http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imagined_communities

The imagined community is a concept coined by Benedict Anderson which states that a nation is a community socially constructed, which is to say imagined by the people who perceive themselves as part of that group.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imaginary_%28sociology%29

An imaginary, or social imaginary is the set of values, institutions, laws, and symbols common to a particular social group and the corresponding society.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arjun_Appadurai

For Appadurai the imaginary is composed of five dimensions of global cultural flow: 1) ethnoscapes; 2) mediascapes; 3) technoscapes; 4) finanscapes; 5) ideoscapes.

Tags: reading, school

obsolescence [(ob-suh-les-uhns)]
A decline in the value of equipment or of a product brought about by an introduction of new technology or by changes in demand.


planned obsolescence
a method of stimulating consumer demand by designing products that wear out or become outmoded after limited use. Also called built-in obsolescence.

Incorporating into a product features that will almost certainly go out of favor in a short time, thereby inducing the consumer to purchase a new model of the product. Placing sweeping tail fins on an automobile was an example of planned obsolescence.

Tags: reading, school

Just some school reading.

From Wilk:
"For Mauss, the answer was that the giving and reciprocating of gifts creates a link between the people involved. His book made some groups of people famous for their "gift economies"... the New Zealand Maori for having a complex philosophy of how the essence of a person is carried in their gifts..."

From Mauss:
"What imposes obligation in the present received and exchanged, is the fact that the thing received is not inactive. Even when it is abandoned by the giver, it still possesses something of him. Through it the giver has a hold over the beneficiary just as, being the owner, through it he has a hold over the thief...

It is clear that in Maori law, the legal tie, a tie occurring through through things, is one between souls, because thinking itself possesses a soul, is of the soul. Hence it follows that to make a gift of something to someone is to make a present of some part of oneself."

Wilk again:
"Thus, upon giving the object away, part of the owner's hau (energy/soul) goes with it. This is why recieving the gift always carries an obligation to reciprocate, because the hau 'wants' to return to its original owner, though it may now be attatched to another's object."

Tags: reading, school

Utopian Enterprise: Articulating the Meanings of Star Trek's Culture of Consumption, by Robert V. Koznets

Abstract: In this article, I examine the cultural and subcultural construction of consumption meanings and practices as they are negotiated from mass media images and objects. Field notes and artifacts from 20 months of fieldwork at Star Trek fan clubs, at conventions, and in Internet groups, and 67 interviews with Star Trek fans are used as data. Star Trek’s subculture of consumption is found to be constructed as a powerful utopian refuge. Stigma, social situation, and the need for legitimacy shape the diverse subcultures’ consumption meanings and practices. Legitimizing articulations of Star Trek as a religion or myth underscore fans’ heavy investment of self in the text. These sacralizing articulations are used to distance the text from its superficial status as a commercial product. The findings emphasize and describe how consumption often fulfills the contemporary hunger for a conceptual space in which to construct a sense of self and what matters in life. They also reveal broader cultural tensions between the affective investments people make in consumption objects and the encroachment of commercialization.

Tags: funny, reading
Current Mood: amused

Glados: Venus in Chains

Tags: games, reading

http://www.lastblood.net/
this is a actually a really good webcomic :)
( My favorite page; possible spoilers )

Tags: comics, reading