Final Paper

So for my final paper I am planning on analyzing three of Maupassant's short stories and tying them into Lakoff's text about "Anger". At the moment, "The Little Cask" and "The Drunkard" will definitely be part of this analysis and I am still working on the third story because I want to be able to have the option to also incorporate the concept of "addiction" and can use some of Freud's analysis for this. I also have the option of focusing on feminist criticism to emphasize the anger used against women in Maupassant's stories. So with a bit more research, I should be able to decide which way I want to go with this.

Spivak...

Reading Spivak was definitely not an easy task. I felt like I had to keep going back to re-read what I had just read to keep some type of coherence with the ideas she illustrates throughout her text. I can’t be sure that I understood very many, so I am going to focus on what I think I did understand from the text, which is the section “the problem of subaltern consciousness”. In this section, Spivak brings up that consciousness within the subaltern study is a “historicized social” conscious; therefore, in this scenario, it is “never fully recoverable”. This is so because the consciousness cannot be recuperated after being oppressed through the “negative consciousness.” Through this, it is evident that the problem lies in this repression of the conscious, causing a change in society. After this, Spivak goes into “self-consciousness” and states that this is the type of consciousness that should be used in the strategy or the study of the subaltern because it has more power than “class consciousness”. This is so, because this last concept isn’t a real representation of humanity. “Class consciousness on the descriptive level is itself a strategic and artificial rallying awareness which, on the transformative level, seeks to destroy the mechanics which come to construct the outlines of the very class of which a collective consciousness has been situationally developed” (205). With this, the descriptive level may be referring to the consciousness constructed by society to differentiate between different economic standings of humankind and set the standards for belonging to a certain consciousness of classes. Therefore, since it is a construction, it is a label that is man-made and goes back to Marx and the Communist Manifesto where there is a clear distinction between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Hence, the working class/the proletariat will eventually be in the power since it will outrun the bourgeoisie “by means of a revolution” and the collective consciousness will help achieve this. So then is this the problem with the subaltern consciousness: that since it cannot be recuperated, it needs to be changed to confine to a social norm???

"What is an author"

         I thought it would be interesting to look up the word “author” and opted for two definitions…1) a person who writes a novel, poem, essay, etc.; the composer of a literary work and 2) the maker of anything; creator; originator. With this, in Foucalt’s “What is an author”, the focus is on the relationship between the text and the author and the different aspects of the work and how it comes to be. Foucalt goes on to exemplifying that “today” there are so many different ways to write, yet this has not always been the case. Writing tends to be “identified through its own works” and can be somewhat of a sacrifice for the writer, not necessarily an author, because it is not always represented in society (books of some importance, so to speak). And for this reason, “In writing, the point is not to manifest or exalt the act of writing, nor is it to pin a subject within language; it is rather, a question of creating a space into which the writing subject constantly disappears” (102). Therefore, the writing is so profound that the subject isn’t always the present, and this is where I think definition 2 can come in to play, since writing pertains to the “creator/originator” of different concepts that transcend to different audiences throughout time. So then it can be said that the context of certain texts is important to be able to understand the meaning of the writing but this context does not limit its appeal to different audiences. Next, Foucalt goes into the function of the author which is dependent of “certain discourses within society” so that he can be connected with a given “mode” and be classified under this “status”. And this is the author’s discourse. Furthermore, in order for the author to keep his “authenticity”, four criteria are proposed and they all lead to omitting any type of work that does not pertain to their specific style, theoretical coherence, level of value and historical context. With this, it can be implied that texts always give away certain characteristics of an author; therefore, this creates his specific style. In conclusion there was an instance in the text where it was stated that writing can kill, it has the right to do this. So in the end, what creates an author and does he still exist? I would like to leave with this quote “…an anonymous text posted on a wall probably has a writer but not an author”.

Axiomatic...is this really a self evident truth?

Axiom: a self-evident or universally recognized truth

In this introduction of Epistemology of the closet, titled “Axiomatic,” there lies an extensive/detailed description of all the key points the author, Eve Sedgwick, will be making in regards to the terms homosexual, gay, lesbian, gender and sex (and how these feed into the modern gay and antihomophobic theory. She starts her intro by laying out some contradictions between the homosexual and heterosexual definition:

·         In the first contradiction, we find the belief that homosexuality only has an “active” importance within the community (at a smaller scale, so to speak); therefore, this is the homosexual minority. The contradiction is that this issue is of utter importance to humanity, meaning it is continually growing and is a part of all sexuality (homo and hetero).

·         In the second contradiction, “same sex object choice” is seen as an issue pertaining to a transitional period (between) both genders; therefore, the argument against this is seeing this choice as a separation within each gender.

Now, this second contradiction didn’t seem as straight forward as the first contradiction and I’m still not sure if I understand it. However, what can be established is that these contradictions serve as precursors to Sedgwick’s hypothesis about the importance of understanding these definitions/contradictions in the 20^th century.

So with the turn of the century, from the 19^th to the 20^th, the term homosexual caused a shift in sexuality where sex (as in sexual orientation) now has to have an identification: homosexual or heterosexual and everyone is expected to fall under one of these two margins. From this, we go to a synopsis of two best friends, a man and a woman, where the man is gay. The point of this synopsis is to understand how this term “being gay” came about in this friendship. Here, “coming out” was more important than saying “I am gay” because they both knew this without needing to communicate it. So when he actually says “I’m coming out”, he embraces his sexuality and launches it into society.

Since this is the text on which I will be presenting tomorrow, I will leave it at this since there is much more to decipher.

Bonkers!

So as I started reading this text, for the first time this semester I was literally laughing out loud at some of the metaphors presented. These conventional expressions are commonly used so I have heard some before, but even the ones that were knew to me made me laugh. So needless to say, I was enjoying and actually understanding it fine until I got to the last section entitled "Anger, Lust, Rape". I didn't really know what to expect here and was shocked by the turn this text took. In this, there lies this notion that there is an enormous social importance in rape, but most people rather not think about it. So then we get to the concept that lust and anger lead to rape, and although I might agree with this point to a certain extent, that a person is probably at a breaking point to have to resort to this, in no way is it a justification to the action as it is put in this text. All cultures have rape in their society, it happens on  a daily basis and it's not something accepted by the American society...this is where I am confused. Is this author saying that American culture accepts these excuses and "justifications" (I absolutely hated that word in this text) for rape?? Any who, moving on to the physical force factor in the little synopsis given in the text. So this man in basically saying that if he were to think about raping this woman it would be because she's too sexy and she's tempting him...so he wants to hug her and kiss her. Now here, this man is not "mid-mannered", at least I don't think so, because for him to feel the need to feel power over this woman who is supposedly rejecting him is not normal..he's probably crazy or something more like "not mannered" at all. So then I think there was a question in this synopsis somewhere along the lines of "Is there such a thing as justification for rape"? and it goes on to say that women judge other women (in court cases as jurors) for being raped, as in, it is her fault she was in this position in the first place. I feel that there is so much more I could say about this, but I won't. All in all, I didn't like the fact that this issue was put in such a degrading way towards women by this author or the study he was conducting. There needs to be a more open framework here because it's not just women who get raped, it happens to men also and humans of ALL ages. I know there might not be much analyzing here but I just couldn't not blog about this.

"Culture is Ordinary"

     The word culture is one of those universal words that can have so many different meanings to humankind. Each individual relates to a specific culture in a special way (perhaps) following his/her family traditions and has the ability to relate to other cultures as well, as he/she is more exposed to different surroundings. In this text, "Culture is Ordinary" by Raymond Williams, the author exemplifies what this word meant or means in Marxism and goes on to say that he does not agree with this view on culture: "...culture must be finally interpreted in relation to its underlying system of production..." Williams states that we cannot create culture because it is made on a daily basis, "we cannot know in advance" what will shape culture and it is made by living. So for this reason, it is "ordinary in every society and every mind." All in all, I have to agree with Williams and his view on culture. It is what unites us to traditions but at the same time something that has the ability to change with time, it has no "system of production" like the Marxists view states in this text, and that is what makes it ordinary. Through culture, we find a way of life and decide how we want to live it, thus creating our own cultural experiences. One of the most intriguing and interesting parts of this text (for me) was when Williams states the we don't have to travel to find our culture because it is simply ordinary. This part automatically reminded me of a short story I just read by Alejo Carpentier where his character is in search of his identity and feels the need to travel from Latin America (Mexico) to Europe (Spain and Italy) to find himself. In the end, he realizes that although he has European blood, he is indeed Latin American, that is where his cultural ties belong and where he feels "home". Therefore, he travelled expecting to find this cultural identity and experience yet his identity was always with him in his personal culture and if anything, his bond grew deeper with this travel and all he wanted to do in the end was go back home. So even though I give an example of a person/character travelling to find culture, I think this is a perfect example of the notion that one does not need to travel to find culture (or at least one's culture) because it isn't created with travel and it is changing all the time through different methods, such as art and learning.

Deus ex Machina

                While reading “Deus ex Machina” I realized that I have to agree with this whole concept of the machine having a pre-determined role. This machine can basically be anywhere, in a larger society, within a home setting, in a different time period, etc; the point here is that regardless of the location, the machine is made for a specific reason. Now, this machine could also really be anything, like the time machine presented in this reading or the water pipe as the loud speaker. However, in order for the machine to function there has to be someone or something receiving the action and vice versa (sending it). In Physical Machines what I found most interesting was the first synopsis given to the reader, which is that of the water pipe machine I have just mentioned. The role of the machine here is to cause an allusion of something that in reality is impossible. Yet the daughter feeds in to her mother’s allusion by becoming the trigger for the voice in the water pipe. This reminds me of a game “telephone” where one person says a phrase to someone and the information gets passed down a whole line of people and in the end the last person needs to repeat this phrase and for the most part it’s always distorted. This is what happens with this machine too, the daughter’s voice is distorted to that of the son’s and therefore, this is what the mother hears. ..or, could it be that the voice is never really distorted and the mother simply hears a male’s voice because that is what she wants? Moving on to Magical and Mixed Machines…the definition of the magic machine is as follows: “Magic machines often combine the properties of physical, social and linguistic machines…” (59). Therefore, the action of this machine (or the purpose) will be to deliver some type of physical, social or linguistic aspect to its user and in this case since flying carpets and drugs that cause spells, etc. are used,  it may also be to its viewer (or the reader). Overall, it all leads to the universal plot machine which is created with a structure and purpose already in mind and for this reason, and probably the most important part of my blog, is that I agree that the writer should not have to resort to any type of machine to write, hence it would take away from the creativity of the work. Yet this makes me think of Barthes’ text “Death of the author” and how the author writes what he sees and knows based on society or whatever issue he/she is focusing on. Therefore, the machine is present regardless, right? So the plot was always planned out with a specific purpose, just like the machine. Wow, now I’m not too sure whether I can agree with Aristotle or not, funny the ideas that pop up while blogging…

Barthes and "Toys"

Even though the section on "Toys" in Roland Barthes' Mythologies was really short, I really enjoyed this mini text. Perhaps because in a way, I agree with him and the fact that he tries to exemplify that this whole "French toys" movement is associated or connected to a social norm. He writes: "...medicine (miniature instrument-cases...) the air force (parachutists)..." and expresses that these toys are set up for children to look up to in a way. For example, a child who plays with the medicine case will aspire to become a doctor one day and this is the same concept for all the other toy comparisons he makes. The most concrete comparison, however, is that of the child (girl) who plays with her doll that urinates, associating her with motherhood. All these connections are very pertinent even to modern times...society has a way of "conditioning" people at a young age, children in this instance, to be "users, not creators". Therefore, the social norm was also created for this child and all he/she has to do is fit the shoe, so to speak, and become that certain individual that society is looking for. Reading “Toys” reminded me of my childhood and made me think of what kind of roles my brother, my sister and I were conditioned to. My brother always had the toy cars and the army men/toys and Nintendo, etc. My sister and I had the barbies and whatever pertained to them. I always wanted one of the water babies Barthes is referring to but I never got one but I did get a doctor case, which automatically came into my thoughts when I read this short text. I remember clearly carrying this case around with me wherever I went and telling people I wanted to be a doctor...as in medicine and what not...but in reality, I don’t think I could ever do that. So according to Barthes, this was society conditioning me to think a certain way, it doesn’t always become a reality, but this “case” was my way of knowing that I needed an education to get somewhere. My parents never had the same educational experience I’ve had so the fact that at a young age I was able to recognize that I did want an education, without really knowing what this meant, just reinforces Barthes vision. In conclusion, society will always have a role for humanity and maybe it’s up to us to be the creators and not the users? I’m not so sure now…    

Althusser and ideology

    From my understanding of Althusser's text, we come upon a society (our society so to speak) where children are taught at a young age what their social norm should be according to this society. And for this reason, the school has taken over institutions, such as the church who along with the parents represented the moral education of children, and become the number one source for their education: "the 'rules' of good behavior, i.e. the attitude that should be observed by every agent in the division of labour, according to the job he is 'destined' for: rules of morality, civic and professional conscience, which actually means rules of respect for the socio-technical division of labour and ultimately the rules of the order established by class domination" (132). I bring this up because in a way, I have to agree with his view on this subject. Since the first day of kindergarten, children are expected to know that they shouldn't speak out of turn, that school is a source of learning things that they will need to pass on to first grade, that they need to be polite, so and so forth. And with every year that passes within the school system, the student/child should come out with a clear understanding of the societal ladder and have an idea of where they belong in that ladder. With this said, we move into the ideology which Althusser refers to as the "ruling bourgeois ideology" whose focus is to "open up for them the path to the freedom, morality and responsibility of adults" (157) that they've been looking forward to since their institutionalization started. In reality, however, and I believe this is what Althusser is arguing here, this isn't freedom because it's always in the constraints of society and the roles we're supposed to play as members of this system.
    Moving on to what Marx defines as ideology according to Althusser, "ideology is a system of the ideas and the representations which dominate the mind of a man or a social group" (158) and furthermore, class is always represented by ideology. In thesis II where Althusser states that ideology has a material existence he exemplifies that the individual will worship what he/she believes in and although this is a text that was written years ago, I believe this concept still holds value today. As individuals in this society we are brought up with certain beliefs, and although not all of us decide to keep those same beliefs, we all believe in something and for the most part, will defend those beliefs over anything. Overall, this is all human nature and this text represents the different types of influence society can have on an individual.

Lacan

In all honesty, this is my first encounter with Lacan and I can't say I love the guy. I didn't really understand his message so that's why I'm deciding to blog about it. I may be totally off in my interpretation so please don't judge me, here it goes. In "The instance of the letter in the unconscious or reason since Freud", Lacan presents the concept that language and structure are entities of their own, leading to the difference between the algorithm "signifier/signified". In this, the signifier is the meaningful unit and the signified is a concept denoted by a sign..."the signifier answers the function of representing the signified, or better, that the signifier has to answer for its existence in the name of any signification" (191). So then we're given the example of the signified when the children on the train both see different words that are given meaning by society and therefore are interpreted by those children. All in all, the letter expresses the signifier because at this stage, it has not given the signified the denotation of the sign because letters take signification when we put meaning to them...just like words. So my question here would be could a word exist without a letter? and more so, can literature exist without letters? I really don't know because I want to say the answer is no because everything we speak on a daily basis are letters put together that make words, therefore, not much could be done without them. However, this also leads me to think of numbers and symbols and how they too can create a language of their own. And this is where I get lost...so for the moment that's it for my blog.

"Art as Technique" by Viktor Shklovsky

    As I started reading this article, the concept that stood out to me the most and in an immediate way, was this concept of the "algebraic" method. From what I understood, this term refers to the most important aspects of an issue (can really be any issue) and emphasizes that we tend to focus on what we consider to be the "main characteristics" of that issue. To try to put this into a way I would understand the reading better, I immediately thought of my cellphone and what I use it for. These days with technology and phones you can basically do anything, but none of that really matters to me because I basically just use my phone to communicate with my family back home; hence, this is the important function of the phone to me. And this is what Shklovsky is also stating, we only see or get what we want out of certain situations and "fail to hear the prose" because we're only focused on what we consider important.
     With this, we go into the meaning of the "purpose of art" only to re-emphasize this author's point of view. "The purpose of art is to impart the sensation of things as they are perceived and not as they are known." The "perceived" in this definition is the word that stands out to me the most because it is what expresses art and everything that the "object" entails. This object, according to Viktor Shklovsky, is not important because its merely just the work of art; but the work of art can be meaningless if there is no one to interpret its meaning for themselves. For this reason, I think that the importance of art, in accordance with this reading, lies in the recipients perception of the piece, in which ever shape or form they see the art. Although a phone might not be the right comparison to art, if my mom and sister weren't on the other side of the phone call, the phone (the object) would have no purpose for me. And the same goes for art which just made me think of the phrase "beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder", art like theory and literature is up for your own interpretation.

the little cask

     Greed is one of those negative virtues in a human that will always be present in all types of societies. In Maupassant's "The little cask", it is seen in both Chicot and Mother Magloire; they both find themselves in a situation where the hunger for money becomes their reason for living (so to speak). Since the beginning, Chicot knows he is tricking this little old lady into his game and vice versa, the old lady also finds a way to profit from this situation. Therefore, Maupassant has created two characters who portray society's constant need for power. And in the end, one (Chicot) has to triumph over the other (Magloire) to reach that power; now the actions taken along the way aren't always positive, as is the case of Chicot. He knows very well that the old lady will not refuse dinner and nevertheless, drinking. Therefore, she represents the weak of the society who give in to the bribes of social injustices.

     Overall, I found the story line to be somewhat predictable, I was well aware that Chicot was going to end up getting his way, even when the little old lady tried to alter his plans. Despite this fact, however, I have never read Maupassant but I enjoyed his writing...I didn't think it was a bad story and I felt that it had some influence from realism in the way he was describing his characters and the surrounding areas. If more comes to mind...i'll be sure to blog about it.

practice run

:)