Sublime

what they say about contemporary culture, what they can actually do for audiences, and what they can offer contemporary social relations.

exclusivity rather than inclusivity,

agree with Morgan that participation is not intrinsically politically progressive. Thus, though I seek these practices’ democratic potential and look for ways they extend equal opportunities for social engagement, I also pay attention to ways they constrain or suppress those opportunities.

Who gets to do what, where, when and how in this cultural practice, and how does this affect people? What are this practice’s relationships to social engagement, communication, social justice, equality and democracy; how might it contribute to or weaken them? If it invites participation, who can participate and on what terms? What is the quality of

I explore what models of social relation and community these practices can produce, while I remain wary of models that either fetishize a myth of a unified singularity and thereby obliterate difference, or propose an unresolved multitude. I seek models of community that recognize people’s social interdependence without assimilating their distinctiv

social engagement to sustain democracy, people’s shared exercise of power. All of these essentials of social life are jeopardized by contemporary cultural trends which damage communication and prioritize self-interest.