Date: Mon, 04 Apr 94 16:43:50
From: mroberts-AT-MIT.EDU (Martin Roberts)
Subject: TAZ: supplementary questions/discussion topics


Here are some random (and in some cases, debatable) instances of the TAZ:
  
        . Palmares, the 17th-century Brazilian runaway slave colony
        . Paris, May '68
        . Tiananmen Square, '89
        . the Palestinian _intifada_
        . raves
        . carnival
        . pirate radio stations
        . the Japanese manga about the maverick nuclear sub which declares 
itself an independent state
        . internet ftp sites of anarchist writings (inc. the TAZ itself) 

This is a pretty diverse list, but it raises what for me is an interesting 
problem of the TAZ. What's been troubling me for some time now is whether the 
concept of the TAZ is simply too *broad* to be all that useful. What does 
Palmares have to do with a dinner-party? May 68 with a pirate enclave? The 
notion of insurrection, perhaps, but then, is the TAZ just a synonym for 
insurrection? Or for any form of political or cultural practice which eludes or 
opposes dominant institutions?

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Other questions/topics:

1. The relationship between the TAZ and festival--especially carnival.

2. The association between the TAZ and piracy, from the 18th-century pirate 
enclaves to today's piracy of information.

3. The impact of the TAZ on contemporary musical avant-gardes (esp. Bill 
Laswell's various projects: e.g. the Malay Black Djinn curse quoted in Praxis's 
_Transformation_). In this context, it would be interesting to compare the TAZ 
with William Burroughs, who has a whole discography of collaborative projects 
with bands from Material to Ministry. What would be a discography of the TAZ? 
(I'd be esp. interested to hear more about the Coil connection someone mentioned 
a while ago).

4. The TAZ and computer technologies/networks. As we know, HB is sceptical about 
the insurrectionary potential of such technologies and networks, but do we have 
to be as pessimistic? While the colonization and regulation of the internet by 
mainstream, corporate culture is already well advanced, is it not also (so far) 
an effective breeding-ground for resistance to this culture? What are the new, 
virtual forms of the TAZ? (anarchy ftp sites, BBSs, MUDs, etc.)?

These are some of the questions which most interest me personally about the TAZ, 
and which I'd be interested in discussing further with anyone on this list. 

-- Martin Roberts

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