Friday 27 February 2015

24.2. Who and what were the International Situationists?

Report on the Construction of Situations and on the International Situationist Tendency's Conditions of Organization and Action

Guy Debord

June 1957

Translated by Ken Knabb

Revolution and Counter-revolution in Modern Culture

FIRST OF ALL, we think the world must be changed. We want the most liberating change of the society and life in which we find ourselves confined. We know that such a change is possible through appropriate actions.

Our specific concern is the use of certain means of action and the discovery of new ones, means which are more easily recognizable in the domain of culture and customs, but which must be applied in interrelation with all revolutionary changes.


A society’s “culture” both reflects and prefigures its possible ways of organizing life. Our era is characterized by the lagging of revolutionary political action behind the development of modern possibilities of production which call for a superior organization of the world.

...

What was the attraction of the situationists in their day?

Luisa Passerini: Critica della vita quotidiana. In I situationisti 1997 Manifestolibri.

1. Stress on everyday life: revolutionize it. Make it a significant part in history and in politics.
2. Foul language: easy to copy. Answered the need to revolt against fathers, especially the symbolical ones.
3. Main attraction: confusion, mixing of art, life and politics, the foundation of everyday revolution. "Almost everybody has been excluded from life (vie), and forced to dedicate all their energy to survival (survie)."

The situationists gave meaning and justification to anxieties of the industrial society.
They gave voice to a profound restlessness ignored by politics and traditions of the left.
Theirs was an ongoing critique of the relations of theory and practice.
They managed to interpret the desire to act, do something, that touched the young generation.
They expressed the need and elements of a radical subjectivity.


No comments:

Post a Comment