File spoon-archives/lyotard.archive/lyotard_1999/lyotard.9907, message 10


Date: Wed, 07 Jul 1999 08:33:45 -0700
From: Lois Shawver <rathbone-AT-california.com>
Subject: Re: opening salvo


Hugh,

Do we need metanarratives daily?  It all depends on how we define
metanarratives, and whether or not you and I find consensus depends in
part on whether or not we can co-construst a language game in which we
define it similarly.  If not, then we will simply talk past each other.

By "metanarrative" I mean a narrative that we assimilate all the facts
to in order to totalize it.  Something like Hegel's dialectic, Marx's
dialectical materialism, or Freud's Oedipus Comoplex.  Every instance is
interpreted in such a way to prove the absolute universality of the
story.  The content of the metanarrative is no different, to my mind,
than a simple narrative.  That's the way I make the most sense of what
Lyotard has to say so that's how I am inclined to pin down the meaning
of the term.

But, we MUST set up the rules of our language locally and provisionally
if we are to make paralogy together.  how are you defining this term? 
And can you think of it in my terms, or do I need to come to yours in
order for us to talk about these things? 

..Lois Shawver

hugh bone wrote:
> 
> Lois Shawver wrote:
> >
> > Thanks to Judy and Colin for stimulating and cordial conversation on
> > Lyotard!
> >
> > Colin, to my way of thinking, it is important to avoid evaluating
> > Lyotard as if he were presenting just a better metanarrative.  Lyotard,
> > like Wittgenstein and Derrida show us new paths out of the trap of
> > making metanarratives.  I believe they also give us clues as to how we
> > make metanarratives.
> 
> -AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT--AT-
> 
> Perhaps we can find among the few dozen people who've come to this
> Lyotard place, sufficient interests, beliefs, thoughts, convictions
> about
> who they are and how the World works to create a meta-conversation.
> 
> I think of metanarratives as essential.  Like civilizations, they rise,
> evolve, are discredited, and may eventually survive, only as history.
> 
> The new metanarrative of globalism is driven by the old metanarrative of
> the divinely ordered State.  The fall of the Wall and the unforseen
> advances in computer technology and global communication have made this
> possible.
> 
> We need metanarratives as we need maps in strange territories or lights
> in dark rooms.  Science has given us new metanarratives.  The Cosmos,
> DNA, the worlds within a single cell, the trillions of connections in
> your brain.
> 
> We need paralogy and the local, and the social bonds.  The cult of the
> divine right of the State dies slowly.  It took this country through
> WWI, WWII, Korean, Vietnam, Persian Gulf, and Kosovo wars, and a lot of
> other hostile actions too numerous to mention.
> 
> Our military is a strong support of the metanarrative of free trade and
> globalism.
> 
> Just as old-fashioned imperialism destroyed the local, globalism is
> destroying the local.
> 
> >From the days when Western heirs of the Romans and Greeks, ethinic
> cleansed the indigenous peoples of the Americas, Australia, and much of
> Africa, the practice of destroying native villages to enrich remote and
> wealthy conquerors continues.
> 
> The logic of the local and the Social Bond is a coupling of interest
> and interaction with people who are part of one's physical existence.
> 
> But we cannot escape a linkage to remote powers and events, whether the
> Pope, the terrorists, the IRS, or the telphone robots who defeat
> communication.  This is the metanarrative we live daily.
> 
> Best,
> Hugh

   

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