Michael Rectenwald has 2 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 2 narrators, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 2 ratings. The most-rated is Google Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom.
Google Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom
Summary
Google Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom explores the reach, penetration, power, and impact of Big Digital or the mega-information managers, social media platforms, Artificial Intelligence developers, providers of other web applications and functionalities, and the architects and proponents of the promised Internet of Things. Alphabet (Google, YouTube, etc.) Facebook and Instagram, Twitter, Yelp, and LinkedIn, as well as their many subsidiaries and competitors, comprise a digital collective Big Digital whose domain is global and whose ideological and functional power represents a force unlike any other in history. Big Digital, a non-governmental constellation of digital technology corporations, now presides over public and private life to such an extent that it rivals, if not surpassing, the governmental reach and penetration of many national governments, combined. Big Digital represents a new private form of government, or a governmentality, the means by which populations are governed, and the technologies that enable that governance. But the constraints of the political field superintended by Big Digital include more than censorship and bias. Constraints are structurally determined by the technology. The primary means behind Big Digital's governmental functions is ideology. And the ideology of Big Digital is decidedly leftist. I call Big Digital's ideology corporate leftism, or to borrow from and redefine a phrase coined by George Gilder, "Google Marxism". Corporate leftism comprises the set of values and beliefs now lodged within a growing number of US and other corporations. Corporate leftism informs the policies, politics, and procedures of Big Digital. But corporate leftism is also disseminated well beyond the work cultures of Big Digital's corporate headquarters and regional sites. Corporate leftism is not a subsidiary feature or incidental aspect of Big Digital. Leftism is coded into the very DNA of Big Digital technology and replicated with every organizational offshoot and new technology. Big Digital's leftist ideology circulates through the deep neural networks of cyberspace and other digital spheres. Corporate leftism is intrinsic to the structure of the Internet, the cloud, algorithms, apps, AI bots, social media services, web navigation tracking software systems, virtual assistants, and more. Google Archipelago tells the story of how Silicon Valley's digital technology corporations became bastions of leftism how, why, and to what ends corporate leftism constituted and informed Big Digital, while still promoting the commercial objectives of its digital global conglomerates and extending their reach as a private governmentality. Big Digital's corporate leftism is authoritarian to the core and the leading governmentality in today's world is the corporate leftist authoritarianism that I call the Google Archipelago.
©2019 Michael Rectenwald (P)2019 New English Review Press
Springtime for Snowflakes
Summary
Springtime for Snowflakes: 'Social Justice' and Its Postmodern Parentage is a daring and candid memoir. NYU Professor Michael Rectenwald - the notorious @AntiPCNYUProf - illuminates the obscurity of postmodern theory to track down the ideas and beliefs that spawned the contemporary social justice creed and movement. In fast-paced creative non-fiction, Rectenwald begins by recounting how his Twitter capers and media exposure met with the swift and punitive response of NYU administrators and fellow faculty members. The author explains his evolving political perspective and his growing consternation with social justice developments while panning the treatment he received from academic colleagues and the political left. The memoir is the story of an education, a debriefing, as well as an entertaining and sometimes humorous romp through academia and a few corners of the author's personal life. The memoir includes early autobiographical material to provide context for Rectenwald's academic, political, and personal development and even surprises with an account of his apprenticeship, at age 19, with the poet Allen Ginsberg. Unlike many examinations of postmodern theory, Springtime for Snowflakes is a first-person, insider narrative. Likening his testimony to that of an anthropologist who has gone native and returned, the author recalls his graduate education in English departments and his academic career thereafter. In his graduate studies in English and Literary and Cultural Theory/Studies, the author explains, he absorbed the tenets of Marxism, the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory, as well as various esoteric postmodern theories. He connects ideas gleaned there to manifestations in social justice to explain the otherwise inexplicable beliefs and rituals of this religious creed. Altogether, the narrative works to demystify social justice as well as Rectenwald's revolt against it. Proponents of contemporary social justice will find much to hate and opponents much to love in this uncompromising indictment. But social justice advocates should not dismiss this enlightening look into the background of social justice and one of its fiercest critics. This short testimonial could very well convince some to reconsider their approach. For others, Springtime for Snowflakes should clear up much confusion regarding this bewildering contemporary development. The book provides a clear and balanced suggestion for unraveling the tangled twine of social justice ideology that runs through North American educational, corporate, media, and state institutions. Never soft-peddling its criticism, however, Springtime for Snowflakes delivers on the promise of the title.
©2018 Michael Rechtenwald (P)2018 New English Review Press