Theory, Having Just Begun

Actually I've been enjoying the quality of discussion at both the Holbo and Bérubé empires this week very much, even if the premise and primary target (which is to say the target of the Theory's Empire book––something in its conception at least not entirely unmarked by genre, perhaps, and let's just note again here how the words "French Theory" (or indeed just "theory") were always something of a uniquely Anglo invention*)...even if the general target of this book (the "anthology of dissent" currently receiving so much attention) may never have been in much dispute.  Most literature professors (at least at the undergrad level, and perhaps beyond) who "do theory" exclusively in the Anglo world, do so poorly.  Sure, I guess.  (But are they really an "empire" now? How innocent is this irony really?)  While the ones who do it well, well...they do it without you even knowing what they're up to!

Let's face it, anybody blindly championing "theory" at this stage as a panacea be-all and end-all, pat diagnostic device, pathway to tenure, carte blanche license to avoid the text entirely, or name-drop and cite without the slightest concern for context, logic, or verifiability, seemingly overwhelmed by TEOTOB...this anybody really knows very little about theory, truth be told.  Indeed, this anybody might be living in a cave, oblivious to the current trends of the academic job market, for that matter, or the semi(barely)-covert assault on all things "PC" and "liberal" in cultural studies, literature departments, and so on, as the corporatization (and scientification) of our beloved universities progresses daily.

Anyone else have any thoughts?  We're supposed to be the resent-nik Zizekians, remember!

What do you think, is "doing theory" not one of those faux pas right up there with proclaiming oneself to be "postmodern" (as in, it's just not, you know, something one does, if one wishes also to be taken seriously)?  I put it to the world.

Update:  There's an interesting post up at Savage Minds about this whole book "event" thing, by the by. Update: And quite a bit more...

*

"Deconstruction in the singular," he said, does not exist" (Derrida, 2001: 15). If "deconstruction" and "French theory" have died, it had died a death without end, for when it "comes to the end of deconstruction, to the end of French theory," he told his audience, "the fall lasts, it repeats itself, it keeps insisting, it keeps multiplying" (Derrida, 2001: 16-17). Anticipating the disappointment of those who had come to hear his repentive eulogy for deconstruction, he said: I fear that I will disappoint those who in reading the title may have come mouth watering, to see someone contritely admit to the failure of a whole project, a whole lifetime, and confess with a tear in his eye: "Contrary to what I had thought or tried to make others think, I must recognize that deconstruction is impossible. Please forgive me, that was a faux pas." I just asked for a grand pardon, and now I must beg your pardon for not begging pardon. (Derrida, 2001: 17-18)

In short, to speak of "theory" in the abstract (or for that matter "Theory", however exactly wrong the pufferfish image may strike you), is as a matter of translation rather meaningless.  Any French person for instance would immediately sniff at you in impatient incomprehension––"theory yes, but theory of what?" (To which the American if she be skilled, and having promptly recognized the sheer folly of her ways, will perform on the instant a sort of self-humiliating Lenny Bruce routine, complete with multiple exaggerated personalities and repetitive use of the word, "dopey." After which the French person will leave in a huff, looking over his shoulder and perhaps slightly afraid for hir personal safety.)

(Lucky us, that ten of the 13 best pages are even available online, thanks to Google Print, thus seemlessly melding in one post what is popularly known as techno-Franco-phoria.)

Comments

[Alain]

Matt

I just glanced at Adam's piece and I think your comments are dead on. These criticisms of Derrida go back to the 1970's and are very tiresome. He is held accountable for all the nonesense that American academics present as "deconstructive criticism." Of course, Derrida has always problematized the relationship between an author, his work, and its appropriation (his work on Nietzsche, Marx, Freud and Heidegger comes to mind). So on Derridean terms, he cannot be absolved of all guilt/debt. But it seems these Valve people must have something better to do then to pick at a corpse, all puns intended.

[Jonathan]

Alain,

Columbia UP published the book. The Valve (and others) posted a series of essays on it. The one linked to here by Adam Kotsko was critical of the Abrams essay. How this equates to picking at a corpse, I'm not sure. Perhaps some parentheses are in order.

[Parentheses]

(...)

[Jodi]

Matt,
I only glanced at the Valve discussion.

Here's how it looks from my little corner of the world. I don't get and never have gotten all the fuss about literary theory. Perhaps this is because political theory thinks of itself as going back to Plato and so doesn't worry about such matters and perhaps because the rest of Political Science pays no attention to us anyway so we don't usually get involved in discussions about taking over a field or that sort of thing.

More generally, the great thing about polemics is that they claim to change the world. The great thing about theory is that it is slow, meticulous, detailed, precise, cautious and, one would hope, audacious all at the same time. One doesn't usually expect the latter to change the world in an instant, that is, to solve are our problems, etc. Or, even when theory does the change the world, which it can, then it creates new problems and new dilemmas. So, has anyone blindly championed theory? Blindly championing anything would seem quite a silly thing to do.

Finally, Zizek says somewhere that the moment when something is claimed to be lost is usually the moment when it is the strongest, when it is now hegemonic or natural or the order of things (not his phrasing, but you get the idea). I think that his holds true with theory. So, sure, all the folks at Cultural Inquiry are worrying about what's left of theory and folks have been lamenting the demise of theory for the past 30 years. But, doesn't that suggest that the last 30 years have been years of strength for theory, for theoretical work? Maybe the 'death' is the death of the Master, which means that then fields are more open and the rest of us can think, can breathe, can get some work done.

If theory is dead, then it is dead that has enabled it to reconstitute myriad fields, dead so that others may live, dead in a way that has created new languages, new discourse (not a new Symbolic, though!).

Theory is dead. Long live theory!

[Alain]

Jonathan

I meant no offense (Just to be clear, I am not the one who posted the parantheses, though I find it amusing). I am someone who spent sometime in academia in the United States more than 10 years ago. I have never stopped reading and enjoying the great works of philosophy, literature, and a little bit of what has come to be known as theory. But fighting over things that seem to have been fought over many times before is not my bag. I acknowledge, however, that these issues keep coming back - so they must reveal something of their political, if not theoretical, importance.

[Alain]

Theory is Dead! Long Live Long Sunday!!!!

[Matt]

interesting.

[Matt]

Just to be clear, I really was 99% sincere in my general praise of this multi-headed event (and not just vent), which by the way continues. For whatever it's worth I recommend people take a more patient look, and also, perhaps more importantly, take part. I know he gives no points for sucking up, but the new post at Bérubé's is especially good today, seeing as it's "Theory Tuesday."

Maybe we should have a No-Theory Day here at Long Sunday, not with baby pictures or cats...maybe some music, a little sex?

[Alain]

Matt

I love it! Yea Baby! Oh Behave.

[Matt]

Um, anyone else?

(no offense, Alain!)

[RIPope]

I'm fine with a day of no theory. Cats and babies, sure thing. Though one must engage theory with cats, actually. The choice of cat is an indication, a symptom, of one's mode of existence. Oops.

But you see, there is nothing wrong with `doing theory', if we understand the theory we're doing to be able to diagnose symptoms and thus to then predict how certain actions will lead to various reactions. As such theory is in itself an intervention. Accessability is another issue, of course, and even in European cultures where intellectuals are still valued such intellectuals are still very much cloistered - and in any case they're more into maintaining their symbolic capital than disseminating it somehow to the masses.

It's not like the Holbos or whatever of the world do much good. Their work stands in opposition to doing theory; it seeks not to change the world but to make sure it remains the same. It purposefully avoids the act, any hope of change (and calls anyone who actually tries to intervene a `totalitarian').

With theory, you diagnose a truth. As soon as you've done it, the world changes.

[s0metim3s]

Might I suggest Rebecca Comay's "Geopolitics of Translation: Deconstruction in America", Stanford French Review 15 (1991).

[jdean]

what does it mean when theorists don't do theory? won't we still ultimately end up reading everything as theory? I'm game for trying, will include stuff about Brittany Spears or the weeds in my garden.

[Matt]

Thanks, A.

While we're at it...Joan Brandt's _Geopoetics: The Politics of Mimesis in Postructuralist French Poetry and Theory_ is also very, very good.

http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?book_id=2760%202761