talkPOPc's Podcast
talkPOPc (Philosophers' Ontological Party club), is public philosophy + cognitively-engaged art nonprofit founded by Dr. Dena Shottenkirk, who is both a philosopher and an artist. As a topic-based project (we are now on our fourth) talkPOPc sponsors one-to-one conversations between a participant and a philosopher (who always dons our amazing gold African king hat, along with our mascot Puppet!) These conversations are consensus-building conversations and feed back into Shottenkirk's related artworks and published philosophy. The conversations become collaborative acts of making both philosophy and art. Thus, each topic - #1. nominalism, #2. censorship, #3. art as cognition, and #4 power - has three "pillars" the associated artworks, the published philosophy book, and podcast conversations. Various philosophers participate (see our website talkpopc.org for the list of philosophers) and these conversations happen in various places. For example, we go into bars and have one-to-one conversations. We sit down next to the deli counter and hold a conversation with someone who has walked in to get a ham sandwich and walked out knowing so much more about their own thoughts. We go into the MDC prison in Brooklyn and have conversations. We set up in galleries where the artworks and the philosophy are also displayed. And we listen. Here are some of those conversations.
Change happens when people talk.
talkPOPc's Podcast
Episode #131 R.P. Tyler Olds talks with talkPOPc participants Jenn and Katherin about social power, power structures, and relationships
Timestamps:
00:10 Intros
01:10 What do we think when we hear "Philosophy? // Interested bystanders
02:00 The nature of power in society // The power of common connection
03:00 Power dynamics as an inevitability, how is power negotiated? Power can be taken away or moved around
04:00 Should we want power to be a stationary concept, should it remain dynamic?
05:05 What would count as the optimal form of power? How should power be distributed in society?
06:35 Small scale: Figuring out how to balance power in individualistic relationships. Can we distribute power evenly?
07:50 Family, can we make the power dynamics explicit? Leveraging power underneath the surface
09:25 Do we explicitly name power in order to deal with it and navigate?
10:55 Explicit power structure, feeling empowered when power is tangible
13:20 What kinds of structures do we want to make? We don't have to replicate what we already know
15:30 The necessity of will and means for power
16:45 Summoning forth the will to enact power over the world, or the right place, right time
18:50 The will to fight all the time. Allowing yourself to play a role in the structure of power
22:00 Changing society is changing our understanding of loving each other