My paper will examine jazz music as a catalyst for social change, most specifically focusing on John Coltrane's role as a leader of the combined social/musical revolution of the 1960s. I will parallel performances of Malcolm X's speeches with live performances of the John Coltrane Quartet, examining the affects evoked between the two, and touching on performance theory and cultural contexts to compare the two figures' roles as leaders of the civil rights movement. I will also look at the affects displayed by the audiences of each performance, and how their reaction helped spur the national movement to social change.

In future research and essays, I wish to continue to look at jazz as a catalyst for social change, perhaps looking at hip-hop's role in a later cultural revolution, and how modern jazz as the emergent, is attempting to blend jazz with hip hop in a new cultural and musical revolution now called the Stretch Movement. I would like to examine how the politically and culturally revolutionary work of modern musicians such as Christian Scott, Robert Glasper, Chris Dave, and Avishai Cohen pushes the barriers of both music and society.

I would also like to explore, throughout, the affects found in music, looking at music as a "universal language" spoken fluently by the best of musicians. Jazz is all about feel, and the dynamics and phrasing used to play a sad song versus those used to play a triumphant one are parallel to the facial expressions we use when we tell a story. The dynamics create a range of intensity, and the phrasing, a tone. The way a groove fits a section, or how a syncopation creates a hiccup in the feel are all relevant in looking at the message a song tries to send. In these, we should find accurate characteristics of the musical tendencies (the musical facial expressions) respond to each affect, as experienced at low and at high intensity.

Paper Topic

In my paper, I'd like to explore the idea of affect and the concept of terrorism. After the events of 9/11, we labelled our stance against terrorist threats as the "War on Terror." How does this labeling effect our interpretation of affect? Is the war on terror actually, to quote Massumi, a "war with affect as one of its weapons?" I'm planning on really thinking through Tomkin's definition of fear/terror as affect and how that may translate to some of the decisions America has  made in a post 9/11 world. I'd also like to throw in some of the ideas that we discussed concerning mourning and melancholia to address the way that we approach the idea of war and terrorism. How does this epochal event and its labeling affect our collective psyche in dealing with the threat of terrorism?

Paper Topic

For my paper, I will be examining the governess from “The Turn of the Screw.” If it can be assumed that she is hallucinating the ghosts, the question that gives meaning to the text is: why is she imagining them? I’m going to argue that her loneliness is the “hook” affect, kind of how we’ve been discussing “interest” to be in that it leads to other affects. In this case, her loneliness leads to fear and anxiety. The relationship all three have to each other determines the governess’s decisions, and thus, creates the apparitions she sees. 

PAPER TOPIC

What I am doing for this paper is taking the affect of interest/excitement and enjoyment/joy and learning how to dissect, create and maintain both interest /excitement and joy/enjoyment in an audience for a circus show.

Paper topic

My paper is focusing on the affect of interest involving attraction to the unknown or misunderstood. I will be focusing on Riquet's attraction to Rosetta compared to the narrator's attraction to Bartleby. Both Riquet and the narrator are fascinated by a character that does not seem to make sense; almost an enigma to what is considered a normal person. Once I discover what this affect of attraction is doing to these characters, I will extend it beyond the individual, trying to sort out where the attraction to an unknown or strange subject can be seen as a common thought for a general population.

Paper Topic: Lauren

For my paper, I am focusing on how affect is seen and interpreted when observed with the subconscious infatuation with capital gain and one’s status in the economy. Much focus is placed on the idea of obsession with the specific affect of excitement. I am concentrating on how setting, surroundings and upbringing (more oriented towards Rosetta) influence this affect. The two main pieces I am referencing to support my argument are Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street and Lauren Berlant’s Cruel Optimism. If I am able, I would also like to compare this desire to popular culture as discussed in the Grossberg article.

Paper Topic

My first paper is on the affect of cruel optimism in Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech as well as the affect of optimism regarding his career.

In my paper, I explain the affects of cruel optimism and optimism, and I also compare the two against each other. I also explore the various events throughout King's civil rights campaign and attribute cruel optimism or optimism to those events. There has been many instances of either throughout his campaign, but ultimately, I have concluded that King's end goal had been a result of optimism and also displays the affect of optimism as well, regardless of how much cruel optimism there might have been in his campaign.

Liberation as an Affect

The topic I will be writing on is a look at Liberation as an Affective state. Here is a rough draft of the first paragraph of my essay. 

Liberation is the affective perception experienced in a state of extreme environmental change. Affect defined as the identifier of “the strength of the investment which anchors people in particular experiences, practices, identities, meanings, and pleasures” and “determines how invigorated people feel at any moment of their lives, their level of energy or passion” (Grossberg, 80) provides the basis for understanding Liberation in terms of Affective scope. Liberation in itself is a reestablishment of the “anchor points” in which one derives their “experiences, practices, identities, meanings, and pleasures”.  It is a transitional Affect. Particulars to these basic anchor points include the perception of the self through any given moment of Affective consciousness. The reestablishment of these anchor points effectively reestablishes the perception of self-identity, through means of recreating self-perception of the world. Whether this reestablishment is entirely beneficial is determined by the stable anchor points and their relation to the concept of self. If those new points determine a self worthy of redemption, a better self, then the Affect of Liberation passes without any detrimental effects. But if the Affect of Liberation leads to the creation of a new self, through means of environmental factors, that is in any way worse than the self prior to the event that created the initial Liberation then that new self will feel immensely conflicted within the core concept of the self. A Black slave, for example, defined their self through the many different anchor points in their life: the level of contempt the free world had for them, the harsh hello of a bull whip on their bare skin, the dehumanizing gaze forced upon them. All of these environmental factors shaped the affective state of the slave, and thusly shaped the slaves outlook on life, liberty and the concept of the self.