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It's important to note the target audience of these writings are usually academics who already familiar with the field. This means they get to use a lot of jarg

by ATsch 5y ago

It's important to note the target audience of these writings are usually academics who already familiar with the field. This means they get to use a lot of jargon and concepts established by their peers without having to explain them first. There are definitely other texts (such as the YouTube video linked in another thread) that are easier to understand as a casual observer. However the other aspect is that as you alluded to, a strong poststructuralist belief is that common language, by nature of being made to describe the current world, always makes it easiest to express ideas that are already commonplace. Thus to create new ideas one must also create new language.

lil_dispaches 5y ago
"What is considered academic discourse within the spectacular society is nothing but false consciousness—spectacular thought, the official lies sponsored by the spectacle." https://unredacted-word.pub/spectacle/#section-210 https://unredacted-word.pub/spectacle/#section-210
- 0xADADA 5y ago
  Translator here, thanks for referring to this one, its one of my favorites
beaconstudios 5y ago
Also apparently Foucault could explain his ideas much more clearly in person, and when asked why he didn't write the same way, said that to be taken seriously as a French continental philosopher at least 2/3 of what you write must be incomprehensible. Most of the semiotics and sociological content of postmodernism (ie the majority of it) is really simple and intuitive - it's just wrapped in layers of reference to obscure philosophy, invented terms, and overly complicated language.
- kelseyfrog 5y ago
  I read part of SotS with my partner outloud. It became obvious, while apprehending the text's ideas, that internet denizens are already intimately familiar with them even to the point of DeBord's perspective as being a bit dated. Social media, and TikTok in particular, push the limits of SotS which is mainly mass media focused. The opportunity for a critical theory of social media is ripe. In this thread, I will 1/13738
  - nefitty 5y ago
    Hahaha you got me
  - 0xADADA 5y ago
    > that internet denizens are already intimately familiar with them even to the point of DeBord's perspective as being a bit dated. Social media, and TikTok in particular, push the limits of SotS which is mainly mass media focused.
  - antihero 5y ago
    See this was my initial take from like the first part, but as I read on I was wondering if there was something a bit deeper that they were trying to describe.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- ATsch 5y ago
  Just that it is possible to explain something with simpler language doesn't mean it is always desirable to. Somehow a standard of comprehensbility is leveled at philosophy that no other field is expected to meet. There are very few people complaining about the unreadability of quantum equations in fundamental physics or the jargon of theoretical mathematics. We appreciate why this is necessary for those fields, that there is a difference between science research and science communication. Yet for philosophy, especially that which criticises the current order, this is somehow seen as discrediting.
  - donw 5y ago
    Richard Feynman, the father of quantum physics, had a rule that, if you couldn’t explain it to a five-year-old, then you didn’t actually understand it.
    - ATsch 5y ago
      Yet he did not address his scientific papers to five-year-olds.
      - stirfish 5y ago
        Maybe they were addressed to a five-year-old Richard Feynman
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    But philosophy doesn't tend to layer so deep as to require especially complex jargon. You need to know some of the field-specific ideas (signifier/signified for semiotics for example) but these are intuitive concepts that relate to daily life, not hyper-specialised concepts like what you'd find in chemistry or physics. Given how many people get upset by even the term "postmodernism", I think it's a worthy exercise to make the concepts more accessible so that less people think it's an exercise in trying to destroy the philosophical foundations of the West, and more an exercise in trying to understand the reality we live in.
  - lapinot 5y ago
- l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
  Sometimes I wonder if crit theory had a natural evolution to serve as a foundation for a million PhD theses. Really these people ever should have had this much to say. Also it seems like philosophy birthed via poetry. These people should have just written poetry.
  - beaconstudios 5y ago
    Much of philosophy is poetic. That doesn't mean it isn't pointing at truth - much of classical fiction in general is about getting at the essence of certain aspects of reality.
    - l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
      I think analytic departments would disagree with you. Also, what poetry does is defamiliarize language. It's impact is emotional. It isn't philosophy.
      - beaconstudios 5y ago
        They probably would because of the analytic/continental divide, but that's fine. That doesn't mean they're right. Thousand Plateaus was extremely poetic but its contents can be converted into more straightforward ideas like deterritorialisation and schizoanalysis. Poetry is just the delivery mechanism. Also Deleuze is an example of a philosopher who has both done poetic and analytic work (including metaphysics, which is a core analytic discipline) but is generally considered a continental philosopher. I don't think the distinction matters - both "sides" just explore different philosophical topics. I enjoy both of them and the divide seems petty.
        l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
        Well continental philosophy is currently turning the western world on its head so I don't think there will be reconciliation any time soon.
VictorPath 5y ago
The book opens > In post-industrial societies where mass production and media predominate, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles. I don't know if the target of the text is only academics, but certainly it is at people who this opening sentence reminded them of another opening sentence - > The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,” its unit being a single commodity. Which is the opening of Marx's Capital. Marx was talking about (in this and after) how there were not wealthy people who owned and had a relationship to an immense accumulation of things, nor working and poor people who owned and had a relationship to no or much less things, but workers and capitalists, who had a social relationship from one class to another as well as an internal class relationship. The ruling class expropriating surplus labor time from the working class, the fulcrum of the exploitative relationship, the resulting alienation of the worker etc. If this is the base of social relations in society, Debord was discussing the hegemonic superstructure, which became a more important topic than it was from World War I on, from Antonio Gramsci to his successors. Everything else in society aside from production - media, church, school - but especially media.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

by ATsch 5y ago

lil_dispaches 5y ago

"What is considered academic discourse within the spectacular society is nothing but false consciousness—spectacular thought, the official lies sponsored by the spectacle." https://unredacted-word.pub/spectacle/#section-210 https://unredacted-word.pub/spectacle/#section-210

0xADADA 5y ago
Translator here, thanks for referring to this one, its one of my favorites

beaconstudios 5y ago

Also apparently Foucault could explain his ideas much more clearly in person, and when asked why he didn't write the same way, said that to be taken seriously as a French continental philosopher at least 2/3 of what you write must be incomprehensible. Most of the semiotics and sociological content of postmodernism (ie the majority of it) is really simple and intuitive - it's just wrapped in layers of reference to obscure philosophy, invented terms, and overly complicated language.

kelseyfrog 5y ago
I read part of SotS with my partner outloud. It became obvious, while apprehending the text's ideas, that internet denizens are already intimately familiar with them even to the point of DeBord's perspective as being a bit dated. Social media, and TikTok in particular, push the limits of SotS which is mainly mass media focused. The opportunity for a critical theory of social media is ripe. In this thread, I will 1/13738
- nefitty 5y ago
  Hahaha you got me
- 0xADADA 5y ago
  > that internet denizens are already intimately familiar with them even to the point of DeBord's perspective as being a bit dated. Social media, and TikTok in particular, push the limits of SotS which is mainly mass media focused.
- antihero 5y ago
  See this was my initial take from like the first part, but as I read on I was wondering if there was something a bit deeper that they were trying to describe.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ATsch 5y ago
Just that it is possible to explain something with simpler language doesn't mean it is always desirable to. Somehow a standard of comprehensbility is leveled at philosophy that no other field is expected to meet. There are very few people complaining about the unreadability of quantum equations in fundamental physics or the jargon of theoretical mathematics. We appreciate why this is necessary for those fields, that there is a difference between science research and science communication. Yet for philosophy, especially that which criticises the current order, this is somehow seen as discrediting.
- donw 5y ago
  Richard Feynman, the father of quantum physics, had a rule that, if you couldn’t explain it to a five-year-old, then you didn’t actually understand it.
  - ATsch 5y ago
    Yet he did not address his scientific papers to five-year-olds.
    - stirfish 5y ago
      Maybe they were addressed to a five-year-old Richard Feynman
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  But philosophy doesn't tend to layer so deep as to require especially complex jargon. You need to know some of the field-specific ideas (signifier/signified for semiotics for example) but these are intuitive concepts that relate to daily life, not hyper-specialised concepts like what you'd find in chemistry or physics. Given how many people get upset by even the term "postmodernism", I think it's a worthy exercise to make the concepts more accessible so that less people think it's an exercise in trying to destroy the philosophical foundations of the West, and more an exercise in trying to understand the reality we live in.
- lapinot 5y ago
l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
Sometimes I wonder if crit theory had a natural evolution to serve as a foundation for a million PhD theses. Really these people ever should have had this much to say. Also it seems like philosophy birthed via poetry. These people should have just written poetry.
- beaconstudios 5y ago
  Much of philosophy is poetic. That doesn't mean it isn't pointing at truth - much of classical fiction in general is about getting at the essence of certain aspects of reality.
  - l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
    I think analytic departments would disagree with you. Also, what poetry does is defamiliarize language. It's impact is emotional. It isn't philosophy.
    - beaconstudios 5y ago
      They probably would because of the analytic/continental divide, but that's fine. That doesn't mean they're right. Thousand Plateaus was extremely poetic but its contents can be converted into more straightforward ideas like deterritorialisation and schizoanalysis. Poetry is just the delivery mechanism. Also Deleuze is an example of a philosopher who has both done poetic and analytic work (including metaphysics, which is a core analytic discipline) but is generally considered a continental philosopher. I don't think the distinction matters - both "sides" just explore different philosophical topics. I enjoy both of them and the divide seems petty.
      - l-_l-_l-_lo_ol 5y ago
        Well continental philosophy is currently turning the western world on its head so I don't think there will be reconciliation any time soon.

VictorPath 5y ago

The book opens > In post-industrial societies where mass production and media predominate, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles. I don't know if the target of the text is only academics, but certainly it is at people who this opening sentence reminded them of another opening sentence - > The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,” its unit being a single commodity. Which is the opening of Marx's Capital. Marx was talking about (in this and after) how there were not wealthy people who owned and had a relationship to an immense accumulation of things, nor working and poor people who owned and had a relationship to no or much less things, but workers and capitalists, who had a social relationship from one class to another as well as an internal class relationship. The ruling class expropriating surplus labor time from the working class, the fulcrum of the exploitative relationship, the resulting alienation of the worker etc. If this is the base of social relations in society, Debord was discussing the hegemonic superstructure, which became a more important topic than it was from World War I on, from Antonio Gramsci to his successors. Everything else in society aside from production - media, church, school - but especially media.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]