Repressive desublimation and the great refusal in Bret Easton Ellis's fiction

In 1968, Herbert Marcuse believed that a Great Refusal was possible, one that would deny the exploitative power of corporate capitalism. Marcuse's vision was never realised. This essay argues that society today is in an advanced state of that which the Frankfurt School termed repressive desublimation and questions whether a liberationary praxis is still possible. It claims that Bret Easton Ellis's fiction choreographs an internalising of the forms of critique that marked 1968 and about which Marcuse writes. It is Ellis's act of double voicing that allows him to develop a duplicitous recalcitrant voice within the state of assimilation and it is double voicing which emerges as the key technique in Ellis's work that effects an ongoing critique in commodity society. Looking at Slavoj iek's recent revisionism of the notion of repressive desublimation, which connects Marxism and psychoanalysis, the essay considers how Ellis's novels, American Psycho, Glamorama and Lunar Park, function to address and reconfigure the relationship between the status of the Marxist fetishised object and the psychoanalytic phobic object in the present-day era of late capitalism. This essay seeks to illuminate how Ellis's fiction, through an involution of Marcuse's political theories, enacts a contemporary refusal from within the state of reification.

Aspectos biológico-pesqueros de la Lisa Mugil cephalus L. en el litoral peruano

La lisa Mugil cephalus, es uno de los recursos que sustentan la pesquería artesanal en el Perú; a pesar de su importancia, escasos son los estudios relacionados con su biología. Con el objeto de determinar su biología y pesquería, se analizan las cifras de desembarques de las Estadísticas de la Pesquería Marina (Flores et al., 1994) de los años 1980 a 1992, las cifras de captura por artes de pesca obtenidas por la pesca artesanal en once caletas del litoral peruano entre los años 1986 y 1988, y, para el estudio de los aspectos biológicos, la información de los Laboratorios Costeros del IMARPE: Paita (05°05 ' S), Callao (12°03 'S), Pisco (13°44 'S) e Ilo (17°38.4 'S), periodo 1979 a 1992. La lisa se distribuye en toda la costa del Perú con mayores volúmenes de captura en el norte del país (5° a 7° S); en el sur, los valores suelen ser bajos. En Paita los ejemplares capturados se encontraron por encima de la talla mínima reglamentaria de captura (35 cm), mientras que en Callao, Pisco e Ilo, por debajo de la misma. La longitud media a la cual el 50% de individuos alcanza su primera madurez es 29 cm y 34 cm al primer desove. Los valores de índice gonadosomático (IGS), indican que la lisa desova en primavera-verano. El análisis de la relación peso-longitud separada por sexos en las zonas de Paita, Callao, Pisco e Ilo mostró que las hembras alcanzaron mayores pesos que los machos a la misma longitud. En ambos sexos se evidenció un crecimiento isométrico.

Ile Ellis montrant l'emplacement où on a reçu des milliers d'émigrants : [photographie de presse] / [Agence Rol]

Référence bibliographique : Rol, 61720

Receipt from Chas. R. Ellis of New York for payment on account

Receipt from Chas. R. Ellis of New York for payment on account, Sept. 14, 1876.

Daniel Weinstock interviews Lisa Eckenwiler and Chris Macdonald -- music by General International

Daniel Weinstock, director of CRÉUM, interviews two professors that were invited to pursue their work at CRÉUM during the summer of 2008. His invitees are Lisa Eckenwiler, Associate Professor of Philosophy in the Department of Philosophy and in the Department of Health Administration and Policy at George Mason University; and Chris Macdonald, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax. You will also hear General International, an experimental/avant-garde music band that was formed only a few months ago.

Theory and practice in value management: a reply to Ellis et al (2005)

The constructivist model of 'soft' value management (VM) is contrasted with the VM discourse appropriated by cost consultants who operate from within UK quantity surveying (QS) practices. The enactment of VM by cost consultants is shaped by the institutional context within which they operate and is not necessarily representative of VM practice per se. Opportunities to perform VM during the formative stages of design are further constrained by the positivistic rhetoric that such practitioners use to conceptualize and promote their services. The complex interplay between VM theory and practice is highlighted and analysed from a non-deterministic perspective. Codified models of 'best practice' are seen to be socially constructed and legitimized through human interaction in the context of interorganizational networks. Published methodologies are seen to inform practice in only a loose and indirect manner, with extensive scope for localized improvization. New insights into the relationship between VM theory and practice are derived from the dramaturgical metaphor. The social reality of VM is seen to be constituted through scripts and performances, both of which are continuously contested across organizational arenas. It is concluded that VM defies universal definition and is conceptualized and enacted differently across different localized contexts.