Next CCT Event

An evening of beer, philosophy, discussion, art, and music – not necessarily in that order…

The next CLUB CRITICAL THEORY event

Theorizing the Other: migration and cultural tourism

Thurs 4th December, 2014

8.30pm

Upstairs at the Railway Hotel, Southend-on-Sea, http://www.railwayhotelsos.co.uk

FREE ENTRY

‘You were the first to teach us something absolutely fundamental: the indignity of speaking for others’ (Gilles Deleuze to Michel Foucault)

With increasingly xenophobic discourse framing political commentary in British mainstream media – cynically articulated this year by a privately educated ex-commodities broker passing himself off as a ‘man of the (common) people’ – to be labelled as ‘Other’ in the contemporary moment is to be read as inferior; a drain on national resources and a threat to the alleged homogeneity of the cultural practice of Britain’s indigenous population. Confusingly, the Other in many forms of popular culture is simultaneously fetishized as an object of desire, often for middle-class cultural tourists intent on indulging in ‘cheap holiday[s] in other people’s misery’ (John Lydon, 1977).This Club Critical Theory event will examine the processes by which the Other is identified and marked by engaging with the work of writers, Agata Pyzik and Sophia Deboick. Each will discuss this theme within their work by examining the ‘exotic’ appeal Eastern Europe held for David Bowie in the mid-seventies and the quasi-religious fervour with which the globalized fan-base of Depeche Mode continues to frame its utopian idealization of the group. In doing so, Agata and Sophia will invite us to explore both the roots and the routes by which the Other is marked and fixed in the public imagination, as both a source of fear and fascination.

In order to provide some theoretical context for this event, we invite you to read Edward Said’s 2003 preface to his seminal 1977 book, Orientalism. A version is available here:http://www.odsg.org/Said_Edward%281977%29_Orientalism.pdf

Biographies

Agata Pyzik

Agata Pyzik is a Polish journalist and author whose work has appeared in publications such as The Wire, The Guardian, New Statesman, New Humanist, Afterall and Frieze. She studied philosophy, art history, English and American studies in Warsaw and has interviewed some of the foremost contemporary leftist thinkers and art theoreticians, which provides context for her interest in contemporary forms of resistance and political aesthetics. Agata is the author of the highly acclaimed, Poor But Sexy: Culture Clashes in Europe East and West (Zero Books).

Sophia Deboick

Sophia Deboick is a historian of religion and popular culture and a freelance writer. Her doctoral thesis looked at the role of images in the cult of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux in early twentieth-century France. Her broader interests include popular religion and sainthood, particularly in modern France and Poland. Sophia also has an interest in fan cults and pilgrimage, in both the sacred and secular contexts of Catholicism and popular music. She writes on history, religion and culture at The Guardian, The Quietus and elsewhere.

Introduction: Giles Tofield

Chair: Andrew Branch

DJ: Beardy Al