Is Maus/s's Gift Appropriate?

Nom de Guerre

A negative example for creating a conceptual persona is "Jihad Jane." 

Colleen LaRose spent long days caring for her boyfriend's father in a second-floor apartment in Pennsburg, a small town north of Philadelphia.  But online, federal authorities say, the devoted caretaker developed a daring alter ego, refashioning herself as "Jihad Jane" while helping recruit and finance Muslim terrorists -- and eventually moving overseas to kill an artist she perceived as an enemy of Islam" (Associated Press).

The story demonstrates the potential functionality of a persona as an interface for new alliances, rhizomes, possibilities for taking action on behalf of one's policy problem.  As Virno observed, virtue and (vice) draw upon the same resources. 

Human Nature

Paolo Virno states that attitudes towards sovereignty or the civil state are determined by one's belief about human nature--whether humans are naturally good or naturally evil. A recent column by David Brooks provides specific examples, comparing the current Tea Party anti-authority views with the New Left movements of the 60s. But the core commonality is this: Members of both movements believe in what you might call mass innocence. Both movements are built on the assumption that the people are pure and virtuous and that evil is introduced into society by corrupt elites and rotten authority structures. “Man is born free, but he is everywhere in chains,” is how Rousseau put it. Because of this assumption, members of both movements go in big for conspiracy theories.

The reference to Rousseau sounds a silent alarm. Brooks notes that neither movement had/has serious plans for what they might do if they actually came into power themselves. History does provide some analogies, beginning with the French Revolution and the Jacobins (declaring Rousseauist principles), responsible for the Reign of Terror (guillotine). Peter Sloterdijk's Critique of Cynical Reason reflects on what happens to so-called enlightened movements (motivated by beliefs in native goodness) when they acquire power. When people (the multitude) resist their ideals, the movements become "cynical." What cannot be achieved by persuasion must then be accomplished by force.

True Fallacies

As is often the case with Python humor, this demonstration of the relationship between fallacious inference and humor is based on historical fact.  The scene is based on the life of Matthew Hopkins, the most famous witch finder of his day, who traveled the counties of Essex, Sussex, Huntington, and Norfolk, examining females suspected of witchcraft (fetishism).  Hopkins' ultimate test was that of "swimming."  The hands and feet of the accused were tied together crosswise, after which she was wrapped in a sheet and tossed into a pond. If she sank she was deemed innocent (albeit drowned). If she floated she was deemed guilty and executed.  In one year Hopkins oversaw more than sixty deaths by this means (Ulmer, Electronic Monuments, p. 165).

In our context we notice that the informal syllogism performed in our scene relies upon certain assumptions (beliefs), about the nature of reality, for example, that there are witches.  We may be reminded of D&G's reference to thought as "a witch's flight."  The reference to the inquisitor indicates a need for "fleeing" more than "flying."

Then there is the eponymous "rock/doom" band.

Bit

Definitions of bit on the Web: 

• spot: a small piece or quantity of something; "a spot of tea"; "a bit of paper"; "a bit of lint"; "I gave him a bit of my mind"
• a small fragment of something broken off from the whole; "a bit of rock caught him in the eye"
• moment: an indefinitely short time; "wait just a moment"; "in a mo"; "it only takes a minute"; "in just a bit"
• piece: an instance of some kind; "it was a nice piece of work"; "he had a bit of good luck"
• piece of metal held in horse's mouth by reins and used to control the horse while riding; "the horse was not accustomed to a bit"
• a unit of measurement of information (from binary + digit); the amount of information in a system having two equiprobable states; "there are 8 bits in a byte"
• morsel: a small amount of solid food; a mouthful; "all they had left was a bit of bread"
• snatch: a small fragment; "overheard snatches of their conversation"
• act: a short theatrical performance that is part of a longer program; "he did his act three times every evening"; "she had a catchy little routine"; "it was one of the best numbers he ever did"
• the part of a key that enters a lock and lifts the tumblers
• the cutting part of a drill; usually pointed and threaded and is replaceable in a brace or bitstock or drill press; "he looked around for the right size bit"
  wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn 

We may include a device learned from Derrida: the choral word. The names of our electrate concept (routine, bit) include all the meanings of the literate concept.

Creating a Brand Persona

Creating a Brand Persona

View more presentations from Jason Levine.
Here is some context for creating our conceptual personae, placing our construction in relation to branding and brand identity.  Brand is a strong contender for the site of subject position in electracy.  Our project appropriates this evolution of identity invention, reframing it within the process of apparatus invention.  Brand in this frame is subordinated to the larger emergence of avatar.

Literary Appropriation

A sign of timeliness is the appearance of this article in the NYT, Sunday, 2/28/10, reporting on the inroads that appropriation techniques from the other arts are making in the craft of literary authorship.
The Free-Appropriation Writer
The author in question is Helene Hegemann, whose novel about the Berlin club scene is a mash-up of unacknowledged quotations from other writers.  It is odd that the Times article does not mention the cut-ups of William Burroughs.