File spoon-archives/bhaskar.archive/bhaskar_2000/bhaskar.0004, message 30


Date: Mon, 10 Apr 2000 10:29:18 -0500 (CDT)
From: Timothy A Dayton <tadayton-AT-ksu.edu>
Subject: Re: BHA: Negelect of Bhaskar (Marx?)


As to the seemingly inexplicable popularity of Butler et al. among
undergraduates and graduate students--or more accurately among their
teachers who pass along an enthusiasm for such stuff--I think a part of
the answer lies in a comment I remember Jameson making in a class I took
with him ten or fifteen years ago. (It might actually have been made by a
much less well-known fellow named Rick Roderick, but no matter).  He was
talking about the split between materialism and idealism as it has been
treated within Marxism and paused to mention realism as an alternative (if
materialism is understood in a mechanical sense).  Then he said that the
problem--at least for humanities types--is that realism isn't elegant, and
(begin irony) we like our theories elegant (end irony).

The Deluze/Butler/other flavor of the week crowd simply have an easier
time of it.  Much of this no doubt also has to do with the resentment of
humanities academics: if we can turn everything into a narrative of some
kind or other, then really we are the ones who hold the key to all
knowledge.  Of course, the salaries are lower (wounded middle-class
pride), and no one takes us very seriously (wounded professional pride).  
Yet we are, along with Shelley's poets, "the unacknowledged legislators of
mankind."  Yee-haw.

Tim

Tim Dayton
English Department
Kansas State University
Manhattan, KS 66506-0701



     --- from list bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005