The crisis of representation and its impact on contemporary society

Abstract

Introduction: When we talk about the most pressing aspects of contemporary society, we usually refer, among other things, to the "crisis of representation." When referring to this crisis, we would be referring to the cultural processes by virtue of which the instances of "mediation" (political, aesthetic, institutional) are radically called into question by the socio-historical processes proper to the so-called "society of the spectacle" (Debord). However, from a mediological conception (McLuhan, Manovich) or from a philosophy of technology attentive to the fundamental relevance of the mechanical or machine components of symbolic phenomena (Kittler, Flusser, Déotte) it is legitimate to affirm that, for culture, it is not possible to do without technical and technological mediation (Stiegler). Materials and methods: The study is based on the consultation of the bibliography as a technique and its critical analysis, as a method of being able to understand the urgency of the change to which we are summoned and committed. The analysis-synthesis and inductive-deductive methods were used to develop and analyze the categories associated with the crisis of representation, its mediating instances (political, aesthetic, institutional) and their questioning by the socio-historical processes themselves. Results: To exist, individually and socially, is for Derrida to inscribe traces on a support, thus establishing a language (a symbolism) and this is not possible without instruments and without technical inscription surfaces (Leroi-Gourhan). Considering this framework of problematizations, it is relevant -in order to think about our "crises"- to carry out a genealogy, aesthetic-political in the sense of Rancière, of the category of "representation", where devices (Déotte) such as perspective, cinema and photography will play a preponderant role when determining to what extent we can overcome, or modify, "representation". Discussion: In the global image-world, those in power produce the narrative code and its adjustment engenders collective autism. The senses are not negotiated; the senses are imposed. The image-world will be the surface of globalization, the shared world, which is shown to be impoverished, gloomy, superficial, in the shared experience. The task that must be carried out is not to place oneself behind the surface of the image but to stretch it, enrich it, give it a definition, give it time. Conclusions: A new culture opens on this line, in view of this, the open path allows the construction of a new culture, mediated by experimental modes establishing new dialogues that return the sensorial perception of a world that has been covered by official narratives and that has been anesthetized.