(No part of this reinterview-cum-pretext issues discussion may be published elsewhere without written permission from victor j. vitanza and
and the individual posters.) --Full Copyright notice at end of each file.
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The PreText Conversations held a Re/In/View with Lynda Haas, beginning July, 1997. The discussion quickly shifted when v posted the announcement that Bill Burroughs had died and Lynda posted a quote from him. For the previous conversation visit and read the last segment of the reinvw with Lynda Haas. |
On Tue, 5 Aug 1997 johanna@RedRiverOK.com wrote:
>
> same thing as it does in the phrase "lit theory"? Or film theory? Or even, Part of my interest in these discussions is that they often come around to considering what happens in all these compartments of arts and letters disciplines in the environment of computing. Computing, the digitalization of information across our civilization, provides a common ground in which R/C, Lit, Film, Tech Writing have something to say, something to offer. Each individual department in our different universities/colleges probably approaches computing somewhat differently depending on the current configuration of the curriculum. For example, at U of Florida, media studies and critical theory are quite strong, and R/C has not been developed as a distinct entity but has evolved within the general curriculum, identified as "pedagogy." This arrangement may change somewhat now that we have just hired a specialist in R/C to develop that dimension of our curriculum in its own right. Some folks have noted the distinctive approach to computers and writing demonstrated at conferences in recent years by UF graduate students. One way to account for this effect is that the models and theory are coming out of media studies. Each of the specializations has something to offer to the invention of "electracy" (reading and writing in electronic environments), and no one specialization has all the resources to account fully for the potential of the tools. In fact, at UF we are starting collaboration with Fine Arts, digital photography especially, to gain some expertise in graphics that the tools support but which is absent from our curriculum (although we do teach video production). The use-value or world relevance of this situation (re Lynda's question here) is that of offering instruction for general electracy that will meet the same need that literacy meets for the print apparatus. General education is the hinge between our work as specialists and the society that pays the bills.
best
Lynda, Thank you so much for your response. Haraway is a good example of breaking the distinction as is Serres:) However, I must admit that your film examples horrify me with my own thinking. On the one hand, I am willing to see history as a construction ala Hayden White. However, I must admit the rewriting of history in Forrest Gump, JFK, or even Nixon bothers me. In the case of Forrest Gump, it isn't so much the rewriting of history but the "if you remain aloof and stupid to history you the good capitalist will be rewarded; however if you become involved in history or society (as Jenny does), you will contract aides and die." With JFK and Nixon, I am a little more particular. In the case of Nixon, I found Stone's justification of Watergate--we don't want folks to no that IKE was involved in Cuba--presposterous. I think Nixon's loss to Kennedy is the most obvious, if not logical, explanation. However, here I am making the distinctions between fiction and reality. I am not sure how to reconcile this, I must admit, other than to think of historiographies in the same way that Hutchins did in the *Politics of Postmodernism.* Lynda, I would like to press you on the experimental nature of your writing, though. I applaud what you have done with this article. I also feel that too few in rhet/comp or any of the other disciplines are willing to experiment in this way. It seems that rhet/comp and lit make claims about the constructed nature of the text, which is always in the process of deconstructing. However, few theorists, I feel, are willing to take the next step of exploiting the gaps and fissures in their own texts in such a way as to have the text visibly deconstructing itself as it constructs itself. For me, another example of this is Nietzsche, whose prose deconstructs the very truth claims that it creates through the use of rheotical and fictional techniques. todd.
>>To give him [William Burroughs] pantheon Yeah, but not so deliberately as old Bill. Perhaps some of my vehemence on this (what? Fred vehement?) was that I was once suckered in big by the Malcom Lowry, William Burroughs, Hunter S. Thompson thematic big bass drum echoing Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt and the WHOLE CONCEPT that REAL vision equals out-of-control, blitz the brain on everything one can possibly eat, suck, or puncture into the body, and then please, oh Lord, an early inexplicable death, Jim Morrison/Janice Joplin...etc. I remember distinctly when Burroughs put a bullet into his wife, killing her, trying to shoot a glass off the top of her head as a party gag. Malcom Lowry came very close to the same sort of thing several times with his second wife, but probably from less sporting intentions. This has NOTHING to do with the interesting discussion preceeding my "dark pillars" comment and I'm embarassed to have fragged the group this way. But, personally, I would just as soon eliminate the Romantic concept that short, disastrous lives (or in the case of Burroughs, long declining lives based upon a one-trick literary pony -- cutting and pasting text randomly) somehow transcend rationality and the veil of Maya and touch ultimate truth the instant before the Universe explodes. Both the body and the bit are human classifications of parts of experience modified for specific conceptual uses. Better Neil Stephenson science-fiction brain candy than sententious homilies about body and bit dichotomies; Stephenson, like Nick, understands the wonderful terrifying blends of both that will reduce mind/body and brain/bit dichotomies to the stuff of Big Sur New Age dancing in bed sheets around paper mache versions of Stonehenge. (Wow. After four weeks off email, that felt good.) Fred Kemp
(or in the case of Burroughs, long declining lives the only cure for this impression of wsb as a one trick pony is... to read or listen to more wsb. in more recent years, wsb's insanity has rings through the cold war and post-cold war insanity as a rare voice of sanity. for years he has been and anti-junk and anti-war-on-drugs, not to mention anti-mainstream politics. his musical collaborations, especially, have been fantastic. mal MATTHEW LEVY
>(Wow. After four weeks off email, that felt good.) WOW, Fred, that WAS good. IMHO. include norman mailer in the mix? thanks for unpacking your bags a little for us.
re
Hi Fred and all On Wed, 6 Aug 1997, Fred Kemp wrote:
> I suppose the Burroughs thread is off topic (although I am sure we could make it fit: I tried that recently with the argument that every subspecialization has something to offer to the problematic of postliteracy). However, the question you have introduced is important in its own right, so maybe we need to reintroduce it when the present reinvw has run its course. I'll just say briefly (I hope) what interests me about the thread, using Kittler's DISCOURSE NETWORKS as a reference point. Kittler compares/contrasts the discourse networks of 1800 and 1900. He is working with German culture and his prototypes for the two paradigms are Goethe and Nietzsche respectively. The upshot of the argument he makes, translated into "English," might come out something like 1800 = Blake / 1900 = Burroughs. It doesn't Have to be Burroughs, although his cut-up method is an excellent example of the features Kittler identifies for 1900; but the 1900 slot would have to be some "experimental" writer or specific work that could be considered representative of the paradigm shift: Gertrude Stein, FINNEGANS WAKE, ...? Several interesting questions follow from the analogy, such as: --what about discourse network 2000? there are some graduate students here working on that.
The Kittler book clarifies something that has puzzled me ever since I
became interested in the avant-garde: why have the monuments of
20th-century letters had no influence on academic writing?
(HEY, this IS relevant to Lynda's thread after all!). Since reading
Kittler I now explain the situation of English as: I expect this formula might be controversial, and I would be interested in hearing all sides of the question.
best
Greg Ulmer writes
why have the monuments of I think we can take this even farther; though I would not locate it with the formula but in the rise of institutional practices in the modern university. The questions is why don't we practice what we preach (on the whole--although some exceptions) in terms of critical theory? Other than a few of the big names (Foucault, Derrida, Deleueze . .), for the most part we speak the language of critical theory and say it in our classrooms, but our methods (the argumentative essay and lecture) are still very traditional in form. While much of the contemporary work undercuts the authority of the speaker, for example, it is still the celebrity, the nod to the big name, that remains the central trope of our work (as I have done here above). This seems to be changing some with the introduction of some forms of technology, perhaps. Dean Rehberger
Among other things, Greg wrote:
>The Kittler book clarifies something that has puzzled me ever since I My 2 cents (or less)... --Steve
Greg wrote:
>The Kittler book clarifies something that has puzzled me ever since I But couldn't one say (and haven't people said) that these monuments have influenced 20th century thinking? E.g. that Joyce/Woolf/Burroughs (take your pick) INVENTED modernism/postmodernism/poststructuralism rather than being symptoms or illustrations of it?
>(HEY, this IS relevant to Lynda's thread after all!). Since reading I think it could be helpful to put your discourse network taxonomy into play with David's taxonomy from earlier--pedagogy, journalism and I forget what the other 2 were (popular and academic?) Sounds like a fun discussion either way. Could you say more about what a discourse network is? Sounds a little bit like a "public sphere". Johanna
At 08:29 AM 8/6/97 -0500, you wrote: Okay--I guess I do see a distinction there. So many of them (Geoffrey Hartmann, J. HIllis Miller) use what you are calling critical theory, though--their texts of choice happen to be literary. The line blurs particularly when we are talking about DeMan and Derrida, who focus on both literature and the literariness/figurality/rhetoricity of language itself.
>
Hmm. We used phrases like "enlightenment sense of progression" quite a bit
when I was in the lit world (ten years ago). Try the words "narrative
closure" or "teleology." Invoke the name of Hayden White. Perhaps he's not
suspicious of your method so much as your motives.
Second, and this gets to the root
I don't know. I'm continually struck by the discrepancy between what lit
people actually "believe" in and how their departments are configured.
They've been trying to get rid of the concept of "periodicity" for a long
time, yet every time a medievalist retires they replace him with another
medievalist--it's that or lose the tenure line, as they see it. They don't
believe in the concept "literature" any more, but they have to teach
canonical "coverage" in order to honor the premises under which they were
hired. (And, at Southeastern, so that their students can pass various
teacher certification tests.)
All I'm saying is that rhet/comp people make a huge mistake when they assume
that lit people regard their disciplinary configurations as somehow "real".
Keep letting 'em know you're in on the secret too.
>Johanna, you pointed out that texts were constructed but that meaning was more
I didn't actually say anything about the "is-ness" of texts or meaning. I
try to avoid doing so. That would be ontological, and very barfinaceous to
me. I did, however, say that I thought rhetoricians are more likely to see
knowledge as a construct than lit people are. (Uh-oh, there I go
essentializing these folks.)
Johanna
Hey folks,
One of the places I see burroughs influence is in cybertheory and
cyberwriting, both on a practical and theoretical level. On a practical
level, writers such as William Gibson have acknowledged Burroughs influence.
On a more theoretical level, I think Burroughs helped us all conceptualize the
fluid self a little more. That is, the most striking thing for me at least is
the fluid (surreal?) nature of the addicts in Burrough's novels. In some
ways, he first taught us that experiences with drugs can lead us into contact
with the fluid nature of conciousness. However, for those who were paying
closer attention, he then taught us that it wasn't really drugs he was talking
about, but langauge.
Of course, B. is not the only writer to do this, or the only to influence many
who write on cyber theory today. Certainly, much credit also goes to people
like Pynchon, Joyce, etc. . . . Yet, I think Burrough's help us to understand
what the fluid self meant as well as the eventual possibilities of this self.
In thinking of Burroughs, I thought about something Mark C. Taylor said about
langauge once: "a fun house is fun as long as there is a way out." Although I
don't think Taylor was referring to the "prison house of langague"--he is far
to embedded in poststructuralist theory," I think he was able to capture some
of the scariness in the uncertainty and fluidity of language. Burroughs, I
think, did some of the same things in his novels (which backs up Johanna's
point Burroughs and poststructuralism).
If this sounds like a eulogy (some good logos), I must admit that my
attachment to Burroughs is more sentimental than scholarly. I happened to do
my undergraduate at Kansas University in the 1980s when the university was
bringing Burroughs into speak as well as organizing these beat reunions around
Burroughs. I had a few chances to meet him, which was a "trip" in itself--my
most favorite being at a public lecture Laurie Anderson gave.
Todd
> the society is in discourse network 2000
Jane Anderson and Margaret Heap, editors of _The Little Review,_ began
publishing _Ulysses_ serially, until they were stopped by court order,
charged with obscenity. Whatever "social" issues the novel addresses were
ultimately overshadowed by the arguments about the aesthetic virtues of the
work. Henry Miller's _Tropic of Cancer_ finally got into the U.S. in 1961;
whatever issues it raised about morality and sex were overshadowed by the
free speech arguments that enabled it, finally, to be sold in this country.
Lit crits as "experts" were experts only on "the aesthetic"; Morris Ernst
and other legal "experts" tow the free speech line; only "public critics"
or "citizen critics," writing letters to the editor in local newspapers,
grappled with the social issues these novels raised. And on and on.
Different discursive networks, same historical moment.
Joanna's question (I believe it was hers; my email is split between home
and office) is a great one. I want to tweak it:
_______How do / Do K's discourse networks allow for / account for plurivocality?
or whatever you want to call it? We aren't all making the same arguments
at the same time in the same way.
Or let me make a conjecture in response to Joanna's question: a discourse
network can't be the same thing as a public sphere. OR Seeing a discourse
network as the same thing as THE public sphere would be to make the same
mistake as talking about THE PUBLIC, which is a normative construct rather
than an empirical, um, thing.
Forgive me if this seems like writing to myself in front of all of you.
as for burroughs, i vote for The Black Rider.
re
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>From: Michael T. Harper [SMTP:mtharp01@HOMER.LOUISVILLE.EDU]
>todd.
Dear Todd,
Irigaray writes love letters to the philosophers. Especially when
talking about Nietzsche, she stays in a seductive vein. Maybe that's
her way to mirror him. She'd rather engage in a tete-a-tete than an
argument. All this is part of her gesture to put on the coat of
femininity...to "put on femininity with a vengeance"... to act in the
way that women are drawn so as to open the door, and then once the
door is open, a discussion can-maybe--begin.
One of the things that has always bothered me about RC theoretical
writing (not to single out RC, others are like this too) is the
authoritative "THIS IS THE WAY IT IS BECAUSE I SAY SO" attitude the
lurks inside the words, the style, the rhetoric. "The God's Eye View
fucks the world," as Haraway says. Even on this list, I can't count
how many times that authority voice registers with me as I read. I
mean, there has to be a way to say what you think without making
everyone else reading it feel like they couldn't possibly think as
well as you do.
Maybe this is one of the reasons I loved VV and VV's writing
immediately-he also seduces instead of authoritating. It seems so
much more productive to me. But anyway, as you wrote, the daughter's
seduction does try to show just how constructed it is (all these
creations and creators) , and the texts it talks about are-but not
just to do that. To seduce. To open.
Sincerely,
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