The First Conference I Attended This Year: BOND Conference 2011, Bochum and Dortmund

The first conference I attended this year was the BOND Conference, the annual dissertation colloquium (combining American Studies in BOchum and DortmuND).

The conference offers young scholars in American Studies a forum to present current research projects as work in progress. Despite the fact that BOND is an "internal" event, a kind of dialogue or intellectual exchange between the American Studies PhD students from Bochum and Dortmund, we always have PhD students and Professors from nearby universities and international guests. This time the visiting American Studies specialists were Lynn Rose (Truman State University, currently Fulbright Professor at the University Rostock) and Steven Reschly (Truman State University). The way they handled their responsibilities as our conference "Rock Stars" was simply excellent. Many thanks, Professors!
If you click on the picture below, you will be able to inform yourself about the presenters and their work.

Thanks extends to the BOND organizers: Elisa Schweinfurth, Heike Steinhoff, Sina Nitzsche and Ariane Theis. Many-many thanks for organizing this annual event! An example of a good academic tradition.

Below is, basically, the extended summary of my presentation, which I have decided to publish as a reminder to myself.

"Construing Digital Nomadism"
Presentation by Svetlana Makeyeva
BOND Conference 2011, Bochum/Dortmund

One way to construe contemporary digital nomadism is to think of it as the basis for the formation of a sphere—a site and subject of liberal democratic practice—on the Web; another way, as the threat to the state system in Deleuzian and Guattarian sense, e.g. a war machine set by a nomad against the State apparatus. The intellectual framework which informs my study has its origins in A Thousand Plateaus by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari (D&G, 1980). With the English translation of the work in 1987, A Thousand Plateaus entered the English-language postmodernist and poststructuralist discourse. This complex philosophical work is qualitatively different from the Kantian and Hegelian [Western] State philosophy. Since A Thousand Plateaus received substantial criticism from many of the tenants of Anglo-American philosophy and analytic tradition, it seems useful at this point to provide an overview of a critical discussion of the postmodern thought, epistemic relativism in the philosophy of science and D&G’s work— particularly, A Thousand Plateaus—at this stage of my study. There is a set of the problems hindering the texts of D&G from acquiring a ‘classical value’ within Anglo-American political philosophy and academic scholarship, in general. (These will be mentioned in the course of the presentation.) However, despite the dominance of the narratives of Enlightenment and Spirit, the postmodern thought and the school of epistemic relativism did receive a degree of recognition in the United States, Great Britain and other countries and institutions, which have successfully adopted the dogmas of the analytical Anglo-American academic scholarship. Indeed, the postmodern thought has gained proponents and paved its way into Anglo-American university curricula. As demonstrated by a number of recent innovative works reviewed in this study, some philosophical concepts (nomad, war machine, body without organs, rhizome, etc.) introduced in A Thousand Plateaus and other prominent works by D&G turned out to be very useful in analyzing and reflecting upon the trends within contemporary American society. These studies are of particular interest due to the major up-to-date topics of my thesis, e.g. the State control of the Internet, the obstacles to the freedom of expression caused by the American corporations and the political resistance to the State system on the Web.
Key terms of the presentation: nomad, State Apparatus, contemporary digital nomadism, the Internet, World Wide Web.

I enjoyed the discussion a lot. I received several questions about the text I am reading, the methodological framework of my thesis and critical approach to Deleuze and Guattari's theories, particularly, feminist criticism of the philosophical concepts in A Thousand Plateaus (which I did not address in my presentation). Two distinguished professors recommended to include a paragraph or two about my approach to the "body" in my research. The comments and recommendations turned out to be a constructive criticism; hence, very helpful. The work on my thesis continues.

I like the picture above very much. It is available on the Web on many websites. Whoever the author, this is witty.)