It's done, it's freakin' done. My ride on the Windy City Express has come to an end...for now at least. I just sent off (2:15 AM) my last paper to my profs. This one was on Mannheim's sociology of knowledge. I'm in schock...it's all open now...life stands before me...vacuous, exciting, scary...for the coming year at least.
AAAAHHHHHHH
Saturday, May 28, 2005
Thursday, May 26, 2005
In Memoriam
I learned today (a few days late, I'm sad to say) that Paul Ricoeur has passed away. I'm not prepared at this moment to go into why this matters to me--I just wanted to get this out there asap. Suffice it to say this is a big loss. He was one of our contemporary giants.
Sunday, May 22, 2005
Cheeze Tayles for Hap, Vol 1a
In my travels in search of cheese, I came across many a strange tale among the peoples I encountered. In this volume I will relate the stories and legends that I learned, that seem to have no direct bearing on cheese or my quest at all. Allow them to provide background, to help you get a sense of the places through which I sojourned and the lore of the natives. Perhaps there is wisdom to be garnered; perhaps merely ethnographic detail; but the telling must be re-told, and the narratives extended into our worlds. Was it Wiesel who said that God created humans because s/he loves stories? Well, let the legends continue as we attempt to image this creator...
I first set out, dear reader, in a northeasterly direction from base camp (near the stock yards, where my cupboards longed for cheese). For many weeks I trekked alongside a tremendous body of fresh water, and through partially settled forests. It was there where I was chased by a strange people, all white with shorn hair, wearing "bomber" jackets and combat boots. They brandished automatic rifles and kept shouting about the "race war" or something of the sort. At any rate, I wanted no intercourse nor commerce with such a tribe, as they were clearly not amenable to inter-tribal interactions. I pressed on, across prairies and wetlands passing nary a soul along the way. Eventually I arrived at an amazing metropolis, which the locals had christened Detroit.
It was here that I heard this tale:
I learned of a child who had been raised in a vacuum cleaner factory. From birth the child was rarely taken outside the factory walls; its mother--for reasons unclear to me--was obliged to remain close to the shop floor at all times. Here the child was showered incessantly with the pleasant hum and constant howl of vacuum cleaners. Around the clock the new models were being tested. As each one cleared the assembly line it was put through the same regimen. Day in and day out the vacuums hummed.
As a result, the baby never learned to cry. As the old wives tale goes, the best way to hush a crying child is to run the vacuum. Well, it held true in this case, and with the continuous rumor of cyclonic machines, this young mother was quite blessed. Never did the child cry, being soothed and distracted by the hum of the machines. The child grew to young adulthood in this way. Never a tear shed.
This story was relayed to me to explain the activities of a powerful group whom I encountered during my stay. The Cult of the Tearless Wonder had arisen around this child, as it grew, as legend spread of the one freed from the sufferings of this world. Comparisons were made to Siddhartha or the Christ child. Here was one uniquely blessed, unaware of pain and sorrow, consistently at peace! The Cult arose at first as a group of awestruck observers, then rules and traditions were created--you know, dear reader, how these sorts of things go. Soon the sick and lame were brought to be healed by the Tearless One, and miracles were reported. Legend grew.
When I arrived, certain quarters of the city had banned any displays of pain or discomfort, with elaborate systems of fines and punishments should one slip up. Darker stories circulated as well, of the fearsome underside of the group, of the Band of Perpetual Weepers, kept in chains, tortured, forced to cry continually to preserve the balance. Strange stories of the sacrifice of crying infants abounded as well. Mothers scared their children into hushed silence if they threatened a cry with warnings of being taken by the group for its ceremonies.
Needless to say, I was quite unnerved. After a few days rest, I secured my provisions and continued on. There was no cheese here, nor, I should dare say, if there were would I want to partake of it.
I first set out, dear reader, in a northeasterly direction from base camp (near the stock yards, where my cupboards longed for cheese). For many weeks I trekked alongside a tremendous body of fresh water, and through partially settled forests. It was there where I was chased by a strange people, all white with shorn hair, wearing "bomber" jackets and combat boots. They brandished automatic rifles and kept shouting about the "race war" or something of the sort. At any rate, I wanted no intercourse nor commerce with such a tribe, as they were clearly not amenable to inter-tribal interactions. I pressed on, across prairies and wetlands passing nary a soul along the way. Eventually I arrived at an amazing metropolis, which the locals had christened Detroit.
It was here that I heard this tale:
I learned of a child who had been raised in a vacuum cleaner factory. From birth the child was rarely taken outside the factory walls; its mother--for reasons unclear to me--was obliged to remain close to the shop floor at all times. Here the child was showered incessantly with the pleasant hum and constant howl of vacuum cleaners. Around the clock the new models were being tested. As each one cleared the assembly line it was put through the same regimen. Day in and day out the vacuums hummed.
As a result, the baby never learned to cry. As the old wives tale goes, the best way to hush a crying child is to run the vacuum. Well, it held true in this case, and with the continuous rumor of cyclonic machines, this young mother was quite blessed. Never did the child cry, being soothed and distracted by the hum of the machines. The child grew to young adulthood in this way. Never a tear shed.
This story was relayed to me to explain the activities of a powerful group whom I encountered during my stay. The Cult of the Tearless Wonder had arisen around this child, as it grew, as legend spread of the one freed from the sufferings of this world. Comparisons were made to Siddhartha or the Christ child. Here was one uniquely blessed, unaware of pain and sorrow, consistently at peace! The Cult arose at first as a group of awestruck observers, then rules and traditions were created--you know, dear reader, how these sorts of things go. Soon the sick and lame were brought to be healed by the Tearless One, and miracles were reported. Legend grew.
When I arrived, certain quarters of the city had banned any displays of pain or discomfort, with elaborate systems of fines and punishments should one slip up. Darker stories circulated as well, of the fearsome underside of the group, of the Band of Perpetual Weepers, kept in chains, tortured, forced to cry continually to preserve the balance. Strange stories of the sacrifice of crying infants abounded as well. Mothers scared their children into hushed silence if they threatened a cry with warnings of being taken by the group for its ceremonies.
Needless to say, I was quite unnerved. After a few days rest, I secured my provisions and continued on. There was no cheese here, nor, I should dare say, if there were would I want to partake of it.
Saturday, May 21, 2005
echoes of PoMo madness, extravaganza a mi piacci
Ever condemned to my voyeuristic, web-jouissance, I got all juiced up at JPE/Brad's dirty pillow-talk with a certain Jim (I don't have trackbacks, so I don't think I can PING!! them). I couldn't resist my own musings on his very apposite and s-s-stimulating questions. I'll take the third:
<<3. Which ideological state apparatus most clearly reifies Weber's thesis of the protestant work ethic?>>
I love it! Love it! Jim's response that all ISAs are implicated is astute (esp for a neophyte), and to some extent I must agree. But in the interest of narrowing this down to some (false) clarity and (violent) fixity, which one will I choose? I suppose I'll go with trade unions. Such orgs and their discourses help foster the economic mindset outlined so well by Weber. To be sure it starts with the family and the church (Family ISA or Cultural ISA), but such unions crystallize in their policies and traditions the dynamics that ultimately contribute to the 'iron cage'. Such unions act as "disciplinary" sites, forging the next gen of proletarians without the critical consciousness. Workers are smoothly conditioned into the supportive role of the dominant economic order. This is why Lenin had such trouble with such pseudo-socialist movements in his efforts to get the vanguard going. Though supposedly there to protect the workers, they really reinforced captialism by solidifying the binarism between worker and industrialist. Trade unions can only exist with the present system; in a sense both feed off of each other, mutually affirming the other in the Manichean dance--though the power difference must be remembered: the system can continually ingest more fodder while the unions keep raising workers up for feed, the system wins every time (pace Hardt and Negri). Such unions are the secular version of the Calvinist sect.
But I've realized why the question has been so difficult. I think it is because it is misleading. I think, rather, that aspects of the Repressive State Apparatus better convey Weber's thesis, and, when brought into conversation with ques 2 re: biopower, make for frutiful consideration. The fear of judgment and hell, the frantic need for justification, Calvin's execution of Servetus, the gestapo of Geneva--violence, no? Might not the overt and covert forms of violence, the subtle and not so subtle methods of shaping our desires to be those that feed the beast, carry on the torch of "Reformed Businessmen"? RSA contributes in this way to a type of "total institution" (in Agamben's not Goffman's sense) that keeps the hope of heaven alive in the bank acct and tv screen. We are beaten, cajoled, massaged and molded into the "ideal type" that supports the status quo. But it is so overt and physicalist that it seems more the RSA rather than the ISA, though both to be sure are operative. (This leaves unaddressed the very real issue that, at present, the protestant ethos no longer appears necessary or central to the current arrangement of the system. No longer is the ascetism of working and saving exalted, but rather the profligacy of the consumer, flying in the face of the traditional Reformed notions that Weber observed.)
But Althusser's state-centered analysis and Foucault's efforts to cut off the king's head mean that this whole synthesis is flawed. The center cannot hold. But that's ok (since there is no center). Further inspired by the nature of the JPE-Jim exchange, I think I want to muse next on why PoMo is great and so nice for Xianity--though that will hardly be original.
<<3. Which ideological state apparatus most clearly reifies Weber's thesis of the protestant work ethic?>>
I love it! Love it! Jim's response that all ISAs are implicated is astute (esp for a neophyte), and to some extent I must agree. But in the interest of narrowing this down to some (false) clarity and (violent) fixity, which one will I choose? I suppose I'll go with trade unions. Such orgs and their discourses help foster the economic mindset outlined so well by Weber. To be sure it starts with the family and the church (Family ISA or Cultural ISA), but such unions crystallize in their policies and traditions the dynamics that ultimately contribute to the 'iron cage'. Such unions act as "disciplinary" sites, forging the next gen of proletarians without the critical consciousness. Workers are smoothly conditioned into the supportive role of the dominant economic order. This is why Lenin had such trouble with such pseudo-socialist movements in his efforts to get the vanguard going. Though supposedly there to protect the workers, they really reinforced captialism by solidifying the binarism between worker and industrialist. Trade unions can only exist with the present system; in a sense both feed off of each other, mutually affirming the other in the Manichean dance--though the power difference must be remembered: the system can continually ingest more fodder while the unions keep raising workers up for feed, the system wins every time (pace Hardt and Negri). Such unions are the secular version of the Calvinist sect.
But I've realized why the question has been so difficult. I think it is because it is misleading. I think, rather, that aspects of the Repressive State Apparatus better convey Weber's thesis, and, when brought into conversation with ques 2 re: biopower, make for frutiful consideration. The fear of judgment and hell, the frantic need for justification, Calvin's execution of Servetus, the gestapo of Geneva--violence, no? Might not the overt and covert forms of violence, the subtle and not so subtle methods of shaping our desires to be those that feed the beast, carry on the torch of "Reformed Businessmen"? RSA contributes in this way to a type of "total institution" (in Agamben's not Goffman's sense) that keeps the hope of heaven alive in the bank acct and tv screen. We are beaten, cajoled, massaged and molded into the "ideal type" that supports the status quo. But it is so overt and physicalist that it seems more the RSA rather than the ISA, though both to be sure are operative. (This leaves unaddressed the very real issue that, at present, the protestant ethos no longer appears necessary or central to the current arrangement of the system. No longer is the ascetism of working and saving exalted, but rather the profligacy of the consumer, flying in the face of the traditional Reformed notions that Weber observed.)
But Althusser's state-centered analysis and Foucault's efforts to cut off the king's head mean that this whole synthesis is flawed. The center cannot hold. But that's ok (since there is no center). Further inspired by the nature of the JPE-Jim exchange, I think I want to muse next on why PoMo is great and so nice for Xianity--though that will hardly be original.
Wednesday, May 18, 2005
idiomatic (non)transference
Rejecting, of course, the myth of formal equivalence in favor of some notion of dynamic equivalence in terms of translation, I must share two humorous expressions from Turkey of which I've been recently apprised. Can you guess what they mean?
1) Should you be tempted to be satisfied with appearances, or prone to take things at face value, let me remind you that "not every bearded man is your father."
2) I'm sorry, I can see that I've just offended you, though that was not my intention. Here I am trying to back track out of it, but it's only making things worse. I should just stop while I'm ahead, and own up to the fact that I seem to be "stepping sideways on my penis"
----
M'kay y'all, the phrase in quotes is the Turkish expression, the rest is just context I made up to give you a clue. Lemme see your best guesses. They do translate (again, roughly) into expressions in English. Prize for the winner.
1) Should you be tempted to be satisfied with appearances, or prone to take things at face value, let me remind you that "not every bearded man is your father."
2) I'm sorry, I can see that I've just offended you, though that was not my intention. Here I am trying to back track out of it, but it's only making things worse. I should just stop while I'm ahead, and own up to the fact that I seem to be "stepping sideways on my penis"
----
M'kay y'all, the phrase in quotes is the Turkish expression, the rest is just context I made up to give you a clue. Lemme see your best guesses. They do translate (again, roughly) into expressions in English. Prize for the winner.
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