[csaa-forum] RE: wanting to be effluent

[Jeannie Martin]

Two (admittedly tangential) quotes from a couple of characters who knew a
thing or two about these things





' Self-Sufficient Criticism humbles itself even to nonsense in practice and
history...complete and perfect in itself.. (it) must not recognise history
as it really took place. for that would mean recognising the base mass in
all its massy massiness.....  (it) has a free attitude to its object...
(so)..all  the laws of criticism have retroactive force: history behaved
quite differently before the decrees of Criticism than it did after them....
'



                          ' significant literary work can only come into
being in a strict alternation between action and writing: it must nurture
the inconspicuous forms that better fit its influence in active communities
than does the pretentious universal gesture of the book - only this prompt
language shows itself actively equal to the moment'



Like everyone else we have to work from (build from) what is at hand .  And
(at the level of daily life), people surely  need to do this with a smidgin
of generosity, and not through adding insult to injury (real or imagined),
especially if, as I suspect is the case, the issues facing people in daily
life are as much existential, are about finding meaning, as they are
'structural' ( it is possible that the deepest damage done by  more than a
decade of neo-liberalism and global stress has occurred at the level of
self - a surplus of meaning become a void) .  Long slow hard work,  most of
which might be pre-political.





Dr. Jeannie Martin
Adjunct Senior Research Fellow,
Centre For Cultural Research
Parramatta Campus
University of Western Sydney,,
Locked Bag 1797,
Penrith South DC NSW 1797
Phone +61. 2. 96859600
Fax; +61.2. 96859610
e-mail <je.martin at uws.edu.au>
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ian Stuart" <istuart at eit.ac.nz>
To: <csaa-forum at lists.cdu.edu.au>
Sent: Thursday, October 14, 2004 8:22 AM
Subject: RE: [csaa-forum] RE: wanting to be effluent


> I think that if you add it to Debord's concept of the society of the
> spectacle we might get closer an explanatory concept, especially with
> reality TV, which lets people become spectacles, and shows like OPop
> Idol and (whichever country) Idol ...
>
> Ian Stuart
>
> >>> je.burgess at qut.edu.au 14/10/2004 10:54:35 a.m. >>>
> Thinking about the uproar over Ricki Lee's departure from
> Australian Idol as opposed to the deafening silence after the
> election, and Stephen Coleman's work on audience engagement
> with Big Brother in comparison to big "p" Politics, I wonder
> if "consumption" is an explanatory enough concept; relatedly,
> it seems that both we and the two big parties are
> misrecognizing the majority of Australian people's modes of
> enacting citizenship.
>
> ---- Original message ----
> >Date: Wed, 13 Oct 2004 10:40:46 +1300
> >From: "Ian Stuart" <istuart at eit.ac.nz>
> >Subject: RE: [csaa-forum] RE: wanting to be effluent
> >To: <csaa-forum at lists.cdu.edu.au>
> >
> >Kia ora Sally
> >
> >The neo-lineral discourse of the past 20 years, especially in New
> >Zealand,  has constructed people as "consumers"  rather than
> citizens.
> >We became "consumers" of the health system, ratrher than
> people, we
> >became "consumers" of the education system, etc etc ...
> >
> >Is it any wonder that "consumer" has become the prime
> identity position
> >of people within our society?
> >
> >Ian Stuart
> >
> >>>> Sally.Scott at curtin.edu.au 12/10/2004 6:16:57 p.m. >>>
> >What a defensive barrage has been creative by allusions to
> Freedom
> >Furniture
> >and fondue. Interestingly, for what it says about the
> discources of
> >cultural
> >studies, I was using the list of aspirational accoutrements
> as symbols
> >of
> >consumerism rather than class. That is, Australians,
> irrespective of
> >suburbs, are more interested in what they can buy and when,
> rather
> >than
> >issues like education and health reform, refugees or
> workplace equity.
> >Are
> >we consuming ourselves into an apathetic torpor? What
> significance does
> >this
> >have for both the political process and the future of the
> Left (as
> >distinct
> >from the Labor party)? (I understand my assumption here is
> that the
> >Left are
> >less concerned with a consumer economy)
> >
> >There is a wonderful doco doing the rounds about the big
> corporates and
> >the
> >many ways in which they are driving consumption - out of this all
> >power
> >leads to them. Where is our Left in this packet of Crispies?
> >
> >Sally
> >
> >
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> >
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