Rachel Coventry: Can Poetry break the Internet: A Heideggerian account of Post-Internet Poetry

This is one of the papers from our 2016 Annual Conference, the Future of Phenomenology. Information and the full conference booklet can be found here on our society website.

Abstract

Sam Riviere’s 2015 collection “Kim Kardashian’s Marriage” is an example of Post-Internet poetry. Post-internet poetry is the practice of using Web content as the basis of poetry. This paper will attempt to show that a Heideggerian analysis can shed light on contemporary texts in a way that renews Heidegger’s poetic thought and calls it into question in the light of new poetic practices. Specifically, Rivierie’s collection will be considered in terms of Heidegger’s opposing accounts of both technology and poetry. Social media is often understood in terms of enframing and thus it contributes to the “extreme danger” of the information age and the marginalization of art.  However, this danger is accompanied by a saving power. Can a collection like Rivierie’s succeed in make the ‘danger’ of social media explicit?