Gizem in Savi Maxi Dress, Olive
Gizem in Savi Maxi Dress, Olive
stories no.11
Gizem Oktay
#everydayactivism
Gizem an interdisciplinary designer and writer. Her practice is dedicated to speculative design with multi-species anthropology and new materialist philosophy. She works on media philosophy and beyond human cultures. We had a mind-opening conversation on daily activism with Gizem, who was inspired by her egalitarian, pluralistic and holistic approach, which she proposes instead of the dominant Western, masculine paradigm that keeps the human species separate and superior to all other living species.
Gizem an interdisciplinary designer and writer. Her practice is dedicated to speculative design with multi-species anthropology and new materialist philosophy. She works on media philosophy and beyond human cultures. We had a mind-opening conversation on daily activism with Gizem, who was inspired by her egalitarian, pluralistic and holistic approach, which she proposes instead of the dominant Western, masculine paradigm that keeps the human species separate and superior to all other living species.
Q. What do you want to change in this world ?
There are many things I want to change in the world. However, I think it is necessary to distinguish between ‘the Earth’ and ‘the world’ here. Because there is not just Earth, there are worlds, multiple and connected worlds… In multiple worlds, there can be many factors open to change. Depending on the worlds I live in, sometimes I want to change everything, sometimes I want to change nothing. At this point, I remind myself what is within my power to change. If we were to consider it as a singular system, I would like it to be better understood that the hierarchical power structures in the world would turn into commons, that the human consciousness and mind should not be placed above the power of action of every animate or inanimate actor, and that the path opened by intuition is the only path to be followed when it is known to listen. My everyday activism is partly intuition and partly non-reductionist thought activism. These two titles infiltrate everything I do: My every action, my art, my idea, my word…
Q. We believe that social transformation is about what we individually choose to do every day. What do you choose to do or not to do when making decisions that do not seem very important in your daily life for the change you want to create?
Two quotes that I keep in mind on this subject are very important for me. One by Rosi Braidotti: “We are part of the problem as well as the solution.” What I choose to do or not do is to realize that I am sometimes part of the solution, sometimes part of the problem, depending on the situations I am in. If I think I am part of the solution, I can choose to take action. If I think I am part of the problem, I can choose to go inside and analyze the situation dynamics better (I may fail at this, then I choose to remain passive). I think it is essential to underline the relationality factor here in daily routines. Because when we understand relationality in all its impersonality, the concept of character, self and ‘myself’ moves to a completely different dimension and obstacles such as social pressure, ego and will to power that stand in the way of original motivation are removed. If I am doing what I choose to do for something more than my own superficial self-interest, then I find meaning.
The second quote I remember is by Lauren Berlant: “I refuse to be exhausted.” For the first time in human history, we live in a period where we cannot control the number or type of stimuli we are exposed to on a daily basis. As people’s ways of being content with their existence often conflict with the non-human and non-living things of the world, we become part of both the solution and the problem – as I mentioned at the beginning – and this leads to capitalist schizophrenia, as Deleuze turned it into theory. I find the first quote important to keep in mind our own paradoxical position, and the second to remind myself that the exhaustion that arises from this paradoxical position is inherent in an ongoing and life-long struggle, but that we can choose not to be a victim of it.
Q. How do you think this activist stance that you place in your daily life as a routine and habit, disrupting the malicious rhythm created by the system, affects the people around you?
I am a person who is motivated to show others the paths I have drawn for myself, in short, enthusiasm to teach. I try to live with a focus on joy ethic and materialist philosophy. Activities such as approaching each different voice of the narrative produced by the consciousness that settles in routines and habits in daily life, thinking out of the “myself”, defending my disjointed thoughts even if they do not overlap with the consensus, recognizing the oppressive voice of the society and finding the courage to not listen to it are becoming a part of everyday activism. As a result of the accumulation and increasing gradually of ‘’every day’’, some productions make up the longer-term productions of my life: Literary production, creating ways that encourage cross-disciplinary, inter-and anti-cooperation, producing visual and experiential works on the axis of art-science-philosophy are the main elements of these.
I see interdisciplinary production as a game-changer and a form of resistance that aims to remove disciplines from being closed systems… Blurring the boundaries between disciplines and nurturing the curiosities that bring the fields together is one of the biggest balances that will disrupt the work/play dichotomy. If we do not work in the jobs in which we are trapped and whose mission we cannot explain, “Saving the World” becomes a knot woven into the present instead of being an impossible utopia. As regards, the distance between the world and us is closing. Because right now there seems to be a gap between ‘our world’ and the Earth. Therefore, I do believe that what I do invites the people around me to bridge between the we/them dichotomy, to acquire systems of thinking tools, and to think about causality through networks, topologies and thresholds – not human-centred linear cause-effect relationships.
Q. “Utopias are beautiful.” What would an ordinary day look like in your imagined future? Can you describe us a little bit?
Are dystopias as beautiful as utopias? I guess the future I imagine is not very optimistic. But that doesn’t deter me. On contrary, I try to simultaneously accept the ‘banality’ and perhaps sometimes necessity of evil, as Hanah Arendt says. Because I think that the action we call evil is not evil in its essence, although it sounds contradictory. I do not believe in the correctness and misleading directions of the dualities of good/evil, nature/culture, human/animal, animate/inanimate, mind/matter as we name and categorize them. Just as I did not put dystopia against utopia, I do not think that I should choose either one. I choose to stay in-between, with one foot on each of them. I think we should attach more importance to the in-between things. Because in the intermediate and transitional phases, although these phases feel uncomfortable or borderline, I think that the boundaries are blurred and the potential for change is opened here.
Yet, I do not want to deprive the question of the answer it seeks. Without being distracted by the possibility of reality, I am an active protector of the space I live in in the future – only when I dream, and I am part of an autonomous common, where the inhabitants of the place decide the future of that specific space – not the nation-state authority. This means that the interests of the commons and non-acting nonhumans are taken into account, not rent or favour of a certain minority group. In fact, crumbs of what we want in the future are occurring in some critical areas today. I would like to live in a future where mountains, seas and rivers have the power to create change and sustain life in the networks of which they are a part, as the activism of the Whanganui River is recognized in New Zealand.
Interviewed and translated by Deniz Saygı
Q. What do you want to change in this world ?
There are many things I want to change in the world. However, I think it is necessary to distinguish between ‘the Earth’ and ‘the world’ here. Because there is not just Earth, there are worlds, multiple and connected worlds… In multiple worlds, there can be many factors open to change. Depending on the worlds I live in, sometimes I want to change everything, sometimes I want to change nothing. At this point, I remind myself what is within my power to change. If we were to consider it as a singular system, I would like it to be better understood that the hierarchical power structures in the world would turn into commons, that the human consciousness and mind should not be placed above the power of action of every animate or inanimate actor, and that the path opened by intuition is the only path to be followed when it is known to listen. My everyday activism is partly intuition and partly non-reductionist thought activism. These two titles infiltrate everything I do: My every action, my art, my idea, my word…
Q. We believe that social transformation is about what we individually choose to do every day. What do you choose to do or not to do when making decisions that do not seem very important in your daily life for the change you want to create?
Two quotes that I keep in mind on this subject are very important for me. One by Rosi Braidotti: “We are part of the problem as well as the solution.” What I choose to do or not do is to realize that I am sometimes part of the solution, sometimes part of the problem, depending on the situations I am in. If I think I am part of the solution, I can choose to take action. If I think I am part of the problem, I can choose to go inside and analyze the situation dynamics better (I may fail at this, then I choose to remain passive). I think it is essential to underline the relationality factor here in daily routines. Because when we understand relationality in all its impersonality, the concept of character, self and ‘myself’ moves to a completely different dimension and obstacles such as social pressure, ego and will to power that stand in the way of original motivation are removed. If I am doing what I choose to do for something more than my own superficial self-interest, then I find meaning.
The second quote I remember is by Lauren Berlant: “I refuse to be exhausted.” For the first time in human history, we live in a period where we cannot control the number or type of stimuli we are exposed to on a daily basis. As people’s ways of being content with their existence often conflict with the non-human and non-living things of the world, we become part of both the solution and the problem – as I mentioned at the beginning – and this leads to capitalist schizophrenia, as Deleuze turned it into theory. I find the first quote important to keep in mind our own paradoxical position, and the second to remind myself that the exhaustion that arises from this paradoxical position is inherent in an ongoing and life-long struggle, but that we can choose not to be a victim of it.
Q. How do you think this activist stance that you place in your daily life as a routine and habit, disrupting the malicious rhythm created by the system, affects the people around you?
I am a person who is motivated to show others the paths I have drawn for myself, in short, enthusiasm to teach. I try to live with a focus on joy ethic and materialist philosophy. Activities such as approaching each different voice of the narrative produced by the consciousness that settles in routines and habits in daily life, thinking out of the “myself”, defending my disjointed thoughts even if they do not overlap with the consensus, recognizing the oppressive voice of the society and finding the courage to not listen to it are becoming a part of everyday activism. As a result of the accumulation and increasing gradually of ‘’every day’’, some productions make up the longer-term productions of my life: Literary production, creating ways that encourage cross-disciplinary, inter-and anti-cooperation, producing visual and experiential works on the axis of art-science-philosophy are the main elements of these.
I see interdisciplinary production as a game-changer and a form of resistance that aims to remove disciplines from being closed systems… Blurring the boundaries between disciplines and nurturing the curiosities that bring the fields together is one of the biggest balances that will disrupt the work/play dichotomy. If we do not work in the jobs in which we are trapped and whose mission we cannot explain, “Saving the World” becomes a knot woven into the present instead of being an impossible utopia. As regards, the distance between the world and us is closing. Because right now there seems to be a gap between ‘our world’ and the Earth. Therefore, I do believe that what I do invites the people around me to bridge between the we/them dichotomy, to acquire systems of thinking tools, and to think about causality through networks, topologies and thresholds – not human-centred linear cause-effect relationships.
Q. “Utopias are beautiful.” What would an ordinary day look like in your imagined future? Can you describe us a little bit?
Are dystopias as beautiful as utopias? I guess the future I imagine is not very optimistic. But that doesn’t deter me. On contrary, I try to simultaneously accept the ‘banality’ and perhaps sometimes necessity of evil, as Hanah Arendt says. Because I think that the action we call evil is not evil in its essence, although it sounds contradictory. I do not believe in the correctness and misleading directions of the dualities of good/evil, nature/culture, human/animal, animate/inanimate, mind/matter as we name and categorize them. Just as I did not put dystopia against utopia, I do not think that I should choose either one. I choose to stay in-between, with one foot on each of them. I think we should attach more importance to the in-between things. Because in the intermediate and transitional phases, although these phases feel uncomfortable or borderline, I think that the boundaries are blurred and the potential for change is opened here.
Yet, I do not want to deprive the question of the answer it seeks. Without being distracted by the possibility of reality, I am an active protector of the space I live in in the future – only when I dream, and I am part of an autonomous common, where the inhabitants of the place decide the future of that specific space – not the nation-state authority. This means that the interests of the commons and non-acting nonhumans are taken into account, not rent or favour of a certain minority group. In fact, crumbs of what we want in the future are occurring in some critical areas today. I would like to live in a future where mountains, seas and rivers have the power to create change and sustain life in the networks of which they are a part, as the activism of the Whanganui River is recognized in New Zealand.
Interviewed and translated by Deniz Saygı