Andreas Reckwitz - Society of Singularities

Performances of singularity operate affectively. This is what fundamentally distinguishes the mode of praxis of the particular from that of the rationalized general, where affect is kept to a minimum. Things are quite different with the performance of singularity, in which, as we have already seen, the intensity of affect plays a decisive role. It should be noted that affects are not the internal emotions or feelings of subjects; rather, they should be thought about in terms of the processes and relations of affecting . This means that singular objects, subjects, places, events, and collectives are characterized by the fact that they address social participants affectively. 48The social entities of the singular mobilize affective intensities primarily in the form of the positive affects of desire and interest, but also in ambivalent mixtures of these with fear or anger. The phenomenon of being affected in such ways is especially clear to see in the appropriation and experience of singularities, but it is also part of the practices of production, interpretive observation, and valorization. The process of affecting others characterizes the overall mode of praxis of the logic of singularities. In short, without affecting others, there are no singularities, and without singularities, people are not (or only minimally) affected.

Especially in late modernity, however, one encounters a form of singularization that fundamentally differs from such affecting performances and might best be called automated singularization . Although I will discuss this phenomenon in greater detail later on, it makes sense to mention it here in brief. This form of singularization has been present in various areas of life since the 1990s, and it is primarily an effect of digitalization. One example of mechanically fabricated uniqueness is the algorithmically generated profiles of internet users, which depend on data tracking. Noteworthy, too, is genome analysis, which makes it possible to examine the unique genetic composition of individuals. Further examples can be found in the field of human resources, which is concerned with systematically determining the talents and potential of employees. Automated singularization, however, not only is interesting with respect to subjects but also is applied in ways related to collectives, as in the case of marketing (which focuses on social niches with particular tastes and opinions) or in the case of political campaigns (which target particular groups of voters).

At first glance, one might be tempted to think that such cases are illustrative of the logic of the general and its instrumentally rational practices, and indeed they do involve instrumentally rational techniques. However, the techniques in question are not applied within the framework of the social logic of the general. Whereas the rationalistic technologies of industrial modernity produced standardized things and people, the technologies of late modernity have largely been transformed into infrastructures of the particular . That is, there is now an intrinsic technological and institutional interest in, and capacity for, making singularities visible and fabricating them automatically. Unlike rationalism and its inclination to generalize, this institutional and technological interest is not oriented toward treating unique entities as exemplars of general types but rather toward reconstructing individual entities in their uniqueness. Whereas the traditional medical perspective, for instance, evaluated individual patients in terms of general symptoms or health standards, the aim of genome analysis is to ascertain the incommensurability of every individual’s genetic composition.

Even these automated singularities can be analyzed as the results of a fabrication process involving the practices of observation, evaluation, production, and appropriation. Here, however, these practices are internal mechanical techniques ; they are conducted automatically by the technologies in question. Even more significant is the fact that automated singularities do not necessarily exist as performances before an audience that experiences them and is affected by them. Often, singularities produced in such a way are themselves the object of instrumentally rational practices, such as a type of medical treatment based on genome analysis or a consumer decision steered by an automatically tailored profile on an online shopping platform. Here the singularity is not experienced but rather used . In other cases, however, automated singularities can indeed put on an (automatically generated) performance, for instance by arranging images and texts on someone’s social media platform in a tailored fashion that the user finds interesting, stimulating, and exciting.

All in all, late modernity’s systems of automated singularization are highly remarkable. Intelligent technologies no longer simply standardize, as was the case during the period of industrial rationalization; they singularize as well. They have thus contributed to a transformation away from instrumentally rational practices toward a greater sensitivity to uniqueness and toward the establishment of a comprehensive technical infrastructure for the performance of the singular.

1 This déformation professionnelle is also a legacy from Western philosophy, whose thinking prioritizes the general (at least at its rational and theoretical core from Aristotle to Kant and Hegel). Philosophers who, in various ways, have focused instead on the singular or individual include Spinoza and Deleuze, and in some respects Kierkegaard and Stirner as well. 2 The term has appeared sporadically in scholarly literature, but never with a consistent meaning. The way that I employ it here is inspired by Kopytoff and Karpic, though they apply it more narrowly and primarily to objects. See Kopytoff, “The Cultural Biography of Things”; and Karpik, Valuing the Unique. In The Society of Equals (pp. 360–6), Rosanvallon applies the term to subjects. On the earlier history of the concept, above all as it was used in late-medieval and early-modern philosophy (uses which are of no concern to me here), see Klaus Mainzer, “Singulär/Singularität,” in Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, vol. IX, ed. Joachim Ritter et al. (Basel: Schwabe, 1995), pp. 798–808. In a different, normatively laden, form, which I also do not draw upon, the concept has also been used by post-structuralist authors such as Jacques Derrida, Gilles Deleuze, Jean-Luc Nancy, and Antonio Negri. 3 Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgement, pp. 271–84. 4 This is the position to which Deleuze and Guattari are inclined. See Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987). Here I have no interest in entering an ontological discussion about the stakes of idiosyncrasies, which would be of no use to the sociology of singularities. 5 As you have come to see, my analytical framework is fundamentally praxeological. On this approach, see Andreas Reckwitz, “Toward a Theory of Social Practices: A Development in Culturalist Theorizing,” European Journal of Social Theory 5 (2002), pp. 243–63; the articles collected in Hilmar Schäfer, ed., Praxistheorie: Ein soziologisches Forschungsprogramm (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2016); and Theodore Schatzki, Social Practices: A Wittgensteinian Approach to Human Activity and the Social (Cambridge University Press, 2009). 6 On the concept of complexity, see, for instance, John Holland, Hidden Order: How Adaption Builds Complexity (Reading, MA: Basic Books, 1995); and, from a different angle, Niklas Luhmann, “Komplexität,” in Luhmann, Soziologische Aufklärung 2: Aufsätze zur Theorie der Gesellschaft (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1975), pp. 204–20. The concept features strongly in the tradition of systems theory, which I do not follow. The notion of density was developed by Nelson Goodman in his Languages of Art: An Approach to a Theory of Symbols (Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968). Goodman, however, understood the concept in purely art-historical terms, whereas I use it more generally. 7 See Ferdinand de Saussure, Course in General Linguistics, trans. Roy Harris (London: Duckworth, 1990). This idea was the basis of all of semiotics and structuralism (up to Pierre Bourdieu’s logic of distinction). 8 Within the context of the theory of science, the concept of incommensurability was established by Thomas Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend. See Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolution, 4th edn. (University of Chicago Press, 2015); and Paul Feyerabend, Against Method: Outline of an Anarchist Theory of Knowledge, 4th edn. (London: Verso, 2010). 9 This topic will be addressed in Part II, chapter 2. 10 When this no longer happens to be the case, then the singularity in question simply joins the register of the general-particular. This is, of course, a possibility and, as I will describe later in greater detail, it implies devaluation. Over the course of this book, whenever I use the term “the particular” without comment, it is meant to denote singularities / unique entities. Whenever I am discussing idiosyncrasies or the general-particular, I use these terms explicitly. 11 Translational processes of this sort are discussed with different terminology in Michael Thompson’s Rubbish Theory. 12 On this heterogeneous semantic field, see Flavia Kippele, Was heißt Individualisierung? Die Antworten soziologischer Klassiker (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1998); Thomas Kron and Martin Horáček, Individualisierung (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2009); and, for its narrower and yet interdisciplinary approach, Manfred Frank and Anselm Haverkamp, eds., Individualität (Munich: Fink, 1988). 13 See Simmel, Sociology, pp. 621–66. 14 It should be noted that Simmel already relates the concept of the individual not only to subjects but also to their social circles (see ibid., p. 621). 15 Objects always have a material basis. The distinction between objects and things is contested; in general, the concept of the thing underscores the delineable materiality of an object. Yet for certain objects – such as novels, myths, or songs – it is characteristic that they are not associated with a single material bearer but can rather materialize in various forms. On this topic, see Gustav Roßler, Der Anteil der Dinge an der Gesellschaft: Sozialität – Kognition – Netzwerke (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2015). 16 See Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility: Third Version,” in Selected Writings: Volume 4, 1938–1940, ed. Howard Eiland and Michael W. Jennings (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003), pp. 251–83. 17 The objects of aesthetics, literary theory, music theory, or theology are thus to a large extent singularities in this sense. For a somewhat rhapsodizing historical look at the singularity of things, see Neil MacGregor, A History of the World in 100 Objects (New York: Penguin, 2013). For a more theoretically informed approach, see Sherry Turkle, Evocative Objects: Things We Think With (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011). 18 On the concept of style, see Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds., Stil: Geschichten und Funktionen eines kulturwissenschaftlichen Diskurselements (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1986); and Dick Hebidge, Subculture: The Meaning of Style (London: Routledge, 1979). 19 See Bruno Baur, Biodiversität (Bern: Haupt, 2010). 20 Regarding objects, this book will look extensively at cultural goods from the economic sphere and their appropriation for the sake of lifestyles (food or living situations, for instance). 21 In this regard, see the articles collected in Richard van Dülmen, ed., Entdeckung des Ich: Die Geschichte der Individualisierung vom Mittelalter bis zur Gegenwart (Cologne: Böhlau, 2001). 22 In Foucault’s sense of the term, which I have borrowed here, subjectification should not be confused with singularization. In the social logic of the general, subjectification operates in a different direction. 23 See Weber, Economy and Society, pp. 241–5. 24 See Verena Krieger, Was ist ein Künstler? Genie – Heilsbringer – Antikünstler: Eine Ideen- und Kunstgeschichte des Schöpferischen (Cologne: Deubner, 2007); and Nathalie Heinich, L’élite artiste: Excellence et singularité en régime démocratique (Paris: Gallimard, 2005). 25 In this book, the singularization of subjects will be analyzed extensively as it relates to the lifestyle of the new middle class (Part V, Chapter 1), to the way that working subjects are profiled (Part III, Chapter 2), and to digitalization (Part IV). 26 Despite all my skepticism about the usefulness of the semantics of individualism, the question is whether it still has any analytic value. The answer is yes, but only when the concept of individualization is clearly related to the social logic of the general and is thus understood as a complementary concept to singularization. In late modernity, individualization and singularization are undoubtedly closely associated with one another, but this connection can only be investigated if both processes are treated as clearly distinct concepts. 27 On the distinction between space and place, see Yi-Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977). 28 On the intrinsic logic of cities, see Martina Löw, Soziologie der Städte (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2008). 29 See Pierre Nora, Realms of Memory, 3 vols., trans. Arthur Goldhammer (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996–8); and Gernot Böhme, The Aesthetics of Atmospheres, ed. Jean-Paul Thibaud (London: Routledge, 2017). In this book, I will go into greater detail about the singularization of places as it relates to the late-modern city, but also as it relates to lifestyles, travel, and living situations. 30 On the concept of presence, see Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, Production of Presence: What Meaning Cannot Say (Stanford University Press, 2004). 31 On rituals, see Victor W. Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (London: Routledge, 1969); on events, see Winfried Gebhardt, Fest, Feier und Alltag: Über die gesellschaftliche Wirklichkeit des Menschen und ihre Deutung (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1987); on being oriented toward the present moment, see Karl Heinz Bohrer, Der romantische Brief: Die Entstehung ästhetischer Subjektivität (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1989); and, more generally, see John Urry, Sociology Beyond Societies: Mobilities for the Twenty-First Century (London: Routledge, 2000). Later, I will discuss the singularization of time as it relates to cultural goods, the economy, professional projects, and lifestyles. 32 On aesthetic communities, see Michel Maffesoli, The Time of the Tribes: The Decline of Individualism in Mass Society, trans. Don Smith (London: Sage, 1996); on the nation, see Bernhard Giesen, Nationale und kulturelle Identität: Studien zur Entwicklung des kollektiven Bewußtseins in der Neuzeit (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1991); and on recent identity movements, see Manuel Castells, The Power of Identity, 2nd edn. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997). In this book I will revisit the topic of neo-communities at length in Part VI, Chapter 2 (which concerns their role in late-modern politics), and more briefly in Part IV (which addresses how they relate to digital communities). 33 See Latour, Reassembling the Social, p. 72. The concept of affordance was first formulated by James J. Gibson in his book The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1966). 34 The phrase is from René Pollesch, “Lob des litauischen Regieassistenten im grauen Kittel,” in Kreation und Depression: Freiheit im gegenwärtigen Kapitalismus, ed. Christoph Menke and Juliane Rebentisch (Berlin: Kadmos, 2016), pp. 243–9. 35 Here, observation is used as an overarching concept for the practices of representation and understanding. 36 This can require a tentative inclination toward interpretations that are not self-evident but rather have to be reached through a sort of open-ended inquiry (as in interpretations of works of art, people, and so on). On the concept of interpretation, see Umberto Eco, The Open Work, trans. Anna Cancogni (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989). 37 The same can be said of any orientation toward the general, which can also be systematically fostered or inhibited. 38 On processes of evaluation and the field of “valuation studies,” see Michèle Lamont, “Toward a Comparative Sociology of Valuation and Evaluation,” Annual Review of Sociology 38 (2012), pp. 201–21. 39 This distinction stems from Émile Durkheim’s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, trans. Joseph Ward Swain (London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1915), though I use it more generally here. See also Michael Thompson’s Rubbish Theory, in which a distinction is drawn between goods of lasting value, goods that lose their value, and “rubbish.” 40 In this regard, see also Boris Groys, On the New, trans. G. M. Goshgarian (London: Verso, 2014). It should be kept in mind, however, that the discovery and reframing of idiosyncrasies can itself become an independent and complex production process (the efforts of the music industry to find new local music is an example of this, as is the attempt to turn something into a classic design by reframing the narrative around it). 41 See Maurizio Lazzarato, “Immaterial Labor,” in Radical Thought in Italy: A Potential Politics, ed. Paolo Virno and Michael Hardt (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996), pp. 133–48. 42 In archaic and traditional societies, for instance, the cultural sphere is not oriented toward innovation. 43 Appropriation is an umbrella term for the practices of dealing with objects, subjects, etc. Such practices include, for instance, utilization and reception. 44 For various approaches to the concept of lived experience, which has a rich tradition, see Georg Simmel, “Die historische Formung,” in Simmel, Aufsätze und Abhandlungen, 1909–1918 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 2000), pp. 321–69; Alfred Schütz, The Phenomenology of the Social World, trans. George Walsh and Frederick Lehnert (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1967), pp. 215–17; and Gerhard Schulze, Die Erlebnisgesellschaft: Kultursoziologie der Gegenwart (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 1992), pp. 34–88. 45 On this matter, see Brian Massumi, Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2007); and Michaela Ott, Affizierung: Zu einer ästhetisch-epistemischen Figur (Munich: Edition Text + Kritik, 2010). Under the concept of “resonance,” Hartmut Rosa has discussed a specifically normative form of affecting; see his book Resonance: A Sociology of Our Relationship to the World (Cambridge: Polity, 2019). 46 Under certain conditions, practices of lived experience can acquire an especially intensive form. In an experience in the narrow sense, the subject structure of the participating individuals can be transformed, or emotions can be felt that had never been felt before. See, for instance, Victor Turner’s discussion of liminal experiences in his book The Ritual Process. 47 On performativity, see Erika Fischer-Lichte, ed., Performativität und Ereignis (Tübingen: Francke, 2003); and Jörg Volbers, Performative Kultur: Eine Einführung (Wiesbaden: Springer, 2014). 48 On the affectivity of the social, see Luc Ciompi, Die emotionalen Grundlagen des Denkens: Entwurf einer fraktalen Affektlogik (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997); and Andreas Reckwitz, “Practices and Their Affects,” in The Nexus of Practices: Connections, Constellations, Practitioners, ed. Allison Hui et al. (London: Routledge, 2017), pp. 114–25.