Captain Planet 09/12/09

In class on Thursday we discussed realism. I never truly understood the concept of realism; how it was defined, how it was used, and how the term connected to the course concepts we’ve been studying. After doing the Lyotard reading and dissecting the text, the class discussion we had on Thursday really aided in my understanding of realism. Realism is a part of our everyday lives because it’s the media. We discussed in class that these so-called reality shows on all the major TV networks don’t actually portray reality at all. When asked if their lives were more like The OC, a show about a group of high school kids, or like Laguna Beach, a reality show about a group of high school kids, college kids on average said their own lives were more like The OC. The fictional show mirrored ‘reality’ more than the ‘reality show’ did. The show Murphy Brown blurred boundaries in the 80’s and 90’s when the lead character became the topic of news headlines because of her out-of-wedlock pregnancy. Every day we are bombarded with images of actors and actresses trying to live normally in their everyday lives – and then on the reverse side of that – of reality show characters on TV commercials and magazine ads. Media has confused us. We no long can determine what is real and what is not. And furthermore, due to realism, nothing new and innovative can be produced. Several blockbuster movies come out in a month nowadays. The movies that follow along with ideas that have already been done before are the ones that masses flock to. The movies that introduce new ideas are often overlooked by the public. Society seems to be driven by realism.

kiwi, 9/11

This week in class we discussed the concepts of authenticity and originality and which one comes first when describing an object. The original thing had more value than authenticity. Benjamin wrote in 1936, “What happens to the work of art when it is constantly reproduced is lost with no value.” FREE Original Hamburger—what is the meaning of this? Get all hamburgers free, but which one is the original one? We struggle to understand which is original and which is real now more than society did back in 1936.
In class, Dr. Rog showed a Harvey Hamburger advertisement that had a mound of hamburgers on it that looked all the same. At the bottom of the advertisement, it said… “This Sunday is Harvey’s Hamburger day, Free original hamburger” But the question is… what is original? If all of the hamburgers physically look the same and taste the same, how can just one hamburger be an “original hamburger” because there are millions of them. How can one decipher between original hamburger A and original hamburger B? Are they talking about an authentic hamburger? This is something we don’t really know, yet no one really takes the time to consider these things. For example, the other day I asked a friend… what do you consider original? She used a piece of art in her explanation. She considered an original piece of art one that is unique but does not necessarily have to be different from its genre. I could see her frustration in trying to decipher original from authentic. “The presence of the original is the prerequisite to the concept of authenticity” (20) The presence implies I am physically here and it is physically here, unless it is physically here, it is not authentic. I have come to the notion that it is nearly impossible to define original and authentic without somehow one crossing the other.

HOLLA! 9/13/09

In class on Thursday we spoke about realism and the theorist’s opposed to the idea. I guess before Thursday’s class I never really understood exactly what realism was or the fact that we live it everyday when we watch any form of media. After really understanding what realism is I love the idea! I feel realism is there to let individuals escape from their everyday lives into something new. If we didn’t have television, movies, plays, etc I honestly don’t know how I would keep myself entertained. In class we discussed that Lyotard’s definition of realism and his somewhat negative opinion of it. He believes realism “stands somewhere between academicism and kitsch.” It provides “correct” images, narratives, and forms designed as “the appropriate remedy for the anxiety and depression the public experiences” (41). Now I feel this definition is harsh considering I don’t see myself or anyone close to me as depressed and anxious individuals relying on television to heal their sufferings. The only negative point that I could see stemming from realism in media is that of crossing the line. We discussed the television series Murphy Brown and how it seemed to cross line of reality and fiction. I can truly say I see this happening a lot in television, individuals not being able to decipher between what is fictional and what is reality. A good example is the fictional show Gossip Girl and the reality show NYC Prep. NYC Prep is playing off of the show Gossip Girl and its ideas. It is showing viewers that Gossip Girls is real because the kids in NYC Prep are living similar lives. I just feel that TV, cinema, plays, etc need to be there for a little escape from our hectic everyday lives, not there to confuse us as the boundaries of what is real and what is not are crossed.

Graham, 9/10/09

It was interesting the way that we discussed the idea of the McDonalds sign, which has become extremely cliché to the majority of Americans, because we see it constantly, which cause us to ultimately forget that the sign itself is a piece of art. This occurs a lot in society today, because things are reproduced so rapidly, causing them to lose their value, because we no longer know what the “original is. We looked at pictures on the Powerpoint, and pointed out the fact that it is almost impossible to figure out what the original is. I believe that this is one of the most important things that Walter Benjamin discusses in his article.
“The camera…need not respect the performance as an integral whole” (25) was also talked about the way that the media completely changes the way that we watch television. Dr. Casey used the example of watching a sports gave on TV, and actually watching it in person. When we are actually there, we encounter various interruptions and distractions which make it very hard for us to stay focused. However, when we watch it at home we intimately see only what the camera crew wants us to see, so it is a lot easier to stay focused. He explained that “the camera has taken place of our eyes” because we sit at home and watch a movie, and we feel as if we are actually there. This is why we cry in movies, and believe that reality television is real. We watch these things and relate to them, so that we actually allow these shows and movies to effect our emotions.
However, if we do not agree with something that is happening in the media, we begin thinking that we could have written it better. He gave us the quote saying “everybody who witnesses its [a film’s] accomplishments is somewhat of an expert…At any moment the reader is turned into a writer.” As a society, we are always judging others and believing that we are far more capable than them.

Captain Outrageous, Lyotard

POST BELOW IS FROM CAPTAIN OUTRAGEOUS! I FORGOT TO PUT IN THE TITLE SORRY!

" LET US WAGE WAR ON TOTALITY; LET US BE WITNESSES TO THE UNPRESENTABLE; LET US ACTIVATE THE DIFFERENCES AND SAVE THE HONOR OF THE NAME"

I'm going to tell a story. Hopefully the story should explain itself. Having the possibility that it won't, after the story I'll give an explanation as to how it relates to Lyotard.

It's summer of 2003 and I'm visiting New York City for the bagillionth time, but the first time in matters of life importance. I've just finished my freshman year of high school and everything is nouveaux rebellion for me, what's new, what's life, what's different? The city feels different on this trip, the museums seem different, even the city buses smell different in the most exhilarating of ways. On the particular day of which I speak, I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art solely for the purpose of the Chanel exhibit in the Basement (where they had recently started doing fashion-oriented exhibits, which are marvelous if you should ever get the chance). I had been to the Met and to other famous museums dozens of times over- I had seen Monet, Van Gogh, Dali, Rembrandt, the likes. Strolling through these art sections meant nothing much to me anymore for I had studied them I had learned from them...I was tired of them. Being so, I decided to explore the Contemporary Art museum for the first time in my life and was aesthetically changed.

As in any Contemporary Art exhibit there are things that don't...make sense. Well, they didn't then at least. Exhibits containing chairs and trash cans and running video, pieces that looked like exploding vomit- most notably for me, a series of solid color canvases hanging on a wall meant to resemble a xylophone. I had one main question and disappointment running through my frustrated nerves: WHY? Why a blank canvas with two colored stripes? Why a canvas with nothing on it but PlaySkool Pink (I didn't realize then what a time-space issue it was aside from lack of knowledge concerning postmodernism)? I was growing increasingly frustrated and further conservative in my aesthetic values when I turned my vision from one wall and landed it upon a Pollock.

Most unfortunately, I don't remember which piece it was. It was big and splattered, but those are no defining qualities when it comes to the work of postmodern artist Jackson Pollock. I would like to say it was Lavender Mist, but only because that piece is my favorite of his. If you haven't seen a Pollock before, you cannot possibly understand the magnitude of what it is. First of all, it is superbly large. Most of us wouldn't be able to fit one into a dorm room or a chapter room for that matter- they most certainly make you feel small. Second of all, they are chaotic: layers upon layers of splatter and dribble and color and texture and continuity and discontinuity and most importantly- unknown- unknown that evokes...something. And that is all that mattered for me. I went quite quickly from being disgruntled to being in awe. I stood in front of that monstrosity of anything-ness and couldn't tear my eyes away, which were slowly streaking my cheeks with tears. The Contemporary Art Section suddenly made a bit of insensible sense- the art didn't have to make sense, it didn't have to mean anything, it didn't have to correspond to the likes of what I considered 'art'- it simply had to evoke. I was overwhelmed, I was confused, I was inspired, I was lost and found at the same time. I didn't understand Pollock at that moment and to this day, after many projects and papers of research about him, I refuse to understand Pollock entirely for that would defeat the purpose of his art or furthermore defeat the purpose of postmodernism.

After reading Lyotard, this experience of mine makes more sense. Really, the xylophone makes sense, the exploding vomit makes sense. Lyotard discusses that 'modern' is the art devoted to present the fact that the unpresentable exists. I would say that postmodern, then, is the art that interprets the unpresentable. A lot of art critics call this abstraction. Lyotard calls abstraction a negative presentation. Lyotard also asks us, "But how to make visible that there is something which cannot be seen?" I answer him "With our eyes open". The Sublime concepts that Lyotard discusses (pleasure and pain) is like understanding Modern Art or Contemporary Art: there is no pleasure from prior knowledge for their are no objects attached to the concepts, there is pain from going beyond these conventions and opening your eyes to a greater acceptance, a greater emotion perhaps or interpretation. We must all be avant-gardes who "devote themselves to making an allusion to the unrepresentable by means of visible presentations".

Let us then 'wage war on totality' and be 'witnesses to the unpresentable'. Let us open our eyes. Let us be evoked.

BiegieGo, Lyotard

“Modernity, in whatever age it appears, cannot exist without a shattering of belief and without discovery of the ‘lack or reality’ of reality, together with the invention of other realities. “What, then, is post modern?” “It is undoubtedly a part of the modern.” “In an amazing acceleration, the generations precipitate themselves. A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant.”
Although I did not understand this reading entirely, I pick out some quotes that I thought had some importance to my brain. The first quote about modernity came off to me as whatever the time period of the work or art or language is pretty much modern. Whatever is happening in that state of being is seen to me as realism. What is in the here and now is all that matters in that point in time for being the reality of real. With saying that is something does not come off as real then other real things can be really real so there for their can’t be any realism.
The bigger question we are looking at is “what is postmodern?” to really describe what postmodern is, would be saying that it is the modern. Whatever the modern is, is what the postmodern was. We can’t have the modern without the postmodern. Some believe that the postmodern is an era that has past but for me postmodern is the beginning of not end. It has happened but it continues to happen and it is changed a little but it will always be in the modern state. It will always be in the here in now even though it has already happened. So postmodern is never ending.

Penny Lane-9/9/09

Upon reflecting on our most recent class discussion, I began contemplating the notion of perception vs. reality. Our daily lives are marked by cues of popular culture which in turn define our constructed outlook. However, the modern point of view is just that, meticulously and unconsciously constructed. The following excerpt from Walter Benjamin’s writings describe this type of historical shift in human thought: “During long periods of history, the mode of human sense of perception changes with humanity’s entire mode of existence. The manner in which human sense perception is organized, the medium in which it is accomplished, is determined not only by nature but by historical circumstances as well. The fifth century with its great shifts of population, saw the birth of the late Roman art industry and the Vienna Genesis, and there developed not only an art different from that of antiquity but also a new kind of perception.” Unlike the time period described in the passage above, the post-post-modern world evolves at a rapid and unparalleled rate. Yet the natural progression of society has taken a strange and contrasting turn away from the pattern of enlightenment toward a mode of disengaged conscious. Our thoughts are routinely determined before they have begun. Ideas are recycled instead of created, which is clearly evident in film, music, and fashion. Outlets of creatively have become commercialized and monotonous to the extent that new ideas are far and few between. The most influential source in the advent of emotional detachment is the Internet. People now live vicariously through cyber lives, but the individual can never be truly encompassed through this medium. The idea of original and artificial can now be applied to a person, not just commodities. Our socialization process and forms of communication have also been altered to an extent that diminishes personal contact to a severe degree (texting, e-mail, ect). While all stages of human development are dependent upon one another, the question remains whether advancement in technologies of the last decade are promoting our disenchantment with reality. If so, will the virtual escape only grow in future to change what we have always defined as “culture”?

FloRida, Lyotard

When I began to read the Lyotard article, I was extremely confused! As I progressed through the dense material I could really make a connection with what he was writing and some other subjects we have learned about in the class so far. Postmodernism is new and abstract ideas within culture, art, and language. It actually started out with architecture and the realization that not everything created had to be so structured and boring. The article states that “Modernity, in whatever age it appears, cannot exist without shattering of belief and without discovery of the ‘lack of reality’ of reality, together with the invention of other realities.” I believe this is a main point in the article. You need to break boundaries to create new and improved ideas that will better society. We need to start thinking outside that box and that is exactly what postmodernism does. Without the modern period we would not have postmodernism because as is it stated, “a work can become modern only if it is first postmodern.” Lyotard actually really connected a lot of the dots for me with the Benjamin article. Benjamin was talking about tropes and how when we have a specific idea or belief in our mind it gives us a base to create assumptions. The statement “She looks like a model,” implies to all of us that “she” is tall, thin, and blonde. What is so interesting about how we described her is that we had never even seen her before! Lyotard talked about film and cinematography, which related to Benjamin’s article about what we as a society sees as reality! Posters, signs, movies, and pictures are reproduced so many times that we identify with them a certain way and it would be hard to change our views. This is what postmodernism does, helps change our views. “ The postmodern would be that which, in the modern, puts forward the unpresentable in presentation itself; that which denies itself the solace of good forms, the consensus of a taste which would make it possible to share collectively the nostalgia for the unattainable; that which searches for new presentations, not in order to enjoy them but in order to impart a stronger sense of the unpresentable.”(Lyotard)

Ron Burgundy, Lyotard

This weeks reading from Lyotard was extremely challenging. In order to understand the concepts that were being explained you had to truly open your mind to new concepts and read everything as a whole, as each piece built upon the last opening up to the final idea. Although there were numerous interesting points made about the modern vs. the postmodern, I found one section in particular that seemed to click when I read it. This part of the article was when Lyotard was addressing the threat that the mechanical and industrial work posed to the original and handcrafted art. He explains that “industrial photography and cinema will be superior to painting and the novel whenver the objective is to stabilize the referent, to arrange it according to a point of view which endows it with a recognizable meaning” (Lyotard 40). This idea once again brought me back to my high school days when we would read a novel, discuss underlying themes within the text, then watch the movies and identify which themes were also present in the movie. Each time we did this type of exercise, the themes found from the book were always greater in number than those themes portrayed in the movie. This perfectly demonstrates the concept that Lyotard was trying to explain in the article. In a book there is more of the unsaid to be discovered and interpreted by the reader, or critic, as your conscious is not drawn to a central point of reference. This is opposite to the work in movies where the eye is drawn and focused on certain aspects of plot, etc. and led to believe or identify the themes that they want you to recognize. With focused shots on people, objects, etc. movies are able to “stabilize the referent” so that the audience identifies the same thing, that this one single idea is communicated with no real unsaid (Lyotard 40). This idea is unsettling as you think of the limits of interpretation and thought that exist therefore within a film vs a novel. It may be that this sort of concept is why when people read a book and then see the movie they are often disappointed. In the book their experiences interplay with the text creating a different experience than others, but in the movie selected referents are displayed, and these can hardly compare to our own experiences that occur with the unsaid in the book.

This weeks reading from Lyotard was extremely challenging. In order to understand the concepts that were being explained you had to truly open your mind to new concepts and read everything as a whole, as each piece built upon the last opening up to the final idea. Although there were numerous interesting points made about the modern vs. the postmodern, I found one section in particular that seemed to click when I read it. This part of the article was when Lyotard was addressing the threat that the mechanical and industrial work posed to the original and handcrafted art. He explains that “industrial photography and cinema will be superior to painting and the novel whenever the objective is to stabilize the referent, to arrange it according to a point of view which endows it with a recognizable meaning” (Lyotard 40). This idea once again brought me back to my high school days when we would read a novel, discuss underlying themes within the text, then watch the movies and identify which themes were also present in the movie. Each time we did this type of exercise, the themes found from the book were always greater in number than those themes portrayed in the movie. This perfectly demonstrates the concept that Lyotard was trying to explain in the article. In a book there is more of the unsaid to be discovered and interpreted by the reader, or critic, as your conscious is not drawn to a central point of reference. This is opposite to the work in movies where the eye is drawn and focused on certain aspects of plot, etc. and led to believe or identify the themes that they want you to recognize. With focused shots on people, objects, etc. movies are able to “stabilize the referent” so that the audience identifies the same thing, that this one single idea is communicated with no real unsaid (Lyotard 40). This idea is unsettling as you think of the limits of interpretation and thought that exist therefore within a film vs a novel. It may be that this sort of concept is why when people read a book and then see the movie they are often disappointed. In the book their experiences interplay with the text creating a different experience than others, but in the movie selected referents are displayed, and these can hardly compare to our own experiences that occur with the unsaid in the book.

Captain Planet, Lyotard

Lyotard argues that the painter and the novelist “must question the rules of the art of painting or of narrative as they learned and received them from their predecessors. Soon those rules must appear to them as a means to deceive, to seduce, and the reassure, which makes it impossible for them to be ‘true’.” “Those who refuse to reexamine the rules of art pursue successful careers in mass conformism by communicating, by means of the ‘correct rules.’ ” By stating that the painter and the novelist need to look outside the scope of their work and question to the rules of their art, Lyotard is stating that it is the painter and the novelist that have a great affect on the social norms of our culture. When a painter and a novelist can reestablish new ‘norms’ for society, the mold of what is ‘acceptable’ and what is ‘comfortable’ can be broken. Lyotard focuses on these two outlets of art: the painter and the novelist – because it is their work that comprises mass media. When a painter and a novelist realize that the ‘rules’ by which they have learned their art are only ways in which mass media deceives and seduces the greater public, it is then that they can make a change. Lyotard continues his statement about the painter and the novelist, by commenting on those who refuse to reexamine the rules. So much of our daily lives are driven by these ‘rules’. By questioning the rules, individuals are questioning society and the norms that have been established. It is not until this occurs though will there ever be a social change. Later in the text Lyotard states that those who question the rules of their work (either art or literature) will have “little credibility in the eyes of those concerned with ‘reality’ and ‘identity’.” Because art seems unfamiliar, it is often not accepted. When the rules are broken, and the artist or the writer, creates a piece of work that may not fit the norm it is regarded as less than a piece that was created ‘by the rules.’

Gwatter06, Lyotard

If there is one thing that I am certain about after reading this excerpt by Lyotard is that Professor Casey is far from a liar. Lyotard’s diction and choice of words creates difficulty in comprehending all that he is trying to discuss. What I noticed is that he makes good connections to other writers and artists, but unnecessarily overloads his thoughts and ideas to come to a conclusion. Through all of the density of his words I was able to notice that he set up his explanation of postmodernism through a pattern and a process by first speaking of the demand for postmodernism, then speaking of realism and modernism, and finally making the connection to postmodernism at the end. This is important because I believe it helps the reader assimilate postmodernism as a whole if you can decipher all that’s in between. Lyotard cleverly links postmodernism with the concept provided by Habermas in saying, “Habermas considers that the remedy for this splintering of culture and its separation from life can only come from ‘changing the status of aesthetic experience when it is no longer primarily expressed in judgments of taste’…” (39) What I believe Lyotard is trying to say is that in the new age of postmodernism the public has grown away from conformity and is trying to embrace individualism steadily. This reminds me of a video we watched in CMC100 called “The Merchants of Cool,” which spoke about the cultures and sub-cultures who strived to be different and individual by doing things differently and when that thing was publicized, they would change again to once again be different. After embracing realism, Lyotard advances to postmodernism with a compelling distinction in saying, “A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant.” I thought this was the most intriguing and compelling concept that Lyotard addressed because it almost seems contradictory. What I understand from this statement is that postmodernism is not derived from the end of modernism as we would expect, but rather at the beginning or development of modernism in which later helps signify his notion that they are correlated. Finally, Lyotard also includes a piece on literature that I found intriguing by stating that, “A postmodern artist or writer is in the position of a philosopher: the text he writes, the work he produces are not in principle governed by pre-established rules, and they cannot be judged according to a determining judgment…” (46). This directly relates to what Barthes incorporates in saying that there aren’t any rules to literature anymore as Barthes explains that the writer cannot determine intent and tmesis. All in all it was a very interesting read and I am interested in shedding some light on the grey areas.

ESPN12, Lyotard

Based on the title, what is post modern? This article was not entirely what I had anticipated. By now it is obvious we know what post modernism is. I figured we would be getting a more detailed description in pin pointing the era, not dealing with the realism and effects of cinema and photography in relation to novels and art. Indeed it was as challenging as expected, so I can only I wrapped my head around it. From my understanding, Lyotard was trying to say that with a faster world of media and cinema, the realism is taken away. The true realism is in the arts and novels and in the fast post modern world things can be seen in many different ways as we are not getting the whole picture. My question is, is that necessarily a bad thing if each person is still able to understand the big picture? It is understood that it is not true realism just as with Benjamin, one is still able to understand a general concept even though it is not the original. It may claim to be the original but they will not get the true feeling of authenticity, but one is still able to understand and enjoy the general concept. Lyotard further explains when he says, “what is advised, sometimes through one channel, sometimes through the other, is to offer works which, first, are relative to subjects which exist in the eyes of the public they address, and second, works so made “well made” that the public will recognize what they are about, will understand what is signified, will be able to give or refuse its approval knowingly” (42).
From Lyotard, I am able to get passed the basic idea postmodernism and what it entails. By addressing problems, He gives us assistance in helping to understand the details and effects that postmodernism has on our culture. Additionally, he makes one raise questions as we look into what the future may bring with a new sense of what is real and what that means for us as individuals and are thought process. He seems to both like and dislike the postmodern world. He appears to be in a search, only to help us realizes the effects that postmodernism can have. He looks back in “terror” upon the modern era as well as the nineteenth and twentieth century’s thus far. However, I don’t believe there is much to worry about as realism is still very apparent today and I cannot image us getting to a point where reality is lost as, people like the real thing and it is not something that people want to get rid of. “Soon these rules must appear to them as a means to deceive, to seduce, and to reassure, which makes it impossible for them to be ‘true’ (41). If they have a plan to gain popularity and respect, then they need to stick with that, and not change it every time that people do not agree, or they will be seen as weak and unreliable.

Nate Dogg, Lyotard

This article illustrates a growing trend between Lyotard and the other theorists we have read and that trend is that they are all out to make me feel exceedingly stupid while reading them. Based on what other students have posted, I do not feel that I am alone in my view point. I like what Lyotard has to say about the complaints against postmodernism, specifically the bit at the beginning from a “reputable historian that writers of the 1960 and 1970 avant-gardes spread a reign of terror in the use of language, and that the conditions for a fruitful exchange must be restored by imposing on the intellectuals a common way of speaking…” (38) because this is a major problem I have with the article. I have an extremely hard time understanding what the hell he is talking about, precisely due to the vocabulary Lyotard uses. I realize that it is probably not Lyotard’s fault that I am not intelligent enough to understand the vernacular of historians, but it never the less demonstrates a problem: if I can’t understand what Lyotard is saying, then I have to take meaning from the parts of the article I do understand.
In this way, Lyotard’s article becomes art in itself. I can read it, understand parts of it and take pleasure or pain away from what has been said. Despite the fact that the pain I take away from the reading takes the shape of a splitting headache, I do take pleasure in the way Lyotard discusses the notion of “taste”, and how it affects the art, literature, music and media we consume. “Taste, therefore, testifies that between the capacity to conceive and the capacity to present an object corresponding to the concept, an undetermined agreement, without rules, giving rise to a judgment which Kant calls reflective, may be experienced as pleasure.” (43)
If taste is in the eye of the beholder, how does one differentiate between the unseen and the seen? If a historian sees qualities of work that make it “post-modern”, and another historian sees qualities that define the work as “realism”, then who is correct? Does the creator of the work decide if the piece is “post-modern”? If so, who is this person to decide what “will have been done”? Certainly, all works created by mankind have a predisposed bias, because everyone has let some form of art influence them in some way or another; are those influences not reflective of modernity? If the past shapes the “post modern”, then it shapes the modern and the past and modern cannot be separated from each other.
I enjoyed the article, but I have one massive bone to pick with it. “We can conceive the infinitely great, the infinitely powerful, but ever presentation of an object destined to “make visible” this absolute greatness or power appears to us painfully inadequate. Those are Ideas of which no presentation is possible.” (43) Where was Lyotard when Superman comics began? The character of Superman is SPECIFICALLY infinitely great and powerful! Superman is a visible icon, akin to the heroes of greek mythology. Conceiving the infinitely powerful isn't just possible, it has been an obsession of artists and writers at every age of civilization. While I agree that the infinitely powerful (Superman) isn't as entertaining as the human (Batman), I think that Zeus, Captain America, Hercules, etc. are all perfect examples of how infinite greatness has been created and displayed. It’s a shame Lyotard never bothered to consider comic books as an art form capable of “making visible” the emotions and consequences of infinite power or greatness.

Teets, Lyotard

“What, then, is the postmodern? It is undoubtedly a part of the modern… A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant” (44). I stared at these lines for a while trying to make sense of Lyotard’s explanation. I finally determined that it is modern to be postmodern. If a work can only become modern if it is first postmodern, then that would likely mean that a postmodern work is then considered modern. Postmodernism is evolving, but it is still stuck in a constant state with future potential.

“A postmodern artist or writer is in the position of a philosopher: the text he writes, the work he produces are not in principle governed by preestablished rules, and they cannot be judged according to a determining judgment, by applying familiar categories to the text or to the work… The artist and the writer, then, are working without rules in order to formulate the rules of what will have been done” (46). Again, after reading this section, I was staring blankly at the page for several minutes. I knew there was something important within this text, but it didn’t come to me straight off.

I gathered that postmodern writers or artists are outside of the modern, outside of the rules. They can’t be judged by previous rules, because they are formulating their own. However, until the ideas stick, their ideas will still be considered modern. Their thoughts are postmodern, but they remain within the modern period. They are trying to step outside of reality to create a more realistic reality. They are revolutionaries, seeking to push society to new heights, towards the postmodern era. Postmodern thinkers are ahead of their time, but their time is still considered to be modern, and not postmodern.

Mongoose, Lyotard

In this article Lyotard attempts to uncover exactly what ‘postmodernism’ is; what does it mean and why it is happening. In his opening paragraph, Lyotard seems to imply that postmodernism is not simply building off of the ‘modern’ age but rather blowing it up and starting over, replacing ‘modernism’ with ‘postmodernism’. Some of these changes mentioned by Lyotard include: the architects abandoning the ‘bauhaus project,’ saying that it was ‘thrown out with the bathwater of functionalism’ (most likely referring to the switch to capitalism), a switch in religion to Judaeo – Christianity and the new notion that increased authority of the government is a good thing. He says that this is happening because many scholars, Jurgen Habermas for example, believe that modernity has completely failed and we are moving in a direction to rectify this failed attempt at enlightenment. One of the reasons that Habermas believed modernity failed was the ‘splintering of culture’ which occurred. He saw that areas of learning were becoming to specialized, meaning that ‘experts’ were only focusing on a specific area of learning and filtering this knowledge down to the regular individual. He saw this as a problem because individuals were not becoming well-rounded, instead focusing their learning in one direction.
The main focus of this article was on the area of art and its effect on postmodernism. Habermas believed that art was an area which could bridge the gap between all areas of focus, being a common ground where intellectual, ethical and political topics could all be covered. Art was an area which could “unify” society. The problem that arose was that art was being replaced by photography and thus losing its sense of realism and creative individuality. Lyotard related this back to Benjamin and his writings and to me this ties in to the discussion we had in class the other day. We talked about how different works of “art” have been reproduced so much that they lose their originality and value each time a new copy is made. Lyotard talked about the true value of a work of art is drawn according to its profits; if each time the piece of art is reproduced it loses value, then every time a copy is made, the profits go down and the original piece becomes less original.

DoubleBubble, Lyotard

Just like the previous posters, I had a really difficult time trying to understand this reading. I kept reading it over and over and realized after reading over the ideas again and again I was able to come to an understanding of what I THINK Lyotard is trying to explain.

In the beginning of the article I was really interested in something Lyotard brought up. Lyotard comments on how the idea of classical is “out of style” and yet, realism is so destabilized that we have lost the idea of experiences. We are no longer able to experience and instead we are faced with ratings and experimentation. Everything we think we are ‘experiencing’ we are not and instead we are experimenting and simply rating that ‘experience’ with our past concepts. How I view that is the idea of everything has been experienced and now we are simply just experimenting with those experiences and rating them. In some cases, it is to make it better, but in other cases it is for the worse. This concept also ties into Benjamin’s theory we learned in class on Tuesday. For instance, paintings have evolved into this concept of photography and so we are not experiencing that concept but rather experimenting with it. It is confusing, but I don’t know how else to explain!

According to Lyotard, everything is changing and becoming different because of this idea of realism. When transforming the art into photography and making it better artists begin to look at the ideas of how our audience will enjoy it and take meaning from it in order to receive approval. This is house the ideas of reality multiply everyday. With painting and literature a split is occurring. Pornography is a good example of this. It is a mixture between photography and film that has been taken to a new level. Certain artists do not want to follow the rules invented by the earliest artists in order to become successful. They are so focused on becoming successful and getting the message, that instances of pornography occur as a result.

The simple things from our past, like photography and film, have been tweaked and taken advantage of in order to please our society and help artists become successful.

Ace Ventura, Lyotard

While reading Lyotard, I first wished that I had chosen to do my pre-class post on Benjamin whose concepts were much easier to grasp. Lyotard often refers to Kant while discussing the meanings of art and literature in this concept of "reality". Lyotard asks the question, "But how to make visible that there is something that cannot be seen?" and Kant answers this with the idea of "formlessness" (3). Art and literature are in reality, but the concepts in them are our own interpretations, so how can we make these interpretations real? How can we convey the meaning that we find in a peice of art or in a literary work to someone else viewing the same peice. And if we can not convey this message to another, does that call into question its validity or does that make it less real? Kant says, "the empty 'abstraction' which the imagination experiences when in search for a presentation of the infinite: this abstraction itself is like a presentation of the infinite, its 'negative presentation'" (4). Through attempting to convey your personal interpretation to another, you make it real. Even if they do not grasp the same concept, you had validated its existence in having it either accepted or rejected by the others. In the philosophy course that I took my sophomore year of college, we studied many of Kant's theories and, in summary, his beliefs are that reality is an abstract concept only until you take it in, interpret it, and then project it out into the world again. When applied to Lyotard's position on art forms and literature, this is to say that a meaning has yet to exist for a painting or a novel until you make one.

Daisy, 9/9

While I found my understanding of this article to be a little blurry like the rest of the class I was able to pull out some main ideas. It is helpful that what we learn in class is built upon in each reading. Lyotard touched on many things we had previously talked about, such as silence, the technique of reproduction, and the concept of authentic and original.
One quote that I found to understand fairly well had to do with the constant reproduction of objects within our society. Lyotard says “what is advised, sometimes through one channel, sometimes through the other, is to offer works which, first, are relative to subjects which exist in the eyes of the public they address, and second, works so made (‘well made’) that the pubic will recognize what they are about, will understand what is signified, will be able to give or refuse its approval knowingly…” (42).
After reading this quote I thought of many things we had talked about in class. We talked about how many things claim to be original but in fact they are not. Also we struggle to understand what is real. For example, we talked about how we could close our eyes and be able to guess we were eating a grape. We can guess this because we have seen a grape before and have related the flavor to that object. In Lyotard’s quote he says that our culture has taught us what objects mean and to recognize them. Since we have been taught to recognize the flavor of a grape, we can also recognize the flavor of artificially flavored grape products such as Kool-Aid. Although, there is no aspect of a “real” grape in the drink, we can still recognize it is grape flavored and we think of a grape as something real. The Kool-Aid has been made to represent something we had previously experienced. But for some people, maybe they tried the grape Kool-Aid before the real grape, but they could still associate the two. Either way, they are both different things that we still associate together and approve them knowingly (42).
Lyotard also mentioned how realism and capitalism are associated. He said “realism accommodates all tendencies, just as capital accommodates all ‘needs” (42). To me this quote describes our culture pretty well. The motivation behind everything made is for money and everything that is made is targeted to be consumed by the population. We have become such an eclectic culture as Lyotard said by consuming anything that we can recognize.

Kiwi, Lyotard

Well, one thing for sure is that, Rog was not kidding when he said the reading was going to be tough. I had a really hard time understanding what was going on in the reading. However I thought I was able to grasp bites and pieces here and there and make sense out of certain things. One thing I was able to reflect on was from a quote that was said by Lypotard, “the effects of reality, or if one prefers, the fantasies of realism, multiply” (pg41) . This reminded me of a time in high school when several students were getting suspended because of photos they had on facebook. For instance students were getting in trouble if they were holding red cups in their hands, making goofy faces (like they were being crazy and at a party)… the principle made the assumptions of these students drinking and or being drunk. Lots of students fought for this making a point that unless the principle was there at the scene he has no right to make these assumptions (fantasies) therefore has no right in suspending them.
This just comes to show how photos can be viewed and interpreted in multiple ways and how people can make fantasies out of them.
I strongly believe that people need to be more cautious and aware of the pictures they put up of themselves because they never know what assumptions or fantasies people are going to make out of them.
The reading also discussed how the cinema and photography are the newer, faster and more improved form of mass media and soon could be completely replacing novels and paintings. There is no doubt in my mind that 20 years from now this could certainly be true. Just the other day my boyfriend was telling me how he wanted a kindle for his birthday. It’s an electronic device that you carry around with you and it downloads books on to it. This is just one example of how are novels are already starting to be replaced with higher technology.

Graham, Lyotard

I felt very confused by this reading, but I hope that I have grasped a few of the main points that Lyotard was trying to convey. I believe that he was saying that cinematographic processes are great ways to get information to people, quickly and efficiently, without giving them time to think about what they are seeing right away. I believe they use movies, commercials, and other quick media mediums to “reproduce the syntax and vocabulary which enable the addresse to decipher images and sequences quickly, and so to derive easily at the consciousness of his own identity as well as the approval which he thereby receives from others” (41). I believe that this is a manipulative way of getting information out to others, in order to have them agree with a way of thinking.
He also mentions that some people recognize what is going on, and they refuse to buy into what is being said. The artists and producers must not focus on the needs of that specific group of individuals. If they do, then these people will begin seeing them as liars who will say anything to get people to be on their side. “Soon these rules must appear to them as a means to deceive, to seduce, and to reassure, which makes it impossible for them to be ‘true’ (41). If they have a plan to gain popularity and respect, then they need to stick with that, and not change it every time that people do not agree, or they will be seen as weak and unreliable.
He also discusses the idea that a lot of times, “anything goes”, people do not have a preference on specific brands and restaurant chains, they just like what they like. However, the “higher-ups” in society do like the things that show that they are wealthy, and they can afford the nicer brands and such. I believe that this just shows that advertisers can appeal to anyone, and they have obviously realized this, which is why the advertising in our society has become so manipulative. The companies will do whatever they have to do to get and keep your business.

BiegieGo, Lyotard

“Modernity, in whatever age it appears, cannot exist without a shattering of belief and without discovery of the ‘lack or reality’ of reality, together with the invention of other realities. “What, then, is post modern?” “It is undoubtedly a part of the modern.” “In an amazing acceleration, the generations precipitate themselves. A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant.”
Although I did not understand this reading entirely, I pick out some quotes that I thought had some importance to my brain. The first quote about modernity came off to me as whatever the time period of the work or art or language is pretty much modern. Whatever is happening in that state of being is seen to me as realism. What is in the here and now is all that matters in that point in time for being the reality of real. With saying that is something does not come off as real then other real things can be really real so there for their can’t be any realism.
The bigger question we are looking at is “what is postmodern?” to really describe what postmodern is, would be saying that it is the modern. Whatever the modern is, is what the postmodern was. We can’t have the modern without the postmodern. Some believe that the postmodern is an era that has past but for me postmodern is the beginning of not end. It has happened but it continues to happen and it is changed a little but it will always be in the modern state. It will always be in the here in now even though it has already happened. So postmodern is never ending.

Elmo, Lyotard

As Dr. Rog said this reading was a little bit dense. However, I thought that the reading was very well organized and placed well among the other authors we have read thus far. I felt that Lyotard’s essay began very broad but then got more specific when talking about specific theorists such as Benjamin. The way that Lyotard incorporated Benjamin’s ideas into his own work aided in my understanding of him essay. I also enjoyed how after explaining a few different theories, Lyotard ended with, again, a more broad description; this time of postmodernism.

One part in Lyotard’s essay that I thought specifically related back to Benjamin and our class discussion on Tuesday was when he said, “photographic and cinematographic processes can accomplish better, faster, and with circulation a hundred thousand times larger than narrative or pictorial realism” (40). This quote related back to Benjamin’s theory about how we can only see part of something but still are able to understand the bigger picture. For example, in class we discussed the example of the Mona Lisa. This is a very popular image around the world yet very few people have actually seen the “real” picture in person. However, even though not all of us have seen it, we all still know that even a poster of the Mona Lisa still represents the real painting hanging in the Louvre. The copying of this image has made it possible for a vast array of people to gain knowledge about the Mona Lisa.

Another quote which seemed to relate back to our prior class discussion was when Lyotard discussed “the effects of reality, or if one prefers, the fantasies of realism, multiply” (41). This reminds me a lot of when I, or anyone else for that matter, take a photo. For example, someone may take a photo of a certain person doing a certain something. This photo can then be copied over and over or put on the internet to be viewed by anyone. Everyone seeing this picture portrays it as “reality” but at the same time everyone viewing this photo could have a different idea of what that person was actually doing; this, in turn, creates fantasies.

So, I guess this really does leave us curious about what actually is real and what is just a copy or a mis-communicated message. Hopefully with further discussions and reading we will hopefully more able to answer this ever-present question.

HOLLA! Lyotard

This was definitely a very dense reading, one in which I think I understand the basic premise of, but could also be misinterpreting its meaning completely. One thing that I can say I do understand about Lyotard’s reading is the examination of cinema and photography versus novels and paintings on the bottom of page 40. Lyotard goes on to say that, “the challenge lay essentially in that photographic and cinematographic processes can accomplish better, faster, and with circulation a hundred thousand times larger than narrative or pictorial realism, the task which academicism had assigned to realism: to preserve various consciousnesses from doubt” (40). Now this quotation is valid in the fact that cinema and photography are definitely on the track to being the new forms of communication and mass media. It is also true that cinema as well as photography can get a message across a thousand times faster than a novel or painting. If paintings and novels are completely replaced does that mean that realism will disappear? I’m not really sure if this is what Lyotard is trying to relay in this message or if he’s trying to keep novelist and artists from falling extinct to these new forms of mass communication of different meanings. Are we losing artists and novelists? I ask this question after Lyotard’s statement, “if they too do not wish to become supporters (of minor importance at that) of what exists, the painter and novelist must refuse to lend themselves to such therapeutic use. They must question the rules of the art of painting or of narrative as they have learned and received them from their predecessors” (41). Does cinema and photography not follow the rules of painting or narrative? Is this a concern of postmodernism? I honestly do not know the answers to either of these questions or if I am even asking the right questions. What I can say I took from this reading was that cinema and photography are the newer and more improved form of mass media and soon could completely replace novels and paintings.

Ron Burgundy. 9/6

This week’s class discussions revolved around several theorists and their discussions of meaning. We looked at Saussure and his concepts of the sign, signifier, and signified, Barthes and the intrigue of the “gap” that exists within texts, and Macherey and the significance of what is unsaid versus the said. Out of these three pieces, Macherey’s excerpt about the interplay of a text between what is said and what is not said was the most interesting. According to Macherey, neither the author nor the critic can fully appreciate or understand the meaning of a text. This is because the full meaning of a text is not found in what is explicitly written on the page but instead what may be absent from the page. The critic begins to understand the text as they ask questions about the text and use their own experiences to interpret the importance of what is not being said. The author is unable to recognize certain experiences that an individual may bring to the text and therefore how they would interpret the unsaid and so therefore cannot appreciate it as much as the critic. When I read this part in the article it reminded me of the idea of underlying themes that exist within a text. We are taught to find underlying themes within stories by taking a deeper look at what is not said in the text, because after all a good author wouldn’t simply state the moral of the story so it would be explicit for the reader. As I’ve mentioned before, in my high school program we looked at numerous different texts and were always asked to come up with certain themes and ideas that the author may try to be communicating in the unsaid of the text. When we would do these kinds of exercises, the class would always come up with a large number of themes that could be applied to the text. To me this was curious because I always went away from these types of discussions wondering if the authors themselves had realized the different themes that existed within their text or if they were just created by my classmates and assumed to be intentional by the author. Several scholars have done great works on the themes that exist within popular novels and it always makes me wonder all these themes we have applied to these texts were intentional or if we are perhaps looking too far into the text, coming up with things that work for our own experience with the text but not for others. As Macherey explains, every person that comes to a text leaves some parts out but never skips the same paragraph twice. This means that every time we engage in a text we see different things and experience it in a different way. This may also suggest that each time we read a text we may find different meaning in the unsaid, different themes. This idea is extremely interesting to me and brings up a lot of questions about the intentions of authors in their writing and the question of who understands the text the best; the author or the reader?

Ace Ventura, 9/3

This week in class we discussed de Saussure, Barthes, and Macherey. Throughout our discussion of comparing and contrasting these three theories on text, I found the consistent theme of intertextuality or comparing texts in order to get meaning. I also found the common theme of the importance of "difference (de Saussure)" or "tension" for Barthes, or "rupture" as Macherey puts it. I like the idea of difference and conflict in text in order to create and give meaning. It shows that one peice of text can not be greater than another because they depend on each other in order to have a meaning and a context. If a person has only read one book or one article, they can't fully appreciate the meaning of it because they have nothing to compare it to. This intertwines Barthes' concept of Perversion and Voyeurism, "looking at more that one thing and in different ways to uncover meanings." Each reader can employ these concepts in different ways in order to create their own interpretation and develop their own appreciation for a text. These concepts can be applied to any form; movies, plays, food, paintings etc. How can a person get a feel for what they like or dislike if they haven't had a variety of options? As my blogger name tells, I like comedic movies like Ace Ventura. But there are many different kinds of humor and many different interpretations of humor. As I learned in CMC-100, humor is a difficult concept to translate across countries. A comedy that is successful in the United States would most likely fail if sent to Germany or Spain. People from other countries interpret things in a different way and find value in different things than we do in the United States so they would fail to see the same humor that we see and vice versa. But without this comparison, they may not have the same appreciation they now have for their comedies. Even though de Saussure, Barthes, and Macherey have different names and concepts for this idea of intertexuality, all of them show the importance of it.

P.S. I'm really sorry this post was late!

DoubleBubble - 9/6

I think this week learning about signs has really changed my view on the symbols within our society. For instance, when Dr. Rog showed us the example of the Exxon sign, we could really relate to that sign in numerous different ways. When we are going to a party and need alcohol, we recognize that sign for beer. We also see that sign when needed gas and relate to Exxon in that manner. If we did not need to go to Exxon for gas, or alcohol or any other types of things that Exxon provides for us, we would not relate to the Exxon sign as much as we do now. With the past of the tiger symbol for Esso, we within our generation do not relate to that because simply we don't understand what that tiger implies to that gas station. One student thought it was the food shop, but really it was a symbol towards the gas and "putting a tiger in your car". I think it is really interesting that our society relates people and symbols to certain ideas, but it depends on which generation knows what that tiger means. Down the road our childrens generations may not know what different symbols mean and imply those symbols to completely different things. That is interesting to me because it shows how much our generations are changing and how much different only a few years can be on our view of things. What is seen one way now, will not be seen the same way down the road potentially.

I also thought that the reading due for Thursday was extremely difficult, but after class it was a lot easier to understand what he was trying to imply with the "silence".

Nemo 9/6

During class we discussed how we should be looking at the gaps - or what is not being said. In every single conversation, book, movie, etc. something goes unsaid. In class we were told to look/listen more closely at texts/during conversations at what the person is not saying. In this quote Macherey perfectly discusses the idea of gaps; ""There remains the possibility of saying something else" (15). To me this quote means that anytime something is being said something is not being said. When we were children we were always taught to read between the lines of a conversation or to look closer when we are watching a movie. I never really paid any attention to that until I was older and now that we are discussing the same concepts in class it is interesting to see that we are always encouraged to go beyond what is being taught. Another quote by Macherey that we talked about during class was "in order to say anything, there are other things which must not be said" (17). This applies to the CMC major because in class we are told everyday to look for things that the advertisements or commercials we look at are trying to tell the consumer. So it is important to make sure we open our minds and allow ourselves to see what is in the gaps. At least that was my impression of this discussion and these quotes.

Gwatter06 9/4

We’ve gotten the course off and running and it’s already looking like we will be unraveling some compelling stuff. I was glad to see that my post was selected to share in class, which gives me confidence that I’m on track and haven’t gotten lost too early on. I like to concentrate on the new things that we learn and that I am unfamiliar with to help cope with the understanding and use of the concepts. Going over concepts like tmesis and tropes was completely new to me but I feel like a have a pretty good grasp on what Barthes was trying to incorporate as far as literature is concerned. We went over that tmesis is inserting something violently and changing the course of history of something else. This relates to Macherey’s concept of a “rupture” within the text. Both of these terms refers to the “absent” in text, relating to the concept that text is created from what is not there but what has already existed; a concept in which we learned is intertexuality. Intertextuality is the concept that text rely on other text to entail its meaning. The most interesting part of learning about all of these different ideas is how they all correlate with each other and how one plays off the other. I have picked up on that early and understand its importance, noticing and acknowledging links between different concepts is very exigent.
This week we also engaged in an interesting conversation in which helped exemplify the concept that intent cannot be imbedded within text. To not believe this as valid is committing intentional fallacy in which explains that the author cannot determine intent because they cannot control you or determine when you experience tmesis. We did this as a class by taking only 6 phrases and creating our own meaning behind what we thought the phrases together meant. It was not surprising, but very interesting, to see how many answers came back completely different and so far from relation. I thought this was a very good example to use and clarified any questions I had on the topic. I can only hope to stay on mark as far as readings go as they continue to get more challenging.

FloRida, 9/6

Studying Critical Media/Cultural Studies and taking an in depth look at it has always been extremely interesting. Most of the times I was confused by what all of the different theorist’s were saying. Being in CMC 300 so far, I have learned that even if I do not understand something right away, it can always be explained in a way that will connect with me. What really struck me this week was the connection between language, signs, and actual meaning. There is a statement from the de Saussure that says, “Language is a system of interdependent terms in which the value of each term results solely from the simultaneous presence of the others.” This just proves how everything is interconnected within a language system. Signs are included as part of language but they are what cause you to think why or how something happens, along with your take on the situation. Language is verbal, movement, gestures, signs and almost any form of communication possible. We can talk with words and people understand what we are saying but we can also use hand gestures or make facial expressions and people will also understand a feeling/emotion or something we want to do, as well. What really connected with me were the examples Dr. Rog used of the street billboards. When we first see a literal sign we only associate with one thing. Once there is another factor that is brought into the situation, that sign means something completely different. We learned in class that language not only gives us meaning but also creates difference. One part of the readings from this week that relates to this is where it states that, “The pleasure of the text is that moment when my body pursues its own ideas- for my body does not have the same ideas I do.”

Elmo, 9/4

After sitting through class this week I realized that while I thought I knew a lot about language, there was still a lot to be learned. One quote which really resonated with me was, “there remains the possibility of saying something else” (Macherey 15). There are so many different ways in which to say something or define something; everyone has something original to say. There is always something the author left out of a text and it’s interesting to discuss what this may be. This idea of different definitions goes back to the class where we discussed the EXXON sign. If you need gas this could be defined in your mind as gas but if you need to make a phone call this could also be defined as a place to make a phone call. Language and definitions seem to be very situational and things may not always seem the same to you as they do to someone else. Something else I found interesting was when we discussed the quote, “it is rupture which must be studied” (Macherey 23). As critical readers of theory, we must study the gaps; we must study what the authors aren’t saying rather than what is so plainly presented to us.

ESPN12, 9/3

I never quite realized how much theory was behind the concept of language. I found it so interesting that there where so many terms for language. Many of the ideas were all ideas I had thought of before, I just never knew there was actual terms, or that any of the ideas had a “signifier” attached to them. I found myself looking back and realizing how I had recently but the terms to use. For instance, I found myself thinking back to the term parole just the other day when I burnt my hand on a stove. I immediately screamed, ahhh, I then thought back the term and realized I chose what to say in order to show I was in pain. I think the choosing process in such an incident is unconscious but there of course are times when you really think about what words you are going to say. As we continue to try and understand language and meaning I came across another term, if I understood correctly, I think I was able to apply to my weekend. The term difference, a word I have used my whole life for different meanings, was used to help me understand the theory behind language. When I was watching football I was able to see that I could recognize it was football, because of what it is not, basketball. I never quite realized how we apply meaning to something by knowing what it is not, but it does indeed make sense. In addition to the mentioned terms, I will never look at words such as “self service” in the same way again. Such a word demonstrates the true essence of an empty signifier. An empty signifier is word that really means nothing, makes much sense, is made to sound better than it really is, and such words will never be looked at the same through my eyes. As I drove past a gas station just the other day, I saw the sign for self service and I immediately thought back to CMC 300. It is quite interesting how just seeing a word can make us associate it with a item or a time, similar to the way we process language.

Mongoose, 9/3

One of the things that caught my attention most from this past week’s class was the notion of language giving us meaning rather than meaning giving us language. One way we explain this is to say that language is completely arbitrary, meaning it has absolutely no meaning, we provide the meaning. We refer to the things we wear on our feet as shoes simply because that is what we have been taught to call them; someone somewhere down the line decided to call these things shoes and they continued to be known as shoes. Shoes could have just easily been named ‘dogs’ and it would not change what they are. This is just to show exactly how arbitrary words are, at some point somebody designated a word to certain items and it stuck, I think this is what makes language exciting, the fact that we control our own destiny with it. Certain groups of people have their own unique words for situations, people things etc. and nobody can take that away from you; language is an area of life where one is allowed to be as creative as he chooses to be or as bland as he likes. This creativity and diversity of words was shown in our class activity in which individuals and groups assigned meaning to the words ‘baby’, ‘shoes’, and ‘never worn’. It was amazing to see the differentiation in meaning that individuals assigned to these few arbitrary words; for some it was a story about actual babies and shoes while for others it turned into an action movie with no mention of babies at all. This diversity comes about because words can have so many different meanings to different people and the arbitrary-ness, which we discussed, gives people the freedom to manipulate words into different meanings. This, to me, is what makes language exciting and creative.

Teets, 9/6/09

"A Short Story" For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never worn. --Ernest Hemingway

This example provided in class really tied together some concepts we covered during the first week. As the slides progressed, signifiers were either added or altered. While the changes were subtle, they always signified something else. Once we arrived at the final product, Dr. Casey had us develop a plot for a movie based on the 6 word poem, story, whatever. Everybody came up with one, most of which were drastically different. This tied in the concept that Macherey discussed, which was the power of silence.

The 6 words from the story were clearly explicit, and yet people developed totally different ideas for a movie plot. It was the words that were not there that spoke the loudest. In the story there are 3 sets of 2 words. "Baby shoes" was what people most used to develop their plot. Through the use of intertextuality, people pieced together a story that would be popular. Several action adventure plots were formed and a documentary as well. People take what they have seen in movies and read in books and essentially remake it in a different way artistically. This is what Barthes talks about when he defines trope.

In America our media outlets tend to repeat ideas over and over. Action heroes and documentaries are both popular ideas, so naturally we developed plots based around those ideas. These ideas are tropes, thus they are destined to be repeated. Copying a trope is a good way to piggyback someone else's idea to make a quick buck.

Back to the example. "To know the work, we must move outside it." (Macherey 20) We cannot know the author's intent for writing this piece. If we thought we could, we would be committing the intentional fallacy. Therefore, to digest and understand the work we must move outside of it. We must read what is not there, rather than what is there. Doing this can be difficult, sometimes impossible, but it is the only way to truly know what the work means. There is a rupture that occurs when trying to understand the intent and the meaning, and this i what must be studied to realize a work.

Captain Planet 09/06/09

For the past two years in CMC, I’ve struggled with grasping the new age concepts that are throw at us. I did all the readings and attended class, and for the most part was able to get by, relying on long study sessions, TJ’s tutors, and help from classmates, but I think this year is going to be different. So far this semester, I’ve entered the classroom with very little idea about what Barthes, de Saussure, or Macherey were talking about. But by the time class ended I felt that I had grasped the concepts… or at least started to understand the fundamentals. A huge part of this new level of understanding is The Notorious Dr. Rog’s teaching style. Everything we are learning about is demonstrated to us through a current ‘happening right now’ example. When we discussed the signifier, the signified, and the sign, Dr. Rog gave us the example of a BYOB party and an Exxon sign. How much more relatable can an example be? When we talked about Barthes meaning of trope, Dr. Rog gave the example of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, _____? (boy gets girl back). By first sharing with the class the meaning of trope – little segments of meaning we see so many times that we start filling in the meaning even though we’re missing parts – and then asking us to finish the statement; boy meets girl, boy loses girl, ____?, we are quickly able to place the word trope with a phrase that we immediately identify with. All of the hard concepts and unfamiliar words Dr. Rog relates to things we know about. This key teaching strategy was missing from my previous CMC classes. We would talk about Habermas, Schor, Giroux, etc, and none of their theories would be tied to things going on in today’s generation. I’m hoping that I leave CMC 300 at the end of the semester knowing all about different theorists and being able to know and use words that I didn’t know existed.

HOLLA! 9/6/09

So I always used to wonder if there were actual meanings or words to things that occur in our minds. To clarify, we all have had that experience when some starts off by saying something and we automatically fill in the blank without even thinking twice about it. For example, what we spoke about in class; boy meets girl, girl falls in love with boy, boy breaks girl’s heart, boy wins girl back, and they live happily ever after. This is an example of what Barthes calls tropes, little segments of meanings we’ve seen so many times we start filling in the meaning even though we are missing parts. After learning about this new phrase, it was great to finally have a symbol that I could put along with a universal meaning/understanding. My question to Barthes, or anyone who may want to respond to this considering Barthes really cant, why do tropes even form. How cliché or unoriginal are individuals that they can create a meaning for missing segments in a conversation. You would thinks Americans would be more creative and begin to step away from the norm. I also wonder, Hollywood wise, when a trope is filled with something that goes against the norm, for example, in the movie The Break Up, the normal trope is broken giving the movie a different ending. The Break Up was a very popular movie, but when boy did not win girl back, and they did not live happily ever after the story had a sad ending that a lot of individuals did NOT like at all. So do we follow these tropes because they are a known normalcy or because we only believe in a perfect reality when perfect is the farthest from our normal reality? This is a question I would love to find the answer to as we explore this topic further.

Daisy, 9/6

This week is class I enjoyed the exercise dealing with the title “A Short Story” For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never Worn. It was interesting to see the different answers classmates gave for the phrase, “a short story,” written in all lower cases and then capitalized with quotations. The phrase went from symbolizing a type of book to symbolizing the title of something. While the answers varied, most classmates identified the capitalized phrase put in quotations as the title for something. This demonstrates the shared meaning within our community that we give a capitalized word put in quotations. The phrase, “A Short Story,” is the signifier and the signified is that it represents a title of something. The only reason we can identify this as students is because we had seen it before. As a community of students we learned the concept within school allowing us to recognize it again. Just like in class with the word ghoti.
The next class session we explored ideas for a film using the title “For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never Worn.” Each group had a different idea for a film with a beginning, middle, and end. It only took six words to create such different ideas. Going along with Barthes and Macherey and the idea that it is what’s missing in the text that causes language. Using different community experiences and utilizing the gap within the language, each student thought of their own, different film idea.
While what we learn in class is new to us, it is eye opening because we have been participating in it our whole lives without realization. For example, so many times throughout conversations with people I think to myself, what are they really trying to say? This searching for a deeper meaning stems from learning that most people do not say what they really mean. Somewhere at a young age I learned that I need to question and search for a deeper meaning. It is this gap within language that Barthes believes is fun and creates meaning. The gap where people create different interpretations just like we did in class with “For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never Worn.”

BiegieGo, 9/6

Roland Barthes analyzes the reasons for people feeling the need to skim when looking at a text. “we do not read everything with the same intensity of reading; a rhythm is established, casual, unconcerned with the integrity of the text; our very avidity for knowledge impels us to skim or to skip certain passages in order to get more quickly to the warmer parts of the anecdote.” He compares reading to a striptease. We resemble a spectator in a nightclub who climbs on to stage and speeds up the dancer’s striptease, tearing off her clothing: but in the same order, that is on the one hand respecting and on the other hastening the episodes of the ritual.” What Barthes is trying to relay to his readers is that they are rushing the readings and not taking the time to sit down and read every word but rather to skim the text and look for the important parts or the most interesting parts to make the story move along more quickly.
Text of pleasure: the text that contents fills grants, euphoria; the text that comes from culture and does not break with it, is linked to a comfortable practice of reading. Text of bliss: the text that imposes a state of loss, the text that discomforts unsettles the reader’s historical, cultural, psychological assumptions, the consistency of his tastes, values, memories, brings to a crisis his relation with language. These two text, the text of pleasure and the text of bliss tell us the different kinds of text and what effects they have on their readers. The text of pleasure implies a state of comfort and the text of bliss pushes that state of comfort into a state of discomfort and test the language of the readers.