[Reader-list] Stupid Intellectual Fads.

[Nazneen Anand Shamsi]

Dear Taraprakash,

Thank you for disagreeing with me, on 'name calling'.

You are right, I suppose, I should not have indulged literally in 'name
calling' or should we say calling names, however, my intent was to pose a
question on Aarti's remark, that in case, if I want a discussion on some
topics then, 'many of us', on the reader list will be happy to respond. I
was just wondering, who these, 'us' are. Hence, 'I hear Nazo calling names
though', will not hold, as these names were not called in an assertive
manner, as you perhaps suggest, but rather in an interrogative sense. In
other words, although, I clubbed names of some people on this list, I do not
know, hence I am not sure or very unsure that, whether that clubbing was
valid or not.

Regards

Nazo



On Sat, Oct 4, 2008 at 10:44 PM, TaraPrakash <taraprakash at gmail.com> wrote:

> I think the following I sent only to Nazneen. I am sincerely sorry for
> doing
> it. I should have been very careful considering that Nazneen does not want
> the list mails to be directed to her personal in box. I had no desire to do
> that, sheer carelessness. Well, this is what I accidently sent to Nazneen
> and not to the list earlier.
> Regards
> TaraPrakash
>
> Hi Nazo and all. Even though I am not Shuddha or Iram, I do not have their
> kind of knowledge or eloquence, but I could not help writing on this
> thread,
> so here is my unsolicited gibberish.
>
> I wonder if the Reader List provided any context for this article under
> discussion. There was a post recently on the list which mentioned Walter
> Benjamin and Adorno and in the same sentence suggested that some of the
> current movements are sectarian and parochial in nature. That may or may
> not
> be the context. Let us agree that Reader list need not provide any context
> for posting of messages. It is a well ventilated list, and I would like to
> thank Nazo for this fresh air.
>
> I thought the article under discussion was poking fun at the cynicism of
> the
> currently prevalent theories. If it was talking about gibberish, the write
> up was no better/worse than that; in other words, meta-gibberish. I wonder
> if there is anything in the world which cannot be called gibberish.
> It was, I thought, an example of, what I would like to call "counter
> cynicism". Marxism stands in stark contrast against the ephamerality of
> post
> modernism and other post * theories. If anybody thought Marxism was dead
> and
> gone after disintegration of the USSR was/is absolutely wrong.
> There still are Marxist thinkers/activists who believe
>
> "Dil na ummeed naheen nakaam hi to hai..."
>
>
> Only this week we saw, what a staunch Republican called, "putting of
> another
> coffin over the coffin of Reagan". Marxism may not have succeeded,
> capitalism too will not remain unbridled was the message of the recent bail
> out in the US. Reagan and Friedman have already died twice. They will die
> many more times before Fukuyama's history will begin again.
>
> I completely agree with Nazo's following statement/question.
>
> "Is it not the logic or rather the magic of the state to engage with each
> other like this. First create abstractions, then push people into
> abstractions and then talk to them as if one is talking to an abstraction.
> Everything else goes for a toss. So in the end one feels comfortable
> because
> one is not talking to a human being anymore. One is engaging with a ST, SC,
> Hindu, Muslim, Naxal, Maoists, terrorist, KP etc."
>
> Yes, that is the logic. All of us fall prey to such a logic and magic.
> Nazo,
> too, did when she said, "Does that make me, Pawan, Aditya, Kshemendra
> 'them'?" All of us are "them" some time or the other, depending on what
> lenses we are using to look at, from which angle we are looking. If in no
> other way, we all are "them" in that we all feel free to express our
> opinions.
>
> I do not agree with Nazo's suggestion that Arti indulged in name calling in
> her response. ("but please tell me do calling (does) names serve any
> purpose?"
>
> That may be my limitation of not being able to find what is not there, or
> to
> be able to find even what is there. I think Arti never indulged in name
> calling in her response. I hear Nazo calling names though, literally,
> "Pawan,
> Aditya, Kshemendra" et al.
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Nazneen Anand Shamsi" <nazoshmasi at googlemail.com>
> To: "Aarti Sethi" <aarti.sethi at gmail.com>
> Cc: "Sarai" <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Sent: Saturday, October 04, 2008 10:19 AM
> Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Stupid Intellectual Fads.
>
>
> > Dear Aarti,
> >
> > 1. Thank you for your response. I think it would do both of us and
> > everyone
> > else on this list a lot of good, if we stop assuming notions about each
> > other. It is no one's case if we keeping on judging everyone else by what
> > they forward on this list. I hold you in high regard, because and only
> > because of your thoughts. Your clarity in argumentation. Your conceptual
> > understanding. Your dogged persistence to engage and talk especially with
> > whom you disagree. I am not bothered whether you sleep with a marx or
> > mills
> > and boons under your pillow. Insofar as I am concerned, I think both marx
> > and mills are important pieces of literature. You know I could have
> > responded hypothetically to your mail, by calling you a self styled
> pseudo
> > post colonialist, post modernist, post feminist, hyper textual diva or an
> > out of work, bored, net slave, or an arrogant propertied vermin whose
> > understainding of marx is restriced to a summary reading of few essays
> one
> > reads in political science 101, but I will not and will never do that
> > because no matter who you are, I still want to engage with you and
> respect
> > your word, read carefully and find time to respond with concern but
> please
> > tell me do calling names serve any purpose?
> >
> > Is it not the logic or rather the magic of the state to engage with each
> > other like this. First create abstractions, then push people into
> > abstractions and then talk to them as if one is talking to an
> abstraction.
> > Everything else goes for a toss. So in the end one feels comfortable
> > because
> > one is not talking to a human being anymore. One is engaging with a ST,
> > SC,
> > Hindu, Muslim, Naxal, Maoists, terrorist, KP etc. In your case could I
> > assume, that from now onwards, every time you will address me or talk to
> > me
> > or respond to my mails- my subjectivity will be viewed through just as a
> > 'faux ayyar persona', or 'the agent provocateur'? I am glad that you
> > tagged
> > me as such Aarti, but then again, I think I am not worthy for these most
> > honourable appellations. Just Nazneen is more than enough.
> >
> > 2. I want to take issue with you for your, ' being earnest is really too
> > boring ' remark. Please tell me what do you mean by this? Do you find all
> > earnest work boring all the times or some earnest working boring most of
> > the
> > times or most earnest work boring some of the times or some earnest work
> > boring some of the times. I could not understand your positioning on this
> > or
> > why should any gives a dime's worth what you in your individual capacity
> > find boring?
> >
> > 3. Please do not suspect anything about my writings, 'I suspect you
> posted
> > this hoping that the "marx-vadis" on the list would immediately jump up
> > and
> > down'. If you 'suspect' anything about my word the please ASK. No, I
> don't
> > think marx-vadis are monkeys with an inherent tendency to 'jump up and
> > down'. I regard them as highly articulate people, one feels sad, though
> at
> > times, to see them still struggling with that same old ideology.
> >
> > 4. 'Regardless, when you actually wish to have an engaged discussion on
> > the
> > history of ideas I'm sure many of us will be more than willing'. (Thank
> > you
> > for your condescension Aarti, but no thanks!)
> >
> > By the way, could you please tell me, who are these 'us' on this list
> > Aarti?
> > Does that make me, Pawan, Aditya, Kshemendra 'them'? So, could I assume,
> > you
> > are, in any way implying that all this recent talk of sarai reader list
> > being public list is hogwash, that Shuddha is rank hypocrite and Iram a
> > liar
> > when these people were waxing eloquent about this list  being a shared
> > public space where people from different persuasions can come and engage?
> > Do
> > you in any way want me to gather from your response that reader list or
> > many
> > of all those who are  'us' on the reader list only welcome certain
> > preordained ideas and those who question this status quo will be
> > arrogantly
> > snubbed by 'I will not respond to your mail' because 'you' have
> > demonstrated
> > 'unlimited energy' (now writing long mails is also a crime, I suppose!)
> or
> > engaged by occassional kind benevolence of informed souls, such as your
> > respected self but only as 'them'?
> >
> > I am absolutely earnest in my belief that reader list is a shared public
> > space and I would like to believe in what Shuddha and Iram had to say,
> and
> > no I don't find that boring. And I would like to hear more about 'us'
> from
> > you.
> >
> > 5. ' gibberish about marx '
> >
> > Please do not manipulate other people's words to suit your agenda Aarti.
> > Please! Please abstain from casually quoting so as to harm or impugn the
> > intent of a person's written word. It's uncalled for. I do not expect
> this
> > sort of a conduct from you. Please do not let me down.
> >
> > What did I write? I wrote, 'professors infect students with their
> > gibberish
> > about marx' and I stand by this. And I think if one just takes just '
> > gibberish about marx ' from this sentence, one changes the import, the
> > meaning and the intended message. Which was this- institutionalized
> > pedagogy
> > often produces rarefied form of knowledge which is perhaps alienating.
> >
> > Marx's thought was brillaint! Even if one do not believe in his ideas
> > still
> > one reads for its eloquence and earnestness and for its irreverence and
> > breadth and for its composition and style and for its poetry and
> language.
> > While writing that book he dug a deep conceptual well but with a needle
> of
> > hard work and perseverance.  And this thought still sells, there's a
> > market
> > for this thought. Many people love it and if they don't then many
> > begrudgingly acknowldege it, like popper did, for instance.
> >
> > But sadly there exists no mass market for often, half processed ideas
> that
> > many university poffessors churn out as 'critical thought', which is
> often
> > peddled as course books with a certain two penny sales from students who
> > want to charm institutional power for a career. I often find many such
> > 'marxist' ideas not earnest enough and hence deeply alienating.
> >
> > 6. 'Keep posting'
> >
> > I would like to extend the same invitation to you. As always, it was a
> > pleasure writing to you Aarti.
> >
> > Will eagerly look forward for your response.
> >
> > In all ' earnestness ' ofcourse!
> >
> > Warm regards
> >
> > Nazo
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Oct 4, 2008 at 12:45 PM, Aarti Sethi <aarti.sethi at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Dear Nazneen,
> >>
> >> I liked the article but I think we would disagree on why we both liked
> >> it.
> >> I read it as a tongue-in-cheek assessment of how certain ideas propel a
> >> generation or have a valance at a certain point of time and then when
> the
> >> world changes, their location at the center of knowledge gets
> >> destabilized.
> >> I don't take these things too seriously in the first place and being
> >> earnest
> >> is really too boring But I suspect you posted this hoping that the
> >> "marx-vadis" on the list would immediately jump up and down waving
> flags,
> >> and loudly lamenting the "end of history" as Fukuyama so eloquently put
> >> it.
> >> This would square well with the persona of the agent provocateur you've
> >> assogined yourself.
> >>
> >> Regardless, when you actually wish to have an engaged discussion on the
> >> history of ideas I'm sure many of us will be more than willing. Till
> then
> >> we
> >> will have to consider comments such as -
> >>
> >>  Here's an article I read about stupid intellectual fads. How university
> >>> professors infect students with their gibberish about marx etc which in
> >>> turn
> >>> results in years of theorizing, conferencing, journal publishing (many
> >>> friends, by the way mockingly argue that, journals articles are read
> >>> just
> >>> two and a half people, the writer, the editor of the journal and that
> >>> reader
> >>> who starts and leaves midway) and a yapping career marked up
> networking,
> >>> networking, networking with an occasional book or two thrown in and
> that
> >>> elusive tenure!
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >> - where you hope to get a raise out of us by summarily characterizing
> the
> >> sweep, breadth and history of 200 years of philosophy and praxis as
> >> "gibberish about marx' and "stupid intellectual fads" as part of the
> faux
> >> ayyar persona you have made your own.
> >>
> >> I really liked the text. Do keep posting :)
> >> Warmly
> >>
> >> Aarti
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> The essay is called: Graphs on the death of Marxism, postmodernism, and
> >>> other stupid academic fads, I could not copy graphs because of
> >>> formatting
> >>> issues on the readerlist. But please check them out at,
> >>>
> >>> http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2008/09/graphs-on-death-of-marxism.php
> >>>
> >>> ******************************
> >>>
> >>> http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2008/09/graphs-on-death-of-marxism.php
> >>>
> >>> Graphs on the death of Marxism, postmodernism, and other stupid
> academic
> >>> fads
> >>>
> >>> [*Note*: I'm rushing this out before the school week starts, as I need
> >>> sleep, so if it seems unedited, that's why.]
> >>>
> >>> We are living in very exciting times -- at long last, we've broken the
> >>> stranglehold that a variety of silly Blank Slate theories have held on
> >>> the
> >>> arts, humanities, and social sciences. To some, this may sound strange,
> >>> but
> >>> things have decisively changed within the past 10 years, and these
> >>> so-called
> >>> theories are now moribund. To let those out-of-the-loop in on the news,
> >>> and
> >>> to quantify what insiders have already suspected, I've drawn graphs of
> >>> the
> >>> rise and fall of these fashions.
> >>>
> >>> I searched the archives of JSTOR, which houses a cornucopia of academic
> >>> journals, for certain keywords that appear in the full text of an
> >>> article
> >>> or
> >>> review (since sometimes the big ideas appear in books rather than
> >>> journals).
> >>> This provides an estimate of how popular the idea is -- not only the
> >>> true
> >>> believers, but their opponents too, will use the term. Once no one
> >>> believes
> >>> it anymore, then the adherents, opponents, and neutral spectators will
> >>> have
> >>> less occasion to use the term. I excluded data from 2003 onward because
> >>> most
> >>> JSTOR journals don't deposit their articles in JSTOR until 3 to 5 years
> >>> after the original publication. Still, most of the declines are visible
> >>> even
> >>> as of 2002.
> >>>
> >>> Admittedly, a better estimate would be to measure the number of
> articles
> >>> with the term in a given year, divided by the total number of articles
> >>> that
> >>> JSTOR has for that year, to yield a frequency. But I don't have the
> data
> >>> on
> >>> total articles. However, on time-scales when we don't expect a huge
> >>> change
> >>> in the total number of articles published -- say, over a few decades --
> >>> then
> >>> we can take the total to be approximately constant and use only the raw
> >>> counts of articles with the keyword. Crucially, although this may warp
> >>> our
> >>> view of an increasing trend -- which could be due to more articles
> being
> >>> written in total, while the frequency of those of interest stays the
> >>> same
> >>> --
> >>> a sustained decline must be real.
> >>>
> >>> Some thoughts:
> >>>
> >>> First, there are two exceptions to the overall pattern of decline --
> >>> orientalism and post-colonialism. The former may be declining, but it's
> >>> hard
> >>> to say one way or the other. The latter, though, was holding steady in
> >>> 2002,
> >>> although its growth rate had clearly slowed down, so its demise seems
> to
> >>> be
> >>> only a matter of time -- by 2010 at the latest, it should show a
> >>> down-turn.
> >>>
> >>> Second, aside from Marxism, which peaked in 1988, and social
> >>> constructionism, which declined starting in 2002 *, the others began to
> >>> fall
> >>> from roughly 1993 to 1998. It is astonishing that such a narrow time
> >>> frame
> >>> saw the fall of fashions that varied so much in when they were founded.
> >>> Marxism, psychoanalysis, and feminism are very old compared to
> >>> deconstruction or postmodernism, yet it was as though during the 1990s
> >>> an
> >>> academia-wide clean-up swept away all the bullshit, no matter how long
> >>> it
> >>> had been festering there.
> >>>
> >>> If we wanted to model this, we would probably use an S-I-R type model
> >>> for
> >>> the spread of infectious diseases. But we'd have to include an
> exogenous
> >>> shock sometime during the 1990s since it's unlikely that epidemics that
> >>> had
> >>> begun 100 years apart would, of their own inner workings, decline at
> the
> >>> same time. It's as if we started to live in sparser population
> >>> densities,
> >>> where diseases old and new could not spread so easily, or if we
> wandered
> >>> onto an antibiotic that cured of us diseases, some of which had plagued
> >>> us
> >>> for much longer than others.
> >>>
> >>> Third, notice how simple most of the curves look -- few show lots of
> >>> noise,
> >>> or the presence of smaller-scale cycles. That's despite the
> vicissitudes
> >>> of
> >>> politics, economics, and other social changes -- hardly any of it made
> >>> an
> >>> impact on the world of ideas. I guess they don't call it the Ivory
> Tower
> >>> for
> >>> nothing. About the only case you could make is for McCarthyism halting
> >>> the
> >>> growth of Marxist ideas during most of the 1950s. The fall of the
> Berlin
> >>> Wall does not explain why Marxism declined then -- its growth rate was
> >>> already grinding to a halt for the previous decade, compared to its
> >>> explosion during the 1960s and '70s.
> >>>
> >>> Still, it could be that there was a general anti-communist zeitgeist in
> >>> the
> >>> 1950s, so that academics would have cooled off to Marxism of their own
> >>> accord, not because they were afraid of McCarthy or whoever else.
> >>> Importantly, that's only one plausible link -- there are a billion
> >>> others
> >>> that don't pan out, so it may be that our plausible link happened due
> to
> >>> chance: when you test 1000 correlations, 5 of them will be significant
> >>> at
> >>> the 0.005 level, even though they're only the result of chance.
> >>>
> >>> This suggests that a "great man theory" of intellectual history is
> >>> wrong.
> >>> Surely someone needs to invent the theory, and it may be complex enough
> >>> that
> >>> if that person hadn't existed, the theory wouldn't have existed (contra
> >>> the
> >>> view that somebody or other would've invented Marxism). After that,
> >>> though,
> >>> we write a system of differential equations to model the dynamics of
> the
> >>> classes of individuals involved -- perhaps just two, believers and
> >>> non-believers -- and these interactions between individuals are all
> that
> >>> matter. How many persuasive tracts were there against postmodernism or
> >>> Marxism, for example? And yet none of those convinced the believers
> >>> since
> >>> the time wasn't right. Postmodernism was already growing at a slower
> >>> rate
> >>> in
> >>> 1995 when the Sokal Affair put its silliness in the spotlight, and even
> >>> then
> >>> its growth rate didn't decline even faster as a result. Kind of
> >>> depressing
> >>> for iconoclasts -- but at least you can rest assured that at some
> point,
> >>> the
> >>> fuckers will get theirs.
> >>>
> >>> Fourth, the sudden decline of all the big-shot theories you'd study in
> a
> >>> literary theory or critical theory class is certainly behind the recent
> >>> angst of arts and humanities grad students. Without a big theory, you
> >>> can't
> >>> pretend you have specialized training and shouldn't be treated as
> >>> such --
> >>> high school English teachers may be fine with that, but if you're in
> >>> grad
> >>> school, that's admitting you failed as an academic. You want a good
> >>> reputation. Isn't it strange, though, that no replacement theories have
> >>> filled the void? That's because everyone now understands that the whole
> >>> thing was a big joke, and aren't going to be suckered again anytime
> >>> soon.
> >>> Now the generalizing and biological approaches to the humanities and
> >>> social
> >>> sciences are dominant -- but that's for another post.
> >>>
> >>> Also, as you sense all of the big theories are dying, you must realize
> >>> that
> >>> you have no future: you'll be increasingly unable to publish articles
> --
> >>> or
> >>> have others cite you -- and even if you became a professor, you
> wouldn't
> >>> be
> >>> able to recruit grad students into your pyramid scheme, or enroll
> >>> students
> >>> in your classes, since their interest would be even lower than among
> >>> current
> >>> students. Someone who knows more about intellectual history should
> >>> compare
> >>> arts and humanities grad students today to the priestly caste that was
> >>> becoming obsolete as Europe became more rational and secular. I'm sure
> >>> they
> >>> rationalized their angst as a spiritual or intellectual crisis, just
> >>> like
> >>> today's grad students might say that they had an epiphany -- but in
> >>> reality,
> >>> they're just recognizing how bleak their economic prospects are and are
> >>> opting for greener pastures.
> >>>
> >>> Fifth and last, I don't know about the rest of you, but I find young
> >>> people
> >>> today very refreshing. Let's look at 18 year-olds -- the impressionable
> >>> college freshmen, who could be infected by their dopey professors. If
> >>> they
> >>> begin freshman year just 1 year after the theory's peak, the idea is
> >>> still
> >>> very popular, so they'll get infected. If we allow, say 5 years of
> >>> cooling
> >>> off and decay, professors won't talk about it so much, or will be use a
> >>> less
> >>> strident tone of voice, so that only the students who were destined to
> >>> latch
> >>> on to some stupid theory will get infected. Depending on the trend,
> this
> >>> makes the safe cohort born in 1975 at the oldest (for Marxism), or 1989
> >>> at
> >>> the youngest (for social constructionism). And obviously even among
> safe
> >>> cohorts, some are safer than others -- people my age (27) may not go in
> >>> for
> >>> Marxism much, but have heard of it or taken it seriously at some point
> >>> (even
> >>> if to argue against it intellectually). But 18 year-olds today weren't
> >>> even
> >>> born when Marxism had already started to die.
> >>>
> >>> It's easy to fossilize your picture of the world from your formative
> >>> years
> >>> of 15 to 24, but things change. If you turned off the radio in the
> >>> mid-late
> >>> '90s, you missed four years of great rock and rap music that came out
> >>> from
> >>> 2003 to 2006 (although now you can keep it off again). If you write off
> >>> dating a 21 year-old grad student on the assumption that they're mostly
> >>> angry feminist hags, you're missing out. And if you'd rather socialize
> >>> with
> >>> people your own age because younger people are too immature to have an
> >>> intelligent discussion -- ask yourself when the last time was that you
> >>> didn't have to dance around all kinds of topics with Gen-X or Baby
> >>> Boomer
> >>> peers because of the moronic beliefs they've been infected with since
> >>> their
> >>> young adult years? Try talking to a college student about human
> >>> evolution
> >>> --
> >>> they're pretty open-minded. My almost-30 housemate, by comparison, was
> >>> eager
> >>> to hear that what I'm studying would show that there's no master race
> >>> after
> >>> all. What a loser.
> >>>
> >>> * I started the graph of social constructionism at 1960, even though it
> >>> extends back to 1876, since it was always at a very low level before
> >>> then
> >>> (less than 5 per year, often 0). Including these points didn't make the
> >>> recent decline so apparent in the graph, so out they went.
> >>> _________________________________________
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> >>
> >>
> >>
> > _________________________________________
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> > Critiques & Collaborations
> > To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with
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>
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