Reality, Virtuality & Hyperreality

-Theory of 'Value'

-Saussure's Theory of The Sign ie. The signifier and the signified, the concept and the image/sound.

- Key theorists/precursors Guy Debord the 'society of the spectacle' Marshall McCluhan media and communication theory, 'the medium is the message', Georges Bataille symbolic aspects of ritual in diverse cultures, Marcel Mauss the 'gift' as an economic principle

- 'The world is an image of something' Plato, the Timeaeus

- Simulacra and Simulation

- The precession of Simulacra - 1. the reflection of a profound reality 2. masks and denatures a profound reality 3. masks the absence of a profound reality 4. has no relation whatsoever: Pure Simulacrum.

Disneyfication

Synopticon - ie. Big Brother, The Loud Family, Forget Foucault?

'Welcome to the desert of the real'

- The end of history? 'If there are no more dustbins of history...(history) has become its own dustbin, just as the planet itself is becoming its own dustbin.'

'America got what it fantasized about'

Although Zižek was referring to the unimaginable catastrophes of Hollywood disaster movies, this quote reminded me of a couple of 'predictions' by rap artists. Boots Riley, the male half of The Coup, is an activist as well as an emcee, and holds strong far left political views. The release date of The Coup's fourth album was put back as a result of it's untimely closeness to September 11th. The album cover - referring to money-obsessed Southern hip-hop in style - depicts Riley pressing a button whilst the World Trade is destroyed in the background.

Another example was Biggie's line on the James Mtume sampling single 'Juicy' ; "Time to get paid/ Blow up like the World Trade" Of course this was again a simple metaphor - in this case for making money rather than in The Coup's case, the destruction of Capitalist ideologies.

What struck me about this was the level of sensitivity, 'A Dream' a Jay-Z track released after the September 11th bombings included an acapella of the aforementioned Biggie verse over a newly produced instrumental, with the words "World Trade" censored.

The relevance in all of this is the different levels of signification, without the 9/11 disaster, the 'Juicy' lyrics would have little cultural meaning. Because the signified in both cases was involved in a very real historical event, this in turn changes the meaning of the signifier, in a way it intensifies its significance.