I figure I bought it so I might as well read it…
One passage from the section “Milieu and Territory,” reminded me of Emily’s response to Bipsham last week. Grosz writes, “Both rhythm and milieu are the slowing down, the provisional formalization of elements of chaos: a milieu, the congealing of a block of space-time, and a rhythm, the emergence of a periodicity, are not separable from the block of emergent territoriality” (47”). One section of Emily’s quote that I think is relevant, “It [entrainment] is embedded in everything.” I agree. I think the external rhythm to which organisms synchronize during the process of entrainment can certainly be separated from a “block of emergent territoriality.” This also makes me think about the source of this “external rhythm.” Where does it come from? Does it necessarily need to be coupled with a milieu? Or do creatures embody this rhythm?
Not entirely clear to me what is at stake with the definition of “territory” in this same section. Similarly, I’m not 100% clear about what actually constitutes a milieu for Grosz. Later on page 47, she declares, “only when those fragments or elements of milieus…cease to be regulated in their relations to living beings by natural selection alone, do they become expressive, acquire rhythm, or become dimensional.” First off, I sort of have a problem with these types of bold declarations; I have an immediate natural inclination to think of counter-cases, which admittedly, can be unproductive. Secondly, it seems (to me at least) Grosz is claiming that the milieu - the environment itself - acquires rhythm. While I think this may be possible (and it would be interesting to discuss the metaphysics of how an environment somehow contains rhythm), I think it is much more likely that creatures themselves posses rhythm, and that milieus emerge when these creatures gather, as opposed to milieus becoming dimensional when “elements [of milieus]…cease to operate functionally, causally, predictably…”