301273 Affects, materialities, bodies and territories (S) (SoSe 2024)

In this course, we want to generate reflections on forms of resistance and organization of the common that aim to broaden understandings of the political, the collective, and the human itself. Starting from multiple understandings of nature, the body and territory from an affective and material perspective, we will begin to analyze how territory, rather than being a mere field of power and counter-power, is the seat of local and external agencies expressed in practices that emerge from the necessary combination of human and non-human elements in a multi- and onto-scalar perspective. In this vibrant encounter of connections and human-non-human actions, space and those who inhabit it take on a multiple rational and emotional dimension. Territory thus emerges as a complex space of experiential multiplicity, which we will approach through the relations between bodies, the formation of subjectivities and affectivities. We will move between analytical perspectives that have complicated the relationship between nature and culture, expanding modern definitions of space, the political and the human, and we will end with analytical perspectives that focus on processes of resistance and collective organization in the relationship between affects, materiality and bodies. The course will be conducted as a reading group, in which we will approach the texts on a weekly basis, based on the previous reading and the preparation of a short text with our comments and reflections.

Requirements for participation, required level

The seminar is based on an understanding of teaching and learning as processes of critical analysis and shared construction of knowledge. The class and the collective learning process are task and concept oriented. Each person is responsible for his or her own path, which requires commitment to the collective learning process as well as active participation. The role of the teacher is that of a facilitator. Therefore, preparatory reading of articles, literature study, and general knowledge of related contemporary literature, materials, and interest in the topics are essential.

Bibliography

Mol Annemarie y John Law, 2002. Complexities: social studies of knowledge practices, Duke University Press, Durham.
Descola, Philippe (2013) Beyond nature and culture, The Chicago University Press.
Melissa Gregg, Gregory J. Seigworth (Eds) (2010) The Affect Theory Reader Duke University Press, Durham
Stewart, Kathleen (2007) Ordinary affects, Duke University Press
Ingold Tim, (2000). The perception of the environment. Essays on livelihood, dwelling and skill, Routledge, Nueva York y Londres.