Last Post

I feel the need to add a tiny conclusion to our deliberations in this course. So here goes.

You are not the children of revolutionaries. You are the children of neo-liberalist thought. This thought emancipates primarily the individual along with and along side late capitalist commerce. The problems this commerce faces are all too clear for us (especially presently in the universities, but also re: climate change, global inequalities etc) but strangely, because the essence of this clever game requires it is essential you never see a problem with it; that you read the Sun, that you shop cheap at Tescos; that X Factor is excellent entertainment, that university is a ticket for a job (and if that is the process, education actually disappears) in short that you never run into the horrors of ideological struggle, you will not, never, confront the real.

I've just watched Matt Cardle's Christmas video, and as if by perfect example, despite the programs essential qualities 'those of enabling the individual' ('It means so much!!') it is actually a pean to the show itself, now a commercial media giant. Matt is no longer, in any sense, himself.

As we have progressed and especially when you get to indulge yourselves in Dos Passos some more, I hope you will realize a certain loss involved in this process, a certain concern for the nature of struggle, and also some of the absolute drama of modernity, and it's inevitable challenges as we discover that 'all thats solid melts in to air'.

Your hand-in date for your hardcopy weekly blogs and some kind of extended conclusion is Friday 28th January to the school office. Any problems, e-mail me.

Seasons Greetings and Thanks.

Paul

Final Session

Really sorry to be so long in posting this image, but you all have the idea by now I hope. This big book is truly amazing, so if you think you've bought a pup, forget it. Some of you will notice it's extraordinary structure, and hopefully enjoy it. It really is a sublime piece of commentary on 'Modernity' (our purpose) and when I first read it, in a cottage in Ireland in the middle of nowhere, Julie couldn't believe I'd 'got it' in less than a week. You have to dip in to this thing, not read it like Tolstoy. If you are under pressure elsewhere then 'save it for later' as they say. Just for now read the chapters 'Tin Lizzie' (Thin Lizzy?!-sic) Architect (FLW) and finally 'The Bitter Drink'. The final one really tells you what happens when you take things seriously.

I'm looking forward to Friday's last session, I hope you will drag your hangovers from the school party to the session for some mental nourishment.

Thank you for being a very engaging group of students. Remember nothing can be resolved, only continual effort in everyday life to do the right thing, and also, above all, understand that 'Theory fucks you up' and that it's good for you!

luv

Paul

Session Friday 10th December

This week we'll take welcome relief by watching this extraordinary film. But we'll be starting early at 1pm. Bring your popcorn.

Session Friday 3rd December

The chapters on Faust are what I want you to read from this book this week. This is a standard text for a wide variety of post-graduate students and so I recommend you buy it. I'm not saying the information you glean from it will make life easy, but I was at dinner last night with a very bright fellow who began talking about a chapter in there that I had not even read! It's that kind of book. Old New York Marxists, you gotta lov'em.

Session Friday 26th

The novel you should read for this week's session is the sardonic appreciation of modernism via Evelyn Waugh. It's a good read and should be easily available from almost any library. It's obviously not the most obvious of theoretical texts, but you need to get inside the mind of Le Corbusier somehow. Thats what the session will be about.

Session 6th Nov

The reading this week is from Henri Lefebvre's volume 'The Production of Space' the chapter being 'Social Space'. This piece usually causes some brains to wrack but this is a useful process.

Getting hold of the book maybe problematic for you but I shall be making copies on Monday and suggest you stop by my office K316 to pick up a copy.

Session 5

This is your reading for next week's session, easily available via the internet. However I would also like you to have a working knowledge of William S Burroughs 'The Job' and another writer I may well refer to is JG Ballard, whose novel 'High Rise' is significant.