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January 23, 2005
Cultural conservatives in Australia often make a bit of fuss about something they call 'Theory', which is associated with political correctness, the cultural wars and the professionalization of academe. It has been a very messy and frustrating "debate."
Though I've never really understood what was meant by 'Theory' exactly, I roughly understand it to be related to the literary institution, the philosophy that is discussed in these pages, a theoretically informed criticism and philosophical aesthetics. From my expereinces in philosophy departments in Australia the resistance to 'Theory' often expressed an Anglo-American concern or anxiety to imported French and German philosophy (Hegel Nietzsche, Heidegger, Derrida etc) by lefty academics.
This historical understanding accords with Mark Kaplin's interpretation over at Charlotte Street. Mark says:
"...the objection (or 'resistance') to theory [more] typically ... refers to a phalanx of mainly ‘imported’ theories which have become increasingly influential in academia throughout the past 30 years or so. These are, very broadly: Marxism (in various guises), psychoanalysis and 'deconstruction'. If what unites these various 'theories' or schools is equidistance from (what had been) orthodox criticism, then 'Theory' would hardly be a particularly coherent or useful category.
It might also seem that this concern with 'theory' is a rather Anglo-centric one, if one thinks of how, in Germany and France, for instance, theoretically and philosophically informed criticism has long been the norm. The brilliance of Benjamin’s analyses of Kafka and others, Adorno or Bloch’s thinking on and by literature, or the meditative essays of Blanchot, are all testimony to the rewards of a theoretically informed criticism."
Okay, that is my cultural background which informs the way I approach this issue.
I mention this because the concern with 'Theory' has resurfaced in the blogosphere with a variety of responses to Gerald Graff's new book, Clueless in Academe. This text is seen to reopening the door on the debate about theory (feminism, post-colonial criticism, deconstruction etc) as well as asking what is a liberal arts education supposed to be about these days?
As Armadeep Singh asks:
Do we really know what we're doing when we teach literature? ... More closely: It is often assumed unproblematically that [the] key goals in the English classroom are to enable students to 1) do close readings, 2) think analytically and critically, and 3) write persuasive arguments in support of their ideas. But all of these are actually things that should be defined more carefully than they usually are, and probably also questioned and contested. What does a close reading consist of exactly? Is there a philosophical or ethical reason why students should do them? And what is an argument exactly? Why is it so devilishly difficult to get students to develop and sustain them?"
I had read Graff's earlier text Beyond the Culture Wars several years ago,and from memory the 'beyond' referred to teaching the culture (canon) wars of the 1980s and 1990s in academia. He argued that it was necessary to bring the controveries to the centre of the academic curriculum in literary studies instead of trying to hide the disagreements about the canon and politics.
Now the responses to Graff's text go beyond the literary institution as they touch on Richard Rorty and continental philosophers such as Derrida. Philosophy is a part of the debate over Thoery. What are the concerns here?
John Holbo says:
"I accuse Theory of being a puffer fish. When you can see you are about to be attacked, inflate to several times your actual size in an attempt to intimidate the attacker into backing off .... We see the puffer in action when thinkers like Derrida imply that Theory is just philosophy, so that resistance to Theory = resistance to philosophy; and when thinkers like de Man imply that Theory is just attention to the nature of language, so that resistance to theory = resistance to language; and when Eagleton declares these days that Theory is just moderately systematic self-reflective study of a subject matter, so resistance to Theory = resistance to any kind of systematic thinking."
I translate that into this:
Those who do 'Theory' (continental philosophy) do not argue.
Why do I do that kind of translation?
Because of my cultural background that I mentioned above. In this context the conflicts were not taught nor the issues addressed. The no argument claim was a very standard criticism made by analytic philosophers about continental philosophy. The standard criticism said that those who write texts earmarked as continental philosophers o not argue. So we (philosophers) do not have to engage with them, as they are non-philosophers. We only engage with those who argue in the way that we do.
At the time (the 1990s) I've found this pretty self-serving, as it meant that the analytic philosohers did not have to do the hard yards and read the texts or engage with them. It was all about gatekeeping (power) not philosophy.
So it was always unclear what the issues between the analytic and continental schools were. The history of the toubled relationship was little guide (Kant is a pivotal dividing figure) as there was little philosophical contact. Rorty can be seen as the change agent here.
Times move on. We are now online. Before we step into these troubled waters we need to see what is Graff saying. We can do this as the Introduction and Chapter I of Clueless in Academe is online (as a pdf file).
I will take a closer look in next post.
next
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But, Gary, since 'theory doesn't argue' is not a premise but a conclusion; also, since you don't actually say what (if anything) is wrong with the one argument you do quote - the one about 'theory' being used equivocally as a synonym for 'philosophy' when really it is at most a name of a particular cluster of styles or thinkers; also, since none of my arguments are analytic philosophy-based; also, since it is rather uncharitable of you simply to assume critics of theory suffer from 'anxiety' in the presence of French and German imports. Well, to make a long story short, why isn't it perfectly reasonable of me to respond to your dismissal of my arguments by turning what you have written around, like so?
What you are advancing is a very standard criticism of analytic philosophy on behalf of continental philosophy. Those who write texts earmarked (in this case wrongly) as analytic philosophy cannot understand the deep thoughts of continental philosophy (even if, like Holbo, they study the history of continental philosophy AND theory.) So we do not have to engage with them, as they are non-philosophers. We only engage with those who 'argue' in the way that we do.
I've always found this pretty self-serving, as it means that you do not have to read critics of theory or engage with them. It is about gatekeeping not critical inquiry, as there is no move to consider whether all the noise about 'teaching the conflicts' amounts to any teaching of the conflicts.
Now isn't this excessively harsh as a judgment on what you have written? But it is just the mirror-image of what you wrote about me. The moral of the story: We'll never get any teaching of the conflicts done this way. You have to start by actually considering whether the other side has arguments, and whether they are any good. Merely assuming it can all be put down to intellectually inadequate anxiety doesn't cut it.
If you are actually curious about my arguments against theory, check out my long mock-Platonic dialogue (linked from the recent post entitled Precluding Untheoretic Prescript.) Then, if you think the arguments are bad, you can explain what it is about the arguments that makes them bad.
Cheers,
JH