So, as we all know I have been in therapy for like months now. Full on transference with the therapist is happening, I send her emails and fantasize about inviting her for dinner, once I stop being her patient and we can start being best of friends. At least I am aware of it ;)
I want to talk about strategies and tactics. A semiotic concept developed by Michel de Certeau, Wikipedia describes the idea as:
"Certeau links "strategies" with institutions and structures of power, while "tactics" are utilized by individuals to create space for themselves in environments defined by strategies.In the influential chapter "Walking in the City," he describes "the city" as a "concept," generated by the strategic maneuvering of governments, corporations, and other institutional bodies who produce things like maps that describe the city as a unified whole, as it might be experienced by someone looking down from high above. By contrast, the walker at street level moves in ways that are tactical and never fully determined by the plans of organizing bodies, taking shortcuts or meandering aimlessly in spite of the utilitarian layout of the grid of streets. This concretely illustrates Certeau's assertion that everyday life works by a process of poaching on the territory of others, recombining the rules and products that already exist in culture in a way that is influenced, but never wholly determined, by those rules and products."
Unlike De Certeau I am less inclined to view tactics as laudable except insofar as they present a set of options to the powerless. On the whole I would prefer that strategic thought be a domain accessible to all of us, regardless our access to institutional structures and support. While it may be romantic to believe in tactics, it is important to use strategy.
mir (@) mirverburg.net
