nomos

Administrator
Is Deleuze a witchdoctor?
Short answer yes, with an if. Long answer, no with a but.
The question is genuine. If he is not, what is being proposed here?
Genuine answer: Get A Thousand Plateaus, read the Massumi introduction and rhizome chapter a dozen times, experimenting with different levels of wakefulness and sobriety. Don't move on until you can imagine becoming-orchid. Never use the word rhizome in conversation if you want people to keep listening to you. Skip ahead to the part about submarines and re-read the line "never think a smooth space will suffice to save us" (or whatever). Apply to step one. Then start wandering around the rest of it - metalurgists, refrains, war machines, wolf men, etc. Pick one you like and try building yourself a machine with it. If you're happy with the results then try a few more. In that case, be prepared to defend yourself or hide your work because D&G are less fashionable these days, having been replaced by smarter men who keep their socks in kitchen drawers and hang pictures of Stalin over their DVD collections.
 

Sick Boy

All about pride and egos
D&G are less fashionable these days, having been replaced by smarter men who keep their socks in kitchen drawers and hang pictures of Stalin over their DVD collections.

landing_page_dolce_&_gabbana_1.jpg
 

franz

Well-known member
i second faustus' suggestion. Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature is a good place to start. as some kind of theoretical backdrop, it's been helpful to me for quite a while now.

i've been wrestling with Mille Plateaux for a few years now... the first chapter seems to be fundamental to the model they are developing... from there they just sort of elaborate in a lot of different directions. the chapter about Nomad Science/State Science was an interesting one (aforementioned stuff about Metallurgy...)... don't have the book in hand now so i can't say precisely what the chapter is called, but i think it's fairly obvious.

as far as the whole Body Without Organs/Organs Without a Body thing goes... i think the basic point is to think of identity boundaries as having a lot of fluidity... affect (and other such energies) having the ability to traverse identities, forming and dissolving 'beings' of various constitutions. a lot of this stuff in and of itself wouldn't distinguish D & G from earlier thinkers, but these sorts of things do seem to form some kind of basis... part of the project seems to be taking on all sorts of different physical phenomena (thermodynamics, migratory patterns, an' good ole rhizomatic root systems) and applying them to questions of identity and other such philosophical concepts...

dunno, it's been a while since i've spent time directly with the feller, but i doubt i'll ever think outside of his massive shadow in my lifetime...
 

luka

Well-known member
i always got the impression that its carlos castenada for poseurs


not that i would stoop to actually reading the books
 

faustus

Well-known member
as far as the whole Body Without Organs/Organs Without a Body thing goes... i think the basic point is to think of identity boundaries as having a lot of fluidity... affect (and other such energies) having the ability to traverse identities, forming and dissolving 'beings' of various constitutions. a lot of this stuff in and of itself wouldn't distinguish D & G from earlier thinkers, but these sorts of things do seem to form some kind of basis... part of the project seems to be taking on all sorts of different physical phenomena (thermodynamics, migratory patterns, an' good ole rhizomatic root systems) and applying them to questions of identity and other such philosophical concepts...

i always thought the BwO was best understood in tandem with Foucault's stuff about how modern society/ disciplinary techniques have made the body 'organic' (in a bad way, functional)
 

josef k.

Dangerous Mystagogue
Tyler Durden: Did you know that if you mix equal parts of gasoline and frozen orange juice concentrate you can make napalm?
Narrator: No, I did not know that; is that true?
Tyler Durden: That's right... One could make all kinds of explosives, using simple household items.
Narrator: Really...?
Tyler Durden: If one were so inclined.
Narrator: Tyler, you are by far the most interesting single-serving friend I've ever met... see I have this thing: everything on a plane is single-serving...
Tyler Durden: Oh I get it, it's very clever.
Narrator: Thank you.
Tyler Durden: How's that working out for you?
Narrator: What?
Tyler Durden: Being clever.
Narrator: Great.
Tyler Durden: Keep it up then... Right up.
[Gets up from airplane seat]
Tyler Durden: Now a question of etiquette; as I pass, do I give you the ass or the crotch...?
 
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josef k.

Dangerous Mystagogue
The bewitchments of Zizek and Badiou is one factor... Their politics is more simple then his, more authoritarian, more macho, and ultimately less demanding. They encourage people to continue to be intellectuals, and they privilege the status of intellectuals... which Deleuze doesn't do. They are sources of hope for a new generation of academics looking to displace the incumbents, and they shore-up the claims of the radical academy to constitute the headquarters of militant politics - a status which had been contested by people like Deleuze and Lyotard. And Guattari, whose stock outside the academy intriguingly continues to rise.
 
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craner

Beast of Burden
That makes a lot of sense, I must say. Though I do agree with Zizek when he said that Guattari was a terrible influence on Deleuze...
 

josef k.

Dangerous Mystagogue
I cannot agree. Guattari was a beautiful man. After he died, the patients of the experimental clinic La Borde, where he worked, maintained a night of silence in honour of a man who had been a friend to them. Guattari also said:

Yes I believe that there is a multiple people, a people of mutants, a people of potentialities that appears and disappears, that is embodied in social events, literary events, and musical events. I'm often accused of being exaggeratedly, stupidly, stubbornly optimistic, and of not seeing people's wretchedness... I can see it, but... I don't know, perhaps I'm raving, but I think that we're in a period of productivity, proliferation, creation, utterly fabulous revolutions from the viewpoint of this emergence of a people. That's molecular revolution: it isn't a slogan or a program, it's something that I feel, that I live, in meetings, in institutions, in affects, and also through some reflections.
 

craner

Beast of Burden
I can see why all those nutcases where so fond of him. Cheers Felix!

I always thought there was a slight Felix and Oscar side to Deleuze and Guattari.

Have you read this book, by the way? Has anyone?

I have, I thought it was superb.
 
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