-Derrida is known as the father of Deconstruction
-recognized that writing has both advantages and disadvantages - like good and evil, you cannot have one without the other
-believed that through writing, the work can make an author present without the author being physically present
-all about interpretation...what does the author really mean? (varies from person to person)
-the absence of the author means that we are left with only the text and texts are understood in different ways
-texts are read in various ways AND on multiple levels
-promoted careful reading of texts
-thought that a person's commentary about the texts (their criticism of it) was personal interpretation
-considered "liberal" compared to Hans Georg Gadamer
-thought that Westernized ideas of thinking were embedded in our minds
-thought Gadamer too positive about tradition - was more contemporary in his thought
-thought that readers have sole control over texts
-ALWAYS rethink your interpretations, play with texts you read, be willing to hear what it is saying and above all, QUESTION it - for this is when understanding (deconstruction) takes place.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Apology Paper
A Sudden Manifestation of the Divine
“Okay, so today we will begin our unit on the dissection of fetal pigs,” the balding science teacher said to his class of advanced biology students. “I know that some of you have applied for college already and that many of you are interested in the medical field – nursing, pre-med…”
He began listing off majors in science as Gabby eagerly looked to the back of the room where the fun would begin. She couldn’t wait to put on her nerdy goggles, the smelly plastic apron and the blue latex gloves to eviscerate the smelly dead animal which awaited her presence, scalpel in hand. Unable to wait to get to college to observe cadavers and take all of the required nursing courses, she had decided that the fetal pig was her chance – her chance to show her biology teacher what she was capable of – that she would someday make a great nurse. Maybe then he would consider writing her a letter of recommendation so that she could receive that hefty scholarship and have four years of nursing school paid for. Oh, if only…
“Alright, let’s get started,” he stated, motioning them to the back of the room. Gabby shot up out of her desk, immediately beginning to put on her gear. As soon as it was all on, she raced to the back table and began setting up the tray that would soon hold her dead pig – her future. Nervous anticipation grew within her as her science teacher began to pass around Bag o’ Pig to her fellow classmates, who did not look nearly as enthused as she did. She twiddled her thumbs, eyes darting around with excitement, as she watched the others grimace as they opened the bags that contained the unborn swine.
What a bunch of sissies, she thought to herself. Why were they incapable of just sucking it up and dissecting this damn pig? It wasn’t a daunting task, especially compared to things that she would have to endure as a registered nurse - oooh, which would be happening in the Spring of 2008 – of course she would graduate in as little as four years. She would not be like those losers who stayed in school for 10 years and never received a degree. She thought of one of her favorite touchstones from William Blake’s Proverbs of Heaven and Hell that kept her inspired – kept her on the right track: “If the fool would persist in his folly, he would become wise.” She was not the fool, and would strive, seek, find and never yield. Oh, nice reference to Tennyson, she thought to herself.
It was her time. Her science teacher approached her table with Pig-in-a-Bag – a quite grotesque Pig-in-a-Bag as a matter of fact, she thought as she eyed the contorted specimen, which was soaking in a dirty orange liquid. She wrinkled her nose as he threw it down upon the table; it gave a little bounce and then laid there flat – dead – static.
Suck it up, she thought to herself, knowing that what she would have to endure as a nurse would be far worse than that of a dead fetal pig. She apprehensively took the scissors and began to slice the top of the bag open as the smell of formaldehyde filled her nostrils – stung her eyes, burned her nose, dirtied her once-clean glove. She shut her eyes, gripped the table and tried to breathe evenly. After a moment, she opened them to find that the fetal pig was staring at her with serious eyes – eyes that meant business. To her disbelief, it then began to move its mouth to speak to her!
At this point, Gabby gasped and wondered why none of her other classmates had witnessed the pig move. Why weren’t they freaking out too?! As her eyes widened in terror, the pig spoke: “Gabby, you must know that all structures in words are partly rhetorical, and hence literary, and the notion of scientific or philosophical or verbal structure free of rhetorical elements is an illusion.”
“What the hell are you talking about?!” she shouted loudly at the pig who eyed her intently. The room became silent and all of her classmates turned to look at her, confused. She didn’t even notice their smirks and giggles because the pig continued to speak:
“Gabby, you may get a whole liberal education simply by picking up one unconventional poem and following its archetypes as they stretch out into the rest of literature,” it stated, now attempting to wriggle out of the plastic bag.
Gabby took a step back, and then felt her hands grow sweaty and her knees wobbly and weak. Her vision blurred and her speech became slurred. The pig eyed her intently as her body weakened and fell to the floor, her head smashing against a hard pipe below the hand sink. And then – darkness.
She awoke in the darkness. She awoke in the damp, cold darkness; the darkness of a cave. She groped around frantically, but there was nothing for her to hold onto; no walls - just the hard ground below her. Her head turned desperately in every which way, attempting to find a light, a light to escape from her blindness.
Just as she began to lose all hope and felt the tears welling in her eyes, she looked up straight in front of her. A light bulb. What? She thought to herself. A light bulb has randomly turned on in…a cave? She shook her head in disbelief, but then realized this light bulb was her only hope – her escape from this terrible dark place.
With that she crawled toward this light bulb, desperate to reach it, to see what it meant – to be freed. The rocks ripped and tore the flesh of her hands and knees as she frantically crawled toward the light; she didn’t care. She had to reach the light no matter what. It was her ticket out of this dark place, a place where she had no future, no pleasure, no life.
When she approached the light bulb, she stood up, marveling at its beauty in the darkness; she could feel the warmth it let off and let it caress the tears from her saddened face. “This is why I’m here,” she whispered to herself, understanding it all a little more clearly now.
And suddenly, just as if her words had triggered it, Gabby stood in a field, a beautiful field full of golden flowers of every shape and size. Everything around her seemed to be surrounded by a celestial light, and all she could do was smile and marvel at the wonder that was before her. She was truly happy. She had left the darkness of the cave and had escaped the dull brazen world she had once lived. Where she stood now was where she wanted to be.
Suddenly, an older gentleman in rusted armor rode up to her on his…steed? It startled Gabby when he swiftly jumped off of the horse and fell straight to the ground, armor clanking and scraping against itself.
“My fair lady,” he began, attempting to pull himself from the ground as he groveled at her feet. His eager face looked up at her as she stood before him. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” He staggered to his feet, quickly took her hand and kissed it overzealously.
She giggled as he spoke the words, but allowed it. “Yes, you may,” she replied.
“Thou art more lovely and more temperate. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May. And summer’s lease hath all to short a date…”
As he said the words, he meant the words. Anyone could see that having looked into his honest eyes. “But thy eternal summer shall not fade,” he continued, and then Gabby realized something. Through this poem, this piece of literature, these words that were once scribbled on a page, she would be immortalized; she would live forever.
As the man finished his sonnet, he looked upon her glowing face. She was awed.
“Come with me and be my love?” he asked softly, his gaze never leaving hers.
Gabby smiled and nodded, captivated by this passionate man who stood baring his heart and soul to her. Yes, he was a bit silly, but then again…he was true.
After the old knight and the fair maiden mounted their horse, they rode through the forest and into the sunset to live happily ever after in their house made of books. As they rode, the words of God filled their eager minds: “Poetry is indeed something divine. It is at once the center and circumference of knowledge; it is that which comprehends all science, and that to which all science must be referred. It is at the same time the root and blossom of all other systems of thought; it is that from which all spring, and that which adorns all; and that which, if blighted, denies the fruit and the seed, and withholds from the barren world the nourishment and the succession of the scions of the tree of life.”
“Gabby, Gabby, are you okay? Wake up, please wake up,” a voice said in the distance.
Her eyes fluttered open to see many young faces standing above her - faces of her fellow classmates. A future psychologist, an engineer, a future philosopher, a great mathematician; their faces looked downtrodden, as if something huge was missing from each of their lives, as if they were all incomplete.
“How long was I out?” Gabby asked, lifting her head to look around the room, ignoring the throbbing in her head.
“About thirty seconds,” someone replied.
She scoffed and then giggled at how absurd they sounded. “But I was in a cave, and there was this light bulb, and I followed it. And then I got to it and then suddenly I was in this beautiful field full of these golden flowers, and I met a knight who recited some Shakespeare to me…” she trailed off as the skeptics eyed her as if she was insane.
“Yeaah,” one of the students said, the future engineer. “I think you hit your head a little hard.”
Unphased, she smiled up at her classmates. “It’s okay,” she stated. “You guys don’t get it…and you probably never will.”
“Okay, so today we will begin our unit on the dissection of fetal pigs,” the balding science teacher said to his class of advanced biology students. “I know that some of you have applied for college already and that many of you are interested in the medical field – nursing, pre-med…”
He began listing off majors in science as Gabby eagerly looked to the back of the room where the fun would begin. She couldn’t wait to put on her nerdy goggles, the smelly plastic apron and the blue latex gloves to eviscerate the smelly dead animal which awaited her presence, scalpel in hand. Unable to wait to get to college to observe cadavers and take all of the required nursing courses, she had decided that the fetal pig was her chance – her chance to show her biology teacher what she was capable of – that she would someday make a great nurse. Maybe then he would consider writing her a letter of recommendation so that she could receive that hefty scholarship and have four years of nursing school paid for. Oh, if only…
“Alright, let’s get started,” he stated, motioning them to the back of the room. Gabby shot up out of her desk, immediately beginning to put on her gear. As soon as it was all on, she raced to the back table and began setting up the tray that would soon hold her dead pig – her future. Nervous anticipation grew within her as her science teacher began to pass around Bag o’ Pig to her fellow classmates, who did not look nearly as enthused as she did. She twiddled her thumbs, eyes darting around with excitement, as she watched the others grimace as they opened the bags that contained the unborn swine.
What a bunch of sissies, she thought to herself. Why were they incapable of just sucking it up and dissecting this damn pig? It wasn’t a daunting task, especially compared to things that she would have to endure as a registered nurse - oooh, which would be happening in the Spring of 2008 – of course she would graduate in as little as four years. She would not be like those losers who stayed in school for 10 years and never received a degree. She thought of one of her favorite touchstones from William Blake’s Proverbs of Heaven and Hell that kept her inspired – kept her on the right track: “If the fool would persist in his folly, he would become wise.” She was not the fool, and would strive, seek, find and never yield. Oh, nice reference to Tennyson, she thought to herself.
It was her time. Her science teacher approached her table with Pig-in-a-Bag – a quite grotesque Pig-in-a-Bag as a matter of fact, she thought as she eyed the contorted specimen, which was soaking in a dirty orange liquid. She wrinkled her nose as he threw it down upon the table; it gave a little bounce and then laid there flat – dead – static.
Suck it up, she thought to herself, knowing that what she would have to endure as a nurse would be far worse than that of a dead fetal pig. She apprehensively took the scissors and began to slice the top of the bag open as the smell of formaldehyde filled her nostrils – stung her eyes, burned her nose, dirtied her once-clean glove. She shut her eyes, gripped the table and tried to breathe evenly. After a moment, she opened them to find that the fetal pig was staring at her with serious eyes – eyes that meant business. To her disbelief, it then began to move its mouth to speak to her!
At this point, Gabby gasped and wondered why none of her other classmates had witnessed the pig move. Why weren’t they freaking out too?! As her eyes widened in terror, the pig spoke: “Gabby, you must know that all structures in words are partly rhetorical, and hence literary, and the notion of scientific or philosophical or verbal structure free of rhetorical elements is an illusion.”
“What the hell are you talking about?!” she shouted loudly at the pig who eyed her intently. The room became silent and all of her classmates turned to look at her, confused. She didn’t even notice their smirks and giggles because the pig continued to speak:
“Gabby, you may get a whole liberal education simply by picking up one unconventional poem and following its archetypes as they stretch out into the rest of literature,” it stated, now attempting to wriggle out of the plastic bag.
Gabby took a step back, and then felt her hands grow sweaty and her knees wobbly and weak. Her vision blurred and her speech became slurred. The pig eyed her intently as her body weakened and fell to the floor, her head smashing against a hard pipe below the hand sink. And then – darkness.
She awoke in the darkness. She awoke in the damp, cold darkness; the darkness of a cave. She groped around frantically, but there was nothing for her to hold onto; no walls - just the hard ground below her. Her head turned desperately in every which way, attempting to find a light, a light to escape from her blindness.
Just as she began to lose all hope and felt the tears welling in her eyes, she looked up straight in front of her. A light bulb. What? She thought to herself. A light bulb has randomly turned on in…a cave? She shook her head in disbelief, but then realized this light bulb was her only hope – her escape from this terrible dark place.
With that she crawled toward this light bulb, desperate to reach it, to see what it meant – to be freed. The rocks ripped and tore the flesh of her hands and knees as she frantically crawled toward the light; she didn’t care. She had to reach the light no matter what. It was her ticket out of this dark place, a place where she had no future, no pleasure, no life.
When she approached the light bulb, she stood up, marveling at its beauty in the darkness; she could feel the warmth it let off and let it caress the tears from her saddened face. “This is why I’m here,” she whispered to herself, understanding it all a little more clearly now.
And suddenly, just as if her words had triggered it, Gabby stood in a field, a beautiful field full of golden flowers of every shape and size. Everything around her seemed to be surrounded by a celestial light, and all she could do was smile and marvel at the wonder that was before her. She was truly happy. She had left the darkness of the cave and had escaped the dull brazen world she had once lived. Where she stood now was where she wanted to be.
Suddenly, an older gentleman in rusted armor rode up to her on his…steed? It startled Gabby when he swiftly jumped off of the horse and fell straight to the ground, armor clanking and scraping against itself.
“My fair lady,” he began, attempting to pull himself from the ground as he groveled at her feet. His eager face looked up at her as she stood before him. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” He staggered to his feet, quickly took her hand and kissed it overzealously.
She giggled as he spoke the words, but allowed it. “Yes, you may,” she replied.
“Thou art more lovely and more temperate. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May. And summer’s lease hath all to short a date…”
As he said the words, he meant the words. Anyone could see that having looked into his honest eyes. “But thy eternal summer shall not fade,” he continued, and then Gabby realized something. Through this poem, this piece of literature, these words that were once scribbled on a page, she would be immortalized; she would live forever.
As the man finished his sonnet, he looked upon her glowing face. She was awed.
“Come with me and be my love?” he asked softly, his gaze never leaving hers.
Gabby smiled and nodded, captivated by this passionate man who stood baring his heart and soul to her. Yes, he was a bit silly, but then again…he was true.
After the old knight and the fair maiden mounted their horse, they rode through the forest and into the sunset to live happily ever after in their house made of books. As they rode, the words of God filled their eager minds: “Poetry is indeed something divine. It is at once the center and circumference of knowledge; it is that which comprehends all science, and that to which all science must be referred. It is at the same time the root and blossom of all other systems of thought; it is that from which all spring, and that which adorns all; and that which, if blighted, denies the fruit and the seed, and withholds from the barren world the nourishment and the succession of the scions of the tree of life.”
“Gabby, Gabby, are you okay? Wake up, please wake up,” a voice said in the distance.
Her eyes fluttered open to see many young faces standing above her - faces of her fellow classmates. A future psychologist, an engineer, a future philosopher, a great mathematician; their faces looked downtrodden, as if something huge was missing from each of their lives, as if they were all incomplete.
“How long was I out?” Gabby asked, lifting her head to look around the room, ignoring the throbbing in her head.
“About thirty seconds,” someone replied.
She scoffed and then giggled at how absurd they sounded. “But I was in a cave, and there was this light bulb, and I followed it. And then I got to it and then suddenly I was in this beautiful field full of these golden flowers, and I met a knight who recited some Shakespeare to me…” she trailed off as the skeptics eyed her as if she was insane.
“Yeaah,” one of the students said, the future engineer. “I think you hit your head a little hard.”
Unphased, she smiled up at her classmates. “It’s okay,” she stated. “You guys don’t get it…and you probably never will.”
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Hello. My Name is Ralph Waldo Emerson.
My name is Ralph Waldo Emerson, and I was born in Massachusetts in 1803. Perhaps you’ve heard of me or my work such as Nature or Self-Reliance? Or maybe you’ve heard of my famous speech entitled “The American Scholar”, of which Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. said to be “America’s Declaration of Independence for Intellectuals”.
My education was between Boston’s Latin School and private tutoring; I later went on to study at Harvard on scholarship and struggled with the curriculum due to being the innovative genius of my time.
I followed in my family’s footsteps and entered Harvard Divinity School to become a preacher. Six years after my ordination, I resigned because I thought that formal Christianity only focused on past traditions, and I was more interested in contemporary issues. Have I mentioned that my work ridiculously ground-breaking?
I later educated myself on poetry and writing, and am often referred to as the “Father of American Literature” and one of the first American writers to be recognized by European literary establishments. Not a big deal or anything.
I was a poet, preacher, orator and an essayist; my work was considered controversial in its day, and I articulated our new nation’s prospects and needs through my speeches and through my writing.
I helped many authors get their start; just a few are Walt Whitman, Frederick Douglas, Robert Frost and Louisa May Alcott.
I worked well into my seventies and had my daughter organize my lectures (that moved many) and my journals that inspired new American writers. Work was indeed my life and I kept over 182 journals over my career.
My initial fame came from my critiques of literary, religious and educational establishments. I was known as an experimenter who urged my fellow Americans to reject their regard to old ideas and values to outdated traditions.
Did I mention that I am the leader in the Transcendentalist movement, which is a movement concerning new ideas in literature, religion, culture and philosophy? Yes, the leader.
In closing, I will leave you with a quote from Joel Porte: “Emerson’s fate, somewhat like Shakespeare’s, was that he came to be treated as an almost purely allegorical personage whose real character and work got submerged in his function as a touchstone of critical opinion.”
My education was between Boston’s Latin School and private tutoring; I later went on to study at Harvard on scholarship and struggled with the curriculum due to being the innovative genius of my time.
I followed in my family’s footsteps and entered Harvard Divinity School to become a preacher. Six years after my ordination, I resigned because I thought that formal Christianity only focused on past traditions, and I was more interested in contemporary issues. Have I mentioned that my work ridiculously ground-breaking?
I later educated myself on poetry and writing, and am often referred to as the “Father of American Literature” and one of the first American writers to be recognized by European literary establishments. Not a big deal or anything.
I was a poet, preacher, orator and an essayist; my work was considered controversial in its day, and I articulated our new nation’s prospects and needs through my speeches and through my writing.
I helped many authors get their start; just a few are Walt Whitman, Frederick Douglas, Robert Frost and Louisa May Alcott.
I worked well into my seventies and had my daughter organize my lectures (that moved many) and my journals that inspired new American writers. Work was indeed my life and I kept over 182 journals over my career.
My initial fame came from my critiques of literary, religious and educational establishments. I was known as an experimenter who urged my fellow Americans to reject their regard to old ideas and values to outdated traditions.
Did I mention that I am the leader in the Transcendentalist movement, which is a movement concerning new ideas in literature, religion, culture and philosophy? Yes, the leader.
In closing, I will leave you with a quote from Joel Porte: “Emerson’s fate, somewhat like Shakespeare’s, was that he came to be treated as an almost purely allegorical personage whose real character and work got submerged in his function as a touchstone of critical opinion.”
Saturday, November 8, 2008
The Removal of the Veil
So, I have been reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy, and it has deep apocalyptic themes. By saying that, I just want to laugh at the statement because if one has read it, by saying it has "deep apocalyptic themes", it is the understatement of the century. It is one of the darkest, most sordid and dismal and bleak things I have ever read. Granted, I am not finished with it, and I don't know the outcome, but it cannot possibly end well, and what I have read so far has made me want to cry, to vomit, to throw the book down in disgust - but I just can't stop reading. Oh, and they're making a film out of it, by the way. Can't wait to go to that one! It makes me want to commit suicide just reading it; I don't know how I'll react when I actually watch it.
Anyway, the term "apocalypse" was mentioned in class made me think of this book. And the literal meaning of apocalypse is "the removal of the veil." Dr. Sexson mentioned that everything is indeed an illusion. The world that has ended in the apocalypse is the world that we thought was real, when in all actuality, the curtain has been drawn, and we see now what was underneath - what has always been there but we have failed to see. McCarthy's world is terrifying; it leaves his readers desperate to see this man and his child live to see the next day - a day with no sunlight, with ash falling from the sky, with no food, no shelter, no hope. Is this how he sees our world now? Is McCarthy capable of removing the veil to see all of the ugliness underneath the facade we have created that is our world? I think he views the human race as we are, not as what we perceive ourselves to be. It is all about illusion, isn't it? Without illusion, we would see what is really there, and no one wants that - no one wants to see the truth. It's all a front - it's just an illusion...
"By an apocalypse I mean primarily the imaginative conception of the whole of nature as the content of an infinite and external living body which, if not human, is closer to being human than to being inanimate." -Frye
Here is an excerpt from the book (READ IT - YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED):
Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
I like the thought of being immortalized in poem. Shakespeare notes in many of his sonnets that by him writing them, the person who he speaks of will be remembered forever. Her beauty, her mind, her soul may fade, but through a poem, she will live on forever. What an idea. This is why literature is superior to history and to philosophy. This is why one would much rather (I know I would) read a sonnet rather than a dry account of history from one perspective. In history it seems as if only one person is right; in philosophy, it seems as if no one is right. In literature, however, we are capable of seeing many perspectives, and rather than being right or wrong, we are enlightened with new thought, new knowledge that encompasses our lives - literature connects everything. Give me many perspectives! Give me a rebuttal, such as Sir Walter Raleigh's "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd" to Christopher Marlowe's "A Passionate Shepherd to his Love". Neither one of these sonnets is wrong; neither one is right. But they both offer the author's perspective - the author's voice - the author's rebuttal to something they find to not connect with what they perceive the situation to be. Where else can one find such thinking than that of literature? Not history. And not philosophy. Literature is where it's at. Literature is where one will live forever.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Go Vote! (But know what you're voting for).
So, I was doing some research last night to update myself on the issues that will be posted on the ballots today, and I thought that sharing this information would be helpful to some. The site has information on ballot issues, registration, absentee voting, etc. Check it out:
And if you are unsure of where you should be going to vote, just go to this web site, type in your address, and it will give you the place where you should be voting as well as directions of how to get there! Get off of your asses and go vote, people! You have absolutely no excuse now!
Touchstones
"Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will; to strive, to seek, to find and not to yield."
-Tennyson
"The best lack all conviction while the worst are full of passionate intensity." -Yeats
"Without contraries is no progression." -Blake
So, for the audio and visual portion of this post, I have the one man I can listen to and the rest of the world disappears; no stress, no worries - just his lovely voice. If chocolate could sing, it would sound like Josh Groban. The song is also paired with some lovely imagery of the grandeur of nature - winter, spring, summer, fall - our circle of phases...it's all connected.
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