Comparative Form and Culture

This course comparatively explores the relation between globalization and various forms of cultural expression. How has capitalism and its corresponding technological development effected us culturally? We will consider the problem of modernity in Walter Benjamin's (German) work on the Paris Arcades of the 19th century, and compare this with the architecture of Las Vegas in the 20th and 21st centuries, and with the recent work of Celeste Olalquiaga (Chile) on kitsch. We will read writings on music from John Cage, Chris Cutler, Christian Marclay, John Oswald, Paul D. Miller, Jacques Attali, Kodwo Eshun, and others, study mixing, sampling, DJ culture, and copyright law, and think seriously about how technological development has changed not only the ways we make music, but what we take music to be. We will read a work on the bicycle as a cultural machine (Raunig), a work on the culture of contemporary capitalism (Fisher), consider a Disney film in relation to modernism/modernity (Return to Oz), study language as something pragmatic (i.e. bound-up with action), read the short stories of Franz Kafka (Czech) with the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari (France). We will compare the cinema of Tsai Ming-Liang (Taiwan) with the work of Walter Benjamin and think glam rock (Velvet Goldmine) in relation to the problems of modernism/modernity. We will think seriously in this course about the relation between capitalism, technology, and culture in relation to such forms as music, art, architecture, film, philosophy, and literature.

Images from left to right: "The Ermines Tea Party" (animal comicality by Hermann Plocquet from exhibit at The Crystal Palace); Las Vegas (photo by R. Thomas); John Cage score; Gerhard Richter, from Life with Pop: A Demonstration of Capitalist Realism; The Crystal Palace, built in 1851. Inset: Paul Klee, "Angelus Novus" (1920).