tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2991343547887142385.post7248440605611978136..comments2024-02-24T20:29:17.083-05:00Comments on MINDFUL PLEASURES: ZIZEK: FOLLOW THE FOLLOWERBRIAN OARDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00695622618831825498noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2991343547887142385.post-15695304346628492562011-03-13T00:10:37.750-05:002011-03-13T00:10:37.750-05:00Gary,
Well, first of all, the Tito part of that s...Gary,<br /><br />Well, first of all, the Tito part of that sentence wasn't really a joke. But perfect strangers' insights into my 'mood' are always welcome.<br /><br />Second, I don't 'despise' Zizek, neither for his celebrity nor his Lacanianism. My biggest problem with SZ (great initials for a critical theorist) is that he's (a) essentially a follower of Lacan who's constantly treated like the leader of a school (this is perhaps more the fault of SZ's followers and the media than the man himself) and (b) an exceptionally shallow interpreter of art who skims over the surfaces of texts and never lets them entangle and challenge his discourse. You offer an answer to the second charge in terms that SZ would probably approve but which do not impress me. I'm still waiting for a single example of Zizek actually engaging with an artwork, allowing himself to feel the challenge art brings to thought.<br /><br />Third, the first line of your comment really mischaracterizes my post.<br /><br />Fourth, you should check out Walter A. Davis, one of whose books I mentioned at the top of the post. Davis's engagement with Hegel, Marx, psychoanalysis and Heidegger in his book "Inwardness and Existence" is at least as radical and challenging as anything in Zizek's The Parallax View.<br /><br />Thanks for your comment (and I don't mean that ironically).BRIAN OARDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00695622618831825498noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2991343547887142385.post-54488984279805795702011-03-12T22:55:12.473-05:002011-03-12T22:55:12.473-05:00so your critique of zizek is that he's popular...so your critique of zizek is that he's popular and uses accessible examples? you must be right.<br /><br />the problem with this, of course, is that much of his critical work remains unexamined by English language readers, who favor his more pop-culture focused crit theory titles. he has an extensive body of dense theoretical work that requires a rich knowledge of continental philosophy and hegel.<br /><br />i'm not defending the man or his work. but you make it sound like he's a charlatan, which is quite ridiculous. the man is unashamedly marxist, lacanian, hegelian. it's hardly a worthwhile to call him out on it. he owns it.<br /><br />i think many of his critics are not capable of handling a critique of hegel and lacan, and certainly not marx, not because they aren't intelligent enough or hip enough, but because they simply haven't read enough of his early work that builds a gorundwork for much of what he discusses in his smaller, more accessible works.<br /><br />You write, "Zizek takes big Quarter Pounder-size bites out of art, but he never allows artworks to bite back. This is the fundamental superficiality of Zizek's relationship to art: artworks are only and always exemplary; they can never be permitted to criticize the Master." And you offer a challenge for anyone to find one example where the lacanian-zizekian thing you hate about zizek permits art a chance to bite back. <br /><br />I guess what you're saying is that zizek has created a theory in which he sets it up where he wins (by proxy, lacan wins,) and art loses. why? in my opinion, because it ignores a very important aspect of zizek's process. it willingly undermines itself, exposes itself for what it is. i'm not going to get into this in a comment on an old post, but it never ceases to amaze me how much his critics despise his celebrity and his admiration for the play he finds in Lacan.<br /><br />And your Tito joke kind of exposes your mood. much more interested in finding a fraud than participating in discourse about the theory.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04336286974067459325noreply@blogger.com