Henry,
What you’re saying is that post ’75 Mulvey realized that gurlz like to watch boyz, too. Freud was wrong.
Therefore, a strict representationalism would involve nothing more than a fairness doctrine in which there’s an equal opportunity to gaze. As this, in a manner of speaking, was easily accommodated, after three years of pondering, our author(ess) moved on.
It’s furthermore obvious that cinematic representationalism closely follows the poly sci flag, or the manner in which various groups are/not represented by virtue of number. In other words, to inquire why and to what ends people gaze is roughly analogous to the old expression, “An equal distribution of inequality”. Both beg questions regarding ends; which in turn delves into issues of meaning—or ‘signification’.
Yet my answer might appear to some to be (provocatively) simple: The impetus of early Woman’s Lib provided a platform for a gaze-equal screen. Women could now stare at nekked men because they now had the means to pay. Two generations hence, this tendency now ebbs and flows in some sort of Kultural zeitgeist. To a small extent, women are now taught that gazing isn't nice.
I agree that the distinction rep/sig is a convenience, at best. This is because, strictly speaking, a philosophy of representationalism would depend upon an extreme empiricism that’s supported by two pillars: analytic truths and reductionism of sensation to word. In this world, meaning would be self-evident. Anyone who saw things ‘properly’ would have access to the truths that are simply theirs for the taking. And this, to a great extent, is still the dominant ideology of
Yet the fact is that we derive meaning from words, concepts and things in a rather jumbled and disputed fashion. We generally sneer at orthodox Marxists and Randites who pretend some genre of ‘objectivity’ that the rest of us lack. Quine, in any case, finished off the epistemic issue ‘way back in ’51….
And yes, I also agree that cinema has always been about desiring machines. My dispute seems to be that in many cases the cinematic object of desire seems to be more of the clearly visible than of the symbolic order. Is there, perhaps, a misunderstanding among certain individuals that semiotics is all there is to significance?
Moreover, much is missed when the viewer simply doesn’t grasp what’s directly before his/her very eyes; in which case semiology becomes a cover story. In other words, when the chorus in Blue sings ‘Ean tais glossis’, you either understand the text, or don’t….there is nothing to decode.
BH
I generally avoid potty talk because of my strong preference for citation and source over gossip. Ditto for ex-cathedra pronouncements of the sort that my own two girls abandoned in their late teens. That’s because their becoming a lawyer and a chemist necessitated a respect for facts—provocative or otherwise.
In this case, my reference to Mulvey’s article is clear; and board readers who are sufficiently versed in the old philosophical polemic between representation and meaning are free to decide for themselves on which side Mulvey’s article falls. Indeed, Sarah’s un-named source saw a rupture between the two modes of discourse, and I do, too.
That certain hidebound semioticians cannot see what others clearly observe on the surface is their problem—which is ostensibly augmented by the necessity that their own intellectual tools dictate. This, of course, has indeed included feminism, which is why I’ve always seen Mulvey's ’75 article as such a welcome break.
On other hand, I personally do not see semiotics as necessarily trivial. Harraway, for example, wonderfully described how sex and power works its way into Biological theory. In (decon)Law, it’s rather clear that certain discursive forms carry more truth than others: white over black, male over female, etc…
Yet it would still seem to me that Mulvey’s article trivializes semiotics in the sense that she explains 95% of what needs to be explained. It’s all super-fically self-evident that moovees are made because guys like to stare at girls and imagine having sex with them. A darkened room with a screen affords them this opportunity because, with the exception of Liz Berkley, the girl doesn't stare back. The rest is dross.
BH
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 2009 21:39:53 -0400
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Screen Theory query
To: [log in to unmask]
* * Film-Philosophy Email Discussion Salon After hitting 'reply' please always delete the text of the message you are replying to To leave, send the message: leave film-philosophy to: [log in to unmask] Or visit: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy.html For technical help email: [log in to unmask], not the salon * Film-Philosophy online: http://www.film-philosophy.com Contact: [log in to unmask] ** * * Film-Philosophy Email Discussion Salon After hitting 'reply' please always delete the text of the message you are replying to To leave, send the message: leave film-philosophy to: [log in to unmask] Or visit: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy.html For technical help email:[log in to unmask], not the salon * Film-Philosophy online: http://www.film-philosophy.com Contact: [log in to unmask] **i generally avoid responding to the provocations of bill harris, but when there are such blatant factual misrepresentations as this they need to be pointed out . . . the idea of a “politics of signification” is one that was developed by feminists – including mulvey and her followers – precisely as a way of understanding the mechanisms by which “the simple truth of sexism” gets inscribed into our discourses . . .
its purpose is specifically to expose this simple truth, not to obscure it . . . one may agree or disagree with the goals, and one can find fault with the [admittedly tendentious] methods, but to call the work of two generations of feminists semioticians “trivia . . . to obscure the simple truth of sexism” is simple misrepresentation
m
From: Film-Philosophy Salon [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of bill harris
Sent: Thursday, September 03, 2009 12:25 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Screen Theory query
Hi Sarah,
Are you familiar with her "famous" 1975 article, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema?
Women are represented on screen as sex objects; and the intentionality on the part of Hollywood producers is rather clear in this regard.
Therefore, any epi-phenomenal search for a deeper meaning is totally besides the point: all you need to know is what is clearly...represented.
Therefore, searching for hidden signifiers is a form of modern scholastics in which the machine of higher learning generates trivia in order to obscure the simple truth of sexism. This, of course, is part and parcel to the auto-labeling of filmic representors as "artists".
Ciao, Bill
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 2009 20:31:34 -0700
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Screen Theory query
To: [log in to unmask]
I recently read an essay on the "Screen Theory" of the 70s and 80s which claimed that Laura Mulvey differed from most of the other Screen critics in that her work pursued "a politics of representation," while many of her fellow critics dealt with a "politics of signification."
I am struggling with the difference, and would appreciate any help that the list would care to give me. Thank you.
Sarah Nichols* * Film-Philosophy Email Discussion Salon After hitting 'reply' please always delete the text of the message you are replying to To leave, send the message: leave film-philosophy to: [log in to unmask] Or visit: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy.html For technical help email: [log in to unmask], not the salon * Film-Philosophy online: http://www.film-philosophy.com Contact: [log in to unmask] *** * Film-Philosophy Email Discussion Salon After hitting 'reply' please always delete the text of the message you are replying to To leave, send the message: leave film-philosophy to: [log in to unmask] Or visit: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy.html For technical help email: [log in to unmask], not the salon * Film-Philosophy online: http://www.film-philosophy.com Contact: [log in to unmask] **