Schizoanalytic Cartographies: A Very Short
Introduction
The present text is a leftover from a chapter on theoretical background which had to be reduced to a single sentence for reasons of economy (the Occam's Razor reduced to a word limit). It explains Felix Guattari's analysis of assemblage domains as an applicable methodological tool for qualitative research. Moreover, due to its "rejected" origin and in strict alignment with Deleuzoguattarian fractaloid thinking, the text itself stands as a proof of this type of thinking. One sentence of a forthcoming paper can be unfolded into this text, ergo, each sentence of this text can be unfolded into other texts... ad infinitum.
While A
Thousand Plateaus is a long dense text which requires a relatively intense engagement on behalf of the reader to schematise its conceptual structures
mentally, a couple of years after its publication, Guattari released his solo
book Schizoanalytic Cartographies,
which, as the title suggests, includes precise maps and concrete definitions of
fine detail of all the Deleuzoguattarian terms. The book emphasises on the
processes which bring an assemblage into existence. In our contemporary societal, individual, environmental, and psychological structures, phenomena are extremely complex, interwoven with other phenomena. Hence, they form admixtures of agencies, agencements, translated as assemblages. To map an assemblage is to help one's navigation in a sea of multilayered ontological traits. An assemblage, thus,
consists of four interconnected domains, which can be synopsised in the
following initial diagram:
Figure
1 The matrix of
cross-relations of the four categories (Guattari 1988: 28)
I will not go into great detail as
Guattari does in his book for it would be irrelevant to the scope of this
paper, but I will attempt to render this description of assemblages accessible
to the non-accustomed reader for the purposes of the specific context. An
assemblage thus, consists of the following:
(a)
Fluxes or Flows F of the fixed territorialised row below, which are the
material realisation of entities. If we speak of a human, a machine, a plant,
an insect, a computer, it is not a sharply defined entity, but a conjunction of
various elements which come from the other domains, a projection.
(b)
Abstract Phyla Φ of
the deterritorialised row above. Phyla are the rather abstract ideas we have
about things, so that, while there are no actual real fixed humans or machines,
the Phylum of a “human,” a “machine,” an “horse” is there. Apparently, this
resembles the Platonic world of immutable ideas, but the main difference here
is that Phyla (like Flows) change during the course of time, according to the
impact of other domains (one can think of extinct animal species, or social
divisions which are irrelevant nowadays). As said, the shaping of Flows in turn
shapes Phyla, but also, it is with reference to Phyla that Flows are affected
in order to change toward the possible Other. “Between this same domain of Flow
and that of deterritorialized Phyla, a form of smoothing that opens onto the
possible is established” (Guattari 1989: 117).
(c)
Incorporeal Universes of reference U (sometimes referred to as Constellations
of Universes ΣU) in
the deterritorialised plane. A collection of Phyla forms a Universe of
reference. We may think of an ideology like Marxism, a religion, the colour
pallet, or the totality of animal kinds. Again, Flows refer to them like in Φ to become loaded with becomings. There
might be a difference, for instance in the becoming-tiger (Φ) or the becoming-animal (U) of a human.
(d)
Existential Territories (T) of the territorialised row below. Each Universe
tends to have a certain materialised area of interactions for the Flows and
Phyla referring to it. One can think of a laboratory setting (T) and its
relation to science (U), the scientist, the experiment, the publications (Φ), and a temporary intern student, an
employee, the specific organisation funding the laboratory (F).
The
four domains have specific forms of “smoothing” (Guattari 1989: 79, 87) and
through various processes (the moments which the researcher analyses) they
affect each other either in a circular manner (from Φ to U to T to F to Φ and vice versa; already explained above)
or a criss-crossing one (from F to U, from Φ to T and vice versa; eg an ideology U
informing a follower F, or many followers shaping an ideology, or a parliament
T giving rise to the formation of specific human categories like voters of
certain parties and reversely, the existence of certain ideologists
necessitating the constitution of a parliament in a non-democratic land). We
need to remember (as shown in the figure below) that the right columns of
Universes and Territories are unary and bring together their Phyla and Flow
components which are countable and plural; also, the territorialised plane of
Flows and Territories is finite and limited due to its material form, whereas
the deterritorialised plane of Phyla and Universes is infinite as being an area
of the possible.
Finally,
it is important to notice the time qualities (or “intermediate temporalities”)
which connect the four domains, something which is found very helpful in
studying a phenomenon, since the different types of time in a given situation
indicate the domains in play. Hence, between Phyla and Flows we find processes
counted with measures of objective time. Between Flows and Territories we find
processes that are perceived as durations. Between Territories and Universes we
find processes which give the impression of subjective temporalisation. And
between Universes and Phyla we find these instantaneous “fecund moments” which
Guattari relates to moments of delirium, Zen Satori, or gestalt switches
(Guattari 1989: 174-177). In a nutshell, this typology of temporalities is very
helpful in the analysis of many different types of social interaction - especially if that interaction involves many different types of traditionally assumed Phyla, such as human-machine, human-animal, animal-plant, and so on - in a twofold manner: (a) In a
given case study of a newspaper article, or during an ethnography, when
analysing a specific type of temporality but the domains of the assemblage are
unclear, we have indications as to which are the domains in play. (b) When the
domains are clear, we lack the answer to the question “what is going on there,”
we can infer the temporality of what is happening and extract some conclusions
according to the temporal function of the phenomenon.
Figure
2 The axes of
deterritorialisation and relative discursivity (Guattari 1989: 54)
The arrows pointing towards the centre signify a general tendency
of the assemblage to remain as such, however, never reaching absolute
unification, since the arrows pointing towards the outer directions signify the
assemblage’s tendency to form rhizomes with other assemblages, Phyla, Flows,
Territories, and Universes.
Having these said, a brief explanation of Deleuzoguattarian
“inter-entitarian dimensions” of an assemblage (Guattari 1989: 90) has been
given.
Work Cited
Guattari, F. (1989 [2013]). Schizoanalytic
Cartographies. Trans. Andrew Goffey. London, New Delhi, New York, Sydney:
Bloomsbury.
