Doug wrote:
> Obviously, my suspicion is that people who claim to be free of humanist
> prejudices and master narratives aren't. But I want to hear why it's ok to
> cross some borders but not others.
The problem is that you pose your questions to some imaginary adversary;
for some reason, you seem to feel that on this list it is appropriate to attack
strawmen. Who are these "people who claim to be free of humanist prejudices
and master narratives"? Yes, if you find any such, I would share your
suspicion that they aren't. This is rather a truism, no?
You undoubtedly have your own answer to the question of borders. We each do.
You come in contact with productive transgressive practices every day --
for example, in good political or religious satire. If you attribute to
Foucault, or to people who read him, some kind of general endorsement
of "transgressive" acts, as a form of social protest or personal
coolness or what not -- or if you think that the point that is made is that
transgressive acts are "OK" -- then I would ask you what thin air you've sucked
this out of. The specters of so-called "relativism", "nihilism" and whatever
else people like to be outraged at when they "discuss" the straw category
of "postmodernism" are just that, specters. You are like a person who gets
on a marxism list to ask why Marxists think it's OK to exterminate people.
-m
> Obviously, my suspicion is that people who claim to be free of humanist
> prejudices and master narratives aren't. But I want to hear why it's ok to
> cross some borders but not others.
The problem is that you pose your questions to some imaginary adversary;
for some reason, you seem to feel that on this list it is appropriate to attack
strawmen. Who are these "people who claim to be free of humanist prejudices
and master narratives"? Yes, if you find any such, I would share your
suspicion that they aren't. This is rather a truism, no?
You undoubtedly have your own answer to the question of borders. We each do.
You come in contact with productive transgressive practices every day --
for example, in good political or religious satire. If you attribute to
Foucault, or to people who read him, some kind of general endorsement
of "transgressive" acts, as a form of social protest or personal
coolness or what not -- or if you think that the point that is made is that
transgressive acts are "OK" -- then I would ask you what thin air you've sucked
this out of. The specters of so-called "relativism", "nihilism" and whatever
else people like to be outraged at when they "discuss" the straw category
of "postmodernism" are just that, specters. You are like a person who gets
on a marxism list to ask why Marxists think it's OK to exterminate people.
-m