while i cetainly sympathize [as, i expect most
persons on this list do as well] with anthony
banks' devotion to clarity, i need to cite one
of his own sentences to suggest that the issue
is more complex than he perhaps allows:
he writes
"There was once an established vocabulary of filmmaking which students
and teachers regarded as foundational--a terminology, in other words,
that was clear and accessible to all who wished to spend time learning
it; and once one had mastered it sufficiently, one could enter safely
and productively into a discussion without fear of being tripped up by
jargon-laced arguments--which is not to say the dialogue was not
difficult and often contentious. "
and i want to point out two things -- first, that
an estalished vocabulary depends on stable epistemic
categories . . . since so much recent work has aimed
at interrogating/undermining/exploding these categories
or or liberating us from their hold, there is no way discouse
could stay safely within their boundaries
second, this very sentence of anthony's would undoubtedly
have been seen in many precincts of elegant prose [such
as the old new yorker] as unspeakably barbaric . . . certainly
one can't imagine joyce, or wilde, or thurber, or edmund
wilson writing such a sentence . . . but it is the absolutely
right sentence to say what anthony had to say
mike
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