Writing and politics both became redefined as mechanical processes of communication in colonial Egypt

Evidence

A transformation that occurred in the nature of writing corresponded to the transformation in the nature of political authority. Both writing and politics, I am going to argue, came to be considered something essentially mechanical. Their essence in both cases would be considered a process of communication. Communication and machinery might appear to be neutral and matter-of-fact notions. But it was these seemingly innocent processes, the mechanisms of the world-as-exhibition, that served to introduce a modern and mysterious political metaphysics. — Timothy Mitchell, Colonising Egypt, 417

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the ontological-political framework of the whole book and echoes Shannon-Weaver communication theory as reification of message. — connects to: the MOC “The Tongue of Power: When Language Becomes the Battlefield of Empire”
• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that ‘communication and machinery’ masquerade as neutral while smuggling in a political metaphysics is a paradigm-level insight about how reification of process becomes political ontology.