re-animation
its time to begin again. writing about writing can help writing, right? and its just to cruel to post such things on facebook. plus, i'd rather spiel about dissertation writing for a few paragraphs instead of a few sentences. the last year of this thing begins now: year six. 2010 is upon us very shortly and since i titled this 'disserter 2010' three years ago, i've got to stick to it.
the school year begins now and its going to be a busy one, so i'll have to get more specific that 2010 and figure out a writing schedule. writing will have to find a home during and inbetween lots of traveling: research trips to Montreal, London and Taipei, several trips to NYC, some time in Maine and even a few weeks working on my parents house in Wisconsin. damn, that sounds fun and scary. discipline will have to be my new friend. i refuse to be at my wits end and suffer more than necessary during this process, we'll see how that goes and if my definition of necessary gets twisted.
my new job at USC begins today too; thus, i am stuck in not so beautiful Oxnard for three days at a training and teambuilding retreat. it is very exciting to not TA and have a job that is interesting, but on some level, just a job. the best part is, no grading! my boss is great and i seem to have managed to miss all activities that involve trustfalls thus far.
so, today it begins. my advisors are supportive (if not a bit too willing to believe in me) and i'm actually looking forward to doing the writing--if for no other reason that to get some things out of my head. and perhaps most importantly i think i reached a place of peace with what i am going to write, why its worth writing and what place a dissertation has in the world. for the latter, the answer should be obvious--a very empty small place. but not diminutive. of course a dissertation doesn't matter at all, of course its a great deal of labor to produce something that will only be read by three to five people (grudgingly) and so on and so on, but this is a gift, an opening, a chance to write and test things and fail miserably as if i am alone in a cabin with my favorite books, writing a tome for myself. to act and think and write as if i am beholden to forces other than the people and books i've worked with (advisors, authors, interviewees, friends) would be way too much to deal with. its great that dissertations are useless and really have no place in world after their production, otherwise it would be impossible to be 1) this focused 2) this selfish and 3) this willing to let what i find guide me, without any great concern for its external merit. some would i.d. this as the great flaw of academia, that the fruits of academic labor lack "relevance," but this is its beauty and trying to put forth an argument based on some form of external "relevance" is flawed and steeped with the traps of neoliberal logic (but this is a spiel for another time and is about larger questions of knowledge and its production is understood, valued and valorized).
the question of why it is worth writing such a thing (aside from it being my ticket out of USC, a worthy reason onto itself) looms large. why is it worth spending three+ years thinking about the politics, social life and materiality of code, the logics and origins of free software, the experiences of coders, changing conditions of work, and all thinks Ubuntu? the short answer is that i find beauty and hope in what free software supporters and coders do. the longer answer involves and curiosity and confusion coupled with irritation and agitation. i'm curious about conditions of work and confused about how and why these conditions are imagined, practiced, institutionalized and experienced. i'm irritated by superficial analysis of things that confuse me: like glossy talk of software without thinking to ask what it is; 99% of the use of the terms "service economy" and "internet community;" talking about workers without talking about work; the idea that computer code is amaterial and costs nothing to reproduce; the idea that coders own their own means of production; and like most anyone whose thought about one thing for a long time, the list could go on and on. the glue that holds my confusion and curiosity to my irritation is my agitation over fun. weird, right? at first fun was just striking as this human need and experience that drove and organized so much of how and what we do--and this was very much on the surface in free software communities--but now fun is a constant agitator. it stirs everything up, helping expose beauty and uncapitalist practices and also making clear that horrible dynamism of capital's capacity to extract value in increasingly indirect modes. i could talk forever about work and fun, which pretty much sums up the peace i've arrived at.
anyway, the point is, i have no idea of the merit, impact, relevance or if anyone should care about what i'm going to write and i'm going to enjoy not having to figure that part out for the moment. this might seem backwards, but its sorta like a very perverted version of what scientists might call 'basic research.' not sure i can say i'm after understanding fundamental principles of how the world works, but isn't that what research is about anyway?
[[wrote this two weeks ago, only posted now. hope this is not the standard of my procrastination]]