Re: [microsound] Dusted - Dust Theories 2 .. Alchemical Residues

["tobias c. van Veen" <tobias@xxxxxxxxx>]

> So even if A, B, & C were true, the dichotomy of organic/inorganic would
> not hold.

I was confused until I got to the end, at which point I agree, although the
dichotomy *does* hold, in situation after situation (a dichotomy that relie=
s
upon a history demarcated here in a trinary, no less), through power, a
certain erasure, a monohistorical record, etc.. (Perhaps it was just me, bu=
t
it was a little unclear--perhaps this was tactical--as to who was positing
the various distinctions).

Otherwise, everything else to me seems very doubtful, & open to questioning=
..
and constructed under a paradigm of thought that deserves a round of
investigation, as you satirize yourself when you mention 'black fags' (in
what is obviously a satirical way, to satirize, almost violently, a
generalisation of music journalism, almost a genre, in fact--but what is
this 'genre' but a marker of a larger, more ubiquitous discourse, the
crosses from the fine arts to the pop arts and beyond?), along with a host
of other terms, divisions, The Postal Service, and so on, all that bend to =
a
certain, essentialist term of the 'organic'. What is interesting about the
terms 'hot' and 'cold', the temperate distinctions, is that they already
presuppose a body, this being especially interesting when various parties,
music journalists or theorists or musicmakers, are trying to erase the
body's flesh.

Distinction B is especially abhorrent.

In a recent article I wrote for FUSE magazine, I trace some of the lines of
what is categorised here as A, B and C in Canadian funding schemas for
experimental music (by this I mean the funding available for Cdn artists
through the Canada Council for the Arts, a state arts body). Although the
word was never once mentioned in the article, the description of the articl=
e
by my Editor names what perhaps I would not wish to name, for reasons
rigorous and polemical, but others might-- racism.

Here's the descriptor, not written by me, of this piece:

"tobias c. van Veen traces the racist contours of an aporia in arts bodies=B9
understanding of, and funding for, house and techno music."

< http://www.fusemagazine.org/launch.htm >

I'm not sure I can subscribe to 'racist contours', as I don't think the
Canada Council are 'racists'; 'contours' here will have to play a strong
role, a pivoting role, to peg 'racism'. But nonetheless, certain paradigms
of power around the subscription to rhythm and bodysound, by the dominant
discourses (and financial institutions) in the Western arts, continue to
create a divide not only of the organic/inorganic, but what is organic-to
'high art' (and thus 'Art') and its opposite, the 'inorganic' dancing-body,
the low-arts, pop-arts, and so on .. and this is carried not only on a leve=
l
of (how can I say this?) 'people who spend a lot of time thinking about thi=
s
shit', ie, 'intellectuals', but is prevalent throughout our own DiY
fractions of popular culture. All you have to do is check a copy of Grooves=
,
or read the violence so prevalent here, on this mailing list (but again:
this pertains to a certain culture of writing, in general, as well as
mailing list culture and its history--this speaks to larger issues, then:
technology, the body, sound, media, teletechnologies, writing, power, race,
music, arts, histories, networks .. ).

Thanks Ben, for this piece.

tobias

tobias c. van Veen -----------
http://www.quadrantcrossing.org
http://www.thisistheonlyart.com
--- tobias@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
---McGill Communications------
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