Gonna Keep on Loving You... Cuz its the Only Thing I Wanna Do

I think that Derrida's idea of love being narcissistic is a very interesting one to explore. In today's world the term narcissism has a very negative connotation. A person who is labeled narcissistic is considered to be self obsessed and vain. We talked in class about the psychoanalytic use of narcissism. Freud discusses narcissism as something that we are born with. As babies we are inherently narcissistic, unable to understand the needs of anyone but ourselves. We have no ability to create a distinction between the self and the Other. As we grow, we grow out of this implicit narcissism and form the abilities to recognize the needs of the other people in our lives.

Derrida however, says that we maintain some of this narcissism in our relationships. All love is narcissistic- that we project our own desires and needs onto the person that we love. I think that this also ties into what Derrida was saying in the film about truly loving someone or just loving something about someone. We look for people to love that fulfill our needs. Whether it be someone to make us laugh, someone that makes us feel beautiful, someone that can cook if we can't, someone who is supportive of our career and decision and a whole host of other things that we need from a partner. We look for self fulfillment in a partner.


I don't think that when Derrida discuses the narcissism of love he necessarily means it in a negative way. However, it is a very interesting notion to look at love in such a way Do we love only to be loved in return? Is love a selfish act?

Give the Sign and Swing Away

Reading Saussure last week was a little bit intimidating, but I will try to make some sense out of it. When he says, "in language there are only differences without positive terms," he is saying that meaning only comes from within the linguistic system. For example, our meaning of Night is only comprehensible because we understand Day and vice versa. Therefore he says "the idea or phonic substance that a sign contains is of less importance than the other signs that surround it." Meaning that when we look at signifier and signified separately, their meaning is "differential and negative," but when looked at together, we are able to get a positive and total meaning. So, we can not understand the meaning of a word unless we look at it in the context of the linguistic system.

Post Structuralism works to challenge these ideas. For this theory it is not so simple to say that combining signifier and signified can give us a total meaning; they do not have a stable relationship. In class we discussed the idea that the signified keeps slipping farther and farther away, and in its place we continue to get more signifiers. Therefore we can truly never get at the meaning of something because the meaning keeps getting deferred. I want to try and give and example of this... bare with me.


Let's use 'baseball' as the signifier. You have the image in your head, and you know what it sounds like. So what is the signified? Is it the actual ball? Or do you take the meaning of 'baseball' to be the sport itself. If so, you start to see other signifiers right? Like players, teams and rules. With each one of these signifiers, the meaning of 'baseball' gets father and farther away from you. All these other and sounds and images expand and defer the meaning and we are unable to get a true and stable meaning of the word.


Hopefully, I didn't confuse you... because I am still kind of confused! Haha.



Ciao until next time!

Buying into Ideology

In reading Dr. Craig's post, I was struck by some of his ideas and was able to, at least I hope; gain a better understanding of Marxism and Marxist theory. I thought that his first examples of the Communist Manifesto and Che Guevara supported the Marxist idea that a works meaning is relevant to the time. Today, the Manifesto does not hold the same meaning that it did when it was first published. Back then it meant danger to our capitalist society. The threat of communism and Marx's ideas created paranoia in our country and fear in the ruling class. As Dr. Craig said today the Manifesto serves only as a symbol of rebellion in this society, no longer a true threat. I found it an interesting point that while the Manifesto is used in a store display to encourage rebellion from society, true communist ideas are lost in the fact that it is not being used to "inspire action" but seems to support the class division that a sweat shop implies. This supports the greater ideas of hegemonic control.

I think that I was most interested in Dr. Craig's point that "American ruling class ideology continuously spins narratives that attempt to limit the working class’s ability to recognize and respond to its own subjugation." I never thought of ideology working in this way before. I know that in class we discussed how in hegemonic society we buy into the ideologies of the ruling class and accept them as just the way things are, but I think that Dr. Craig did a great job of explaining this idea further. In his sports analogy he discussed how the sports industry targets working class people in its advertising. By cheering for our teams at a game, going to a sports bar to watch the game or throwing a Superbowl party we experience release of the frustrations that we deal with on a daily basis that "result from working in a low-wage job." However in providing this release, the ruling class is also making money. When people go out like this they spend money- on tickets, food, beer and souvenirs. So, while the working class is releasing tensions brought on by the ruling class, the ruling class is still making money. A distraction from the working classes discontent. I also find the idea that "When the ruling class convinces working people that corporate profits are actually a good sign for all – all boats rise in the rising tide sort of thing – it encourages them to believe in the virtues of an economic system that does not have their best interest in mind." supports the point about how we go along with the ideologies of the ruling class because we have accepted them as the way things are.

Thank you again Dr.Craig.

Ciao until next time!

Musings on Marxism

So here it goes: an attempt to make some sort of sense of Marxist criticism. I know that today in class we were all somewhat overwhelmed and confused, but I am going to give it my best shot.

Let me first say that I agree with the Marxist idea that literature is a product of its social, economic and cultural circumstances. Because of this, Marxism provides a stark contrast to the ideas of liberal humanism.

Liberal Humanism says that true literature is timeless. It presents us with thoughts and values that transcend place and time. Basic human truths. LH also tells us that the piece of literature has its own meaning and has no need to be placed in the context of time. The entire belief of Marxist criticism goes against this. Marxist criticism tells us that a work of literature is a product of very specific circumstances, thus making it a reflection of the time and culture in which it was written. The economic system, class position, and the where and when are all important factors that influence a writer's works.

In the first week of class, we discussed this idea to some extent. Does a work carry the same meaning with it through time or does its meaning change as cultures and values adapt? Personally, I think that this is true- in reading a work from the early 1900's we may not understand it the same way in which someone living in that time and place would understand it- however, we are given a window to that time, we are allowed a glimpse into the circumstances surrounding the author's life and a reflection of those circumstances in their writing.

Another interesting idea is presented in Lenenist Marxism: art and literature can and should be used for political purposes. In liberal humanism however, we are told that literature is not able to influence political views. "If literature becomes overtly and directly political it necessarily tends towards propaganda."

I know that that last bit about political influence was a bit off topic from the rest of this post, but I wanted a chance to incorporate a picture. And with the upcoming election I thought that a little bit of election art would be interesting.

OK so what do we think? Propaganda or an expression of support of the party views? How can we think about this poster in a Marxist way?

Comment with your thoughts!

Ciao until next time :)

The First

Hello to all!

I find it much easier to introduce myself and share ideas in written form, so I am happy that we get to keep a blog for this class. I am a senior at Emmanuel and a Communications major. The word senior, admittedly, freaks me out; but I'm dealing with it. I love to travel and spent the last semester abroad in Italy and it was one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

I love photography and theater. Fall is my favorite season, especially in New England. I am a Boston-aholic. We have great sports, history, art and of course that certain charm that only Boston could ever have. Hopefully through this blog, I will be able to tie my experiences living in this beautiful city into the world of theory.

As of now, I don't really know all that much about theory, but am definitely interested. I find it very interesting to analyze something from a point of view that might differ from your own, in order to gain a deeper understanding of its meaning, and I think that is what theory allows us to do.

So I guess that will be it for my first post! Ciao until the next!