[Xmca-l] Re: a linguist and a child on D. Trump

[Greg Thompson]

Alfredo,
I wonder if Latour isn't missing something in between the helplessness of
those who don't benefit from it and the immense enthusiasm of those who do,
particularly in the U.S. I'm thinking in particular of the Joe The Plumber
types. For those who don't recall, Joe the Plumber was a side-show of the
McCain-Obama election, he was a partly out of work plumber who was
vehemently opposed to Obama's proposal to increase taxes on those making
more than $200,000 because even though, at that point, he was only making
$40,000 or so, he imagined that some day he'd be making lots more and that
he didn't want the government taking his money. This is to say that in the
U.S., there is a kind of affect that attaches to "capitalism" itself. A
fetish of sorts.
Not sure if any other U.S.-based folks see this interplay of ideology and
affect?
-greg



On Mon, Jul 10, 2017 at 1:07 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>
wrote:

> Carol, interesting that you mention feeling 'helpless' as a best way to
> describe how many of us feel. This, along with Andy's mention of the type
> of perezhivanija that he was expecting would have emerged among trumpists
> but didn't, made me wonder if one good way to try to make sense of this
> non-sense (as Greg describes it) would be to analyse the situation in terms
> of the 'types of affects' that relate to the present economico,
> environmental and political situation. This sort of analysis is what Bruno
> Latour has done with respect to capitalism. The article can be downloaded
> here:
> http://www.bruno-latour.fr/sites/default/files/136-
> AFFECTS-OF-K-COPENHAGUE.pdf
>
> In the article, he writes, 'I will take *capitalism* to mean not a thing
> in the world, but a certain way of being affected'. So, could we try to
> analyse what the current politico-economical situation is that surrounds
> 'trumpism' in terms of the affects it generates. Helplessness was indeed
> one of the affects Latour identifies with respect to capitalism. He starts
> with the idea that
>
> 'one of the *affects of capitalism*, that is, of *thinking* in terms of
> capitalism, is to generate for most of people who don't benefit from its
> wealth a feeling of helplessness and for a few people who benefits from it
> an immense enthusiasm together with a dumbness of the senses'
>
> Which definition of this sort would be appropriate for the situation
> today? Perhaps this one would actually work?
> Alfredo
> ________________________________________
> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> on behalf of Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com>
> Sent: 10 July 2017 12:56
> To: Andy Blunden; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: a linguist and a child on D. Trump
>
> That would be the vice-President!
>
> I think Trump enjoyed being the fly in the ointment at G20, and then ...
> offered to work jointly with Russia on cyber security. And now we hear that
> his son went to a meeting with a Russian because he believed they had some
> damaging information on Clinton.
>
> Alfredo I think lots of us are feeling 'enfadado' -- but rather helpless
> with it too.
>
> Carol
>
> On 8 July 2017 at 11:43, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>
> > I was thinking ... does the US system allow for the appointment of a
> > Regent?
> >
> > andy
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > Andy Blunden
> > http://home.mira.net/~andy
> > http://www.brill.com/products/book/origins-collective-decision-making
> > On 8/07/2017 7:40 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
> >
> >> We've been perplexed (some may say horrified) by Trump's speech in this
> >> list before, as many others in the media have. A linguist in the
> Washington
> >> post (see link below) comments on this and notes how Trump's speech
> sounds
> >> like (American) everyday speech, like he 'could be a family member or a
> >> friend'. She also notes his use of hyperbolic verbal and gestural
> devices.
> >> ??I was watching the video and my two-years old daughter passed by and
> saw
> >> Trump talking. Pointing at him, my daughter said, 'enfadado' ('angry' in
> >> Spanish). Honestly, I am glad that not many of my family members or
> friends
> >> sound like that, even the American ones!
> >>
> >>
> >> https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/this-linguist-
> >> studied-the-way-trump-speaks-for-two-years-heres-what-she-
> >> found/2017/07/07/12f310c6-627d-11e7-80a2-8c226031ac3f_video.html
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
>
>
> --
> Carol A Macdonald Ph.D (Edin)
> Cultural Historical Activity Theory
> Honorary Research Fellow: Department of Linguistics, Unisa
> alternative email address: tmacdoca@unisa.ac.za
>



-- 
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson