Go to page content

Our narcotic modernity

Social work professor authors book on addiction, modernity and the city

Research | Books at Memorial

Addiction, Modernity, and the City: A Users’ Guide to Urban Space examines the interdependent nature of substance, space and subjectivity, and is an interdisciplinary analysis of the intoxication indigenous to what has been termed “our narcotic modernity.”

The book is authored by Dr. Christopher Smith, an assistant professor at Memorial’s School of Social Work.

The first section—Drug/Culture—demonstrates how the body of the addict and the social body of the city are both inscribed by “controlled” substance. Positing addiction as a “pathology (out) of place” that is specific to the (late-)capitalist urban landscape.

The second section—Dope/Sick—conducts a critique of the prevailing pathology paradigm of addiction, proposing in its place a theoretical reconceptualization of drug dependence in the terms of “p/re/in-scription.”

The third section—Narco/State—remaps the successive stages or phases of our narcotic modernity, and delineates three primary eras of narcotic modernity, including the contemporary city of “safe”/”supervised” consumption.

The fourth section—Brain/Disease—employs an experimental “intra-textual” format and mimics the sense, state or scape of intoxication accompanying each permutation of narcotic modernity in the interchangeable terms of drug, dream and/or disease.

Tracing the parallel evolution of “addiction,” the (late-)capitalist cityscape, and the pathological project of modernity, the four parts of this book together constitute a users’ guide to urban space.

For more information, please visit here.

Latest News

C’est une fête

Memorial University marks 50 years of French immersion in Saint Pierre et Miquelon

Studentview

At semester's end, Megan Smith reflects on how university life has changed her

Head start

First-year student starts Memorial University degree with four-year scholarship

Off to Oxford

Political science and chemistry joint major N.L.'s 2024 Rhodes scholar

Expressions of interest

Memorial University to host inaugural EDI-AR conference

Dec. 6 vigil

Silent vigil to be held each day during week of Dec. 4-8