Why is that?

[kellner@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu]

David W wrote:

"We can meet on common ground on the abstract plane, because our specific
disciplinic prejudices are less relevant there. But more to the point, we
can discuss abstract subjects, because they belong to only one of the
disciplines - philosophy. On these subjects we all use the same language.
And those who don't know the lingua philosopha, can't even read these
postings, let alone criticise them."

David's posting was very interesting and I think that this is true as a
diagnostic critique of the different perspectives of people on this list
(though I don't like his academics/ real life distinction and am fed up
with the attacks on academics here that is about as antithetical to the
spirit of the FS as anything I can imagine as they argued constantly
concerning the intervention of radical thought in the "real world...")

Back to my point: BUT although everyone is stuck in their own subject
position and in some cases this involves their academic discipline I think
that the whole thrust of the FS was to transcend disciplines for a
transdisciplinary approach (see my book CRITICAL THEORY, MARXISM and
MODERNITY for an elaboration on this point). This is why I suggested that
discussing something like jazz or hip hop requires a multiperspectivist
approach and not just a one-sided formalist valorization, or "real life"
trashing or whatever. Check out Adorno's "Lyric Poetry and Society" for an
engagement of German lyric poetry on many levels. Ergo, we should in the
spirit of the FS overcome one-sided disciplinary perspectives or limited
points of view to more broadly contextualize and analyze phenomena....
 
Douglas Kellner, Dept of Philosophy, Univ of Texas, Austin, TX 78712
kellner@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu  fax: 512 471-4806
Web sites: Postmodern theory= http://ccwf.cc.utexas.edu/~kellner/pm/pm.html
Critical theory= http://www.uta.edu/english/dab/illuminations/