Postmodernism

[Terrance]

I saw Derrida some time ago and my impression of him was not
much different after listening to him. Heikki is correct, we
should not misrepresent Derrida (It is after all, as  that
great American Philosopher taught us, "easier to attack than
to understand a philosophy"). Derridean deconstruction does
not promote an "anything goes" but something much more
serious. Since the list is silent on Pynchon, and at the
risk of igniting the theory wars again, I'll give my final
post to the list on this issue. It's so difficult to discuss
anything here because we are burdened with the jargon-laden
language of so much contemporary literary criticism. The
whole sick crew is sick with a bad case of Jaundice -
Jargon. Two years ago I asked the list to define
Postmodernism. I was told to read several books. I was sure
then and I am sure now that I've read more books on the
subject than I care to admit, but still, a definition never
materialized. Oh, I missed it! Why by its very "nature" this
root and vine is not to be '(de)fined'. Yeah, right, said
Lisa Simpson. But as bad as that can be, it is only a
symptom of a greater pathology.  The most serious problem
stems from the largely unexamined metaphysical and
ontological premises on which postmodernism rests (detached
from their inventors, mostly French thinkers under the sway
of Nietzschean and Heideggerian philosophy).  This has been
foisted under the guise of literary criticism on a whole
generation  of college students without the knowledge,
background or verbal  skills to examine the premises on
their own.  These  have been spun over and into the minds of
the hapless student body with an almost authoritarian
assurance of 
 their veracity, their finality and their universal
validity.  This, 
 the implication runs, is the final metaphysics, the end of
thought.  
That chimes nicely with the end of history, doesn't it? 
 
What are they teaching anyway?  

  Meaning is created by difference not by 'presence,' which
is 
 defined as identity with an object of meaning.  Nothing,
that is, has 
 any inherent meaning; to call genocide a 'crime' has
therefore no 
 stable or absolute meaning because there is no identity
between 'mass 
 murder' and 'crime.'  C. S. Lewis noted the tendency to
sever meaning 
 from its object long before postmodernism, but the full
development 
 of this trend waited for Saussure.  

They don't teach our students that Derrida and others have
been accused of   intellectual dishonesty, and the misuse,
misinterpretation, and distortion
of Saussure's thought to provide a theory of signs that
supports the severance of  meaning from an object of
meaning. 

They teach that there is no foundational truth or reality in
the universe that we  can know.  The only truths that exist
are local ones that 
 human beings construct through cultural systems as they
respond to 
 the need for power, survival and esteem.

 
They teach that language is rather like the old Freudian
concept of the 
 conscious and unconscious minds: on the surface it may look
simple 
 and unified, but below it  is complex, shifting, uncertain
and 
 multiple.  The linguistic surface meaning is just a mask
for the 
 'real' meaning of the lower depths.  Naturally, it is only
the new 
 textualists who can, like modern linguotherapists, uncover
the 
 reality beneath the deceptive surface.  They alone can
unfold the 
 interfoldings as they're called of language. 

Language always has  excessive signification, it always
means more than 
it seems to mean  in any verbal context.  That 'more' only
they can uncover with 
 special new surgical tools that are sharp enough to cut
through 
 narrative and rhetorical tropes, the stuff of linguistic
excess.
 
   Here is my favorite. Language creates humanness, not some
inner essence or quality 
 let alone a timeless soul.  We are merely the product of
all our 
 symbol systems.  We are, fundamentally, nothing but
symbols.  The 
 postmodernists drive this empty point home again and again
in their 
 writing, so one must assume they really believe it.  As a 
 consequence, what we take to be the meaning of our normal
social life 
 is not the real meaning.  Through a variety of mental
errors, 
 omissions, misstatements, displacements and downright bad
faith we 
 create a false social meaning.  The real meaning of the
world we 
 occupy is nothing but an ideological construction.  

Note the two-tier system, bifurcation being an unconscious
love of the 
 postmodernists: false social reality where words like
'freedom,' 
 'democracy,' 'individualism' and 'equality' seem to mean
something, 
 and  true social reality, where nothing exists except
vectors of 
 power that collide and careen off one another.
 
   Here is a good one. A text is woven from other texts and
echoes of 
other texts, so it  is not wholly itself.  It is also not a
thing, fixed and established.  "Grapes of Wrath" is not for
example a set text with a variable but 
 delimited meaning.  It is, like all texts, a process of
engagement.


 This notion is very convenient, since it allows the critic
to use the 
 text as a hunting ground for indeterminacy.  It is never
explained 
 why indeterminacy has virtue, but  they once again provide
the rationale for the training of initiates. Students facing
this hodgepodge of nonsense must surely feel a sense of 
power over the text and the author, since it is THEIR
engagement   with the text that determines its range of
meanings, not what the  author (who doesn't exist of course)
may have thought he was putting  into it.

 
So GR, like ALL texts, is like ALL texts, ALL texts are
essentially the same because they are all  constructed from
the same narratives and tropes (the two favorite 
 words of the theorists).  No text, literary or otherwise,
can 
 therefore claim a privileged position in our study. So keep
your Newspapers and put your TRP, Dante, and Shakespeare out
to be recycled.   


Here is a goody.    All of experience is merely a text. 
Some say the world is a text, OK Alice, if you say so. This
follows naturally from 
 some of the previous premises.  Human experience in its
protean 
 day to day is constructed symbolically; we only know it
through the 
 flow of constituted symbols.  This flow of symbols obeys
the same 
 rules of narratology and rhetoric as a printed text--- all 
 experience can be reduced to text.  Experience, like
society, has its 
 own grammar, vocabulary and syntax.  And who then should
become the new 
 social scientists but the theorists, since they alone have
the 
 techniques for delving into the problematics of the
experiential 
 text.
 
 The inventors of this "philosophy/pedegogy/insert whatever
you like here 
 have not in my humble opinion ("MHO")made their case for
the new textual 
 metaphysics.  But they have collectively advanced their
thought with 
 a breathtaking absolutism that would sweep away all before
it.  If 
 one wants to make the case that there is no foundational
truth or 
 reality, one will do much better to read Sextus Empiricus. 


 The cumulative effect of all these premises, now woven into
the 
 narratives of virtually all literary criticism courses here
in the US, is 
 highly destructive since the metaphysical strands are
rarely 
 drawn out and subjected to searching critique.  They have
become 
 givens, factual but unseen in the critical fabric, their
real nature 
 and effect forgotten.  And that, as any philosopher or
teacher or woman 
of good common sense will tell you, is dangerous.   
 
 But it is not the metaphysics per se that worries me. What
worries me is the way 
 they have been silently accepted and used to advance a
project that 
 has exceptionally serious consequences for the mental and
creative 
 life of students.  One can attribute the rapid growth in
theory, with 
 its only partially understood metaphysics, as evidence of
the literary 
 academic's desire for power. The students are but the
preterite in the War for 
publications and profits, for dominance over the true
creator, for final 
 mastery of the only reality that is, textuality.  All this
might 
 be charmingly foolish, but theoreticians are also churning
out tens 
 of thousands of teachers who are dragging this all down to
younger and younger children.  These poorly educated
teachers,  with their wretched writing skills atrophied by
theory, will then  perpetuate more of the same.
 
 Metaphysical premises have ethical and social
consequences.  If one 
 thinks there is no truth, that nothing has an inherent
meaning, that 
 social norms are false and merely a mask for power
constructs, 
 that all texts are the same and none privileged over the
other, then 
 certain consequences inevitably follow.  When a teacher 
corrects  
 students for historical or logical or factual errors, is it
any 
 wonder that many will respond angrily with "That's only
your 
 opinion." When a  professor tries to justify a set body of
key texts, is it any wonder that students will say
"Shakespeare [insert any other name] has no value for  me
except as evidence for the ideology of power and social 
oppression"?