Statues of Jeff Bezos

Brown, SD ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7841-3225, 2024. Statues of Jeff Bezos. Angelaki, 29 (4), pp. 88-97. ISSN 0969-725X

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Abstract

The passage of human civilization into the new geological era of the Anthropocene raises the question of species extinction. How can we confront the possibility of collective death in a way that does not descend into uncontained anxiety or melancholy? Michel Serres’s works in the Foundations and Humanism series offer critical insights into the way in which human violence and death operate as mechanisms for binding together human collectives. Serres draws attention to the role of “social technologies” based around sacrificial practices, the scapegoating mechanism, and the use of corpses as markers of social relations (or “statues”). He argues that these mythic logics and practices persist in modern societies and technoscience. They may also be at work in a modified way in the proposed technical solutions to climate change around space travel and planetary colonization. Drawing on the tradition of Folk Horror film-making and literature, it is argued that reversing the direction of travel, back into the Earth, provides better instruction about how to live and die in the Anthropocene. Reflection on the puteal sites where this may be accomplished will serve as the mechanism.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Angelaki
Creators:	Brown, S.D.
Publisher:	Routledge
Date:	2024
Volume:	29
Number:	4
ISSN:	0969-725X
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1080/0969725x.2024.2382601 DOI 2379481 Other
Rights:	This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, trans-formed, or built upon in any way.
Divisions:	Schools > Nottingham Business School
Record created by:	Jonathan Gallacher
Date Added:	04 Mar 2025 16:32
Last Modified:	04 Mar 2025 16:32
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/53179

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