so the interview stops so idiocy can be spewed??? you gotta love the line "you are well known in the states for deconstruction" good job informing him of that. blows my mind man...
Derrida is quite possibly the most esoteric, impenetrable and bourgeouis intellectual you will ever read. Save yourself some time and jump to Heideggar instead.
@bosman1988 While I tend to agree, at the very least his 'construction' of deconstructionism is fairly sound. If you live in this day and age these ideas have to exist. Foucault was the better thinker though.
Does anyone know if raw footage of this interview is available anywhere? I can't believe how contradictory the narrator's interruption of Derrdia is; considering the subject of conversation. I would love to hear what he actually had to say on the topic.
@TheOlympians2S2K Her interruption was the integral deconstruction to his self- fulfilling meta- reflection on the unnaturallity of the situation. She proved him right.
Baudrillard was right - the social sciences have been replaced by a weak simulation of their former selves - this is just a simulation of a thinker thinking - the faux intensity - the pipe - the wildly beautiful hair - if a computer was given the task of producing the perfect philosopher it would give us Derrida.
@32peartree Then would not the computer by means of proxy be the perfect philosopher? Although we might be observing a simulation of Derrida, perhaps the simulation has an origin by which some truth can be ascertained. Maybe not complete truth, but truth enough.
@32peartree you just laid a blanket judgment on one of the most influential philosophers of our day, and then backed it up by a critique of his physical appearance. Seriously? Read a work. Then read a commentary. Then read it again, and see if you still think he's insubstantial.
What a load of incomprehensible double-talk! Derrida is the biggest fraud that ever was and is to blame for much of the travesty called postmodernism and its bastard child political correctness!
If you want to be a respected French intellectual you have to make sure of a few things:
1- Express completely obvious and meaningless crap in such a language that the casual idiot who cannot take the time to DECONSTRUCT and translate what you are saying in everyday terms is blown away by your depth.
2- Make sure to deflect all criticism of your banal insights and pointlessly abstruse lexicon by saying that you have been misunderstood.
3- Wear designer clothes and eccentric hairstyles.
@DonVoghano your comment was very funny and entertaining..thanks for your contribution...oh and i think your three points to being a respected French intellectual look to be absolutely true! :)
@DonVoghano ok. at the very least the guy wrote more shit than you have. as an extension of will, he's at least trumped you. I don't know, maybe you're steven king.
William Frawley played Fred Mertz on I Love Lucy. Frawley FUCKED Chomsky in his rectum while simultaneously grabbing Woody Allen's woody, and wrapping his mouth around Barney's Frank. Frawley then had his own rectum violated by Anthony's Weiner.
Fred Gwynne later arrived and sprayed Kouros pour Homme on all of them, and began whistling the opening theme song to the ancient TV show "Taxi" while he completely disrobed, revealing tattoos of Jimmy Carter and Vladimir Lennon on his butt cheeks.
If your going to edit with a voice over, at least provide a transcript of his words in the original language spoken, rather than assume your translation will convey his ideas effectively without destroying the blasé genius nature of his speech.
wtf! Derrida just has enough time to say he wants to be careful to craft his message for the precise situation he's in. And then he's cut off by a voiceover of a quote from one of his books. How f*ing ironic. And unfortunate, given that he really looks like he's saying some interesting stuff while the voiceover goes on with the quotation. All waving his arms around and whatnot, like he expects his voice to go with his image.
I would advise people against parroting Sokal . I can't recall how many blogs I've seen where their (sokal's and Bricmont 's) work it is uncritically accepted by people who've never read derrida , baudrillard or lacan.Afterwards they claim to have exposed some kind of quackery.
Ironically , they think others do the same thing they end up doing (unreflected acceptance).
Sokal and Bricmont seriously misread Derrida, they prove nothing other than their own incapacity to accept new ideas. See Colin Davis, After Poststructuralism for more on this.
Deconstruction is not an operation that supervenes afterwards from the outside one fine day. It is always already at work in the work. Since the disruptive force of deconstruction is always already contained within the very architecture of the work all one would finally have to do to be able to deconstruct, given this always already, is do memory work. Since I want nether to accept or reject a conclusion formulated in precisely these terms let us leave this question suspended for the moment.”
history, institutions, or society is natural. The very condition of the deconstruction may be at work in the work, within the system to be deconstructed, it may already be located there, already at work, not at the center but in an eccentric center, in a corner whose eccentricity assures the solid concentration of the system, participating in the construction of what it at the same time threatens to deconstruct. One might then be inclined to reach this conclusion.
“I want to make a preliminary remark, on the completely artificial character of this situation. I don’t know who’s going to be watching this, but I want to underline rather than efface our surrounding technical conditions, and not to feign“neutrality” which doesn’t exist. I’ve already in a way started to respond to your questions about deconstruction because one of the gestures of deconstruction is not to naturalize what isn’t natural- to not assume that what is conditioned by
For philosophy postmodernism is when you stop philosophizing and look back to see all the philosophies that have failed to catch on throughout history.
it's not valuable. i here this criticism so fucking much and it was thin from the instant it hit. there is no evidence that this is any less 'valuable' or pragmatic than the everday life of the so called 'anti-postmodern crusader.' i'm tired of reading these completely uninformed opinions on 'postmodernism' [whatever the fuck that is]. i see no reason someone should be allowed to generalize an entire movement without knowing every single fucking detail about it first.
@dodeiale anger breeds bad spelling... i meant to say 'hear' not 'here.' intellectual masturbation ... a value judgement. whomever lobbing the attack would need to first prove that their own brand of intellectual discussion is NOT masturbation, or is genuinely more meaningful or valuable than that of Derrida for instance. otherwise it's all the fucking same.
This is a shocking example of editing. Why did they cut out his preliminary remark which was clearly going to bear upon his answer? And why is the voiceover A WOMAN? Are there no males in america with a monotone voice of this standard to do this job??
What impact, if any, has Derrida had outside of philosophy itself? To put it another way, if Derrida had written the opposite of everything he actually wrote, who would have noticed the difference?
@fremsley001 It's arguable that Derrida hasn't had much impact outside literary departments much less philosophy departments. In France Derrida wasn't as influential generally speaking in the French academic and intellectual world.
I think what's tagged "postmodernism" has been a negative detraction for progressive i.e. left-wing politics. It along with the "New Left" of the Baby Boomer 60s Generation have little to do with a real left and so in the U.S. there hardly is one to speak of.
I think Derrida is trying to say that we have constructed structures of thought with regards to all things. E.g. We will consider what is bad based on what society or culture claims is bad. When it comes to text he is saying that we need to break it down to its bare bones, and read it as a text, as if it only just existed and see exactly what it means to us. what are our emotions. The implications of the author are to play second fiddle to the readers own reflections in Post-Structuralism
continued...as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him speaking his own words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
@socrates757 continued.... as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him and his own spoken words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
@socrates757 continued... as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him speaking his own words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
@brothamouzoune The Sokal Affair proves that the editors of Social Text were lazy or incompetent. It has nothing to say about Derrida's work or the idea of deconstruction.
@stillceaser yeah I'm sorry I'm not as pomo as you, but I have a hard time internalizing pure rhetorical bullshit when there are many other more important things to think about in this world. you're all elitist snobs that get no respect from the wider world so you have to engage in this intellectual circlejerk in which you say nothing but all nod and grin like you're saying something. trust me..i've been there.
@brothamouzoune I thought Derrida was hard going to begin with. It's difficult, and I don't agree with many things he says. However, there are some good things in there - especially his critique of Husserl. You are right that there a lot of intellectual snobs and they do no credit in representing very good, and important ideas. I take no part in that. Equally, flippantly dismissing things out of hand is just as bad. Obscurantism is a menace, but lets not throw the baby out with the bath water.
@stillceaser Well that's more like it. I agree completely. Some specific topics of his have actually made me think quite differently, but the entire body of work is incoherent nonsense. But that's my opinion. If you see true intellectual value in what he does, and you're not an elitist prick about it, then more power to you, that's what intellectual exploration is all about. cheers.
@PrestyGomez Sokal actually agrees with you PrestyGomez. In 'What the Social Text Affair Does and Does Not Prove,' Sokal says "It proves only that the editors of one rather marginal journal were derelict in their intellectual duty... some of my over-enthusiastic supporters have claimed too much"
Lucky for you, Sokal was fairly quick to reveal his hoax. So for now you can claim that it is only the editors who were incompetent. Honestly, would you be willing to bet that his essay would have been called on its total bullshit by actual postmodernists, just as easily as a piece of terrible science is when such is published in a professional science journal?
I wouldn't, and that is because it is sometimes impossible to distinguish postmodernist texts from nonsense.
The de facto history differs. The social text people expressed concerns over the contends of the article , sokal refused to make any changes . It was eventually accepted based on sokal's reputation and credentials .There's nothing extremely unusual in that when you're running a non peer reviewed journal.
By the way , no one thus far has brought up the Bogdanov Affair , which took place at the table of a peer reviewed journal.
@brothamouzoune you google to ease your impatient and scared mind. Take some time. Take a deep breath. Read one of his works, all the way through. Every word. Or maybe start with an essay. It's going to be alright.
This is as clear as fuckin mud. I fuckin hate it when people use language which no normal person can understand. Why does he have to be a dick and talk like that?
@poculasacra Like I give a shit what you think. If you put the majority of the world in front of this video and told them to make sense they wouldn't get it either. Music, film and dance are all excessible to Joe Public-why does art have to be the exception? All I'm asking for is layman's terms.
@Terrra91 Hey sorry for being a dick there I was in a really bad mood. What he's saying is basically that systems of thought which we believe to be unified concepts: justice, truth, beauty, etc, are really the end results of cumulative social construction. The dichotomies between good/evil, right/wrong that define most of our society's thinking are ways of interpreting reality on our own terms, that distort the things themselves. The very recognition that systems of thought are constructed sets
@Terrra91 In motion the process of deconstruction, which is a conceptual breakdown of what would otherwise be accepted as "natural", when it is really socially or historically conditioned. Deconstruction is what it sounds like: a form of radical intellectual critique. Again, sorry for being an asshole there, but it just really rubs me the wrong way when people are quick to dismiss serious thinking simply because its hard to digest- I myself am a graduate student so I get pretty rankled at that.
I think that many Anglo Saxon ppl no let us say Northern Europeans perhaps because of their linguistic traditions as well as the predominance of the Analytic school (in some regards) would find this to be very abstract and circuitous .... however in the original French and if you were immersed in the traditions of the Latin people you'd see he does have an eloquent point
This little talk from him is pretty easy to understand, that concepts and institutions have no inherent connection with reality, and thus are not natural. At other times, he is just being obscure.
@Xrayz0r I don't think you should generalize or talk down on "French intellectuals" from such distance of understanding. What is the nature of "being obscure" and what is it's purpose? Is it even an "act" at all? Is obscurity ever necessary?
Don't answer me, but research. Those who do not like thinking should stay away from thinking.
I admit there is a large gap between French leftist intellectuals, on one hand, and American intellectuals, of any political wing, on the other. I question this divergence, as I am myself French-German of origin but firm in English as well. I would say, each of the groups needs to study the other group's language not only on a superficial, but on a deep level, which includes study of the whole of the culture. If I want to make headlines in America, I will need to speak English. Okay?
Thanks for this. If anybody's interested, I've just finished an "Introduction to Poststructuralism" video that dives into Derrida (especially "Limited Inc.") Search BrianArtese.
Thanks, I know Zizek's book. However, it has not helped me understand Ecrits. My serious suspection is that nothing will. That poseur Lacan himself said that it is *not* ment to be understood, but that it should bring about some kind of mystical revelation or something.
@vanderbilt887 I think you mean suspicion rather than suspection. Anyway Ecrits is notoriously poorly translated into English & yes, a rather torturous read if I recall correctly. Try the Four Fundamentals if you haven't already, which is far easier to digest. But yep, there's always going to be a degree of re-reading involved, although Zizek's interpretations helped me a lot when I was studying this stuff. Of course, like any psychoanalytic theory, it helps to get some actual therapy!
I am sick and tired of people saying they can't understand Derrida. Who says you have to understand him? Not understanding is fine and you should be comfortable with that. If you genuinely wish to understand him, though, perform a basic human function: think. Reflect. Study history, languages, philosophy, human beings. Ca c'est tout.
you have got to be kidding me. i didn't get any of that. i don't want to reject pm off the bat but any attempt on my part to understand it always results in frustration.
@fede2 -- Would you say the same about an expositor of black holes or some graduate idea in mathematics? No. Why then do you expect all at once to be able to understand a late 20th century philosophical idea that has in some ways required almost a new language to express? They said the same thing about Aristotle, Hegel, Kant, etc. Even a professional cook may be hard to understand if he doesn't first define and explain his words.
obviously, if i'm new to an area i won't understand it right away, but if i procede into it i can get a generalized idea. when it comes to postmodern philosophy, however, for some reason this doesn't hold. this may be due to bad luck or looking in the wrong sources or wrong circles but every time i try to understand there is always this apparent diliberate obscurantism.
@greatsea Exactly -- there's a great section in one of Terry Eagleton's books in which he addresses how people think that specialized discourses in science or in (for example) architecture can be difficult and rely on a specialized vocabulary, but at the same time there is a great deal of resentment when cultural or language theorists need specialized vocabularies or difficult concepts.
"That's what people say who don't take the time to understand French intellectuals."
I actually have taken the time (call me crazy, yes I know!) to understand at least some of the "post-modern" French philosophers, including Derrida, and, as an avid reader of analytical philosophy myself, I full-heartedly agree with Martha Nussbaum's assertion that although straw-man's do tend to get made about him, Derrida is, ultimately, not worth studying.
that is relatively accesible, say for instance his Structure, sign and play in the discourse of the humanities, but the bulk of his work is *indeed* full of obscurantism. He should have read Orwells wonderful essay Politics and the English language. Not to mention the greatest obscurantist of them all: Lacan. That man seriously has the worst writing I have ever encountered.
Moreover, I do not find most aspects of French post-modern philosophy orginal or contributory. I do recognize it
as one of the major sources of that academic and by now popular Orwellian surveillance monster: PC, i.e. eumemetics. Furthermore, the amount to which it has contributed (mostly through the writings of Foucault) to the anti-enlightenment sentiment that has, until recently, been in vogue with certain so-called intellectuals and their own little academic niche is more than just irritating.
The enlightenment, to quote Jonathan Israel, has "been and remains by far the most positive factor shaping contemporary reality and those strands of modernity anyone wishing to live in accord with reason would want to support and contribute to."
@vanderbilt887 Really? You just suggested that Derrida, whose work pretty much dismantles all of the presuppositions Orwell was depending on, should have read him?
I'm glad you mentioned Lacan, though, because they're up to precisely the same thing (insofar as writing is concerned) -- they both write in the same form as what their content suggests. Thus you end up w/ (esp. in Derrida, because Lacan is doing something different) slippages in the language.
@vanderbilt887 You should check out Zizek's "How to Read Lacan." I don't mean that to sound insulting -- although the book title makes it seem so -- because it's a really interesting take on Lacan.
I kinda have to agree with many sentiments that have been said about his use convincing language or lack thereof. I really don't understand most of what he says and I study philosophy for a living.
@ForeverPerfectXI ich weiss nicht so genau oder muss es nicht unbedingt sein, eben ob du Wittgenstein auf deutsch gelesen hast?? Ich zweifle daran, deswegen lasse ich dir gerne deine Süffisanz. Dies gesagt tue doch nit die leut langweilen vor allem wenn du nix zu sagen hast.
@PrestyGomez I think, more accurately it is the statement of a person who makes broad ethnic generalizations. Numerous French intellectuals have dismissed Derrida as deliberately obscurantist and vague to the point of irrelevance.
@PrestyGomez That is not the real retort. The real retort is why do French intellectuals make their work unnecessarily obscure when they can simply put their ideas into easy to grasp language. The real work shouldn't be trying to understand what they are saying in the first place and then becoming a parrot. The real work should be in doing research and expanding upon these ideas.
@DanMorgan98 You say, "The real work should be . . ." From where do you get these rules? What do you mean by "real work." Maybe simply making a point is not the "real work." Maybe there's something else going on.
@DanMorgan98 yawn, it takes a month, at the absolute maximum, to familiarise yourself with the language of the '60s french intellectuals and then for the rest of your life you can read them clearly. you can't separate the manner in which they write and their ideas. i would have thought someone watching an interview with derrida would at least understand that. and when a substantial field of their work is on literary theory do you expect them to write in atomic sentences? ridiculous.
@nwatts88 I have read the 6 volumes of Edward Gibbons great historical work, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." It is not a matter of not being able to understand what is being said. The point is that it is unnecessary. If they have a theory or a system of thought then they should state it plainly, clearly, unambiguously. I have yet to hear a definition of postmodernism that is consistent across the board nor have I come across any testable hypothesis. It's a a fraud.
@DanMorgan98 the thing is that post modernism is not a theory at all to define you can better say its a state of mind what derrida says here is clear constructing theories from something and clinging on to it as if it were natural is unacceptable and imposing the same on others is violence
@DanMorgan98 Why do poets write as they do? Meaning is in the manner of expression, and while Derida is not simple, neither is he so abstruse as to be opaque. The complexity of his utterance depicts the deep complexity of meanings he makes avalailable. Distrust paraphrase. He writes with exactitude and so must he be read.
they make it so obscure as to force you to move outside of your established conceptual scheme. if you start applying your own perspective or your own frameworks to derrida, or french post-structuralists in general, they begin to elude you because. And so they should, derrida does not want to understood according to you, he wants to teach you to think in the same way he is.
@DanMorgan98, first, French intellects do not multiply their words. That would be like saying American scholars do or do the Japanese. It's an unnecessary broom over the entire community and is not the right tool since really you are just talking about Derrida and maybe the only other French intellects you've read thus far. Second, most of the intellectual world agrees with you if you're rejecting Derrida. Most of that world doesn't care for his ideas or attitude. Just say that if you think it.
@barisbilgegunal I agree, for example you can't really compare Karl Marx and Immanuel Kant and they are both from Germany. I hate when general statements are made like the one you responded to when dealing with varying opinions of different philosophers/poets/what have you. It's as if reading "deep" books allows them to be just as narrow-minded, and/or ethnocentric, as those who don't.
There are ghosts in this video. Deconstruct it you will see ppl walking back and forth.
tobamzi 1 week ago
so the interview stops so idiocy can be spewed??? you gotta love the line "you are well known in the states for deconstruction" good job informing him of that. blows my mind man...
lloplop 1 week ago
the speaker deconstructs derrida :-D
BlueberryNight10 2 weeks ago
I'm not sure why Derrida is replying in French. He spoke perfect English.
mikelheron20 1 month ago
Derrida is quite possibly the most esoteric, impenetrable and bourgeouis intellectual you will ever read. Save yourself some time and jump to Heideggar instead.
bosman1988 1 month ago
@bosman1988 While I tend to agree, at the very least his 'construction' of deconstructionism is fairly sound. If you live in this day and age these ideas have to exist. Foucault was the better thinker though.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
@bosman1988 I would credit your opinion with more weight if you spelled his name correctly.
remittancegirl 3 weeks ago
@remittancegirl This isn't a spelling bee. The content of my opinion stands just as well.
bosman1988 3 weeks ago
@remittancegirl and there goes your credit. honey, you are clueless.
lloplop 1 week ago
Does anyone know if raw footage of this interview is available anywhere? I can't believe how contradictory the narrator's interruption of Derrdia is; considering the subject of conversation. I would love to hear what he actually had to say on the topic.
TheOlympians2S2K 1 month ago
@TheOlympians2S2K Her interruption was the integral deconstruction to his self- fulfilling meta- reflection on the unnaturallity of the situation. She proved him right.
Losloth 1 month ago
@TheOlympians2S2K Agree, but it's probably locked in the film maker's archives.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
vous n'avez jamais lu durkheim?
yolenin1 1 month ago
I don't get this, is she dubbing him just to over-emphasize the "unnaturalness" of their situation? xD
blomlie 2 months ago
@blomlie Probably just to emphasize a really base human need to feel "creeped out" by understanding the world in different terms.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
Derrida's deconstruction is nothing more than a review on subjectivity.
N73B60 2 months ago
what an interesting guy...
tonyfalca 3 months ago
god i hate her voice
lispectorando 3 months ago 2
Is this fucking music necessary? For God's sake!!!
ruydaleixo 3 months ago 3
can someone deconstruct what she just said?
PimpMyParadigm 3 months ago 6
Baudrillard was right - the social sciences have been replaced by a weak simulation of their former selves - this is just a simulation of a thinker thinking - the faux intensity - the pipe - the wildly beautiful hair - if a computer was given the task of producing the perfect philosopher it would give us Derrida.
32peartree 3 months ago
@32peartree Then would not the computer by means of proxy be the perfect philosopher? Although we might be observing a simulation of Derrida, perhaps the simulation has an origin by which some truth can be ascertained. Maybe not complete truth, but truth enough.
SimulacraMan 3 months ago
@32peartree you just laid a blanket judgment on one of the most influential philosophers of our day, and then backed it up by a critique of his physical appearance. Seriously? Read a work. Then read a commentary. Then read it again, and see if you still think he's insubstantial.
mostlycaveman 3 months ago
@32peartree the pipe was foucault.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
What a load of incomprehensible double-talk! Derrida is the biggest fraud that ever was and is to blame for much of the travesty called postmodernism and its bastard child political correctness!
hznfrst 4 months ago
@hznfrst
I think that if you read some Derrida you might be pleasantly surprised.
guatahala 4 months ago
@hznfrst yeah, the term "political correctness" is an example of obfuscation for starters.
jazzmunky 3 months ago
Don't you just want to turn the hoses on these people?
universalsailor 4 months ago
And she doesn't let him finish!!!
rakanzrib 4 months ago
it does have to be said that this is total utter bullcrap.
curlysue27 4 months ago
@curlysue27 sure, but give some reasoned arguments.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
If you want to be a respected French intellectual you have to make sure of a few things:
1- Express completely obvious and meaningless crap in such a language that the casual idiot who cannot take the time to DECONSTRUCT and translate what you are saying in everyday terms is blown away by your depth.
2- Make sure to deflect all criticism of your banal insights and pointlessly abstruse lexicon by saying that you have been misunderstood.
3- Wear designer clothes and eccentric hairstyles.
DonVoghano 4 months ago 4
@DonVoghano excellent!
curlysue27 4 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@DonVoghano is it obvious or meaningless? Not sure you can have it both ways
atom47sa 3 months ago
@DonVoghano your comment was very funny and entertaining..thanks for your contribution...oh and i think your three points to being a respected French intellectual look to be absolutely true! :)
8bobthebuilder 2 months ago
@DonVoghano ok. at the very least the guy wrote more shit than you have. as an extension of will, he's at least trumped you. I don't know, maybe you're steven king.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
@JMMFilm You are absolutely right. He certainly wrote shit.
DonVoghano 4 weeks ago
William Frawley played Fred Mertz on I Love Lucy. Frawley FUCKED Chomsky in his rectum while simultaneously grabbing Woody Allen's woody, and wrapping his mouth around Barney's Frank. Frawley then had his own rectum violated by Anthony's Weiner.
Fred Gwynne later arrived and sprayed Kouros pour Homme on all of them, and began whistling the opening theme song to the ancient TV show "Taxi" while he completely disrobed, revealing tattoos of Jimmy Carter and Vladimir Lennon on his butt cheeks.
g17y5wb 5 months ago
What's with the ambient music? Sort of cheapens it.
therealtruth123 5 months ago
If your going to edit with a voice over, at least provide a transcript of his words in the original language spoken, rather than assume your translation will convey his ideas effectively without destroying the blasé genius nature of his speech.
Dilliboy63 7 months ago
The guy's fucking talking, why is she the most important thing to be heard? He wrote about the topic, let him fucking talk D;
Minipolce 7 months ago
description should be "Derrida begins to perfectly define deconstruction--until the narrator decides to play her synth over him."
abraxus1989 7 months ago 82
@abraxus1989 That's exactly what I was thinking! :)
jehanfrollo 3 months ago
@abraxus1989 Absolutely right. This thing is terrible...
mookie2637 1 month ago
@abraxus1989 Her voice over is obviously a continuation of his explication of deconstructionism.
JMMFilm 4 weeks ago
wtf! Derrida just has enough time to say he wants to be careful to craft his message for the precise situation he's in. And then he's cut off by a voiceover of a quote from one of his books. How f*ing ironic. And unfortunate, given that he really looks like he's saying some interesting stuff while the voiceover goes on with the quotation. All waving his arms around and whatnot, like he expects his voice to go with his image.
Sporky023 8 months ago 3
why can't we academics ever just answer the goddamned straightforward question, without clearing our throat over every desideratum conceivable?
seandevega 8 months ago 3
@seandevega Thank you- I have been asking the very same question for years....
Nuturalable 6 months ago
Comment removed
seandevega 8 months ago
I would advise people against parroting Sokal . I can't recall how many blogs I've seen where their (sokal's and Bricmont 's) work it is uncritically accepted by people who've never read derrida , baudrillard or lacan.Afterwards they claim to have exposed some kind of quackery.
Ironically , they think others do the same thing they end up doing (unreflected acceptance).
SonytoBratsoni 8 months ago 2
Sokal and Bricmont seriously misread Derrida, they prove nothing other than their own incapacity to accept new ideas. See Colin Davis, After Poststructuralism for more on this.
visagedesapin 9 months ago 2
I don't understand!!
Argastus 9 months ago in playlist derida
what's up with the eerie music halfway the vid? Sounds like some new age spiritual crap, just let the man speak
hyvonen1 9 months ago 2
Deconstruction is not an operation that supervenes afterwards from the outside one fine day. It is always already at work in the work. Since the disruptive force of deconstruction is always already contained within the very architecture of the work all one would finally have to do to be able to deconstruct, given this always already, is do memory work. Since I want nether to accept or reject a conclusion formulated in precisely these terms let us leave this question suspended for the moment.”
mikebblack 9 months ago
history, institutions, or society is natural. The very condition of the deconstruction may be at work in the work, within the system to be deconstructed, it may already be located there, already at work, not at the center but in an eccentric center, in a corner whose eccentricity assures the solid concentration of the system, participating in the construction of what it at the same time threatens to deconstruct. One might then be inclined to reach this conclusion.
mikebblack 9 months ago
“I want to make a preliminary remark, on the completely artificial character of this situation. I don’t know who’s going to be watching this, but I want to underline rather than efface our surrounding technical conditions, and not to feign“neutrality” which doesn’t exist. I’ve already in a way started to respond to your questions about deconstruction because one of the gestures of deconstruction is not to naturalize what isn’t natural- to not assume that what is conditioned by
mikebblack 9 months ago
@desafinado490 You want it in plain english? You make up a rule and sooner or later somebody's gonna fuck it up.
NearVSMello 9 months ago
For philosophy postmodernism is when you stop philosophizing and look back to see all the philosophies that have failed to catch on throughout history.
NearVSMello 9 months ago
it's not valuable. i here this criticism so fucking much and it was thin from the instant it hit. there is no evidence that this is any less 'valuable' or pragmatic than the everday life of the so called 'anti-postmodern crusader.' i'm tired of reading these completely uninformed opinions on 'postmodernism' [whatever the fuck that is]. i see no reason someone should be allowed to generalize an entire movement without knowing every single fucking detail about it first.
dodeiale 9 months ago
@dodeiale anger breeds bad spelling... i meant to say 'hear' not 'here.' intellectual masturbation ... a value judgement. whomever lobbing the attack would need to first prove that their own brand of intellectual discussion is NOT masturbation, or is genuinely more meaningful or valuable than that of Derrida for instance. otherwise it's all the fucking same.
dodeiale 9 months ago
A troll in his own time. An inspiration for us all!
KalleVarta 9 months ago
Why did they edit Derrida's answer???
ZabRinUta 10 months ago
@ZabRinUta
i am not aware that they did. was it not Simpy put into English. after typing it the words seem easier to listen to than read.
Do you speak French? and read lips in French?
did they edit something out?
mikebblack 9 months ago
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bathotic 11 months ago
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bathotic 11 months ago
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bathotic 11 months ago
This is a shocking example of editing. Why did they cut out his preliminary remark which was clearly going to bear upon his answer? And why is the voiceover A WOMAN? Are there no males in america with a monotone voice of this standard to do this job??
julianna12345 11 months ago 3
HULK ANGRY ABOUT POSTMODERN PHILOSOPHERS
HULK SMASH!!
jxhensley 11 months ago
@Omnicron777 Thanks for your insightful and thoughtful critique.
PrestyGomez 11 months ago 18
fucking pomo bullshit
BomberDomme 11 months ago
Why is this man respected?
TheLenyon 1 year ago
@TheLenyon god knows
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
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bathotic 10 months ago
What impact, if any, has Derrida had outside of philosophy itself? To put it another way, if Derrida had written the opposite of everything he actually wrote, who would have noticed the difference?
fremsley001 1 year ago
@fremsley001 It's arguable that Derrida hasn't had much impact outside literary departments much less philosophy departments. In France Derrida wasn't as influential generally speaking in the French academic and intellectual world.
I think what's tagged "postmodernism" has been a negative detraction for progressive i.e. left-wing politics. It along with the "New Left" of the Baby Boomer 60s Generation have little to do with a real left and so in the U.S. there hardly is one to speak of.
S2Cents 1 year ago
@fremsley001 he's impacted the declining number of philosophy graduates as well as the social awkwardness of his disciples.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
This is so frustrating ... You should have let him talk in French and translate.
susie4466 1 year ago
I still cant figure out where the substance is to this man
TheLenyon 1 year ago
@TheLenyon There isn't substance to the film.
S2Cents 1 year ago
I think Derrida is trying to say that we have constructed structures of thought with regards to all things. E.g. We will consider what is bad based on what society or culture claims is bad. When it comes to text he is saying that we need to break it down to its bare bones, and read it as a text, as if it only just existed and see exactly what it means to us. what are our emotions. The implications of the author are to play second fiddle to the readers own reflections in Post-Structuralism
warbo666 1 year ago
Why the spooky music?
GeorgesBarras 1 year ago
I like Derrida here, but not the tone of the voice-over.
scttzwdrff 1 year ago
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continued...as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him speaking his own words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
socrates757 1 year ago
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socrates757 1 year ago
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socrates757 1 year ago
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@socrates757 continued.... as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him and his own spoken words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
socrates757 1 year ago
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@socrates757 continued... as it stands, I have to present him in class and was hoping to conclude with a snippet of him speaking his own words for the class...but as a joke I think I might just tell the class that Derrida wrote “What deconstruction is not? everything of course! What is deconstruction? nothing of course” and be done with it...lol...lol...lol...lol
socrates757 1 year ago
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google "the sokal affair" and be enlightened.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
@brothamouzoune The Sokal Affair proves that the editors of Social Text were lazy or incompetent. It has nothing to say about Derrida's work or the idea of deconstruction.
PrestyGomez 1 year ago 21
@PrestyGomez It proves that Derrida, and other postmodern philosophers couch their rather pedestrian concepts in impenetrable language.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
@brothamouzoune probably more to do with your impenetrable mind.
stillceaser 1 year ago
@stillceaser yeah I'm sorry I'm not as pomo as you, but I have a hard time internalizing pure rhetorical bullshit when there are many other more important things to think about in this world. you're all elitist snobs that get no respect from the wider world so you have to engage in this intellectual circlejerk in which you say nothing but all nod and grin like you're saying something. trust me..i've been there.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
@brothamouzoune I thought Derrida was hard going to begin with. It's difficult, and I don't agree with many things he says. However, there are some good things in there - especially his critique of Husserl. You are right that there a lot of intellectual snobs and they do no credit in representing very good, and important ideas. I take no part in that. Equally, flippantly dismissing things out of hand is just as bad. Obscurantism is a menace, but lets not throw the baby out with the bath water.
stillceaser 1 year ago
@stillceaser Well that's more like it. I agree completely. Some specific topics of his have actually made me think quite differently, but the entire body of work is incoherent nonsense. But that's my opinion. If you see true intellectual value in what he does, and you're not an elitist prick about it, then more power to you, that's what intellectual exploration is all about. cheers.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago 3
@PrestyGomez Sokal actually agrees with you PrestyGomez. In 'What the Social Text Affair Does and Does Not Prove,' Sokal says "It proves only that the editors of one rather marginal journal were derelict in their intellectual duty... some of my over-enthusiastic supporters have claimed too much"
leolasi 1 year ago
@PrestyGomez one should also google for what the chief editor of Social Text responded to the sokal Affair regarding that.
perplexedmoth 1 year ago
Lucky for you, Sokal was fairly quick to reveal his hoax. So for now you can claim that it is only the editors who were incompetent. Honestly, would you be willing to bet that his essay would have been called on its total bullshit by actual postmodernists, just as easily as a piece of terrible science is when such is published in a professional science journal?
I wouldn't, and that is because it is sometimes impossible to distinguish postmodernist texts from nonsense.
zanderstuud 11 months ago
@zanderstuud
The de facto history differs. The social text people expressed concerns over the contends of the article , sokal refused to make any changes . It was eventually accepted based on sokal's reputation and credentials .There's nothing extremely unusual in that when you're running a non peer reviewed journal.
By the way , no one thus far has brought up the Bogdanov Affair , which took place at the table of a peer reviewed journal.
SonytoBratsoni 8 months ago
@PrestyGomez I wouldn't even go far enough to call it their fault; it was published on the justification of Sokal's expertise.
spurious 5 months ago
@brothamouzoune
;-)
thesuikerlounge 1 year ago
@brothamouzoune you google to ease your impatient and scared mind. Take some time. Take a deep breath. Read one of his works, all the way through. Every word. Or maybe start with an essay. It's going to be alright.
Androidwebber 7 months ago
how can u separate what is natural from social and historical conditioning... whats unnatural about the dynamics that manifest conditioning....???
ekotpekot 1 year ago
Presty Gomez, you are all class and thanks for putting this up. My boy is Baudrillard but Derrida is a nice sized side dish for me.
AirplaneRadio 1 year ago
This is as clear as fuckin mud. I fuckin hate it when people use language which no normal person can understand. Why does he have to be a dick and talk like that?
Terrra91 1 year ago
@Terrra91
Because you are an undereducated idiot
poculasacra 1 year ago
@poculasacra Like I give a shit what you think. If you put the majority of the world in front of this video and told them to make sense they wouldn't get it either. Music, film and dance are all excessible to Joe Public-why does art have to be the exception? All I'm asking for is layman's terms.
Terrra91 1 year ago
@Terrra91 Hey sorry for being a dick there I was in a really bad mood. What he's saying is basically that systems of thought which we believe to be unified concepts: justice, truth, beauty, etc, are really the end results of cumulative social construction. The dichotomies between good/evil, right/wrong that define most of our society's thinking are ways of interpreting reality on our own terms, that distort the things themselves. The very recognition that systems of thought are constructed sets
poculasacra 1 year ago 2
@poculasacra Its alright man. I figured out what deconstruction was anyway.
Terrra91 1 year ago
@poculasacra Thanks. Your explanation actually makes sense, unlike his definition of Deconstruction, recited by a female voice in the video.
annaizmailova 5 months ago
@Terrra91 In motion the process of deconstruction, which is a conceptual breakdown of what would otherwise be accepted as "natural", when it is really socially or historically conditioned. Deconstruction is what it sounds like: a form of radical intellectual critique. Again, sorry for being an asshole there, but it just really rubs me the wrong way when people are quick to dismiss serious thinking simply because its hard to digest- I myself am a graduate student so I get pretty rankled at that.
poculasacra 1 year ago
subtitles in spanish please
MAJORJANNA 1 year ago
Men sandheden er at selv en lille kollision til søs kan ødelægge hele din dag.
Baburote 1 year ago
I think that many Anglo Saxon ppl no let us say Northern Europeans perhaps because of their linguistic traditions as well as the predominance of the Analytic school (in some regards) would find this to be very abstract and circuitous .... however in the original French and if you were immersed in the traditions of the Latin people you'd see he does have an eloquent point
QED
abnerunintended 1 year ago
sokal.
thesuikerlounge 1 year ago
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Aaaaaaaaah! Atama ga itai...Kare wa muzukashi koto o tsukaimasu. Wakarimasen kara yamemasu naa. /end of sarcasm
uberhikari 1 year ago
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Aaaaaaaaah! Atama ga itai...Kare wa muzukashi koto o tsukaimasu. Wakarimasen kara yamemasu naa. /end of sarcasm
uberhikari 1 year ago
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Aaaaaaaaah! Atama ga itai...Kare wa muzukashi koto o tsukaimasu. Wakarimasen kara yamemasu naa. /end of sarcasm
uberhikari 1 year ago
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uberhikari 1 year ago
This little talk from him is pretty easy to understand, that concepts and institutions have no inherent connection with reality, and thus are not natural. At other times, he is just being obscure.
Kavino 1 year ago
I don't get it.
What he said just didn't make sense.
leafclash 1 year ago
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@Xrayz0r I don't think you should generalize or talk down on "French intellectuals" from such distance of understanding. What is the nature of "being obscure" and what is it's purpose? Is it even an "act" at all? Is obscurity ever necessary?
Don't answer me, but research. Those who do not like thinking should stay away from thinking.
basdirks 1 year ago
a new challenger has appeared
Derrida, Go!
Derrida used deconstruct
n00bs get pwn'd
shakeyourdimsims 1 year ago 3
j'aime bien la compagnie de Jacques je capte bien son devenir pensant et reflexant.
La philosophie enchanteresse m'incite à des apports directs dans mon travail video et sonore.
YmoArt 1 year ago
I admit there is a large gap between French leftist intellectuals, on one hand, and American intellectuals, of any political wing, on the other. I question this divergence, as I am myself French-German of origin but firm in English as well. I would say, each of the groups needs to study the other group's language not only on a superficial, but on a deep level, which includes study of the whole of the culture. If I want to make headlines in America, I will need to speak English. Okay?
ipublica 1 year ago
Thanks for this. If anybody's interested, I've just finished an "Introduction to Poststructuralism" video that dives into Derrida (especially "Limited Inc.") Search BrianArtese.
BrianArtese 1 year ago
Thanks, I know Zizek's book. However, it has not helped me understand Ecrits. My serious suspection is that nothing will. That poseur Lacan himself said that it is *not* ment to be understood, but that it should bring about some kind of mystical revelation or something.
Whatever... I know BS when I see it.
vanderbilt887 1 year ago
@vanderbilt887 I think you mean suspicion rather than suspection. Anyway Ecrits is notoriously poorly translated into English & yes, a rather torturous read if I recall correctly. Try the Four Fundamentals if you haven't already, which is far easier to digest. But yep, there's always going to be a degree of re-reading involved, although Zizek's interpretations helped me a lot when I was studying this stuff. Of course, like any psychoanalytic theory, it helps to get some actual therapy!
bcsnape 1 year ago
Meaning is the product of diference, so deconstruction does restore it.
Aedox1 2 years ago
I am sick and tired of people saying they can't understand Derrida. Who says you have to understand him? Not understanding is fine and you should be comfortable with that. If you genuinely wish to understand him, though, perform a basic human function: think. Reflect. Study history, languages, philosophy, human beings. Ca c'est tout.
dembogiatzis 2 years ago
he has nice white hair.... hair and now :)
podfunaug30 2 years ago
you have got to be kidding me. i didn't get any of that. i don't want to reject pm off the bat but any attempt on my part to understand it always results in frustration.
fede2 2 years ago
@fede2 -- Would you say the same about an expositor of black holes or some graduate idea in mathematics? No. Why then do you expect all at once to be able to understand a late 20th century philosophical idea that has in some ways required almost a new language to express? They said the same thing about Aristotle, Hegel, Kant, etc. Even a professional cook may be hard to understand if he doesn't first define and explain his words.
greatsea 2 years ago
obviously, if i'm new to an area i won't understand it right away, but if i procede into it i can get a generalized idea. when it comes to postmodern philosophy, however, for some reason this doesn't hold. this may be due to bad luck or looking in the wrong sources or wrong circles but every time i try to understand there is always this apparent diliberate obscurantism.
fede2 2 years ago
@greatsea Exactly -- there's a great section in one of Terry Eagleton's books in which he addresses how people think that specialized discourses in science or in (for example) architecture can be difficult and rely on a specialized vocabulary, but at the same time there is a great deal of resentment when cultural or language theorists need specialized vocabularies or difficult concepts.
daschwpierdellevigne 1 year ago
"That's what people say who don't take the time to understand French intellectuals."
I actually have taken the time (call me crazy, yes I know!) to understand at least some of the "post-modern" French philosophers, including Derrida, and, as an avid reader of analytical philosophy myself, I full-heartedly agree with Martha Nussbaum's assertion that although straw-man's do tend to get made about him, Derrida is, ultimately, not worth studying.
He has actually written *some* material (cont)
vanderbilt887 2 years ago
that is relatively accesible, say for instance his Structure, sign and play in the discourse of the humanities, but the bulk of his work is *indeed* full of obscurantism. He should have read Orwells wonderful essay Politics and the English language. Not to mention the greatest obscurantist of them all: Lacan. That man seriously has the worst writing I have ever encountered.
Moreover, I do not find most aspects of French post-modern philosophy orginal or contributory. I do recognize it
vanderbilt887 2 years ago
as one of the major sources of that academic and by now popular Orwellian surveillance monster: PC, i.e. eumemetics. Furthermore, the amount to which it has contributed (mostly through the writings of Foucault) to the anti-enlightenment sentiment that has, until recently, been in vogue with certain so-called intellectuals and their own little academic niche is more than just irritating.
vanderbilt887 2 years ago
The enlightenment, to quote Jonathan Israel, has "been and remains by far the most positive factor shaping contemporary reality and those strands of modernity anyone wishing to live in accord with reason would want to support and contribute to."
vanderbilt887 2 years ago
@vanderbilt887 Really? You just suggested that Derrida, whose work pretty much dismantles all of the presuppositions Orwell was depending on, should have read him?
I'm glad you mentioned Lacan, though, because they're up to precisely the same thing (insofar as writing is concerned) -- they both write in the same form as what their content suggests. Thus you end up w/ (esp. in Derrida, because Lacan is doing something different) slippages in the language.
daschwpierdellevigne 1 year ago
@vanderbilt887 You should check out Zizek's "How to Read Lacan." I don't mean that to sound insulting -- although the book title makes it seem so -- because it's a really interesting take on Lacan.
daschwpierdellevigne 1 year ago
i'd really like to hear mr derrida, please. [2]
paulantschell 2 years ago
I like Derrida. Expert troll.
niceboar 2 years ago 2
a little integrity, please. Let's not get personal.
megalomaniaeighty 2 years ago
I kinda have to agree with many sentiments that have been said about his use convincing language or lack thereof. I really don't understand most of what he says and I study philosophy for a living.
Neondub 2 years ago 7
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Xrayz0r 2 years ago
That's what people say who don't take the time to understand French intellectuals.
PrestyGomez 2 years ago 15
Who said anything about not understanding? =) lol, cute
The fact remains, this guy is being unnecessarily obscure about a theory that really isn't difficult to grasp.
Xrayz0r 2 years ago 2
@PrestyGomez And people who don't take the time to read Wittgenstein beyond the Tractatus.
ForeverPerfectXI 1 year ago
@ForeverPerfectXI ich weiss nicht so genau oder muss es nicht unbedingt sein, eben ob du Wittgenstein auf deutsch gelesen hast?? Ich zweifle daran, deswegen lasse ich dir gerne deine Süffisanz. Dies gesagt tue doch nit die leut langweilen vor allem wenn du nix zu sagen hast.
YmoArt 1 year ago
@PrestyGomez I think, more accurately it is the statement of a person who makes broad ethnic generalizations. Numerous French intellectuals have dismissed Derrida as deliberately obscurantist and vague to the point of irrelevance.
drmodestoesq 1 year ago
@PrestyGomez
I guess its more fanscinating for you to watch hollywood movies.
giselle113 1 year ago
@PrestyGomez That is not the real retort. The real retort is why do French intellectuals make their work unnecessarily obscure when they can simply put their ideas into easy to grasp language. The real work shouldn't be trying to understand what they are saying in the first place and then becoming a parrot. The real work should be in doing research and expanding upon these ideas.
DanMorgan98 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98 You say, "The real work should be . . ." From where do you get these rules? What do you mean by "real work." Maybe simply making a point is not the "real work." Maybe there's something else going on.
PrestyGomez 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98 yawn, it takes a month, at the absolute maximum, to familiarise yourself with the language of the '60s french intellectuals and then for the rest of your life you can read them clearly. you can't separate the manner in which they write and their ideas. i would have thought someone watching an interview with derrida would at least understand that. and when a substantial field of their work is on literary theory do you expect them to write in atomic sentences? ridiculous.
nwatts88 1 year ago
@nwatts88 I have read the 6 volumes of Edward Gibbons great historical work, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." It is not a matter of not being able to understand what is being said. The point is that it is unnecessary. If they have a theory or a system of thought then they should state it plainly, clearly, unambiguously. I have yet to hear a definition of postmodernism that is consistent across the board nor have I come across any testable hypothesis. It's a a fraud.
DanMorgan98 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98 haha, was this a joke?
nwatts88 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98 the thing is that post modernism is not a theory at all to define you can better say its a state of mind what derrida says here is clear constructing theories from something and clinging on to it as if it were natural is unacceptable and imposing the same on others is violence
VALANIFS 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98-You say this,but are you really saying this?
CarsOfGaia 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98 Why do poets write as they do? Meaning is in the manner of expression, and while Derida is not simple, neither is he so abstruse as to be opaque. The complexity of his utterance depicts the deep complexity of meanings he makes avalailable. Distrust paraphrase. He writes with exactitude and so must he be read.
jblacktree 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98
they make it so obscure as to force you to move outside of your established conceptual scheme. if you start applying your own perspective or your own frameworks to derrida, or french post-structuralists in general, they begin to elude you because. And so they should, derrida does not want to understood according to you, he wants to teach you to think in the same way he is.
wearethehollowmen 1 year ago
@DanMorgan98, first, French intellects do not multiply their words. That would be like saying American scholars do or do the Japanese. It's an unnecessary broom over the entire community and is not the right tool since really you are just talking about Derrida and maybe the only other French intellects you've read thus far. Second, most of the intellectual world agrees with you if you're rejecting Derrida. Most of that world doesn't care for his ideas or attitude. Just say that if you think it.
semasiologistics 1 year ago
@semasiologistics Please define "intellectual world." And if such a thing exists, how can you say what most of it thinks?
PrestyGomez 1 year ago
@PrestyGomez you've really learned the art of bullshit well from your french intellectual overloads I see.
brothamouzoune 1 year ago
@Xrayz0r Wittgenstein 1 would have lamented Derrida, W2 would have applauded him.
DaedalAbsurdist 1 year ago
@Xrayz0r what is a french intellectual anyway? A breed of race horse that you can readily identify because of the language and ethnical cues?
barisbilgegunal 1 year ago
@barisbilgegunal I agree, for example you can't really compare Karl Marx and Immanuel Kant and they are both from Germany. I hate when general statements are made like the one you responded to when dealing with varying opinions of different philosophers/poets/what have you. It's as if reading "deep" books allows them to be just as narrow-minded, and/or ethnocentric, as those who don't.
DavidF89999 1 year ago
try some reading instead
american987usa 1 year ago