Have been reading a few journal articles on Actor Network Theory (ANT). The journals are mainly by or about Bruno Latour. What I have understood, in a really broad sense, is the incredulity of ANT to objectivism and its associated separation with subjectivism and vice versa. I've always thought that the pursuit of the 'objective' was problematic and a highly constructed endeavour, but I've never really thought of (inverting?) that logic ie. if that for everything we try to perceive as objective instantly becomes subjective because we are addressing it, then logically what we don't address or try to rationalise must be the very thing that is authentic or real or natural. There is a sense that there does exist things in our everyday lives that are authentic, but the moment we try to capture or articulate these things they instantly cease to exist as 'natural'. The 'objective' seems to be determined by the very thing that isn't objective. 'Culture' seems to try to convince us that subjective and objective are transposed somehow and that distinction between the two even exists. I'm getting deja vu of Jacques Derrida 'Under Erasure' somehow at this point but not sure as yet why. Is Under Erasure fission and ANT fusion??
Further, Latour discusses the notion of the agency of objects and how objects signify and carry meaning that kind of talks back to us by the way that we perceive them via scripts. What I found interesting was Gijs Van Oenen's critique of Latour and ANT regarding the agency of objects (van Oenen 2011). I think what he's saying is that Latour kind of tries to redefine 'act' or 'actor' by reducing 'act' to 'actant' to include objects as possessing agency and thereby reducing humans to objects. Latour seems to be defining human beings like any other life form in the universe, it is only humans that elevate their status above all else. 'Act' becomes any kind of random 'doing' regardless of intent or reason, which challenges Modern/Philosophical notions. Meanwhile, van Oenen states that 'act' must include both an end and an intention, objects cannot escape culture by becoming a 'snapshot' of a singular moment escaping time and meaning as Latour suggests, objects are a part of the 'flow' of culture. van Oenen is accusing Latour of only further becoming enmeshed in objectivity by trying to escape it in this way. van Oenen states that it is only through the restoration of agency to all things and by immersing ourselves in subjectivity can we continue to pursue 'objectivity'. In this sense, van Oenen is elevating objects instead rather to the status of humans and maintaining Modern notions (van Oenen 2011). This kind of reminds me of Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn as the gateway out of Modernism to Postmodernism through critique of Science (epistemology) but Latour and van Oenen seem to represent the gateway from Postmodernism back into Modernism through Philosophy (ontology). Latour defines everything as objects in the Postmodern world where van Oenen defines everything as human within Modernity (van Oenen 2011). Latour seems to pull us even further toward the 'edge' while van Oenen seems to pull us back to 'centre'. Is it the dialogue or tension between these two perspectives that is important or the truth that we pursue?? Is Latour still 'seeking' and van Oenen has 'settled'? Or has Latour 'settled' and van Oenen is still 'seeking'?
What is also interesting is the emergence of ARPANET, the internet and Web2.0 described as 'random' or as a result of a series of unpredictable events. Unpredictable yes, unrelated, I don't think so. I think 'random' is like 'objective'. I think there is always an underlying pattern or grammar and that all events are tied into underlying patterns of culture that we can't escape. It depends what level you are talking about. Perhaps this is the difference between epistemology and ontology, two currents flowing concurrently through time but at two different levels. I think Latour is talking about epistemology and van Oenen is talking about ontology which seems to be what culture is. Latour is talking about specifics and van Oenen is speaking more broadly, kind of reminds me of the local and the global (van Oenen 2011). So is this inverted epistemology in what Latour describes as the new 'non-modern' world what is referred to as 'glocal' I wonder??
References:
van Oenen, G 2011, 'Interpassive Agency, Engaging Actor-Network-Theory's View on the Agency of Objects', Theory and Event, Vol. 14, Iss. 2
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