Dear Nettime, CDI-TV will do its first livestream for the 2024-25 season this Wednesday (30.10.24), a conversation with Adam Arvidsson on the Neo-Plebeian Condition, TikTok and the New Social Media Economy.
Ten years ago, Instagramism extended the aspirational aesthetic of celebrity culture and luxury brands to aspiring influencers as well as ordinary selfie-posters. Since the pandemic, the growth of TikTok along with a range of Chinese platforms like Temu or AliExpress have facilitated the platformization of a wider diversity of aesthetics and aspirations that often derive form popular, ‘unlikely content creators’ that have remained excluded from the more elitist social media culture of the ‘10s. In this stream, we'll discuss Arvidsson's research into the digitalization of popular economies in Naples, and the suggestion this can be seen as a growing neo-plebeian condition where those cast out from the promises of modernity, and into a world of precarious gigs and digital hustle, now find forms of aesthetic and organizational re-composition, along with entrepreneurial opportunities via digital platforms. We consider the history of the category of the ‘plebeian’ as a persistent ‘other’ of modernity, and chart the conditions for its comeback in terms of a Neo-Plebeian future that joins flows of underglobalization, pirate modernity and neoliberalism from below across the globe. Tune in online 17:00-18:00 GMT on YouTube or attend in person at Warwick Media Lab (FAB 1.15): https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgXqb4zJkXqQHoSrtdjW59Q CDI-TV is an initiative of the Centre for Digital Inquiry (https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/cdi/) and node in the Stream Art Network (SAN). Dr. Michael Dieter (he/him) | Associate Professor | Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies (CIM) Director of Postgraduate Teaching | Convenor of MA in Digital Media and Culture Co-Director of the Centre for Digital Inquiry (CDI) Applications open for CIM’s degree programmes: MSc Big Data and Digital Futures<https://warwick.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/courses/pgdip-msc-big-data-digital-futures/> MA Digital Media and Culture<https://warwick.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/courses/ma-digital-media-culture/> MASc in Data Visualisation<https://warwick.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/courses/pgdip-masc-data-visualisation/> PhD Programmes at CIM<https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/cim/apply-to-study/phd-programmes/> University of Warwick | Coventry CV4 7AL -- # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: https://www.nettime.org # contact: [email protected]
