Re: AUT: spinoza/lacan

["David McInerney" <borderlands@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Nate,

Thanks for your reply.  I had a similar experience starting _Politics and
the Other Scene_.  If you are stuck on that first chapter, which is terribly
dense, I suggest moving on to the subsequent ones, which are much more
accessible and the relevance to contemporary politics much more evident.
You could then go back to Chapter 1 later once you've read the rest, and
hopefully it will then make more sense.

There is an enjoyable irony in recommending this method of reading Balibar's
book, as Althusser said the same with respect to Vol 1 of Capital in his
preface to the French edition, that we should start at Chapter 2 and read
Chapter 1 only after reading the rest of Vol. 1!

On radical stuff on Spinoza I would suggest Warren Montag's book as the
place to start. His book is contextualised and better written - if we can
compare a book written in English with translations - than Balibar's and
Negri's books on Spinoza.  Balibar's and Montag's books are well worth
reading for anyone interested in the concept of the multitude.

The less said about Zizek and the neo-hegelians the better, as I have a hard
time finding any positives these days.  Yes, the covers are great,
especially the one with the photo of the dead octopus, the last book of his
that I bought (1996).  It doesn't take much imagination to come up with
crude jokes to include in a psychoanalysis book - from memory most of them
are about masturbation.

best wishes
David


----- Original Message -----
From: "Nate Holdren" <nateholdren@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, March 29, 2004 1:46 PM
Subject: RE: AUT: spinoza/lacan


> Hi David,
>
> Forget the discursive and the transgressive, those are passe, our age is
the
> becoming-historical of the digressive! All power to the cocktail party
> conversationalists!
>
> I've not read Balibar. He's on the miles long list awaiting reading,
though
> not very near the top. I started Politics and the Other Scene but found it
> kind of dry. The longer I stay out of university the less patient I become
> (I think it's largely aesthetic, frankly. Negri may be overly optimistic,
> but I crave the sense of excitement and possibility he sometimes conveys-
> there's enough boredom and pessimism in life already.) I'm quite
interested
> in the various radical approaches of Spinoza but haven't got around to
> reading much of them. I'm still enduring the death march through Marx...
>
> As for Lacan etc, I find all the mutant descendents of Freud, regardless
of
> lineage, tremendously dull. Zizek's only virtues to my mind are a minor
> dramatic flair and a crude sense of humor. His books do tend to have
fairly
> well designed covers though. If I had the money or better skill at
> shoplifting I'd acquire them to jazz up my living room table.
>
> best wishes,
> Nate
>
>
> on Sunday you need some wine to get through the terrible wilderness of
> workdays.
> -Luisa Valenzuela, "Strange Things Happen Here"
>
>
>
>
>
> >From: "David McInerney" <borderlands@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Reply-To: aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >To: <aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Subject: AUT: spinoza/lacan - reply to Nate
> >Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2004 09:07:04 +1030
> >
> >Hi Nate,
> >
> >This might be a digression from the current thread, but I just thought
I'd
> >ask these simple questions and make these comments in response to your
> >latest post while it is still fresh in my mind.
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Nate Holdren" <nateholdren@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> >To: <aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> >Sent: Saturday, March 27, 2004 6:19 AM
> >Subject: Re: AUT: RE: antiwar movement
> >
> >
> > > Hi Peter-
> > > Sorry for the rough and schematic character of this (as usual) hasty
> >post,
> > > I'm pressed for time (as usual). Well put and I like the references to
> >the
> > > Colectivo Situaciones and Precarias a la Deriva. What's the problem,
> >though,
> > > with communicability? Sure, there are no communicative guarantees -
> > > conversational misfire can always happen - but isn't incommunicability
> >just
> > > another unpleasant cousin in the same family as transcendence? It's
like
> > > talk about absolute difference from certain anti-hegelian camps, one
> >moves
> > > away from some of the sillier excesses of the tradition but still
> >retains
> >an
> > > absolute, a foundationalism (or a despair over the lack of achieving a
> > > viable foundation). The reason I'm drawn to the Spinozist approaches
to
> > > Marxism is precisely because in the idea of immanence (which I don't
> >pretend
> > > to really understand) it seems to me there's an affirmation that the
> > > hacienda can always be built, in theory speaking, that is, that
> > > relationships are always constructed and at least potentially
> >constructible.
> > > One may fail in a project, communication may not occur or may break
> >down,
> > > but that doesn't mean it was impossible, that failure was guaranteed
> >from
> > > the outset.
> >
> >I wonder what you think of Etienne Balibar's more recent (since his split
> >from the PCF in the early 1980s) works, such as _Spinoza and Politics_?
He
> >has added a chapter on 'Politics and Communication' to the expanded
english
> >edition (1998).  His work differs from Negri's in interesting ways, and
in
> >many ways is less of a 'system' philosophically and perhaps less
optimistic
> >politically.  One of the great things about his work - and this goes back
> >to
> >the reasons for his split with the PCF, namely their racist immigration
> >policies - is its engagement with issues of race and nation in relation
to
> >class and also he has done some very interesting stuff on the
> >intellectual/manual division of labour in relation to racism.
> >
> > > I'm not sure incommunicability is even a coherent concept, simply by
its
> > > being articulable in language - if one can hang the term
> >'incommunicable'
> >on
> > > a given referent one has just demonstrated that the referent is
subject
> >to
> > > description and communication and has a relationship with all those
> >other
> > > things termed 'incommunicable'. I'm not trying to grind any hegelian
or
> > > davidsonian axe here, I'm not all that invested in the various
> >philosophies
> > > of language and philosophies of mind floating around (implied or
> >explicit)
> > > in political discussions. Rather, I think this may not be the most
> > > productive avenue of thought (much like interminable and boring
> >discussions
> > > over sameness and difference) for political inquiry. (Just as certain
> > > conversations I've had with Lacanian folks serve to my mind as a
> >reductio
> >ad
> > > absurdum argument against the idea that Lacan is politically useful.)
> >
> >I have never read anything by a Lacanian that would be considered
> >politically useful at all.  The most "political" of those writers (by
> >popular account) is Zizek, but his work seems to boil down to the answer
> >"Lacan (as Zizek imagines him) is always right", and every political
> >situation presents itself not as in need of concrete, open-ended analysis
> >of
> >relations of forces but rather simply a demonstration of it manifests the
> >triptych of Symbolic-Imaginary-Real.  How droll.  It's like a giant
sausage
> >factory.  All sorts of interesting and different material go in, but the
> >same bland Lacanian sausages always come out.
> >
> >I was a fan of Zizek et al many years ago (1994-95) but soon came to the
> >realisation that, like Anthony Giddens, he simply writes the same book
over
> >and over again with new examples.
> >
> >DM
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >      --- from list aut-op-sy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ---
>
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