Shakespeare Electronic Conference, SHK 7.0915. Thursday, 5 December 1996.
(1) From: Thomas Bishop <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Wednesday, 4 Dec 1996 09:31:37 -0500
Subj: Re: SHK 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
(2) From: Belinda Johnston <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 5 Dec 1996 13:51:30 +1100 (EST)
Subj: Re: SHK 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
(1)----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Thomas Bishop <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Wednesday, 4 Dec 1996 09:31:37 -0500
Subject: 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
Comment: Re: SHK 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
Jane A Thompson asks:
>Can we not talk about each other's postings without resorting to casual
>put-downs?
Alas no, since gratuitous offensiveness and ad hominem attack now count as
genuine intellectual engagement in many academic circles. This tendency seems
to be exacerbated by the Internet medium, with its absence of a need to worry
about aspects of the non-electronic context of argument which might normally
inhibit the display of sheer nastiness. Of course, when you've been trained in
Melbourne, you just cant help it....
Cheers,
Tom
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From: Belinda Johnston <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 5 Dec 1996 13:51:30 +1100 (EST)
Subject: 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
Comment: Re: SHK 7.0910 Re: Politics: Marxists, Elitism, and Texts
I see I have been accused by Jane Thompson of flippancy and non-argument.
Indeed, Thompson implies that the non-arguments proferred by 'we Marxists' is
the reason for the lapses into the hate speech exemplified by Walker-White's "I
despise Marxists". Show me an argument for 'human spirit' and 'creativity'
that doesn't resort to tired essentialisms and I'll accept the charge of
'non-argument'. Few of the Marxists I know would say the human subject is
'spiritless'- rather they would suggest that our very notions of spirit,
creativity, and artistic value are variable, culturally-bound and produced out
of a series of material relations. Therefore, we must be careful how we deploy
those terms. It is precisely this language that I object to in Walker-White-s
argument and my flippantly insulting response was intended simply to point out
that the notion of a sovereign individual subject (employed in Walker-White's
latest posting in his reduction of capitalism and marxism to individual
'motive') is a notion in need of interrogation, and worthy of suspicion.