Dileep, I feel very happy!
On 6/29/08, Dileep Raj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Hi > With apologies to the author I am summarising/ making public some > arguments from an unpublished / incomplete seminar paper ( "Was there a > public sphere in Keralam?Were Malayalam media ever a public sphere?") by > Nizar Ahmed.I don't think this such papers should forever remain in my > "private' collection!! > > > 1.Public sphere historically is the sphere wheres those who have hitherto > been treated as just the addressees of the public authority come to form > themselves as a public in order to engage in "a debate over the general > rules governing relations in the sphere of commodity exchange and social > labor". They are private people in the sense of having not been allowed to > enter into decision-making in the public affairs before. Historically, i.e: > in the seventeenth century Europe, these people are modern bourgeoisies > whose mercantilist enterprises though a privatized affair ( commodity > exchange and social labour) are considered to be publicly relevant. " > Public" referred to "the functioning of an apparatus with regulated spheres > of jurisdiction and endowed with a monopoly over legitimate use of > coercion". This public authority was the emerging form of modern state. As > against this, there was the private realm consisting of civil society ( > realm of commodity exchange and social labor) internal space of families. > Public sphere emerged in between these two realms. The newly emerged > political realm, the world of letters (clubs and press) , and town-centered > realm of cultural products were public spheres. Private realm was truly a > modern phenomenon that arose during the mercantilist phase of capitalism. > > 2.The emergence of modern media is almost simultaneous with the > mercantilist expansion of the 17th century in Europe. Postal services and > press were there to institutionalize regular contact and communication. > Stock market originated in Europe almost at the same time. Initially press > mostly served mercantilist purpose. Merchants needed journals and journals > needed merchants. By the end of seventeenth century regular supply of news > became public. As Habermas notices, "traffic in news developed not only in > connection with the needs of commerce, the news itself became a commodity. > Commercial news reporting was subject to the laws of the same market whose > rise it owed its existence in the first place." > > 3.The public authority of the new State needed legitimization from the > civil society for its mercantilist policies. > > 4. If news, ideas, viewpoints etc are made known to the readers, viewers or > listeners through a medium then it can not constitute a public sphere, even > when there is a public who gather around that medium however discretely in > space and time. Though it is true that information in the broadest sense of > the term is passed through the medium to the people who receive this > information, unless and until the people involved engage in these activities > of generating opinions, criticism, view points, information etc, the medium > cannot be considered as their own sphere. > > 5.Media as a public sphere is not a rout for one-way traffic. Public is not > conceived of as a mute listener. Public is not a mass. Public cannot remain > just as an addressee. A public is constituted when it is active, when it can > address itself or what it counts as the other. When people are active as a > public then media traffic is two-way. > > 6.When the people are generalised , i.e: when the term is used to refer to > the whole, it has two implications: 1)it does not distinguish with in the > private, and 2)the motivation for abstracting the public itself should come > as a private move.that is, ther is no apriori level of generality at which > the public can be conceived.In other words, there is nothing beyond the > private, other than the virtual order of abstraction, to be claimed as > public. The act of selecting from the private the features that charecterise > the public is an arbitrary act. If we theoretically accommodate the private/ > public dichtomy we may fail to appreciate the arbitrariness of the public.In > fact the modern bourgeoisie created the public in its own image.The language > of dichotomy conseals or suppresses this history. The private/ public model > is tailored to suit the rational negotiation of interests that would > invariably favour the group that has at ityys disposal the technical means, > material resources and institutional support.What we call private is a > multitude of perceptions, views or images that are mutually incommensuarble > and represent different practices that will not lend themeselves to any > abstraction.There will, then , be no public.Incommensurable principles of > practices leave evry thing social as indeterminate. > > 7. Who were the public in Keralam where towards the middle of the 19thcentury > print media appeared in Malayalam for the first time? This question > by itself is highly misleading. It assumed that Keralam also should have a > public. The specific historical sense in which the public was thought to > have existed in Europe may not have been retrievable in the context of > Keralam. > > > > -- > Dileep R I thuravoor > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
