Dr. Eric Wycoff Rogers is a scholar, organizer, designer and artist. Eric researches, writes, and speaks on political, cultural and social infrastructure; philosophy and critical theory; gender and sexuality; the politics of desire; countercultural movements; urban and architectural design; and communal living and alternative relationships. Eric designs experimental and futuristic spaces and graphics, and is also the founder of the London Night Cafe; the convener of Critical Hedonism(s); and is half of the consulting agency Decoding Labs.

Research

Eric’s research is informed by a broad interest in the historical construction of artificial scarcity in capitalist societies, and the various efforts that have been made to overcome these scarcities. This research examines the many ways in which social and built environments have been historically conceptualized and constructed by professional/managerial/political elites and reformers, the structural functions that these environments have played within the history of capitalism and the state, and the trajectory and breakdown of the institutions that have given purpose and coherence to these environments. Eric is especially interested in the historical construction of sexual and romantic scarcity—particularly the gauntlet of heterosexuality and the history of sexual and romantic frustration and hierarchy within heterosexual culture and the related history of sexual manipulation in consumer-capitalist cities and suburbs.

Current research: Eric is currently researching the history of “parasexuality” in the United States—a type of dynamic in which sexual arousal is disconnected from sexual availability and instead is used to sell or motivate effort. The research points to the way that the emerging commercial capitalism of the 1920s, rather than producing a true sexual revolution in morals, produced a "monstrous hybrid" between pre-WWI sexual purity ideals and the modern embrace of sexual expression. In the commercialized world of the 1920s, the allure of sex became omnipresent, while actual access to sex continued to be stifled by social pressures not to devalue oneself in the sexual marketplace.

Past research: In their PhD dissertation, Eric researched the American military’s use of “parasexual” motivational techniques to compel soldiers to fight harder in World War I, and how this set the stage not only for advertising and HR policies (which leveraged sexual allure and romantic longing to boost consumption and hard work), but also the broader gender and sex relations between men and women in much of the ensuing century. Prior to this, Eric’s research primarily focused on the history of social reform during the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and the ways that reform organizations and other institutions shaped everyday life, from municipal governments to urban layouts, the definition of home and domesticity, leisure, families, cultural constructions of sexuality/desire, gender, financial infrastructures and collectively-held aspirations—namely the gendered, affective investment in the idea of home and suburban homeownership fostered by home economics and the Better Homes in America campaign of the 1920s and 30s. Eric has also researched the queer spatial politics of the Gay Liberation movement of the 1970s and contemporary and historical communal living experiments.

In addition to these historical research interests, Eric is an avid reader (and occasional teacher) of theoretical literature, especially queer theory, affect theory, post-structuralist theory, and the burgeoning literature on transgenderism and gender abolitionism. Eric also reads political theory, and has been thinking a lot about metamodernism recently.

Projects

London Night Cafe: an experimental nightlife venue for doing calm, sober, and mindful activities in central London. See the Instagram here.

Decoding Labs: consultancy specializing in research, design, theories of change, and social interventions. See the website here.

Series

Critical Hedonism(s): an ongoing series on the politics of desire. See the website here.

Queer Utopianism Reading Group (collaboration with Rita Pataki and Zarinah Agnew): an ongoing series of discussions on paired science fiction/utopian fiction and social theory texts. See the syllabus here.

The Affect Theory and the History and Politics of Emotions Reading Group: a past series of readings and discussions on the politics of feelings, focusing especially on the history of emotions and affect theory texts. See the syllabus here.

Immanent Urbanism(s): a past series exploring rogue, bottom-up appropriations of urban space, specifically for the purposes of social and cultural abundance. See the website here.

Imagining the Post-Work City Project (collaboration with Andra Bria): a past series of design workshops and a call for entries inviting design proposals and visions for what cities/urbanism could be like in a fully-automated future where people no longer need to work. See the website here.

Writings and Publications

“The Men Behind the Girl Behind the Man Behind the Gun: Sex and Motivation in the American Morale Campaigns of the First World War,” Journal of the History of Sexuality, issue 31.2, May 2022.

“Sexual Racism in the Ranks: Morale and the U.S. Military’s Placement of Black Soldiers in the First World War,” Journal of the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era (article accepted and publication date still pending), 2024.

“Deprofessionalizing Architecture(al Theory): The Case for Anti-Work Politics” (book chapter), in Asymmetric Labors: The Economy of Architecture in Theory and Practice, Peggy Deamer, Aaron Cayer, Eric Peterson, et. al., eds. (Brooklyn, NY: The Architecture Lobby, 2016).

“Professional Interests: The Development and Concerns of Professionalized Architecture in the U.S.,” ARPA Journal 5, “Conflicts of Interest,” 2016.

Education

University of Cambridge PhD in History, 2023.

University of Cambridge Master of Philosophy in Architecture and Urban Studies, with honors, 2018.

Yale University Master of Environmental Design (M.E.D.), with awards, 2015.

California College of the Arts BFA in Interior Architecture, with distinction, 2013.