[Nettime-bold] E is for Event

[McKenzie Wark <mw35@nyu.edu>]

E is for Event
McKenzie 
Wark

Words fail the 
very event 
with which 
they tangle. It 
is in the 
nature of 
disaster to 
defy 
representatio
n. The 
abstract 
grazes the 
concrete and 
vaporises on 
contact.

What we are 
witnessing, 
on our TV 
screens, our 
computer 
screens, is a 
weird global 
media event. 
Like all such 
events, it 
appeared as 
if it came out 
of nowhere. It 
took the 
media by 
surprise. The 
networks 
were 
reporting live 
on an event 
before they 
even knew 
what the 
envelope of 
the event 
was. 

As I write, we 
still don't 
know. There 
is no reliable 
information 
as to how this 
event started, 
or how it will 
end. And still 
the networks 
keep 
pumping out 
the 
information. 
As with all 
such events, 
the desire for 
information 
far outstrips 
the ability to 
provide it. 
People 
cluster 
around 
screens and 
newsfeeds, 
anxious for 
details that 
are not 
forthcoming. 
Endless 
repetitions of 
the same 
video clips 
and endless 
speculation 
from 
supposed 
experts fill the 
yawning gap 
between fact 
and 
appearance. 
CNN just 
goes live 
without 
commentary. 
Images and 
sounds in 
search of a 
story.

The 
saturation of 
the media 
space and 
time spills 
over from 
broadcast 
media into 
personal 
communicatio
n. The phone 
lines jam as 
people try to 
contact loved 
ones. People 
use their 
internet 
communities 
to share 
words, 
mostly 
heartfelt but 
futile, as a 
way of 
working 
through the 
surplus of 
emotions that 
spills over 
from this 
weird global 
media event. 

Weird global 
media event: 
It is an event 
because it is 
far outside 
the routine of 
newsmaking. 
In news, the 
story always 
precedes the 
facts, and the 
facts fit the 
story with the 
predictable 
tang of 
redundancy. 
It is a media 
event 
because it 
instantly 
connects any 
and every 
vector of 
communicatio
n together in 
a vast, 
irrational 
stew. 
Everything 
from financial 
data to erotic 
emails twist 
toward the 
unfolding 
shape of the 
event. It is a 
global media 
event 
because the 
vectors that 
snap into 
place create 
their own 
world. (We 
are that 
world). 
Events of this 
kind are no 
respecters of 
scale or 
boundaries. 
And it is a 
weird global 
media event 
because it is a 
pure 
singularity. It 
does not 
quite fit any 
template. It is 
its own 
precedent. It 
defies 
meaning. The 
truth of the 
event lies in 
what can't be 
said. 

This is not an 
irony: I wrote 
about weird 
global media 
events in 
Virtual 
Geography: 
Living With 
Global Media 
Events 
(Indiana 
University 
Press, 1994). 
The examples 
in that book 
were 
Tiananmen 
square, the 
fall of the 
Berlin Wall, 
the Gulf War 
and the 'Black 
Monday' 
stock market 
crash. I 
thought when 
I wrote about 
these events 
that they 
would not be 
the last. I 
never 
expected to 
be touched 
by a weird 
global media 
event 
personally. 

New York is 
my home 
town. Like 
everyone 
connected to 
this most 
global city, I 
spent the day 
trying to 
confirm that 
friends and 
family are 
safe. And 
they are. But 
there are 
many people 
whose friends 
and family 
are not safe. 
My proximity 
to loss makes 
me feel their 
genuine loss, 
in the very 
marrow of 
what I cannot 
say for them 
or about 
them. Words 
lose their 
glamour. But 
silence is not 
much of an 
option.

INDEX TO 
THIS 
FABULOUS 
WORLD
http://www.
fineartforum.
org/Backissu
es/Vol_15/fa
f_v15_n09/te
xt/feature.ht
ml



~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~
We no longer 
have roots, 
we have 
aerials. 
~~~~~~~~~
~ McKenzie 
Wark 
~~~~~~~~~



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