A Swerve Edition, distributed for Zone Books. Also an artist and filmmaker, he is the author of Memoires and Commentaires sur la société du spectacle. Guy Debord was one of the most important participants in the activities associated with the Situationist International in the 1960s.

In a sweeping revision of Marxist categories, the notion of the spectacle takes the problem of the commodity from the sphere of economics to a point at which the commodity as an image dominates not only economic exchange but the primary communicative and symbolic activity of all modern societies. Today, Debord's work continues to be in the forefront of debates about the fate of consumer society and the operation of modern social power. At the same time it was one of the most influential theoretical works for a wide range of political and revolutionary practice in the 1960s. Originally published in France in 1967, Society of the Spectacle offered a set of radically new propositions about the nature of contemporary capitalism and modern culture. The book essentially reworks the Marxist concepts of commodity fetishism and alienation for the film, advertising, and television age.įirst time readers of Debord’s work may prefer to read Comments first, since it is a brisker and more informal read than The Society of the Spectacle.For the first time, Guy Debord's pivotal work Society of the Spectacle appears in a definitive and authoritative English translation.

The spectacle is hence a technological version of the exiling of human powers in a 'world beyond' - and the perfection of separation within human beings.īy paraphrasing Marx, Debord immediately establishes a connection between the spectacle and the economy. The present stage, in which social life is completely taken over by the accumulated products of the economy, entails a generalized shift from having to appearing: all effective 'having' must now derive its immediate prestige and its ultimate raison d'etre from appearances. – An Illustrated Guide to Guy Debord's 'The Society of the Spectacle'Īn earlier stage in the economy's domination of social life entailed an obvious downgrading of being into having that left its stamp on all human endeavour. The book examines the ' ],' Debord’s term for the everyday manifestation of capitalist-driven phenomena advertising, television, film, and celebrity. This overlap of power and new virtual worlds / information culture interests me.

Going off the back blurb, it's going to look at modernity, capitalism, and everyday life and it's crucial 'for understanding the contemporary effects of power, which are increasingly inseparable from the new virtual worlds of our rapidly changing image/information culture.' 📓 the-society-of-the-spectacle.md (text) by neil ️本 📝 ⇣ ⇡ The Society of the SpectacleĪnother work of political and cultural theory found on my brother's bookshelf.

Ken knabb society of the spectacle