From: Patsloane <Patsloane-AT-aol.com>
Date: Mon, 5 Jan 1998 19:19:46 EST
Subject: Re: PLC: O.T. : N.T :: Freud : Lacan (Was Cultural studies)


>  But really, in this
>  matter I'm curious in the general phenomena of the derailed textual
>  tradition: Old Testament to new, Freud to Lacan, Hegel to Marx, O.T./N.T. 
>  to Islam. It seems perhaps in all of these cases (of Islam I'm woefully
>  unfamiliar) that there is a similar mechanism at work: a spectacular new
>  read coupled with a thematization and justification of the inceptive
>  breach. Almost performative in its logic: depending, as it were, on the
>  extra-textual gauarantee of a charasmatic "new reader." Perhaps this might
>  explain the pseudo-messianic cultifying of the figure of Derrida--merely
>  the reactivation of a familiar logic? 
>  
>  James
>  
I agree it's all the same mechanism. You don't get rid of the text, like the
Spaniards burning the Inca holy books.  You say, keep the text, but you've
never understood its "real" meaning, which I will proceed to unfold (and which
you can't learn  anywhere except from me).  The exclusionary aspect reminds me
of those magazine ads that say "Send $29.95 for the hidden secrets of the
ages." It's all flim flam.  

pat


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