Culture

Notes from Cultura Ingobernable.

• There are hundreds of definitions of culture out there (~250).
• Kultur, as a XIX century concept, is indisociable from the conformation of state nations.
• Modern definitions of culture are as accurate as vague: everything from laws to food. Or worse: they are so thight they are not recognized as such by the people creating culture.
• On the topic of state-sponsored/-enabled culture: what is a set of ideal circumstances that would lead to cultural participation? My hunch is that it’s not as much a matter of industry as of:
  1. Community spaces. No wonder that’s the first role that CSOA squats tend to occupy. Think ateneos, municipal and private musical schools, libraries… Though I’d say there is a difference of degree between private spaces (not only economically, but in terms of delimitation of activity) and public ones. Following this double definition of privateness, a library is public in that it’s a municipal service potentially open to anyone, but, at the same time, is private in the sense that it cathers to a certain public with certain interests by offering only a subset of cultural expressions. I guess the question is: what would you do if you could enter a space relatively freely and undisturbed? What kind of cultural uses would, as a citizen space, arise from a blank slate?
  2. Time! Anyone working a 8-6 in Spain can tell you this much.