[Sci-tech-public] *research-in-progress 2008

[Melissa Lo]

*research in progress, 2008

We are pleased to announce the fourth annual *research-in-progress,  
presented by the History, Theory and Criticism section of the  
Department of Architecture at MIT. The 2008 workshop, focusing around  
the theme “What Object” aims to offer graduate students an  
opportunity to work together in cross-disciplinary and cross- 
institutional dialogues, and, specifically, with objects in mind.

Please see attached poster for schedule and presentation topics.  **  
Keynote addresses by Edward Eigen (Princeton School of Architecture,  
History and Theory) and Peter Galison (Harvard, History of Science  
and Physics).

Made possible by by a Graduate Student Life Grant (c/o the MIT  
Graduate  Students Office) and the Office of the Dean of the School  
of Architecture and Planning.

  --------------------

  Objects are at once physical bodies, grammatical constructions, and  
philosophical abstractions. We obsess over objects of desire, objects  
of affection, and objects of scorn; we encounter found objects,  
objets d'art, object lessons, and the occasional objection. In short,  
we are awash in objects, objectives, and objectification; the  
discourse of objects can be both concrete and endlessly expansive.

  To introduce Things That Talk, Lorraine Daston writes: "Imagine a  
world without things.  It would be not so much an empty world as a  
blurry, frictionless one: no sharp outlines would separate one part  
of the uniform plenum from another; there would be no resistance  
against which to stub a toe or test a theory or struggle stalwartly.   
Nor would there be anything to describe, or to explain, remark on,  
interpret, or complain about – just a kind of porridgy oneness.   
Without things, we would stop talking."[1]

  Our object-riddled and thing-populated world, then, urges us to  
continue to keep talking.  This is precisely what we hope this  
meeting of Research-in-Progress will foster: continuing dialogues  
about how objects work in our world, how they don't work in our  
world, what they do, and, fundamentally, how they keep us in  
conversation with one another.  How are our practices – artistic,  
architectural, scientific, academic, everyday and otherwise –  
continually informed by objects?  And how do the objects of our  
practices necessitate overlap with other kinds of practices?  Or,  
alternatively, when do we reject objects? And to what ends?

   [1] Lorraine Daston, "Speechless," Things That Talk, ed. Lorraine  
Daston (New York: Zone Books: 2004): 9-24, 9.


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.mit.edu/pipermail/sci-tech-public/attachments/20080329/4be4b7a1/attachment.htm
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: poster_0328_FINAL_lo_res.pdf
Type: application/octet-stream
Size: 211137 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://mailman.mit.edu/pipermail/sci-tech-public/attachments/20080329/4be4b7a1/attachment.obj
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.mit.edu/pipermail/sci-tech-public/attachments/20080329/4be4b7a1/attachment-0001.htm