Traces

Deconstruction -- misused to mean taking apart and then to analyze discretely. Heard misused since I was an undergraduate. Misused by everyone from clever students to maths teachers. Of course used correctly if one never knew about DECONSTRUCTION. But probably safer to approach the thought through its specifics: its paradoxes, the collapse of metaphysical certainties, the questioning of "natural" binaries, the erosion of "presence", the rubbing of the interior against the exterior, the play of writing, the violence of writing, writing as inside language as language, and always, traces.

Overheard --
Int: "So what is it like to see your theories, like deconstruction, being played out in popular culture?"
Der: "?"
Int: "Like the American sit com -- Seinfeld. Critics have said that deconstruction has influenced comedies ..."
Der: "Seinfeld?"
Int: "Yes, it's an American comedy ..."
Der: "Deconstruction is not about comedy."

"Rousseau knew that death is not the simple outside of life. Death by writing also inaugurates life.... Death is the movement of differance to the extent that movement is necessary finite." Of Grammatology

Logocentrism (or another scene of domestic bliss)

Another delightful evening finds our protagonists sitting in their living room cum study. Both are peering into books that have been assigned for their respective courses. On the chair by the window, ET sits, reading a book on the evolution of race and biology while GL tries to make sense of Culler on Saussure. We intrude into this scene with a keen awareness that both out readers are in deep thought, though what they are thinking about is not apparent to the other person ...

ET: I've got so much reading to complete by the next lesson. I've got to finish this book and other stuff ...
Me: Yup -- it's like that for me too ...
ET: But it's different ...
Me (now vaguely interested): Why? There's as much reading in Lit ... we do two to three books a week ...
ET: Yah. But I'm reading about theories. You're ONLY READING STORY BOOKS...

What was exchanged after that would be of interest only to the parties involved but needless to say, words were exchanged. But let us take a step back from that last remark, "You're ONLY READING STORY BOOKS ...", and consider it in the light of Logocentrism.

The assumption in a comment like that can trace itself to a the binary relationship between "form" and "content". In effect, Logocentrism (a neologism derived from the Greek Logos -- the Supreme Word -- and somewhat popularised by that mad brilliant Frenchman Jacques Derrida) is an insistence that the REAL/CORE/ ESSENTIAL/the TRUE should be privileged over APPEARANCE/ REPRESENTATION/ SURFACE. Derrida exposes this as a myth that has been handed down by the Enlightenment but there are implications even before one tries to overturn the distinction.

A Logocentric view of language and knowledge takes "language" as a transparent, objective, uninvolved vehicle of "ideas", privileging the latter over the former. Hence, language is merely the receptacle used to contain the vastly more important "ideas", merely used as a mode of communication. Implicit is the idea that "ideas" exist prior to language; that under different circumstances "ideas" could be transmitted without "language" anyway. We see this insistence of the Logocentric in EVERY English/GP/Humanities class where are essays and writing are the issue:

"It's the ideas that are more important than the grammar or style what. So why are you penalising me because of my language? It's only language what."

"Can you proof read this submission? It's for the Maths/Science/Physics whatever. You don't need to bother about the content -- just look at the language."


Roland Barthes has pointed out that the "science" (under which he includes the social sciences) has been most guitly in promulgating this position, believing that "language" is an instrument that knowledge can confidently deploy for its own purposes. In opposition stands "literature" where the distinction between "form" and "meaning" are endlessly collapsed and questioned. it is then the study of literature, of how forms disrupt the confidence with which we presume the ascendancy of "meaning". Story books have already discovered every theory that psychology, anthropology, sociology, economics, and the hard sciences have. But they evade the tyrannical confidence of Theory by self-consciously privileging the "act" of knowing rather than presuming it.

Gary, when are we going to do some writing?

An interesting occurrence in class today. After about 30 mins of talking about the Freud piece that we were supposed to be reading in preparation for a long writing assignment, one of the students, frustrated, asked me, “Why are we doing all this? isn’t this supposed to be English 101?” And I had a mini-coup on my hands.

People started piping up, “Yeah – when are we going to do some writing? All we’re doing is talking about ideas. We’re supposed to be writing!”
“Aren’t you going to tell us exactly what we need to do in the writing assignment?”
“We need to know exactly what the 101 course is about!”
“I don’t get this stuff. It’s just too hard. I need to get writing.”

I desperately tried to explain that we would get to the writing soon. But they weren’t appeased. After the lesson, a group stayed back and explained the situation to me.

Several had been taking ENGL 095, an even more basic writing course where they dealt with paragraph structure, points of grammar and essay structure very explicitly. They’d been told exactly what to do when writing an essay. They wanted the same thing. They wanted to write, or be told what exactly to write.

Which struck me as rather significant.

First – no student, in my time teaching in Singapore has ever stopped a class where we were having a discussion about ideas (and mind you, the lesson this morning WAS an animated discussion of ideas) to insist that we should be writing.
Second – the age old question: can we write without content? The students wanted to write BUT they did not get the Freud. How much understanding of ideas is required for writing?
Third – the pragmatics of the situation manifested itself.
• “Do you know it’s taken me two years to qualify for this class!” ie I’ve spend two years in remedial English and I need to pass this class!
• “If I don’t pass this class, I don’t get my financial aid and I can’t continue ...”

My compromise? Instead of discussing the passages some more – we were supposed to apply the Freud to a short story, I said we would do writing in the next lesson, based on the Freud alone. I actually don’t think this is a satisfactory situation because it means that people will be writing in a vacuum. But at least it’ll allay some panic about being prepared for the exam and it’ll get some work done.

Dinner Conversations

Over dinner last night, a strange conversation. Slurping down our third meal of instant noodles and dumplings for the week, the following:
Me: You know I’m reading this Delany book, it’s a memoir of his time as a struggling writer, when he was 18 and married to Marilyn Hacker. It’s intriguing that he managed to explore his homosexual instincts so freely. I mean, he goes into a subway toilet at 125th street, looks over this other guy in the stall, they exchange smiles, then they get it on.
ET: Should I be concerned that you find homosexual explorations intriguing?
Me: No no – the point here is how easy it was. He just looked over and smiled. And it’s like a public toilet.
ET: You really need to protect your mind while you’re reading all this stuff. You don’t need to be homosexual to be good at Lit. And don’t go and try smiling at people in the toilets here.
Me: That’s not the point.
ET: You mean you’re reading the book because it’s full of homosexual encounters. If you tell me you’re homosexual, I’ll jump off the Brooklyn bridge ...
Me: Ok. I don’t go around smiling at people in the toilets. I don’t even use the urinals. I go into the stalls and close the door. But I read Delany because he’s probably the best contemporary writer I know. It’s just that when you want to have a conversation about a books with people, you need to pick out the sensational bits, to make conversation. Look here (flip flip flip) ...

“Every once in a while I would get up to wander into the kitchen to stir the skillet full of spaghetti sauce I’d done up from a recipe on the back of a small white-and-green cardboard box of oregano leaves, the counter still flaked with bits of onion and three fugitive pieces of tomato. Or I’d wander into the front bedroom – just as another arc from the hydrant below broke between the black fire escape slats to sing across the grass, and five hundred purple crescents would gem and drool the pane, while I stood watching the motion of light in water.”

He’s obviously writing in retrospect and thus poeticising the mundane. Still, this is some of the keenest description of the mundane that I’ve seen in a long time. The alliteration in the first two lines is varied with the subsequent consonant and vowels fusing the repeated “s” into the sentence, such that they don’t stick out and draw attention to themselves but bring energy to the line so that its length becomes seductive rather than laborious. And that wonderful synesthetic image of a jet spray “sing(ing) across the grass” having those twin effects -- “gem and drool” – the ornate and the primal, all on an evening of living, young and poor, on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

I'll make a comment on the Comments

A response to the truly "Anonymous":

I think it's quite a keen observation, about students feeding on ignorance -- like vultures you say -- an image that does imply that their quarry (would you even call it that since vultures don't hunt) is already dead and, well, rotting. The image is "productive" (a word I'll come back to later) in that it proposes that ignorance alone is not that which students will pounce upon and have for lunch ... It's ignorance that possesses stale, rotting air about it. It is an ignorance that refuses to budge from its position of not knowing, that refuses to move from the assumption of its "rightness", in spite of its incomplete knowledge, that students sense in teachers and love to tear apart. Then again, like vultures, I don't think many students actively engage most teachers about their own ignorance. Instead, they take a nibble here and a bite there whenever they can, rather opportunistically. In fact, an out and out showdown in the open, that would actually be healthy, I think for classrooms where the students are less than satisfied with the quality of the teaching / teacher.

Second, "hunk!?!?!" As Harris would point out, "hunk" is significant, not because of what it means denotatively but because of its contextual significance. Here, one finds the opposition between a "paragidmatic" versus a "syntagmatic" view of language. After more than one year of playing out the "hunk" ritual while morning announcements take place ... hey "hunk" comes to represent a lot more.

Third, "ewww how proletarian." "Proletarian" followed by "ewww", what does one make of that? A certain disgust? A mocking, screwed up face? The danger of the following comments is that they may romanticise poverty and the working class but I firmly believe that to use the "proletariat" as a marker of derogation, designating the working class as a demonised and impoverished "Other", is an indication of the commodity culture that has infected our societies. To think of the "proletariat" as the lower classes, is indicative of a class consciousness that is a product of affluence. Not a revolutionary class consciousness as Marx would have, but a lackadaisical assumption that the working class and their concerns can be readily dismissed. "Ewww how bourgeois" would be my response. Now if the comment had said "Ewww how 'village people' " ...

Last - to tie it all up (through an amazing stretching of ideas / boundaries). The students where I'm teaching at, BMCC, ARE the proletariat. They don't have nice cushy backgrounds. They come to school for an hour in the morning, work a normal work day, then come back for another lesson at night. I don't know how much "passion" one can have for ideas / abstractions given that kind of challenge. It's a real challenge for me, coming from a background of immense academic privilege, to locate myself in that kind of classroom, not in a condescending manner, but in a manner where I can help these students achieve their goals (which is a college degree so that they can get a better job ...) To push the argument further, the question of whether Lit is at all relevant to the concerns of the "proletariat", is fundemental, in helping these students see that the knowledge they acquire in the classroom is worth their commute, is worth the baby-sitter that they had to employ, is worth the overtime pay they they're missing out on. Lit Crit has, for too long (in the Singapore school system at least), been confined to the narrow formalist modes of the New Critics who believed in texts as "Artistic works, complete, whole objects" to be appreciated, mixed in a little with some reader response theory -- "what does this wonderful work of art say to your emotions". But very little has focussed on an ideological- productive view of the literary ie, how literary works, in their production, consumption and intepretation, demonstrate the class biases of a society or indicate ways that might abolish inequalities. Does thinking about "Hamlet" force one to think about the patriarchial systems that dominate modern society are a product of inbreeding and incest (culturally speaking)? A critical reading framework that takes into account Marxist theory and cultural materialism is needed to unmask some of the hegemonic ideological illusions that bourgeois readings have promulgated.

Is it all worth it, these intellectual acrobatics? Or as the pencilled margin notes in this book that I just borrowed "The Body In Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World" put it, is it all "meaningless mumbo jumbo" ...?

To Harris and Andrew (who also posted comments) -- don't feel left out ok?

Being Observed

Finally, I started on "the new life" today. I taught my first lesson today ... actually I don't think I taught anything ... just went through some of the class policies and some of the things that the class should expect. As always, I did not get much sleep the night before. It's the day before classes dread that I get in Singapore as well ... Ms Tan gets it ... and we'll like stare and the ceiling the day before a new term and ask each other, intermittently, "you still awake?"

Anyway, last night there were like people in the street outside our window talking really loudly. They just parked their car in the middle of the street and started to have a conversation at the top of their voices. So at least there was a reason for NOT getting enough sleep. An excuse, more like -- I doubt I would have slept very well anyway.

So being typically anxious, I got out of the apartment really early -- which actually turned out to be quite fortunate as there was a train delay later. I got to the college, "the Borough of Manhattan Community College", about 1/2 an hour before ... which was just nice ... got waved through the NYPD officers on security duty -- yup all CUNY campuses have NYPD security officers ... I think because we're a university that is run by the city ... columbia for eg, employs their own security people ... -- and found my room.

Of course my paranoia materialised in the fact that there was a blackboard (which I have not used since ... lower sec ...) and no chalk on the board. Of course being paranoid (and slightly obsessive) also means that I had made a mental note of where to get fresh supplies of chalk from (the Dept Office photocopy room...) when I visited the college two days ago. Come to think of it, it's these tiny things that make me most anxious. It's not the content of the lesson ... it's like where to photocopy (nowhere for now as I don't have authorisation), where to get the name list (nowhere for now cause the Dept hasn't made up one) and where the rooms are located. Actually, I ended up directing new students to their rooms cause they kept coming into mine even though the number of their schedules said something different -- I guess people are attracting to a classroom with lights on, nevermind the room number says "N 736" and not "S 722".

Anyway, the students in my class -- students, not pupils, according to the MOE powers that be because they're all over what age is it, 14? -- drifted in throughout the hour long lesson. They couldn't find the room, went to the wrong room, etc. They're an immensely mixed bunch -- I got them to write their names and we have (a sampling) ... "Kimberly Ramos", "Shi Jie Tan", "Peteulah Charles" ," David F. Narvaez", "Vllanda Barnett", "Alan Aramburu"... so - a real hodge podge of ethnicities. Assuming that position on the teachers' desk does wonders for your credibility and authority. I just sat there and they came in very respectfully and sat very quietly in their seats. I could have been just another student faking it ...

The nice thing about the class was that they were quite spontaneous. When I asked for the different kinds of writing that they knew, hands went up all over the class. They were pretty eager to show what they knew. I was actually rather relieved about that. Nothing like being in a totally alien environment and having a totally silent class. Anyway I amazed myself at how anal I was about going through the class guidelines ... I normally don't but teaching cross-culturally, I decided it was proabably appropriate to do so.

So after going through all the required stuff, I introduced myself and asked them where they thought Singapore was. One girl said "Next to Malaysia!" Someone said, "In Thailand" Most said, "In Asia! Near China!" I needed to explain South East Asia -- which they immediately understood because of Vietnam. To establish more credibility, I explained that I'd taught at several places (which is true) and in High School (which is true) and that I was a PhD student (which is also true). THEN ...

Me: "Any questions? Nothing too personal now ..."
Girl: "How long you've been here, in NY?"

Me : "Long enough to know what TriBeCa* stands for ... Now for your homework assignment ..."
Me : "How long have I been here? What is Time but a shred of that complex fabric called Existence? To account for the Time that I've been here would reduce my existence to random threads that precariously stitch together the patchwork of my life ... Now for your homework assignment ..."
Me: Errrm ... Two weeks...

At which point the class breaks up in what seems to me to be an enthusiastic uproar -- but I'm autistic so they might actually have been protesting ... : "Woah that's crazy man!", "You gotta be kidding me!" "Two WEEKS? Man!"

Ok. So I'm slightly worried now that I've blown my cover. But actually, why should it worry me? Ah well, we'll see how the next lesson goes. Hopefully they'll turn up.



*TriBeCa actually stands for "the Triangle Below Canal (Street)" so that wouldn't have been a lie either. Somewhat like SoHo, which is often mixed up the London's once seedly now uppity Soho, which stands for "South of Houston (Street)".

Some observations -

There a tensions in this city that rest just beneath its surface, errupting occassionally but in a somewhat frightening manner.

Two days ago -- as part of the administrative pilgrimage that I've been hopelessly sent on while I've been here -- I went to get a social security number, after finally having the right documents (several letters from my school) to make an application. I need the social security number to work here -- at least to work here legally and to get paid. Anyway, we were waiting in this lift lobby -- a small crowd of us, about 15, waiting to get into the lift that would bring us up to the offices. The security guard on duty (black) limits the number of people that get into the lift -- to six I think -- of course he does this in a rather callous manner, rather brusquely issuing instructions about how to queue up and stopping people from getting in the lift. Anway, this white guy just in front of me, tries to RUSH the lift. He actually propels his (rather rotund -- I feel miniscule here) body into the lift and tries to get it going. The security guard (equally large) WRESTLES him out of the lift, much to the horror of the people in the lift and much to my consternation (I'm next in line, remember ?) Then the insults begin:

White guy: "YOU FIT in the lift, you fatso. Why can't I get in? You're fatter than me."
Guard: "You fat asshole. There's a limit."
WG: "Yeah? What's the limit? You don't know do ya?"
Guard: "You fatasshole."
WG: "What is it you said? Could you repeat that?"
Guard: "You heard what I said ..."
WG: "No I didn't, cause I WASN'T paying attention to you, you fatso."
Guard: " You're an asshole"
WG: "You can't count can you? You can't count how many ..."
Guard: "You're on medication aren't you? I can tell ... you're on medication ..."


Then in the lift, this white guy picks on ANOTHER black guy. And they have a staring match right over my head. In the meanwhile, I'm desperately trying to avoid all eye contact.

Then again. Yesterday, at an outdoor concert, there was a Black Dance group whose dance incorporated some poetry. The poetry was very nice. Full of images of richness and opulence that harkened to an imagined Africa (eg "paths, made of mother of pearl" ). Anyway, some white guy (again) stood up and starting cursing the whole performance. Condemning it as black nationalism. The security people had to come in to diffuse the situation.

So far -- it's the white people who aren't behaving themselves.

My only encounter about MY ethnicity so far:

At the registrar's office ... a clerk (who isn't really helpful -- with an italian accent ...)
C: So waddaya STARdying?
Me: English.
C: ENGlish? That's reFRESHing you know, that's a nice change. I LIKE that. Cause you guys NORMally do the Phee-sics, the MatheMAaaatics, you know. ENGlish... that's gooooood.

Leaving on a Jet Plance

Is a song that I've always thought was very cheesy. Not least because John Denver sang it. But if songs provide the unobstrusive haunting background music of our lives and we look to them to provide some form of release from the otherwise mechanical process of checking-in, queuing up, sitting down and flying off, here's a song for the moment. Of course the specifics are all inappropriate -- but that line -- "All my bags are packed and I'm ready to go ..." it gets me.

I'm glad about the chance to go. to do something different for a while -- not that different considering that it's all Lit and teaching still. There is a stubborn romantic belief that I need to know about what living "over there" is like -- if only for a short while. I have no grand ambitions about moving away "for good" or "making it" elsewhere. I remain firmly believing that it doesn't really matter where you are as long as your read the right books, think about things, keep the music always playing in the background of your mind. But when the opportunity presents itself -- or rather -- when I've worked so hard to make this "leaving" happen, I can't help but invest a certain amount of desire and anticipation in the event.

Of course leaving isn't going to be easy. It's probably easier for me than Ms Tan, who has such strong ties with family and friends here. I know I will try very hard to keep in touch -- with people who want to know about what's going on, with people who have shared special moments with me -- but I also know that we're creatures of presence (believing or caught, intensely entangled in the metaphysics of presence, exposed, if not denied, by Derrida but affirmed in the redeeming illusions of touch, whispers, sighs, smells) and that being so far away will make casual coffee breaks, long lunches, and the occassional dinner meeting onyl cherished memories. I'm bringing as much of my life as I can, the books (26 in all -- an assortment of sizes ...) and my CD collection, diligently translated into 10 gigs on my imac) and I suppose that'll help. But the quotidian will be missed. Mush missed, I suppose, only when I'm there and face a new set of mundane challenges without the friends and acquaintences that make life just that little bit more interesting.

So -- a silent good bye.

Big Hairy Deal

Ok so my fashion ambition in life is to have long wavy hair and to look good with it. Of course, I've been disuaded constantly by just about every family member, the people I work with (in varying intensities) and just about everyone else who has an opinion on the matter. The nicest thing anyone has said about my attempts to keep my hair long: "Just do what you want ... as long as you're happy ... " Hey! It's not about being happy -- it's about looking nice. Then again, many hold the opinion that with the face that I've got, there isn't much that can be done to improve the dire situation.

Anyway the long hair look isn't supposed to end me up looking like one of those Taiwan Boy Band boys ... it's supposed to be "Eric Clapton in the early 90s" -- or "Nick Drake before he comitted suicide" ... pictured here:


So I asked Ms Tan -- late last night -- ok honestly -- do you ever think I'll look like that. She kinda laughed and said something about my face not having the bone structure -- ok so it's all in the face. To sort of verify this, I decided to have a look myself:



(shoot -- there's that double chin flopping around as well ...)

Well -- I suppose most people are right about that. Instead of the high cheekbones and cleft chin, I've got a somewhat mooney face. Add my normal stuporic look -- I guess the long hair just says, "drug addict", "unkempt" or "potential terrorist".

So I decided to give in -- against my better instincts -- and get a hair cut. This I did after collecting my new IC. Yes turning 30 in Singapore means you get thmub-printed 3 times -- twice on a cool scanner thing and once in ink -- oh, make that four -- you have to do one yourself when you mail in your new ic application ...

Anyway -- at least my IC has me with the long hair. I don't think there's much difference in the way I look between the various ICs that I have ...

This is the one I made in 1991 -- when I was 17. Note the damn retro specs and ever futile attempt at a smile.


This was when I re-enlisted for NS in 1998

And the latest installment -- I look like some pasty buddha in this one -- check out the fat cheeks man and trademark greasy hair...


Ok so I've got my hair cut and collected a new pair of specs. Here's the new look:

Face like that -- not much can be done, I suppose. As long as they don't stop me at immigration and say that I'm holding on to a fake passport ...

Weekends

This must be the greatest National Day weekend of them all. A FRIDAY of celebrations in school (which I conveniently skipped) then the actual thing only happening on MONDAY which means we get TUES off as well. Which is just as well as I've got too much to do in too little time. Besides the immense amount of marking that I've got lined up, I'm also supposed to finish writing those all important documents called testimonials and look at Project Work reports. Too much too much too much to do.

Anyway -- on this great weekend -- I've realised that I have nothing significant left to say about anything because I'm too damn busy with the trivialities of life. sigh.

OK -- I think this has become the story of my life -- I'm great at making everything the NON EVENT. I was just thinking -- actually I've been in the last few days talking consistently with Ms Tan and thinking about the ways we're saying GOODBYE. Given that we're both going away for a couple of years (hopefully -- if I don't screw up and end up failing) I'd say that it's a valid kind of experiment. An uneasy pattern has been developing. For example:

Scenario One
ET: You know what happened in school today?
Me: What?
ET: Some of my colleagues came up to me and said goodbye, then started crying ...
Me: Really. Wow. They really love you huh ...
ET: I don't know -- I don't even know them that well.
Me: You know what happened to me?
ET: What?
ET: My HOD came up to me and said, "giggle giggle, looks like we have to work you to the bone until your last day ..."

Scenario Two
ET: My sec one girls are MAD!
Me: What did they do?
ET: They said they wanted to take photos of me and chased me snapping pictures of my back.
Me: Wow -- they really love you.
ET: They're mad.
Me: I've got a photo story too ... I was made to sit in the front row of the dept photo -- I almost got away with standing behind until the stupid photography teacher in charge noticed I was the only male in the back ...
ET: How is this relevant ?
Me: You tell me ...

Scenario 3
ET: How, I feel so bad -- my friends got me so much stuff (ie shoes, trip to Bintan, Creature II Speaker System -- which guess who has to lug to bloody NY)
Me: Wow -- your friends love you ...
ET: How, I feel so bad ...
Me: I also got a lot of stuff -- got marking, got June marking, Testimonials, US Applications, plato to read ...
ET: *Killer Stare*
Me: oooops ...

Scenario Four
ET: I've got so many notes to write to my class, I can't finish. I need to make all these cards, how? Then tonight I'm going out to watch dim-sum dollies with the RGS pple, how?
Me: Why do you even bother?
ET: Because I've got things to tell them. It's closure. If I don't tell the girls these things, their blood is on my head ...
Me: Eh - you very intense ... you're like a teacher that slams them, whacks them, scolds them then when you leave you must leave with a parting shot ... and they love you ... I'm in awe ...
ET: How how to finish?
Me: I also got a lot of stuff -- got marking, got June marking, Testimonials, US Applications, plato to read ...
ET: *Killer Stare*
Me: oooops ...
(yes when conversations with your wifey start to end the same way ... better stop talking and go listen to Billie Holiday and watch NDP Parade so that you can Kao Pei one last year ... Fine and Mellow man)