Q&A Submissions!
Added 2020-05-15 08:32:45 +0000 UTCIt's been a couple of months since the last, so it seems like its time for another Patron Exclusive Q&A.
After working on a couple of half-hour long epics, it may be an extra week between my last video and my next (although I might still manage to squeeze it in!) so I thought I'd use the extra bit of time to put together another Q&A.
Your questions before have always been fantastically inquisitive and it's always great fun doing these.
So, drop your questions below!
Comments
Hiya, sorry, I only just spotted this! Technology sits a little outside of my area of expertise I'm afraid. I'm currently planning a video on Whiteness which hopefully might help a little bit. I think the ways in which data collection, storage and interpretation tends to reflect society's biases is a really important topic though and one which many of those who operate in the field are worryingly unaware of...
Tom Nicholas
2020-06-05 15:15:27 +0000 UTCHi, Tom: Love the Patreon site. I am wondering if you could discuss this emergent area of thought relating decolonizing technology, data, and innovation. Basically, after reading Algorithms of Oppression, Surveillance Capitalism, and the Cost of Connection, Race after Technology, and Design Justice. I am interested in learning your thoughts about data colonialism and imperialism. Thanks for your great analysis!
N. K.
2020-05-24 19:07:55 +0000 UTCHey Richard! This is a great question and one that I actually feel pretty qualified to answer. In fact, I'll probably have to restrain myself from going on for too long about this, haha. I'll definately chat a bit about representing cities in the Q&A!
Tom Nicholas
2020-05-20 22:18:35 +0000 UTChey tom! i understand your phd research is on (and i hope i dont butcher this) the representation of cities in theatre. lately i've been thinking a lot about how my own city (new orleans, louisiana) has been shaped by its representations, especially in dialogue with the economics of our tourism industry. i find that in its attempts to 'brand' the city, more often than not, tourism ends up reducing major aspects of our cultural heritage (jazz, mardi gras, voodoo) to flat, differential signifiers of 'new orleanity' to serve as spectacle for visitors. meanwhile, the largely black working class population which generates this culture sees none of the gains. for example, to draw from theatre, tennessee williams's eponymous 'streetcar named desire' actually stopped operation in 1948 in the city government's midcentury war against public transit. for a more gruesome example, try looking up the rise of 'disaster tourism' in the wake of hurricane katrina, where guides would take gawking tourists in vans through the most ruined areas of the city so they could have an up-close look at all the horror they'd seen on tv. anyway, all this to say, i wonder if you have a word on the problematics of representations of cities made for an outside audience? as always, love your work!
Richard
2020-05-20 18:30:32 +0000 UTCInteresting, I've never done much reading on criminology but these different approaches are certainly interesting and I can see how they stem from broader schools of thought outside of criminology. I'll have a think about this and include it in the video!
Tom Nicholas
2020-05-18 15:37:31 +0000 UTCHi Bing, I've not done a huge amount of reading on metapolitics but can certainly discuss the idea of politics being "downstream from culture"! I'll also have a bit of read up on metapolitics so that I can offer you some thoughts on that too though! Thanks for such a thoughtful question!
Tom Nicholas
2020-05-18 15:35:48 +0000 UTCHi Tom, I’d love to know your thoughts on crime theories. What is your take on prisons vs community type programs? I tend to think the interactionist theories make the most sense but then the left realists come in and I’m swayed 😂
Persē
2020-05-16 01:42:22 +0000 UTCHi, Tom, I'd like you to discuss the concept of metapolitics. At first I wanted to include an accompanying text, but on closer inspection I prefer to leave it open. To give some interpretation I do not apply the definitions of Ranciere or Badiou, instead I refer to the definition that the alt-right attaches to it: 'politics is downstream from culture'. The alt-right is regarded as an actor of metapolitics and does it fairly successfully online. I myself am reluctant to look up certain topics on Youtube because I know that if I click on certain videos the algorithm will persistently recommend the same kind of videos to me. It creates an atmosphere of influence that can be very effective on an impressionable mind. Against this background, taking into account that there is a revival of political left-wing online, what are the possible opportunities and limitations of metapolitics for the Left? Cheers, Bing
Bing
2020-05-16 00:15:32 +0000 UTCHaha, thanks! I'll include some mumblings about this in the video!
Tom Nicholas
2020-05-15 16:09:34 +0000 UTCYeah, it's interesting, in the sequence of crises we've had over the past decades, how quickly we move from one to the next and how this allows the "unprecedented" events of each to be quickly forgottern. Apparently the Patriot Act has just been reauthorised in the US too...
Tom Nicholas
2020-05-15 16:09:12 +0000 UTCForgot the ask a question! At times of existential challenges such as 9/11 and Covid etc, what are you're thoughts on our potential cultural responses if we are living under in a cultural post post-modernism/meta modernism world.
Niall Ferguson
2020-05-15 15:39:16 +0000 UTCHi Tom, really enjoyed the Harry Potter analysis. I was surprised what with the housing crisis, everything that happened in 2016 and how Covid; I'd forgotten how much the world had changed after 9/11. Great reminder of how important it is to be aware of how willing we were in accepting such intrusive government policy to combat 'terrorism'.
Niall Ferguson
2020-05-15 15:32:01 +0000 UTC
