This way to the stars

An unexpected thread through seemingly disparate elements

I never thought Filipino class could be so...ENLIGHTENING.

We were discussing literary theory through a text by Jonathan Culler entitled "Language, Meaning, and Interpretation" which is actually the fourth chapter in his book "Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction"...but I believe I mentioned all this in a previous post where I was complaining that the self-proclaimed short introduction was not really short at all, but long, tedious, tortuous, and hard to understand.

Excuse me? Did I really say that?

I take it all back now.

Although the text explained some pretty boring stuff about the poetical and hermeneutical way of interpreting texts and the fine distinctions between meaning, interpretation, and context (for the satisfaction of critical theorists and linguists), it also put forward some really interesting concepts on the nature of conventions and institutions - why most people mindlessly follow systems without questioning their limitations and weaknesses.

It's the mind-boggling question that have apparently been bothering linguists and theorists for a lot of time as they attempt to concretize and articulate that which can't really be explained through words but can only be felt and experienced. According to Culler, the system of language is an arbitrary convention; in other words its the system used and agreed upon by everyone in the society. Thus language concretely manifests and expresses the ideologies, the principles, and the beliefs of the culture or the society that uses it.

However, language, and thus ideologies, are not without their pitfalls. People can only think , understand and communicate with each other through language, but there are feelings that people can't express through words or phrases. Similarly the ideology that runs a society has weaknesses; that's why Karl Marx proposed communism because the capitalist ideology unjustly upholds the status quo (in other words, it holds the rich capitalists in power and supresses the laborers and the poor). Though some people see these weaknesses, they are called "radicals" or "leftists" because they go against THE SYSTEM FOLLOWED BY THE MAJORITY and propose an "ideological change", or a change in the system that defines and limits the structures of society.

This is actually why the movie "The Matrix" was so sensational and thought-provoking; its plot showed that people are enveloped in a world whose comfortable realities are only CONSTRUCTED and RUN for them by a system, a culture, an ideology, a convention, a machine. However, people would continue to be dumb robots enslaved and controlled by the system unless they get out of it and see it entirely and objectively - thus Neo couldn't grasp the nature of the Matrix until he got disconnected from it and saw those endless human-harvesting fields. More ironically, people who do see the weaknesses of the system have to destroy it by attacking it from within (thus the repeated soujourns into the Matrix by Neo and the other rebels, whom I can't help likening to local communist NPAs).

Thus throughout history there have been what are considered radical groups who have been pushing for change. However, they have never been more heard and more prominent than they are now, what with the emergence of terrorists who crumble the American pride, security, self-esteem along with the Twin Towers with a single bomb. However, much closer to home is the increasing volume of the energetic and perpetually discontented voice of the youth (that means us) who scream out their defiance in the form of rock music through artists like my beloved Incubus who croon and whine out lyrics such as:

Make Yourself
If I hadn't made me, I would've been made somehow.
If I hadn't assembled myself, I'dve fallen apart by now.
If I hadn't made me, I'd be more inclined to bow.
Powers that be would have swallowed me up, but that's more than I can allow.
If you let them make you, they'll make you papier-mache.
At a distance you're strong, until the wind comes then you crumble and blow away.
If you let them fuck you, there will be no foreplay.
But rest assured, they'll screw you complete 'til your ass is blue and grey.
You should make amends with you.
If only for better health.
But if you really want to live, why not try and Make Yourself?
If I hadn't made me, I'dve fallen apart by now.
I won't let 'em make me, it's more than I can allow.
So when I make me, I won't be papier-mache.
And if I fuck me... I'll fuck me in my own way.
You should make amends with you.
If only for better health.
But if you really want to live, why not try and Make Yourself?
Make yourself.

Although we are considered callow, immature, and inexperienced, we do want to be the ones responsible for our own lives, find or make our own opportunities, fight our way through the world. Though we know that we will eventually face obstacles that would seem insurmountable, it is the thrill of facing challenges and breaking senseless rules - breaking the barriers of systems and conventions - that add to our notion of uniqueness, power and self-worth.

Hmmmm...the Terror of the Filipino Department WAS right. Reading unusual and even obscure literature widens your "horizon of expectation" through the fusion and addition of various and sundry standards and principles.

Ha. Don't you wish you know what I've been talking about? Consider it an inside joke of Fil 11 Sec X, and you'll be fine.

posted by steph @ 7:00 PM