Waiting

Waiting at the border, the government office, the hospital. Waiting one’s turn, holding the line. Waiting for the end of the play, for a diagnosis, for sleep. Waiting for an answer, a visa, or a loved one. Waiting for something that will never come. Waiting is often conceived of as pointless void, idle or ‘stolen’ time, provoking shapeless boredom, or as ritualized demonstration of power, exercise of passivity – rarely, however, as deferral, productive break, an interstitial moment of contemplation and reflection. Nobody likes to wait, nobody likes to be kept waiting.

Yet waiting is also understood to provide the most immediate, emblematic, albeit infuriating experience of time. Is it possible to say, conversely, that, as long as there is time, experience is marked, at least in part, by the curious suspension of waiting?

‘Waiting’ will explore the enervating and exhilarating aspects of waiting in the context of the ICI’s current research focus ERRANS, in Time. In two parts, this year’s ICI Library Event will explore the socio-political implications of the ways in which we are being kept waiting and the paradoxical fullness and intensification of time spent waiting.