Thanks for this. I'm still don't think I get it.

I've got essays to write, and can't put my mind to this right now. I might come back to you with more questions later.

Yes exactly. Maybe I should accept it, stop whining, and get on with things.


yeah true, the parliamentary debated can be pretty vicious.

Even if politics is not ideological anymore that doesn't mean it isn't important. Now we've just voting for the best save money.

i'll attempt translation.

the first part means that we can't see ourselves as ourselves, but only through other people's eyes. in other words (jung said it before lacan i believe) the ego is not the self. but lacan doesn't talk in those terms-- lacan likes to be incomprehensible (i've tried reading the bastard-- headaches).

the second part i don't understand well, it's still abstruse, but i'll try: descartes proofs of existence crap out once we recognize that the "i" in "i think therefore i am" (that's descartes proof of existence) is not a real i but a representation of one so... *something something*

anyway, only the french still argued with descartes in the xx century. descartes supposedly denied empirical truths (empiricism) with his rationalism, so.... destroying his argument would bring back empirical truth. but only partially because....? i don't get. this somehow ends up feeding postructuralist notions.

fuck, i should post notes when i reedit shit, or maybe i should write on a separate thing & post when finished, but i'm posting this between emails & work calls-- sorry.

ok, no more edits to this post-- consider it finished, warts & all.

yup, we're just a national corporation. I think its a good thing that we treat our decisions in a businesslike manner. But im a Socialist through and through.

A funny anecdote. I once had to sit in on a tutorial that an MA student was having with a very old academic (who did know his Lacan inside out). The student proceeded to talk for about fifteen minutes in the most convoluted Lacanian doublespeak imaginable. Eventually, the old academic stopped him and said, "so ultimately, what you're trying to tell us is that High Noon is a Western."

DELETED.

He...doesn't negate the value of these cultural practices outright...DELETED.

DELETED

thinking more about lacan's mirror stage, not just jung said it before, freud said it with his ego/id/superego, nietzsche said it before in 20 different ways, rimbaud said it too around the same time (lettres du vident), and zen monks said that too a long long time ago.

lacan's slight modification to these repetitions of past statements is i believe that he proposes that this split happens through language. that's it. that's why literary "theorists" had a boner for him for a while. language! let's hang on to that...

anyway, nobody really fucking understands lacan. check this out:

"Lacan deliberately wrote in an obscure and at times absolutely unintelligible manner, one made infinitely more complicated, I have painfully learned, by much play on words in sophisticated French that defies translation even by professors of French. Fink attempts to be as clear as possible, and one must give him credit for making a tremendous effort to explain Lacan's ambiguous, deliberately obscure, and narcissistically esoteric prose, but at certain points he simply is unable to do so. "

this by someone who actually thinks lacan is important to the psychiatric profession:

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/...ll/155/2/298-a

it's a nice review, by the way.

haaa haaa-- haaaa haa haaa haaaa---

awesome

that unfortunately doesn't happen these days, everybody gets a pat in the back...

I'm a bit busy at the moment, but a brief defence of Lacan's writing: he himself decries it. He's really not interested in the written word. He constantly repeats, in interviews and so on, that his seminars were most important, and his students have spent most of the last century saying that his was a work in progress, an amorphous, constantly-changing response to the world. There are themes, and there are consistencies, and he has a lot of ideas that recur, but he himself would've likely been aghast at the amount of stress that's placed on works he didn't necessary stand by as definitive.

And if he says something very simple (which he does) which has been said elsewhere (which is debatable, but not very - I can't be bothered to negate it), is that really a problem? Ultimately, we're stuck between two poles - he's a difficult 'writer' saying something simple, re-articulating existing points. His consolidation of Wittgenstein into psychoanalysis, reconstituting a modern metaphysics is indispensable and seminal, to my mind, but if that requires a historical-narrative-context to obviate its uniqueness, well, that's kind of what philosophy, in the broadest possible terms, always does.

i've no problem with his writing. i have a problem with his elevation as unquestionable prophet who is namedropped by people who can't possibly understand him.

see: demonrail's anecdote.

i bet you that sucka he witnessed is today angling for a departmental chair somewhere.

how many people quote lacan who haven't bothered to read freud? answer: most of them.


is not a problem as long as this is kept in perspective, not treated like he forever changed the world. he was a shrink. had some interesting ideas, some are hard to grasp, some incomprehensible. some of them are valuable, some are fresh, some are recycled. good enough, but he's no philosophical god-- though you seem to think so. i'd like to understand why. which brings us to the last part (skip this next thing if you want)


nothing wrong with that, as long as this is remembered and kept in perspective.


ok, so, here, please, when you have time, can you explain how he "consolidated wittgenstein into psychoanalysis and reconstituted a modern metaphysics"? i've never heard of such thing (i don't mean this as "there is no such thing", i mean it as "i am ignorant of it"), and i'd like to know. if you can explain it in a manner this audience can understand, that would be great. i guess those are 2 statements so perhaps explain them separately? start with his work "consolidating wittgenstein into psychoanalisis", then explain how metaphysics was "reconstituted" as a result. i am seriously clueless about what you're saying here. feel free to provide historical-narrative context.

I'll do that later, if I have time - but again, if I don't make any sense to you, it's for one of two reasons: the first, that I'm articulating it badly (a crime I'd plead guilty to without reservation, if accused) the second, that I'm talking the language of a specific discipline - if you don't get it, it's not because you're stupid, it's because it's outside of your ken. I am incapable of getting even the most fundamental grip on particle physics, for instance, while I'm ok with architectural theory. Horses/ courses etc.

don't worry, i have no fear of stupidity, which is simply the limit of intelligence (hence we are all stupid), however, please try as much as you can to be clear-- that's why i'm saying "when you have time." the principles of particle physics, while governed by very difficult equations, can be explained quite simply-- but that's another story.

I do think we should be careful to seperate off those misusers of Lacan: students and lecturers that we all know exist. While I'm personally not a fan of Lacan, I can't think of another intellectual who's had his reputation so discredited by the excesses of his devotees. Nietzsche maybe. Anyway, I'm convinced Lacan isn't the problem, nor some of his more serious champions (Zizek, Heath, Butler, etc), but rather it's the prat who suddenly declares himself a card carrying Lacanian after skim reading 'Beginners Guide to Poststructuralism' on the way to a seminar. I know that to be the case, because ten years ago I was that very prat.

I'm sure you're right. I maintain he's the most onerous 'academic' I can think of. In many ways, he's academia's Cameron - no matter the facts of the matter, he'll always be a prize bellend, and should be admonished as such.

Wittgenstein represents the linguistic turn in philosophy; Lacan turns the focus of psychoanalysis from Freudian analysis of the conscious/ unconscious (etc) to the language of the analysand, and language in general. Although I really think Lacan's psychoanalysis as a mental health practise is his least important aspect - if I remember rightly, he didn't actually do much of it in his later career (possibly due to a lack of a licence). But yeah, there's a new idea about - Wittgenstein's language games - and Lacan goes 'hey, why the fuck don't I use this for what I do? That'd be well sick that.' He quite literally put a banging donk on psychoanalysis.


Metaphysics was sort of off the cards at the time - it was the sort of thing that dreadfully boring English philosophers were on about, boringly. So reconstitute because it was a bit of a leper subject, which he made relevant again under the new ideas relating to language and psychoanalysis.

Incidentally, the English are incapable of doing philosophy.

first time i hear lacan incorporated language games into psychoanalysis-- i'm doing a search on it and no dice. but ok, both dealt with language, and perhaps converged somehow.



well, yes, ok. but you had heidegger and husserl and whatshisname that frenchie, bergson, dealing with metaphysics at that time, no? not sure what the eeengleesh were up to

what do you mean by metaphysics anyway? cuz i dont know that lacan was dealing with metaphysics per se-- he dealt with psychoanalysis-- freud & shit-- how do you bridge this?



ha! nietzsche said that. seriously.

Mis-representative on my part: not 'Lacan does language games' but language is our new focus.

You had odds and sods of metaphysics, yeah - but both Heidegger and Bergson didn't become popular till a bit later I think. Either way, they're from very different worlds to Lacan. Metaphysics proceeding from psychanalysis rather than philosophy.

Lacan was a psychoanalyst (or a theorist thereof); Descartes was a mathematician - both have metaphysical points to make. Really, I don't see it as any more difficult than that.

This thread sure has derailed hard from where I last let off.

Just for the record, I suppose, I will state that I am much more trusting of an explanation that is ground in the context of the struggling economies than one that seeks to pin it on critical theory, the lack of public intellectuals, ambiguous jargon, Lacan, or any other favorite target. Those things aren't new.

Probably despite my tone in my first replies, I'm don't believe Middlesex wanted to discontinue its Philosophy department. Even with courses like Housing Studies and Early Childhood Studies, which don't actually sound so ridiculous to me, I can't imagine what it must be like to run a university.

Of course, though, I don't want to pardon anything on count of placing business on a mystical pedestal but I think the answer lies there more than with the neurotic state(s) of the humanities.

that is true, i did say however that what you call "the neurotic state(s) of the humanities" was partially responsible as well.

regarding your observation on business above all-- it is true, but that is a fact of life, isn't it? i mean-- survival comes first, all the accoutrements of wealth come later. not sure if you've ever read "the theory of the leisure class"-- it's an ancient sociology treatise that reads more like a science fiction novel written by an alien. thorsten veblen (the author), who at heart was a socialist, discusses the intrinsic "barbarism" of human societies and how the more money you have the more you waste through "conspicuous consumption" (he coined the term)-- we regard this waste as honorific-- the more we waste the higher we place on the social scale-- you can look for example at the relative prestige of a sport according to how many resources are invested into it-- say, golf is more prestigious than billiards, polo (which requires the keeping of stables) even more so than golf

anyway, somewhere in the book (i confessed to having skipped parts) he talks about training in "useless" professions as a sign of status. the more money a society has, the more artists, philosophers, writers, and thinkers it's able to afford. the renaissance exploded in a handful of italian city states for a reason-- they were fucking loaded. same thing with athens. the enlightenment was propelled by the rise of capitalism that was fueled by gold and silver from the americas, as well as the slave trade. wherever you find intelligence , there is money backing it up.

the thing is, those of use who studied or study or work in the humanities have been told that we're essential to keep alive a number of ideal without which society would collapse, etc-- but it's not true-- we serve a pecuniary function-- in other words, it's how the rich show off-- by funding poetry chairs and philosophy departments. it's sad, hilarious, and true.

in previous times, the people we think of as philosophers and writers were usually the byproduct of theology faculties or law schools-- which required the study of philosophy, rhethoric and other various "liberal arts" for its function. and artists and thinkers since the time of the greeks required the patronage of the rich-- aristotle had alexander the great, roman poets had mecenas, the monks in the middle ages were funded by the church, the renaissance had the borgias and other families, and the pope, and the french court; the elizabethan poets, i don't know but it was someone who was loaded; descartes had some swedish princess or something, new york had peggy guggenheim, and so on and so forth. when you run out of rich people, or corporate sponsors, or government or church funding, the arts and humanities are run into the ground.

i'm not saying that the humanities have no value, or that it's ok to kill them, but it's been proven over and over that having a good education will not make you a better person. this is a tired argument, but germany was a highly educated nation when they embraced the nazi ideology, many of its leaders were art connoisseurs, highly literate people, well versed in music... and then they happily cooked jews. heidegger was a fucking nazi, strauss was a bit of a nazi ass-licker (ok, he had to survive, but still), leni riefenstahl was goebbels's intrument, there were a bunch of other names of people i don't know who were professors, scientists, philosophers, who happily contributed to this mad enterprise.

so the whole argument about the improvement of humanity is shaky at best.

then you have the humanities people committing suicide-- terry eagleton for example, though he may have changed his mind since, claimed in his most successful and widely read book that literature was a social invention that deserved no special status. sure, his job was probably safe, but by that logic, a lot of teachers of literature should have been terminated. and i'm sure they were. fuck you, eagleton.

anyway, i'm slapping together a half-assed devil-advocate's argument here, not one that i wholeheartedly support, but this is only to say that maybe the economy of middlesex cannot afford to train a bunch of unemployable critical theorists at this particular juncture, and since the critical theorists haven't made a case for their importance to the society at large, and fast food workers and clerks do not require university educations, the fucking dean, or whoever it is, decided to drop the axe.

interestingly enough though, there is an explosion in the demand for librarians these days-- though they deal more with corporate and institutional archives and that sort of thing.

I just quoted this paragraph but your post as a whole raised some really important issues that I think most reaonable people would find really hard to argue against.

I remember a while back someone - I think it was you - linking an article from (I think) the New Yorker, about the fate of the arts in the recession. It seemed to be suggesting that the arts will have to rethink its reliance on the very corporate funding that has traditionally supported it.

This would obviously require the arts to undergo a huge internal re-think as to what they're for and how they can function in that role. While I obviously find that task daunting, I also think it's now absolutely necessary and might ultimately prove quite positive (a point T&B made in an earlier post, which I agree with). Not only are the arts clearly unable to function in the way they've become accustomed for so long, there's a good argument to say that's probably no bad thing.

As in, 'is there a text in this class?' Good old Stan.

No, but seriously, I've recently come around to the idea that good old Fisho might seem a bit way out, but his stuff on performative readings is pretty crucial. I'm not saying 'is this a book?' sounds anything like interesting, but, well, it could be.

I've not heard of Stanley Fish before.

It doesn't look like something I'd be interested in going to...but then is absolutely no description of what is going discussed. There's no indication of in what the question is being asked. Is it an historical account of the existence of books? Something more theoretical? Or merely a lesson for people who are excessively illiterate?

Well, it's a provocative title with a view to getting people into a conference. I end up at a lot of conferences, and you'll find that the more ambiguously-titled ones tend to get more people in. A friend and I were talking about heading a conference titled 're-imagining postmodern wallpaper', just to see how many people we'd get.

However, knowing a bit about the sort of department that is, and the fact he's a lit/ crit theory sort, it'll definitely be something relating to Stanley Fish or the vogue for books 'disappearing' in crit theory. Which is a fine theory, except when anyone thinks it actually means something more than 'Dickens isn't very good'.

Really? I suppose that sounds likely.
Haha, you really should do that! I'd go to that.

You're probably right.

You're very passive for someone on the internet, you know that?

In what way?

For starters you've not once called anybody a cunt.

Fuck you!

Yeah, I'm probably too nice to people.

See, that just came across as cute. Something about his greying nutsack would've been much more piquant.

the only one in this entire thread that isn't a cunt is demonrail, and I only say that because he loves my mom.

and by loves my mom, I mean, with his penis.

CUNTS, the lot of you.

I told you already:

when "education" becomes solely the means by which future employment is determined, the schools become plebe factories. US universities graduate hundreds of thousands of "business" majors. None of them have any fucking clue how to run a business.

And in each case, I would argue that the sum body of theory in those times was also neurotic from an outside prospective. Indeed, I believe that one needs to detach oneself from reality in order to reconsider and represent the world in a new, relevant understanding. It's not so much that intellectuality *improves* humanity but, I think, that humanity requires intellectuality. If intellectualism is so connected to wealth, as you say and I don't doubt, does this make the case that an era of poverty is less "bullshit" and then better that regard? I don't think so. I've never lived in a dark age but I think the lack of artists, philosophers, writers, and thinkers (or, rather, lack of their presence in society as they are there, just not funded) leads to confusion, dejection, and dogma.

So, in my largely unqualified opinion, I don't think critical theory is responsible for this in anyway exceptional.

well, sure--- the hatred of michelangelo for his patron the pope was legendary-- naked bodies on the sistine chapel-- the horror!-- socrates being forced to drink hemlock-- etc-- sure, art science and philosophy have always been "neurotic", but also "honorific", i.e., "my stable of great minds is bigger than yours"


well, sure, we'd be living in caves otherwise.


neither do i! i think i'm not being clear here-- you seem to think that i believe that all intellectual activity is bullshit-- that's not what i meant at all.

i do think that legions of academics in recent decades have indulged in excesses brought about by the mindless following of intellectual fashions, and thus lost a good amount of influence and relevance in society at large.

i'm not throwing out the baby with the bathwater though. I know in spite of the overabundance of shit disciplines there is some great work happening in places, necessary work, important work, which unfortunately is being obscured by the charlatans.


we've lived through the bush presidency; and a future of sarah palin and fox news is as close to the dark ages as i can imagine, so yes,



critical theory is responsible for losing the support of its patrons, whoever they were. perhaps retaining that support would have required a betrayal of its own principles, perhaps the loss of support was deserved, perhaps whatever critical theory does is not relevant to its receiving patronage or support-- i am not qualified either but as the saying goes, it takes two to tango, so i'm going to say it's not just "them" that fucked up and it's time for academia to do some soul searching (i meant to respond to demonrail's post about the arts but i'm running out of time).

look, demonrail's original blog link (necessary agitation) points out to this:

"Many have already rightly spoken in outrage that Middlesex’s renowned philosophy department is to be closed. The department is the home of our finest hub of continental philosophy and political theory in the UK. During the recent Haiti quake, Professor Peter Hallward was the number one commentator from a critical perspective in the news, reminding the viewers of both the history of U.S. intervention and disempowerment of the people by multinational agencies such as the UN. "

You see the Haiti quake comes up first? It's how they say "we are relevant to society". It's true, but I'm thinking-- too little, too late. In this day and age the humanities need good PR very badly, because "Joe the Plumber" doesn't think they are important. And neither that John McSame, who decried the use of science to... save money! (see: bear DNA study). Yeah, basic science gets fucked in the ass by dunces too, it's not just the humanities

Anyway, gotta go make dinner but I DONT HATE THE HUMANITIES. i do feel betrayed by academia though.

Then I don't see how your historical perspective implicates critical theory in any exceptional manner. Socrates decried sophistry for many of the same points but the philosophers who were included under it have been valuable. What makes this a develop of "recent decades" rather than a common and necessary trait? You mention intellectualism being a result of wealth so does intellectualism always bring it upon itself during impoverished times by simply being itself?

You speak of patrons but you don't know who they are so I don't know how this is relevant. What patrons? I was under the impression that universities funded their departments from tuition and the like rather than wealthy private interests. Could you explain to me the role of patronage in contemporary the university system?

You use the word "sophistry" an awful lot. That's just something I've noticed.

You use the word "sophistry" an awful lot. That's just something I've noticed.