Costelloe-KuehnMemo27

MEMO27 Describing People., to Make an Analytic Point
This memo should include a 200-400-word description of a person that you have or may encounter, during your research, leveraging the description for analytic insight. In other words: make the description speak to a social theoretical question or point. You can fabricate the person described if you haven’t yet had relevant field encounters. For an example, see my “Environmental Right-To-Know and the Transmutations of Law.”

SS: "coherence in contradiction expresses the force of a desire" (Derrida, 1966?, structure sign & play)

SS embodies multiple double-binds. He has a background in (and continues to inhabit) corporate media production and dedicates a great deal of time and energy to alternative media projects that are often critical of the mainstream media. He uses daily a number of high-tech devices, produced in highly toxic processes (that affect populations in very uneven ways) to critique technoscientific practices, and associated distributions of burden and benefit. He develops trans-national flows of funding, expertise, knowledge, etc. in order to support projects that focus on the importance of local, traditional, site-specific practices, information, solutions, etc. He enjoys the benefits of middle-class life while working to undermine many of the structures that provide these comforts.


 * Embodies the middle-class/subaltern connection that I think is a "site" of great potential and many possibilities.
 * Background in the "mainstream" media (still partially in it) and yet/enables him to participate with grassroots, bottom-up, community-based media projects focused on local knowledge and environmental issues.
 * Beautiful articulations of the catapult arts caravan. Nice example of the "streams" that already flow and that I enter into as an ethnographer (Marcus & Fischer).

JATAN member interested in social science, "tribals," eco-stuff, etc.?
 * Strong valoraization (and romantic view?) of "tribal" way of life, which he sharply opposes to "development," ecological degradation, alienation, etc.
 * Faith in social science/journalism/media (in short, knowledge production and circulation?) to "get us out" of many of the major problems facing India.