Category Archives: Dialogue

In collaboration with the new Chicago branch of the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, InterCcECT welcomes you to a moderated discussion on immoderate SLOP.

From the bulldozing of the White House to the rise of ICE Barbie, the visual regime of contemporary American fascism merges violent delight in destruction with nouveau riche vulgarity, middle class mediocrity, and internet meme culture. Despite incessant callbacks to the 1930s and continued deployment of classic fascist themes, contemporary fascism distinguishes itself from its historical predecessors by its speed, virulence, sites of production, and mode of distribution. Hyper-capitalized, decentralized, and algorithmically determined, the big beautiful slop machine and its army of broligarchs, podcasters, tradwife influencers, and internet trolls are rewriting the fascist rulebook, rewiring the libidinal economy of the present, and stacking the deck for capital.

How does the aesthetic regime of contemporary fascism function? What marks the specificity of fascism 2.0 and what does it reveal about the transformations of American and global political life in the age of polycrisis? How does the technical apparatus of postmodern capitalism influence the production, circulation, and consumption of fascist aesthetics? And what, under these conditions, would it mean to resist by “politicizing aesthetics” as Walter Benjamin once enjoined us to?

Anna Kornbluh and Kate Wagner, moderated by BISR Chicago faculty Audrey Nicolaides.

Join us Saturday 28 February, 3-5pm

Twelve Ten Gallery
1104 West Thorndale Avenue
Chicago, IL 60660

This event is co-presented by the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research and Twelve Ten Gallery and is free to attend. $10 suggested donation. Complimentary refreshments will be provided. Please RSVP.

ON OUR CALENDAR:

(with apologies for the unfortunate unusual winter gap, and in anticipation of more InterCcECT mainline events in spring)

16 Feb Extraction: Thea Riofrancos in conversation with Gabe Winant

19 Feb Performing Chance: The Art of Alison Knowles

15 April Lenin with DuBois: Theorizing A Revolutionary Countermood

In a partly salutary shift, gender has largely replaced sex as a category in contemporary culture and theory. Popular sex negativity and insurgent fascist politics alike pose sex as a problem – but not the way psychoanalysis meant. A new book by longtime Friend of InterCcECT Chris Breu challenges this shift, constructing a theory of sex as nonbinary embodiment and as prosocial desire. Professor Breu dialogues about In Defense of Sex with Professor Rebekah Sheldon at Seminary Coop on Saturday 7 December at 3pm.

Join InterCcECT there and afterwards for a book party and holiday festivity, prosociality amid the darkness (RSVP for party deets).

Smell is the sense the least available to medium, mediation, and remediation, and the most susceptible to association with the natural, the animal, the disgusting. For these and other reasons, the theory and art of smell generate great friction in philosophy, political-economy, and psychoanalysis. An exciting new book palpates these frictions and percusses insights about truth, language, and sexuality. In a very special InterCcECT dialogue, Dr. Simon Hajdini discusses What’s That Smell with Dr. William Mazzarella, Join us at 4pm Tuesday 12 November, UIC University Hall Room 2028 (601 S Morgan St, 20th floor; Blue Line: UIC Halsted).

Advance reading not required but suggested; contact us for PDF.

Mark your calendars now for our 7 December event, In Defense of Sex, a book talk at Seminary Coop followed by InterCcECT festivities that evening!