Culler Chapter 8 -- another apology

A somewhat hectic 36 hours dealing with the problem of an evening class in a building unexpectedly closed by security at Baruch. Helas pour moi.

Chapter 8 outlines theoretical takes on the formation of the individual/subject, focusing primarily on the tension between “accounts of subjects who choose” the way their identities/selves develop, and “accounts of forces that determine subjects.”  This tension very much echoes the dichotomies in theorizing the author, as well as textual meaning, and may in a way lay ground for them (an author is also a self, and a decentered author is easier to dispose of, as in Barthes). Culler outlines the positions of Marxism, feminist & queer theory, and psychoanalysis on whether and how the “I” is unique, essential, or predetermined/shaped and even created by outside forces and discourse (like the nascence of “homosexual” as an identity, as per Foucault – or the "heterosexual" as per Butler).

It’s interesting to consider the personal and social pros and cons of group identification and, more importantly, how theorizing group identity might influence political and legal treatment of minority groups. I was especially interested in the legal implications of a more broadly defined self, who might take responsibility even for less conscious or “intended” actions, and the havoc such a notion of responsibility would wreak on the cornerstone notion of legal intent. The tensions of subject and literary character formation in literature are also discussed, as is the readers’ identification with this narrative, and prompted me to consider the paradox of a bildungsroman in which a character both develops and is, in a way, sloughed off to reveal some pre-existing essential, true self – or even a kunstlerroman where an artist might labor to become and express what s/he already in essence is.

Culler discusses Anthony Appiah’s argument that notions of subject position and agency simply belong to different narratives, and should not be contrasted to an unproductive extent. Culler goes on to say that, since the nature of theory is to take arguments as far as possible—even to the extreme—the lessening of this tension is unlikely. I am not sure that this binary position truly agrees with, as Culler himself notes, the rather fuzzy (in the mathematical sense) and inexhaustible nature of theory. In fact, I talked to a math professor the other day about quantum computing: rather than using 0 and 1, a quantum computer would consider the bit as a kind of continuum between the two (0----1). Perhaps it would be more useful to consider the subject/self as just such a fuzzy continuum, already manifest in the ambiguousness of the word “subject.” In this case perhaps the two-faced word is already smarter than us.

-Ana Bozicevic