{"id":5400,"date":"2018-03-26T11:44:02","date_gmt":"2018-03-26T08:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/?p=5400"},"modified":"2019-04-25T13:50:46","modified_gmt":"2019-04-25T10:50:46","slug":"leandros-kyriakopoulos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/leandros-kyriakopoulos\/","title":{"rendered":"“Performing Euphoric Cosmopolitanism: Public Space and Nomadism in Electronic Dance Music Culture”"},"content":{"rendered":"
Research Proposal<\/span>Conference<\/span>Research Results<\/span>Short Bio<\/span>Publications<\/span><\/div>
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Summary of the Research Proposal<\/h4>\n

During summers, the European continent vibrates with festivals of all kinds of art and music genres. Such tradition follows a strong genealogy of many of the 1960s movements\u2019 desire for a utopia, even a temporary one, of an alternative aesthetic and affective community. Electronic Dance Music Culture (EDMC) festivals are prominent within this map of European events precisely because they embody a powerful cultural imagination of traveling and nomadism, aesthetic difference and individual transcendence. EDM techno-culture attracts people to participate in its nomadic routes and phantasmagoric practices, in ways that are akin to \u2018alternative\u2019 or \u2018other\u2019 ways of life. This fact coincides with the aesthetic and affective over-determination of the EDM event due to the audio-visual technologies and chemical-drug consumption of the participants (especially MDMA and LSD).
\nThis research draws on the extensive fieldwork I have conducted for my Ph.D. thesis concerning Psychedelic Trance (psytrance) festivals \u2013 a music genre that belongs to EDMC. More specifically, it is based on a multi-year ethnography of traveling practices and carnivalesque recreation, in the rave fashion, as performed by my Greek informants: Festivals and parties in Greece, Hungary, Morocco and the Netherlands have been sites I visited in order to follow my informants\u2019 imagination for discovering the world and liberating the self through euphoric nomadism and phantasmagoric experiences. Hence, I wish to expand questions regarding EDMC by incorporating contemporary literature on affect, citizenship and cosmopolitanism to examine the relationship between urban nomadism and recreational practices as a performative production of an aestheticized public space. Namely, I wish to ponder on the questions of how public space is performed, how it is borderline and how it is inhabited in terms of aesthetic inclusion.
\nThus, what I imply is that the euphoric mobility in transient remote \u2018dream worlds\u2019, which has gained great popularity after the turn of the 21st century, is the paradigmatic indication of techno-aesthetic forms of cosmopolitan belonging, cross-border engagement and contemporary affective conceptions of citizenship. Contrary to most academic literature that read in the EDM event a \u2018liminal experience\u2019 and a \u2018heterotopic\u2019 setup \u2013 a supposedly evidence of the possibility for an out-of-the-ordinary or utopian site against the everyday normativity \u2013 I propose to investigate nomadism and aesthetics as cultural effects of the quest of utopia in modernity; and the EDM event as a product made possible due to the value that recreation practices and self discovery and experimentation hold within the post-1960s era.<\/p>\n

This\u00a0<\/em>research project was\u00a0funded by the Research Centre for the Humanities (RCH), with the support of the\u00a0John S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation.
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To view the conference’s program in Greek, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Research: \u201cPerforming Euphoric Cosmopolitanism: Public Space and Aesthetics in Electronic Dance Music Culture\u201d<\/h4>\n

Researcher: Dr. Leandros Kyriakopoulos<\/h5>\n
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The research project <\/em>\u00ab<\/em>Performing Euphoric Cosmopolitanism: Public Space and Aesthetics in Electronic Dance Music Culture<\/em>\u00bb<\/em> was funded by the Research Centre for the Humanities (RCH<\/em>)<\/em> for the year 2016, with the support of the John S. Latsis Public Benefit Foundation.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

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How can we think about the opening of postwar western societies toward traveling, encounters with alien cultures, and experimenting with the self at a\u00a0 moment of global imposition of neoliberal reforms and revival of conservative values? Indeed, how can we conceive the cosmopolitan ideal so much embraced by \u201ccountercultural\u201d positions as it is aestheticized into spatialized (sub)cultural practices?<\/p>\n

This research explores the network of Electronic Dance Music (EDM) festivals \u2013 a quintessential cultural product of the carnivalesque celebration, drug consumption (for the most part LSD and MDMA) and euphoric traveling of the 1960s \u2013 as a transient topography for performing contemporary global urban nomadism, with a special emphasis on aesthetics, current forms of cosmopolitan citizenship and affective belonging. Its prime ethnographic concern is specifically the massive phantasmagoric events of the distinct genre of Psychedelic Trance (psytrance), which acquired great momentum since the late 1990s in Europe. Indeed, during summers, the European continent vibrates with festivals of all kinds of art and music genres. Such tradition follows a strong genealogy of many of the 1960s movements\u2019 desire for a utopia, even a temporary one, of an alternative aesthetic and affective community. EDM festivals are prominent within this map of European events precisely because they embody a powerful cultural imagination of traveling and nomadism, aesthetic difference and individual transcendence. Even more, EDM techno-culture attracts people to participate in its nomadic routes and phantasmagoric practices, in ways that are akin to \u201calternative\u201d, \u201cspiritual\u201d or \u201cother\u201d ways of life. This fact coincides with the aesthetic and affective over-determination of the EDM event due to the audio-visual technologies and chemical-drug consumption of the participants.<\/p>\n

Due to this strong affiliation with \u201calternative spiritualities,\u201d EDMC became prominent ground for research in the British Cultural Studies of the 1990s, and it led to the theoretical evaluation and renewal of the study of subcultures. In short, it was claimed that to participate in the consumption culture of the EDM was a paradoxical act of escapism, which nonetheless disrupted social normality by bringing forth fluid subjectivities and new aesthetic public spaces. Nevertheless, the question this study dwells on does not juxtapose alternative lifestyles against a supposed normalized everyday life. Neither does it highlight the possibility of a transcendental subject that may intentionally go beyond normal affective formations (due to drug consumption); or even rescue the ideal of a world-citizen as presented in the psytrance figure of the traveler who is open to meeting alien cultures.<\/p>\n

By examining the euphoric mobility in transient remote \u201cdream worlds\u201d, which has gained great popularity after the turn of the 21st<\/sup> century, this study focuses on the relationship between urban nomadism and recreational practices as a performative production of an aestheticized public space. Namely, it ponders on the questions of how public space is performed, how it is borderline and how it is inhabited in terms of aesthetic inclusion. Indeed, contrary to most academic literature that read in the EDM event a \u201climinal experience\u201d and a \u201cheterotopic\u201d setup \u2013 a supposedly evidence of the possibility for an out-of-the-ordinary or utopian site against the everyday normativity \u2013 it investigates nomadism<\/em> and aesthetics<\/em> as cultural effects of the quest of utopia in modernity; and the EDM event as a product made possible due to the value that recreation practices and self discovery and experimentation hold within the post-1960s era.<\/p>\n

In that sense, the very set up of the festival can be seen as an intensive investment in the reorganization of the sensible according to the psychedelic imagination and utopia of a colorful, re-enchanted world: the massive crystal-clear sound systems that create an ambience of carnivalesque, dystopic, liquid or harsh musical journeys, the dreamy landscapes of the verdant European meadows, forest clearings or beaches that embody the fantasy of escaping urban life and the demand for a different way of life; the state-of-the-art kaleidoscopic installations that correspond to and, for that reason, trigger the physiognomic impressions of the visual from psychotropic consumption. Indeed, even the physiognomic aspects of the psychedelic impressions cannot be seen apart from the memory of the collective enterprises of the westerners to recover the lost knowledge of the Other, to build a political utopia wherein life is art, to realize the subject\u2019s enlightment and ascension. The psytrance techno-aesthetics acquires its capacity to introduce the phantasmagoric psychedelic dream world because it manipulates the intake of stimuli on the basis of the chemical reorganization of the senses made possible upon the imaginary of modernity\u2019s ghosts.<\/p>\n

In the psytrance event, spirituality is thematized and spectacularized, defining the aesthetic zone of the psychedelic phantasmagoria. At the same time, the desiring-image of the colorful bubble festive world of knowledge and transcendence encourages the subject to initiate the euphoric nomadism of psytrance culture and be engaged with the cosmopolitan ideal of adventure, learning, acceptance and tolerance. As the body enacts the specter-image of transcendence, it acknowledges the image of \u201cuniversal life\u201d \u2013 a memory-image fabricated within the technological horizon where the bodies are permeable and interconnected to form a coherent web. The affects of proximity as well as physiognomic intimacy become an aesthetic endeavor and a claim towards a techno aesthetically mediated citizenship. In the psytrance dream world, subjects do not experience an \u201calternate world\u201d yet they are exposed to the promise of an alternate world and the infinity of its versions. Indeed, as a recreational technology that weaves the mythological world of psychedelic reality, the psytrance event is simultaneously a technology of perception and since it brings an addition to the perceptual unconscious, it registers the body with the metaphysics of the multiple (and potentially infinite) worlds.<\/p>\n

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\"\"Leandros Kyriakopoulos <\/strong>is a fellow of the Research Center for the Humanities, Athens, Greece, and a lecturer in the department of Social Anthropology at Panteion University. His academic concerns include the study of aesthetics, new media and visual culture. Specifically, his areas of interests are the cultures of entertainment and consumption, urban nomadism and cosmopolitanism, politics of place, affects and the senses, new technologies and subjectivity.<\/p>\n

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  • \u00abWelcome to paradise\u00bb: \u039f\u03b9\u03ba\u03bf\u03b4\u03bf\u03bc\u03ce\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf psytrance \u03b4\u03c1\u03ce\u03bc\u03b5\u03bd\u03bf\u201d, \u03c3\u03c4\u03bf \u0391. \u0398\u03b5\u03bf\u03b4\u03bf\u03c3\u03af\u03bf\u03c5 \u03ba\u03b1\u03b9 \u0395. \u03a0\u03b1\u03c0\u03b1\u03b4\u03ac\u03ba\u03b7 (\u03b5\u03c0\u03b9\u03bc.), \u03a4\u03b5\u03c7\u03bd\u03bf\u03c0\u03bf\u03bb\u03b9\u03c4\u03b9\u03c3\u03bc\u03cc\u03c2 \u03ba\u03b1\u03b9 \u03a0\u03bf\u03bb\u03b9\u03c4\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03b9\u03ba\u03ad\u03c2 \u0392\u03b9\u03bf\u03bc\u03b7\u03c7\u03b1\u03bd\u03af\u03b5\u03c2<\/em>, \u0391\u03b8\u03ae\u03bd\u03b1: \u0395\u03ba\u03b4\u03cc\u03c3\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2 \u039d\u03ae\u03c3\u03bf\u03c2 (\u03c5\u03c0\u03cc \u03b4\u03b7\u03bc\u03bf\u03c3\u03af\u03b5\u03c5\u03c3\u03b7)<\/li>\n
  • \u201cPerforming Euphoric Cosmopolitanism: The Aesthetics of Life and Public Space in Psytrance Phantasmagoria\u201d, Journal of Greek Media and Culture<\/em> (\u03c5\u03c0\u03cc \u03b4\u03b7\u03bc\u03bf\u03c3\u03af\u03b5\u03c5\u03c3\u03b7, 2019)<\/li>\n
  • \u00ab\u03a5\u03c0\u03b5\u03c1\u03b2\u03b1\u03af\u03bd\u03bf\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf \u03c4\u03b1\u03bc\u03c0\u03bf\u03cd \u03c4\u03b7\u03c2 \u03b6\u03c9\u03ae\u03c2 \u03c3\u03c4\u03b7\u03bd psytrance \u03c6\u03b1\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1\u03c3\u03bc\u03b1\u03b3\u03bf\u03c1\u03af\u03b1\u00bb, \u03c3\u03c4\u03bf D. Honorato \u03ba\u03b1\u03b9 \u0391. \u0393\u03b9\u03b1\u03bd\u03bd\u03b1\u03ba\u03bf\u03c5\u03bb\u03cc\u03c0\u03bf\u03c5\u03bb\u03bf\u03c2 (\u03b5\u03c0\u03b9\u03bc.) \u03a4\u03b1\u03bc\u03c0\u03bf\u03cd- \u03a0\u03b1\u03c1\u03ac\u03b2\u03b1\u03c3\u03b7- \u03a5\u03c0\u03ad\u03c1\u03b2\u03b1\u03c3\u03b7 \u03c3\u03c4\u03b7\u03bd \u03a4\u03ad\u03c7\u03bd\u03b7 \u03ba\u03b1\u03b9 \u03c4\u03b7\u03bd \u0395\u03c0\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03ae\u03bc\u03b7<\/em>, \u039a\u03ad\u03c1\u03ba\u03c5\u03c1\u03b1: \u0399\u03cc\u03bd\u03b9\u03bf \u03a0\u03b1\u03bd\u03b5\u03c0\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03ae\u03bc\u03b9\u03bf, 2017, \u03c3\u03b5\u03bb. 357- 385.<\/li>\n
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  • \u201cThe state of exception as precondition for crisis\u201d, \u03c3\u03c4\u03bf P. Papailias (\u03b5\u03c0\u03b9\u03bc.) Beyond the \u201cGreek crisis\u201d: Histories, rhetorics, politics<\/em>, Hot Spots- Cultural Anthropology, Journal of the society for cultural anthropology, 2011. \u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n
  • \u201cDecember\u2019s riots as mediated by the image of mass media\u201d, \u03c3\u03c4\u03bf A.G. Schwarz \u03ba.\u03b1. (\u03b5\u03c0\u03b9\u03bc.) We are an image of the future: The Greek revolt of December 2008<\/em>, Oakland and Edinburgh: AK Press, 2010, \u03c3\u03b5\u03bb. 241-243.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[92,70],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultures-and-cultural-production-en","category-research"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5400"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5400\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7465,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5400\/revisions\/7465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rchumanities.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}