Assumptions, beliefs and the continuum between them

Assumptions underpin much of what we do on a daily basis. Extend this to discussion and debates of a more theoretical nature and assumptions are quite essential. Many economic theories, for example, must assume that humans behave rationally – one of the more contentious assumptions in that field of study, understandably. Making assumptions eases our progress through life – if you need to set the terms of engagement on every conversation you might embark on in any given day, you might find yourself never actually saying anything at all.

Assumption is the more common and acceptable younger cousin of belief. Assumptions, at least on some level, are understood by us all to be unfair simplifications (never quite the whole story) which make our lives just a little easier. They are also challengeable and, with a bit of resistance, can change. Beliefs are a little more intransient. They tend to run deeper than simple assumptions, they are more fundamental (a dangerous word these days) to one’s view of the world.

One day, some centuries ago, some English man had an apple fall on his head. He theorised and proposed the existence of what we call gravity. Gravity, for all the evidence to support it, remains nothing more than the best explanation we have for why apples fall to the Earth.

Before proceeding it feels important to recognise unequivocally that the theory of gravity is very compelling, indeed the evidence is overwhelming and largely without genuine challenge. On that basis one can believe in gravity without fear of being proved wrong. For that matter, one of the most heartening things about science is that it deals in evidence and not proof.

Some many centuries before that day of the falling apple, some people believed that the Sun was pulled across the sky by a horse, others believed that it was carried by a boat. These respective theories were, at the time, the best known solutions for the journey of the Sun across the sky. Arguably neither theory has ever been proved to be incorrect. Simply the weight of evidence has pushed us to believe that there are, in fact, better explanations out there.

In order to theorise about the world scientifically, you need to believe in certain things. Certain specific requirements could be considered assumptions – you need to assume that theory X is correct in order that theory Y might even be possible. Other things must, by necessity, be more accurately called articles of faith – you must simply believe that gravity exists as a force in this universe before you can consider further theories of physics.

If one was to ask someone of an even moderately religious nature if there is evidence for the existence of (a) God they would say “Of course, it is in every blossoming rose and every smiling baby” or words to that effect. And, of course, given their belief system, they would be right. There is such evidence. For some people the existence of a deity or series of deities remains the best possible solution for the world being the way it is.

One does not need to reject either science or religion to argue that at one point in our history that religion acted as science. When looking at the rising and falling tides, when experiencing the change of winter to spring, when witnessing birth and death and all that happens in between, when contemplating our dominance as a species above all others on this world – what better solutions could we have come up with? And different peoples came up with different solutions. And they all stood up to scrutiny given the logic they followed and given the evidence available.

Slowly but surely the balance of evidence started to slip away from the religions – actually it make more sense for the Earth to rotate around the Sun rather than the other way around; also, humans are more likely to have evolved from a lineage linked to the animal world over the course of several hundreds of thousands of years rather than being created over the course of a few days. In time the argument simply becomes impossible to make (even if the second named is still in contention). And it is still possible to be religious and believe the Earth is round.

That religions lost their position as the best explanation for how Earthly and celestial phenomena happen, did not remove their power or influence or importance. Where religion could no longer provide people with the explanations for how the world is, it started to focus more solely on the reasons why the world is.

Some may see the growing virulence of the debate between atheists and the religious establishment (the relativist and fundamentalist sectors of both camps being embroiled) as evidence of the nearing end of the entire structure of and, by implication, need for religion. Such a thought process negates the continuing power and impact religious faith has on people’s lives. Indeed, use of such logic exposes the blind self-confidence of the more extreme atheist sectors of the debate, very much a characteristic of the crumbling façade of irrational empires.

But thankfully, science isn’t irrational. It may sound contradictory, but my faith in science comes from knowing that if a better explanation for, say, gravity does come along that science (not that we talk about science as a single entity with a single consciousness) will accept it as the new best explanation.

Science lives and dies by the validity of its arguments. If science compromises itself, or the evidence it uses, it becomes worthless. It is for this reason that ‘serious’ scientists take such entertaining glee in ripping to shreds clinical trials, for example, that have been funded by drug companies and are not double blind and peer reviewed.

Religions, on the other hand, do have a vested interest in considering the evidence that supports its foundation and not that which attacks it. While the Pope can retain his infallibility in the eyes of many Catholics if he changes his mind on a policy – say the use of contraception – he would have a hard time of it if he changed a central tenet of Catholicism – the Immaculate Conception or that Jesus rose from the dead, for example. Such a change could topple the Catholic Church because the contradictions it would throw up would be too great for anyone to ignore. That is why it is impossible to imagine the Pope doing such a thing (it is, indeed, hard enough to imagine him changing the church’s position on contraception).

So, while science may deal in many articles of faith, these beliefs are somewhat more flexible – closer on some imaginary continuum between assumption and belief to the former. It is also fallible and uses fallibility as one of its strengths.

One imagines that religions will continue to reject their fallibility. But so be it. For many people, religion remains the best explanation for why the world is. Until something else comes along to tip the balance of evidence, it will remain so.

- by James Grogan

A Space for Thought, Part 2

- by Dan Marsden

Reframing myths – stories of the city

Shrouded in the mists of memory, tinted in certain sepia tones of distance, told and re-told stories of glory days come, gone and here again. Certain people and places carry a baggage of mythology. In people it’s almost inevitable – a construction of enigmatic behaviour, a flair for exaggeration, battle tails recounted at dinner parties; everyone propagates their own myth, some are accepted and encouraged by others, some are rejected. We do it endlessly with celebrities, politicians, sports personalities, even journalists: Bill Clinton, the relaxed sax player with Southern charm and Northern politics; Tiger Woods, the steely-eyed genius of the golf course; Jeremy Paxman, hard-hitting, strikingly intelligent, witty.

It’s never entirely without truth, of course. But on some level it must be a careful construction. In some ways our everyday identities will always be constructed, playing roles as student, mother, taxi driver, whatever. More subtly, but perhaps more persuasively, we construct our identities as black, white, Asian, gay, straight, man, woman and all the subgenres of identification that one can find beyond those. As you continue to break down the classifications you come closer to that unique, undividable me. Each of these sub-divisors has their own set of mythologies, identifiers and implications. And on some, perhaps less public, level we propagate a myth all of our own – reliable, intelligent, charming, sociable. None of these are false, but it is never the whole story.

Inanimate objects are just as capable of developing mythologies (the hallowed turf, the sacred shroud, the lucky hat). Such objects can become the focus of worship, they possess a power far beyond their use as things and inevitably they have a history to them which people enjoy, which people find something of themselves in. Such mythologies really do relate to a sense of where we have come from – a father introducing a son to the pocket watch that has been passed through the generations, an atavistic link to a world he cannot inhabit. Such objects become powerful and permanent tokens of origin; they provide scope and definition to where we have come from; they initiate a legacy which one is party to, and to which one has to adhere. One may even go as far as to speculate that such objects (of a familial, cultural or religious nature) go a long way to ensuring social stability and cultural cohesion.

Some of the greatest mythologies surround cities. Hong Kong: bustling Eastern (this is, of course a mythology from Europe) metropolis of sky-scrapers and Old Colonial charm. Tokyo: city of endless money-making, epic movements of people, a spiritual centre. New York: exciting, pulsating place where art and culture are pressure boiled and where anything can happen. Dublin: quaint and pleasant city of slightly bleary eyed jolly Guinness drinkers, statues, history and music. London: city of ancient rituals and traditions with a thrilling mix of artistic and cultural activities, a people of steeled cohesion.

In this last named case, the myth is sadly lacking in reality. London, as a place to live in and as an experience for anyone who ventures forth on its famous thoroughfares, is a nightmare. Streets heaving with suicidal-looking pedestrians, crazed black cab drivers for whom zebra crossings are little more than an opportunity for some excitement, unfriendly and inept staff at overpriced and odd smelling eateries, corporate branding that has ensured every café, pub, restaurant and shop is a carbon copy of every other on every other dirty street. Screeching underground trains, filled with more dead-faced souls, trundle through century old tunnels, shifting millions of people from one place to the next every day. It is a city which exists to ensure the false economy of its over-inflated nature (not to mention its grossly over indulgent levels of consumption and waste) is propagated and supported in a continuous cycle.

The two greatest constituents of the London myth are that it is a place of solidarity and cultural engagement.

Many will have, as I did, witnessed the unforgettable scenes on July 7^th 2005. London, having been struck by a series of terrorist bombs, continued. People got to work as best they could. Then, with the transport systems grounded, they walked home. Walking from central London to the suburbs is quite a trek; but there they were, endless streams of regular Londoners walking quietly home, because that’s what they had to do. There was solidarity in that mass of people, there was a strength that you only find in a people that support each other. We were reminded of our (cultural, historical) memories of Blitz era London, bomb shelters and blackouts, the all clear and The White Cliffs of Dover. The pit of one’s stomach was tweaked by the scenes. “Yes”, one though, “this truly is one of the greatest cities of the world.” A city held together in solidarity – a rare and wonderful thing indeed.

The vision of a cultural London is more historically based. King’s Road, The Beatles, Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, David Hockney – The Swinging Sixties. A time of political and cultural revolution; hippies in Hampstead and Belsize Park; the golden age of The Royal Court Theatre; a new era of peace and harmony. The King’s Road is now one of the most fashionable shopping streets (no independent stores could even consider the rents in such a place); Abbey Road (or somewhere in the general area) has a Beatles museum; Belisize Park and Hampstead’s hippies have either moved on, or grown up, shaved and started working in media or finance. The cultural institutions of London today, many and valuable though they are, seem more concerned about the ever dwindling funding from the Arts Council and performance related targets, the very essence of life under New Labour. There is all but no space for experimental or fringe arts – the cost of even a small theatre space in London means that only the most crowd pleasing pile of drivel will break-even.

I am, I know, being unfair – July 7^th was an incredibly rare set of circumstances, which produced something truly unique, unpredictable and perhaps in line with human nature. That Londoners don’t display the same signs of communal solidarity on a daily basis is an inevitability of urban living, or so it would seem from here. The past always produces misty eyed memories, especially when those who lived through it are still around, though not living quite as exciting lives as they like to believe they once did.

But either way these things have found their way into the mythology of London as a place. They are inscribed on the fabric of the city, they are written into its historical narrative, they are as much part of London as Big Ben and the changing of the guard. But that’s just it – London, as we like to understand it, as we like to speak about it, is a set of signifiers with cultural or historical significance; it is a fantasy constructed through the telling and re-telling of those places, those times and (perhaps) an exaggeration of the significance of those self-same things.

But does it matter? Arguably the myth of London, like the myth of how your grand dad won the war, is harmless and unimportant. It’s just part of the way we identify our place in the world, a way to attach ourselves to something we can understand, be proud of even. It gives us context and a basis for definition and identity. These things are valuable – essential even.

But there are moments, in the most genuine of London experiences, when the myth and reality start to bare next to no relation. London can possess qualities of incredible intimacy (unspoiled days spent picnicking on Primrose Hill spring to mind) and immense fun. But even these do not tally with the agreed, collective mythology of the place. Perhaps the only way to survive is to create your own myth of the city – rediscovering memories down shady roads, catching a scent on the breeze, buzzing through streets of good times gone, and maybe to come again.

And here we come close to the nub of the point – the myth’s I outlined above will be disputed by many. We do all construct our own myths, found in the retelling of stories and the recounting of experiences related to place. The problem comes when myths are imposed from elsewhere. See above – you’ll find assertions about places, arbitrary associations between potentially random cultural signifiers. It is something you find in newspapers, documentaries, novels and the ever expanding broadcast news. These are the building blocks of society, and those who control the narratives of myth have a hand in the control of society.

Perhaps our only recourse is to insist on reframing the myths to our own purposes. Shifting the viewfinder to a new position, taking one section and making it our own.

These mythologies are only ever a product of our desire. Without people to pass them on, agree on them, adhere to the collective experience, they would vanish in an instant. Is it the ever more prevalent mass media that pushes such myths through into our subconscious with greater speed and effect? Or is it simply that we need the myths to get through more easily – the realities feeling just a little too boring, or empty, or uninspiring? Either way we sustain the mythology because it sustains us; we need to believe in it – what else is there?

- by Neil Keating

Crossroads

If you could capture the now

Freeze it in captivity

What dour changes would you find

Trapped in the barbs of history?

The earth is rumbling under force of new feet

The dirt is shifting to the east

The withered stalks bow to a new breeze

There's a grind we can feel in all our bones

A foreign tongue has a leash on the land

The Queen’s English has kind hands around our throats

Giving up on trying to make us change

Instead they gift us with new signs and new names

The outsiders come to measure our words

Tailor our sounds to suit their intentions

Preoccupied with the pleasantries of a quiet conversion

Yet with the determined dignity of an Empire’s will

Some have the awkward grace of respect

The Saxon desire imbued in their work

To breathe in the smoke of Ireland’s fire

But we must look them in the eye down the barrel of a gun

What will they find, dismantling our land

A place drowsy with its own beauty

Drenched in culture, soaked in silent sameness

Lame after years of dreaming its own existence

All the lessons we’ve taught ourselves

In the houses of wisdom buried in the dirt

All to be smothered by the wave of new words

A premature funeral march for the soon dead languages

Language we have, but never a voice

The constant medley of stagnant progress

Parnell, O’Connell, the mystical echoes of Wolfe Tone

We listen to all, thus now we are confusedly deaf

Some find the new voices suit their ears

And their tongues were made for the modern talk

Now they rise with the sun, and bow to The East

And have washed their mouths out with English soap

Others see futures as theirs to construct

Breaking the chains of Irish self

Demanding the proud progression of sea

Away from the rotting stalks and browning green

Yet Ireland’s change is departing its home

And stubborn roots refuse to be pulled

Either blinding ourselves as to not see their sense

Or furiously drawing blood from the foreign hand that feeds

So here we all stand, at crossroads divisive

The edge of The West, the middle of nowhere, the centre of the battle for the world

The Irish may depart on the roads they want to see

But, where then, will Ireland be?

by Halligan Quin

Gaitas and Volkgeist: Music, Identity and Nationalism in the 21st Century

Music has been often described as the most noise conveying the least information. Eduard Hanslick, summarizing the tenets of formalist criticism, has said that “music has no subject beyond the combinations of notes we hear, for music speaks […] nothing but sound.” As I listen to the voice of Betsy Smith on the radio, I feel very much inclined to disagree. Music plays a critical role in human exchanges and in making us human. At the same time, I would also like to reflect on some of the contradictions that emerge in a complex world where post-national governance structures and the most virulent nationalism co-exist. How can a national musical expression help individuals and communities construct an imagined self in the 21^st century? What are the boundaries imposed and the promises delivered by the music of national artists in nations that are not states? What are its dangers?

If we understand music as a multilayered text that can be read and interpreted outside of its subjective, formal and sonic qualities, then we can’t fail to realize the power of music in shaping the symbolic dimension that permeates all facets of life, from the imaginative-emotional to the politico-social.

The work of several contemporary ethnomusicologists (including Joseph Lam and Martin Stokes) rests on the assumption that music is one of the battlegrounds in which identity is shaped. More than political projects, historical conditionings, and religious and ethnic associations, music plays a privileged part in the imagining of a “global self” because of its immediacy and because it contains, reifies and is informed by all of the above. By highlighting its discursive nature, in its practice and its products we learn that music is not an innocent and disembedded object meant solely for aesthetic pleasure, but that, in fact, it carries meaning and provides an aural venue for the intangible threads of identity to be woven. Music acts as an epistemological palimpsest of critical importance in a confused age where individuals and communities are searching for ways to re-imagine their souls, for a coherent articulation of their desires, subjectivities and yearnings that will infuse their political and historical projects, and their presence on this planet, with signification and meaning.

But homogeneity, or even coherence, is not to be expected. Go to the “World Music” shelves of a record store and you will find wonderfully hybridized compositions where the rhythms of a beatboxer mix with the pulsations of taiko and tabla, or a flamenco guitar sings with and Indonesian gamelan orchestra in the background. This trend of music making by borrowing and incorporating foreign elements and practices is characteristic of the larger process accelerated with the advent of globalization in the phase of late capitalism. We enter a historical phase where there is nothing, if there ever was, nationally or culturally authentic. Cultural practices are but an alloy of influences and currents from diverse sites.

Now, to the political implications of all this. If music is a battleground in which the self is built and negotiated, then it provides a rich, subversive and accessible platform for individuals to express their agency, and to compete and bargain vis-à-vis their international Other. For this reason I’m interested in looking at the role of music in the formation of nationalist identities. Borrowing Anthony Smith’s definition of the term, I’m referring to nationalism as “the doctrine that makes the nation the object of every political endeavor and national identity the measure of every human value.”

In the European context, the nationalist forces that punctuate domestic politics in many countries (including Spain and the UK) are crucial to understand the contradictions of a historical moment where the nation state is under serious attack and when internal national boundaries are being abolished. However, as we learn from a quick glance at the newspaper, borders and nations still matter. Last September, the Spanish press reported that more than four hundred people attending a nationalist demonstration in Catalonia burnt images of the Spanish king while singing Els Segadors, the Catalan anthem.

As Anthony Smith suggests,

“in many ways national symbols, customs and ceremonies are the most potent and durable aspects of nationalism. They embody its basic concepts, making them visible for every member, communicating the tenets of an abstract ideology in palpable, concrete terms that evoke instant emotional responses from all strata of community.”

It is in this sphere of the emotive-political that I seek to understand how music articulates a nationalist ideology by building an imagined contemporary nationalist self.

The sonic textures of the gaita

In order to explore this, I have chosen a musical soundscape that is very dear and familiar to me: Galician music, the music produced in the northwestern autonomous region of Spain.

Galicia has a distinct character and culture, different from the rest of regions that comprise Spain. Gallego, a romance language closely related to Portuguese, is the native language. Since 1978 it enjoys co-official status in Galicia together with castellano. From pre-Roman days, Galicia was occupied by Celtic tribes whereas the rest of people in the Peninsula were of Iberian origin. This Celtic past has survived trough the ages in its mythological and poetic form and, for some, it grants claims of a distinct ethnic identity. Whereas this ethnic claim is arguable, its culture presents many unique features. Galician music, for instance, stands out from the rest of music in the Iberian Peninsula. Its flagship instrument is the gaita, a version of the bagpipe. The gaita has become “the” symbol of Galician national identity. The Romantic poets of the nineteenth century that articulated the nationalist tenets of the Rexurdimento movement spoke of the beauty of this instrument and its connection to the land. Its potent melody always accompanies official acts and informal events alike.

The symbolic importance of the gaita has an indisputable political dimension. Last year, a group of musicians had the creative but unfortunate idea of performing in an official event a version of the Galician anthem in Flamenco style. The Galician Nationalist Party presented a resolution in the Galician parliament to avoid this from happening again. As Dr. Lam points out, “whenever the self is factually or psychologically threatened, the efforts to preserve and to adjust the treasured self promptly emerge.” Indeed, members of the nationalist party argued that it was their duty “to defend our culture, our music and our symbols.” (El Mundo, December 21, 2006).

Since Franco’s death in 1975, nationalism has become a major political force in Galicia and in other Spanish regions. The Galician Nationalist Block (BNG in Spanish) is the main nationalist political party in Galicia. Based on claims of the existence of a distinct national identity different from the rest of the country, the BNG strives for self-determination and eventual independence. Today, the BNG holds a modest number of seats in the Galician parliament but it is now governing in the region thanks to an alliance with the Socialist Party.

It is necessary to mention that several competing projects of Galician selfhood co-exist today in the region. For instance, a large number of Gallegos, although they have been born and live in Galicia, conceive their self as a uniquely Spanish one, believe in the territorial and political unity of the Spanish nation, and rarely use Gallego or limit it to the private sphere. Another equally important self is that of individuals who comfortably inhabit a dual or benevolently schizophrenic self, the result of a combination of both a Galician and Spanish identities that are not mutually exclusive. Finally, there is the nationalist self, which discourages a dual Galician/Spanish identity and favors an exclusively Galician one. This Galician self, however, is often imagined in a global context.

By analyzing the sonic texture of the gaita in the work of two Galician pipers, I endeavor to illustrate how music helps to simultaneously articulate and subvert a nationalist identity, while offering a creative way of imagining a Galician global self.

Electronic authenticity and musical cosmopolitanism

Mercedes Peón is in many ways the symbol of the renaissance of Galician folk music. A BBC world music award nominee, she has spent ten years visiting Galician villages, collecting and recording the oldest of Galician musical expressions from the rapidly disappearing oral tradition of the Galician people. Her ethnographic fieldwork has yielded more than two thousand hours of musical material which has crystallized in three CDs. In her work, the rough and primal vocal rhythms of the Galician heartlands can often be heard in conjunction with a hoe, whose blade she beats with a piece of cut flint to provide percussion. The gaita plays a central part in her music, but the sonic texture of this instrument is very different from its traditional sound. Peón places the gaita in the crossroads where tradition and modernity meet.

A sinuous, primeval sonic quality confers Peón’s work with a surprising, new-age-cum-medievalist flavor. I believe Peón has undertaken the romanticist project of “reconstructing the sounds of the nation in all its concrete specificity and with ‘archaeological’ verisimilitude.” (Smith). She goes back to the past and the oral tradition which are the genuine sources of the Volksgeist. Peón thus rescues the “authentic” national character of the land. However, as she herself has stated, her music is not “traditional [but] an evolutionary expression of the people, from generation to generation.” The way she incorporates synthesizers, pre-recorded sounds from nature, and other digital technology to create special sonic effects attests to this. By creating such a soundscape, Peón suggests “the nation’s antiquity and continuity, its noble heritage and the drama of its ancient glory and regeneration” (Smith) now accomplished through electronic technology and international global markets. The global Galician self holds the hand of the past while walking confidently into the future.

Despite their connection to the land, the modern Galician people are also global nomads. Over the last 150 years, at least 2.5 million Galicians (roughly the population of Galicia nowadays) have migrated in massive numbers to Latin America, to the point that nowadays Spaniards in the American continent are referred to as Gallegos.

This global presence is best captured in the music of Cristina Pato. This twenty-seven year old piper belongs to the Erasmus generation, that increasingly larger group of European students who thanks to the educational policies of the European Union have become more aware of the cultural diversity beyond their national borders. As Pato has stated, her musical project consists in “mixing the gaita with other musics. [She wants] to drink and eat from other cultures.” This thirst for hybridity led her to collaborate with the Silk Road Ensemble in New York last year. More importantly, it can be appreciated in the eclecticism of her last two works, in which she combines traditional musical codes from Galicia with Latin music, jazz and blues.

Adjusting the gaita to the musical codes of other traditions alters its sonic texture in surprising and inspiring ways. In conjunction with electric guitars and a piano, the gaita transcends its melancholic, lyric, and martial tonalities. It becomes explosively sensual and enticing. It achieves a cosmopolitan dimension that projects the desires of the global Galician self.

This transcultural process of music-making, however, is not totally devoid of a nationalist agenda. Pato states that her goal is “to bring the gaita to the same level with other instruments […] because I am a woman of the world, but first of all I am gallega.”

The hybridity of Pato’s music is not new. As some of the Galician immigrants returned from Latin America in the 1930s, they brought with them Cuban rumbas, Argentinean tangos and Mexican rancheras that were adapted and incorporated to the gaita’s repertoire. Ironically, the proponents of Galician nationalism in the pre-Franco years despised these “sins of the art… this profanation of the Galician gaita.” Both in Pato’s work and that of her predecessors, we see how the foreign is not disciplined, but is emphasized and made salient, either to embrace it or to despise it.

Re-thinking nationalist identities through music

The two examples I have used reveal the inherent contradictions enmeshed in the formation of a contemporary nationalist identity. On the one hand, musicians project a global Galician self, confident in different cultural codes and embracing global technologies and markets. At the same time, they participate in a nationalist project that rejects the idea of a world community in its moral unity. Nationalism, as Smith argues, “offers a narrow, conflict-laden legitimation for political community, which inevitably pits culture-communities against each other.” I am perfectly aware of the need to actively preserve and cherish traditions and cultures (and I acknowledge the crucial role that nationalism has played in that respect). However, I cannot condone the radicalism and insularity that is often used to defend such postures and which emphasizes our human differences over our commonalities. I understand that individuals and communities need to have an identity core that centers them and allows them to meaningfully interact with each other. However, when the creation of such identities rejects democratic ideals of equality, fraternity and non-violence I despair. Similarly, I also understand the need for people to fight political and military oppression (I am an outspoken supporter of the rights of the Palestinian, Tibetan and Saharaui people), but in the current European context of rights, freedoms and material wealth, radical nationalism is reactionary. Taking it to the extreme of groups like the Basque ETA, is totalitarian.

If music allows us to re-imagine ourselves and our relationships with the rest of the world, why not transcend parochial attachments and truly embrace a global identity? After all, as Benedict Anderson has said, communities and nations are constructed through acts of the imagination. In order to encompass a more accurate reflection of the global Galician self, it is necessary to create a global identity that is not bound to national imperatives. Shelly, appropriately wrote that artists “are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” Their duty, I believe, is to legislate ethically and responsibly.

sanzbritz@gmail.com

Post-Humanism II

It has been a month, and we have had ample time to consider what is, and what is not moral in our pursuit of posthumanism. Our definition of the posthuman must first agree (and I always enjoy quoting myself):

The Post-human is described as -in evolutionary terms- a being whose qualities exceed that of present man and, that said being can no longer be classified as such (human) for he/she/it has transcended the homo sapien. This all sounds like normal, proper evolution yes, but this Post-human being -by definition- must have at one time existed as a human but has since transcended this classification by application of mechanical and genetic components which have greatly advanced its abilities. Any human whom has been improved by nano-technology, genetic manipulation, life extension therapies, etc. but has not advanced beyond the universal definition of humanity (what ever that is) is dubbed a transhuman: that is someone in the transitional phase between the two classifications, owning elements of each.

We run into many dangers in the argument for, or against, Post-human, many of the arguments involving definitions, and sly maneuvers around the proper subject. Firstly, there is a danger even using the term Post-humanism, for this implies that this is some movement post dating humanist thought. We are not discussing humanism by any means, although the idea that humans are so important that they can supersede themselves does seem to be a thought strain engendered by humanist waffling. In fact, transhumanism is considered an outgrowth of secular humanism.

Transhumanists believe, as a generalization, that human improvement technologies should be widely accessible and available. Although these transhumanists believe that dangers lurk in the advancement of humans, they believe the pros outweigh the cons. So what are the Pros?

There are possibilities for the Trans-human and Post-human in increased longevity i.e. immortality (perhaps in someway unimagined), increased intellectual faculties, the ability to halt, stifle, or manipulate emotion, and an ability to cohabitate wider ranges of environmental platforms, indicative of an increased separation from normal biometric function. The main worry of this, which is voiced by many in the bioconservative camp, including writers and academics such as Leon Kass and Wesley Smith, is that the processes involved here could possibly be dehumanizing.

The word dehumanizing is misplaced. Post-human endeavors are dehumanizing, and that is the point, to move the current race beyond its faults and foibles. Perhaps a better way to express this fear is the concept that post humanism undermines our inherent human dignity – another humanist theorem – and that letting go of things that make us human under current definition might destroy what is valuable in being a human.

So it seems the argument is between Science and Philosophy, both in their own ways a sort of religion. So what we are really talking about here, and this is the crux of the matter, is whether or not it is ok, right, or even wise to play God with our own evolution. Should we, as a people, not just say God is dead, but also say God is dead but don’t be bummed, my buddy here has a few gizmos and a costume beard – couldn’t he just take over?

Now it isn’t as simple and rudimentary as that, not so cut and dry. The main focus here should be – and it is in many bioconservative papers – is that a appreciation of human nature, and our defenses against the dangers of being such at present is too general. We are a people with a well developed society, with fail safes in place for a great number of the population – far more than any other time in history – to live in peace with little distress. Yet – and this is important – we still fail to be happy, to take full advantage of these gifts and to improve upon the society we have gone so far to build. We have the opportunity provided us by invention to run away and cower, to turn our back on the redeeming qualities of human kindness and charity, and become enhanced mechanically, rather than spiritually. This is not just improvement of body and mind, this is a dumping of all previous human baggage and evolution – a fresh start. For some this may be appealing, and is in the case of the Transhumanist, but the Transhumanists run the danger of becoming worshipers of a Utopia unfounded i.e. because we have been enhanced by technology racism, disease, death, rape, plunders and war will cease to exist. That everything we have ever feared will be no more.

Since we are afraid of the dark then, should we turn on the light? Is it right in every situation, or are we being wasteful, using resources to much, burning up the planet, burning up ourselves? Is it too presumptuous to believe that because of a few man made and most likely fallible devices man will overcome all things which have plagued him since the beginning of his existence? This is the argument of the transhumanist! How amazing! How fantastical! I query as to whether the rise of the Posthuman may come peacefully. Will it truly come to pass without a smear against the so called peaceful dignity we will achieve with enlightenment? Would there not be violence in relation to those who choose the path of this so-called improvement, and those who do not? Would one side not defend their right to choice? Would they co-exist, or is the term posthuman in fact an ominous premonition of the fate of those who choose to conserve their individuality.

There is a quote from Leon Kass which goes:

the final technical conquest of his own nature would almost certainly leave mankind utterly enfeebled. This form of mastery would be identical with utter dehumanization. Read Huxley’s Brave New World, read C. S. Lewis’s Abolition of Man, read Nietzsche’s account of the last man, and then read the newspapers. Homogenization, mediocrity, pacification, drug-induced contentment, debasement of taste, souls without loves and longings – these are the inevitable results of making the essence of human nature the last project of technical mastery. In his moment of triumph, Promethean man will become a contented cow. (L. Kass 2002: Life, Liberty, and Defense of Dignity: The Challenge of Bioethics. P48)

This brings us to interesting territory. Is there not evidence in our current use of technology which proves the possibilities of the deterioration of human dignity? Perhaps the internet – not always a bad tool, nor such a terrible resource – is breaking down communities, wiring us up, making us more intelligent, making us intelligent to a fault, bringing us to a point where little joy can be got from life when not constantly turned on? Is this not a drug, pacifying rumbling souls? Is this not encroaching upon our carefully developed human pride with silent but deadly piano wire?

And violence does encroach daily upon us. How many men have we seen shot on a television, how many sex scenes have we seen and how many people have we ourselves blown to pieces in a video game. There is the old adage querying whether without movies we would know how to cry and perhaps it is true. Perhaps we already know little on feelings, and have begun the first tragic steps towards the Posthuman.

If viewed in such a manner it seems we are living in a new age, one of the Post-romantic, where human interaction is no longer involving the senses, feelings, and souls, but rather simple exchanges of information. Our synapses are turned on by flashing lights, we salivate when presented with conditioned material such as adverts and we express feelings under the same conditioned experiences. Our moods are aroused by imaginary quantifiers such as video games and technology, movies inform our behaviors and I’ll be so bold to say that art has become a commodity, so part of everyday life that instead of inspiring, it is dulling the senses (this is said in generality, for there are still artistic materials which challenge and inspire).

If this is so, with the little technology we currently have at our perusal, will we become homogenized? Will so many peoples personalities be put through a blender then shot into a giant computer for the sake of ‘human advancement’? For knowledge beyond our own? For life immortal? We do not know how to use the knowledge we have now. Will becoming posthuman flip and switch and make us fully cognitive of ourselves and the limitations we have? And if it does, will we be able to do anything about it?

No. The resounding answer is no, and we should focus now, in all days ahead, on what we are doing here; that is exploring the psyche of man, discovering new layers, making ourselves better without false layers of man made material, without quick fixes. There is a danger of destroying something truly grand in us because of our bravado, and our inability to see the right and true aspects of what the humanists lied down as a manifesto is dooming us to a lukewarm existence where the senses are extinct and we live as pulses along a wire.

Respond to this article at horatiotigre@googlemail.com

By Horatio Tigre

Your Milkshake Brought Me To This Yard

Last Tuesday I suffered a rare glimpse of lucidity through a misty gin-soaked haze whilst lying next to a man I thought was a terrier but who was actually an umlaut. This is wrong I thought, it’s all wrong, it shouldn’t be like this. This has been going on too long. “What are you referring to?”, came a voice from my iPhone, apparently Garth was listening to the whole thing, “Waking up next to an umlaut?”. “No, the British Legal System. It’s negligible. But…when did I get an iPhone? This isn’t my beautiful wife?” I say ‘glimpse’ because it was now that I fell back into my drunken nightmare (like a willow) and lost control of my conscious self-hood. There are photographs of I, complicit in crimes of passion somewhere outside Sao Paolo, but they are but a bagatelle.

Needless to disclose, the iPhone were actually a phone box and I have no wife. No need to display sympathy, I have no wife because I am repulsive. And a braggart.

Regardless, my reason for today putting fingertips to computer bits is thus. During my travels I have related to myself a utopian model for law giving-ness thus titled ‘The System of Gratitudinal Sin Balancing.’ Being no stranger to a sin-bin or two I know first hand the berry serious deficits of the currant bunishment system. In this isolated island of a world we live in that we have sometimes frequently left to beat up other people, and which we once did send lots of prison-ish bastardlies away from to Oz, we are barking up a tree so wrong its probably… not even a tree.

What is missing, my pie in the sky, is a sense of reward for tasks of kindnessness and generosity. Once upon a time we had religion to keep the unwashed in check, but now that God’s a metrosexual, and Tom Cruise is gay, there’s no one to rely on for salvationist treats and paradisiacal redemption. Who’s gunna give you a sticker for helping the old female across the street? Not even David Cameron! He’d sooner pat your sexyback for assaulting her so as to look street-ish, iz it - wurd. And what about the prison ships fulla nesbitts and penny snatchers and whoremongers? We can’t keep feeding ‘em our juicy money biscuits! Not with my tixes. (tax that!)

Ay no. Here’s a rub. I would be good if I got a reward! Like a dog. Like, I’m like a canis, not I’d like a canis. Bad for the fleas. So…there’s all these people who want to do good if only they could…for example they’d love to make shoes for disabled children but they’re too busy earning monetary to pay for Trident/NHS and there’s all these young dudes in prison…see where I’m going? You are quick as a flamingo. I proposing have Courts of Law pass judgement on how nice people are as well as evil, and designate candy-coloured convicts to their services accordingly! “Mr. Ginger, for saving Jane Seymour’s life I sentence James ‘Trotsky’ Kleinberg to do your washing for 3 years”. BANG BANG BANG! Imagine, all over the Isles, burglars doing the gardening, murderers getting the spuds in, drug-dealers feeding the cats, rapists putting up flat-packs, arsonists entertaining the kids and token Muslims stocking the fridge! The money we’d save on cheap labour. She loves a bit of it and that’s totally all right.

I hear you SCREAM and my ears bleed gin ‘n’ ketchup. Yes, you foresee the safety danger of the scenario thus yes? Give a burglar a trowel?! Rapists in IKEA? Totally un-Swedish! Give the nice man Mr. Ginger a gun and if the burglar gets frisky/Tyskie shoot the silly boy. But you knows the smarts? Nice man Ginger, now murderer, increase work force yes! Fail safe goodnight. It’s a system of revolutioniteless. its getting dark out here…..whence forth dizzzzzeeeeee fruitless campaign.for love. And mutuwal, banl , respect, one worldturnthelightoffiwannastayherefuckoff.fuckoffisnotfuneee

G’night. If yer dryv’n oome t’nigh dun f’git y’car.

by Ethical Andy

Post-Humanism

We are at a unique precipice at the great divide which separates human past and human future. Great leading line there for a piece of copy, but hold on my dear hearts. We have been given the opportunity at this great height to look backward and to look forward upon history and future, at choices made and choices which can be made for improvement and refinement. Some of these choices, indeed, have to be made for the sake of existence. Some might not affect existence but will merely the future of all of our peoples –merely, being too weak a word, but somewhat appropriate. Our present time is unique in that we have been given the awareness to view situations confronting us with intelligence, hindsight and a fair bit of intellectual clarity. We also have comfort, comfort to look upon history and our situation without great expense to ourselves or our neighbors –although as a side note, and pardon my digression, but it is often our neighbor (never seen) which takes the blunt of our mindlessness.

For most of the peoples in the G8 who reside above the poverty line, this is the life that we lead. These aforementioned peoples are given an abundance of choice which can have detrimental and or positive affects on other peoples, places, or things. Human morality and responsibility is an important subject here. Although these subjects have always been a central divide for debate throughout the ages, we have different morals now, bred by an advanced and for the most part, consumerist populous. These issues must be addressed.

We know the affect of our normal, everyday consumption which –let me not forget to mention- is at an all time high. Further, we know that even our little decisions affect others, and that even our smallest decisions can be sources of pain somewhere far away. In fact, for the first time, some of our smallest decisions -the butter we use, the detergents we clean our clothes with, the vehicles we drive- can affect not only ourselves, but others on a global basis as well. What great pressure for us all!

These concepts must be dealt with for us to build a future worth living. It is possible it could get on top of us if we do not harness it. The danger lies in the great global guilt, and the great global pain, but these are subjects for another time.

So, morality is important. ‘Yes, we know’ you say. You hear enough about it, yes, our responsibilities, yes, our duties to the planet you say, on televisions, billboards, posters, radio, word of mouth, books and magazines, possibly even website articles (read on!). Yet, it is more important now as humans have begun the great trek towards unification; i.e. worrying about morality on a global scale, outside of the village and the household. It is the first step (and possibly one of the few) to the nigh impossible Utopian ideal. This is an exciting prospect indeed. You may argue that global recognition has been around since 1945 -yes, with the bomb, and war, and the effects of these- but many small decisions with big reactions are now in the hands of the normal man and not a government, nor a despot, nor even (gasp!) nature (the defeat of nature and the nature guilt, will be another subject we will delve into soon dear brothers and sisters).

So now, possibly, the weight of morality can be counterbalanced by this:

Change is possible with a single human act.

You can agree to disagree.

The purpose of this series of articles is to stoke debate on human morality and the choices we are given the privilege to make –that is as beings with the ability to make choice as well as the spirit (one guesses) to free ourselves from animal urges. We’ll explore, together, the troubles and pleasure (oh especially the pleasures) of living in this modern age. We are unique –this present day is ours, given to us by evolution and heredity. We can choose what to eat, what to drink, whether or not to hunt, to eat meat or only vegetable, to drink diet or regular (to use an American aphorism) etcetera. We are unique, and being such, we have a great deal of philosophy to dive through to get to the crux of that meaning of life (is the meaning of life tied to morality? See, the questions keep coming!).

Who is this writer you will ask -and if you do not ask, why would you trust? So you ask and I give the answers in the tradition of many a past philosopher –as I will be calling myself while writing these articles; not great mind you, just a philosopher. I should indeed introduce some of my personal effects, my mind artillery if you will. It is important so that you may explore my own moral weighting. Being a male is indeed the first thing you should know about your dear narrator. As such, I will be giving a male’s perspective –albeit the post post-modern male’s perspective, with all the baggage that entails. Second, I am American and refuse to hide it, not even with all the immense paranoia, prejudice, and ignorance that this may bring to the discussions henceforth –on both my part and my readers. In this I am not afraid. I hope my arguments will be intelligent as will my audience be equally so. Third, I come from a social class which teeters between the poverty line and complete ruin, but the social class which often has the spurts of great windfall which keep one happy in such a position. This is important because I will be touching on subjects that hinder all classes, and will profess my ignorance to those people who have more than a few dimes to spare. This may appear in subsequent articles as over eager generalization, or overzealous ignorance, I do not know. Fourth, I have never been too strong with my beliefs, nor too weak, and as such a person I have a handful of creeds of which I always return to, and these, I hope, will opinionate me and not indoctrinate me. If I receive an e-mail, or, preferably, by the Gods, a letter, I will take any arguments into account and if thoroughly swayed, will profess this change in writing. This is my binding contract to you. We must have trust.

So with an introduction of such length, where do we begin? It is my belief to rarely pull punches so we should start with something quite heavy yes?

Let us deal with a question of greatest debate and deliberation; that of our evolution and development, specifically focusing on the concept of the Post-Human.

Whether you believe in evolution or not should not come into the debate. We have scientific evidence that the human species evolved in a certain way, yes, but at one time we did believe the Earth was flat, say, so I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt –that is if you believe in all that creationism rubbish. We are all here with our own ideas. But if evolution in history is false, the possibilities of evolution in our present are a harsh reality. With technology, gene splicing, DNA manipulation, and the all too unsettling prospects of human cloning, we have begun a new phase of human evolution –one engendered by our own intelligence.

Post-human theory is amongst one of the more interesting of these evolutionary prospects. The Post-human is described as -in evolutionary terms- a being whose qualities exceed that of present man and that said being can no longer be classified as such (human) for he/she/it has transcended the homo sapien. This all sounds like normal, proper evolution yes, but this Post-human being -by definition- must have at one time existed as a human but has since transcended this classification by application of mechanical and genetic components which have greatly advanced its abilities. Any human whom has been improved by nano-technology, genetic manipulation, life extension therapies, etc. but has not advanced beyond the universal definition of humanity (what ever that is) is dubbed a transhuman: that is someone in the transitional phase between the two classifications, owning elements of each.

There is an important distinction here –that the being that is post-human was once human but made the decision to evolve and to throw away what made them human by our definitions. Evolution has never been a choice, but rather, something nature (or God, whatever your beliefs) has thrown at us like so much sticky goo. Whatever stuck was there to stay. It was not man’s choice. Now the choice is with us as to how grand we want to be, how much we see God in ourselves, how much we believe we can transcend nature and improve upon ourselves. The implications of these improvements are endless; super human speed, strength, cognition (by way of nano-chips implanted in the brain). We could be living Frankenstein’s, but perhaps without the monster moniker.

So what are the moral implications here? One questions whether humans at this stage have had enough time, and that the human should indeed transcend. Some may worry about the implication this may have on the environment, as these new techno beings would have little need for the planet’s atmosphere.

There is so much debate to be had! Would we loose our emotional abilities? Do we want to? Have we already begun to with the advent of so many technological diversions? Perhaps we have! But did not Nietzsche say ‘I teach you the overman. Man is something to be overcome. What have you done to overcome him?’

Should man be overcome? Here is where I lay my gauntlet. No. Man has not taught himself enough to be overcome. What is man but a floating body of molecules and ideas, yes, grasping onto straws? Great emotional immaturity and, dare I say, indifference creeps wild throughout contemporary culture. We are a people increasingly depended on large scale diversions i.e. television, movies, etc. to bring emotional calm and clarity to emotions. There are too many theories abound on the idea that many a person lives emotions discovered in film, or express emotion through a song lyric because they can not engender it themselves. Should we be moving on the human race right once we’ve lost the idea of what it is to be human (if in fact we’ve ever known; cue next debate)?

Some of these things are happening now. We already have external devices which make us smarter (PDA’s with internet access), bionic parts which make the handicapped whole (such as arms with electronic leads) and yes, indeed they are helpful. I am not doubting or debating this. But evolution at the scale many leading Post-human thinkers are debating would require a great leap in human empathy and maturity, which doesn’t look likely to happen on the morrow.

Why do I go on about emotions when we talk about physical improvement and possible mental expansion? How would we handle such new powers without the emotional clarity to use them with respect and good intentions? Would we automatically gain the maturity to use them wisely with a mere 10 point boost in IQ? Would we really be able to trust ourselves with possible Godlike power when we have a fraction of that now and we can’t seem to hold it together? These are not rhetorical questions, but rather questions with one answer. No. No again and again.

This is where the experiment begins. The web is a marvelous tool and could potentially be a great forum for debate and critical argument. I believe the manifesto of Head Press is to challenge the reader to rethink and question their world and environment. This is what I’d like to do here in this space. I have included an e-mail address where you, dear brothers and sisters, may write to your dearest of narrators with questions, answers, critiques, etc. The desirable outcome of this being that you can present your thoughts on the issues, which I will critique, agree upon, and/or present out of interest as I see fit, in the style of an Oxford debate. We are looking to the Greek Dialogues as inspiration here; a greater understanding through criticism and the flagrant over use of English vernacular.

Sample questions you may want to ask yourselves:

What are the main arguments for or against the application of science to transcend the human definition? What are the social implications of such practices? Would the spirit of our current race continue in the upgraded human? Or would these qualities burn away? Would we gain autonomy as Post-Humans or would we become increasingly subjugated and watered down as a people, and if so, is that a particularly bad thing?

Feel free to answer these, or pose your own question which I will endeavor to answer as lucidly as possible. We will return to the subject of the Post-Human next issue.

I also hope that all of you will go out and do a bit of research yourself as this article is merely a beginning, and not an academic treatise. I will cover more information, and give names of some of the more prominent thinkers next issue.

Bring on the intellectual heat.

horatiotigre@googlemail.com

- by Horatio Tigre

Performance Architecture and Architectural Performances

Space, in both an architectural and performance setting, is a key consideration. The space must have a functionality, a sense of composition and a liveness that transcends its stasis (assuming, that is, that constructed space has a static existence, a notion to be challenged). In theatre we have starting talking about the space as another character, another ‘body’ to be read and understood. Spaces are often ‘animated’ by human presence – humans provide a context, a function to a space. This does not, however, mean that a space cannot live alone – a space that is flexible, organic, that finds the right mix of purpose and openness. It is in discovering (or uncovering) the purpose of space in contemporary human interactions that performance and architecture find their strongest link.

Performance has become a class of theoretical understanding, often uncomfortably placed under the ‘theatre studies’ rubric. Performance theory deals primarily with constructions. As humans we construct our identity in the clothes we wear, the way we hold ourselves, the words we choose to use, the style of our hair, the subjects we interest ourselves with and so on. Race, sexual orientation, gender – these are all considered constructions, imposed either by ourselves or by society. This does not make them fake (or any more fake than anything else) it just recognises that they are more to do with a series of social interactions than they are to do with any internal, eternal ‘truth’. In essence, every action, every interaction we undertake as humans comes from a series of strategies we have learned throughout our lives to best cope and thrive within society. We present ourselves through identifying actions and accompaniments. These actions and accompaniments become so familiar to us that the sense of ‘performance’ is replaced with a sense of ‘being’ – I would say I am male, I am straight, I am Irish, rather than I act male, I act straight, I act Irish. The ‘truth’ is probably somewhere in the middle – or rather those identifying actions have become so essential to my being, that they are unrecognisable.

Architecture fascinates me as it deals directly with how people interact with one another. Architecture must consider, as it seems from the uninitiated view, how and why people combine and connect in the way they do, how this changes and how it can be made more effectual. Thus architects are in a unique position – both responding to and leading innovations in human relations, thereby somehow having a hand in adjusting and moulding society. Perhaps on some level theatre makers attempt the same feat – presenting different realities to those who are taken to watch. Perhaps our best attempts can not model utopic visions of society, but exploring possibilities as they differ from those established gives at least a view to a change, opening up the knot of accepted reality to reveal potentialities not yet discovered. We both hold the mirror to the world around us – the mirror is a reflection to what we see, inevitably skewered and subjective, but as genuine and as honest as we can manage.

Theatre, in the more formal region of ‘performance’, is also to do with human interactions. Whether dealing with Greek epics, Stanislavskian naturalism, kitchen sink realism, modernist absurdism, post-modern deconstructionism or phenomenological explorations through movement if there is one constant it is that there is a relation between humans (even in monologue pieces, or ‘one-handers’ the absence of another human body establishes a relation to other humans, on the most basic structural level). When considering the construction of a theatre space we must think of proxemics – in what spatial relationship will the performers be to the audience, can the ‘stage’ space ever be ‘balanced’, will the audience be made to be aware of one another through interrupted sightlines or close proximity, do you want all of the audience to see all of the action all of the time?

Further, we can start to think of the space itself as some sort of additional performer – can a space be flexible enough to change during a performance (one imagines an external wall starting to contract, making a square space a triangular one…), can it change its texture and nature, its atmosphere, its meaning? In theatre we look to change the nature of a neutral space for our own purposes – adding lighting, sounds, set and costume (as well as, of course, performers) to a space that in it self ‘says’ nothing to create the effect we want. On the other hand you have ‘site-specific’ work that takes a space (usually non-theatrical) which has a character, a history, that is a filled canvas, and transpose live action on to it. In either sense the space is static – it provides the backdrop, it can be plastered over or used, but in itself is not organic or changeable.

Moving toward a theatre space that facilitates adjustability, an organic flexibility that allows the space to shift throughout a performance, changing the sense of proximity, sight-lines, status relationships between characters opens a whole new set of possibilities for theatre makers that has yet, in my knowledge, to be explored. Thus, as space makers and space users we empower ourselves with new potential realities.

- Neil Keating

A Space for Thought

- by Dan Marsden

True Colours

Having lived in Dublin my entire life I have always considered it to be a predominantly grey place. In my minds eye I can see grey oppressive skies full of grey puddles in waiting. I can see grey, imperial georgian buildings and grey, squat, soviet-esque office buildings from the 1960’s. The land of grey summers and more intensely grey winters.

Contrary to this I always considered the countryside to be a place of neon-vibrant, lushous greens, of blue seas, of black and white cows and, of course, a place of red tractors. The post card image, as the mother of a friend of mine put it: the colours of ‘paddy-whackery’ colours with shades that have all the subtlety of our tricoloured flag.

To my grave embarrassment, I know very little about Art and less still about Irish Art so I am by no means an authority but my impression of Irish decorative art, at least, the type I see in the hallways of my apartment building or that you might expect to see in the room at your B&B is that it reflects this. Bright red boats with fishermen folding nets on yellow sand and the green hills rolling ad infinitum into the crayola blue skies. Although my knowledge of painting is limited I do know a little of Irish cinema and anything I have encountered as of this time has either reflected my idea of a grey city and of the post card painted countryside.

That said, on a recent trip to Wexford, looking out on the seascape to my left and the land to my right I was shaken to attention by the hue of the sea and colours in the landscape I had never associated with Ireland before. The sea was full of what seemed wise stoney blue shimmers, the rocks between Greystones and Wicklow were hard carbon grey and jagged like monstrous unpolished crystals. In the country side the deep umber oranges in rusted railings and the wet, mossy greens in the grass seemed much richer than I had previously imagined. The aspect of the place seemed to bely a maturity and a wealth of epic, sage emotion. It seemed as though beneath or withstanding the ‘paddy-whackery’ existed a real place which exists through the ages and into time immemorial.

The experience here brought back to me many of the poems I had learned verbatim in school which now reside in my mind only as the whisps of sentiments they left with me. I now sensed what Seamus Heaney meant when he spoke of the bogs and how they connected us with our ancestry. I knew why the ‘Tollund Man’ had affected him so intimately and why the ‘Bogland’ was such a powerful place and made such a perfect metaphor.

These sentiments struck me again when I visited the Office of Public Works on St. Stephen’s Green on a whim. In the entrance foyer there are sheets of stone set into the walls from different areas of the country. Each has its own striking and unique texture, make up and colour. Some are ebony black punctuated by the primordial white shells fossilized within them which give them the quality of a clear night sky. One particular example from Connemara has shades of greens which gives it the aspect of being almost liquid and the impression that if you reached your arm out to touch it you could quite easily plunge straight into it.

It seemed a subject which was so ripe for exploration in a modern context against our New Ireland that I was at a loss as to why no one, as far as I knew, had broached it. This is the very reason why I was so stunned and moved when Leonard Abraham and Mark O’Halloran’s new film ‘Garage’ was released shortly after this. Mark O’Halloran’s powerful script viscerally captures a man, ‘Josie’, living in the abyssal margin of society, politely shuffled aside and left alone. This poignant portrayal is only strengthened further by Leonard Abraham’s keen investigation and apt depiction of the true colour scheme of Josie’s surroundings.

Just like the colours I had experienced, Abraham had astutely rendered them on screen, although he used more muted tones than I had invisaged which better suited the drama of the story. This was coupled with an ingenious art direction which held all the shots together by creating a composition of tones and shades of similar colours throughout. At Josie’s garage we saw the rusted reddy-browns in the paint work, in the signage and in the pipes. While he walked we saw the sombre greens in the trees and fields. Throughout the film water is a hugely important element and here we saw gun metal blue stillness of the lake and the darkness and forboding infinity of the deep waters against the blue-grey sky. This truly evocative and well crafted use of the colours at the locations fascinated me and with this in mind and feeling as though I had for the first time really seen the landscape or at least really reacted to it I felt compelled to make a similar effort to reassess how I had seen Dublin up until this point.

I took it upon myself to walk home from the city center and to search for some interesting and telling colours of an urban Ireland beyond the grey-scale or the vibrant colours of foreign franchises. I wanted to see colours which would tell me something about both the modern city and hopefully something which would link it with its history. I was hoping to discover colours or compositions of colour which would speak of Dublin and not merely of urban.

Strolling around, presumably looking like a mad man I must admit, inspecting the buildings I had considered all to be grey, I was stricken by the shades of colour in the brick work. The stone work in some of the Georgian buildings seems to have a soft skin-tone like complexion about it I had never noticed before. The vivid turquoise of the copper roofed churches sprang out at me, particularly that of the great domed church in Rathmines. Yet these colours as striking as they are do not speak specifically of Dublin, I imagine that similar colours exist in London or elsewhere. So the search goes on.

With this in mind I fell back to consult with some of the past masters of this exercise. I went to O’Connell bridge to see the colours in the Liffey, I could distinctly make out the colours that Jack B. Yeats’ had seen there and rendered. Although in these dimmer months the colours seemed more muted than he had invisaged. I wondered if even in the right light the colours that Yeats had seen were representative of the Dublin I know.

This led me to consider Kavanagh as I went to stroll along the Grand Canal which runs nearby my home. I walked for a spell to listen to the locks ‘niagarously’ roaring and to find the ‘stilly greeny’ water alongside which Kavanagh wished to be and is commemorated by. The sounds which I wanted to find as dramatic and lyrical as Kavanagh had were somewhat swamped by the now constant deadlock of traffic idling at the lights on their way into the city centre. Luckily the colours could not be affected by any noise. The waters still have the same stillness and deep mossy green colours I suspect Kavanagh must have seen. They are marred a little by the floating milkshake cartons and tesco bags but none the less these colours are there and they are beautiful.

The trees in these autumnal months in the city’s greens and along its lusher streets were honestly quite arresting. They did not simply take on the dried brown colour I had assumed they would, and may still later in the month, but a spectrum of shades encapsulating lemony yellows, lime greens and rich, velvet reds. Though with slight dismay I realised that many of these trees, and I should note I am not a botanist, particularly in gardens seemed to be of foreign ancestry. Many of the more lively colours came from trees I am convinced were oriental in origin.

I was adament and confident that the city would spring forth colours which were uniquely her own and although it now seemed obvious that I had been doing the city a disservice by considering it to be so dull a place I had still seen nothing which really made me feel was authenticly indigenous. I was at first a little dissappointed that I couldn’t distinguish a lot which was uniquely of the fair city. I took this as a failure either on my part or perhaps more seriously as a failing of the city itself.

I was disillisioned until I considered how in a way the colours and their origins actually reflect perfectly on what Dublin is, it is a city of its people and a city of its history, to my eye the colours reflect this. As hackneyed as it is to say and no one was more surprised than me that I came to this conclusion, Dublin is now a city which is to some extent – and more so every day – multi-cultural.

This is evidenced by the restaurants we eat in, the languages on our adverts, the faces on our streets and as I dicovered, by the colours in our surroundings. As well as this it is a city with a colonial past still just within living memory and it has been home to a diverse range of societies, civilisations and cultures for millenia. If we see our man-made capital like this then surely we should accept that the colours will reflect that history and as far as I could see they do, and beautifully so.

I hope that soon we see this cornucopia of colours reflected, as Lenny Abrahamson showed us is possible, in many more artistic endeavours, cinematic or otherwise.