Final Post

This class has taught me much about the different theories for literature and even movies. I did start out with some knowledge of a few theories from Persuasive Strategies, this class went in more depth with them.
Marxism has always been my favorite, but probably because it's been the easiest to understand, however Psychoanalytic has always been interesting with the desire factor.
The theory that surprised me most was the Feminist theory. What I had previously thought about the theory was the stereotypes. But as I learned more about the theory, I agreed with it more, and now I feel very strongly about it. I think that literature needs to be picked apart using theories to determine what's actually going on behind the words.
Also, going back to the first article we read in the class about reading deep into literature or not, the class just proved that we should and ought to because there can never be just one meaning.

Feminist Criticism on Mantissa

I will do a feminist critique on Mantissa, specifically on section two, more specifically on page 58. The woman is clearly being posed in the man’s mind as thing, just a beautiful thing to look at. The woman continues to tell the man to stop looking at her breasts, and that she “will not be turned into a brainless female body at your beck and call at every perverted whim” and “I am something real.” Not only is the woman trying to break free from the stereotypes of being an object at service for a man.

ten

I will start off by saying that I must admit, I thought of feminism to be just as Dr. Krouse described in her book and in the first paragraph. However, as a female, and an aspiring writing, and potential (probable) wife and mother, and current girlfriend, I do not want to be tied down to these ideals of a nurturing, “at-your-service”, yes woman. Granted, I still want to be beautiful, I love make up and being blond, I also want to be respected.
I also think that it is important especially as a twenty year old female to be able to say that, no, I do not like kids, that I support abortion, but I still have the ability to change these thoughts as I get older.
But as I write and learn, I think it is necessary to know where this all came from. It is important to think of theses factors when reading texts. So rather than attacking males, or the stereotypes that try to drag us down, we should embrace what it means to be female and how far we’ve really come.

nine

First off, Ashley Shelden’s explanation of Lacan was very helpful and interesting. I think Lacanian psychoanalysis says a lot about the real world in which we live as well. People all over the world are constantly seeking true meaning of life, which for thousands of years, have turned to religion for the answer.
Christianity, for example, offers Jesus Christ as the meaning behind everything from science to emotions, until it comes to sexuality. Just like in Lacan explains, sexuality becomes a void when searching to fulfill desires. The church directs its followers away from sex until “marriage” to only “procreate”.
Christianity allows its followers to identify with Jesus with the “word of the Lord” written in the Bible. Lacan says that language is synonymous with desire. People have this desire to seek meaning, hope and to ease fears, and in return they have these words that the Lord apparently once spoke.
Yet, once when human nature and sexual drives come into the question, the religion suppresses these desires in order to stay pure and innocent.
So with both Lacanian psychoanalysis and Christianity, there are still questions that go unanswered and holes that don't get filled.

seven

Ken Rufo's guest post was quite helpful, but the most interesting part was during his discussion on the Matrix movie and the concept of the simulacrum. Rufo explains the simulacrum of Epcot and how we believe that we're really in movies, which are just fakes. This makes me think of all the ideas from my childhood, including Disney, the future, and all of our childhood hopes and dreams are just simulacras, and none of it is real at all. The ideas we get from Disney are love, beauty, frienships with humans and animals, and happy endings. I grew up thinking that one day I will get a great, fun job, live in a nice house, fall in "love", have a perfect family and die happy. This dream life was based off of movies like Aladdin, the Little Mermaid, and Beauty and the Beast. These movies projected these picture perfect life ideas that were embedded into my mind. These themes come from cartoons, nothing real, nothing that could ever be real. (Talking fish, magic carpets, beast to handsom man). But through it all, it was believed to be true.

six

In class, we discussed the idea of the author and Roland Barthes explains that text does not come from the author, but that the author is dead. The author is really the scriptor who transcribes culture. I agree with this notion that culture kind of just flows through the author and into a text. But does this text have a meaning? And if it does, is it truth? I find it difficult to follow the idea that humans are not essentially individuals. I think that authors impose their ideas and beliefs on the text that they are creating even these thoughts are skewed by culture.
Foucault then said "The function of an author is to characterize the existance, circulation and operation of certain discourses within a society." He is saying that certain things have writers, but not necessisarily an author. The "real" person does not shine through the texts, whether or not a this "real" person exists or not.

Authorship!?
In this blog, the "author" discusses the ideas of blogging and plagerism, not excactly authorship and pseudonimity, but another point that I think should be addressed when it comes to authorship. The idea of having ownership over ideas seems strange when the author is just the scriptor of culture. So does the author then own the language that is describing culture? Does the author own culture? It doesn't seem likely.

five

In the film, Derrida, he states that love is the most important thing in personal lives. But that raises the questions about what exactly love is. Is it the who or the what? Psychoanalytic criticism is "a form of therapy which aims to cure mental disorders 'by investigating the interaction of conscious and unconscious elements in the mind'", specifically how the mind, the instincts and sexuality work.

Derrida's ideas and the ideas of psychoanalytic criticism merge at the idea of sexuality. When Derrida says that this is the most important thing, to define a person, to really get to know a person is through their love and sexuality, it relates with psychoanalytic perspective in that sexuality is innate and it is what drives humans through the libido. Freud also agrees with this saying that this innate sexuality is repressed in humans and that it comes out through the Oedipus Complex, projection and dream work.

Through each of these, the repressed desires shine through to show the unconscious of the person and their true feelings.