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Hauntology

Vasilisa

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Hauntology: A not-so-new critical manifestation
The new vogue in literary theory is shot through with earlier ideas
by Andrew Gallix
17 June 2011
guardian.co.uk

Excerpt:
In the original French, "hauntology" sounds almost identical to "ontology", a concept it haunts by replacing - in the words of Colin Davis - "the priority of being and presence with the figure of the ghost as that which is neither present, nor absent, neither dead nor alive".

Today, hauntology inspires many fields of investigation, from the visual arts to philosophy through electronic music, politics, fiction and literary criticism. At its most basic level, it ties in with the popularity of faux-vintage photography, abandoned spaces and TV series like Life on Mars. Mark Fisher – whose forthcoming Ghosts of My Life (Zer0 Books) focuses primarily on hauntology as the manifestation of a specific "cultural moment" – acknowledges that "There's a hauntological dimension to many different aspects of culture; in fact, in Moses and Monotheism, Freud practically argues that society as such is founded on a hauntological basis: "the voice of the dead father". When you come to think of it, all forms of representation are ghostly. Works of art are haunted, not only by the ideal forms of which they are imperfect instantiations, but also by what escapes representation. See, for instance, Borges's longing to capture in verse the "other tiger, that which is not in verse". Or Maurice Blanchot, who outlines what could be described as a hauntological take on literature as "the eternal torment of our language, when its longing turns back toward what it always misses". Julian Wolfrey argues in Victorian Hauntings (2002) that "to tell a story is always to invoke ghosts, to open a space through which something other returns" so that "all stories are, more or less, ghost stories" and all fiction is, more or less, hauntological. The best novels, according to Gabriel Josipovici, share a "sense of density of other worlds suggested but lying beyond words". For the reader or critic, the mystery of literature is the opacity – the irreducible remainder – at the heart of writing that can never be completely interpreted away. The whole western literary tradition itself is founded on the notion of posterity, which Paul Eluard described as the "harsh desire to endure" through one's works. And then, of course, there's the death of the author ... All this, as you can see, could go on for quite a while, so perhaps we should wonder if the concept does not just mean all things to all (wo)men. Steen Christiansen, who is writing a book on the subject, explains that "hauntology bleeds into the fields of postmodernism, metafiction and retro-futurism and that there is no clear distinction – that would go against the tension which hauntology aims at".

As a reflection of the zeitgeist, hauntology is, above all, the product of a time which is seriously "out of joint" (Hamlet is one of Derrida's crucial points of reference in Spectres of Marx). There is a prevailing sense among hauntologists that culture has lost its momentum and that we are all stuck at the "end of history". Meanwhile, new technologies are dislocating more traditional notions of time and place. Smartphones, for instance, encourage us never to fully commit to the here and now, fostering a ghostly presence-absence. Internet time (which is increasingly replacing clock time) results in a kind of "non-time" that goes hand in hand with Marc Augé's non-places. Perhaps even more crucially, the web has brought about a "crisis of overavailability" that, in effect, signifies the "loss of loss itself": nothing dies any more, everything "comes back on YouTube or as a box set retrospective" like the looping, repetitive time of trauma (Fisher). This is why "retromania" has reached fever pitch in recent years, as Simon Reynolds demonstrates in his new book - a methodical dissection of "pop culture's addiction to its own past".

Hauntology is not just a symptom of the times, though: it is itself haunted by a nostalgia for all our lost futures.


< full article >

 
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SilkRoad

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Oh, I like this! I may be off the mark, but to me what it's saying is that anything in the field of human endeavour or experience carries all the related burdens of the past, as well as the Platonic ideal that only appears in a corrupt and imperfect form.

There is nothing new under the sun...
 

Vasilisa

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I'm don't pretend that I am versed in philosophy. But this piece seemed interesting to me merely because I have been thinking on ideas related to this in the cultural and entertainment realm: all the nostalgia mining in Hollywood films, those faux vintage photography filters, retro fashion by hipsters, social networking and "the larger trend of our viewing the present as increasingly a potentially documented past.", people being less present generally.

< An Elixir of Reminding >
This is the immediacy of experience principle. If you didn’t see it, it didn’t happen.

This is what is becoming in the world: the acceptance, only, of lived experience. I did not hear it if it did not scrobble, I did not see it if it’s not on Flickr, I did not say it if it is unpublished. Without Foursquare, I am not even there.

Because of the network, our lived experience now encompasses everything: hence Network Realism. The All-Seeing Eye. The shared electronic consciousness, endlessly proliferating.

We’re repeatedly told that computers’ memories are better than ours, that Facebook photos will ruin our future careers, that our youthful indiscretions will last for a thousand years in the mind of the network. And so we give up our memories to the machines, endlessly feeding them with our thoughts and our experiences, hoping, desperately, to preserve them. Attempting to defy death.​

< The Faux Vintage Photo >
What I want to argue is that the rise of the faux-vintage photo is an attempt to create a sort of “nostalgia for the present,” an attempt to make our photos seem more important, substantial and real. We want to endow the powerful feelings associated with nostalgia to our lives in the present. And, ultimately, all of this goes well beyond the faux-vintage photo; the momentary popularity of the Hipstamatic-style photo serves to highlight the larger trend of our viewing the present as increasingly a potentially documented past. In fact, the phrase “nostalgia for the present” is borrowed from the great philosopher of postmodernism, Fredric Jameson, who states that “we draw back from our immersion in the here and now [...] and grasp it as a kind of thing.”​


see also: INFJs and Nostalgia

When someone has lots of pictures of themselves in their house
 

SilkRoad

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It's all very...over-conscious, in a way... I was on holiday last year and with one of my friends we realised we kept saying "this would make a great Facebook profile picture." Had to laugh at ourselves in a way. Just live in the moment and stop thinking about how good you're going to look on Facebook!

I find the faux vintage photo thing kind of weird, wasn't everyone so overjoyed when we no longer needed film to take pictures? And now everyone seems to be manipulating their digital photos to make them look retro and film-like.

It seems like a superficial way to acknowledge the past and the burden of history. I really do think we are haunted by the burden of history but in a more meaningful way than faux vintage and hipster fashion.

I'm no philosopher either but I think it's interesting. ;)
 

bunnyhighbrow

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Reminds me of a Kilgore Trout novel, where there are so many art masterpieces that they have more of them than they do rubbish, and they aren't worth anything, and generally clash together. Only the writer did miss a part: the part where every single person gets their ideal work of art to appreciate.

SilkRoad: on a meaningful way of expressing the tension between past and present, have you seen the film 'Sunless'?
 

SilkRoad

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Reminds me of a Kilgore Trout novel, where there are so many art masterpieces that they have more of them than they do rubbish, and they aren't worth anything, and generally clash together. Only the writer did miss a part: the part where every single person gets their ideal work of art to appreciate.

SilkRoad: on a meaningful way of expressing the tension between past and present, have you seen the film 'Sunless'?

I haven't seen that film, what is it about? :)
 

NegativeZero

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Post-modernism redux? Seriously, this shit is STUPID. Don't worry, I'm not calling onlookers stupid for reading about it or being interested, but this one of those dupes that attracts non-philosophers into pseudo-philosophy.

At least they belong there...
 

Octarine

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The article is a bit difficult to penetrate isn't it....
I think the persistence of hauntological concepts is still due to them being evoked as a natural reaction to continued change in the world.

It's not just concepts like Marx's 'utopian revolution', we still evoke concepts dating back to our earliest written histories, even if they have been made 'obsolete' by modern ideas.

I don't buy the whole 'end of history' argument though (I am just as likely to buy a 'start of history' argument), so I don't envisage a future society that is entirely preoccupied with the past.
 

Vasilisa

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Post-modernism redux? Seriously, this shit is STUPID. Don't worry, I'm not calling onlookers stupid for reading about it or being interested, but this one of those dupes that attracts non-philosophers into pseudo-philosophy.

At least they belong there...

I deliberately put it in the arts section because its something I relate to easier and thats what interests me.
 
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violaine

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I think it's interesting to think about, and it gives form to a loose collection of observations I've had myself. Thanks for posting Vasilisa, I'll be reflecting on things through this lens. (The shortcomings of language, in particular, English has really intrigued me for quite some time... I studied Japanese and there are concepts inherent in their words and writing that convey deeper meaning. As is also the case with what I know of Maya hieroglyphs. I've often mourned what I think of as the single-dimensionality of English. Though, I've had other competing thoughts around that but won't go into them.)

It's seems we are awash with the refrains of history. We all have access to so much historical information now, that there are many timelines and experiences to absorb. Our present is inundated. I'm reminded of the idea of the value of learning from history, but it's interesting to think about the possible effects of historical events living long past when they might have, were they not preserved so well for future generations. (Hmm, thinking...)

I think it's a reach though to ascribe the use of things such as facebook to the preservation of self for posterity or a means to ward off death. It may be on that continuum, in that I think of it as a way to ward off a feeling of irrelevancy, and a way to satisfy urges for attention. Or socializing. Not bad things, just not as lofty.

I think our avatar/internet selves can take on a life of their own that is quite seductive though and may be preferable to real life existence for many at some future time.
 

bunnyhighbrow

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I haven't seen that film, what is it about? :)

A kind of falsified documentary about the straying thoughts of a traveller in far off places. Read out over 90 minutes to a strange, but compelling arrangement of footage gathered in relation to the writing. I can't actually remember any points that the narration contained, but that wasn't the point of it ^^. I remember being inspired at distinct times in a very Ne kind of way, just like violaine described above.
 

NegativeZero

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Care to explain pseudo-philosophy?

The concept is self-explanatory: philosophy that tries to seem insightful and analytical, but really doesn't pertain to philosophy in its content. It's possible to be philosophical or to have a philosophical interpretation of something, but that doesn't necessarily make it a form or branch of philosophy, or even making it worthy of the term.

According to the Wikipedia page, it's a philosophy of history that is somewhat related to "non-places" and brings in its concept of non-time. I just don't think it's all that profound or poignant. If you really want to defend this concept, go ahead.

BTW, just for good measure, from the Wiki page: "The idea of hauntology has been criticised by a number of philosophers..." Also, no one likes Derrida. Fact.
 

Red Herring

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The concept is self-explanatory: philosophy that tries to seem insightful and analytical, but really doesn't pertain to philosophy in its content. It's possible to be philosophical or to have a philosophical interpretation of something, but that doesn't necessarily make it a form or branch of philosophy, or even making it worthy of the term.

That's still too fuzzy for me. Sounds like it all comes down to conventions or personal taste. Wasn't the question what the backside of the moon looks like once considered a philosophical question (in the sense of not answerable in an empirical manner)? Also, you define pseudo-philosophy as philosophy that isn't philosophy...shouldn't it be something other than philosophy posing as philosophy?
That is, what specific criteria have to be fulfilled in your opinion for a concept or discipline to deserve the label?


According to the Wikipedia page, it's a philosophy of history that is somewhat related to "non-places" and brings in its concept of non-time. I just don't think it's all that profound or poignant. If you really want to defend this concept, go ahead.

Ha ha, oh no. I find it mildly interesting but am not invested in it and have no intention of defending it. I have just met a few too many snobby philosophy PhD students who IRL who are very touchy about what is or isn't kosher and who has a licence to even talk about certain things (which seems to go against the grain of what philosophy was and is supposed to be!). So I developed a certain degree of allergy against that. Academic severity and rigor are important and have their place. Snobbism and reflex-like dismissal of ideas is something else.

BTW, just for good measure, from the Wiki page: "The idea of hauntology has been criticised by a number of philosophers..." Also, no one likes Derrida. Fact.

See above. As for Derrida...you might be right. I even heard a guest lecture of his once. Everybody went "omg, god is coming!" (a bit like Zizek coming into town years later, but he's much more fun :D). Let's just say I found him very hard to digest, but maybe that's just me and my limited faculties.
 

NegativeZero

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Sorry if I came off as snobby or pretentious. I have a bad habit of doing that when I doubt someone's good faith within comments or question (which I always do, at least initially).

That is, what specific criteria have to be fulfilled in your opinion for a concept or discipline to deserve the label?

My criteria for this is actually simple: not germane to philosophy and its branches and various sub-branches (metaphysics, aesthetics, ethics, logic, epistemology, constructivism, ontology, utilitarianism, deontology, etc). Its treatment of whatever subject it involves, in this case is history, is typically shallow and unfounded. Whether or not it's philosophy that isn't philosophy or something that tries to be philosophy but isn't is just a bunch of semantics. I'd rather debate content over definitions.

Academic severity and rigor are important and have their place. Snobbism and reflex-like dismissal of ideas is something else.

Sure, I have a knee-jerk reaction to these sort of things. Is that a lack of charity on my part? I don't know, maybe. I can tell you that I don't typically react like this when presented with substantial reasoning and/or strong explanatory power.

Let's just say I found him very hard to digest, but maybe that's just me and my limited faculties.

I haven't read much technical philosophy, but from what I have read, it's all hard to digest. Don't worry, I'm sure your faculties are plentiful. :) Most philosophers are densely magniloquent to the point of producing baffling batshit that defeats their initial purpose which is clarity and precision. Kant comes to mind. I needed paraphrases to understand any of his concepts. I also think a good amount of philosophers are rather unskilled writers, but that's my opinion. I would actually not recommend reading much technical philosophy at first; settle for analytical essays or interpretations. Not aimed at you, but just in general. I feel like it's too time consuming when a lot of philosophy can be summed up well in like >10 pages.

Off-topic, I thought this was going to be related to parapsychology just based off of "haunt." Parapsychology is a far more interesting discipline, I have to admit.
 
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