THING THEORY

Having got distracted by Heidegger, I missed another interesting strand of 'thing theory'. This actually by the guy who coined the term, Bill Brown. A very good collection of writing on the topic can be found in a 2001 issue of Critical Inquiry, which those with the right affiliations can access in its entirety through university libraries as an e-journal. Brown subsequently edited a further collection of essays in a book: Brown, B, ed. 2004, Things, Chicago University Press, Chicago. The book has an added attraction as it includes a wonderful essay by Bruno Latour, 'Why has critique run out of steam? From matters of fact to matters of concern', which was originally published in a later issue of Critical Inquiry (30:2, 2004). The use of the word 'matter' in the title should signal that Latour has NM on his mind (and, indeed, was one of the first to mobilise the concept in relation to the visual arts as well as more -- perhaps -- everyday matters/things).

To get a picture of some of this stuff, it is worth having a look at the discussion at:
http://objectsandthings.wordpress.com/2010/02/07/bill-browns-thing-theory (This blog looks to have had potential but appears to have been neglected of late).

To read Brown's editorial in the Critical Inquiry 'thing' issue without accessing the journal, you can download a pdf at: http://faculty.virginia.edu/theorygroup/docs/brown.thing-theory.2001.pdf

Bruno Latour's article can be downloaded at: http://www.bruno-latour.fr/sites/default/files/89-CRITICAL-INQUIRY-GB.pdf