Constructing an Animistic History: Voice, Relation of Place and Being

The podcast for Indelible, a documentary in progress for the week of September 22, 2018. In this quasi-video podcast, (it has hidden images...), the method used to construct a controversial history is discussed.

Description of the images in the opening screen, clockwise from lower left:

Shadows on wall in late summer; My left hand on a pillow, turned upside-down prior to it being broken a few weeks later; an Ethiopian opal, whose beauty here and in this type of opal is because of it being filled with and holding water—yet this is removed when exchanged for its monetary value; a shadow image just before sundown on the wall unretouched. The letter-form depicts nothing. As words created by them sometimes do.

It has become clear through the research phase of this documentary project that recording a history using traditional techniques can only be counter-productive for any outcome with an authentic reading or a solid place within the historical record. It is too controversial and there is too much of a desire by those who wish to suppress the history to create controlled opposition and various diversions, (propaganda).

Rather than feel I must rail against this fact, I decided to use it as an opportunity to invent a unique method for describing a history that could be used for any historical telling. This has been a difficult road. But I think I am now very close. The path is one that relies on Animism. Do I use this descriptor correctly? I don’t know. I will let you decide.

I do know that we can not currently create histories as we have been doing, especially within our current forms of controlled media. Nor can we continue on using journalistic approaches that show us repeatedly doing so will result in failure and limit access to the very history we are recording. There are too many tools to dissuade such tellings. And attempting to right this wrong only leads to being marginalized with ones metaphorical voice box crushed, (a lament referencing Phil Ochs’ literal silencing by federal agencies):
https://nfold.net/2016/06/phil-oaks-voicebox-crushed/

So please follow along as I put this new toolbox together. It is for all of you.

In this podcast:

Animism is a relation to place.
Animism is a system of relationships.
Animism in this sense is not symbolic. It is not a metaphor.
History can be the recording of relations rather than facts, as expected. Facts are a concept from a materialists perspective.
Facts are discrete components.
Julian Assange and his fluid metaphor for living in the hybrid-cyber world.
The game of Go.
The overlay of the numeric grid upon the fluid being of human.
The value of voice: language and sound.
I am grateful again for the work of Gordon White, and now the work of Dr. John Reid, whose efforts to bring Animism to the big kids table is a worthy effort.

The ideas I mention in the podcast from the last talk given by Julian Assange prior to having his ability to communicate with the public cut, can be found here:

https://youtu.be/P_m3eO3c5Uw