New Materialism and Dystopian Environments

What is New Materialism?

Thinking about our reality through the lens of a new materialist allows us (as readers) to see humans as equal to everything else in nature.  Hence, the new materialist sees humans as not superior animals.  This concept is important to understand because it assumes that both organic (living) and inorganic (nonliving) beings or objects hold some sort of power within our society (Bennett, 2010).  And, this idea of giving all objects power is called thing-power.  According to Deleuzean theory, thing-power is when objects have the power to change outcomes as a result of their being and place in society (DeLanda, 2006).  And, all of these objects that have thing-power combine into an assemblage together that hold enough power to modify reality (DeLanda, 2006; Bennett, 2010).  These aspects of new materialism allow for dystopian environments to form. 

New Materialism in Dystopian Environments

Many dystopian environments present the new materialist idea of nature containing everything, including human beings, by presenting an “us” versus “them” mentality.  By creating a society of individuals that are oppressed by a dominant culture, the author successfully establishes a need to restore order by giving power to those who are in opposition to the beliefs of the dominant culture.  In order to continue their ultimate power hold over the rest of society, the dominant culture seeks to dismantle the new materialist idea of thing-power, that all things (including every human being and every object) has power, in order to quash the dissenting beliefs by the counterculture.  Thus, the dominant cultures use surveillance and other methods of control in order to restrict thing-power from occurring.  Hence, the dominant cultures in dystopian environments seek to restrict the thing-power of every individual and object within their environment for their own benefit. 

It is the new materialist idea where all of nature is equal and have the ability to hold power that the counterculture characters of dystopian realities live and thrive on in order to survive.  One of the most notable series of novels that illustrates a counterculture seeking to attain thing-power within a dystopian environment is The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins.  In all three novels, the Panem government seeks to maintain control over all individuals within its society, including the Capitol and it’s twelve districts.  The Panem government holds power by visually showing its power to its citizens and making them fear the consequences of starting a rebellion.  For example, in The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen (the main character) remembers that individuals are often killed for making weapons, even bows, because they are perceived by the Panem government as objects potentially used for a rebellion (Collins, 5-6).  Another way that the Panem government seeks to control the possibility of rebellion are by completely leveling and destroying District 13 and hosting a yearly "Hunger Games" (Collins, 18-19).  Also, the Panem government continually innovates its technologies to inflict harm on individuals who commit treasonous acts.  In "The 74th Hunger Games," the “muttations” and “trackerjackers” in “The Games” are mutations of animals used in order to kill and/or disorient the tributes into causing their death.  To see how the “muttations” are used in “The Games,” check out this "Muttations" link.  To see how the “trackerjackers” are used in “The Games, check out this "Trackerjacker" link.  To see even more examples of the Panem government’s control over its districts, please click this "Ideologies of Control" link to see my previous blog post on surveillance and panopticism, which is a technique origianlly proposed for the prison system to dehumanize prisoners and cause anxiety and fear in the hope that they feel watched and, therefore, not take part in any dissenting behaviors.

"Muttations" that are attacking three tributes (Cato, Katniss, and Peeta) in The Hunger Games movie.  Image from pinterest.com.

"Muttations" image when the Gamemakers of "The 74th Hunger Games" inserted them into "The Game."  Image from hubpages.com.

Perhaps the ultimate show of thing-power in retaliation to the Panem government is the use of the innovated technologies by the counterculture.  For example, the rebellion used the symbol of "The Mockingjay" against the Panem government.  The mockingjay was a consequence of sending the jabberjays, that were created by the Panem government to listen to secret conversations of the rebellion during the war (which led to the Panem government winning and holding all of the power over the districts), to District 13 where they mated with mockingbirds.  Over the course of the series, "The Mockingjay" assemblage of rebellion gained thing-power as it grew stronger and stronger with support from the districts.  Katniss became the ultimate symbol of the rebellion as she became known as “The Mockingjay.” 

Katniss as she literally takes on the form of "The Mockingjay" (the symbol of the rebellion) during her interview before "The Third Quarter Quell Hunger Games."  Image from pinterest.com.

The "Mockingjay" pin that Katniss wore during "The 74th Hunger Games."  Image from reddit.com.

The rebellion grows so big that it can no longer be contained by the Panem government.  One of the moments in the series that illustrates the assemblage of individuals against the Panem government is during the interviews before “The Third Quarter Quell Hunger Games” when the 24 tributes come together to hold hands at the end of their interviews.

Tributes of the "Third Quarter Quell Hunger Games" holding hands in opposition to the Capitol's decision to have past winners of "The Games" come back into "The Games."  Image from hungergames.wikia.com.

Finally, the rebellion overtook the Panem government using the symbol of "The Mockingjay."  Thus, the symbol of "The Mockingjay" held thing-power while Katniss was dehumanized into the symbol.  Fortunately, she showed perhaps the ultimate dissent of authority when she murdered President Coin, instead of President Snow (who was then mauled to death).  This event showed that Katniss was able to regain her thing-power at the end that she had lost by becoming the symbol for the rebellion.  To see Katniss’s ultimate rebellion and her regaining of thing-power, click on this "Katniss Kills President Coin" link. 

The idea of thing-power is expressed in other novels as well.  In Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, society is attempting to rebuild itself virtually by using the computer platform of OASIS, a “massive multiplayer online game” (Cline, 1).  However, according to the main character Wade Watts, the Innovative Online Industries (IOI) took hold over OASIS by making it focused on profitable business ventures, instead of allowing it to be freely accessible.  The OASIS held so much thing-power in the society that Wade (with the game name of Parzival) says, “My virtual surrounding looked almost (but not quite) real. […].  Unless you pulled focus and stopped to examine your surrounding more closely, it was easy to forget that everything you were seeing was computer-generated" (Cline, 40).  (To see the OASIS, click this "OASIS" link.)  And, as more and more gunters (or people playing the game to retrieve James Halliday’s fortune that are not connected to a large organization) begin to find the keys left by Halliday in a game with 1980s references before the IOI workers (known as Sixers) do, IOI attempts to kill Watts and his family or buy-out the gunters who successfully found the first key (Cline, 226).  Halliday's game holds thing-power over everyone in the society.

It is important to remember that the idea of thing-power can occur within all aspects of nature.  In the examples mentioned in The Hunger Games and in Ready Player One, both main characters (Katniss and Wade) take on counterculture roles against their dominant culture.  In the face of their dehumanization or oppression, the two characters find a way to beat the dominant culture of their societies, illustrating their own thing-power.  And, in both cases, they use the nature around themselves to aid in their success.  More specifically, Katniss uses her bow and experience being out in nature to allow her to survive in “The Games.” (To see Katniss in action, click this "Gale/Katniss First Scene" link and this "Katniss-Pig/Apple" link).  And, Wade uses his computer skills to be able to defeat IOI with an assemblage created with Artemis and other gunters.  (To see the Ready Player One (2018) trailer, click this "Trailer" link).  Here, it is important to note, in both cases, Katniss and Wade create an assemblage of individuals and objects with thing-power in order to be successful in going against their dominant cultures.

New Materialism, Dystopian Reality, and Our Current Society

Using a narrative of destruction and reasoning for the characters being in such a disordered environment, dystopian environments are formed.  It is through the creation and continuance of these environments that the aspects of new materialism are illustrated.  And, it is within these disordered environments that countercultures rise up against the dominant cultures, which consist of humans who want to challenge the idea of thing-power.  In the face of struggle and/or oppression, a dystopian reality allows the reader to contemplate and question their own current reality.

We find our current reality questioned in many dystopian realities.  One that I found to be particularly unsettling given our current society of social media is “Nosedive,” the first episode in the third season of the Black Mirror series.  This dystopian reality is based on societal control through the rating of one’s virtual person.  This episode uses the character of Lacie to show how easily an individual can become obsessed with their individual rating by other people.  (To see this reality, click this "Explanation of Nosedive" link.)  This is very similar to the “likes” that one can use on current social media platforms, like Instagram or Facebook.

And, at this current time period where the coronavirus (COVID-19) has created a pandemic across the world, many people have questioned whether we are currently on the brink of a new dystopian reality.  Because of many people panicking as a result of the coronavirua, we have seen the concept of human superiority within our society (which goes against the new materialist concepts).  In other words, we see the greed that many people in our society have in a crisis like this current one.  For example, the toilet paper practically flew off the shelves a few weeks ago because of a lot of people wanting to make sure that their family had enough to get through this unsettling time.

All paper products gone in Australian grocery store as a result of COVID-19.  Image from www.abc.net.au.

Along with no toilet paper, I went to the grocery store last week with my mother and found no fresh meat whatsoever.  The grocery store had apparently received a few crates of meat from their truck less than two hours before we showed up to get our weekly groceries, and the store was already completely out of fresh meat.  This is another example of how people are putting themselves over others during this global crisis.  They are putting themselves over other humans and other aspects of nature.  This is potentially deadly to the human race as a whole.  If we do not see each other as equals in this time of fear, then we are going against new materialist ideas of all things having power.  And, it is this loss of thing-power and equality that results in a dystopian reality blossoming.  It is this control by others, where some humans become greedy, that results in rebellion.  And, it is this idea of human superiority that we see today during this world crisis that creates major concern of a dystopian reality spawning right before our eyes.

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Works cited

Bennett, Jane.  "Preface" through "Chapter 2."  Vibrant Matter:  A Political Ecology of Things, 2010. pp. vii-38.
Cline, Ernest.  “0000” through “0014.”  Ready Player One.  Broadway Book, 2017.  pp. 1-230.
Collins, Suzanne. “Part 1.” The Hunger Games.  Scholastic Press, New York:  2008.  pp. 1-130.
DeLanda, Manuel.  “Chapter 13:  Deleuzian Social Ontology and Assemblage Theory.”  Ed. by Martin Fuglsang.  Deleuze and the Social.  Edinburgh University Press, 2006.  pp. 250-266.