It's too easy to slide into a postmodernesque, detached analysis and ignore the personal pragmatics. How is it affecting your life? What connections --- ontological as well as intellectual --- are you making?

intentions

The last thing postmodernism intends is a finished body fit for discussion. It is a living-breathing life form made up of individual life forms called people, not some postmortemized corpse as some may think. Postmodernism is discussion. Discussion is postmodernism. The essence of real discussion is life interaction. If you must make a corpse of it, make it an exquisite corpse!

analysis rigor mortis

There have only been a few articles that I have read that actually recognize with desire toward production, desire toward action, desire as action rather than analysis rigor mortis. The individual who suffers from this analysis rigor mortis trap becomes rapt in a pattern of repetitive thoughts and behaviors that are senseless and distressing and extremely difficult to overcome. Such individuals, like a new trim line bible, seek a trim lined discussion, society, compartmentalized, wherein established facades are preserved and antiquated cultural models are maintained religiously. This is not original creation; it is one’s individual fabrication. The more trim lined it is the easier it is for the masses to swallow. This, whatever “this” may be, is what becomes popular.

you won’t do it!

Step out of what you have fabricated. Explore, discover, walk around, and search, upsetting the balance of your comfortable presuppositions that bear only personal significance. Attach yourself to the abnormal connections of affirmative desire and function. Link your findings back to an evaluation of the tangible and bring to the table a discourse of experience that is worthy of electronic print. Try on new styles in communication. Experience the effects. Do not get stuck in the intellectual corner of weak and worthless analysis—analysis as an end, postmodern epistemology as a trim lined cadaver fit for discussion and interminable discourses beating some kind of “it” in the head. Otherwise, you might find yourself “chasing a rant”.

At this point, one will have bought into a trim lined expression of postmodernism, narrowed down into a user friendly, neatly packaged “rant in a box,” and rants in a box are really “consumer friendly” and “postmodern cool” as the Davemeister might say.

reading the articles

A key mistake in reading postmodern writing is just that, trying to come up with that “key something.” This is the attempt at interpretation leading to action failure. The most common results are inaction and postmortem analysis. Hmm…I can just see it now, postmodern analysis reduced to postmortem analysis…as someone makes of corpse of such a statement, reducing it into a compartmentalized body fit for discussion? Now, I’m wishing I had not thought of that. And so I digress.

Put the writing you just read into action! See the writing you just read as action. If it baffles you how this might be translated into practical, concrete actions/effects, then…well…Congratulations! Your adventure has just begun. To acknowledge a baffled and bewildered condition is to experience postmodernism through action engagement.

now on to another realm of discussion

I tried on Nietzsche in a new and different perspective this last week. Nietzsche is not one to ruminate over the death of God in the Christian sense of the word. “On the contrary, Nietzsche is exceedingly tired of all these stories revolving around the death of the father, the death of God, and wants to put an end to the interminable discourses of this nature, discourses already in vogue in his Hegelian epoch. Alas, he was wrong, the discourses have continued. But Nietzsche wanted us to finally pass on to serious things.”*

True, Nietzsche gives us “twelve or thirteen versions of the death of God, for good measure and to be done with it, so as to render the event comical.” Lastly, he “says that what is important is not the news that God is dead, but the time this takes to bear fruit.”* 

For clarity, Nietzsche is not discussing the true and living God, which the bible speaks of. In fact, how could he? It is good to remember that he is refuting the idea of “God” in the Hegelian form of the word/idea. With this in mind however, think about all those intellectuals who have never moved on to serious things.  They remain blogged down in the interminable discourses of this nature. And I digress again.

Now, what is this all about? My honest answer—for you, not sure? I only that know I am writing this for my own good and you seem to be reading it for whatever reason.

from metaphor to metamorphosis

I teach Language Arts to kids in fourth grade. We have learned about metaphors and are now leaving the lesson behind. It is funny how they just do not see it sometimes, especially the ESL kids in my class. What is scary is how I just don’t see what they see most of the time. Let’s take the fourth graders for example. Adults are not really all that different from fourth graders. It has taken me a while to realize that there is very little difference between fourth graders and adults, in a great many respects. In all fairness to the fourth graders however, they seem to see things more clearly.

These fourth graders are teaching me many things. They are helping me to see more clearly once again. They are teaching me how to rant. They can also show me about twelve to thirteen versions on the death of rant as well. They teach me the simple comedy in it all. What amazes me is how long it takes to see exactly what they are teaching me—the time it takes to bear fruit.

It seems to me that their rants only last for a few minutes and they never rant about the same thing more than one or two times. Instead of taking a personal offense, they simply leave it and move on. There are always other more pressing issues that need be dealt with.

On the contrary, fourth graders are exceedingly tired of all these stories, all these rants, and stories on the death of rants. At this point, they could really care less. They want to put an end to the interminable discourses of this nature, discourses already in vogue in the postmodern epoch. Alas, they are wrong, the discourses have continued. But these fourth graders want us to finally pass on to serious things—like football and fairy tales.

So, I played a game of football the other day. I couldn’t stand it any longer. I’ve been too busy rantatanttanting-ad nausea. I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to see what was so special, what was so important about football and fairly tales. I played football (soccer for you western types-the real football) and I had a blast. The other day I stopped to read the story The Little Prince to my fourth graders. They listened attentively and enthusiastically. Connections were made in both situations—connections that will last a lifetime.

So now I look at my circumstances with great struggle and contemplation that gives way to action. I see that I can personally make one of several choices. I can either keep on ranting, rant on the death of ranting, or even give thirteen versions on how the rant continues or dies. Or I can spend my time pragmatically and productively, with the generation that is ready for us to move on the more serious things. I have chosen the latter. This is the situation I have been placed in. Of course, this will not be for everybody. Who ever said it would be? Some may have been created to “chase a rant” all their lives. For me however, my time has run out.

On a final note: It seems to me that a true rendering of the postmodern epistemology would emphasis a freedom from the oppressive—liberation from the control center per say. If I were to make such a choice as to “chase a rant” for example, I wonder if I might be able to do so without succumbing to the oppressive nature of discussion, and in turn robbing the discussion of its valuable potential? I wonder if one could engage in the conversation without really stepping in and thus being swept away in the current that leads to analysis rigor mortis? I wonder if we can experience the freedom from oppression in such a way as to move on to more serious things?

Oh, there I go again. Now I am just babbling. Nobody will certainly have read this far. Besides, my attempt to do such a thing would be futile. After all, it would seem impossible to “rant on ranting without ranting.” You are laughing at me now. I can feel it. You think I have lost it and now I babble. If only you knew.

just more babble

In the meantime, I simply engage in the lives of fourth-graders who will either be the next generation of ranters or the next generation of world changers. If the former happens, then my rant will travel further than yours. If the later happens, then I did my job is complete.

So you may well ask, “why am I reading something that would not concern me?” Well, all I can say is, “You tell me?” You’re the one who kept on reading. As for me, I will not type the word rant ever again, since it has become so popular that CNN. Other news agencies have also chosen it as the ideal “catchword” for present day reporting on the Iraq war. Read the news instead of watching it on TV sometimes and you will see. Rant away! Everybody’s doing it! You aren’t cool unless you beat it in the head a thousand times, unless you enter into the stage of analysis rigor mortis. Such action as this seems postmodern—enter illusion. Suddenly, ranting is rendered meaningless.

As for me, it’s time for more serious things…like football and fairy tales.

*Anti-Oedipus by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari