Date: Thu, 2 Mar 1995 09:12:33 -0800 (PST)
From: Kenny Mostern <kennym-AT-uclink2.berkeley.edu>
Subject: Re: responsibility and decon


Bruce Simon--

It seems to me that decon's argument that, as you put it, responsibility 
can't be programmed in advance, is a fine common sense notion that hardly 
needs philosophical generation let alone constant restatement and 
reelaboration.  For at least some of us the issue with decon has never been 
that it is wrong, but that it doesn't help us ask the questions we care about, 
such as, given a set of historical conditions (about, for example, 
postmodern capitalism) and a given sociocultural location (say, the U.S. 
academy) what set of responsibilities do we have?  This question in no way 
implies that the answer is always knowable in advance of action.  But that 
doesn't mean the question becomes irrelevent, or that guidelines and 
tendencies should not be sought.  It is in this context that I have never 
thought that close readings of canonical philosophers all of which 
ultimately argue the identical point--that systems cannot be built 
without something outside the system--is a pointless act.  Not wrong, but 
nothing I should have to suffer through, either.  And you can't do cultural 
studies in the U.S. today without suffering through Derrida.

Kenny Mostern
UC-Berkeley Ethnic Studies Graduate Group

Against:  racism, sexism, homophobia, capitalism, militarism
For:  the truth--and the funk!



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