From: "Diane Davis" <ddd-AT-mail.utexas.edu>
Subject: RE: Gorgias and the fragility of reality
Date: Mon, 14 Apr 2003 10:44:30 -0500


Hi, Eric. That was funny! Our messages crossed in electromagnetic space.
Unfortunately, I've not been reading the list very carefully
lately--seriously overloaded right now--so I'm not certain what you all
are talking about concerning Helen! But I'd say there is indeed a
feminist angle to Gorgias's reading, you're right about that. Or, well,
a post-fem angle (but not pre-fem). At any rate, a post-humanist angle.
According to a certain read of this text, it's less a text on Helen than
on decision. No decision is strictly possible, Gorgias suggests (well
before Derrida), without the experience of the undecidable. If decision
were simply possible, then no decision would be necessary; but if no
decision is possible, if the subject is incapable of MAKING a decision,
*that* is when a decision is necessary, is called for. And right then,
in a kai(e)rotic moment, a moment of madness that overwhelms the
subject, a decision takes place that then makes the subject. The
decision makes the subject rather than the other way around. 

~ddd

___________________________________________
  D. Diane Davis
  Division of Rhetoric & Department of English
  1 University Station B5500
  University of Texas at Austin 
  Austin, TX 78712-0200 

  Office: 512.471.8735; Dept: 471.6109; FAX: 471.4353
  ddd-AT-mail.utexas.edu
  http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~davis

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu [mailto:owner-
> lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu] On Behalf Of Eric
> Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2003 11:06 AM
> To: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> Subject: RE: Gorgias and the fragility of reality
> 
> Diane,
> 
> This is very weird. You sent out this message to me during the same
> minute I sent out a message about you.  This is ALMOST COSMIC!
> 
> Thanks for the info!
> 
> By the way, how do you see the Helen text? To use modern parlance, it
> seems feminist to me since Gorgias undertakes to defend Helen, which
was
> probably a bold and controversial undertaking back then.  At the same
> time, he posits Helen in such a way that she seems almost like a kind
of
> badminton birdie tossed about by Fate, the Gods, Male Seduction,
> Language, and Love.
> 
> eric
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> [mailto:owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu] On Behalf Of Diane
> Davis
> Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2003 10:54 AM
> To: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> Subject: RE: Gorgias and the fragility of reality
> 
> Just fyi, eric: in addition to Vitanza's pathbreaking work on Gorgias
> and Helen, you might be interested in Michelle Ballif's excellent
book,
> _Seduction, Sophistry, and the Woman with the Rhetorical Figure_, the
> second chapter of which is titled "Seduction and Sacrificial Gestures:
> Gorgias, Helen, and Nothing."  Michelle was Victor's student, and on
> this question of Helen, they each got a world of inspiration from the
> other. ~ddd
> 
> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu [mailto:owner-
> > lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu] On Behalf Of gvcarter-AT-purdue.edu
> > Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2003 9:37 AM
> > To: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu; Eric
> > Cc: lyotard-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> > Subject: RE: Gorgias and the fragility of reality
> >
> >
> > Eric,
> >
> > Right, Lyotard is already--or, probably better to say "will have
> been"--an
> > important part of the Rhetoric discussion.  Again, Vitanza is
probably
> the key
> > figure in the field to forward his work (and many, many others), and
> if you're
> > interested in his wide scope, I highly recommend his Negation,
> Subjectivity and
> > the History of Rhetoric (1997).
> >
> > Now the Gorgias debate might be characterized in the following
> fashion:
> >
> > Edward Schiappa has attempted to do rhetorical historiography by
> recovering
> > what the words mean in the context in which they were written
> (ipissima
> > verba).  That is, there is some kind of discoverable translation of
> certain
> > words, and that these words cannot cross certain historical
boundaries
> that can
> > be delineated.
> >
> > John Poulakos, by way of contrast, has attempted to read the
sophists
> as the
> > other party involved in the formulation of Platonic/Aristotliean
> thinking.
> > That is, his rhetorical historiography attempts to generate "so
what?"
> > arguments about the tension early sophists had with figures who are
> now more
> > widely known.  This work seeks, as you put it, to look at the
"latent
> > possibility of denial" in now canonized works vis-a-vis the
> pre-socratics.
> >
> > Schiappa and Poulakos locked horns over whether one can interpret
> history along
> > the lines of denial or whether the words only "mean what they mean"
> (to which
> > one asks, rhetorically, "What does that mean?!"=) semi-famously, in
> the journal
> > Philosophy and Rhetoric back in 1983.
> >
> > Yet a third part of this discussion is Scott Consigny's recent work
> Gorgias:
> > Sophist and Artist (2001). He sees Gorgias as a key figure in
> realizing the
> > dynamic of "Agonistic Communities," and he suggests that Gorgias
> philosophizes
> > on the necessary tensions.  (In some ways, Consigny accounts for
> facets of the
> > Poulakos/Schiappa debate, though it's worth noting that Consigny
> positions
> > himself against both of them.  He sees Schiappa has too hung up on
the
> actual
> > words, and Poulakos being too "application" oriented.  Consigny
views
> the
> > community as the sole arbitrator, and since this opinion must be
won,
> it can
> > never be known in advance.
> >
> > Consigny's argument, though hitting upon quasi-Lyotardian notions of
> the
> > differend, at times, does not reference his work.  In many respects,
> Vitanza's
> > spin on Gorgias that tries to recognize the ethics of pre-socratic
> moves is
> > more interesting.  He stretches Gorgais's Encomium of Helen across
> feminist
> > lines and attempts to denegate EVEN THOSE lines via Cixous and
Judith
> Butler.
> > This feminist may seem odd to outsiders, but, really, if I had to
> characterize
> > the tensions of the field, I see Gorgias's Helen essay as very
> important to how
> > Rhetorical studies current positioning--despite the fact that
> Vitanza's work is
> > sometimes (unfortunately) dismissively put aside.
> >
> > That's the best I can do as far a nutshell is concerned.  Hope this
> serves as
> > something of a sketch of a debate that is, of course, more
complicated
> than
> > I've rendered here.
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Geof
> >
> >
> > Quoting Eric <ericandmary-AT-earthlink.net>:
> >
> > > Geof,
> > >
> > > I really would like to hear more about this, especially if you
could
> > > give a kind of thumbnail sketch of this debate.
> > >
> > > Let me just make this one comment for right now, since my fingers
> > > already have blisters from typing.
> > >
> > > Yes, Gorgias was certainly in the background of what I wrote, the
> > > Gorgias section of Chapter 1 of the "The Differend."  Maybe I am
> just
> > > stating the obvious, but I am surprised no one explicitly made
that
> > > connection.
> > >
> > > The differend is obviously concerned with conflict, but I find it
> > > interesting that Lyotard begins his discussion talking about the
> kind of
> > > epistemological denial practiced by historical revisionists and,
as
> > > Gorgias shows, this latent possibility of denial is contained in
> every
> > > assertion of existence as a kind of ontological shadow.
> > >
> > > It would be interesting to connect the arguments in Rhetoric with
> > > Lyotard. (or is that already a part of the discussion?)
> > >
> > > eric
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >