Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Order for Thursday

The lineup: Catherine (ALT 1-3, see Rhetorical Criticism on BB); Patrick (Continental Criticism, see Continental Theory on BB); Lillian H. (Covino, see #12 under Course Documents). Presenters post below; audience also post on these topics below or on your own blogs. --Dr. L
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3 comments:

Patrick M. said...

Deconstructionist Critique
• "Intensely skeptical of all claims of truth"
• "Language is an unreliable structure that violates its own rules"
• "Challenges rather than confirms assumptions"
• "Explores rather than retraces textual features "
• "Subverts rather than accepts literary or rhetorical artistry"
• Three crucial premises:
1. Meaning is problematic
i. Same words take on different meaning for different people at different times
ii. Derrida's "deferral of meaning in a text
iii. Critical Question: "In how many different ways might people understand this text?"
2. All messages are intertwined
i. "Intertext"
ii. Goodall: campaign images as "intertext"
iii. Jenkins!!
3. Rhetoric is problematic
i. Approach rhetoric like literature
1. Read literature as rhetoric and read rhetoric as literature
2. Declaration of Independence - vs -Canterbury Tales (?)
a. http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/
• Do not worry about producing answers but rather about producing more questions that emphasize the multiple meanings of a text.
• Eagleton quotes pg 319 "…text embarrass their own ruling systems of logic"
• Ford's speech
• Forces a text to be honest with itself
• (?) critics of deconstructionists say they are "anarchists who treat communication as an impossibility …nothing more than radical debunkers" . Are they?




• Marxist and Deconstructionist critiques are at definite odds with one another
• Marxist and Deconstructionist both expose the "complicity between rhetoric, power, and authority"
• Marxist ask, "What social liberation comes out of deconstruction?".
The Marxist Critique
• Repression, Economic instability, Ruling Class, Exploitation
• Four basic premises
1. Economic Factors determine rhetoric
i. "…the possibilities for communication are set by society's structural and economic mechanisms
ii. Eagleton: "Consciousness does not determine life; life determines consciousness".
iii. Engineered insecurity in American society (i.e. deodorants, soaps, body filth) Is this true (?)
2. Messages are produced, not created
i. Calvin Klein Jeans- (?)
1. Is her decision her own?
3. Ideologies leave textual evidence
i. Knowing even "yourself as the product of a historical process that has deposited its traces in you".
4. Established Institutions need rhetoric
i. Rhetorical establishment
ii. Cultural capitol
iii. Conglomeration of media influences erects rhetorical establishment. Jenkins!
• Marxist criticism as process:
o Reestablish the history that produced the text
• By particular people/ for particular people
o Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable
• University of Texas Parking Regulations
• Those critical of Marxism say that it Marxist "rough [a text] up …until it says what is ideologically required by the interpreter's community". Is it (?)
• Last paragraph - Call to arms. (?)

February 21, 2008 at 7:42 AM
Anonymous said...

What is the American way of criticising texts? I agree with Heart that it is politically motivated and dictated by those holding power. With a close look at the unedited version of the Declaration of Independence we find that Thomas Jefferson had extensive thoughts about the mistreatment of slaves. He believed that slavery should be abolished (which is quite hypocritical considering he owned his own slaves), but this entire section of the Declaration was edited out of the document so to appease every member of the Continental Congress. Here the power overruled the opinoin and dictated an integral portion of our American history.

February 21, 2008 at 9:37 AM
Anonymous said...

Ok, my computer died before I could finish what I wanted to say...

Continuing with the Marxist notion Hart discusses it is easy to see why the Declaration would have been edited the way it was. Many members of the Continental Congress were not ready to give up their livlihoods that depended so much on slave labor; thus, the black populartion was not included in the group that deserved "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." The economic benefits of holding slaves overruled the depraved state in which slaves lived. If I upheld the Marxist viewpoint I would claim that this notion will never change as long as the money is in the hands of the powerful and the power in the hands of the rich.

February 21, 2008 at 11:32 AM

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