Stream #4 - Towards a (dark) Counter-cartography for Liberation
The current stage of late capitalism, that tries to occupy our world and political imaginaries, ironically capitalises on doom determinisms while continuing to promise a bright future governed by data accumulation, wells of information and an “artificial intelligence”. Yet, what about all the ignorance that capitalism needs to produce, conceal and project so it can continue expanding through extraction? What can we unlearn and colearn from agnotology (the study of the production of ignorance and uncertainty) as we collectively gather in the dark, in search for transformational routes for liberation? How does the militarization and corporatization of the university spaces influence the disciplinary organization of knowledge and space, the production of ignorance and the philosophy of intelligence? What modes of attestation and temporalities of resistance do these regimes of in/visibility create, or dislocate when death can be increasingly slow, eruptive or automated depending on where you are in this universally dark planet?
In this workshop, artist, educatress and technologist Jessika Khazrik will be delving into “خريطة الظلام Cartography of Darkness” (publicly accessed on https://dark.society.systems), a transclusive research platform dedicated to exploring universalisms and the dark unity of knowledge in our highly obfuscated and multiple crisis-ridden age. Launched in August 2023 on the third year memorial of the Beirut Port Blast with the urgently ongoing chapter “For a Trans-electric Solidarity”, the online cognitive mapping platform is comprised of a triad of interconnected, sonified spaces: a map, a periodical and a repository. These virtual spaces, that are continuously reactivated through multi-generational assemblies, workshops on cognitive mapping/counter-cartography and orgaraves, bring together various contributions that resist the agnogenic practices of militarization. How do we heal our imagination in a global system that institutes separation and disseminates a seemingly functional ignorance all while promising the opposite of its truth?
This workshop is open to practitioners from all fields and greatly encourages group participation, regardless of whether you were a witness, a dancer, a musician or an architect. It could be most generative for folks who work at the intersection of several interconnected urgencies like environmental justice, transformative justice, energy infrastructure, digital rights and disarmament. All are welcomed!