Things I Believe In
- Thread starter josef k.
- Start date
“The Mind's narcissism,” notes Debray, in the course of a stinging critique of the sign-scavenging Semiotic method (demonstrated by Baudrillard) “is the corporate penchant of intellectuals.1”
“A tempting dream, this: to produce the metalanguage of all languages, and re-beget every event by producing its law of begetting. The world is garbled speech, but I who know its codes shall give ti back transparence. The “meta-level” becomes the one transforms into “objects,” and thus into lower-stage, all the other levels.” In the course of critiquing the consumerist conversion of all bodies to signs, Baudrillard is... converting all bodies to signs.
Whoever accedes to it is transformed into a cultural Grand Subject. Since this novel, this thriller, this poem declines (as one possible version among many others) into a generative model whose keys I possess, I become its master at a critical distance, at the very least its equal in inventiveness. The encoding on all fronts of the manifestations of human genius – with the translations and passings it authorized from one to the other – places the Decode at the upper reaches of the sources of meaning and makes him into the author of authors, a creator to the second power. To “semioticize” a text, a film, a commercial poster, a program is in some sense to turn them into satellites. The critic turns sunlike, pulling works and products one by one from his deconstructable disourse as if out of a hat containing a thousand secrets.2
**
“A tempting dream, this: to produce the metalanguage of all languages, and re-beget every event by producing its law of begetting. The world is garbled speech, but I who know its codes shall give ti back transparence. The “meta-level” becomes the one transforms into “objects,” and thus into lower-stage, all the other levels.” In the course of critiquing the consumerist conversion of all bodies to signs, Baudrillard is... converting all bodies to signs.
Whoever accedes to it is transformed into a cultural Grand Subject. Since this novel, this thriller, this poem declines (as one possible version among many others) into a generative model whose keys I possess, I become its master at a critical distance, at the very least its equal in inventiveness. The encoding on all fronts of the manifestations of human genius – with the translations and passings it authorized from one to the other – places the Decode at the upper reaches of the sources of meaning and makes him into the author of authors, a creator to the second power. To “semioticize” a text, a film, a commercial poster, a program is in some sense to turn them into satellites. The critic turns sunlike, pulling works and products one by one from his deconstructable disourse as if out of a hat containing a thousand secrets.2
**
Agent
dgaf ngaf cgaf
Debray was a Situationist iirc
Mr BoShambles
jambiguous
Also I find some of the terminology baffling... but then I'm not well versed in this type of critical theory or whatever. Can you dumb it down at all for us ignorant types?
Agent
dgaf ngaf cgaf
i don't mind answering questions, but yeah but i can already tell this debate is going nowhere, or will only take the form of non-sequitters, and we'll just keep covering the same ground. i'd rather go back to the original question. not so much defeatist as i have a headache and i hate retreading.
vimothy
yurp
From what? A colleague is writing a paper using Baudrillard, and I'd like to send her a critique...
Agent
dgaf ngaf cgaf
hmm i'll have to look for some definitions. this is mostly jargon, i agree, and right now the posts are in mixed order, so this is going to look kind of meaningless.
Why, from the book I finish writing in precisely six days...
Mr BoShambles
jambiguous
I'm not looking for an argument. But your attitude here seems wholly defeatist. I don't really understand what it is that you are driving at. In order to have a debate surely you need to engage with people and explain and discuss your ideas rather than just make pronouncements. Seriously, answering questions is part of the process...
Mr BoShambles
jambiguous
dissensus has got confused! jumbling up the order of posts... keeping us on our toes?