User:Laurier Rochon/readingnotes/certeau1/

Michel de Certeau > The Practice of Everyday Life > Making Do, uses and tactics

Notes & quotes

Making do : getting by, coping, surviving
De Certeau proposes an analysis of the art of everyday life (more specifically, how to navigate it - to get by). The premise of the the text seems to be that power structures continuously impose restrictions on individuals, who are seemingly alienated to a high degree and incapable of escaping the system. This is where the tactics and strategies described come into play.
The introduction is very confusing - abstracting the notions of strategy and tactics, which are treated later in the text
Possible solution 1 to making do : navigating the cracks of restrictions and laws imposed upon us in a creative/pluralist manner. This puts one in an ambiguous and unexpected position, which can result in interesting outcomes.
Possible solution 2 to making do : recontextualized consumption. By consuming a product that is fed to us and transforming its function to something else, one can subvert the origninal aim of the dominant agent's will.
Possible solution 3 to making do : by absorbing a cultural product without resistance in a widespread manner (to the masses), the original quality and aura desintegrates, as the product becomes bastardized, or 'popularized'. This watering down of culture is an effective strategy in its anonymity and somewhat irreversibility. A concrete example of this could be language.
Possible solution 4 to making do : innovators 'trace intederminable trajectories that are apparently meaningless, since they do not cohere wutg tge constructed, written, and prefabricated space through which they move. Innovation appears to be an interesting case here, as the new media landscape is innundated with 'trends' that crop up and die incessantly (i.e. augmented reality, data visualization, physical computing, tangible media, etc.)
How do we analyse the 'success' of a cultural product? By its sale/circulation data, or by the impact it has on its users. In the latter case, how do we measure such a thing?
The author clearly does not have kind words for the TV : 'The television viewer cannot write anything on the screen of his set. He has been dislodged from the product; he plays no role in its apparition'.
De Certeau stresses the importance of the action, not the subject (what is used VS ways of using). He argues that the action is completely lost in a world of codification. The example of a 'trajectory' is given here, as a succession of points, and not the end figure that is created.
Strategy : It is a mastery of place over time, it has the luxury of being calculated. It is 'the calculation of power relationships that becomes possible as soon as a subject with will and power can be isolated. It postulates a place that can be delimited as its own and serve as the base from which relations with an exteriority composed of targets or threats can be managed. It is the typical attitude of modern science, politics and military strategy'. (An attitude!)
Tactic : it does not have its own space - therefore a tactic is reactive to the space of others. It must play by the laws of the dominant power, and cannot 'plan things ahead' like a strategy. 'It operates in isolated actions, blow by blow'. It is 'an art of the weak'. This art, which often requires to 'pull a trick', involves a sense of the opportunities afforded by a particular occasion. It is successful in its ability to adapt pertinently to a situation in time.
An interesting disgression comes up towards the end, the author suggests that these practies of the 'weak' are actually present in all natural elements of life - that plants, animals, etc. use these techniques of 'deception' to also 'make do' in their respective environments. It's a compelling, somewhat self-referential concept that would assume a direct correlation between our physical composition (for lack of a better term...the amalgamation of genes?) and the strategies used to survive. (more of the subject in this book)