November 2010
9 posts
6 tags
Kierkegaard I: finite and infinite
In 1844 Søren Kierkegaard wrote a book called The Concept of Anxiety, where he suggests that the experience of anxiety isn’t just a response to external circumstances, but rooted in the very nature of the human being. We exist, therefore we are anxious. Even when there’s nothing to worry about.
Why might this be? According to Kierkegaard, the human being is a spiritual being: not just a...
6 tags
This Week's Guest Blogger: Clare Carlisle
We are please to announce our guest blogger for this week, Clare Carlisle. Clare Carlisle is Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool, UK, where she teaches courses in the philosophy of religion, ethics, and the history of philosophy. She is the author of three books on Kierkegaard, and the co-translator of Felix Ravaisson’s ‘Of Habit.’ She is currently working on her own book on...
11 tags
"He raged at the hypocrisy of the aristocracy...
I found an article on lexical > gustatory synesthesia, a rare form in which words conjure up a strong companion taste. Most manifestations of this seem obvious in a Pavlovian way, but James Wannerton states that “Whenever I hear, read, or articulate (inner speech) words or word sounds, I experience an immediate and involuntary taste sensation on my tongue. These very specific taste...
10 tags
Nervous Eating/Nervous Abstaining
“As a sensory experience, taste operates in multiple modalities—not only by way of the mouth and nose, but also the eye, ear, and skin. How does food perform to the sensory modalities unique to it? A key to this question is a series of dissociations. While we eat to satisfy hunger and nourish our bodies, some of the most radical effects occur precisely when food is dissociated from eating...
4 tags
Holiday Uncertainty Syndrome
For me, the official onset of The Holidays marked by Thanksgiving yields a shimmering metaphysical nervousness. Amidst virtual duck fat, bourbon & pecans, and the confusions about agave syrup, I will (do my tryptamine best to) focus my posts on food, gratitude, and performance in all their merry, mangled forms. Things to feel anxious about this week: 1. Being Grateful Enough Today I received...
6 tags
This Week's Guest Blogger: Marina Zurkow
We are pleased to introduce our first guest blogger for Uncertain Spectator(s), Marina Zurkow, artist and associate teacher at the Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) at New York University.
Marina Zurkow makes psychological narratives about humans and their relationship to animals, plants and the weather. These take the form of multi-channel videos, customized multi-screen computer...
8 tags
The Anxiety of Curating
I find myself in the paradoxical position of being anxious while realizing an exhibition whose subject is anxiety. Kierkegaard maintained that anxiety arose in the face of possibility; his now famous image of anxiety is that of a man standing at the edge of a precipice who is terrified by the fact that he could choose to throw himself over it. In keeping with this spirit of Kierkegaard’s thought,...
10 tags
Civic Insecurity
Anxiety often manifests as an obsessive need to prepare for the possibilities that the future may hold. This is particularly true during times of international military tension, when such anxieties become socialized, coming into contact with one’s national identification. During specific periods of societal crisis in United States history, citizens have pointedly been asked to adopt an anxious...
6 tags
Searching Uncertainties
Uncertain Spectator responds to the culture of anxiety that has become so much a part of the political, economic, and media climate in which we now exist. This blog is a place for invited cultural theorists, philosophers, artists, and curators, to reflect on the manifold manifestations of anxiety within contemporary culture, whether that be through timely events, currents in philosophical...
