Is writing simply "performative"?

http://blog.escdotdot.com/2007/02/01/creative-journal%E2%80%94roland-barthes-and-pierre-bourdieu%E2%80%94the-death-of-the-author/

This blogger discusses some of Barthes' concepts from "The Death of the Author." One concept I find interesting is the idea that when a "scriptor" engages in the process of writing, he/she is not creating, but performing.

This makes me think about the act of improvising. I always thought of improvisation as taking what you know and creating something new from it. For example, a guitarist works off of scales to create unique solos, incorporating styles from familiar styles of music and favorite songs. Barthes would say that the guitar solo is not an expression of the guitarist, but rather a mixture of sources from the "immense dictionary" (R&W, 187) of the guitarist.

I understand that a new creation is hardly and rarely new. Everything is influenced by a plethora of sources (overdetermination). However, I don't really understand how producing something that has never been produced in the past is not creating something new. Guitarists create new solos all the time...they are obviously similar to what influenced them, but the specific arrangement of notes and the rhythm is a new combination. Poets are of course influenced by past works, but they create poems that have never been written before.

I think Barthes would argue that a new poem is a new combination, but not a new creation. And the poet merely put things into a novel combination, as opposed to creating something outside of influences. So going back to improvisation, I think Barthes would say that the end result may be something new, but the improvisor did not choose the way it came out.

Yet, as much as I agree with that, I still can't fully accept that there isn't some degree of creativity. After all, not just any new combination of words makes a good poem, just as not just any new combo of notes makes a good guitar solo. The artist still retains some control over the end product. What I am writing right now is largely influenced by many factors, but I (as in the overall system of all that makes up my physiology and psychology...as opposed to the "I" of the constructed self) am choosing how to use what is influencing me to create what is being written. So I think that writing is performance, yes, but there is also creativity involved.

The Unconscious and Consciousness

I like Lacan's idea that the unconscious is the nucleus of one's being. Most of what we are is unconscious: our desires, which are the reasons for what we say and think and do, come from our unconscious. So how can we say we know ourselves when we have no access to our nucleus, to that which causes the majority of what is conscious and the majority of our behavior? And further, how can we be held responsible for much of what we do if we are not consciously choosing to do it?

That most of what we think and do comes from unconscious sources is not surprising when you compare humans with animals -- humans, afterall, are not so different than animals (especially when there are a lot of people in one place at the same time). However, there is something quite important that separates humans from animals: language. It allows us to have complex societies, to have complex relationships, and it allows us to have consciousness in the sense that we can contemplate our current situation, and think about our thoughts, and plan for the future, etc. (This is so because we think with language; the more complex language we have, the more complex thoughts we can have.)

And with the consciousness that language allows for, we have some control over what we say and do, though it is indeed limited (again, we're still pretty similar to animals). Though, conscious effort can affect the unconscious. What I mean is that consciousness, as limited as it may be, can shape a person in a way they choose. For example, imagine Jerard has a bad habit of biting his nails and he wants to stop. He doesn't think when he does it; he sometimes realizes that he is biting his nails while already in the process (Jerard's habit is unconscious). However, with some effort, Jerard can consciously pay attention whenever he bites his nails, and make the conscious effort to refrain from biting (and perhaps using positive reinforcement when he successfully refrains, such as rewarding himself with a piece of candy).

With enough time and effort, Jerard can stop his nailbiting habit -- a habit which was unconscious. So he used his consciousness to affect and change his unconscious. It's important to note that the habit is probably not gone completely, meaning that Jerard may pick it up again in the future. Yet, it's gone for now and for at least a while. The more Jerard consciously avoids biting his nails the less likely the habit will return.

So even though most of a person is unconscious, there is the power to consciously change. In my opinion, the reason people don't change more often is because of laziness. It's so easy to keep doing what comes natural. And in many cases what's natural is the optimal way, but not in all cases, as with Jerard's nailbiting habit. Besides, conscious effort is work. It's much easier just to bite one's nails. But it doesn't have to be that way. Language gives us the power of consciousness, which gives us the power to change that which is unconsciously caused.

Derrida's Distinction between Who and What in Love and Being

I was interested in Derrida's distinction between the "Who" and the "What" in love and Being. Usually, when someone says they are in love without another person - let's call them Jack and Jill - one thinks that Jack loves Jill as Jill (her "self" or her "soul"). However, Derrida argues that there is no self to Jill, because a self would require a center, and the universe is 'decentred.' This is the "Who" that we take for granted; we falsely assume Jill has a static essence.

Obviously, Jill changes physically as she gets older, developing in many different ways, even regenerating completely new cells - physically, Jill is a continuous process of change; even mentally, things are in constant process and Jill is always thinking of different things or in different ways (which contributes to her changing interpretation of herself). But what makes Jill at five years old the same person as Jill at tweny-five? Physically and mentally, Jill is different. She may have memories of her past, but memories are vague interpretations of truth and are unreliable (which becomes a major criticism of the psychoanalytic process, because psychologists were creating memories in their patients mind of events that never happened). So what is it that stays constant? What is it that allows us to say young Jill and old Jill are the same Jill?

The self, of course. But remember, there is no self because there is no center. Jill is "always already" changing in fluid process, meaning that at any given moment she is not a thing, not a "Who." Rather, she is a process of becoming (Sidenote: I would argue that, at one single moment, if time were paused, Jill cannot be in process because process depends on causality, and both process and causality depend on the flow of time. So what is Jill in that frozen moment? She is Jill, technically with a center, yet that center is a "substitution" as Derrida would call it, and will be something different the next moment - maybe not vastly different, but different nonetheless. But in any case, in that frozen moment Jill as Jill, as a "Who," can be interpreted, but it's an inevitably faulty interpretation since it is a fleeting identity).

So how can Jack love Jill as a "Who"? The answer is he doesn't. What Jack is in love with is Jill as "What?" This means that Jack loves what he associates with Jill, not what is part of Jill's essence.

Jack loves Jill's fiery personality. He loves the way she acts towards him, the things she says to him, and how she says them. But all these things are not Jill. Because these things can change. Very often, it is because people change in different directions that their relationships fall apart. If Jill stopped acting compassionatley and lovingly towards Jack, then Jack would see Jill differently, and he would still be in love, but he'd be in love with his idea of what Jill was, not with how he sees Jill now. This is the "What" that Derrida talks about. Jack is in love with the "Whats" that he associates with his conception of Jill's "self." If those "Whats" change drastically enough and for a long enough period of time (which is what happens when people naturally change), Jack will eventually associate these new "Whats," these new personality traits with what he currently considers Jill's self. Thus, he will no longer love Jill (except in his memories, where he keeps alive the conception of what he used to associate with her - and even that is a love of "What" not of "Who").

About the Incest Taboo

In thinking about the incest taboo, it seems to me to be much more natural than cultural. Obviously, the incest taboo is a natural, universal human trait because it's in every culture, spanning the entire human-populated world. And most cultures (perhaps all) make incest even more taboo by making rules and laws against it.

However, there are exceptions to the rule; some people do engage in incestuous acts. And when I try to think about why, the answers seems to lean towards reasons of deviations from the natural norm. I mean, yeah, when a person engages in an incestuous act it is also a deviation from the cultural norm, but it seems that the cultural norm is only there because the natural norm is there. After all, why would a culture make incest forbidden? What's wrong with incest? The thought of it gives me the shivers, but that's because it's part of my nature to avoid it, plus it has been ingrained in me, through culture, as something horrible and disgusting. And the reason it's part of our culture is because it's maladaptive for our natures (the offpring of two organisms very close in DNA usually turn out to be sick, either physically, mentally, or both).

There are two ways I can understand how/why someone would engage in an incestuous act, one dealing with nature and one dealing with nurture (a binary opposition in psychology), yet both really go back to physical nature.

The first way is if the person has some sort of psychological disorder, which would be a result of a chemical imbalance or genetic mutation, or something of that sort; basically, the person's "nature" is messed up, deviating from the norm of the rest of the human population. This would explain why a person could/would defy a universal human trait.

The second way is if the person was conditioned by some traumatic life event (or many) to either become habituated to incest, or to associate it with positive emotions -- in either case this changes the brain's neural networking (the brain has quite a bit of plasticity), making the incestuous acts a result of physical deviations from the normal/average human.

So it seems that nature has much more to do with incest, both in upholding the taboo and in explaining those who engage in incestuous acts. Culture adds to nature, but it doesn't seem to carry enough weight to oppose nature in a true binary system.

What is Reality?

I'm intrigued with (though I disagree with) the post-structuralist notion that the universe is "decentred" and therefore, "inherently relativistic." I mean, yeah, it's true that relativity is a crucial factor in perception, but perceptions are not necessarily truths.

Standing on the side of the road, a car driving by at 60 mph appears to be zooming; yet, that same car from the perspective of a car driving parallel with it, and at the same speed, appears to be standing still. So how fast is the car actually going? Is it going? Are there multiple answers because there are multiple perspectives?

A post-structuralist would say that there is no answer because the answer you give depends on the point, the center, of perception that you argue from - and there is no correct point because the universe is decentred.

But how is the car even going at all if there is no answer? At one moment it is at Emmanuel College, and a few moments later it is at Star Market. No matter what perspective you take, the car still traverses space and time.

I don't know if this is true, but the post-structuralist may argue that space and time are an illusion and there is no space nor time (since there is no center of anything). But if this were the case how does anything happen at all? Causality (cause and effect) depends on time: one thing cannot cause another unless the first thing happens before the next (otherwise, how could it be considered the cause?). Further, how could there even be existence in the first place?

Everything falls apart unless the answer is that the car is going 60 mph, and it only appears to be standing still to the other car because the other car is also going 60 mph. So, yes, relativity plays into the appearence of reality, but there is still a real answer outside of perspective.

The Function of Signs

Saussure points out that language is basically arbitrary; it is a tool that humans use to communicate, but does not supply a one-to-one correlation between word and thing. He says, "in language there are only differences without positive terms" (40). The word "book" is not a positive term; it is not the thing itself nor is it the way of naming the thing; it is a sign used to describe the thing, an object consisting of a front and back cover with multiple pages of paper inbetween, held together by some sort of binding. In other words, the thing itself is not a book; book is simply what we call it. If language perfectly described reality, then all languages would be the same; in fact, there would only be one language, the language. But this is certainly not the case. In Italian, "libro" is used to describe the object we call a book. Libro and Book are not even close to sounding or looking like the same word, but they mean the same thing. So, the way we use language determines how we create meaning of reality. For example, we have the general word book. But we also have notebook, journal, diary, ledger, tome, etc. These different words all contain different specific meanings, even though they all fall under the same category of book. Diary means to us something different than does journal, notebook, or just book. The difference gives it its unique meaning. We can use a word like diary and understand that it is not quite the same thing as a notebook or a journal; and even though it is a type of book, it holds a different meaning than does the word book.

This seems like common sense. Of course a diary isn't a notebook. But what about snow? How many different words for snow do we have? Just a handful: snow, sleet, hail. Eskimos have something like 50 different words for snow (I've heard different numbers; someone even claimed it was over 100). Eskimos see differences in types of snow that we either don't pay attention to or don't see at all. They have words that cannot be translated into English. It would be like if someone saw a diary and called it a book; yes, it is a book, but it's specifically a diary. Yes, that stuff is snow, but it's specifically a certain type of snow. Since we don't have a language for it, we don't have a conception of that specific element of reality. It makes me wonder how much I am limited in understanding about the world not only in terms of not knowing other languages, but in what has not, or perhaps cannot, be expressed linguistically.

Marxist Criticism vs.Liberal Humanism

Marxist Criticism assumes that before the writer - let's call him Ricardo - even begins to write, his novel is already partially determined. One might ask, How can that be? How can a blank page be fated? According to this theory, Ricardo feels as if he is free from any social context, but in fact, he is unconsciously molded by his social status. And these unconscious notions inevitably come out in his writing. So, the blank page before him will soon be filled with what he freely wills, yet it will be inescapably tinted by his unconscious feelings about his social circumstances.

In opposition to this theory is Liberal Humanism, which assumes that Ricardo can freely write his novel without any interference from outside contexts. The underlying meanings of his novel have nothing to do with his social status (unless, of course, he chooses this). And as readers, we don't need to have knowledge of Ricardo's life in order to understand what he has written about. All we need is to study the novel itself.

I believe that neither theory is entirely correct. There is truth in both, and it really depends on the specific text you're studying whether one theory is more applicable than another. So, in Ricardo's case, it may very well be true that his social status as a lower middle class immigrant (he moved here from Cuba when he was ten) clearly influences the thoughts and actions of the characters in his novel. However, if Susie goes to write her novel, and does so with a self-conscious desire to create characters dissimilar to herself, it would be a waste of time trying to analyze her novel through a Marxist lens.

The main point here is that there are different ways to interpret a text, and sometimes one works better than another - but it all depends on the specific text being studied. There is no one, exclusive, ultimate way to interpret every text in the world...unless that way is broad enough to encompass every other theory, and allows overlap, flexibility, and freedom of interpretation. But I guess that would defeat the purpose of having a specific way to analyze a text.