>Karl: Er...diane, I was wondering whether there is any point
>responding to the following "trash". However I eventually
>decided to reply, despite being like yourself a very busy bee,
>in the hope that someone on the List may realise how loquacious
>and empty some pomo stuff is.
>
>Diane: Err...karl, whoever you are, please don't be personally
>offended by the fact that I've been trashin foucault/french
>fem/d&g/baudrillard/and ACW-L messages for the last few weeks
>and that one of yours happened to be one of them. I did mention
>that I'm busy as hell right now, no? And yes, of course I know
>there are archives. But ya know, I've got to admit that nothing
>in your post made me want to hop over there and sift through
>them. I did indeed scroll down and see my message attached to
>yours, though. Your message doesn't really click for me...even
>with the context. Here's what you said:
>
>Karl: It is not possible to conceive or experience the human
>body independently of human reality. All reality is human.
>
>Diane: Bit terminology problem here. What do you mean
>"independent of human reality"? And what do you mean "all
>reality is human"? How does this relate to my comments about
>butler? I can't tell if we're agreeing or disagreeing or
>talkinga bout something else all together.
>
>Even if "all reality is human" (and who knows? The X-files
>makes me wonder), that doesn't mean all humans call the same
>fantasy "reality." Dig? The body is fantasmatically constructed
>across our own interpretive/ideological grids and then made
>iterable. Butler is suggesting that if there is something we
>can call the "matter" of the body, it is always already
>mediated by language and/or interpretation.
>
>Karl: So you are saying that if a person is knocked down by an
>automobile and severely injured that this is a fantasy of some
>"human" and that it does not necessarily mean that other
>"humans" would entertain this fantasy. The conclusion then is
>that the person in question has not been necessarily knocked
>down by the automobile and severely injured. Instead it is just
>mere fantasy. It never really happened. It is a purely
>subjective matter: the fantasy created by an individual.
>
----------------------------------------------------------------
----------- ----------- No! In the case where a human is hit by
an automobile and severely injured, the language "mediating"
this situation does not employ verbal definition, rather,
ostensible definition describes the event. Human, automobile,
injury, body--these are "things" we can point at in order to
define them. The signified exists in space and time. The
signifiers relate to substantives. These "things" are NOT
purely subjective.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Karl: Prof there is a misunderstanding here. You are attributing an
argument to me that I do not make. I am simply drawing out the absurd
nature of Diane's comments. I understand that these things are not
purely subjecitve. That is precisely the point I am trying to make. It
is to Diane that you should direct these commments not me. On first
impression I thought that this piece was indeed addressed to her. You
don't address anybody at the beginning of your message. Perhaps you
are a shy person.
>Err... Diane what unadulterated nonsense. Dig?
>
>Incidentally you ask: What do you mean "all reality is human"
>and then proceed to discuss this very description. If you do
>not know what my description means then how can you proceed to
>discuss it as if you do know? Perhaps of course this is just
>one more fantasy.
>
>Furthermore there is nothing in my message to suggest that I
>have been personally offended, by above all, your mail. Perhaps
>you were "fantastamically" constructing my "message" across
>your own "interpretative/ideological grid." hehhe.
>
>Diane: We can't know anything called "pure"
>matter. Just as there is no "reality" that is not the fantasy
>of a certain system or systems of thought, understanding.
>Reality, as well as the body, is always mediated by our own
>cognitive grids...by what is iterable, thinkable, knowable.
>Butler never suggests that we might access the "body" as it's
>"natural" self. She's saying quite the opposite.
>
>Karl: Then the "body" is a fantasamical construct. In other
>words as fantasy or image or whatever kind of weird yuppie
>language you want to use bodies don't objectively exist. It is
>all in the head. When I catch a cold I am fantasising. I don't
>really have a "cold" at all. The " cold" is just a word. Indeed
>the doctor only concludes that I have a "cold" as medium
>through which power asserts itself. The "cold" as a word is a
>fantasmatical construct (this yuppie language is an
>amusement). The "cold" is the medical doctor and I
>fantastamically constructing the "cold" across our own
>interpretative/ideological grid. But even then maybe the doctor
>is a fantasy of mine too.
----------------------------------------------------------------
----------- ----------- Same point here--the "cold" is not a
"verbal" construct. It exists in space and time. The word
"cold" signifies a condition that is ostensible--sneezes, fever,
stuffiness. The interpretive grid for the term "cold" relies on
just a few other words to get at the meaning ("sneeze" "fever"
"stuffiness"). Interpreting "cold" leads us directly to a
handful of substantives that effectively define the term.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Karl: Same point here--I know the "cold" is not a verbal construct. It
is just this that I was endeavouring to show. It is Diane's "views"
that suggest this absurd thesis. As I said to the other geezer who
like Sir Galahad came to Diane's defense don't point your armalite at
me point it at Diane. Sometimes I wonder if this List is not sexist
against men.
I am really sorry that you spent so much time writing this only to
find that your polemic was aimed in the wrong direction. What a waste
of ammunition that could have been used to liquidate Diane. It would
have been particularly well used since she suffers from uncontrollable
giggles. However perhaps someone as erudite as you would have some
prescription that might help relieve her from her amusing sympton.
Have a wee talk with her prof.
Having said all that I must say it has one of the ore interesting
pieces I have seen on this List.
>When people were tortured and killed in the German death camps
>by the Nazis during the second worl war we only think that this
>is what happened. It is merely our subjective way of
>experiencing "reality". It is not objective. Indeed there are
>reactionary historians who claim that there never were
>concentration camps: "an ideological construct" developed by
>certain interests.Ya know!
> Yours etc.,
> Karl
> Carlile
>
>
Yours etc.,
Karl