The Public of S. 10th

I live with three women.  Are we a public?  That is my question.  To answer it, I want to explore a few of Warner's qualifications as well as Habermaus's and Fraser's criteria, and consider my house's relevant public-ness.

Are we self-organized?
In some sense, yes.  Our current state of sharing a house was not organized by any state or overarching power (such as a rental service); we found each other through mutual friends and Craigslist.  Warner adds that the self-organization necessary to publics must revolve around discourse. In fact, he defines a public as "a space of discourse organized by nothing other than discourse itself" (Warner 50).  In our house we certainly organize ourselves around other aspects than simply discourse, including jobs, mutual interests, expectations for cleanliness, etc., but arguably we are officially organized around a document-- our lease.  This piece of text officiates our relationship to the house (no damage, no smoking, etc.), and lays down groundwork for our relationships with each other.  We all take a stance towards this document, much like when Warner noted that members of a public maintain different reflexivities towards the circulating discourse (73).  Do we, or do we not mind the clause about "no large house parties"? Our response shapes our public.  As roommates, we may lose our qualification for public-ness because other elements besides discourse do structure our interactions, but one could argue that in any public, features emerge besides discourse which shape its identity (such as power relations between male and female members).

Are we a relation among strangers?
Not any more; it is difficult to maintain any level of estrangement when the members of said public frequently walk around with no pants or discuss sex lives.  That said, we began as strangers united around a multimodal piece of discourse-- a Craigslist ad.  I would qualify Craigslist ads as circulating discourse, because they constantly change and aim to unite individuals around common ventures.  Generally, these pieces of discourse do not intend to create long-lasting relationships or affect large-scale change, but in the case of roommates, our advertisement carried a lasting weight.

Skipping a few of Warner's criteria, let's explore this one: are we a social space created by the reflexive circulation of discourse?
Our house on 10th does not publish any "intellectual newspaper" (as Habermaus called it), but we do circulate discourse in alternate ways, and our reflexive response to this discourse mediates our relationships with each other.  For example, I pay the Internet bill.  Every month, I write each member's totals on our fridge whiteboard (a central space in our public discourse), and they pay me then erase their name.  An instance of a member refusing to pay me or erasing their name without paying me would certainly cause dissension and affect the nature of our public.  Our unity is reliant on collaboration and parallel responses to such a piece of discourse.  Another text which may qualify as "circulating discourse" is our ongoing group text message.  Communication in this includes everything from, "Would someone please let the dog out?" to "Hey, I'm having friends crash in the living room tonight."  The reflexive stance each one of us takes to this discourse shapes our public.  I could refuse to let my roommates dog out, which could ruin the carpet, which would trigger higher legal consequences (i.e., being liable for floor damages.)

What else should we consider...

Publics must decide on their "general interests."  Fraser notes how the terms public/private are not straightforward designations, but rather powerful terms to valorize and devalorize different topics.  For instance, it is in the general interest of our house public to let the dog out; it's a simple task which builds rapport between the roommate who owns the dog and the rest of us, keeps the house clean, and creates camaraderie.  We have decided that "letting the dog out" is a public interest, but we also could have decided it was a private interest and the dog's owner was solely responsible for her care (thus decreasing responsibility and obligation for the rest of us.)  As roommates, we constantly negotiate these common interests.

Sharing a house does "bracket inequalities," an idea Fraser repeated often, because we all pay equal rent.  No one individual has more share of the house than another.  However, equality on paper does not directly translate to equality in practice.  Those who have lived here longest have more experience with the house and landlord, and the two who lived here first chose the remaining two roommates, perhaps dequalifying our designation as self-organized.  Those here longer have more furniture in the house, more art on the walls, more "prime real estate" in terms of rooms and shelves, etc.  My point is, although certain pieces of text (like the same rental agreement we all sign) can seem to neutralize a public, "classes" almost inevitably emerge.

We do have the potential for subaltern counterpublics to emerge-- two of the four roommates could decide they don't like how the living room is arranged, and bring their petition to the other two, or simply rearrange while the other two are gone.  Alternate discourses could arise, in the form of new pictures hung on the wall or (more drastically) a wall painted.  We re-cast certain terms in order to understand them under a new light-- calling the next door neighbors the "bro house," for example, or nicknaming the mailman "Stephen" because we find him handsome (all Stephens are, obviously).  We are most likely an enclave public, making choices and circulating communication that aims to further our closeness and relevant understanding of certain topics, rather than enact external change.  That is, we aren't telling others outside our roommate circle how to best "do roommate life," although it does sometimes come up casually in conversation ("You're dealing with that?  Well, we do x, y, z, and it seems to work...").  Certain phrases have talk value; calling the basement the "cave" vs. "the dungeon" (we use both) can clarify a member's current feelings towards the basement.  Language and ideas emerge which mark us as a discourse community (the "hungry dryer" eats socks and waistband strings, the "fluffy potato" is the dog, etc.)

So, it seems that in many of these situations, we qualify as a "public," but rather than centered around discourse we center around daily cohabitation actions.  In the end, in many ways, it seems publics aim to figure out just that-- how, on small local or large international scales, us humans are going to do life together.