File spoon-archives/lyotard.archive/lyotard_2001/lyotard.0102, message 38


Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 13:33:18 -0500
From: "Smith, Donald S" <Donald.S.Smith-AT-usa.xerox.com>
Subject: RE: Becoming Intellectuals Without Organs



Eric wrote:
<<<<<<<What if the concept of intellectual did not need to involve a subject
at
all?  How is an intellectual without organs possible?  (How do we become
Deleuzian without becoming delusional?)

Perhaps in Lyotardian terms, an intellectual is an articulation of the
impossible phrase, giving voice (silent or otherwise) to feeling; to
libidinal desires (even without a set-up).

Perhaps the intellectual is simply a becoming; a singularity, not an
individual; an event, not a person.

Not who is an intellectual, but rather "Is it happening?">>>>>>>>


Isn't hegemony the disembodiment of intellectuals? To me, hegemony
establishes a Zeitgeist that disguises ideology as common sense. For example
when I discuss the disproportionate distribution of wealth with
acquaintances they justify it as a part of the natural order of things. They
say that to accumulate as much as possible is human nature. They see
meritocracy as a natural condition rather than a socially constructed
institution. Why do they think this way rather than otherwise? Hegemony! 

For me the important characteristic of hegemony is the insidious way in
which it creates a common sense in the service of power in such subtle ways
that the victims participate in their own undoing. I think Foulcault was
effective in pointing out the often subtle ways in which discourse forms the
subject in the interest of power.

Don 


   

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