Spectacle of Enlightenment: The Bulgaria Essays, 2016 - Tapa blanda

Rather than liberate humanity from tyranny, modern enlightenment has wound up subjecting us to a new servitude imposed by systems of mass manipulation, electronic vigilance, compulsive consumerism, and the horrors of a seemingly unending global war on terror. Our national democracies are an imperial farce and the most that intellectuals either know or dare to do in the face of all this destruction is to blithely recommend resistance. In this pamphlet, which we publish in anticipation of the book Enlightenment in an Age of Destruction, we challenge the self-defeating notion that intellectuals should settle for resistance and urge them to accomplish much more. With this aim in mind, we construct a cosmology of enlightenment that regards it as an unstable epiphenomenon, we critique the limits of the enlightenment of Pax Americana, and we provide an epistemological theory and demonstration of intellectual participation in civil society. As such, we promote a reflexive challenge to the spectacle that defines our reality today. Spectacle assigns to the intellectual the role of the critic, on the one hand, and on the other, that of the soothsayer of princes. In opposition to both and on the basis of this radical critique, we propose a trespassive tradition of cultural leadership.

Subirats, Britt & Fenn are co-authors of ENLIGHTENMENT IN AN AGE OF DESTRUCTION (2017), & have published jointly in EL VIEJO TOPO, ALMANAC LITERARIO & other journals. Eduardo Subirats is the author of some forty books in Spanish, as well as many articles in Spanish, Portuguese, German, & English. His main books deal with topics of aesthetics, cultural theory, colonialism, & literary theory: El continente vacío (Madrid: 1993; México: 1994; Cartagena, Colombia, 2011), Linterna Mágica (Madrid: 1997), La recuperación de la memoria (Madrid: Losada, 2003; Barcelona 2016), Paraíso (São Paulo 2001, Madrid, 2005; México 2004, 2013), and Mito y Literatura (México 2014). He has been professor of philosophy, literature, & art theory at universities in Madrid, Sao Paulo, Caracas, México, and Princeton. Since 1997 he is Professor of Spanish literature and culture at New York University. Christopher Britt is the author of Quixotism: The Imaginative Denial of Spain’s Loss of Empire (2005) & Imperial Idiocy: A Reflection on Forced Displacement in the Americas (Forthcoming: 2017). Additionally, he is the author of over twenty-five essays written in Spanish & English and published in journals in the U.S., Spain, Colombia, & Mexico. His focus is tyranny. He studies the role of the intellectual in the formation of nationalist and pan-nationalist cultural movements in Spain, the United States, & Latin America, & considers their ties to fascism, imperialism, & postcoloniality. He is Associate Professor of Spanish at The George Washington University, in Washington, DC, where he has taught since 1998. Paul Fenn is the leader of the Community Choice Energy movement to localize energy in the United States, architect of several hallmark U.S. state and local laws & programs to democratize energy; & also the author of essays & books including This Is Not a Theory (2010) & The Localist Platform (2017). Anita Pantin is a Venezuelan painter, scenographer & digital artist. In the 70s & 80s she exhibited in galleries and museums, & designed stage & costumes for opera & theater (“Madame Butterfly”, “Tosca”, “Ne blâmez jamais les bédouins”, etc.) in Caracas & Montreal. In the 90s she collaborated with the Advanced Communication Technologies Lab., at U. of Texas, Austin. (1993-2004), & started working with digital media. Since 2005, she lives in New York where she continues to explore different media & techniques, always integrating into her digital work.