Other Things

435 Pages·2016·5.717 MB·English

by  Bill Brown

Other
Things

Other
Things
Bill
Brown
The University of Chicago Press
Chicago and London
Bill Brown is the Karla Scherer Distinguished Service
Professor in American Culture at the University of
Chicago and a coeditor of Critical Inquiry. He is the
author of several books, including A Sense of Things:
The Object Matter of American Literature, also published
by the University of Chicago Press.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2015 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2015.
Printed in the United States of America
24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15  1 2 3 4 5
ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 07665- 2 (cloth)
ISBN- 13: 978- 0- 226- 28316- 6 (e- book)
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226283166.001.0001
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Brown, Bill, 1958– author.
Other things / Bill Brown.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN: 978-0-226-07665-2 (cloth : alk. paper)—
ISBN: 978-0-226-28316-6 (ebook) 1. Object
(Philosophy). 2. Material culture. 3. Object
(Philosophy) in literature. 4. Material culture
in literature. 5. Material culture in art. I. Title.
BD220.B76 2015
814′.6—dc23
2015014453
♾ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO
Z39.48- 1992 (Permanence of Paper).
To Short, in thanks for the gift of culture

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xiii
Overture (The Shield of Achilles) 1
One Things—in Theory 17
I
The Matter of Modernism
Two The Secret Life of Things (Virginia Woolf) 49
Three The Modernist Object and Another Thing (Man Ray) 79
Four Concepts and Objects, Words and Things (Philip K. Dick) 125
II
Unhuman History
Five The Unhuman Condition (Hannah Arendt/Bruno Latour) 155
Six Object Relations in an Expanded Field (Myla Goldberg/
Harold Searles) 175
Seven Objects, Others, and Us (Brian Jungen) 197
III
Kitsch Kulchur
Eight How to Do Things with Things: A Toy Story
(Shawn Wong) 221
Nine Reification, Reanimation, and the American Uncanny
(Spike Lee) 245
Ten Commodity Nationalism and the Lost Object 271
Coda A Little History of Light (Dan Flavin/Gaston Bachelard) 291
Notes 303
Glossary 371
Index 375
Illustrations
Plates (following page 242)
1 Carl Andre, One Hundred Sonnets (I . . . Flower) (1963)
2 Carl Andre, 18 Small Field (2001)
3 Jackson Pollock, Full Fathom Five (1947)
4 Robert Rauschenberg, Bed (1955)
5 Lee Bontecou, Untitled (1959)
6 Lee Bontecou, Untitled (1961)
7 Andre Breton, Poem- Object (1935)
8 Man Ray, Tears (1930–32)
9 Brian Jungen, Bush Capsule (2000)
10 Brian Jungen, Furniture Sculpture (2006)
11 Brian Jungen, Cetology (2002)
12 Brian Jungen, Prototype for New Understanding #7 (1999)
13 Brian Jungen, Prototype for New Understanding #9 (1999)
14 Robert Davidson, Eagle Transformation Mask (2002)
15 Thomas Edstrand, “The Chief” (c. 2010)
16 Advertisement for Nike Air Jordans, Sports Illustrated (1997)
17 Christopher Radko, “Heroes All” (c. 2001)
18 Christopher Radko, “Brave Heart” (c. 2001)
19 Minoru Yamasaki/Emery Roth & Sons, World Trade Center,
scenic skyline view from the south (1964–74)
20 FEMA/Bri Rodriguez, Rescue and recovery operations continue
at the site of the collapsed World Trade Center (2001)