[Nettime-bold] Chicago, know your .histories

["Lachlan Brown" <lachlan@london.com>]

No, this is not right. Its important to 
know your .histories (small h or repressed histories rather than History) as the 
confusion over the meanings of 'commons' 
and common-wealth' is an outcome of these repressed histories. 
You can't know where you are at until you 
know where you came from, Once you know 
both, you know where you are going.

>The term /digital commons/ is derived from >the Common Law movement in
>England in the 1600s. The movement called 
for >the protection of shared
>public spaces - the "commons" - its tools and >resources. Often, larger,
>private interests overran the commons, and >this failure of the
communities to maintain their public resources is known in the discourse as
>"the tragedy of the commons".

'The Commons’ is NOT an outcome 
of radical thinking in England in 
the 1600s. The idea of ‘Common-Wealth’ is. It’s an important idea that inflected all 
radical thinking in the English speaking 
world including the foundation of 
New England colonies and the American Revolution.  ‘The Commons’ is a 
part of a tradition of ‘common law’, the ‘commons’ being the colonized English 
under the feudal Lordship of the Normans, 
or the ‘Norman Yoke’. If one wonders 
what Heath Bunting is doing leveling enclosures, and leading the way for 
hundreds of Agfhani refugees to illegally enter Britain through the Channel Tunnel,  
he is, among a number of others, merely embodying a deep tradition of dissent, 
revolt and cultural revolution in English, 
and British life. Some of this may be 
relevant to other cultural contexts, 
some of it may not. 

I note that Mute magazine’s editorial to 
its Leveller and Digger inspired issue also 
made this error possibly due to hasty or 
foggy abridgement somewhere down the line (probably Sean Cubitt) of Lachlan Browns 
paper “Love is the Law: the passion of 
revolt” which was written in 1993-94  and published in Public #10, a rather 
obscure and sometimes irrelevant 
Canadian art and theory journal published 
in Toronto.

The paper drew upon substantial research in
 the period by Christopher Hill, in particular “The World Turned Upside Down” recommended reading for all would be
revolutionaries, as well as relevant contemporary cultural theory.

I wrote the paper at the outset of my 
research into the field of digital culture 
to allegorise the threads, themes and issues the ‘digital revolution’ might 
parallel during the ‘long revolution’ we are presently engaged in. The idea 
was to contrast a distinctly radical historical instance where publishing was 
associated with ‘reading communities’ or nascent publics, including some 
distinct feminisms, with claims applied to ‘the digital revolution’ and to map 
out some of the issues it would have to address if it was to meet the honorific 
‘radical’.

I’ll come to Chicago to deliver the 
original paper if you like, (there were several important sections including the relevance of anti-colonial movements in 
the New Model Army and The Leveller Party 
in 1647 to contemporary post-colonial 
thinking edited out of the published paper) and to discuss how mediation and distribution are related in new modalities of publishing.  


When I began my research into the cultural implications of Internet I was interested 
in possibilities for alternative or radical publishing. The 'culture of the press pamphlet' in England during our Civil War 
and failed Republic (hijacked by the ‘Independents’ or Puritans, and 
ultimately abandoned in a compromise with conservative forces) threw up a tremendous range of ‘proto-englightenment’ ideas
some of which were millenarian (or religio-aesthetic), some of which were political and some that were economic. Ultimately The English Revolution of the mid seventeenth century merely helped make the world safe 
for The Hudson Bay company, The East India Company The American Republic, and hence 
IBM and Microsoft, but many of the ideas of the time have relevance for radical thinking today.

Its important to get these .histories (and 
the Leveller and Digger movement was for centuries  repressed (small h) .history) right. Some of the ideas and movements that appeared during the period are highly relevant to the contemporary cultural situation during the War, or dare we call it contemporary cultural revolution?

The 'digital commons' is an idea from 
'common law'. The notion of 'common-wealth' (all things in common for the good of community) has resonances in the ecological
debate, the political debate about uneven development, distribution and access to resources and wealth, as well as the present
'open source', shareware, and copyright debate.

 
As I say, you can't know where you are at until you know where you came from. Once you know both, you will already be half way to where you are going.

If there is confusion over 'the digital commons' and 'the common wealth' well, 
there's is a distinct hegemonic reason for this obfuscated history, and of course I 
will discuss this too.

Best,

 Lachlan



Lachlan Brown
Toronto
T. (416)  826 6937
Voice Message (416) 822 1123

Cultural Studies
Goldsmiths College
University of London









Version>02 
April 18-20

Calling all artists, designers, activists, multimedia producers, information
architects, tactical media agents, programmers, musicians, filmmakers,
concerned citizens and critical thinkers: This is a call for a gathering of
the digital commons, and we want to hear from you!

We are interested in your ideas, projects, sounds, films, papers and
proposals concerning the future of the digital commons, and invite you to
share them with us during our three-day convergence.

The term /digital commons/ is derived from the Common Law movement in
England in the 1600s. The movement called for the protection of shared
public spaces - the "commons" - its tools and resources. Often, larger,
private interests overran the commons, and this failure of the
communities to maintain their public resources is known in the discourse as
"the tragedy of the commons".

This April 18-20, 2002, the Museum of Contemporary Art  in Chicago will host
Version>02, a digital arts and technology convergence. To initiate the first
iteration of this event, we are asking you to consider how the maintenance
of this digital commons necessitates a dialogue about intellectual property,
the balance between civil liberties and security, freedom of speech and
privacy, and the implications of free or limited access to tools and
information. We ask you to share your vision of this space, it¹s present and
future. 

Version>02 is an exploration of our digital commons and an opportunity to
meet those who tend to its gardens, fences, and pathways. It is an
investigation into maintaining, expanding and designing the commons, while
ensuring the continuation of shared resources and information in all facets
of communications.

This April, Version>02, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago and
participating area galleries will provide a forum for artists, performers,
and critical thinkers. For three days and three nights, this digital arts
and technology will feature performances, film screenings, web
installations, and demonstrations from active minds of the emergent culture.

Interested? Send your questions and submissions to:
Submissions@select-media.com







This April 18-20, 2002, the Museum of Contemporary Art  in Chicago will host
Version>02, a digital arts and technology convergence. To initiate the first
iteration of this event, we are asking you to consider how the maintenance
of this digital commons necessitates a dialogue about intellectual property,
the balance between civil liberties and security, freedom of speech and
privacy, and the implications of free or limited access to tools and
information. We ask you to share your vision of this space, it¹s present and
future. 

Version>02 is an exploration of our digital commons and an opportunity to
meet those who tend to its gardens, fences, and pathways. It is an
investigation into maintaining, expanding and designing the commons, while
ensuring the continuation of shared resources and information in all facets
of communications.

This April, Version>02, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago and
participating area galleries will provide a forum for artists, performers,
and critical thinkers. For three days and three nights, this digital arts
and technology will feature performances, film screenings, web
installations, and demonstrations from active minds of the emergent culture.

Interested? Send your questions and submissions to:
Submissions@select-media.com



-- 

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