Society of Singularities. Andreas Reckwitz
of Chicago Press, 2015); and Paul Feyerabend, Against Method: Outline of an Anarchist Theory of Knowledge, 4th edn. (London: Verso, 2010). 9 This topic will be addressed in Part II, chapter 2. 10 When this no longer happens to be the case, then the singularity in question simply joins the register of the general-particular. This is, of course, a possibility and, as I will describe later in greater detail, it implies devaluation. Over the course of this book, whenever I use the term “the particular” without comment, it is meant to denote singularities / unique entities. Whenever I am discussing idiosyncrasies or the general-particular, I use these terms explicitly. 11 Translational processes of this sort are discussed with different terminology in Michael Thompson’s Rubbish Theory. 12 On this heterogeneous semantic field, see Flavia Kippele, Was heißt Individualisierung? Die Antworten soziologischer Klassiker (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1998); Thomas Kron and Martin Horáček, Individualisierung (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2009); and, for its narrower and yet interdisciplinary approach, Manfred Frank and Anselm Haverkamp, eds., Individualität (Munich: Fink, 1988). 13 See Simmel, Sociology, pp. 621–66. 14 It should be noted that Simmel already relates the concept of the individual not only to subjects but also to their social circles (see ibid., p. 621). 15 Objects always have a material basis. The distinction between objects and things is contested; in general, the concept of the thing underscores the delineable materiality of an object. Yet for certain objects – such as novels, myths, or songs – it is characteristic that they are not associated with a single material bearer but can rather materialize in various forms. On this topic, see Gustav Roßler, Der Anteil der Dinge an der Gesellschaft: Sozialität – Kognition – Netzwerke (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2015). 16 See Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility: Third Version,” in Selected Writings: Volume 4, 1938–1940, ed. Howard Eiland and Michael W. Jennings (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003), pp. 251–83. 17 The objects of aesthetics, literary theory, music theory, or theology are thus to a large extent singularities in this sense. For a somewhat rhapsodizing historical look at the singularity of things, see Neil MacGregor, A History of the World in 100 Objects (New York: Penguin, 2013). For a more theoretically informed approach, see Sherry Turkle, Evocative Objects: Things We Think With (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011). 18 On the concept of style, see Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds., Stil: Geschichten und Funktionen eines kulturwissenschaftlichen Diskurselements (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1986); and Dick Hebidge, Subculture: The Meaning of Style (London: Routledge, 1979). 19 See Bruno Baur, Biodiversität (Bern: Haupt, 2010). 20 Regarding objects, this book will look extensively at cultural goods from the economic sphere and their appropriation for the sake of lifestyles (food or living situations, for instance). 21 In this regard, see the articles collected in Richard van Dülmen, ed., Entdeckung des Ich: Die Geschichte der Individualisierung vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart (Cologne: Böhlau, 2001). 22 In Foucault’s sense of the term, which I have borrowed here, subjectification should not be confused with singularization. In the social logic of the general, subjectification operates in a different direction. 23 See Weber, Economy and Society, pp. 241–5. 24 See Verena Krieger, Was ist ein Künstler? Genie – Heilsbringer – Antikünstler: Eine Ideen- und Kunstgeschichte des Schöpferischen (Cologne: Deubner, 2007); and Nathalie Heinich, L’élite artiste: Excellence et singularité en régime démocratique (Paris: Gallimard, 2005). 25 In this book, the singularization of subjects will be analyzed extensively as it relates to the lifestyle of the new middle class (Part V, Chapter 1), to the way that working subjects are profiled (Part III, Chapter 2), and to digitalization (Part IV). 26 Despite all my skepticism about the usefulness of the semantics of individualism, the question is whether it still has any analytic value. The answer is yes, but only when the concept of individualization is clearly related to the social logic of the general and is thus understood as a complementary concept to singularization. In late modernity, individualization and singularization are undoubtedly closely associated with one another, but this connection can only be investigated if both processes are treated as clearly distinct concepts. 27 On the distinction between space and place, see Yi-Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977). 28 On the intrinsic logic of cities, see Martina Löw, Soziologie der Städte (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2008). 29 See Pierre Nora, Realms of Memory, 3 vols., trans. Arthur Goldhammer (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996–8); and Gernot Böhme, The Aesthetics of Atmospheres, ed. Jean-Paul Thibaud (London: Routledge, 2017). In this book, I will go into greater detail about the singularization of places as it relates to the late-modern city, but also as it relates to lifestyles, travel, and living situations. 30 On the concept of presence, see Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, Production of Presence: What Meaning Cannot Say (Stanford University Press, 2004). 31 On rituals, see Victor W. Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (London: Routledge, 1969); on events, see Winfried Gebhardt, Fest, Feier und Alltag: Über die gesellschaftliche Wirklichkeit des Menschen und ihre Deutung (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1987); on being oriented toward the present moment, see Karl Heinz Bohrer, Der romantische Brief: Die Entstehung ästhetischer Subjektivität (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1989); and, more generally, see John Urry, Sociology Beyond Societies: Mobilities for the Twenty-First Century (London: Routledge, 2000). Later, I will discuss the singularization of time as it relates to cultural goods, the economy, professional projects, and lifestyles. 32 On aesthetic communities, see Michel Maffesoli, The Time of the Tribes: The Decline of Individualism in Mass Society, trans. Don Smith (London: Sage, 1996); on the nation, see Bernhard Giesen, Nationale und kulturelle Identität: Studien zur Entwicklung des kollektiven Bewußtseins in der Neuzeit (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1991); and on recent identity movements, see Manuel Castells, The Power of Identity, 2nd edn. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997). In this book I will revisit the topic of neo-communities at length in Part VI, Chapter 2 (which concerns their role in late-modern politics), and more briefly in Part IV (which addresses how they relate to digital communities). 33 See Latour, Reassembling the Social, p. 72. The concept of affordance was first formulated by James J. Gibson in his book The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1966). 34 The phrase is from René Pollesch, “Lob des litauischen Regieassistenten im grauen Kittel,” in Kreation und Depression: Freiheit im gegenwärtigen Kapitalismus, ed. Christoph Menke and Juliane Rebentisch (Berlin: Kadmos, 2016), pp. 243–9. 35 Here, observation is used as an overarching concept for the practices of representation and understanding. 36 This can require a tentative inclination toward interpretations that are not self-evident but rather have to be reached through a sort of open-ended inquiry (as in interpretations of works of art, people, and so on). On the concept of interpretation, see Umberto Eco, The Open Work, trans. Anna Cancogni (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989). 37 The same can be said of any orientation toward the general, which can also be systematically fostered or inhibited. 38 On processes of evaluation and the field of “valuation studies,” see Michèle Lamont, “Toward a Comparative Sociology of Valuation and Evaluation,” Annual Review of Sociology 38 (2012), pp. 201–21. 39 This distinction stems from Émile Durkheim’s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, trans. Joseph Ward Swain (London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1915), though I use it more generally here. See also Michael Thompson’s Rubbish Theory, in which a distinction is drawn between goods of lasting value, goods that lose their value, and “rubbish.” 40 In this regard, see also Boris Groys, On the New, trans. G. M. Goshgarian (London: Verso, 2014). It should be kept in mind, however, that the discovery and reframing of idiosyncrasies can itself become an independent and complex production process (the efforts of the music industry to find new local music is an example of this, as is the attempt to turn something into a classic design by reframing the narrative around it). 41 See Maurizio Lazzarato, “Immaterial Labor,” in Radical Thought in Italy: A Potential Politics, ed. Paolo Virno and Michael Hardt (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), pp. 133–48. 42 In archaic and traditional societies, for instance, the cultural sphere is not oriented toward innovation. 43 Appropriation is an umbrella term for the practices of dealing with objects, subjects, etc. Such practices include, for instance, utilization and reception. 44 For various approaches to the concept of lived experience, which has a rich tradition, see Georg Simmel, “Die historische Formung,” in Simmel, Aufsätze und Abhandlungen, 1909–1918 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2000), pp. 321–69; Alfred Schütz, The Phenomenology of the Social World, trans. George Walsh and Frederick Lehnert (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1967), pp. 215–17; and Gerhard Schulze, Die Erlebnisgesellschaft: Kultursoziologie der Gegenwart (Frankfurt am