AHRC Seminar Series: Rhythmanalysis: Everything You Always Wanted to Know but Were Afraid to Ask (original) (raw)

Rhythm lies at the heart of our experience of shifting dynamics ruling neo-liberal society in terms of life patterns, economic growth and decay, and our systems of mediation and communication. Our lives are shaped and partake of rhythmical fluctuations: the regular happening of events and its sudden variations, the negotiations between different degrees of speeds, as in the way we produce and consume food, think and practice art and the balance and alternation between our moods, affects, and desires. Rhythm is nevertheless difficult to grasp, point down, describe. It is more something we feel, sense and intuit. Its study encompasses such diverse fields as cultural theory, psychology, crafts and design, movement arts, music, sociology, literature and the visual arts. Moreover, based on time and rhythm rhythmanalysis was famously introduced by Henri Lefebvre as a new type of methodology. However, both rhythm and rhythmanalysis have fluctuating meanings, something that hinders their understanding and that has limited their impact. This seminar series foregrounds rhythm and rhythmanalysis by highlighting their relevance and richness as methodological perspectives and practices within the humanities. The six sessions will explore various approaches to time and rhythm as those found in the work of key critical theorists, such as Gilles Deleuze, Henri Lefebvre, Rudolf Laban, Roland Barthes, Henri Meschonnic, Emile Benveniste, Gaston Bachelard and others.