The Borders of Things

Ah, Liberal Education

In honor of the first week of classes for many college students out there (including my little sister), I offer this compelling story about a UVA student's encounter with, um, Cliffs Notes.

And for all us teachers, her instructor's comment hits home:

"It's one of those universal American stories," said Ferguson . . . . "I look forward to skimming her essay on the importance of following your dreams and randomly assigning it a grade."

Vermin, Gamblin, and Jackson

My credibility as a quasi-culture-and-arts blogger has been enhanced in the last few days. I've started watching Deadwood and went to see Snakes on a Plane.

I'm only half-way thru the first season of Deadwood, so my impressions are limited at the moment. However, the reports on it thus far have been accurate in that the dialogue is far superior to most shows I've seen and the characters are . . . complicated, to say the least. The latter is particularly important, I think, because it reflects the unique social and cultural climate in which the show is set. Deadwood is a town with no law; it is simply a nexus of forces held together by the sheer adn tenuous fabric of social cohesion. Consequently, there is a proliferation of different personalities which are given a wider range of expression.

However, what the show clearly lacks, I realized, is Samuel L. Jackson. There is no substitutes for this powerhouse of a personality, particularly when said personality is confronted with an airplane full of venomous "snakes on crack" (in his words). More importantly, SOAP is the finest example of an actor reaching the stage of self parody. S.L.J, you realize, has been in a tremendous number of movies, in many of which he plays the Bad MF we all know and love. In SOAP, he takes all of those characters and morphs them into pure Samuel L. Jackson, himself; the result, one could argue, is parody perfected. Indeed, the line between "himself" and the role is fuzzy. For instance, while he goes by Neville Flynn in the film, he claims to be from "Tennessee," where the real S.L.J. grew up.

Incidentally, Deadwood would also boost itself if it offered free phone messages from its characters over the internet.

And Just Like That . . .

A few night ago, I watched a rerun of Seinfeld (as I do many nights). This particular episode was the one where George decides to do the exact opposite of whatever his instincts tell him--he begins to initiate conversation with women, he's brutally honest at job interviews, he yells at some punks in a movie theater. As a result, everything begins to go great for George, and he ends up scoring a job with the Yankees.

Some days, I feel as though the universe is a bit like George in that episode. Everything is going in one direction, for better or worse, when BAM!--the whole thing gets flipped upside down. The universe begins ordering chicken salad on rye instead of tuna on white. Tea instead of coffee. The universe tells its mother it loves her instead of what it really thinks.

Today is one of those days. Why? Because Pluto is no longer a planet.

Good night, sweet prince.

Poor Floundering Humanists

According to this chap by the name of Rafe Champion at the Rathouse, literary critic René Wellek once wrote these words:

"I hope that I have preserved my integrity and a core of convictions:

The lawyer knows or thinks he knows what is right and what is wrong; the scientist knows what is true and what is false; the physician knows what is health and what is illness; only the poor humanist is floundering, uncertain of himself and his calling instead of proudly asserting the life of the mind which is the life of reason."

As of right now, I can't think of a better affirmative statement in defense of the study of literature. Three cheers for "proud assertions!"

The Fine Line between Metal and Theory

I've recently discovered The Valve, a blog devoted to literary stuff in general. There was a great post yesterday entitled "AC/DC/Derrida," which is exactly what it sounds like: a comparative reading of the French philosopher and the Aussie Rockers.

It is full of clever analyses, like the following derived from that hard-loving staple "You Shook Me All Night Long":

"By purporting to provide us a glimpse of intimate life (in this case, sex), which is to say; by adopting a confessional idiom, the song makes plain the blindness of all self-representation. Its prosopopeia gives voice to the consciousness ‘knocked out’ (of consciousness, of life) by ‘those American thighs’; a process of transference that marks the singer as the blind person (vision, perhaps, but not voice obscured by the very thighs to which he adverts)."

The Moon Rises on Rodents, Too

Many thanks for Chris Totten for helping me revamp the blog. The visuals are still in process, but I really like where it is going.

As many of you know, I am something of an animal buff. My wife and I have a running joke about me as Marty Stouffer, the bearded host of PBS's long-time show Wild America. I spend road-trips watching for wildlife as well as the road. Most animals, particularly in their native environments, I find endlessly fascinating.

Not so, however, for rats. I absolutely despise and loathe rats. Every time I see one, I experience a form of revulsion that nothing else evokes. My stomach churns. I feel goosebumps on my back. My hands itch for some sort of blunt weapon. I usually shout something like "There's a &#@* RAT!" Some primordial instinct tells me to destroy the little bastard.

Well, according to the Seatttle Weekly cover story this week, my beloved city is crawling with 'em. And, to my horror, there were something like 65 rats-in-the-toilet reported in King County last year. Apparently the demon spawn can, as unbelievable as it sounds, scurry their way up thru the plumbing in their attempts to spread disease and pestilence.

Couple that with this gem of a fact, reported in the article: "When does 1 + 1 = 29,560? That is the number of descendants a pair of rats and their issue can produce in a year's time."

Lovely.

The State of Things

Ryan and I have had a bit of back and forth. Be sure to read his post here before reading my response.

First off, I don't think I'm using "moral," particularly in my piece on citizenry, as an honorific at all. I'm using it in the sense of a faculty, a capability. In Rome, a citizen was a political agent, while a slave was not. A human being is a moral agent, while a tree is not. It is up to the moral agent whether those actions are going to be morally/ethically good--they can just as easily be evil. But without the agency, you can't do either.

I'm much closer to Ryan on the issue of pragmatism than he may think (and much closer than I've been in the past), but I think the split between city of God and city of Man is dangerous, for two reasons. One, it essentially washes the hands of the state by making efficiency the only logic underwhich political power operates. One could probably say that it is the only power under which it can operate, hence to speak of its moral agency is futile. But if we say that a state can perpetrate evil acts, we have to say that a state can also act good.

The second reason I find the two worlds split dangerous is that it denies anyone outside the city of God the ability for moral reasoning. (This gets us back to differing theologies, which is a relevant but larger conversation than either of us have time for). In other words, simply because someone is not within the city of God does not mean that they cannot think within and act within ethical categories. Moreover, these categories can be articulated rationally--that's what the secular project of philosophical ethics is all about. I'm not talking about the search for a Platonic one, or anything like that. I'm talking about the ability to be in a situation and say "is this the right thing to do?," not just "is this the most efficient thing to do?" Is this ability to reason perfect? No. Possible? Yes. If its not, then the Enlightenment was a tragic waste of time. As much time as I spend bashing the Enlightenment, I don't want to throw it out altogether.

The possibility for moral reasoning is why human beings of every religious and philosophical stripe can forge something like a society. And it is the defining characteristic of what I would call civilization, a word Ryan uses a fair bit. What makes a state civilized is not an essence but a habit of action and thought that recognizes the ethical consequences of the laws it passes and the wars it forges. My argument regarding citizenry is an attempt to define the necessary division of labor that allows that process of self-critique to occur.

In theory, this all sounds somewhat feasible. In practice, however, it is far more messy and far more difficult. However, I don't see any other way out. The state is too powerful of a force to let off the hook, and this is the best argument I can think of for the promotion of democracy. If we divide these sphere's too sharply, then we have no real objection to something like the concentration camps, other than a feeble argument along the lines of "these are not expedient."

The process of bringing ethical reasoning to bear on political action (the task, as I have argued, of citizens within the state, particularly a democracy) is the best answer to the question "what does an moral state look like?" I realize that answer is probably not very satisfactory, but I think it grants flexibility without reducing us to sheer utilitarianism. I for one am unwilling to annul the marriage between power and responsibility, but I realize that it's a union that requires a lot of counseling to make it. "It" is not the end of history, heaven on earth, the dictatorship of the proletariat, etc. "It" is the constant viscissitudes of human life on this planet, a perpetual now that we can't escape.

This is written in a bit of haste, an a discussion like this requires more time. I'm open to responses, as I know I've left a lot unsaid and a lot unclear. But other studies call to me, and I'd be acting unwisely if I fail to heed the call.

Rolling Rock Will Never Be The Same

Poor Latrobe.

Crossing Lines

A pleasant weekend was spent with Capria's parents. We attended the opera. It was my first time and it left me thinking about numerous issues, (the usual suspects: art, representation, desire, etc.), and maybe those thoughts will show up here someday.

In the meantime, here are two compelling articles to consider while war wages, one from Lebanon and the other from Israel.

American Aesthetic

I'm beginning the process of putting together my reading lists. Here is a passage I stumbled across from William Carlos Williams's brief essay "Descent":

There is nothing for a man but genius or despair. We cannot answer in the smart language, certainly it would be a bastardization of our own talents to waste time to learn the language they use. I would rather sneak off and die like a sick dog then be a well known literary person in America--and no doubt I'll do it in the end. Our betters we may bitterly advise: Know nothing (i.e., the man on the street), make no attempt to know. With a foreign congeries of literary claptrap, come without coutesy to a strange country and make for youself a smooth track to the pockets of the mob by catering to a "refined" taste and soiling that which you do not know how to estimate. Courtesy would at least bid him be informed or keep still. . . .

However hopeless it may seem, we have no other choice: we must go back to the beginning; it must all be done over; everything that is must be destroyed.