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.
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