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Liquid Love or the fraulty of human bonds Zygmunt Bauman argues in Liquid Love that in the consumer age, human relationships are caught between our irreconcilable needs for security and freedom. The hero of the book has no kinship ties and constantly has to use his skill and dedication to create provisional bonds that are loose enough to stop suffocation, but tight enough to give a needed sense of security now that the traditional sources of solace are less reliable than ever. "Liquid" is the adjective used by Bauman to qualify to the second stage of modernity, as oppose to a first stage seated over “solid” certainties. At this liquid stage, there is no more effort to replace a set of old rules and identities with a new one. The freedom to switch identities as often as we want, move around, transform ourselves is now seen as an end in itself and the most prized characteristic of our existence. One of the main struggles of individuals in pre-modern societies consisted of defending their private sphere from the public sphere invasion. People belonged to their families, their clans, social classes. Their identities that were assigned to them at birth were inescapable. If you were born a woman, this very fact implied a set of roles, behaviors and life strategies that was pre-ordained and that you could try to escape at your own risk. It isn’t until the birth of the Romantic movement in late XVIII century that individual emotions, personal feelings start being discussed as something valuable. It is only at the end of the XIXth century that we begin to see a slow process of liberation from identities one is assigned at birth. Today, however, Bauman maintains, it is the public sphere that needs to be salvaged from the constant encroachment of the private sphere. According to the philosopher, our public sphere has been eroded by a constant parade of exhibitionist private issues that there isn’t any public sphere left to speak of. After this cut and paste composition to introduce Bauman ideas, I would like to rise a question. ¿Do you feel that Bauman reasoning is apocaliptic or nostalgic?¿With the suggesition of a public sphere desintegration or weakening, is Bauman perspective rising a critic of feminism slogan: "Personal is political"?
May 28, 2014
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