Answers to blog questions from readings

(Naeema)Space and Place: How is Feeling Intentional?
Feeling is intentional in the sense that an object is imbued with qualities that relate back to the person who is doing the feeling. If you are consumed with hatred toward dollar menu quarter pounders, the reason you assign hatred (say the mistreatment of cows in factory production) refers to the object and also back to you. So there must be a recipient of the emotion and a willing agent at the same time.


(Donna)"The Cyborg Self and the Network City": Do you think its possible to live in today's world with no technology?

Even in the remotest parts of the world where agricultural traditions are still embraced, or perhaps some hunter gatherer groups in the Sahara, they are still embedded in trade networks of some sort and the products they obtain go through processes of industrialized manufacturing in the richer parts of the world. So their seeming isolation is broken apart as soon as they get coffee from South America, or when tourists come via airplanes to buy their handicrafts, or when United Nations airlifts foodstuff to help with hunger crises. I think the question of being free form technology can only be to a relative extent, because the contact with the rest of the world is inevitable.

(Daniel) Why are heterotopias important?
Foucault spends time illuminating these contra-utopias because they connect a society to itself, like the cemetery holding members of every line of descent in the city and government. Heterotopias are places where deviants often reside, like the insane asylum or even a hospital where people who aren't currently productive citizens go to be healed. By setting aside these spots for the category of deviant, societal norms are reinforced and continually reinscribed, which serves the interests of those in the upper echelons.