240085 SE Affect, Precarity and Post-Industrialisation (P4) (2014S)

The sense of a post-industrial crisis is all-pervasive in many parts of the world, particularly in what was once called the '1st World' of North America and Europe. 'No hope' and 'no future' characterise this historical moment, but it still seems to be hard to talk about these fundamental changes. One field in which scholars have tried to tackle these changes most thoroughly is the literature on affect. Based on an introduction into theories on affect, this course will explore recent contributions by thinkers such as Kathleen Stewart, Elizabeth Povinelli, and Anne Allison in order to search for the impact current precarious work relations, a post-industrial loss of the future, and widespread existential insecurities have on human life worldwide. Their shared approach will help us to, firstly, re-embed affect in a broader political economy of precarity and abandonment. It will also assist to explore how 'the political' has been reconfigured in times when planning seems impossible and expert knowledge loses authority. Indeed, what role do human bodies, needs and affects play when negotiating change and political belonging, how has the human subject been reconstituted in the 21st century, and how is the discipline of anthropology to respond to this?