The Ontology of Media Operations, or, Where is the Technics in Cultural Techniques?
The Ontology of Media Operations, or, Where is the Technics in Cultural Techniques?
Abstract
My aim in this paper is to develop an ontology of media operations that is rooted in Gilbert Simondon’s theory of individuation. I position this media operative ontology in contrast to Bernhard Siegert’s understanding of operative ontology as a cultural technique. Drawing on Wolfgang Ernst, Henri Atlan, and Michel Serres, I argue that Siegert’s position compromises the extra-cultural operationality of technical media, and of techniques more generally, in its bid to redirect media theory from its Kittlerian trajectory. With his theory of information as reception of environmental singularity by a metastable receiver, Simondon provides a mechanism for theorizing how extra-cultural operationality of technical media informs the production of culture and the distinctions upon which it rests, without compromising the alterity of technics.
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Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike 3.0 Generic
Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike 3.0 Generic
Keywords:
ontologymedia operationsindividuationoperationality