Focusing on policy consultation, my dissertation consults on the current US addiction epidemic and aims to answer, "What is our disposition to addiction?" Borrowing and clarifying Ulmer's MEmorial method, as established in his text Electronic Monuments, the dissertation combines the ancient Greek practice of theoria, Deleuzian theory, and psychogeographic counter-mapping methods to trace ways in which ideological apparatuses construct addiction. The aim of the dissertation is to reveal an abject value by constructing MEmorials which provide space for individuals to mourn loss and see their relation to that loss. Through mourning, individuals strengthen their ties to other community members and new policy can be made possible. Currently there is not an AIDS-like quilt for the victims of the addiction epidemic; therefore, the dissertation proposes the construction of a physical and electronic MEmorial to addiction. By conducting a psychogeography, a method directly tied to logic and reasoning appropriate to electracy, I traced the abject value of desire as it is constructed through the assemblages that construct the values of the Bradenton, FL community. The psychogeography revealed a categorical image "DE" which I traced through the ideological state apparatuses working their effects on Bradenton, FL. The image also connects to Bradenton, FL to the larger National War on Drugs through the star emblem of John Wayne. Concluding from the method, I argue to create a MEmorial to addiction at the John Wayne Birthplace Museum to reveal the horror of our communal desires and call for national drug policy reform.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:etd-7807 |
| Date | 01 January 2019 |
| Creators | Benjamin, Clayton |
| Publisher | STARS |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Electronic Theses and Dissertations |
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