{"title":"Polity","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePolity is a renowned music label hailing from Bristol, UK. With a rich history and an impressive roster of talented artists, Polity has firmly established itself as a force to be reckoned with in the music industry.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSince its inception, Polity has been dedicated to showcasing the best of electronic music across various genres. The label's diverse range of releases spans from *ambient* and *downtempo* to *techno* and *house*, ensuring there is something for every discerning listener.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003ePolity takes pride in nurturing emerging talent and providing them with a platform to showcase their creativity. Their commitment to quality is evident in each release, as they meticulously curate their catalog to offer only the finest musical experiences.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"the-aesthetics-of-pop-music","title":"The Aesthetics of Pop Music","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn this short book, the leading German cultural critic Diedrich Diederichsen puts forward a fresh and original account of pop music. He argues that pop music is not so much a form of music but rather a constellation of different media channels, social spaces and behavoural systems, of which music is only part. As a constellation, pop music relates to other forms of music – popular, classical or folk – in the way that photography relates to painting, or cinema to theatre. Its own logic of attraction is based less on compositions and the expression of subjectivity and more on indexicality, real or pseudo-involuntary effects as recorded by sound technologies, and on studio discipline and staging, and hence on performance. Pop music came into existence when recipients became involved via a range of diverse and decentralized outlets like TV, transistor radio, 7\"\" singles, glossy magazines and jukeboxes in public spaces. They had to create a virtual unity out of these heterogeneous outputs in a process of active reception. Experiencing pop music is more than an act of listening: it is immersing oneself in an alternative ontological regime.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBy elaborating his innovative account of pop music as a constellation, Diederichsen develops a theory of pop music that distinguishes itself from sociology, cultural studies, media studies and ethnography while at the same time drawing on and encompassing them all.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback - 1157445","offer_id":50388912341323,"sku":"1157445","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/58065d1e-5f3a-4765-9ba0-751de1d8640a_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1726351322"},{"product_id":"cryptocommunism","title":"Cryptocommunism","description":"\u003cp\u003eCryptocurrencies are often associated with right-wing political movements, or even with the alt-right. They are the preserve of libertarians and fans of Ayn Rand and Friedrich Hayek. With their promotion of anonymity and individualism, there’s no doubt that they seamlessly slot into the prevailing anti-State ideology. But in this book Mark Alizart argues that the significance of cryptocurrencies goes well beyond cryptoanarchism. In so far as they allow us ‘to appropriate collectively the means of monetary production’, to paraphrase Marx, and to replace ‘the government of persons by the administration of things’, as Engels advocated, they form the basis for a political regime that begins to look like a communism which has at last come to fruition – a cryptocommunism.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":50447175385419,"sku":"1139411","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/afc8df80-66e6-44d2-9a4f-649824e15d57_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727072890"},{"product_id":"xenofeminism","title":"Xenofeminism","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn an era of accelerating technology and increasing complexity, how should we reimagine the emancipatory potential of feminism? How should gender politics be reconfigured in a world being transformed by automation, globalization and the digital revolution?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThese questions are addressed in this bold new book by Helen Hester, a founding member of the 'Laboria Cuboniks' collective that developed the acclaimed manifesto 'Xenofeminism: A Politics for Alienation'. Hester develops a three-part definition of xenofeminism grounded in the ideas of technomaterialism, anti-naturalism, and gender abolitionism. She elaborates these ideas in relation to assistive reproductive technologies and interrogates the relationship between reproduction and futurity, while steering clear of a problematic anti-natalism. Finally, she examines what xenofeminist technologies might look like in practice, using the history of one specific device to argue for a future-oriented gender politics that can facilitate alternative models of reproduction.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChallenging and iconoclastic, this visionary book is the essential guide to one of the most exciting intellectual trends in contemporary feminism.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":50452640629067,"sku":"1139412","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/31951b65-bf7d-4f36-b49e-ddbb4dd1e9ad_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727159324"},{"product_id":"solar-politics","title":"Solar Politics","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis book is a philosophical essay on the sun. It draws on Georges Bataille’s theories of the solar economy and solar violence and demonstrates their relevance to a world affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe sun, which, since Antiquity, has played an essential role in our utopian imaginations, is the ultimate source of energy, both productive and destructive. According to Georges Bataille, its infinite generosity can be taken as the model for human societies, which suggests an alternative to the capitalist economy with its infinite expansion, colonization, and disastrous consequences on the cosmic scale.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTaking a step from solar economy to solar politics, Timofeeva locates the grounds for it in solidarity with nature, treated neither as a master nor as a slave, but as a comrade.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe book will appeal to students, academics, artists, and other readers interested in the philosophy of nature, ecology, social and political theory, postcolonial and decolonial studies, and the humanities generally.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":50453440364875,"sku":"1139415","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/ed285f7a-7973-48af-829e-6ef465326da6_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727172093"},{"product_id":"narcocapitalism-life-in-the-age-of-anaesthesia","title":"Narcocapitalism: Life in the Age of Anaesthesia","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhat do the invention of anaesthetics in the middle of the nineteenth century, the Nazis’ use of cocaine, and the development of Prozac have in common? The answer is that they're all products of the same logic that defines our contemporary era: ‘the age of anaesthesia’. Laurent de Sutter shows how large aspects of our lives are now characterised by the management of our emotions through drugs, ranging from the everyday use of sleeping pills to hard narcotics. Chemistry has become so much a part of us that we can’t even see how much it has changed us. In this era, being a subject doesn't simply mean being subjected to powers that decide our lives: it means that our very emotions have been outsourced to chemical stimulation. Yet we don't understand why the drugs that we take are unable to free us from fatigue and depression, and from the absence of desire that now characterizes our psychopolitical condition. We have forgotten what it means to be excited because our only excitement has become drug-induced. We have to abandon the narcotic stimulation that we’ve come to rely on and find a way back to the collective excitement that is narcocapitalism’s greatest fear.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":50459734376779,"sku":"1139413","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/508a4313-4724-4859-9c3a-bd480f1048f0_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727226840"},{"product_id":"the-playstation-dreamworld","title":"The Playstation Dreamworld","description":"\u003cp\u003eFrom mobile phones to consoles, tablets and PCs, we are now a generation of gamers. The PlayStation Dreamworld is – to borrow a phrase from Slavoj Zizek – the pervert's guide to videogames. It argues that we can only understand the world of videogames via Lacanian dream analysis. It also argues that the Left needs to work inside this dreamspace – a powerful arena for constructing our desires – or else the dreamworld will fall entirely into the hands of dominant and reactionary forces.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhile cyberspace is increasingly dominated by corporate organization, gaming, at its most subversive, can nevertheless produce radical forms of enjoyment which threaten the capitalist norms that are created and endlessly repeated in our daily relationships with mobile phones, videogames, computers and other forms of technological entertainment. Far from being a book solely for dedicated gamers, this book dissects the structure of our relationships to all technological entertainment at a time when entertainment has become ubiquitous. We can no longer escape our fantasies but rather live inside their digital reality.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polity","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":50460303458635,"sku":"1139414","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/6a410268-bc2e-485c-a08c-938debea557b_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727230826"},{"product_id":"becoming-an-artwork","title":"Becoming An Artwork","description":"\u003cp\u003eModern history is a history of aesthetizations – and every aesthetization raises a claim of protection. We aestheticize and want to protect almost everything, including Earth, oceans, the atmosphere, rare animal species and exotic plants. Humans are no exception. They also present themselves as objects of contemplation that deserve admiration and care. For some time, artists and intellectuals struggled for the sovereign right to present themselves to society in their own way – to become self-created works of art. Today everybody has not only a right but also an obligation to practice self-design. We are responsible for the way we present ourselves to others – and we cannot get rid of this aesthetic responsibility.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHowever, we are not able to produce our own bodies. Before we begin to practice self-design, we find ourselves already designed by the gaze of others. That is why the practice of self-design mostly takes a critical and confrontational turn. We want to bring others to see us in the way we want to be seen – not only during our earthly life but also after our death. 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