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I have a real love-hate relationship with academia in that, A. it pays my bills and B. It allows me to do things I wouldn't be able to do out there in the 'real' world. I value its existence above almost everything else within society but become increasingly frustrated when I see it being exploited and undermined by careerists. My own interest in figures such as Guattari and Foucault has nothing to do with how their ideas work within a strictly theoretical context, but how they can be used practically. As I said in an earlier post, the problem with that attitude is that the very university departments that hold their work in such high esteem would be terrified to actually apply them to their own structures - for fear of the consequences to their own position.
I once saw a video of a lecture given by Lacan at the Sorbonne in the sixties. It was great because he had the guts to apply his ideas to the whole method of his teaching. At one point a student stood up and called Lacan a 'prick' while others trold the student to 'shut the fuck up'. It was evident that Lacan was deliberately putting his own position of authority into question. This is in direct contrast with so many lecturers today, who talk about dissolving 'structures of power' without ever seeming to question their own right to wield it. Lacan, Deleuze, Guattari, Foucault, etc are probably turning in their graves at the way in which they're being used so cosily.
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