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FILM-PHILOSOPHY  2004

FILM-PHILOSOPHY 2004

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Subject:

Re: Symbol and Index

From:

Nathan Andersen <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

Film-Philosophy Salon <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Thu, 20 May 2004 12:07:20 -0400

Content-Type:

text/plain

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text/plain (71 lines)

In response to my response, Rob wrote:

>I would need to see in very specific terms how your distinctions
>between index/sign/icon/symbol might help develop a meaningful argument.
>Hasn't deconstructionist thinking put an end to these philosophical
>distinctions.

I have to admit that although I am familiar with these distinctions from
Peirce, I haven't ever done much to use them in discussions of film (except
for occasional discussions of symbolisms, and of the way film can eschew
symbolism and index the real) -- so I'm not going to produce an argument
about a film that shows them to be unproblematic and helpful (although I'm
sure lots of people on the list could give citations for several such
arguments).  My message was really in response to the line of thinking that
says, "these distinctions can be problematized, and any usage of them can be
called into question, so doesn't that render them useless?"

I think the response to this question, and the response to the question
about deconstructionist thinking is along the same lines.  Mike Frank
helpfully gave the pragmatic part of the answer: that however problematic
they might appear from one perspective, it still seems worthwhile (and fun
or intriguing and satisfying of curiosity) to employ such distinctions in
our efforts to make sense of things we are interested in.

Another part of the answer is that even when "deconstructive thinking" is
brought to bear, it does not so much render distinctions useless as reveal
interesting things about them.  But it can't do this until the distinctions
are in place and reasonably well understood to begin with.  You don't
deconstruct a straw man set of distinctions.  (Derrida did not write "Of
Grammatology" because he thought J.L. Austin was an idiot.)You deconstruct a
well-established framework, a powerful text, etc., to show (roughly) that it
achieves its clarity or force only by obscuring something more subtle and
basic that renders problematic the things it takes for granted.  What this
means, though, is that in the course of a desconstructive reading of a text
or film or whatever, you have to begin a careful reading of what the text or
film makes clear and explicit, and only then do you attempt to expose what
is obscured or hidden by such a reading and yet turns out to be the
unacknowledged factor that reading depends on.  (I know that this is not
very precise, but I've got to get back to grading papers, and so I'm
attempting to give a quick and dirty response).

An excellent example of this, in relation to the distinctions that started
this discussion, is the interchange between Rob T and Mike Frank.  Rob
pointed to the neorealist effort to eschew symbolism in film, and let a
knife just be a knife.  But he wondered why we couldn't say of any element
of any film that it is just what it is and not a symbol of anything else.
One answer is to point to history -- to say what a work is "trying" to
achieve requires that we see it as a specific response to a specific
historical problem (e.g. the failure of the "white telephone" films to speak
to the reality of post WWII).  Mike (in what amounts to a deconstructionist
reading of the neorealist attempt to avoid symbolism) pointed out further
that if a film sets up its knife as just a knife, then that really renders
the knife as a representation of "not-phallus."  The very effort to avoid
symbolism in favor of "realism" turns out to reintroduce another form of
symbolism.  But I guess the point to notice is that in the course of this
discussion we learn something.  Moreover, you can't think about this more
subtle form of symbolism without already thinking the first; and so the
deconstructive reading does not render terms like "symbol" or "reality"
useless, just shows that they cannot be resting points but merely starting
points for thought.  As Mike F. points out, the process of interpretation is
endless -- but that doesn't mean we don't get anywhere in the process or
that we are perpetually beginners.  We learn loads of things along the way.

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