In Poster’s introduction to Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings, he observes that: “Marxism emerges in Baudrillard’s pages not as a radical critique of capitalism but as its highest form of justification or ideology” (4). The rather ironic image this brought to mind for me was an example used earlier in the semester—the Manifesto as an advertising piece promoting designer jeans. Though I’m taking this example out of context, it does to seem to illustrate Poster’s comment: Rather than inciting revolution, Marxism actually supports the system it opposes.
After reading Ken Rufo’s post, it seems to me that Baudrillard’s insights into Marxism may be among his most immediately accessible concepts. What he’s saying about Marxism, in other words, is that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Marxism is essentially starting from the same premise as capitalism—the primacy of production—with different motivations. What neither capitalism or communism have articulated, according to Baudrillard, is that the real key to the whole system is consumerism. And this is where he begins to bring in Saussure, linguistic theories of reality, exchange value, and ultimately, the value of illusion (see below for an awesome quote on Baudrillard, media, and illusion).
Although it is not addressed in Rufo’s post, from my other readings it seems generally acknowledged that not all of Baudrillard’s work was of the same caliber. His later work, in particular, attempted to address vastly complex political/historical situations, with varying degrees of accuracy and even acceptance among scholars. I was very interested to find that, although he explains rather convincingly the limitations of Marxist theory, when Baudrillard applied his own theoretical concepts to actual political situations (such as the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and later, terrorism and 9-11), he seems to have often missed the mark himself. As I read through the extremely negative piece written after his death (posted as a comment after Rufo’s post), I couldn’t help but think Baudrillard would have to have expected to take some flack for pointing out other theorists’ flaws, and then proceeding to publish such controversial work himself.
A closing quote from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which I found interesting and seemed so appropriate to this blog: “Baudrillard claims that the negation of a transcendent reality in the current media and technological society is a ‘perfect crime’ that involves the ‘destruction of the real.’ In a world of appearance, image, and illusion, Baudrillard suggests, reality disappears although its traces continue to nourish an illusion of the real.” (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/baudrillard/#4)
Until next time,
H.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Whodunit?
I've been waiting all semester to use that title--and good ol' Foucault finally gave me an excuse! So, in keeping with this doubly appropriate question, I'd like to make a few observations on the concept of author function.
First of all, my basic understanding of the author function is that it refers to all the baggage and status associated with the proper name of the person who wrote a text. I love the example given in the intro to our copy of "What is an Author?" in which Shakespeare the Person--about whom we know very little for certain--is compared with Shakespeare the Author, who is pretty generally accorded a lot of respect and admiration.
So the author function is something different from the actual person himself.
Foucault then spends several pages explaining how this author function isn't something intrinsic to literature, but that it evolved over time. As it came about, it began to limit the interpretations that could "validly" be given to a text. People were interested in what the Author had intended. This gave rise to the idea that there was a single, unified meaning to a text. Which in turn led to the need for experts to give official interpretations.
Foucault, instead, calls for freedom from the tyranny of the author function, in favor of reader interpretation. He ends his essay by asking, "What difference does it make who is speaking?" What difference does it make whodunit, now that the deed is done?
Since we were also sent out to hunt down other blogposts on the topic, I checked out the first link on Dr. M.'s list. Lucky for me, it fit the bill perfectly, albeit in a quirky sort of way. The post I discovered is apparently a parody on the concept of "erasure," which I discovered is connected to Foucault's author function. If you check out the post, you'll see that the (anonymous!) author/writer has written a review (presumably of a journal article?), "erasing" all references to both him/herself AND to the author of the original work. Every proper name, pronoun--every reference to someone who put pen to paper--has been conspicuously deleted. The point, I suppose, is to show how the author function helps us make meaning, imperfect though the system may be. Foucault himself admits that some reference point is needed, noting that "It would be pure romanticism... to imagine a culture in which the fictive would operate in an absolutely free state..." (558).
A little more investigation then turned up class notes on the subject (from a professor of Critical and Cultural Studies in Canada), and I was able to figure out what "erasure" meant. It seems to be a deconstructionist's compromise with the problem of authorship--a little like bricolage. In other words, we make a big deal about authors, allow them to limit meaning, etc., but at the same time we can't quite get along without them. So we place them "under erasure." We take the author off the pedestal, but we let them stick around after all.
Until next time,
H.
First of all, my basic understanding of the author function is that it refers to all the baggage and status associated with the proper name of the person who wrote a text. I love the example given in the intro to our copy of "What is an Author?" in which Shakespeare the Person--about whom we know very little for certain--is compared with Shakespeare the Author, who is pretty generally accorded a lot of respect and admiration.
So the author function is something different from the actual person himself.
Foucault then spends several pages explaining how this author function isn't something intrinsic to literature, but that it evolved over time. As it came about, it began to limit the interpretations that could "validly" be given to a text. People were interested in what the Author had intended. This gave rise to the idea that there was a single, unified meaning to a text. Which in turn led to the need for experts to give official interpretations.
Foucault, instead, calls for freedom from the tyranny of the author function, in favor of reader interpretation. He ends his essay by asking, "What difference does it make who is speaking?" What difference does it make whodunit, now that the deed is done?
Since we were also sent out to hunt down other blogposts on the topic, I checked out the first link on Dr. M.'s list. Lucky for me, it fit the bill perfectly, albeit in a quirky sort of way. The post I discovered is apparently a parody on the concept of "erasure," which I discovered is connected to Foucault's author function. If you check out the post, you'll see that the (anonymous!) author/writer has written a review (presumably of a journal article?), "erasing" all references to both him/herself AND to the author of the original work. Every proper name, pronoun--every reference to someone who put pen to paper--has been conspicuously deleted. The point, I suppose, is to show how the author function helps us make meaning, imperfect though the system may be. Foucault himself admits that some reference point is needed, noting that "It would be pure romanticism... to imagine a culture in which the fictive would operate in an absolutely free state..." (558).
A little more investigation then turned up class notes on the subject (from a professor of Critical and Cultural Studies in Canada), and I was able to figure out what "erasure" meant. It seems to be a deconstructionist's compromise with the problem of authorship--a little like bricolage. In other words, we make a big deal about authors, allow them to limit meaning, etc., but at the same time we can't quite get along without them. So we place them "under erasure." We take the author off the pedestal, but we let them stick around after all.
Until next time,
H.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
"The case has, in some respects, been not entirely devoid of interest." --Sherlock Holmes
I've been intrigued by Derrida's statement (from the film): "There is not narcissism and non-narcissism; there are narcissisms that are more or less comprehensive, generous, open, extended. What is called non-narcissism is in general but the economy of a much more welcoming, hospitable narcissism, one that is much more open to the experience of the other as other. ...Love is narcissistic."
In terms of post-structuralism, it seems that Derrida is trying to break apart the commonly understood structure between the binary opposites narcissism and non-narcissism. He does this by introducing the idea of love (ideally thought to be non-narcissistic) as being somehow in relation to narcissism. Love is generally thought of as being other-directed, whereas narcissism is, by definition, focused on oneself. Defining love in terms of narcissism seems to exemplify Saussure's idea that there are no positive meanings in language. Meaning is relational. Love, then, would have no meaning if we had no narcissism to measure it against.
To find a point of connection with psychoanalytic theory, we can note that this relation of meanings also reflects a concept from psychoanalytic theory: metaphor. In the use of metaphor, one thing is described in relation to something else. In Freud's work concerning dreams, the notion of displacement has a similar meaning, in which one image comes to symbolize something else.
The second concept of deconstruction that comes in to play here can be described using another example from Derrida. In speaking about forgiveness, Derrida says that there is no such thing as pure forgiveness. Acts of forgiveness may be made for a variety of reasons, but pure forgiveness is impossible. It seems to me that he may be saying the same thing with regard to love. Whereas we may be capable of greater degrees of openness and welcoming of the "other," we are unable to reach a state of complete forgetfulness of self. This concern with "self" and the "other" are also classic psychoanalytic categories.
The point of his quote as I understand it, then, might be put this way: That only in the measure in which I am aware of myself as a person, am I able to recognize--and therefore love--the other. This would be the open, hospitable narcissism of which he speaks. But we are not able to become completely and perfectly free from this innate self-interest (Freud would seem to agree with that). And so Derrida sees pure love as humanly impossible.
Before you hear what I think about all this, check out the following quote. It's taken from a letter by Benedict XVI on the nature of love (Deus Caritas Est), and I found it very meaningful:
"....Eros and agape—ascending love and descending love—can never be completely separated. The more the two, in their different aspects, find a proper unity in the one reality of love, the more the true nature of love in general is realized. Even if eros is at first mainly covetous and ascending, a fascination for the great promise of happiness, in drawing near to the other, it is less and less concerned with itself, increasingly seeks the happiness of the other, is concerned more and more with the beloved, bestows itself and wants to “be there for” the other. The element of agape thus enters into this love, for otherwise eros is impoverished and even loses its own nature. On the other hand, [one] cannot live by oblative, descending love alone.... Anyone who wishes to give love must also receive love as a gift" (#7).
Although I appreciate the insight of much of what Derrida says, it seems to me it tells only part of the story. His point in deconstructing love/narcissism is, I would guess, to point out that there is no ideal "love" somewhere out there, in the sense of classical philosophical forms, essences, etc. However, it seems to me that the very point of love lies in the fact that it pulls us out of ourselves, to look toward the other. In other words, Derrida (and Freud, too, perhaps) seems to address what is referred to above as eros, denying the possibility of agape--which is essential for true growth as persons and genuine human freedom.
In terms of post-structuralism, it seems that Derrida is trying to break apart the commonly understood structure between the binary opposites narcissism and non-narcissism. He does this by introducing the idea of love (ideally thought to be non-narcissistic) as being somehow in relation to narcissism. Love is generally thought of as being other-directed, whereas narcissism is, by definition, focused on oneself. Defining love in terms of narcissism seems to exemplify Saussure's idea that there are no positive meanings in language. Meaning is relational. Love, then, would have no meaning if we had no narcissism to measure it against.
To find a point of connection with psychoanalytic theory, we can note that this relation of meanings also reflects a concept from psychoanalytic theory: metaphor. In the use of metaphor, one thing is described in relation to something else. In Freud's work concerning dreams, the notion of displacement has a similar meaning, in which one image comes to symbolize something else.
The second concept of deconstruction that comes in to play here can be described using another example from Derrida. In speaking about forgiveness, Derrida says that there is no such thing as pure forgiveness. Acts of forgiveness may be made for a variety of reasons, but pure forgiveness is impossible. It seems to me that he may be saying the same thing with regard to love. Whereas we may be capable of greater degrees of openness and welcoming of the "other," we are unable to reach a state of complete forgetfulness of self. This concern with "self" and the "other" are also classic psychoanalytic categories.
The point of his quote as I understand it, then, might be put this way: That only in the measure in which I am aware of myself as a person, am I able to recognize--and therefore love--the other. This would be the open, hospitable narcissism of which he speaks. But we are not able to become completely and perfectly free from this innate self-interest (Freud would seem to agree with that). And so Derrida sees pure love as humanly impossible.
Before you hear what I think about all this, check out the following quote. It's taken from a letter by Benedict XVI on the nature of love (Deus Caritas Est), and I found it very meaningful:
"....Eros and agape—ascending love and descending love—can never be completely separated. The more the two, in their different aspects, find a proper unity in the one reality of love, the more the true nature of love in general is realized. Even if eros is at first mainly covetous and ascending, a fascination for the great promise of happiness, in drawing near to the other, it is less and less concerned with itself, increasingly seeks the happiness of the other, is concerned more and more with the beloved, bestows itself and wants to “be there for” the other. The element of agape thus enters into this love, for otherwise eros is impoverished and even loses its own nature. On the other hand, [one] cannot live by oblative, descending love alone.... Anyone who wishes to give love must also receive love as a gift" (#7).
Although I appreciate the insight of much of what Derrida says, it seems to me it tells only part of the story. His point in deconstructing love/narcissism is, I would guess, to point out that there is no ideal "love" somewhere out there, in the sense of classical philosophical forms, essences, etc. However, it seems to me that the very point of love lies in the fact that it pulls us out of ourselves, to look toward the other. In other words, Derrida (and Freud, too, perhaps) seems to address what is referred to above as eros, denying the possibility of agape--which is essential for true growth as persons and genuine human freedom.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Under the Magnifying Glass
Now that we've finished watching the documentary on Derrida (French philosopher and deconstructionist), I'll just make a few observations regarding the film's use of images....
I think that there are two primary images used by the filmmakers in telling this story about Derrida: Derrida, the celebrated philosopher and Derrida, the man. Throughout the film, we cut back and forth between scenes like Derrida being greeted by admirers--and then his wife kissing him goodbye before leaving for work. This juxtaposition creates a visual contrast between his celebrity status and his ordinary life, which leads us to wonder about the nature of this celebrity status--and this is probably what Derrida would have hoped.
He himself makes it clear that an exalted view of the philosopher places emphasis in the wrong place. When asked what he wished would be included if someone were able to make a similar documentary on Socrates, for instance, Derrida states that he would want to know more about the philosopher's personal life and what was important to him (I suppose that's a pretty liberal paraphrase, but the general idea, I think!).
The often off-center, partially obstructed shots throughout this documentary serve to further emphasize the humanity of the documentary's subject. There is no slick, seamless editing; no pretense of perfection. The viewer is constantly reminded that we are watching staged scenes, as Derrida reminds us himself.
These juxtaposed images of the celebrity and the ordinary man do not seem to be in conflict, however, as Derrida manages to carry both with simplicity and refuses to let artificial constraints be forced upon him.
At one point in the documentary, Derrida also comments on the significance of a person's gaze--their eyes--and also of the human hand. I noticed that throughout the film, frequent close-ups of both Derrida's eyes and hands were included, perhaps in recognition of what he thought you could learn about a person in this way.
This sleuth gives Derrida (the movie) two thumbs up, for not only giving us a sense of the life, thought, and personality of Derrida, but also for demonstrating through the film itself, some of the key concepts of his thought.
I think that there are two primary images used by the filmmakers in telling this story about Derrida: Derrida, the celebrated philosopher and Derrida, the man. Throughout the film, we cut back and forth between scenes like Derrida being greeted by admirers--and then his wife kissing him goodbye before leaving for work. This juxtaposition creates a visual contrast between his celebrity status and his ordinary life, which leads us to wonder about the nature of this celebrity status--and this is probably what Derrida would have hoped.
He himself makes it clear that an exalted view of the philosopher places emphasis in the wrong place. When asked what he wished would be included if someone were able to make a similar documentary on Socrates, for instance, Derrida states that he would want to know more about the philosopher's personal life and what was important to him (I suppose that's a pretty liberal paraphrase, but the general idea, I think!).
The often off-center, partially obstructed shots throughout this documentary serve to further emphasize the humanity of the documentary's subject. There is no slick, seamless editing; no pretense of perfection. The viewer is constantly reminded that we are watching staged scenes, as Derrida reminds us himself.
These juxtaposed images of the celebrity and the ordinary man do not seem to be in conflict, however, as Derrida manages to carry both with simplicity and refuses to let artificial constraints be forced upon him.
At one point in the documentary, Derrida also comments on the significance of a person's gaze--their eyes--and also of the human hand. I noticed that throughout the film, frequent close-ups of both Derrida's eyes and hands were included, perhaps in recognition of what he thought you could learn about a person in this way.
This sleuth gives Derrida (the movie) two thumbs up, for not only giving us a sense of the life, thought, and personality of Derrida, but also for demonstrating through the film itself, some of the key concepts of his thought.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Shot in the Dark
"in language there are only differences without positive terms"
Saussure continues: “Whether we take the signified or the signifier, language has neither ideas nor sounds that existed before the linguistic system, but only conceptual and phonic substance that have issued from the system.” (40)
He goes on to explain, however, that this is only true when words are considered in isolation. Once a collection of terms is brought together in a coherent way, a positive value comes into existence. But on its own, each signifier has no positive meaning. It requires a point of reference. In other words, language is a system of differences.
As I understand it, this concept is integral to the structuralist approach to literature. If we accept that language has no inherent meaning in itself (no positive meaning), then it naturally follows that in literature a text could have no meaning in and of itself, independent of the larger structure of which it is a part.
I think that in pointing out the relational quality of language, Saussure makes a good observation about how we understand things. At the risk of oversimplification, I think it could be explained in this way: that the state of being “warm” has much more meaning for me if I’ve just come in out of the cold…. And perhaps Saussure would say that if we were never cold at all, there would be no “warm.”
As far as the study of literature is concerned, it seems that there is some merit in saying that a text only achieves full, “positive” meaning in the larger context of its genre, structure, etc. Although whether I’d personally go so far as to say that on its own it holds only negative meaning, I’m not sure.
Ask me again after we’ve finished post-structuralism!
H.
Saussure continues: “Whether we take the signified or the signifier, language has neither ideas nor sounds that existed before the linguistic system, but only conceptual and phonic substance that have issued from the system.” (40)
He goes on to explain, however, that this is only true when words are considered in isolation. Once a collection of terms is brought together in a coherent way, a positive value comes into existence. But on its own, each signifier has no positive meaning. It requires a point of reference. In other words, language is a system of differences.
As I understand it, this concept is integral to the structuralist approach to literature. If we accept that language has no inherent meaning in itself (no positive meaning), then it naturally follows that in literature a text could have no meaning in and of itself, independent of the larger structure of which it is a part.
I think that in pointing out the relational quality of language, Saussure makes a good observation about how we understand things. At the risk of oversimplification, I think it could be explained in this way: that the state of being “warm” has much more meaning for me if I’ve just come in out of the cold…. And perhaps Saussure would say that if we were never cold at all, there would be no “warm.”
As far as the study of literature is concerned, it seems that there is some merit in saying that a text only achieves full, “positive” meaning in the larger context of its genre, structure, etc. Although whether I’d personally go so far as to say that on its own it holds only negative meaning, I’m not sure.
Ask me again after we’ve finished post-structuralism!
H.
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