For many years, starting somewhere around 1994, we at Cliff Cottage have selected a virtues card, from a pack, each Sunday. We then focus on that virtue for that week. After more than 20 years, it is time for a change
For many years, starting somewhere around 1994, we at Cliff Cottage (the house we live in, in Norway) have selected a virtues card, from a pack, each Sunday. We then focus on that virtue for that week. After more than 20 years, it is time for a change
In 2019, I would like to reflect on a different set of words, taken from John Patrick Leary’s latest book, Keywords: The new language of capitalism. There are 47 sets of words. Set is used, because sometimes there is an adjective and a noun, or a noun and a verb, rather than just a noun or an adjective.
One change from the first original emails covering the introduction, accountability, artisans, best practices and brands is the use of quotations from John Patrick Leary’s book, Keywords: The new language of capitalism. Now, with the exception of the introduction, these direct quotes have been replaced with a paraphrasing of the content.
People who want the entire content, can order the book from: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/
Recipients are encouraged to casually discuss each keyword during the course of a week with family members and/or close friends. Discussions on Facebook, and other social media are seldom fruitful, although I have deliberately engaged in one discussion on Sunday, 2019-01-27 to see if there were any benefits. So far, all I have noticed, is that participants become entrenched in their original positions.
Many other topics than keywords are discussed in this web-log, including a more general one discussing the origins of keywords: https://keywords.mclellan.no/2018/12/31/keywords/
Language (n.) The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another’s treasure. Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
Language, Ambrose Bierce tells us, cannot be trusted, and the sweeter it sounds, the less we should trust it. This is a book about words and their deceptions. The words in this book make up the twenty-first century language of capitalism, a metaphorically rich vernacular in which the defenders of private property speak of virtues and “vision,” where wage laborers become imaginative artists and agile athletes, and workplaces are transformed into vibrant ecologies and nurturing communities. In this language, the differences between creative resistance to capitalism and creative capitalism, health care and wellness, rebellion and disruption, and working-class power and the commercial slogan of empowerment can be difficult to grasp. These keywords are what Bierce might call charming words used to deprive others of their treasure: if we understood them better, perhaps we might rob them of their seductive power.
Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism is a field guide to the capitalist present, an era of unprecedented technological possibilities to bring humanity together—so we are regularly told, anyway—that also features privation on a scale comparable to Bierce’s late nineteenth-century Gilded Age. Are we living in a new stage of capitalism, though, or are today’s digital echnologies just a different version of our ancestors’ railroads and six-shooters, our Silicon Valley titans just the newest update to the ketchup and steel tycoons of an earlier, east-coast fantasy of wealth and opportunity? Identifying what makes our moment unique (or not) is no easy task, in part because we are living in it, and in part because the language we have to understand and describe our era’s inequality is itself one of the instruments of perpetuating it. How can we think and act critically in the present when the very medium of the present, language, constantly betrays us?
Nøkkelord 001 Introduksjon
I 2019 vil jeg reflektere over nøkkelord hentet fra John Patrick Learys siste bok, Nøkkelord: Kapitalismens nye språk, eller: Keywords: The Language of Capitalism. Det er 47 sett med ord. Sett brukes, fordi noen ganger er det et adjektiv og et substantiv, eller et substantiv og et verb, i stedet for bare et substantiv eller et adjektiv.
Jeg håper å sende ut en epost hver uke, og velkommen dine kommentarer tilbake igjen.
Mottakere vil motta mer enn en tweet, men mindre hele innholdet om ordet som finnes i boken. Hvis du vil ha hele innholdet, kan e-boken lånes av meg.
Mottakerne oppfordres til å diskutere “ordet” i løpet av uken med sine familiemedlemmer og / eller nære venner.
Hvis du ikke vil ha denne informasjonen, kan du enten ignorere / slette e-post fra meg med emnet Nøkkelord, eller du kan sende meg en e-post som ber om å bli fjernet fra adresselisten.
Jeg har også skrevet en blogg om disse nøkkelord på engelsk: https://keywords.mclellan.no/2018/12/31/keywords/
Beste hilsener,
Brock
John Patrick Leary 2018 Keywords: The Language of Capitalism
Introduksjon
Språk (n.) Musikken som vi beroliger slangerne, som vekter andres skatt.
Ambrose Bierce, Djevelens ordbok
Språk, Ambrose Bierce forteller oss, kan ikke stoles på, og jo søtere det høres, desto mindre bør vi stole på det. Dette er en bok om ord og deres bedrag. Ordene i denne boken utgjør det tyve-første århundres språk av kapitalisme, en metaforisk rik folkefortelling hvor forsvarerne av privat eiendom snakker om dyder og “visjon”, hvor lønnsarbeidere blir fantasifulle artister og smidige idrettsutøvere, og arbeidsplasser blir forvandlet til levende miljøer og nærende samfunn. På dette språket kan forskjellene mellom kreativ motstand mot kapitalisme og kreativ kapitalisme, helsevesen og velvære, opprør og forstyrrelse, arbeidsklassekraft og det kommersielle sloganet om empowerment være vanskelig å forstå. Disse nøkkelordene er hva Bierce kan kalle sjarmerende ord som brukes til å frata andre av deres skatt: hvis vi forsto ordene bedre, kanskje vi kanskje røve kapitalistene av deres forførende makt.
Nøkkelord: Kapitalismens nye språk er en feltveiledning for den kapitalistiske tilstedeværelsen, en epoke med enestående teknologiske muligheter for å bringe menneskeheten sammen – så vi fortelles jevnlig, uansett – det har også en beskjed som kan sammenlignes med Bierce sene nittende århundre Gilded Tidsalder. Er vi imidlertid i en ny fase av kapitalismen, eller er dagens digitale teknologier bare en annen versjon av våre forfedres jernbaner og vil vestens seks-skyttere, er våre Silicon Valley-titaner bare den nyeste oppdateringen til ketchup og stål tycoon av en tidligere øst-kyst fantasi av rikdom og mulighet? Å identifisere hva som gjør vårt øyeblikk unikt (eller ikke) er ikke en lett oppgave, delvis fordi vi lever i det, og delvis fordi språket vi må forstå og beskrive vår tids ulikhet er i seg selv et av virkemidlene til å videreføre det. Hvordan kan vi tenke og handle kritisk i nåtiden når dagens mellomstore språk sprer oss hele tiden?
Originalen:
Language (n.) The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another’s treasure.
Ambrose Bierce/ The Devil’s Dictionary
Language, Ambrose Bierce tells us, cannot be trusted, and the sweeter it sounds, the less we should trust it. This is a book about words and their deceptions. The words in this book make up the twenty-first century language of capitalism, a metaphorically rich vernacular in which the defenders of private property speak of virtues and “vision,” where wage laborers become imaginative artists and agile athletes, and workplaces are transformed into vibrant ecologies and nurturing communities. In this language, the differences between creative resistance to capitalism and creative capitalism, health care and wellness, rebellion and disruption, and working-class power and the commercial slogan of empowerment can be difficult to grasp. These keywords are what Bierce might call charming words used to deprive others of their treasure: if we understood them better, perhaps we might rob them of their seductive power.
Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism is a field guide to the capitalist present, an era of unprecedented technological possibilities to bring humanity together—so we are regularly told, anyway—that also features privation on a scale comparable to Bierce’s late nineteenth-century Gilded Age. Are we living in a new stage of capitalism, though, or are today’s digital technologies just a different version of our ancestors’ railroads and six-shooters, our Silicon Valley titans just the newest update to the ketchup and steel tycoons of an earlier, east-coast fantasy of wealth and opportunity? Identifying what makes our moment unique (or not) is no easy task, in part because we are living in it, and in part because the language we have to understand and describe our era’s inequality is itself one of the instruments of perpetuating it. How can we think and act critically in the present when the very medium of the present, language, constantly betrays us?