The recent Cultural Anthropology, 32(1) contains an Openings collection on “Speed” edited by Vincent Duclos, Tomás Sánchez Criado, and Vinh-Kim Nguyen.
As the presentation of the issue states: ‘In their introductory essay, the editors discuss how they hope to open anthropological practice to speed by offering a “a timely probe into machinic, productive, pressurizing, and largely intangible energetics that operate within, across, and beyond specific social configurations and forms of life.”’
Another end of the world is possible, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre. Photo courtesy of Audrey Bochaton.
“On every front, life is being mobilized. Connected and put in motion, activated and fast-forwarded, life is sped up in unprecedented ways. This Openings collection is premised on the conviction that the world is accelerating, and that anthropology needs to catch up. We do not make a claim for a faster anthropology, but rather for the crafting of concepts capable of creatively engaging with forces and intensities—technological, but also economic, political, and geological—that constitute and spoil the worlds we are attached to. We aim to open anthropological practice to temporalities that are immanent to both the congealment of life—for instance, of responsive capacities—and to potential deviations and overflows” (from the Introduction)
