27.8.10

Variations on the Body - Audio Version

Here is the audio of the English text of Variations on the Body that was given to me by Randolph Burks. I cleaned the text of footnotes and other apparatus, noted headings and sections, then fed it into NaturalSoft text-to-speech in four blocks.

It isn't as good as having a human being reading it but it does allow quick turn-around and will hopefully be a useful experiment.

Is this type of audio - or audio of written texts in general - of any value?

Part 1 - Metamorphosis

Part 2 - Potential

Part 3 - Knowledge

Part 4 - Vertigo

26.8.10

Syracuse Conference - Serres Themes Included

John Caputo and company are putting together a conference titled "The Future of Continental Philosophy of Religion" at Syracuse University, April 7-9, 2011. Papers are being accepted until December 15, 2010 and decisions will be made February 2011.

Within the lengthy call for papers list of questions is this one referencing the work of Serres - "What about the new sciences of information and complexity in thinkers like Mark C. Taylor and Michel Serres?"

If this event is of interest either as an attendee or as a participant, contact and paper submission information can be found at the conference link above.

I'm working on a paper tentatively titled:
Respecting Complexity: Michel Serres and the Challenge of Reductive Cultural Analysis.

It looks at how: "the hazards of specialization encompass both the ‘specialists’ who do the work and the ‘objects’ of their reductive scrutiny, whether organic or inorganic, human or non-human. The specialist can lose contextual perspective leading to psychological fragmentation that mirrors the narrow focus of inquiry. An inability to integrate ideas and circumstances beyond the ‘known’ range of experience can produce anxiety as the apparently inassimilable information scrutiny can suffer too from the dissecting which specialization thrives on because certain emergent properties and qualities are lost when their various aspects are separated out from each other for independent examination."

Is anyone else working on papers related to Serres's work?

24.8.10

Variations on the Body - Michel Serres document

Randolph Burkes sent me this English translation Variations Sur La Corps with an open invite to make it available - see his note below.

Enjoy. I hope this is a helpful resource. It may be that some adjustment of layout, adding page numbers and other design/format ideas are worth considering.





Hi, I noticed you have a blog about Serres.
I've had a translation of his Variations sur le corps in my desk for about four years now but have had little luck getting such a heavily illustrated book published. So I've decided to just send it around to people who would be interested in having a copy.
Do with it what you please. Share it. I'm sure M. Serres would approve. Too bad I can't send the photos, but the references and captions are included.
Ciao!
Randolph Burks