I'm kinda liking this Lerner dude's take on the evolution of subjectivity through modernization. Seems to me like a way of describing factors that go into the construction of a post-structural self - one that is adaptable to both deep structure (say, culture) and structure more palpable to perception (such as microsocial interaction).
"I was really impressed with your latest blog posting. Lots of self
discovery going on there."
"How do admissions of psychological/emotional vulnerability contribute to getting people to move to action? It's very easy for people to say, "Ah ha! I knew it wasn't about the department; she's having personal problems and using the department as a scapegoat."
Probably this is what Stephen's been on my case about - does acknowledging the personal (what he has been defining as "private" and labeling "psychological") move people to action? ? Perhaps not, but maybe it depends on what kind of ìactionî is desiredÖ
Stephen and I hashed out some clarity via Habermas regarding our "flurry" about where to draw the line about what should and shouldn't be part of a shared blogspace.
Habermas puts the public sphere in the zone of the private, for starters. This is linked to capitalism as the condition of possibility for a public sphere, because it was the transfer of the economy out of the household that initially allowed non-royal and non-divine elite/privileged persons to come together to exercise their faculties of reason.
According to Lippmann, if other human beings' behavior "crosses" mine, is "dependent" upon me, or is "interesting" to me, then that's a rough definition of the boundaries of "public affairs" about which one may have "public opinions" (29).
Lippmann's summary of reasons why people wind up with disparate pictures of events, issues, etc that require some kind of decision-making seems relevant. Why do "the pictures in peopleís heads" lack correspondence with "the world outside?" We all have limited access to facts through ìartificial censorship, the limitations of social contact, the comparatively meager time available in each day for paying attention to public affairs, the distortion arising because events have to be compressed into very short messages, the difficulty of making a small vocabulary express a complicated world, and finally the fear of facing those facts which would seem to threaten the established routine of [peopleís] livesî (30).
(btw - 15 (!) people attended the comm grad stduent meeting yesterday but you'll have to wait for the minutes to find out what's what.)
Stephen has been arguing, I'm starting to think, for a blog composed of or otherwise enacting representative Public Opinions, while I have been arguing for a site for the expression of representational public opinions.
At least our debate has been carried out in public (apparently -?- generating an impression that one or both of us is "really mad"?)
Vico defines philology as "the doctrine of all the institutions that depend on human choice; for example, all histories of the languages, customs, and deeds of peoples in war and peace" (in Labio, p. 47).
The academy is an institution; rhetorical discourse is an institution. War is an institution. Peace is not. How does one exercise choice that invokes an institutionalizing of peace without negating half the human experience (aggression, desire, passion....in short, sensation itself)?
I think you may be right, Stephen, that there is "no one else" reading at the moment, your critique that my writing is too blurry ("linguistic meanderings") is well-taken and consonant with other recent feedback. However, its also, I think, in part constituted by the intersubjective condition of talking outloud to myself. I think that tends to occur on Reflexivity when there is a dearth of "audience" or at least when it seems to be so.
You're also accurate, I think, in characterizing your discourse as an expression of "perhaps white / straight / male / educated" power. It is. I return to the thread on "separate knowing". And a bit Habermasian at that. I appreciate much in your critique, of all that I have not made clear, and I twinge a bit that I'm such a slow learner in this regard, but the construction of meaning occurs between us, so if you feel "psychologized" its 50% your doing. If we're having a moral disagreement (and I'm not sure we are, it was presented as an hypothesis), it has to do with acknowledging the presence of the psychological, of which "desire" may be our most tangible expression.
This may be one of my new guys. The blogpost cited before (The Pinocchio Theory is a great summary of Tarde that winds up exactly where I've been trying to be, believe it or not! (I loved Ripley's as a kid.)
This article by Bruno Latour about Tarde is about interrupting repetitions - think problematic moments! (and Latour looks interesting in his own right: Making Things Public).
Wikipedia shows his work turned to unsavory purposes (Le Bon) but also taken up by others who may be less scary....I'm not sure yet, because Mattelart lumps him in with the psychopathologists and (despite dysfunctionality) I really don't think humanity is hopelessly pathological, but more investigation is on the horizon. I wonder if I can get the Encyclopedia Brittanica article on him from school?
OK, so history repeats itself, right? This is what I thought reading the last section of Mattelart's chapter 2 (p. 48-52). How to reach a wider public than those I already have regular contact with? Newspapers, serial stories, and feuilletons were used to do it in the mid-19th century, blogs may be one of the 21st's equivalents. I have to say I am drawn to Cesar de Paepe and his notion of public service:
~ by Rebecca M. Townsend, Ph.D.
"Post-Social Security ìreform:î picture a 35-year old couple going to a convenience store on payday, putting part of their paychecks toward their Social Scratch Tickets.Ý Social Scratch Tickets have replaced Social Security cards. While still resembling the old cards, they now have a small gray bar workers scratch when they retire. Fast-forward to retirement: the couple eagerly scratches off their tickets.ÝìTry Next Time,î each card reads.Ý Workersí wages no longer help seniors.
Carsí safety belts protect us during crashes. Social Security cards are safety belts, not scratch tickets. Mr. Bush wants us to gamble on senior citizen safety. If we make $90K/year or less, we part with a small percent so seniors donít starve.ÝIím tired of Mr. Bush only looking out for those who only look out for themselves. You might NOT be a winner with his scheme. To ìante upî as Mr. Kristoff (2/5/05) would like, why not lift the $90K cap? Share the wealth, don't squander it."
Ý
Aha! A reference for something I've been struggling to explain: "logical confusions we find ourselves trapped within (like flies in a fly bottle).
If I'd read this about three years ago maybe I'd not have dug myself in so deep! No doubt the "therapeutic discourse" runs through and out of me.
Before I get on with that though, I found characterizations of Briankle and Stephen that seemed to good not to share:
Briankle: ìno one in the Heideggerian inheritance has any time for information exchange.î (17)
Stephen: ìA cheerful sense of the weirdness of all attempts at communication offers a far saner way to think and liveî (30).
Na na na na boo boo! You're just as tragic as me and you want to be remembered just as much! (No one performs like you do intending to be forgotten.) Obviously you haven't taken a peek at the pic under "Seriously" (on Reflexivity's Main Page) for a while. Please do, and imagine me blowing you a raspberry.
