synkar.org

review method guide

salience

is the most subjective metric of the three, which refers to my personal level of enjoyment and pleasure during the actual reading experience. as such, it sits as its own category precisely because on an intuitive level it gives us a unique phenomenological window into the affective states our works produce, which also exposes some usually subconscious and repressed evaluations that have been seemingly socially disregarded in certain critical approaches, but that usually attempt to surface as somehow engrained in a sense of rationality, which is naturally a very dishonest perspective on the side of criticism.

mood a: i’m forcing myself to read this even though i’m apparently supposed to be enjoying itmood b: this is fun and easy to read but honestly i kind of feel it pathetic and below memood c: reading this made me want to do bad things to myself the whole time basicallymood d: i had to ask ai to read it back to me because i felt that most of it was useless to my reading experiencemood e: i got through this at a decent pace but it literally made me feel nothing but light dreadmood f: the extremely rare actual goosebumps and thrill when reading a text experience

standard

is both the interdisciplinary and comparative positioning of the text relative to works similar to its nature, but also its expected accomplishment and influence. as an intolerable and almost offensive criterium, in my reviews, standard as a form of evaluation is considered only sparsely, or at the very least, under-considered. its importance isnt as a dogmatic metric for consistency, but falls more in line towards a discussion within the discipline that considers our own motives over the motives of the global audience. standard usually compares the work with one adjacent superior work from and one adjacent inferior work from a related contemporary.

style

refers to most of the structural build and flow of the text itself in its written form, including, as a secondary criterium, most of the actual substance of the text and its integrated components (concept, narrative, theme, flow, density, lexicality, glossary, approach). style as such is exclusively a subjective preference in my view, and as such is at best simply an evaluative metric which i use to contextualize and study my own theoretical preferences, rather than to hate on the style of the text itself, which is interdisciplinarily pointless and politically costly. the reason that style is both form and substance is because i believe these two categories have reached an almost total collapse in todays literary landscape, for better or worse. in a sense, all written text is regurgitated, and stylistically self-confirming, where works rarely break away from this aspect.

scoring

there is no scoring criteria. the final score remains entirely unquantifiable and a product of only my innermost positionings, which is actually precisely the only thing that gives my final score any type of life at all. this doesnt mean it is irrationally decided, there are naturally plenty of reasons i decide on one score over another, but they may be strategic, political or performative, or my criteria could wildly shift between any two rankings. it is also very likely that the very concept of a grade as i present it is just decided on a whim and has no deeper calculated properties. this is done intentionally, if it were up to me i would simply be evaluating style, but audiences look towards reviews to get an edge on things and reconsider their position on a text as a cultural artifact rather than to see me attempt to “objectively” evaluate something. unfortunately because of the nature of how reviews work, my grade is about half the reason

axes

the criterial axes for cultural research are as follows:delineation → does the text even know its terrain and boundaries, or is it overloading on empirics as an excuse? delineation is about substance or thematics.embedding → is the text able to handle grounding or empirics without shamelessly drowning in the summoned worlds?continuity → does the text have descriptive integrity in its referential or ethnographic sequencing?association → are references woven into arguments or do they sit apart from the actual stakes?framing → framing is seen as being relevant to your own intentions, where meandering is seen as getting out of your own imposed limit. framing is about rhetoric or presentation.

the criterial axes for theoretical work are as follows:novelty → are the newly introduced concepts, operators and problems, if even any, actually or just semantically fresh?scaffolding → is there internal return-looping or conceptual recursion? the backbone of theology’s influence on speculation as a genrenarrative → how is the conceptual movement and story as it unfolds and its level of consistency?compression → conceptual load to textual volume is about subtle key dynamics that cause intentional oversaturation, density is about sitting neatly between everything, not standing above the text.polemic → functionally, a polemic isnt a style but the total gathered amount of imbedded and energetically intense encounters with the discourse at hand.

style

cultural research

drift (⸮)delineation: weakembedding: neutralcontinuity: weakassociation: strongframing: neutral

shear (ˎˊ˗)delineation: neutralembedding: weakcontinuity: neutralassociation: neutralframing: strong

segment (∴)delineation: strongembedding: neutralcontinuity: weakassociation: strongframing: neutral

oscillation (∿)delineation: neutralembedding: strongcontinuity: neutralassociation: weakframing: strong

anchor (⊶)delineation: strongembedding: strongcontinuity: neutralassociation: weakframing: neutral

theoretical work

spark (✶)novelty: strongscaffolding: weaknarrative: strongcompression: neutralpolemics: weak

pressure (⟡)novelty: strongscaffolding: strongnarrative: neutralcompression: weakpolemics: neutral

axis (☉)novelty: neutralscaffolding: weaknarrative: strongcompression: strongpolemics: neutral

loop (∞)novelty: neutralscaffolding: strongnarrative: strongcompression: weakpolemics: neutral

break (⧉)novelty: strongscaffolding: neutralnarrative: neutralcompression: strongpolemics: weak

themes

medieval → hierarchical cosmology, angelology, providentialitymost obvious examples: thomas aquinas, summa theologiae / dante, paradisogothic → ruination, spectrality, abjection, eroticismmost obvious examples: georges bataille, inner experience / ann radcliffe, the mysteries of udolphobaroque → ornament, convolution, instability., foldsmost obvious examples: leibniz, monadology / gilles deleuze, the foldromantic → negation, mythopoesis, sublimity, fragility, love & caremost obvious examples: friedrich schelling, system of transcendental idealism / novalis, hymnen an die nachtindustrial → rhythm, scale, causation, standardization, conflict, institutionmost obvious examples: sigfried giedion, mechanization takes command / marx, capital vol. 1cybernetic → feedback, computation, signals, optimization, regulation, controlmost obvious examples: stafford beer, brain of the firm / wiener, cybernetics: or control and communicationneon → hyperillumination, synthesis, speed, luminositymost obvious examples: paul virilio, the aesthetics of disappearance / william gibson, neuromancer

haunted → leakage, revenance, trauma, temporalitymost obvious examples: freud, das unheimliche / mark fisher - the weird and the eeriearcane → symbolism, correspondence, ritual, fanatic aestheticismmost obvious examples: walter benjamin, the origin of german tragic drama / elim. levi, dogme et rituel de la haute magiepastoral → harmony, cycles, ecology, non-entropymost obvious examples: martin heidegger, the origin of the work of art / virgil, ecloguesruined → strata, archeology, sedimentism, regression, planesmost obvious examples: reza negarestani, cyclonopedia / j. g. ballard, the drowned worldmineral → cartography, subterraninaism, acoustics, deterritorializationmost obvious examples: félix guattari, chaosmosis / alarsón-barker, the tunneloceanic → fluidity, depth, motivemost obvious examples: thomas nail - lucretius one / rachel carson, the sea around us

synkar.org

thinker index

figuresdistinguished by an iconic ahistorical presentation that weaponizes and mutates their ideas in their self-image

adornostieglerb-chulbaudrillardpreciadocagecastellsdescolafanonfedericiflusserfoucaulthaudricourthavelockhayleshendersonhorischhooksmausslevinaswieneraugustineanselmaquinasavicennaaverroesmaimonidesplotinus

lyotardkristevakantholbachalthusserarendtarnheimbarthesbataillebatesonbifobergerbergsonberlantbogdanovbraidottibrechtbuck-morssbutlerzupanciccassirerkierkegaardpeircejamesdeweyfregerussellputnamquine

marxfisherhegellacanjakobsonkittlerklugelangerlatourleguinlevi-strausslippardllulllordelotringerluhmannmalaboumalrauxdurkheimsimmelfreudlockeberkeleyhumemontesquieuvicoschopenhauernietzsche

platolandschellingdeleuzewrighthusserlheideggerwittgensteinderridarortychomskyspinozaaristotlerousseauhobbesdebeauvoirsaint-simonweberricœurbarthgirardsenecadescartesleibnizrawlsnozick

agambenzizekfichtebenjaminmarcusemattelartmcluhanmignolominh-hamitchellsontagpovinellirancieresaussureviriliosloterdijkharawaywyntergraeberpollockdelandaepicuruszenoepictetus

personsdistinguished by a non-mediated and non-iconic presentation

der derianvladimir solovyovernst machmax schelerarnold gehlenlotzehelmholtzelsa gindlerpaulhanlyonel feiningercarla lonzireiner schurmannillichgilbert durandgayatri spivakranajit guhadipesh chakrabartyernesto laclauaime cesairepaul gilroy

anne schmidjanneke ademaadilknophilip agrekarel slavoj amerlingandre gorzgloria anzalduaroy ascottadrian johnsben kafkadouglas kahngaston bachelardgeorges canguilhemalexandre kojevemaurice merleau pontyjean paul sartresimone weilemmanuel mounier

klaus theweleittilman baumgartelalexander baumgartennorbert bolzandre chastelcomeniusdevin-foreursula franklinlucien goldmannkoyréalfred schutzgilbert simondonfelix guattarihans blumenbergraymond williamsstuart halledward saidchantal mouffec l r james

gayo petrovicpetar milatalla mitrofanovastefan morawskiroswitha muellermiklos peternakdecio pignatarialanna lockwardpiotr piotrowskirita raleypetr uhlgabriel tardeantonio gramscigyorgy lukacskarl polanyiwalter ongmichel de certeauhans georg gadamerj l austinjohn searle

avatarsdistinguished by a contemporary non-canonical presentation and by a mixed media enviornment

anna wintersluhuna carvalhoroberto espositoeyel weizmannreza negarestanihari kunzruadam kotskoray brassierthomas moynihanmat dryhurstholly herndonpatricia reedmetahavenxenogothicryan engleymike watsonalexander bardbenjamin brattonkate crawfordgeert lovinkalessandro ludovicojonathan bellerdavid berryjosephine berryclemens apprichinke arnskonrad beckerguy van bellemercedes bunzvito campanelliwendy chungabriella colemanflorian cramerjonathan crarydouglas crimpde suttermark postermarek poliksroberto trillorobin mackayjoshua meyrowitzsvitlana matviyenkonancy mauro fludelev manovichshintaro miyazakinat mullerachille mbembeedouard glissantfred motensaidiya hartmanjasbir puarsara ahmedlaura mulveylaura u marks

ben noyskane bakeranna kornbluhpit schultzstevphen shukaitispaula sibiliabernhard siegertkaja silvermanhoward slatervivian sobchackjohan soderbergetienne souriauboaventura santosfelix stalderisabelle stengersbruce sterlinghito steyerltiziana terranovachristoph tholennanna thylstrupovidiu tichindeleanusherry turklefred turnerpaul verbeekfrancoise vergesjelena vesicmilos vojtechovskylioudmila voropaimckenzie warkalexander weheliyepeter weibelstephen wilsonhartmut winklerwinthrop youngdunbar hesterlegacy russellnils roellermirko schaeferflorian schneidertrebor scholzerhard schuettpelzjozef cseressean cubittnina czegledydieter danielsanna lowenhaupt tsingshoshana zuboffsafiya nobleruha benjamindanah boydtarleton gillespieevgeny morozovtimnit gebru

james illisscott alexandermaurizio lazzaratokathy rae huffmanerkki huhtamoalexandra huiyuk huieleni ikoniadouanthony ilesdenisa keraderrick de kerckhovematt kirschenbaumdmitry kleinereric kluitenbergsybille kraemermarkus krajewskichris krausbojana kunstmachiko kusaharakatja kwastekbrenda laurelteresa de lauretisaymeric mansouxarmin medoschhans christian danyjodi deanregine deb attyannet dekkersean dockraymartin dodgemladen dolarricardo dominguezsher doruffjohanna druckertimothy druckreyhal fostergerald rauniglaurence rickelsflorian roetzersuely rolnikavital ronellantoinette rouvroymichael hardtantonio negrikeller easterlingeugene thackertung huisarah kember

bogna koniorcraig sereptieknut ebelinglorenz engellwolfgang ernstelena espositoharun farockimatthew fulleralexander gallowaybernard geoghegancharlie gerelisa gitelmanandrew goffeyolga goriunovaoliver graumarina grzinicwolfgang hagengary hallfrank hartmanneva hornsimon yuillsiegfried zielinskiraimar zonsjoanna zylinskaoxana timofeevabolt rasmussenphilippopouloslorenzo marsilifabian muniesahelen rollinssrecko horvatboris groysarman avanessiannick srnicekgraham harmanalfie bownbonnie nardinorie neumarkarndt niebischhelen nissenbaumrodrigo nunesjussi parikkaluciana parisimatteo pasquinellisimon pennyclaus piassadie plantjoy buolamwiniluciano floridishannon vallorkatherine mckittrick

synkar.org

publisher index

press

forge

◇ mit
◎ urbanomic
☐ sequence
◎ re:press
◎ becoming
◎ meson
☐ punctum
◎ nero

crypt

◇ duke
☐ semiotext
☐ zone
△ spector
△ pragnesia
△ contra mundum
◎ open humanities
△ minor compositions
◎ time spiral press
erratum

lattice

△ cloak
▽ valiz
▽ sternberg
▽ onomatopee
△ jap sam
☐ zer0
▽ nightboat
☐ archive books
◇ bloomsbury
◇ wiley
▽ rollo
▽ inventory
◇ edinburgh
△ spiral
▽ coffee house
☐ art & theory
inside the castle

bastion

◇ cornell
▽ st. augustine’s
▽ brill
▽ peeters leuven
◇ northwestern
▽ notre dame
▽ angelico
◇ fordham
▽ duquesne

cathedral

◎ verso
◇ routledge
◇ polity
▽ oxford
☐ repeater
☐ seagull
☐ autonomedia
△ common notions
▽ primary information
detritus

periodical

forge

◎ antikherya
◎ ill-will
◎ krisis
◎ collapse
◎ qui parle
design issues
computational culture
stack
glass bead
n+1
catastrop(h)ic
splinter

crypt

◎ plutonics
◎ endnotes.
☐ parrhesia
◎ hostis
barricade
expat

lattice

△ e-flux
▽ cabinet
☐ šum
☐ blue labyrinths
◇ chôra
☐ ugly duckling
▽ frieze
▽ artforum

bastion

bastion
△ telos
△ compact
epoché
modern age
logos
philosophy today

cathedral

parallax
third text
between the lines
blackbox manifold
△ ak press
△ pm press
theory & event
☐ radical philosophy
new internationalist
☐ critical times
☐ critical inquiry
☐ identities
☐ differences
south end
tout fait
☐ constellations
angelaki
selvedge zone

platform

forge

▽ snav
nicolas villarreal
◎ graham harman
◎ peter wolfendale
◎ grant maxwell
generative ink
chaosmotics

crypt

◎ vergil
andrew kuiper
jonathan geltner
◎ levi bryant
☐ mark fisher
☐ matt colquhoun
◎ taylor adkins
☐ last positivist
shelley tremain
◎ hunt hendrix

lattice

☐ maxwell foley
▽ crysta

bastion

cathedral

☐ slavoj zizek
☐ devin goure
addison hart
tim troutner
jordan wood

preserve

forge

☐ anarchist library
◎ bureau of public secrets
◎ no subject

crypt

△ ubu
△ textz

lattice

bastion

cathedral

☐ marxists
☐ libcom
◎ criticism

the press is archetypally spearheaded by the cathedral, the historical form of the academy-church-postal, the global large-scale legitimating institution which combines scholastic bureaucracy with cultural hegemony and ecclestical authority, perpetuated by state funding and media. in my philosophy, crypts gave way too academies, which turned into cathedrals, morally paranoid institutions that constantly revise history in order to create discourses and disciplines which are supposed to give legitimacy to non-existent entities, in order for the cathedral to control resources over knowledge. originally moldbug’s term, ironically the cathedral itself is a paranoically perpetuated concept, however, its accurate precisely because cathedrals create generic discourse that has no value other than perpetuation. the cathedral is currently threated by all other social forms in contemporary society due to late modernity’s fragmentation of power. the paradigmatic cathedralist was probably aquinas himself, or, more recently, mbembe, chomsky and so on. cathedralists are primarily oriented around justice, such as marxists, jews, christians and so on. as it also happens however, presses are the most valid forms of publishing books due to the fact that a majority of books get sent to piracy networks and can actually be used and read, unlike a majority of periodicals, which are gatekept by bastions, a majority of preserves, which are gatekept by cathedrals, and a majority of platforms, which are gatekept by algorithms superimposed on top of the internet by corporations.note: every single one of synkar’s sociological forms can be located in every form of publication

periodicals are currently legitimized by forgeries, who were previously cryptological societies. crypts are subterranean proto-institutions which cultivate esoteric or marginal theory before institutional capture, usually cults or ritualistic organizations, but they can also be on the fringes of para-academia. crypts occur rarely because the more contained, consistent and lame forms of power contain talent away from its potential, usually by the promise of practical pleasures or goals, killing unique conceptual philosophy. there are fringe crypts at every point in time, but most of them rarely develop in the common consciousness, the last famous one being french poststructuralist or irrationalist circles some fourty years ago, who turned into celebrities that preserved collectives and movements over institutional legitimacy, or more recently the ccru. a lot of crypts cement into cathedrals later. forgeries on the other hand construct new operational epistemes through technical work, theyre transitionary stages between the formation of new cathedrals by a cryptological elite that sustains their work into infrastructural necessity. forgeries are rare because they require the fall of cathedrals, since they cant directly compete with established cathedralical zones. a recent paradigmatic cryptologist is someone like fisher, a recent paradigmatic forgerist is someone like bratton. cryptologists are primarily mystics, forgerists are primarily constructivists or scientologicalists.note: every single one of synkar’s sociological forms can be located in every form of publication

platforms are currently ran by lattices, which are post-cathedral dispersions enabled by network media, or in older times the post office; lattices are unconscious, fragmented and most of the time useless forms of knowledge, made up of decentralized liberal arts ecology, essentially, the philosophy of unconscious formation and regurgitation. lattices are simply a more decadent form of already decadent cathedrals, supported by various cathedral grants or brief cryptological remissions. lattices cant be forgeries, since forgeries usually see lattices with disdain due to their non infrastructural, uneventful and deweaponized paradigm. lattices often exist solely to give credibility to cathedrals, but sometimes its also made up of collectives who are attempting to establish themselves into lattices but are far too defocused to do so. lattices are also so fragmented that they no longer encompass simply the aim of knowledge formation, but are often times made up of genuine practitioners, clueless wanderers of the world that have no radical aim beyond tooting the horn of the various multiplicites the world presents before us. the lattice has no representative, its quite literally everywhere. but an example would be somebody like, say, mcluhan or butler. anyone in the world who doesn’t know where they are, or dont really have a name made for themselves are usually a part of the lattice by default. the lattice is a fringe made up of historical accidents, with no real teleological direction, only cope.note: every single one of synkar’s sociological forms can be located in every form of publication

preserves are archetypally gatekept by bastions, the historical form of the castle-library-fortress, which maintains inherited epistemic orders; legitimizes through tradition rather than novelty. however, what you’ll see on this website are mostly platformic and therefore lattice bastions, because actual bastions such as gutenberg, perseus or actual libraries and so fourth are simply far too large and concentrated to even matter for my project. the reason the bastion appears second chronologically after the cathedral is because the bastion was originally split off from the cathedral, itself being a brainchild of the aristocratic monarchy, who split off from the cathedral in order to create secret societies and esoteric cults that maintain power dynamics rather than rupturing them the way crypts would. the bastion is primarily revelatory and negative in nature, found today in snobby and salty conservative think-tanks, historically legitimized by figures close to the monarchy that reacted to various periods of dialectical progress with doubt, be it reactions against enlightenment rationalism, reactions against fascist ideology, fascist ideology itself which was a reaction to modernity, and so on. the paradigmatic bastionist is probably somewhere between a spengler and fourier, at any point in society. preservationalists are primarily fascistic in nature due to their authoritarian support-groups, but either way they are either the elite themselves, or supremacists of any kind.note: every single one of synkar’s sociological forms can be located in every form of publication

◎ - exclusively theory-first
☐ - theory-oriented but cultural
△ - cultural studies with a theory backbone
◇ - non-theory but has a theory series
▽ - non-theory with accidental overlap

note: as one of the first critical theory publishing cartographies, this catalogue is an independent critical project by andrej synkar and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by any publisher or imprint listed, but instead serves as an index for synkar's work