Hi Dom
> I was taught somewhat differently, I should say. Partly I was self-taught,
> reading outside the curriculum
I enjoy reading readings of theory which undertake the sort of honest
engagement you undertake. Also, I detect someone who is concerned with taking
responsibility for their discourse, in your response. Even if it were nothing
else, this is to be admired and respected.
What I dislike or dismiss is a sort of dogmatic repetition of a line which
appears or claims to spiral out of the bowels of this or that institution.
To my way of thinking this is a type of stupidity.
> You could probably get Terry Eagleton, state-sponsored pedagogue, to agree
> with you about that one.
Terry Eagelton's a funny fellow. I have enjoyed some of his stuff. I am not,
however, in my criticism of state sponsored pedagogy an utopian idealist. I
am quite happy to teach in the university system. Only utopian idealists who
can't handle paradox will have trouble with that. I do live in the world and
claim the right to be critical of this world (I say that without implying
anyone on this list denies me this.)
I understand and appreciate your points about politics and the refusal of the
overdetermination of one over the other. So am I not ignoring it. I just want
to skip to your question.
> > Yale deconstruction, as it is properly recognised, was
> > complicit in continuing the spread of the HIV pandemic within populations
> > of young gay men, perhaps. Yale is a homophobe?
> You cannot be serious. Or, to put it another way, a great many things
> besides literature, a "deconstructive" approach to literature [snip]
The question has been posed before by others and I have twisted somewhat
Douglas Crimp to do this, with apologies. From my perspective, however,
the better question is: am I joking? Yes and I am deadly serious. I should
warn against a prosaic reading, first. (Except, I must admit to a perverse
interest in conspiracy theories.) A fashion passed me by in Sydney in the
early 90s called queer theory. It was so flakey and stupid I let it go by,
having other urgent tasks to do. Recently I came across it again in a more
grotesque form, a antithetic synthesis of Foucault and a book called _Gender
trouble_, so I thought this may be interesting to map. Norris and deMann were
the claimed authorative texts, the first time I saw this odd thing calling
itself queer theory which went on to claim there is no such thing as
homosexuality. What was being said would be an insult to Norris and deMann,
which is why your response is so important. As you so rightly point out, the
political situation of the Reagan years in response to HIV/AIDS is erased
from this discursive manifestation of queer theory, as it crudely presented
itself in Sydney. So the connection occurs only as a mapping, not a tracing,
in order to construct a way in which the various partial readings, with their
resulting insults to Norris and deMann, may have occurred. Simply, how was
this possible? The joking I refer to is a sketching of a parodic flat-lining
of this queer theory, as I experienced it, and hence deadly serious.
Your comments then are very useful in giving me some more detail of the
situation in the States and also ways of approaching the connections between
HIV/AIDS and the sort of homophobic queer theory I saw passing by in 1990s
Sydney. Thanks for taking the time. Most appreciated.
Chris Jones.
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