmard).Frank, Thomas. "Dark Age: Why Johnny
Can't Dissent," The Baffler,
no. 6.Jaspers, Karl. Man In The Modern
Age.
Doubleday, 1957.Katz, Barry. Herbert Marcuse and the
Art of Liberation.
Verso, 1982. Marcuse, Herbert. Negations: Essays in Critical
Theory.
Trans. Jeremy J. Shapiro. Boston:
Beacon Press, 1968.____ One-Dimensional Man.
Beacon Press, 1964. Miller, Mark Crispin. "De-Monopolize Them: a
Call For A Broad Based Movement
Against the Media Trust." Extra: The
Magazine of FAIR,
Nov.-Dec. 1995,
Vol. 8, no. 6.Mills, C. Wright. The Sociological Imagination.
New York, London: Oxford University Press,
1967 (originally 1959). Moltmann, Jurgen. Theology of Hope: On
The Ground And The Implications of
A Christian Eschatology.
SCM Press, Ltd.
1967 (originally published in Germany in
1965). Schweitzer, Albert. The Decay and The
Restoration of Civilization.
trans. C.T.
Campion. London: Unwin Books, 1967 (original
German Publication 1923). |
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