User:Marcel Burger/sandbox

Marcel Burger was born in Geneva in 1962 of Swiss-German parents. He is a professor of linguistics at the University of Lausanne, as well as a poet, editor and musician. He has also published works under the pseudonym Stepnjak Butler. He is interested in intimacy in all its forms. He lives in Geneva, Switzerland.

Date/place of birth: January 11, 1962, Geneva, Switzerland. Collections of poems: À côté de cela, Écailles followed by Portes battantes, moi.Moi, What if they come to say hello, Ovales auroraux, Shadows followed by Sexes appellent, Magnétisant.

Summary Biography Overview of works The poet The musician The researcher Published works Literary works Musical works Academic writings

Biography Marcel Burger was born in 1962 in Veyrier, Geneva, of Swiss-German parents who settled in Geneva in the 1950s. At the age of four he became a vegetarian and learned French. He was brought up according to the essential values of respect, equality and mutual support. From an early age, he took part in domestic chores, learned to cook and sew in addition to playing the piano and learning foreign languages. Fascinated by languages and music, he was awarded a PhD in linguistics from the University of Geneva in 1997. His work was devoted to the construction of identities in the artistic avant-garde in the early 20th century. His first published book (Les manifestes. Paroles de combat. Paris, Delachaux & Niestlé) articulates the analysis of André Breton’s surrealist aesthetics with that of Marx and Engels’ revolutionary system.

In parallel to his studies and university research, he plays keyboards in alternative rock bands. Discovering punk rock and then the new wave in the 80's, he is supported by his brother, the bass player Gérard Burger from the French band Ka, and composes music in duo with the multi-instrumentalist Graham Broomfield. The band released four albums under the name Noir de Soie for 150 B.P.M. / COD Records in 1988. These albums were not a commercial success but were nevertheless noticed by specialized critics.

For Marcel Burger, the academic framework has always been an opportunity to provide a basis for reflection about his artistic activities. Professor of linguistics at the University of Lausanne (UNIL) since 1996, he has published over twenty works in the field of public, political and media discourse analysis as well as in ethnography of communication in social networks. Since 2008, he has been director of the Center for Linguistics and Language Sciences (CLSL) at the Faculty of Arts of UNIL. In this context, he travels regularly to Asia as a visiting professor: Australia (Melbourne), New Zealand (Auckland), Fiji, Hong Kong, and Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh City). Two academic stays in Venice (as a visiting professor at the Venice International University) left a lasting impression on him. He therefore decided to publish the poetic writings he has kept since he was 18 years old. In 2020, he published collections of poems, and created the publishing house A côté de cela, using his musical pseudonym: Stepnjak Butler.

Overview of works

The poet The poetry of Marcel Burger, or Stepnjak Butler, is made of sensitive unveilings. Freely delivered forms express the poet’s life experience as a simple statement that aspires to establish a universal melody. Far from any mannerisms, poems are written with ordinary words of community, or of ‘the tribe’ as described by Pierre Reverdy (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Reverdy). We approach time and consciousness through escapisms that appear absurd as soon as they are envisioned. Burger-Butler’s poetry is a rock song, which is always also an ode to life. Its’ vital core is intangible: it is made of the music of words from the perspective of rhythm rather than meaning. In addition to the quadrilogy Le Rêve_le Désir_le Deuil_l'Eveil, the experience of life as a poetic experience can be read in a travelogue which constitutes the first title in the collection À côté de cela (https://www.viceversalitterature.ch/book/21798).

The quadrilogy Le Rêve_le Désir_le Deuil_l’Eveil

Shadows. Beings who radiate love are beings of desire. Shadows is their story, told through a few hundred fragments that delineate the edges of a love life, weaving it through time and making it unique. This is done through a bond that continues in spite of the flaws of the image, of the memory, of the subdued evanescent rendering that we often have of this ‘life in desire’. Shadows is the shadow of those who are crazy for love. It is what marks their skin, the temporal-time of bodies which is their desire and their sex, the desire of sex, the sex of desire. All that remains after all: shadows, Shadows. Yes, because s.he who has obstinately unlearned to look the shadows in the eye sees them get attached to their being, embodying them, unavoidably accompanying them and, finally, defining them. Shadows is the shadow of being and its desire. (In the quadrilogy, this is the Désir, vol. n°1. Published in September 2020, 154 pages).

What if they come to say hello. You might be aware that digital syntax forbids the use of a hashtag followed by a number. In such cases, the address cannot be found: it is lost in the infinite immensity of digital space, which nevertheless keeps the trace of the attempt to find it. The (mostly very short) texts at the core of this collection’s opening speak of realities that are impossible to anchor online. It is about small anodyne, daily escapes. In the second part of the collection, improbable beings tell their stories and in doing so, they narrate yourself, perhaps taunting you, even frightening you - hence the title of the collection. Far from any apparent fiction, they tell us ourself. Sitting us in front of us to consider ourself: these beings are like freak-show animals, and are therefore like us. And if by chance we met them? (In the quadrilogy, this is the Rêve, vol. n°2. Published in September 2020, 166 pages).

moi.Moi. The mourning of a father, a life experience many encounter, allowed moi.Moi to know himself as such. The journey took over twenty years and this collection tells its story. Twelve separate sections retrace these wanderings back towards oneself. One can read them in sequence or consider each element separately as a facet of a kaleidoscope: each one resonates, marks, echoes, obliterates, signifies or obstinately obstruse its own image. To unveil the obvious therefore becomes a necessity: moi.Moi is an identity made up of fragments and without a gravity center. It is about imposing the outline of a figure, to give a face to words. (In the quadrilogy, this is the Deuil, vol. n°3. Published in September 2020, 234 pages).

Ovales auroraux. Auroral time is the moment when the comatose person comes back to the material world. This is what the collection is about: the materiality of days. Namely, time, which is never anchored. And the mind that struggles to capture some kind of outline of it. And then, time is revealed in every being, thing, object which is already polished and frayed. Or else it is fresh, novice, untouched because hardly born to the world. It is the time-tattoo. Ovales auroraux somehow says the evidence of this everyday materiality. Like an awakening. Like the eyes of the sleeper which pop open and look around: amazed, astonished, afraid, interested, excited, it reaches out for the world. The world of swirling mystery that is the oval world. The auroral world. (In the quadrilogy, this is l'Éveil, vol. n°4. Published in October 2020, 196 pages).

Other poetic works

À côté de cela. The end-of-day sky on an island in the Yasawas, Fiji, brought about this revelation. But it may be just as true for the sea abyss, the volcanic rock, or the snowy peak. Or of the loamy earth, the burning sand, or the rain evermore lashing the asphalt all over the city. In À côté de cela, we are told about the telluric cycle and the swirling wave of life. A seemingly unique voice speaks to us throughout a narrative in which isolated lines alternate with pages full of details. We witness a storyteller who is indeed plural. Such is the polyphonic narrative of À côté de cela: Being is defined by the persistence of vital renewal. (Published in September 2020, 106 pages).

Écailles. This is the story of a fleeting passage. A threshold to cross. Exposed. Écailles are those tiny protections of the dermis. Here they have been scraped off, exposing the narrator to nakedness, which allows for the salutary vulnerability of any learning process. According to the saying, ‘one is only passing through’, and so the passage is orchestrated by two timeless guardian figures. The Witness, and Justice. In turn, Mimesis and Nemesis deliver their cryptic message that must be restored to the world, a task to which the storyteller is committed in his daily life. We can thus foresee the second part of the collection: swinging doors are simultaneously a resource and an obstacle for the passage. In the door-gap, we take uncertain steps at the pace of the storyteller. (Published in October 2020, 128 pages).

Magnétisant. It is the story of a romantic encounter that changed the life of the storyteller. Kleret is the inspiration for these seven lullabies that are addressed to her. Threads of word-sounds are used to convey the universe of the sensitive. Magnétisant expresses the current that unifies. Yes, because the beloved woman is at the antipodes of he who loves. And the declaration is made from a distance, itself imposed by the materiality of their separation. Supported by the slightest sign, a fleeting glimpse of contact, fantasized on earth and in the skies. Yes, because Magnétisant recounts the telluric magic that unites two beings wherever they are. The storyteller’s day is his night, and vice versa. Kleret is all at once muse, lover, spirit-body, desire and sex. Kleret is the other, and is therefore self-same. The half of him-she. Kleret is the Desired. She is the Sublime, the Unique. An appearance that Magnétisant - as a mirror - reveals. (Published in February 2021, 269 pages).

The musician In the 70’s, like many other teenagers, Marcel Burger’s friends introduce him to rock music. Listening to a record of Genesis was his revelation to the world of Anglo-Saxon progressive rock. Bands such as Genesis, Van Der Graaf Generator, and Yes left a lasting impression on him. Although he tried his hand at bluesy or hard rock electric guitar, he quickly turned to keyboards, thinking he could make the most of his classical training. He plays long lyrical compositions in concert with his band. But in the wake of punk, and especially the English New Wave, Marcel Burger can express himself at his best. With his alter-ego Graham Broomfield, he forms the band Noir de Soie. They release a collection of tracks based on sampler combinations and tour London’s trendy record labels. The reception is positive (they are nicknamed the continental Dépêche Mode), and Noir de Soie signs a production contract with 150 BPM (https://www.discogs.com/label/21849-150-BPM-Records), an independent Swiss-German label founded by the film producer Reto Caduff (https://www.retocaduff.com). Two records of innovative electro pop and coldwave techno music: Deviation and A suite of Aural Pictures are released worldwide. Although sales are good in Spain, Germany, and the USA, their commercial success is getting smaller and the band leaves the label after the release of Grateful Grins.

The dark and rich universe of Noir de Soie is rooted in combinations of sounds recorded from traditional Far Eastern ethnic music instruments (China, Japan) with screeching, acidic electric guitars and a delirious saxophone. As of 2000, Noir de Soie takes a 360-degree turn. Tired of electronic worlds and omnipresent computers and samplers, the musicians come back to a basic formula: vocals, guitar, bass, drums. The band releases Ladybird on Shin Records, an ultimate abrasive rock album loaded with vital energy.

The researcher Marcel Burger’s journey as a researcher began with his thesis in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Geneva. He is interested by André Breton’s ‘manifestary’ rhetoric in his Manifestoes of Surrealism (1924). The postgraduate student outlines keys to reading the book in the context of the avant-garde’s extreme provocation at the beginning of the century. Futurists, Dadaists, Surrealists and the like published manifestoes that were less about defining their aesthetic creed than shocking the bourgeois and thereby asserting an identity that contrasts with that of other competing groups. Words are polyfunctional, and the linguistic perspectives offered by discourse analysis are more apt than literary theory to describe the properties and functioning of this genre. Naturally, Marcel Burger focuses his PhD thesis on the phenomena of identity construction through discourse. He specializes in the analysis of mass communication from a linguistic perspective: public, political and media communication. His perspective is multidisciplinary: sociological, communicational and linguistic. As such, Burger conducts ethnographic research in the media of the public audio-visual broadcasting service in Switzerland, the RTS (Radio Télévision Suisse). How do the media contribute to national cohesion (a mission enshrined in the Constitution of the Swiss Confederation) when addressing such heterogeneous multilingual audiences? He leads investigations in the newsrooms of three cultural and linguistic regions of the country over a period of two months and analyzes them over a period of ten years. The results show that the political and managerial levels of media communication are important because they decide abstractly on guidelines for citizen behavior. However, it is the journalists who actually carry out this abstract task in and through their daily work. In the context of these research projects, the focus is on the detailed analysis of work interactions, combining the linguistic, physical and ideological resources of the actors in collaborative situations.

All aspects of society, including mass communication, are impacted by the advent of digital technologies. There, Marcel Burger discovers a developing field of study while keeping in line with previous research: digital technology tends to make contemporary utopias a reality. As such, post-truth and post-mediatization serve to unveil the new on the basis of the old. And to take the perspective of a casual user allows for a better understanding of the realities and the challenges of digital communication: what is at stake, what type of messages is it made of, and for what purpose.

Published works

Literary works

• moi.Moi, Éditions À côté de cela, 2019. ISBN 978-2-9701421-0-2 • Shadows. Suivi de Sexes appellent, Éditions À côté de cela, 2019. ISBN 978-2-9701421-1-9 • What if they come to say hello, Éditions À côté de cela, 2020. ISBN 978-2-9701421-2-6 • Ovales auroraux, Éditions À côté de cela, 2020. ISBN 978-2-9701421-5-7 • Écailles. Suivi de Portes battantes, Éditions À côté de cela, 2020. ISBN 978-2-9701421-4-0 • À côté de cela, Éditions À côté de cela, 2020. ISBN 978-2-9701421-3-3 • Magnétisant. Poème à Kleret, Éditions À côté de cela, 2021. ISBN 978-2-9701421-6-4

Musical works

• Deviation, EP 3 titres, 150 BPM Records, distribution Play it again Sam, 1988. • A suite of aural pictures, CD, LP 10 titres, 150 BPM Records, Play it again Sam, 1990. • Grateful Grins, CD, K-7 10 titres, 150 BPM Records, Play it again Sam, 1992. • Wasted words, in TransEuropa2, Techno-Crossover, 150 BPM Records, 1993. • Couleuvres nuit et jour, in Safer Sex Rock, COD Tuxedo Records, 1995. • Taken for granted, single, Shin Records, 1996. • Ladybird, CD 10 titres, Shin Records, 2000.

Academic writings

• Les manifestes. Paroles de combat. De Marx à Breton, Paris, Delachaux & Niestlé, 2002. • Les modèles du discours au défi d’un dialogue, Nancy, Presses universitaires de Nancy (avec Eddy Roulet), 2002. • La communication touristique. Approches discursives de l'identité et de l'altérité. Tourist communication. Discursive approaches to Identity and Otherness, Paris, L'Harmattan (avec F. Baider & D. Goutsos), 2004. • L’argumentation dans les médias, Québec, Editions Nota Bene (avec G. Martel), 2005. • L’analyse linguistique des discours médiatiques. Entre sciences du langage et sciences de la communication, Québec, Editions Nota Bene (avec G. Martel), 2008. • Langues et littératures pour l’enseignement du Français en Suisse romande. Problèmes et perspectives, Cahiers du CLSL 27, 2010. • La parole politique en confrontation. Analyse des discours politico-médiatiques contemporains, Bruxelles, DeBoeck (avec J- Jacquin & R. Micheli), 2011. • Polémiques médiatiques et journalistiques. Le discours polémique en question, Semen 31 (avec R. Amossy), 2011. • Identités en confrontation dans les médias, Cahiers du CLSL 32, 2012. • Pratiques du débat : la construction d’un espace public par le discours, Bulletin suisse de linguistique appliquée n° 98, 2013. • Repenser le rôle des pratiques langagières dans la constitution des espaces sociaux contemporains, Bruxelles, DeBoeck (avec A.-C. Berthoud), 2014. • Les discours de communication publique, Cahiers du CLSL 34, 2014. • Les discours de santé. Du cabinet médical aux arènes publiques, Cahiers du CLSL 42, (avec G. Merminod), 2015. • Discours des réseaux sociaux, Bruxelles, De Boeck (avec J. Thornborrow & R. Fitzgerald), 2017. • Investigating Journalism Practices, Cahiers du CLSL 54, 2018. • La communication digitale. Entre affordances et discours multimodaux, Cahiers du CLSL 55, 2018. • Se mettre en scène en ligne, Cahiers du CLSL 59, 2019. • Les communautés en ligne, Cahiers du CLSL 64, 2021.