From the editors (of Wig):
Wig is a low-budget magazine devoted to writing and art composed on the job. Not necessarily "about" work, the wig-artist employs labor for poetic ends that implicitly critique — through the action of poaching company time &/or materials — the productivist logic of what Hannah Arendt calls the "laboring society." The title of the magazine alludes to Michel de Certau's discussion of "la perruque" in The Practice of Everyday Life (1974):
La perruque is the worker's own work disguised as work for his employers. It differs from pilfering in that nothing of material value is stolen. It differs from absenteeism in that the worker is officially on the job. La perruque may be as simple a matter as a secretary's writing a love letter on 'company time' or as complex as a cabinet maker's 'borrowing' a lathe to make a piece of furniture for his living room. Under different names in different countries this phenomenon is becoming more and more general, even if managers penalize it or 'turn a blind eye' on it in order not to know about it. Accused of stealing or turning material to his own ends and using the machines for his own profit, the worker who indulges in la perruque actually diverts time (not goods, since he uses only scraps) from the factory for work that is free, creative, and precisely not directed toward profit.
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12 comments:
Glad to know it, John. Sounds like you got your hands on a copy of the journal, too. What's it like filling BB's business loafers?
actually, i still need to pull out the check book and send away for it.
my first week on the job, ad infinitum "nice to meet you...you must be the new brandon brown..."
but really though, i'm for real the new and improved brandon brown...and he knows it.
MOTED!!!!
Not really.
That's why they put a III at the end of my name sucka.
III is an odd number.
I got into Naropa using entirely writing completed on the clock at a bookstore in Ann Arbor. La perruque is my favorite. Seriously, the Practice of Everyday Life is really good. Read it if you haven't.
hullman?
yes, but my laptop tries to retain some level of anonymity. one of my current jobs is in an academic dept, which means la perruque (including occasional blog rounds:-) starts when i get to work. i think in academia they actually encourage it, since most people's personal work involves some sort of research that in a convoluted cyclical way ends up further feeding the academic institution. which is why i'm getting out... imagine a workplace so fast-paced, competitive, & vital so as to make la perruque feel like some sort of shameful affliction, as in the promise of checking your email is just the uber-capitalist's way of luring you to come to work for the rest of your life...
that was awesome.
thanks. now if only i could put a similar level of thought into my billable time...
btw, what do you actually do (for work?) is it at all related to writing?
i'm an assistant to the dept. of psychiatry at UCSF. i basically work with 1 practicing doctor who is also UCSF faculty...the only writing i do on the job is editing papers to be submited to medical journals.
sorry to hear that. at least your blog is a service to mankind. psychiatry- that qualifies as working for the bad guys, doesn't it? although i suppose you could call what i'm doing marketing, since i'm just providing advertisers w/the technical tools to better spread their smut online. which means i have to stay up late reading stuff like artaud after work in order to purify my mind. (is there an emoticon for half joking?) :-$
ok this thread is getting too long. i'm going to end up working over the weekend if i keep wasting time. there is undoubtedly a french term for that too...
i like that you said "sorry to hear that,"
most people say "congratulations"
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