It’s time to start talking language again, so I’ll begin by harkening back to the early days. This excerpt comes from a 2006 post in response to “Thersites,” in which the plump community college new historicist decided he’d tackle what he referred to as the “standard simplification” of intentionalism. My response should refresh some basic insights into our relationship with signs and signifiers.
*****
update: Thersites replies, first by [contemporaneously] quoting from [my 2006 post]:
Intentionalists are well aware of (and dutifully acknowledge) the social conditions [convention, context, multiple authorship, presumption of agency, inter- and intratextuality, etc.] necessary for the communication of meaning. In fact, the notes themselves address (and critique) how this common sense observation is made into an interpretive paradigm and then “used to justify the marginalization of the “author” (along with originary intent), and to expand “meaning” beyond any coherent parameters (meaning as untethered from authorial intent).
—then arguing:
The standard oversimplification. There is just far more to any linguistic exchange that takes place in the real world than can be accounted for through “authorial intent.”
Literature is a case in point, indeed THE case in point for, well, literary analysis. JG says he is talking about “interpretation in general, and applying general principles to literary texts as well as any other text.” This is exactly the problem. As I said, this approach “elides the entire history of how literature came to be constitued as a unique social field explicable by the specific rules (descriptive more than prescriptive) that in fact define it.” Literary texts are NOT “any other text.”
He says he answers this objection by refuting Derrida and Culler. Which is nice, but I’m not making a deconstructionist argument, something that should be obvious to anyone who recognizes where phrases like “exterminate the brutes” (all of them!) come from. Sheesh. (I’m not making any sort of new critical or romantic argument about Great Literature, either. )
JG’s approach ultimately ends in a refusal to say anything actually insightful or perceptive about literature, or even authors. It’s not that he’s wrong, it’s that he’s… dull. And leaves the door open to some bad-faith and noxious kinds of arguments. I’ll get to that later. Meanwhile, my opinion of the sentence I quoted stands, notwithstanding JG’s refutation of something I wasn’t talking about.
Quickly, because I’m on my way to a Rockies game:
1) Thersites’ first claim: “The standard oversimplification. There is just far more to any linguistic exchange that takes place in the real world than can be accounted for through ‘authorial intent.’”
True and false. We can (and do) do many things with texts “in the real world” that don’t take into consideration authorial intent. But again, that’s not in dispute. The question is, what makes those things we do which don’t take into account authorial intent come to count as “interpretation”? Again. I implore you, Thersites: read more. All of this is covered quite thoroughly in my notes.
2) Thersites’ second claim: “Literary texts are NOT ‘any other text.’” Here, Thersites’ is claiming a special status for literary texts, though it is not clear on what he is basing this rather interesting ontological distinction. Presumably, he wishes to say that we do different things with literary texts than we do with other kinds of texts.
To which my reply, once again, is…and? I thought I’d addressed this clearly enough by highlighting the response to Culler (ignore Thersites’ red herring about my trying to pigeonhole him as a deconstructionist; I’m not, nor are such labels important here, though his initial appeal to the “social conditions necessary for the communication of meaning” indicate he is an adherent of one of the “reader response” schools), but evidently Thersites needs me to zero in more: here is my direct address to the assertion that literary texts, because they are placed in an interpretive context with different expectations from other texts (which doesn’t make them different, I would argue—only differently situated—but we’ll grant Thersites his peculiar ontological tic), cannot be treated similarly, and are open to “more” meaning than, say, street signs. Once again, and with feeling!:
What I would argue, however, is that while interpretive assumptions may indeed be institutionally (and thus impermanently) sanctioned, “meaning” is not a product of particular assumptions, but rather a product of the intention to signify. If by “interpretation,” we mean we are seeking a text’s meaning (what the addresser meant by the signs she used) then what we are after is, in fact, stable. That institutions can adopt illimitable interpretive assumptions, then, simply means that at different times we believe we can do different things with texts, depending upon the assumptions employed at a given interpretive moment. But the force of this (accurate) claim does nothing to alter the meaning of the text under investigation; instead, it testifies to a kind of ingenuity which seeks to equate incorrigibility with absence — and therefore to equate whatever proves non-provable with the necessity of its provisionality.
3) Thersites’ third claim: “JG’s approach ultimately ends in a refusal to say anything actually insightful or perceptive about literature, or even authors. It’s not that he’s wrong, it’s that he’s… dull. And leaves the door open to some bad-faith and noxious kinds of arguments. I’ll get to that later.”
Well, whether or not I have anything insightful or perceptive to say about literature is a matter of opinion; a noted Renaissance scholar, for instance, was very excited about my take on The Prince (I read it as a parody on Renaissance advice manuals, though through Hutcheons, and a bit differently than Mattingly); and I think the discussion of In Cold Blood, Ragtime, Beloved and Portnoy’s Complaint toward the end of the notes is very interesting, though of course, I’m biased.
My students found it interesting, though—as did they being taught intentionalism through a study of Curious George. But it takes a great deal to titilate Thersites (“GOLDSTEIN EATS PASTE! OPEN THREAD!”), so I am willing to grant that perhaps he truly is bored by what I have to say.
However, lest we miss it in all the self-serving verbiage, Thersites does note “It’s not that he’s wrong, it’s that he’s… dull”—which means we’re making progress.
Although I would have preferred “right” instead of “not wrong.” But again, that’s just me nitpicking.
As to the claim that certain ideas about interpretation “leave the door open to some bad-faith and noxious kinds of arguments,” well, I couldn’t agree more. As regular readers know, I believe that ideas of interpretation that proceed from an incoherent base in linguistics are dangerous and lead us toward an interpretive environment where meaning is “made” in the person of the interpreter, but can be ascribed, conveniently, to the author (if one so wishes), or else be said to exist independently of the author. That’s trying to have your cake and eat it to, and it leads to a situation in which meaning is necessarily relative, having nothing concrete to anchor itself to.
Intent—whether it is the intent of the original author or the intent of the interpreter—is what provides marks their signification, and so a text its “meaning(s)”. Thersites calls this a “standard oversimplification”—though he doesn’t say how or why, except to note that we can do more with texts than appeal to an author’s intent. But again, so what? Yes, we can make paper airplanes out of the pages of Ulysses or origami out of the pages of Moby Dick—neither of which changes the fact that, for purposes of interpretation, what I take pains to describe in my notes is the process of making and interpreting meaning.
But please, let us continue….
Oh hey — I didn’t realize we were back for reals until I saw your tweet to dicentra. Sweet!
His insistence on providing a separate ontology for literature goes against the root of New Historicism, which rightly points out that there’s no linguistic difference between a historical (factual) account and a fictional or parodic account.
Which, that means there’s no linguistic difference between a book of poetry and a restaurant menu with florid descriptions of its items.
Which means that there’s no reason to assume that an author had less “intent” in writing a novel than in making notations in his account ledger.
As for intentionalism being dull, well, that’s kind of the point. Intentionalism removes the raison d’etre for most lit crit that’s been produced in the last half-century—if you can’t “have fun” with the text, if you can’t wrassle it down until it becomes a Marxist tract (or whatever theory you want to push), then what’s the point?
You can’t make someone see a point when his livelihood depends on his not seeing it.
Good to see you writing again Jeff. Although I am not on Twitter I have been keeping up by reading yours.
dicentra:
if you can’t “have fun” with the text, if you can’t wrassle it down until it becomes a Marxist tract (or whatever theory you want to push), then what’s the point?
You can’t make someone see a point when his livelihood depends on his not seeing it.
Does any of this eventually – or ever – lead to ethics?
Put another way, when is the right going to finally discuss outlawing material Marxism per structural principle? Insisting on its free speech for it is akin to, say, delivering the corporation a vote or a censorship because your bona fides are so unctuous that you’ll invite malignancy to prove them.
Arbitrary Marxist tract = Trojan horse. This time the right should actually preempt something.
> “Literary texts are NOT ‘any other text.’” Here, Thersites’ is claiming a special status for literary texts, though it is not clear on what he is basing this rather interesting ontological distinction.
Is Thersites teasing some sort of divine inspiration as a qualifier for literary texts?
I’d submit that the only judge is history. If we’re still kicking something around a few centuries after publication, it probably qualifies as “literary”.
So does this intentionalism include references to a dancing gerbil? Asking for a friend.
More seriously, it’s good to see the site back up and running again.
It’s like my recipe for blueberry atole what I got off the internet online from a web page.
The author had a result in mind but i interpreted the need to add a generous amount of cardamom and a healthy tablespoon of cayenne plus a nice measure of salt.
So is it the recipe the author intended? Nope.
But that recipe provided the framework i needed to make something tasty and wonderful for breakfast and surely that *is* exactly what the author of the original recipe intended.
Using my honesty skills I can tell you what the original recipe was and also tell you how I tweaked it.
Today is a good day.
Which means that there’s no reason to assume that an author had less “intent” in writing a novel than in making notations in his account ledger.
I’d love to talk to the corporate accountants to get their views on intentionalism as it relates to something like, say, forensic auditing.
(I’ve missed you, Jeff! Never could bring myself to get a social media account, so I’ve just kinda watched you and Burge from afar, lo these many years.)
The moon is not part of Mars.
Welcome back, JG, you’ve been well missed.
Also, as an aside, screw mister barking moonnotpartofmarsbat.
Frank Sinatra
“OF CABBAGES AND KINGS”
Now I’m hungry for coleslaw.
Still, I must insist on substituting carrots for kings.
YMMV…
To be fair, this aged rather well:
https://proteinwisdom.com/?p=58521#comment-1276276
Such foresight comports itself well with our times and for that matter with our present tenor. I shudder to imagine the alternative, as I’m sure in hindsight we all do. There are times when you need to realize what time it is and was and this is one of those times.
I hate to consider any of the alternatives back there on stage in the waning days of 2015. I grow more skeptical with each passing day at the notion that any of esteemed Senators of that bygone age would have grown and matured into a Jefferson, such as Jefferson was. You can imagine that skepticism too when one of their dads had told a fickle radio host and former phenomenon on live air that his son was a promised political messiah.
Orange Man Bad, for all his foibles, at least didn’t have to live up to that. Plus, his First Lady tends to make more of a positive fashion statement on the world stage than a pasty, half-naked former New Jersey governor once did overflowing a tin beach chair (that never deserved that kind of treatment) out in plain view on a cordoned-off public recreational area.
As bad as we’ve been at securing “this little country”, at least we got that much right.
So it’s a different recipe now. A different text. Excellent. You’re all caught up!
Whether or not the author of the original recipe wanted you to riff off it or not is an open question. That it was certainly possible for you to take her text and create some sort of homage isn’t in question. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, eg., is one such example — as are critical glosses on primary texts.
Then again, there are also laws against plagiarism, which can included additions to an original source text that apparently the author wasn’t so happy to surrender.
So you could have read that recipe and then made steak and eggs, thereby fulfilling that author’s intent? He put you in the kitchen, after all.
“Look at the ways I changed it!” is an argument you make to defend against a copyright claim.
[sips coffee … prepares notepad for class]
i like the recipe analogy cause people say that stuff all the time
it said use sugar but you can use splenda
or… we use tart cherry juice instead of vinegar for the sweet n sour sauce
or… you’re supposed to use banana ketchup but we just mix regular ketchup and honey and nobody’s ever complained
People are very practiced in honoring the original text in this admittedly narrow kind of example cause they *like* talking about their tweaks and the ideas they experimented with.
so they know how to do it is all i mean
but people just straight up distort and lie on purpose now
this is what they learned from twitter
it’s a stratagem not a rhetorical failure or an analytical one
“Bad-faith and noxious kinds of arguments” were the good old days.
CNN Jake Tapper Fake News and their peers, they’ve transcended bad-faith.
Now they’re routinely crafting deceptive bricolage from whatever’s handy like how they did on the covington kids.
Loom o’er us doth ye colde shadowe once againe.
https://twitter.com/Czakal/status/1137505585623195650
That guy who’s blog got canceled is a parentheses ALt-er baby-stormfronter and a conspiracy addled shit-log but he’s the suddenly gone quiet canary in this mine so…trouble ahead. Casey Jones is playing on the juke box. The corpo speech cops ain’t just dropping their bombs on youtube this month.
I’ve developed a secret recipe for bar-b-q pikachu.
But I can’t share it.
Acause of then it wouldn’t be secret.
Not necessarily tasty, but uneducated palates might enjoy it.
but people just straight up distort and lie on purpose now
this is what they learned from twitter
it’s a stratagem not a rhetorical failure or an analytical one
“Bad-faith and noxious kinds of arguments” were the good old days.
CNN Jake Tapper Fake News and their peers, they’ve transcended bad-faith.
Now they’re routinely crafting deceptive bricolage from whatever’s handy like how they did on the covington kids.
Wow, slewfoot!
Aside from the fact that you were a purporter, I take back almost everything I’ve said about you.
Still, c’mon, fingers… erm, foot, let’s sing!
i already knew about how many fingers
“…our relationship with signs and signifiers…”
I’ve found that if I disagree with an author’s intent, I simply close the book. And if a recipe has or doesn’t have an ingredient I like, it gets a dash of Tabasco, which improves nearly every dish tremendously AFAIC. Even a nice champurrado!
Palaeomerus, the little fellow you Twitter-linked is but a ham-fisted maroon who lacks any sort of nuance* whatsoever (if one earns a positive mention on Stormfront, one is not of class: Good People). That said, he should be allowed to have his voice, however bad his breath.
* https://americanmind.org/features/the-crisis-of-american-national-identity/creed-and-culture-in-clown-world/
That said, he should be allowed to have his voice, however bad his breath.
The right* is most gentlemanly when it insists on airing malcontents.
Yet, from the link:
*As defined by its fanciful 2A, with 1A being its vital, necessary gift to those malcontents, not uncommonly the people-corporations who run everyone and whose costs are insistently borne by patriotic rightists as “skin in the game”.
The other Amendments were forgotten, along with what they amended.
Or of anything other than exactly what it has become. The left took little that boomer-con rightists didn’t hand it.
I guess you can be anything but dull.
It’s time for an offensive strategy.
Innocent until proven guilty is for criminal convictions, not elections. I believe Leigh Corfman. Her account is too serious to ignore. Moore is unfit for office and should step aside.
Hot damn. I just realized you’re back!
I also see feets is here. Whatevs.
What o what does Jeff do with the New Nomenclature, wherein “male” and “female” along with “man” and “woman” have no objective meaning? Didn’t we all figure that THAT dichotomy was obvious enough it wouldn’t be breached?
My 2 cents is that they haven’t removed the meaning, they’ve changed the argument. We never argue over “sex” any more, it’s “gender”.
But what do I know, I disagreed with someone on the internet and now I’m a liar and an SJW. Glad you’re back Jeff, drop some bombs on these motherfuckers.
Ho_Li-Chit! I clicked my Protein Wisdom link, which I’ve neglected to delete, and we gots new content ……….. and Happyfeet. Sigh!!
“Now my empty cup tastes sweet as the punch…”
Along Comes Mary
Didn’t we all figure that THAT dichotomy was obvious enough it wouldn’t be breached?
Heh!
Hiya, Dice, good to see you again. Still, it’s all about the breachings.
Masterpiece Cakeshop Owner Sued Again after Refusing to Bake ‘Gender Transition’ Cake
As for me?
I now feel forward enough to go trans-species.
Please don’t dismiss me because I’ve always fancied myself a penguin.
h8rs
Seriously, wrfkdppl.
Twice.
Because, if it’s up to Congress alone, we are fucked.
From where I stand, the only politico who is now on my side is President Donald Trump.
And I now have to take back all my earlier opinions of him.
So, God bless President Trump.
Come and get me, Hillary lickers.
To continue, I’d like to go with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s national anthem…
??????????????? ???? ?????????? ?????
All those question marks link to “Soviet National Anthem (With Lyrics)”
Enjoy!