Hi people,
I can relate to your suggestions Cordelia. I think the separation from
your culture that rk mention is a really crucial point to discuss.
What constitutes a separation? Does critical intervention require
distance?
I've always thought that the radical changes sought by Foucault (and
other poststructuralists) go beyond yearning for an outside to any
particular cultural formation. I suppose I follow the line that all
attempts to move 'outside' are flawed in that they create a new inside;
validated by its opposition to the 'bad' old inside until of course
they turn bad too. Perfect example on a macro scale is 'liberating'
iraq, (though perhaps few thought it legitimate in the first place).
Saddam = bad, US oust Saddam, US takes over his palaces as their
command centers - go figure.
In sum, escape is its own discourse. But by no means does it need to
be the same discourse. To deconstruct a discourse, to denaturalize a
system of power et al don't need an 'outside' to operate, and are
surely far more radical than oppositional politics?
On the other hand, I've recently read a bit on 'lines of flight' - can
anyone relate Deleuze & Guattari's analysis of power structures and
resistance to Foulcault's?
I also read once that Derrida claimed that opposition is always the
first step to problematise any hegemony...
Re., people who are perceived as outsiders by the system. I totally
agree, that is a huge factor in marginalisation, women and patriarchy,
physical and mental 'deviants' vs the medical norm, etc... They are
seen to be outside of the logic of the norm.
I'd say that the threat of these subjectivity's is more radical than
'outside-ness' for outside-ness amounts to equivilance. Rather, it is
their reconfiguration of what is inside and outside that is most
'dangerous' to systems of power. The fear of the other guarantees that
it is never truly separate but rather an internal complication - a
hemorrhaging. It is the struggle to draw the line between insane and
sane that is its violence.
Perhaps it is the binary logic of inside/outside that must be
problimatised.
Nils
UTS
On 07/12/2003, at 12:05 PM, Cordelia Chu wrote:
> Hi rk,
>
> That's great, which leads me to other questions:
> 1) is it possible to remove yourself from your culture? And if
> partially so,
> to what extend?
> Foucault speaks of Pierre Riviere as a person who is caught in
> discourse
> beyond himself, and narrated his suicide in prison, which I take to
> imply a
> certain causal effect. (Foucault did not explicitly state that
> "trapped in
> discourse beyond self" causes "suicide", it's just my own perception).
> If
> Pierre's action/ destruction is indeed an effect of culture/ discourse
> of his
> own time, is there any way he (or we) can escape from that discourse?
> 2) and if it is possible to remove (or to some extend remove) oneself
> from his
> own culture/ discourse - would that make the person a threat to the
> society,
> since he is no longer disciplined and controlled by the governing
> agent?
>
> -Cordelia
>
>> ===== Original Message From PsycheCulture@xxxxxx =====
>> In a message dated 12/6/03 1:12:11 PM Eastern Standard Time,
>> francois.gagnon.1@xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
>>> On problematization
>>
>> Perhaps this means to begin to call into question that which
>> had been
>> taken for granted.
>>
>> When you are totally immersed within a culture, you embrace
>> certain
>> ideas, modes of being and behavior as "truth."
>>
>> As you begin to separate from a culture, one may wish to call
>> into
>> question certain ideas or modes of being, to recognize that they
>> arise out of
> a
>> particular discourse at a particular moment in history.
>>
>> It seems to me that one has to be motivated to problematize
>> something:
>> the idea or institution is bothering you, functioning in a destructive
>> manner, so you wish to "call it into question," begin to deconstruct
>> the
> discourse,
>> move it from being an "absolute" to something that can be questioned.
>>
>> rk
>>
>>
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>
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I can relate to your suggestions Cordelia. I think the separation from
your culture that rk mention is a really crucial point to discuss.
What constitutes a separation? Does critical intervention require
distance?
I've always thought that the radical changes sought by Foucault (and
other poststructuralists) go beyond yearning for an outside to any
particular cultural formation. I suppose I follow the line that all
attempts to move 'outside' are flawed in that they create a new inside;
validated by its opposition to the 'bad' old inside until of course
they turn bad too. Perfect example on a macro scale is 'liberating'
iraq, (though perhaps few thought it legitimate in the first place).
Saddam = bad, US oust Saddam, US takes over his palaces as their
command centers - go figure.
In sum, escape is its own discourse. But by no means does it need to
be the same discourse. To deconstruct a discourse, to denaturalize a
system of power et al don't need an 'outside' to operate, and are
surely far more radical than oppositional politics?
On the other hand, I've recently read a bit on 'lines of flight' - can
anyone relate Deleuze & Guattari's analysis of power structures and
resistance to Foulcault's?
I also read once that Derrida claimed that opposition is always the
first step to problematise any hegemony...
Re., people who are perceived as outsiders by the system. I totally
agree, that is a huge factor in marginalisation, women and patriarchy,
physical and mental 'deviants' vs the medical norm, etc... They are
seen to be outside of the logic of the norm.
I'd say that the threat of these subjectivity's is more radical than
'outside-ness' for outside-ness amounts to equivilance. Rather, it is
their reconfiguration of what is inside and outside that is most
'dangerous' to systems of power. The fear of the other guarantees that
it is never truly separate but rather an internal complication - a
hemorrhaging. It is the struggle to draw the line between insane and
sane that is its violence.
Perhaps it is the binary logic of inside/outside that must be
problimatised.
Nils
UTS
On 07/12/2003, at 12:05 PM, Cordelia Chu wrote:
> Hi rk,
>
> That's great, which leads me to other questions:
> 1) is it possible to remove yourself from your culture? And if
> partially so,
> to what extend?
> Foucault speaks of Pierre Riviere as a person who is caught in
> discourse
> beyond himself, and narrated his suicide in prison, which I take to
> imply a
> certain causal effect. (Foucault did not explicitly state that
> "trapped in
> discourse beyond self" causes "suicide", it's just my own perception).
> If
> Pierre's action/ destruction is indeed an effect of culture/ discourse
> of his
> own time, is there any way he (or we) can escape from that discourse?
> 2) and if it is possible to remove (or to some extend remove) oneself
> from his
> own culture/ discourse - would that make the person a threat to the
> society,
> since he is no longer disciplined and controlled by the governing
> agent?
>
> -Cordelia
>
>> ===== Original Message From PsycheCulture@xxxxxx =====
>> In a message dated 12/6/03 1:12:11 PM Eastern Standard Time,
>> francois.gagnon.1@xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
>>> On problematization
>>
>> Perhaps this means to begin to call into question that which
>> had been
>> taken for granted.
>>
>> When you are totally immersed within a culture, you embrace
>> certain
>> ideas, modes of being and behavior as "truth."
>>
>> As you begin to separate from a culture, one may wish to call
>> into
>> question certain ideas or modes of being, to recognize that they
>> arise out of
> a
>> particular discourse at a particular moment in history.
>>
>> It seems to me that one has to be motivated to problematize
>> something:
>> the idea or institution is bothering you, functioning in a destructive
>> manner, so you wish to "call it into question," begin to deconstruct
>> the
> discourse,
>> move it from being an "absolute" to something that can be questioned.
>>
>> rk
>>
>>
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>>
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>
>
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