Download or read book The Revolt of the Spectacular Society written by Adam Weishaupt and published by Magus Books. This book was released on with total page 66 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 signalled the end of not just communism but also of capitalism. The removal of its dialectical Cold War enemy allowed capitalism to release the brakes and bring about an enormous transfer of wealth from the ordinary people to the privileged elite. It is estimated that the richest 400 Americans are worth as much as the 150 million poorest Americans! These figures spell doom for capitalism. The arrogance of the super rich now rivals that of the French aristocracy in 1789. The elite create a "Society of the Spectacle", full of images of perfection and of captivating, beguiling events staged on a monumental scale. The people, entranced, worship at the cathedrals of capitalism. The Situationist International, the Dada movement, the Futurists and the Punk rockers were all revolutionary groups of the twentieth century who opposed the ruling order. Has their time come again? The New World Order envisioned by the Pythagorean Illuminati is based on Meritocracy.

Download or read book Society Of The Spectacle written by Guy Debord and published by Bread and Circuses Publishing. This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Das Kapital of the 20th century,Society of the Spectacle is an essential text, and the main theoretical work of the Situationists. Few works of political and cultural theory have been as enduringly provocative. From its publication amid the social upheavals of the 1960's, in particular the May 1968 uprisings in France, up to the present day, with global capitalism seemingly staggering around in it’s Zombie end-phase, the volatile theses of this book have decisively transformed debates on the shape of modernity, capitalism, and everyday life in the late 20th century. This ‘Red and Black’ translation from 1977 is Introduced by Notting Hill armchair insurrectionary Tom Vague with a galloping time line and pop-situ verve, and given a more analytical over view by young upstart thinker Sam Cooper.

Download or read book The Society of the Spectacle written by Guy Debord and published by Unredacted Word. This book was released on 2021-04-01 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Debord describes and critiques the way we live. The power in these ideas lies in their ability to question, identify, and name the common assumptions of the present. Developing the concept of The Spectacle, he describes the “gaze” of contemporary society. From its publication just before, and ultimately influencing the May 1968 revolt in Paris and Occupy Wall Street, this book continues to transform a wide range of progressive philosophical and political movements, most notably anti-capitalism, postmodernism, marxism, and anarchism. This new translation brings a concrete edge to the text, elaborating upon the original, and adding annotations. Bringing fifty years of prominent radical thinking back to the text, from Baudrillard to Odell to Zuboff—it’s clear that Debords’ book is more relevant in the era of social media, the attention economy, and the emergence of Surveillance Capitalism than ever before.

Download or read book The Society of the Spectacle written by Guy Debord and published by PM Press. This book was released on 2024-09-03 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Society of the Spectacle is a carefully considered effort to clarify the most fundamental tendencies and contradictions of the society in which we find ourselves—in order to facilitate its overthrow. Guy Debord was the founder of the Situationist International, the notorious avant-garde group that helped trigger the May 1968 revolt in France, which brought the entire country to a standstill for several weeks. His book The Society of the Spectacle, originally published in Paris in 1967, has been translated into more than twenty other languages and is arguably the most important radical work of the twentieth century. Ken Knabb’s meticulous new translation is the first edition in any language to include extensive annotations, clarifying the historical allusions and revealing the sources of Debord’s quotations and “détournements.” Contrary to popular misconceptions, Debord’s book is neither an ivory tower “philosophical” discourse nor a mere expression of “protest.” This makes the book more of a challenge, but it is also why it remains so pertinent more than half a century after its original publication, while countless other social theories and intellectual fads have come and gone. It has, in fact, become even more pertinent than ever, because the spectacle has become more all-pervading and glaringly obvious than ever. As Debord noted in his follow-up work, Comments on the Society of the Spectacle (1988), “spectacular domination has succeeded in raising an entire generation molded to its laws.” Debord’s book remains the best guidebook to understanding that mold and breaking it.

Download or read book Comments on the Society of the Spectacle written by Guy Debord and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2020-05-05 with total page 77 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1967, Guy Debord's stinging revolutionary critique ofcontemporary society, The Society of the Spectacle has since acquired acult status. Credited by many as being the inspiration for the ideasgenerated by the events of May 1968 in France, Debord's pitiless attackon commodity fetishism and its incrustation in the practices of everydaylife continues to burn brightly in today's age of satellite televisionand the soundbite. In Comments on the Society of the Spectacle, publishedtwenty years later, Debord returned to the themes of his previousanalysis and demonstrated how they were all the more relevant in aperiod when the "integrated spectacle" was dominant. Resolutely refusingto be reconciled to the system, Debord trenchantly slices through thedoxa and mystification offered tip by journalists and pundits to showhow aspects of reality as diverse as terrorism and the environment, theMafia and the media, were caught up in the logic of the spectacularsociety. Pointing the finger clearly at those who benefit from the logicof domination, Debord's Comments convey the revolutionary impulse atthe heart of situationism.

Download or read book Revolt Revolution Critique written by Bulent Diken and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-03-15 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In contemporary society the idea of ‘revolution’ seems to have become obsolete. What is more untimely than the idea of revolution today? At the same time, however, the idea of radical change no longer refers to exceptional circumstances but has become normalized as part of daily life. Ours is a ‘culture’ of permanent revolution in which constant systemic disembedding demands a meta-stable subjectivity in continuous transformation. In this sense, the idea of revolution is painfully timely. This paradoxical coincidence, the simultaneous absence and presence of the desire for radical change in contemporary society, is the point of departure for the symptomatic reading this book offers. The book addresses the social, political and cultural significance of revolt and revolution in three dimensions. First, it analyzes revolt and revolution as ‘events’ which are of history but not reducible to it. Second, it elaborates on theories that grant revolt and revolution a central place in their structure. Thirdly, it discusses revolutionary or emancipatory theories that seek to participate in radical change. Further, since both revolt and revolution involve the critique of what exists, of actual reality, the implications of the intimate relationship between revolt, revolution and critique are explicated.

Download or read book Artistic Utopias of Revolt written by Julia Ramírez Blanco and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-03-13 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book analyses the aesthetic and utopian dimensions of various activist social movements in Western Europe since 1989. Through a series of case studies, it demonstrates how dreams of a better society have manifested themselves in contexts of political confrontation, and how artistic forms have provided a language to express the collective desire for social change. The study begins with the 1993 occupation of Claremont Road in east London, an attempt to prevent the demolition of homes to make room for a new motorway. In a squatted row of houses, all available space was transformed and filled with elements that were both aesthetic and defensive – so when the authorities arrived to evict the protestors, sculptures were turned into barricades. At the end of the decade, this kind of performative celebration merged with the practices of the antiglobalisation movement, where activists staged spectacular parallel events alongside the global elite’s international meetings. As this book shows, social movements try to erase the distance that separates reality and political desire, turning ordinary people into creators of utopias. Squatted houses, carnivalesque street parties, counter-summits, and camps in central squares, all create a physical place of these utopian visions

Download or read book Public Secrets written by Ken Knabb and published by . This book was released on 1997 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The greatest hits, and a fine read for anyone interested in situationist ideas, anarchism, the 60s counterculture and beyond. Includes both two substantial new texts - 'The Joy Of Revolution' and 'Autobiography,' and reprints of all his old pamphlets, co-authored work, and translations of various situationist texts. A veritable treasure trove of pamphlets, texts, posters, comics, articles, leaflets and essays. Over 400 pages, and every one is a winner!

Download or read book An Essay on Liberation written by Herbert Marcuse and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 1971-06-01 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this concise and startling book, the author of One-Dimensional Man argues that the time for utopian speculation has come. Marcuse argues that the traditional conceptions of human freedom have been rendered obsolete by the development of advanced industrial society. Social theory can no longer content itself with repeating the formula, "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," but must now investigate the nature of human needs themselves. Marcuse's claim is that even if production were controlled and determined by the workers, society would still be repressive—unless the workers themselves had the needs and aspirations of free men. Ranging from philosophical anthropology to aesthetics An Essay on Liberation attempts to outline—in a highly speculative and tentative fashion—the new possibilities for human liberation. TheEssay contains the following chapters: A Biological Foundation for Socialism?, The New Sensibility, Subverting Forces—in Transition, and Solidarity.

Download or read book Spectacular Capitalism written by Richard Gilman-Opalsky and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Literary Nonfiction. Philosophy & Critical Theory. Despite recent crises in the financial system, uprisings in Greece; France; Tunisia; and Bolivia, worldwide decline of faith in neoliberal trade policies, deepening ecological catastrophes, and global deficits of realized democracy, we still live in an era of "spectacular capitalism." But what is "spectacular capitalism?" Spectacular capitalism is the dominant mythology of capitalism that disguises its internal logic and denies the macroeconomic reality of the actually existing capitalist world. Taking on this elusive mythology, and those who too easily accept it, Richard Gilman-Opalsky exposes the manipulative and self-serving narrative of spectacular capitalism. Drawing on the work of Guy Debord, Gilman-Opalsky argues that the theory of practice and practice of theory are superseded by upheavals that do the work of philosophy.

Download or read book The Political Economy of the Spectacle and Postmodern Caste written by John Asimakopoulos and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-10-01 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Political Economy of the Spectacle and Postmodern Caste, John Asimakopoulos analyzes the political economy of the spectacle conceptualized by philosophers like Guy Debord through a broad interdisciplinary-nonsectarian approach concluding every society is a caste system legitimized by ideology.

Download or read book The Revolt of the Whip written by Joseph Love and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2012-05-16 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This short book brings to life a unique and spectacular set of events in Latin American history. In November 1910, shortly after the inauguration of Brazilian President Hermes da Fonseca, ordinary sailors killed several officers and seized control of major new combat vessels, including two of the most powerful battleships ever produced, and commenced bombing Rio de Janeiro. The mutineers, led by an Afro-Brazilian and mostly black themselves, demanded greater rights—above all the abolition of flogging in the Brazilian navy, the last Western navy to tolerate it. This form of torture was closely associated in the sailors' minds with slavery, which had only been prohibited in Brazil in 1888. These events and the scandals that followed initiated a sustained debate about the role of race and class in Brazilian society and the extent to which Brazil could claim to be a modern nation. The commemoration of the centenary of the mutiny in 2010 saw the country still divided about the meaning of the Revolt of the Whip.

Download or read book Leaving the 20th Century written by Christopher Gray and published by Bread and Circuses Publishing. This book was released on 2014-09-09 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first Situationist text to be published in the UK in 1974, ‘Leaving the 20th Century’ was Chris Gray and the English situationists’ attempt to capture and distil the vibrant anti-art, anti-capitalist energy of the original International Situationist texts (1957-74). With its loose translations and irreverent commentary, Gray and co. attempted to capture the “terrorism, wit and general megalomania” of the original publications, whilst faithfully reprinting the “photographs of girls, soldiers, bombings, comic-strip frames, maps of cities and diagrams of labyrinths, cathedrals and gardens.” From the art/anti-art beginnings, to the role of the Situationists in the worker-student insurrection of May 68’, ‘Leaving the 20th Century’ remains the definitive English pro-situ text.

Download or read book Reason in Revolt written by Alan Woods and published by Wellred Books. This book was released on 2015-12-15 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The achievements of science and technology during the past century are unparalleled in history. They provide the potential for the solution to all the problems faced by the planet, and equally for its total destruction. Allegedly scientific theories are being used to "prove" that criminality is caused, not by social conditions, but by a "criminal gene". Black people are alleged to be disadvantaged, not because of discrimination, but because of their genetic make-up. Of course, such "science" is highly convenient to right-wing politicians intent on ruthlessly cutting welfare. In the field of theoretical physics and cosmology there is a growing tendency towards mysticism. The "Big Bang" theory of the origin of the universe is being used to justify the existence of a Creator, as in the book of Genesis . For the first time in centuries, science appears to lend credence to religious obscurantism. Yet this is only one side of the story.

Download or read book The Collapse of Complex Societies written by Joseph Tainter and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1988 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dr Tainter describes nearly two dozen cases of collapse and reviews more than 2000 years of explanations. He then develops a new and far-reaching theory.

Download or read book Guy Debord and the Situationist International written by Tom McDonough and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2004-02-27 with total page 524 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critical texts, translations, documents, and photographs on the work of the Situationist International. This volume is a revised and expanded version of a special issue of the journal October (Winter 1997) that was devoted to the work of the Situationist International (SI). The first section of the issue contained previously unpublished critical texts, and the second section contained translations of primary texts that had previously been unavailable in English. The emphasis was on the SI's profound engagement with the art and cultural politics of their time (1957-1972), with a strong argument for their primarily political and activist stance by two former members of the group, T. J. Clark and Donald Nicholson-Smith. Guy Debord and the Situationist International supplements both sections. It reprints important, hard to find essays by Giorgio Agamben, Libero Andreotti, Jonathan Crary, Thomas Y. Levin, Greil Marcus, and Tom McDonough and doubles the number of translations of primary texts, which now encompass a broader and more representative range of the SI's writings on culture and language. In a field still dominated by hagiography, the critical texts were selected for their willingness to confront critically the history and legacy of the SI. They examine the group within the broader framework of the historical and neo-avant-gardes and, beyond that, the postwar world in general. The translations trace the SI's reflections on the legacy of the avant-garde in art and architecture, particularly on the linguistic and spatial significance of montage aesthetics. Many of the translated works are by Guy Debord (1932-1994), the impresario of the SI, especially known for his book The Society of the Spectacle.

Download or read book The Beach Beneath the Street written by McKenzie Wark and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2015-05-05 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over fifty years after the Situationist International appeared, its legacy continues to inspire activists, artists and theorists around the world. Such a legend has accrued to this movement that the story of the SI now demands to be told in a contemporary voice capable of putting it into the context of twenty-first-century struggles. McKenzie Wark delves into the Situationists’ unacknowledged diversity, revealing a world as rich in practice as it is in theory. Tracing the group’s development from the bohemian Paris of the ’50s to the explosive days of May ’68, Wark’s take on the Situationists is biographically and historically rich, presenting the group as an ensemble creation, rather than the brainchild and dominion of its most famous member, Guy Debord. Roaming through Europe and the lives of those who made up the movement – including Constant, Asger Jorn, Michèle Bernstein, Alex Trocchi and Jacqueline De Jong – Wark uncovers an international movement riven with conflicting passions. Accessible to those who have only just discovered the Situationists and filled with new insights, The Beach Beneath the Street rereads the group’s history in the light of our contemporary experience of communications, architecture, and everyday life. The Situationists tried to escape the world of twentieth-century spectacle and failed in the attempt. Wark argues that they may still help us to escape the twenty-first century, while we still can.