Mayumi Blogger Template

Hey guys, I was actually supposed to do a primary blog on 3/11 but I messed up on the dates so ended up not doing that. Sorry about that, so I'll be doing a primary blog alongside Kyle for this week.

Summary:
Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guatarri provide an abstract and extended metaphor to help explain the structure of thought in their introduction to A Thousand Plateaus. Their metaphor is the rhizome, which they explain as a something very different from roots and radicles. Roots and radicles “have beginnings and endings”, whereas a rhizome at any location has no beginning or ending and it “connects any point to any other point” (NMR 409). They argue that a book is “the image of the world”, but it is difficult to decipher what exactly they mean by this in the introduction (NMR 409). Through their explanations, a book has two figures: the root-book and the radicle-system (NMR 408). With the root-book, there must be a strong principle unity that creates a system of ramification and with the radicle-system, the “principle root is aborted and an indefinite multiplicity of secondary roots grafts into it” (NMR 408). These explanations help Deleuze and Guatarri’s point of the distinction between object and subject, or the signified and signifier, and that “a book has neither object nor subject” (NMR 407). Finally, the authors mention that the rhizome operates by variation, expansion, conquest, capture, and offshoots that is defined solely by a circulation of states. This dense piece is full of plant terminology but is directed towards a computer-oriented audience because the multiplicity and linkages they discuss are similar to that of the Hypertext. Regardless, the authors make use of the rhizome metaphor to explain the importance of multiplicity, like that of a potato, rather than linkages with roots and radicles, like that of a tree.

Inquiry:
I found it very difficult to get through this short piece because of the dense language, but I did understand, to some extent, the rhizome metaphor that Deleuze and Guatarri used. The rhizome connects any point to any other point and is consisted of dimensions (NMR 409) and it seems the argument is that the rhizome is far superior to roots and radicles. I would agree with this because the points, with beginnings and endings, in roots and radicles may limit us, but a rhizome is made of lines of segmentarity and stratification that undergo metamorphosis and changes in nature. To me, this basically means that a rhizome is limitless because it is always and forever changing, adapting, and expanding, which seemed very similar to what we’ve discussed in class regarding Hypertext. Hypertext similarly has no limits and is continuously adapting because of the ability to edit, re-edit, link, and further link to other texts. The rhizome system seems far superior to a limited system of roots and radicles. While reading, Deleuze and Guatarri did prompt a few questions:

1. What is your take on the rhizome metaphor? How is this different, if at all, to the root and radicle systems?
2. Do you agree or disagree that a “book has neither object nor subject, but that it is made of variously formed matters, and very different dates and speeds” (NMR 407)?
3. What kind of challenges to Deleuze and Guattari’s writings offer to “Western thought” (NMR 406)?
4. What do you think Deleuze and Guatarri meant by these statements:
a. “A book exists only through the outside and on the outside” (407)
b. “The world has become chaos, but the book remains the image of the world” (409)