Here we go with some notes and links.
Last night went to a great jazz jam at a brew pub in walking distance of the house. Video at Instagram Stories.
For Juneteenth at Art & Theology, on the poem “Fisk Jubilee Proclamation” by Tyehimba Jess, from his Pulitzer-winning collection Olio.
“Fisk Jubilee Proclamation” by Tyehimba Jess is the first in a heroic crown of sonnets from Jess’s second poetry collection, the Pulitzer Prize–winning Olio. A crown of sonnets is a circular sequence in which the last line of the first sonnet becomes the first line of the second sonnet, the last line of the second sonnet becomes the first line of the third sonnet, and so forth, until eventually the last line of the last sonnet becomes the first line of the first sonnet. What makes Jess’s crown “heroic” (part of the form’s technical name) is that it comprises fifteen sonnets, and the final one is made up of all the first or last lines of the preceding fourteen, in order. Quite the feat!
With this heroic crown, Jess honors the Fisk Jubilee Singers from the historically Black Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, a choral ensemble established in 1871 and still active today. Fisk was founded after the Civil War to educate freed men and women and other young African Americans. To raise money for the new school, music professor and treasurer George L. White formed a small choir of nine students to tour the United States. Their repertoire was the spirituals they and their parents sang on the plantations, songs that were rarely known at the time among northern white audiences—such as “Go Down, Moses,” “Steal Away to Jesus,” “Ezekiel Saw the Wheel,” “Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho,” and “Roll, Jordan, Roll,” to name a few. The Fisk Jubilee Singers are credited with spreading and popularizing this uniquely Black American art form over the country and world.
A few months ago, the Alabama Shakespeare Festival in Montgomery presented a play, Jubilee, based on the story of the Fisk Jubilee Singers.
My friend Chris Barnett has a great Substack post on Succession – a show which I watched not a minute of, but that doesn’t stop me from appreciating good commentary!
Both Matsson and Pierce are idiosyncratically flawed and ruthless; yet, they are not portrayed as threatening the public good—a discrepancy that insinuates that propaganda only comes from one side of the political spectrum. This is, of course, a historical falsehood: the Soviet Union, no less than Nazi Germany, employed propaganda. The same is true of Western states as well, including the United States. Hence, to the extent that media is a tool, it can be abused by people of all stripes.
But what does this reality say about popular media as such? This is the essential question. In his 1962 book Propagandes, later published in English as Propaganda: The Formation of Men’s Attitudes (1965), French theorist Jacques Ellul (1912-94) argues that propaganda needs to be understood as a phenomenon inextricable from modern society and technology, rather than as something utilized by a few bad actors. Indeed, for Ellul, propaganda runs far deeper than, say, made-up stories about a nation’s military activity. Yes, this sort of propaganda does exist—usually under the guise of what Ellul calls “agitation propaganda”—but it’s only the tip of the iceberg. More pervasive and insidious is “integration propaganda,” which seeks to instantiate certain attitudes and to conform people to desired patterns of thought and action. Education plays a key role in “integration propaganda,” but so does the mass media. In fact, both work together to convince people—particularly those who are well educated—that societal assimilation is a good thing, thereby imbuing their lives with meaning and worth. Why is this a problem? According to Ellul, the trouble runs in two directions. On the side of the propagandist, it is a form of coercion, exhibiting a desire to manipulate others. On the side of the propagandee, it is a form of surrender—an exchange of freedom in favor of placation. No one can escape the consequences of propaganda. It is not something that can be avoided if one watches the “right” news channels or follows the “true” Twitter accounts. This is because, as Ellul puts it, “propaganda is…the effect of a technological society,” not the “political weapon of a regime.” Now matter who’s in charge, it is propaganda that persuades “man to submit with good grace,” “convinced of the excellence of what he is forced to do.”
On this reading, then, the problems of contemporary society cannot be reduced to a single media corporation, much less to a single family. For Ellul, it is crucial that people accept this larger, systemic reality; they must be roused “to defend themselves by making them aware of their frailty and their vulnerability.” Even media that claim to champion democracy—as, indeed, Succession ultimately does—pose a danger.
Somewhat related – and something I hope to return to later – is the latest from the Convivial Society: “Care, not control” – or, to use a way the author summarizes his point himself: surveillance does not equal care.
Sacasas also references this Ellul fellow, so perhaps he’s someone I should look into.
As I thought about what I’ve written over the last few weeks, I realized that much of it could be summed with a simple imperative:
Resist the temptation to confuse control for care.
Implicit in how digital technologies are often marketed is the promise of greater control as if it were equivalent to greater care.
I chose the word control because it captures a wide array of possible practices and technologies. The promise of control might be expressed, for example, through technologies that offer the possibility of improved data-gathering, planning, monitoring, calibration, customization, scheduling, outsourcing, security, or documentation. In each case, we are encouraged to reduce the skill of caring—either in the sense of taking an interest in or looking out for the welfare of another—to one of these various forms of technological mediation. Technologically mediated expressions of control also suggest relationships of distance and detachment rather than presence and involvement, which can in turn imply a certain evasion of the risk and obligations that care can entail.
Armed with a bamboo ink pen and a steady hand, Ethiopian Orthodox priest Zelalem Mola carefully copied text in the ancient Ge’ez language from a religious book onto a goatskin parchment.
This painstaking task is preserving an ancient tradition, all the while bringing him closer to God, the 42-year-old said.
At the Hamere Berhan Institute in Addis Ababa, priests and lay worshippers work by hand to replicate sometimes centuries-old religious manuscripts and sacred artwork.
The parchments, pens and inks are all prepared at the institute, which lies in the Piasa district in the historic heart of the Ethiopian capital.
Yeshiemebet Sisay, 29, who is in charge of communications at Hamere Berhan, said the work began four years ago.
“Ancient parchment manuscripts are disappearing from our culture, which motivated us to start this project,” she said.
Did you see the Cato 2023 study, focused on digital currency, that secondarily found that 29% of 18-29yo were in favor of govt installing surveillance cameras IN EVERY HOME to cut down on domestic violence, abuse and other illegal activity? (And perhaps wrongthink while we’re at it??). 29%!!! Yikes. Definitely time to break the surveillance = care false equivalence.