Re: Reproduction in the academy

Christopher Mcmahon wrote:
> 


> 
> Yes. But those determinant conditions are only one part of the tale. And
> what is determined, given that there is chaos in determination, is not
> really as determined as we have led to think? I believe, for example, in
> the marxist theory of history, but what that deterministic view of history
> is constantly bringing to light, and this is everywhere in the writings of
> Marx, is a certain underdetermination, a certain contingency. I'm not
> saying that there are no ISAs (there are ISAs), but no ISA actually
> seems top work that well in reality despite the ideal of the ISA. even an
> ISA is made up of machines, has its rhizomic lines of force as well as
> its tree-structures and lobster claws.

 Yes, I agree -- but lets not forget the RSA's -- and there is 'affect'
(which can not be pre-empted) - the government think only in terms of
economic rationalism, but they are stupid if they think that starving
the poorest of the poor is actually going to save the upper middle and
middle classes they so love -- after all necessity will have its way --
crime rates increase (of course -- who's about to respect a law that
starves your children based on crap (naive) ideology!)  and then the
fear campaigns and who benefits?  The insurance companies and the
security companies must be rubbing their hands with greedy joy  - and
then tax will have to increase to build all those extra prison cells and
so you end up with a situation where the 'saved' money is only moved
into having an 'affect' of pure oppression and increased division --
nobody wins/everybody looses.  They take money out of education to build
pretty little 'clean' streets, but forget about providing housing and
decent living conditions for a whole group of people, who will then
become the 'dirt' on their clean streets.   People won't go away, just
because they are ignored.  Does this make sense?  I mean, by determinant
conditions that yes, one way or another desire/life will have its way
and if all one group of people are allowed in terms of cultural
commodity is shit, the its shit that they will play with/multiply/create
into their own markets -- the good old 'black' economy that the
government so desperately wants to get rid of is only bound to grow and
grow with the people who, like everyone else have desires and needs and
skills (that adapt) when they are excluded from the capacity to operate
within the legitimate(d) economies...   I think maybe my eg. is too
simplistic, but the point is that if there is potential (and there
always is) it will manifest within the material conditions it finds
itself one way or another (I don't mean to overdetermine!)  

>
> > I think for many, the play(ing) around with the essay happens out of a
> > need/desire to say something different
> 
> I can see that. I don't do fictocrit myself, but I'm not simply against it
> from a 'traditionalist" pov. It's just that I'm doing something different
> in a different way.

Yes, I didn't want to imply that 'traditionalist' forms should
dissappear in favour of new forms -- the problem is to do with the whole
judgement dichotomy, and the restrictions this can put upon the flow of
what's being said/dealt with when a criteria is set that provides only
some forms of discourse and play to take place, but prevents others.  I
think that form and content have to happen simultaneously and I'm not
against structure, just pre-defined structures.  One tactic I used
recently in a presentation where we where given a directive on form, but
where the structure was too simplistic and didn't have enough positions
for me to present my research, was to adapt the placements of a tarot
card layout -- no mysticism involved, it just happened that the multiple
positioned structure better suited my purposes -- it still allowed me to
break-down a complex set of material, but without reducing it into a
simple question/answer format.  

> I'd rather explore than argue, myself.

yes - me too!  Although I do think that 'arguable' postions emerge from
exploration, or perhaps its more that you can come up with possible
suggestions/openings rather than strict blue-print models to deal with
the 'problem'/issue???.

> 
> Explore! Sad that the markers - some of them - will read this exploration
> as a poorly conceived or flawed/confused agrument?

Yes -- interesting, in the example of my presentation I just told you
about, the 'marker' sat there with her pre-formed criteria and tried to
tick off the points and got all confused and bewildered, but I got a
very positive response from the other class members AND the tutors who
just sat and listened.  The only reason she was confused, I would
suggest, is because she continued to insist in trying to make my work
fit her structure, despite the fact that I had announced right from the
start that I had thrown it out and created my own.  The same happened
with one of the other students who did a great presentation on Foucault
by writing it as if he was writing to his ten year old brother and read
it in the style of a bed-time story -- and it was great! but
alas.....the poor marker, who probably didn't 'hear' a word of it, just
sat there looking at the first point on her pre-printed sheet waiting
for a preconcieved statement so that she could tick or cross, and
consequently missed the whole point.  


> right. But what i don't feel myself is the need to write myself in as a
> text alongside the text. I understand how this can look overly traditional
> or "objectivist", but tho I write in an objectivist way, I think its
> implict that these are just claims, I think "I" am already, still, too
> implicit. I don't want to make myself look overt. It's not that I am
> opposed to fictocrit, tho, it's just not what i do.

And I don't think anyone should do what doesn't feel right.  I hope I
didn't imply that fictocrit was automatically better than -- and yes I
have read plenty that just seemed like a complete wank -- I always
suspect that these emerge from those people who think - oh! the new
trend, I must get in on it and all they end up with is contrived
bullshit!  But, on the other hand, I think its always a learning
experience to experiment with different ways of doing things - but if it
doesn't work or if it stops feeling productive then move on...

Another point:  I don't think writing yourself as a text alongside a
text needs to come into the equation -- it could work/does work if it
suits, but making it a criteria, well...you just end up with another
modelled generic form and a whole bunch of new limitations!  Perhaps I'd
be better off to just speak of experimental(ing) texts rather than allow
myself to be latched onto terms like ficto-crit???

>
> 
> I think there is more space opening up here. at JCU fictocrit is already
> an orthodoxy. One of my supervisors even directed me to do it. Wanted me
> to write myself in, give myself a clear position, etc.
> 
> "I am a white male middle-class......
> 

Yes -- this is a big problem -- this is the coding of ficto-crit and why
I said earlier that I was beginning to have my own misgivings about it. 
I remember going through that whole 'write yourself in' bit, where the
yourself was assumed to be white and middle-class, but I couldn't fit
this criteria because I couldn't consider myself to be strictly middle
class -- so I just ended up writing a meditation on the conformitive
notions of class -- I mean what criteria defines? 
economic/cultural/attitude/dress/self/education???? Class itself turns
out to be a marker of territory and by repeating over and over hey but
I'm middle-class white superior male you could be just strengthening
that power -- becoming the despot, that you suppose yourself to be
questioning...    I had a very interesting discussion with a friend of
mine who's writing a PHD on fictocrit in terms of
becoming-minoritarian.  For those outside the defined 'status' symbols
of majoritarian codification, perhaps their class/race/sex (although
this is more and more questionable) do mark point of minoritarian
status, but to define yourself within the/as the majoritarian does
nothing/ or just supports the status quo.  My understanding of D&G on
this point was to find your vulnerabilities -- your own minoritarian
state/spaces where there is no symbolic power to sure you up!  To move
away from the overcodings of status symbols and the like -- question
them from another space - become-other....  etc... ?????


> and who say's/defines what's correct!
> 
> The academy? Bless it.

But is the academy just some transcendental god that can't be
questioned?  Isn't the academy a heterogenious group of people?    And
it does make a difference/ tutors do have space to move/question/open
and allow difference to flow in/through the dusty old chambers.  It's
the ones who are too afraid to use their own agency and constanty deferr
to the abstract 'academic criteria' -- it's decreed I can't do anything
attitude -- that make for the worst teachers/ they just teach passive
acceptance.  O.K. yes, there are limits, but clearly some are more
prepared to push the boundaries than others/ or allow for their students
to.    
> 
> There's
> > nothing I hate more than hearing tutors speel off reams of
> > interesting/exciting theory that questions these very forms and then
> > they expect you to write in them!
> 
> Ironic, aint it.

Sometimes I wonder whether its not just ironic, but if they actually
understand the material they propose to teach!????

> As a tutor I am sort of obliged to "cover the course" etc. Can't get out
> of it. But I try to avoid the kind of extreme fascism against
> antiproduction that you describe (and not every tutor does). In staffrooms
> in schools and unis it is easy to hear the culturalist snobbery, as if God
> wrote the canon. But not everybody at the academy is like this. I have
> been blessed with a great many open minded teachers, personally. Sometimes
> i wish that some of them were more closed minded, didn't allow me to hang
> myself in my own petard etc. but so? That's just the
> institutionalised habitus talking.
> 

I don't think the problem exists in covering the course -- I always want
the course to be covered -- I just want to hear all the different free
flowing responses and meditations on it.   Another point, though, in
some of the experiences I've had/been involved in when the teacher
over-limits the discussion or promotes an atmosphere where a lot of
students are too scared/self conscious to ask the 'stupid' questions
that most of the time end up being the catalysts to the very best
discussions, we often end up having them anyway standing in the
corridors or sitting around the coffee machine.  It's the tutors in this
instance who end up missing out on the learning experience!   

> 
> I think this goes a long way, is very profound and deep. The production
> of "high" via deferral of the immediate, the role of education in
> producing that "higher pleasure". I'm not sure I'm totally against it,
> would want to give up all my 'higher pleasures" but I wouldn't want JUST
> the "high".

Ahem!   Scare "" or not, sorry "high"/ "higher pleasures"!!????   What
do you mean?   


Chris