A Thousand Plateaus I, RAI-3 Recordings, Lecture 7, 3 February 1976

<p><em>The Deleuze Seminars</em> is a collection of audio recordings, transcriptions, and English translations of, and supplemental materials from, the lectures French philosopher Gilles Deleuze gave during his career at the University of Paris 8.</p>

<p>Following the publication of <em>Anti-Oedipus</em> in 1972, Deleuze continues to develop the proliferation of concepts that his collaboration with Guattari had yielded. Throughout the 1970s, Deleuze and Guattari’s interest in expanding these concepts continues, eventually producing the sequel, <em>A Thousand Plateaus</em>.</p>

<p>The 1975-1976 seminar sessions were filmed by one of his students, Marielle Burkhalter, as part of her masters project, “Filming Philosophy as it Happens.” Enrico Ghezzi acquired the videos for broadcast on the RAI-3 cinema program “Fuori Orario,” after inviting Burkhalter to screen them at a festival he co-curated. Marielle Burkhalter, along with Stavroula Bellos, would eventually become the director of the L’Association Siècle Deleuzien and oversaw the French transcriptions of Deleuze’s seminars at the Paris 8 “Voix de Gilles Deleuze” website (http://www2.univ-paris8.fr/deleuze/).</p>

<p>In this group of lectures, Deleuze offers the multi-faceted focus of the semester’s work, mainly to distinguish forms of faciality, encompassing black-holes/white-walls, faces and landscapes, facial power-relations, redundancy, molecular multiplicity, the rhizome, the refrain, and courtly love. As none of the films was marked chronologically, the order of the successive seminars was determined based on the content provided in the videos, notably Deleuze’s course organization that followed successive chapters from <em>A Thousand Plateaus. </em>Besides the content as one guidepost as well as the physical disposition of classroom details, the chronologically first video was the one titled “Deleuze su molteplicità molare e molteplicità molecolare” followed by the two successive four-hour segments, titled “Il Senso in meno”. Furthermore, despite no precise dates provided, a sequence of dates was extrapolated before and after session 7 based on comments by an Iranian student announcing during that session that a demonstration would occur later that day, 3 February 1976.</p>

<p>In session 7, 3 February 1976 (date verified), the film corresponds to the first segment of the “Il Senso in Meno” II recording (the sixth segment of both parts), on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1Po2tIgeD4, corresponding to time stamp 0:00 to the end of the first recording at 29:15.</p>

<p>In session 7, 3 February 1976, the tenor of Deleuze’s opening remarks during the segment’s first minutes, as well as his clothing and the drawing that dominates the blackboard – the fourth, four-cornered drawing reproduced in <em>A Thousand Plateaus</em> (p. 183) --, all suggest that this opening segment is the end of a missing session (possibly January 27, 1976). The brief subsequent session (to minute 29) is the sole session for which a date is certain, February 3, 1976, stated by an Iranian student during the session. Having concludes the opening fragment with a review of the previous sessions’ topics, notably the <em>rhizome</em> in opposition to the tree, a <em>theory of redundancy</em>, the problem of <em>faciality</em>, Deleuze commences the February 3 with discussion the face-power assemblage, hoping that others will discuss the close-ups role for the face and in cinema. Following a recording interruption, the discussion opens to student interventions, notably a student (identified as Éric) dominating the exchanges, but an Iranian student succeeds in announcing details of an important demonstration occurring that very day, to which Deleuze lends his support with plans to cut the session short., to allow students time to reach the demonstration, also mentioning a general assembly at Vincennes the next day.</p>

<p>The French transcription and subsequent English translation were developed for the Deleuze Seminars directly from the RAI-3 recording, located at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emORIIs8esw&t=10347s. This dataset includes two files: a revised French transcription and new English translation in odt format.</p>

<p>--</p>

<p>Les Séminaires de Deleuze sont une collection d'enregistrements audio, de transcriptions et de traductions en anglais et de documents complémentaires des conférences que le philosophe français Gilles Deleuze a donné lors de sa carrière à l'Université de Paris 8.</p>

<p>Dans la séance 7, le 3 février 1976, la teneur des remarques d’ouverture de Deleuze au départ du segment, ainsi que ses vêtements et le dessin qui domine le tableau noir – le quatrième dessin à quatre coins reproduit dans Mille Plateaux (p. 183) –, suggèrent que ce segment d’ouverture est la fin d’une séance manquante (peut-être le 27 janvier 1976). La brève séance qui suit (jusqu’à la minute 29 de l’enregistrement) est la seule séance pour laquelle une date est certaine, le 3 février 1976, comme le déclare un étudiant iranien pendant la séance. Après avoir conclu le fragment d’ouverture par une revue des sujets des séances précédentes, notamment le rhizome en opposition à l’arbre, une théorie de la redondance, le problème de la visagéïté, Deleuze commence la séance du 3 février en parlant de l’agencement du pouvoir du visage, espérant que d’autres parleront du rôle des gros plans pour le visage et au cinéma. Après une interruption de l'enregistrement, la discussion s'ouvre aux interventions des étudiants, notamment un étudiant (identifié comme Éric) dominant les échanges, mais un étudiant iranien réussit à annoncer les détails d'une importante manifestation qui se déroule ce jour-là même, à laquelle Deleuze apporte son soutien en prévoyant d'écourter la séance, pour laisser le temps aux étudiants de rejoindre la manifestation, mentionnant également une assemblée générale à Vincennes le lendemain.</p>