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Dystopia, art & revolutionRight now! AlsoThe Circle (also our quiz, also your final)

Dystopian literatureSpeculates on possible outcomes from current conditionsProvides commentary on current social, economic and other realitiesSatirizes the human conditionExamines the human conditionRepresents the ongoing struggles of different societies and people overall to maintain individuality and human kindness in the face of equally human desires for power and controlSends a message about the dangers perceived by the author and others

Before we look at the books weve been reading, lets look at the real world2

Utopians Gone WrongAs the Commander notes in The Handmaids Tale, better for some always means worse for othersThe societies in the dystopian novels all have utopian premisessomeone believes society has been improved (Make America Great Again!)We learn that the society isnt so great through living it via a hero/anti-hero/victim of the new societySo one question to ask is what was the intent of those who changed society? And what was the perception of those who fought?But first, whats happening right now in the real world?

Social unrest: on the streets and through art

Belgian cartoonist5

Holland and Mexico6

Canada,7

Arab news site Hunasotak8

Brazil10

Art and Social MovementsArt (representation through aesthetic means) is clearly an elementWhat role does it play?Presentation of issues (known as framing)Drawing people/involving them (known as mobilizing)

Framing is a concept, a term, thats important in social movement theory. Some sociologists believe that how a movement frames their goals/ideas is key to whether or not they succeed. But whats interesting about framing is that it assumes that people respond purely intellectually to movement causes, rather than emotionally. Mobilization often thought of as techniques: solicitation, fundraising, education, social media12

Art & Social MovementsWhat role does art play? Different theories include:Can be used to maintain or promulgate ideas (propaganda)Can be used to unsettle/challenge societyCan just reflect society as it isFrivolous/entertainment

Look at the impact music had on changing American society from the 50s to the 60s Aaron pointed out introduction of gay culture through pop culture;13

Art & Social MovementsRaises awarenessPrompts debateGoes beyond cognitive effects to:Provide emotional reassuranceReinforce valuesCreate a sense of community/solidarityCreate venues for disseminationRaise money/resources

Music has probably been focused on the most in social movement theory because of the way in which music plays at peoples emotions, draws people in14

Culture Jamming

ADBUSTERS#Occupy Buy Nothing Day digital detox etc

Culture JammingYes Men

Spreading the wordAnd lets not forget the Guerilla Girls

The business community was stunned one Monday morning when the powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce, long a stalwart enemy of sensible climate legislation, appeared to dramatically reverse it's position. During a well attended press conference at the National Press Club in downtown Washington, DC, Chamber representative "Hingo Sembra" announced some startling news16

Art meets Social CauseGhost BikesCultureStrikeGod Bless Graffiti CoalitionCritical ResistanceLocal ProjectsPuppets

Go to visual dinner guest17

Shifts in EconomyAmericas decline as a superpower: dollar no longer strong; no longer leader in technology; shrinking power for world tradeRising deficits, in large part due to the cost of military actionsEvidence that the US is slipping into a worse depression than the 30s

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2010/12/06/america_collapse_2025http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/09/27/investopedia61952.DTL18

What to do, what to doThe Movement Action PlanA framework, written by Bill Moyer in the late 1980s, widely used by groups to delineate the path of social movements.Describes eight stages of a social movement, and the roles of those participating in them.

Organizing a movement, opportunity to see a movement growing in the time of this class.19

Expanded into book form

Movement Action Plan

MAP plan describes two views of powerPower Elite: Relatively few elite at the top, controlling government, laws, social norms, the mass on the bottom Power flows from top to bottom Social change happens by the masses appealing to the elites

People PowerHolds that power resides with the populaceAnd that even power elites power is dependent on agreement and cooperation by the peopleUnder MAP, people power is the model for social movementsIn other words, the effort isnt to convince the top to change, but to educate and mobilize the people.

Source of Power in Social MovementsA strong sense of right and wrongAn understanding of the world largely through symbolism

Movements happen when people set one into motion because theyre upset and believe that their values and interests are being violated, particularly when they feel that their leaders are violating their trust.24

The StruggleIs between a social movement and the power holders for the trust and belief of the general public.Power holders want the public to believe they are acting in the best interest of the publicThe social movement wants the public to realize thats not true.

The ChallengeSo a social movements challenge is to win over the majority of the publicThis is done by showing that the movements values resonate with the symbolic values of the public.Those values could include: human rights, democracy freedom etc.

Thats how movements are able to create social change.26

Stage One: Normal TimesEven if conditions are bad, policies are maintained and most people are unaware that the basic values they hold arent being upheld.Opposition to conditions are ridiculed and efforts are ineffective

For instance, African Americans rights were being widely violated prior to the civil rights demonstrations in the 60s and the social movement and change that grew out of that.27

Stage 2: Proving the Failure of InstitutionsThe movement proves to the public that policies are violating their beliefs and values.Public movements often spurred on by anger at hypocrisy.This requires the movement to do its homework, to provide proof, and to use all the standard avenues at its disposal.

St. vincent ceo. In other words, dont match in the streets first. First, go to the city council, file the lawsuit, testify in the public hearings. You cant prove the system is broken until youve used the system.28

Stage 3: Ripening ConditionsGrowing awareness and discontentGrowth of local groups, a wave of grassroots oppositionLonger-term trends that worsen the situation, like a tanking economy, loss of jobs, gun violence, student loans, you get the idea

Stage 4: Take OffTrigger event that highlights the problem itselfFollowed by social protestCan be planned; can be by accident.

Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to move to the back of the bus in 1955, that launched what was already growing opposition to the discrimination against African Americans; it gave people their event and heightened awareness. Troy Davis execution sent people into the street.30

Stage 5: Identity CrisisMovements hopes turn to despairFaith that success will happen faltersPerception that power-holders are too strongPerception that their efforts have been pointless

Goals havent been achieved so the movement believes it is failing.31

Stage 6: Majority Public SupportWinning over the majority opinion of the populationGrassroots movement is needed: ongoing low-intensity local organizingMassive public educationCoalition buildingRe-use of public forums of expression and regular conduits, keeping the issue in the spotlight

Ironically, Stage 5 usually happens at the same time as stage 6. Just as movement feels it is hopeless, is the same time that its actually shifted majority opinion32

Stage 7: SuccessTurning the tide against the power holders, either through:Dramatic showdownQuiet showdownAttrition

Major showdowns during the civil rights movement, the marches in Selma forced president Johnson and Congress into motion that lead to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Quiet showdown is the people in power realize the peoples will and shift their policies, and try to take credit for it. Attrition refers to the slow, decades long changes to policy and leaders. Obviously, in attrition, much harder for activists to take credit.33

Stage 8: Continuing the StruggleCelebrating the successFollowing up to make sure the laws actually are followed/changes implementedWorking toward new goals in the existing movementFostering new issuesGoing beyond reform to actual systemic change.

Even when gay marriage passed, there will still be work to be done about homophobia and acknowledging differences34

How did you learn about an issue about which you now care?What did you do then?What did you want to do?What do you feel are your options?What are the obstacles?

Dystopic Parameters & Quiz ReviewA figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.Citizens live in a dehumanized state.Conformity among citizens and assumption that individuality and dissent are bad.An illusion of a perfect utopiaRead, Write, Think.org

Quiz ReviewOryx and Crakeby Margaret AtwoodFirst in a trilogy, followed by year of the flood (2009) and Maddaddam (2013)Humans disregard for nature: GMOsTrauma in the individual life wrought on the worldSex trafficking/ pornography/violence in video gamesIsolation and communityA figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.Citizens live in a dehumanized state.Conformity among citizens and assumption that individuality and dissent are bad.An illusion of a perfect utopia

Consider the future in the novelJimmy and Crake live on the CorpSeCorps compound. Current parallels? (keep in mind Atwood wrote this book in 2003).Apparently no government, only corporate surveillance. Any current parallel to that?Jimmy and Crake spend a lot of their time online in some form, and searching for hidden/dark web content. What about today?How do you think their environment impacts Jimmy and Crakes stance toward life? What about today?The game "Extinctathon" plays a foreshadowing role in the novel. Jimmy and Crake also play "Barbarian Stomp" and "Blood and Roses." What comparable video games do you know of? What do you think about virtual violence? Are there advantages? Are there disadvantages?

Post-HumanismPosthumanism considers the possibility that historical phenomena (such as advances in technology or discoveries about animals) are leading to fundamental changes in the human species and its relationship with the world.

Post-HumanismIt thus involves radically rethinking the dominant, familiar humanist account of who we are as human beings. According to the humanist model (a clear and influential example of which can be found in the seventeenth-century writings of Rene Descartes), the figure of the human has a natural and eternal place at the very center of things, where it is clearly distinguished from machines and animals, where it shares with all other human beings a unique and universal essence, where it is the origin of meaning and the sovereign subject of history, and where it acts according to something called human nature

Post-Human For humanists, Man, to use the problematic gendered term often employed in accounts of the human condition, enjoys a position of automatic and unquestionable hegemony. Man is the measure of all things. Posthumanism, by way of contrast, begins with the recognition that Man is not the privileged and protected center, because humans are no longer and perhaps never were utterly distinct from animals and machines, are the products of historical and cultural differences that make any appeal to universal human essence impossible The Encyclopedia of Literary and Cultural Theory

Posthumanism + genderAs weve discussed, binary gender tends to categorize people into roles, and roles tend to create hierarchies, aka power structures and oppressionTraditional feminist thought focuses on that oppression, on patriarchy and its consequencesYou could argue (and many have) that this traditional feminist lens is at odds with third-wave feminists, queer theory and the like because the latter groups are less concerned with oppression and more concerned with identity politics than with identification of oppressive structures.Transhumanism is more concerned with the fusing of thoughts regarding biological determinism with the advances of technology and science. In other words, what can science and technology bring to the desires of the post-binary world?

He, She and ItWinner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Best Science Fiction in the United Kingdom (1991)Author Marge Piercy considers herself a political writer. She is a poet, novelist and memoirist; shes written 43 books (by my counting)Her novel, Woman on the Edge of Time (1976) explores comparable science-fiction and feminist motifs

Cyborgs as a construct for exploring identityIn Donna Harraways essay, The Cyborg Manifesto, she defines the cyborg thusly:A cyborg is a cybernetic organism, a hybrid of machine and organism, a creature of social reality as well as a creature of fiction. Social reality is lived social relations, our most important political construction, a world-changing fiction. The international womens movements have constructed womens experience, as well as uncovered or discovered this crucial collective object. This experience is a fiction and fact of the most crucial, political kind.

Cyborgs and womenJune Deery argues in part that cyborgs might resemble or identify with women and visa versa in the novel.Yods position in society is comparable to women in patriarchal society: he has to close read others reactions, he isnt paid for his work, hes compared to a sex toy by a characterHe ultimately rejects his own technological/weaponized role/ aka masculine role

Brave New World by Aldous HuxleyReflects fears about the role of technology over society (even though mostly all they had were cars and the radio)State control versus peoples willingness to be controlledConsumerism Squashing human instincts toward love and art with mind control and drugsControl over sexual norms and reproductionCaste societyA figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.Citizens live in a dehumanized state.Conformity among citizens and assumption that individuality and dissent are bad.An illusion of a perfect utopia

The novel was written in the aftermath of several large historical events:World war 1Influx of new technology, early harbingers of globalization, including cars, mass production, mass mediaThe great depression and subsequent new deal (federal programs1918 super flu

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1984Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written directly or indirectly against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it. George Orwell, Why I Write

1984Constant surveillanceThought crimesControl through language (newspeak)Control through fearDoublethink (hypocrisy)Erasure of the past (memory hole)Control over love, sex, reproductive freedomA figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.Citizens live in a dehumanized state.Conformity among citizens and assumption that individuality and dissent are bad.An illusion of a perfect utopia

Which brings us to the circle48

The CircleDave Eggers, founder of McSweeneys, which publishes The BelieverAuthor of at least 10 books, novels and otherwise. Fiction author and journalistSocial activistHis work has been nominated for the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and has won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, FrancesPrix Mdicis,Germanys Albatross Prize, the National Magazine Award, and the American Book Award.Founded 826 Valencia, a nonprofit youth writing and tutoring center in San Franciscos Mission District

The Circle and 1984?War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.George Orwell, 1984Secrets are lies. Sharing is Caring. Privacy is theft.Dave Eggers, The CircleSharing is Caring is Sharing, Betsy Morais, Oct. 20, 2013 The New Yorker

Where 1984 has the vigilant Police Patrol and Thought Police, The Circle has SeeChange and Clarification. Surveillance isnt a bad word; its a gift, even a human right.50

The Circle and Brave New World?The CircleisBrave New Worldfor our brave new world and lets be frank: Aldous Huxleys classic is no model of understatement, either. Now that we all live and move and have our being in the panopticon, Eggerss novel may be just fast enough, witty enough and troubling enough to make us glance away from our twerking Vines and consider how life has been reshaped by a handful of clever marketers. Ron Charles, WaPo, Oct. 1, 2013

After this slide Rachel and Jen. As a work of architecture, the panopticon allows a watchman to observe occupants without the occupants knowing whether or not they are being watched. As a metaphor, the panopticon was commandeered in the latter half of the 20th century as a way to trace the surveillance tendencies of disciplinarian societies. Is it still a useful way to think about surveillance in an age of NSA andGCHQ?51

The CircleWhats the concept?How does surveillance play out?How are the characters dehumanized?How is conformity represented?What is the illusory nature of The Circle?A figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.Citizens live in a dehumanized state.Conformity among citizens and assumption that individuality and dissent are bad.An illusion of a perfect utopia

After this: Rachel and52

The CircleThe charactersthoughts on Mae?Obviously, a story about the dangers of technology...what about sex and technology?What is the role of family in this society?What statement is the book making about identity?

Stewart's Storage Unit (Symbol)Mae's fascination with Stewart's Storage Unit far in the basement of the Circle is symbolic of exactly what all the sharing she and others have been doing amounts to. It physicalizes the amount of information one can put out, but its storage in a dank and secluded place demonstrates the sadness and wastefulness of attempting to share everything with everyone.

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Coming upNext week, final reading quiz plus movieThe week after that is ThanksgivingThe week after that (Dec. 2) Station Eleven by Emily St. John MandelDec. 9, class is a SURPRISEFinals week, Dec. 16. We will not be meeting but your final papers are due

This is weirdThe image of a Donald Trump supporter has long been considered the face of an angry white man. But it was white women who pushed Trump to victory. According to CNNs exit polls, 53% of white women voted for Trump rejecting the possibility of a first female president. In interviews, white women said Trumps record as a businessman and his policy positions resonated with them more strongly than Clintons candidacy as a woman. They downplayed his behavior to varying degrees and saw Clintons flaws as more troubling. UK Guardian, Nov. 10