Glib over-simplifications

[Paul Nightingale]

jbor,

On the 'personal response' theory. Firstly I thought I was pointing out,
quite simply, that this is just as much a theory as anything else. Secondly,
I was thinking of the watered-down Leavisite studies that masquerades as
serious textual analysis; perhaps this critique is more pertinent in Britain
than the US? Thirdly, I do plead guilty to glib oversimplifications if,
indeed, that is the personal response my text has inspired: what else do you
expect in two or three lines - see the first point above.

The point of studying a range of "critical regimens" is to deconstruct the
notion that you have to earn membership of a select club by being able to
read in the correct way. If and when the personal response is offered as a
means to denying that any reading is a construct, then it is certainly
deceitful: I'm not quite sure what "honest" means here.

Finally, I confess to being baffled. I fail to see how "we can only make
sense of our experiences through language we share with others, not that
there aren't aspects of our experience we don't share with others" is
translated as "this formulation presupposes that language and phenomena
share a 1:1 correspondence". To add insult to injury, I would argue that
(some of)my posts have indeed illustrated the point made, as quoted, by
Laclau & Mouffe.