Discordia || On crowds

Information InFiltration. Mediaculturistic artistic dissent-o-mania.

[- On crowds
By williamegginton, Section question corner Posted on Wed May 7th, 2003 at 06:34:54 AM EURODISCORDIA TIME
This is an abstract for an article entitled, "Intimacy and Anonymity, or How the Audience Became a Crowd," which will appear next year in a volume entitled CROWDS from The Johns Hopkins University Press.

[ --------------------------------------------- ]

What is a crowd? From where does it draw its power? What is its proper phenomenology? The twentieth century, which was supposed to be the age of the crowd, was also witness to declarations of its end, and yet the outset of the next century is marked by people marching the streets in unprecedented numbers. This article seeks to approach these questions and the current phenomena from the perspective of a historical examination of the political manipulations and reverberations of crowds in the European cultural context. The specific thesis is that the modern crowd as a political phenomenon emerged at least in part from group dynamics honed in the theatrical institutions of the early modern period. Envisioned as thecrucible for the production of a docile populace, the crowd has always haunted the modern state's best laid plans with the specter of an other it cannot quite comprehend.
[editor's note, by Aileen][moved from "Discuss Discordia" to "Question Corner", because the question appears to involve crowds in general rather than the crowd Discordia will draw.]

[ --------------------------------------------- ]

On crowds | 0 comments

[- CREATE ACCOUNT
so you can post & vote!

[- how to post and vote
[- faq (discordia q&a)
[- faq en español
[- search
[- send feedback

[- sick of english?
[- multi-lingual babelfilter

submit story | create account | faq | search