[csaa-forum] Rebecca and the beach

[Catherine Driscoll]

What a strange set of claims.

Relativism arrogantly claims to have all the answers, while claims that 
particular works are just without question excellent does not, apparently, 
make any claim to have the answers. By association at the very least, all 
theorists not used by you are theoretically bankrupt mystics even when they 
would clearly share your concerns about relativism and your investment in 
absolute aesthetic value (as Adorno would). All these bankrupt mystics are 
also clearly, by your blanket assertion, "anti-human, anti-Enlightenment, 
anti-reason, anti-judgement and pro-relativist", as are all of us with the 
temerity to notice that our students are often much more comfortable with 
generalisations and transcendent human "truths" than they are with 
acknowledging that what we see and hear is constructed by social and 
historical conditions.

I, for one, would be most interested in seeing this curriculum.

Best wishes,
Catherine

At 03:01 PM 11/08/2004 +1000, you wrote:

>I don't buy the story that before the meteor of cultural studies clarified 
>everything humanities teaching and research was a theoretical Jurassic 
>forest, full of nasty creatures. In fact cultural studies today is every 
>bit as ideologically naive as what came before. Today the ideology is 
>this: anti-human, anti-Enlightenment, anti-reason, anti-judgement and 
>pro-relativist. You see it dripping from every set of scare quotes 
>('truth' 'real' etc) and every lame assertion that what we see and hear is 
>constructed by social and historical conditions. (What insight!) I'm 
>currently teaching a new course which is about cultivating judgement, 
>eschewing relativism and actually engaging with artworks (film and 
>television); the students find it hard because it does not arrogantly 
>claim to have all the answers. It grants that there may be aspects of the 
>world that cultural studies has neither the imagination nor the theory to 
>grasp, that there are works of excellence whose achievements might take a 
>lifetime to account for. I'd rather be teaching that than supplying the 
>false idea that everything can be explained (or 'approached' - since I'm 
>sure there can be no 'final' 'truthful' explanation...) by a bit of 
>Foucault, Adorno, Deleuze or any other theoretically bankrupt mystic.
>
>
>Dr Jason Jacobs
>Senior Lecturer
>School of Arts, Media and Culture
>Griffith University
>Nathan Campus
>Queensland 4111
>Australia
>Phone: (07) 3875 5164
>Fax: (07) 3875 7730
>_______________________________________
>
>csaa-forum
>discussion list of the cultural studies association of australasia
>
>www.csaa.asn.au

---------
Dr Catherine Driscoll
Lecturer
School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry
University of Sydney
Phone: (61-2) 9036 9503
Fax: (61-2) 9351 5336
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