13 February 2009: "Feelin Really Stuck Lately"

This post is about the production of alienation through geographical configurations necessitated by postindustrial capitalism. Carles explains: "Feeling down about architecture cuz space changes ur daily life more than u even realize." In other words, architecture is a kind of ideological imposition; our subjectivity is shaped by the spaces we inhabit to the degree in which we refashion those spaces to express identity. But the general inflexibility of architectural integuments makes these efforts at personalizing space doomed to a merely illusory success. The space has become so homogeneous in its articulation that it precludes even imaginary escapes: "I can’t get ‘lost’ and metaphorically get lose in my own thoughts." Consequently, despite efforts to apprehend and sublate such environments, suburban anomie can become nothing more than a mirror that reflects the lacunae we sense in our own being: "Feelin’ teen angst / Feelin’ feelings is what I do best." Emotions become as barren as the space which nurtures them, to the zero degree of tautological unnameability. Carles concludes, as he often does, with some pertinent philosophical questions. "Is San Francisco more authentic than Brooklyn? Or is Minnesota the new Brooklyn? Or is Minnesota the new Australia?" What are the terms for authentic being, when places has usurped the characteristics of and aspirations for authenticity. What happens to being when authenticity becomes a destination rather than an ontology? Is it more difficult to achieve authenticity once we can conceptually relocate it to Australia? Is it safer when it is fixed where the foot soldiers of the culture industry can carefully monitor it, in Brooklyn? Or is it best imagined in an American heartland, like Minnesota, shaped by recumbent nationalism?