14 to 24 August 2024, Topolò
From 14 to 24 August 2024, diffrakt will go on a road trip and visit Robida in Topolò to – finally – become part of the Academy of Margins. We will spend 10 days talking and walking about the margins and the periphery, about theory and its topològraphies, about counter|infrastructures, about science fiction and of course whatever else may arrive to us while we’re there.
As part of our stay in Topolò, and besides an appearance on Radio Robida, we will host two public workshops:
1) SO FAR | SF and the Margins
Monday, 19 August 2024, 4–7 pm
SF – science fiction, speculative fiction, etc. – is (among many other things) an art of the margins. In this workshop, we’ll read extracts from works by authors such as Octavia Butler, Samuel R. Delany, Harry Josephine Giles, N.K. Jemisin and Ursula K. Le Guin, but also Thomas Ligotti and Sarah Pinsker, in order to examine the condition of being on the margins, in constant negotiation and exchange with the established centres. In our conversations across various materials, we’ll explore the analytic-diagnostic as well as the transformative potentials of speculation as a method.
2) On counter | infrastructures: Topològraphies
Tuesday, 20 August 2024, 4–7 pm
Infrastructures are essential to our lives and shape – though often barely perceptible – the ways we live as well as our immediate and mediate environments. But which structures and infrastructures are necessary for which forms of life? Which are desirable and which need to be rejected? The study of counter|infrastructures implies both a critique of actually existing infrastructures and an examination (and potential prefiguration) of the infrastructures necessary for building communities that rely on principles of mutuality and solidarity rather than competitive individuality. In this workshop, we’ll start our discussion from Hakim Bey’s classic T.A.Z.: The Temporary Autonomous Zone in order to discuss what we can learn from infrastructures along the margins.
Should you be anywhere near Topolò, please do get in touch – we’d be happy to see you there, whether for a workshop or just for a visit.
