Date: Sun, 12 Feb 1995 02:50:22 -0500 (EST)
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim-AT-panix.com>
Subject: My-So-Called-Life




The ABC television show My So-Called Life was, as you probably all know, 
cancelled recently. The show is discussed on alt.tv.my-so-called-life at 
length. When it was on I found myself completely entranced by it, and I 
think it is highly relevant to discussion about constructing subjectivity 
- in fact you can see this sort of thing in the posts on the Usenet 
group. The numerous characters present a polysemic (re. Fiske) diegesis; 
one is literally threaded through the show, reproducing (for me at least) 
a high-school or nerd or neurotic self that plays at playing. 

I must say that while this is film-theory, I think the most exciting work 
in terms of subjectivity is occurring in commercial television, from the 
surface indexicality of narrative on Seinfeld to the King Lear quality of 
Roseanne. My So-Called Life opened up a space which I can only describe 
as _uncanny,_ formed from memories, disappointments, intensities and 
complicit gazes - a space that (again for me at least) creates a 
potential for healing (that old _suturing_ on another level again).

Alan, just returned from reading the group



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