tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post1591983119371784988..comments2024-03-10T20:46:19.274-04:00Comments on In the Middle: post Kalamazoo postCord J. Whitakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06224143153295429986noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-11910767240759491672007-05-29T09:19:00.000-04:002007-05-29T09:19:00.000-04:00THanks, Dan -- much appreciated. I really enjoyed ...THanks, Dan -- much appreciated. I really enjoyed our lunch, and look forward to hearing more about your new project as it develops.Jeffrey Cohenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17346504393740520542noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-46573263279740567182007-05-28T00:34:00.000-04:002007-05-28T00:34:00.000-04:00Jeffrey, Thanks so much for the kind words and vot...Jeffrey, <BR/><BR/>Thanks so much for the kind words and vote of confidence. Having lunch together was a real high point for me, at this or any other K'zoo. It's been a pleasure getting to know a man whose care for others and the profession is matched only by the quality of his work.<BR/><BR/>And as I've been perusing the Middle Ground blog and the others in the Babel clatch, you all have (just about) convinced me that this newfangled blogging thingy might be worth looking into. <BR/><BR/>My problem? Sometimes it's hard to stop typing...<BR/><BR/>Best from Anchorage, <BR/><BR/>dklineAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-48604036785801716842007-05-15T06:27:00.000-04:002007-05-15T06:27:00.000-04:00Thank you Jeffrey for the nomination, which I will...Thank you Jeffrey for the nomination, which I will treasure eternally: <BR/><BR/>"And so among the parts of an animated body, some are directed to the accomplishment of the souls' operations, for instance the heart, liver, hand, foot; while others are directed to the safe-keeping of the other parts as leaves to cover fruit; and thus hair and nails are in man for the protection of other parts. Consequently, although they do not belong to the primary perfection of the human body, they belong to the secondary perfection: and since man will rise again with all the perfections of his nature, it follows that hair and nails will rise again in him" (Aquinas, Summa).Nicola Masciandarohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01279665722551517693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-70490773025549223242007-05-15T04:11:00.000-04:002007-05-15T04:11:00.000-04:00And just to close the deal before splitting - yay ...And just to close the deal before splitting - yay - Karl - I absolutely agree with you on that too. <BR/><BR/>Farewell - sorry you won't be at Leeds any of you. But then of course Leeds doesn't dance!N50https://www.blogger.com/profile/02927387227571782287noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-76697344525619355102007-05-14T19:15:00.000-04:002007-05-14T19:15:00.000-04:00I try not to spread hearsay.I can vouch for that. ...<I>I try not to spread hearsay.</I><BR/><BR/>I can vouch for that. So I didn't think you gossipy at all, unless we can gossip about ourselves. Anyone have a treatise of virtues and vices handy?Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-41433709613364931542007-05-14T18:36:00.000-04:002007-05-14T18:36:00.000-04:00your real life self is not as constrained to be di...<I>your real life self is not as constrained to be discrete. It is, therefore, full of hilarious and wicked (and at times distressing) stories. Well, so is your online persona, but the real one can name names.</I><BR/><BR/>Oh damn, I guess MF is right -- I *am* a big old gossip. Well, I only gossip about stuff that actually happened to me, at least. I try not to spread hearsay.Dr. Viragohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03960384082670286328noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-9163523017045788902007-05-14T16:40:00.000-04:002007-05-14T16:40:00.000-04:00Although I should make it clear that I'm not doing...Although I should make it clear that I'm not doing some kind of 'yay! subversion!' reading, since that break with the mechanistic response to events can just as well result in--to fall into the medieval version of Godwin's law--the ritual murder charge.<BR/><BR/>Also very good time hanging out with you DV (and hearing RB's stories of cursing children). As for this, your <I>real life self squarely matches up with my blogging self,</I> well, your real life self is not as constrained to be discrete. It is, therefore, full of hilarious and wicked (and at times distressing) stories. Well, so is your online persona, but the real one can name names.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-15889420458505149502007-05-14T13:56:00.000-04:002007-05-14T13:56:00.000-04:00OK, people are having a serious conversation here,...OK, people are having a serious conversation here, but what I really want to know is how it is that my real life self squarely matches up with my blogging self. Because it's all about me! Te-hee!<BR/><BR/>Seriously, I'm sorry I had to miss the theory and queer/feminism panels, but other duties and obligations called. I'm in way too many circles of friends, colleagues, and fields, dammit.<BR/><BR/>Glad you had a good K'zoo, JJC! It was lovely meeting you and seeing Karl and Eileen again (though Eileen, I didn't see nearly enough of you this year -- next year I'll make a point to have at least one sustained conversation with you!).Dr. Viragohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03960384082670286328noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-17007933341431213822007-05-14T11:30:00.000-04:002007-05-14T11:30:00.000-04:00I do not want to be freed from the 'inhumanity' of...<I>I do not want to be freed from the 'inhumanity' of man.</I><BR/><BR/>My point is more with the inhumanity of past events, of humans actions that have passed into inhumanity by falling (inexorably) into the unalterability of the past. I want to call the past inhuman to stress the monstrous quality of human actions that have passed out of human control while continuing to pressure and compel us in the present.<BR/><BR/>And, yes, absolutely, I agree with you: we should determine what really happened insofar as such a thing can be determined (i.e., against whatever practical or theoretical difficulties we encounter in this effort). We should do this in part to discover the moments when humans in their present moment split with the 'actual' event, those moments when they attempted to colonize (bad verb?) or claim (better?) or resist (cliche?) the past with their agency.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-21382080220710827792007-05-14T11:11:00.000-04:002007-05-14T11:11:00.000-04:00One might even say--and note my deferral of respon...<I> One might even say--and note my deferral of responsibility for this idea through the use of the third-person impersonal--that such an invention, such a disregard for the 'actual' event, helps free the writer (for good or ill) from the inhuman burden of the past.</I><BR/><BR/>I think that is what I [note use of first person personal;-)] really do not want to be freed from. Both for my sake, and for those of people in the past, and for the sake of the future, I do not want to be freed from the 'inhumanity' of man. <BR/><BR/>And to try to understand what really happened in the twelfth century 'anarchy' increases the agency that can be found in all writers about those events, at whatever time, and in whatever way, they write.<BR/><BR/>Thinking about how things really were - <I>in relation to</I> how they have and might be perceived - also enables me, I hope, to avoid tyrannically imposing my views on the past - No that is too optimistic - but maybe to be in a constant state of reflection about how and why I impose my views on the past (and on the future).<BR/><BR/>And so the real materiality of the past matters (pun intended).N50https://www.blogger.com/profile/02927387227571782287noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-38854839095129225052007-05-14T10:39:00.000-04:002007-05-14T10:39:00.000-04:00Ah: thanks n50.I do think what happened mattered. ...Ah: thanks n50.<BR/><BR/>I do think what happened mattered. <BR/><BR/>But if there's a historiographical 'invention' or thickening of an event that, materially, wasn't much of an event, it <I>is</I> more interesting. In such a text, say, a chronicle that believes a famine is far worse than it actually was, that a Viking raid destroyed something that it merely damaged, that a genocide (say, of Celts or Saxons or Norsemen) took place that did not, we're no longer in a text that "merely" reproduces the inhuman event. <BR/><BR/>The more straightforward the record of an event, the less agency in the record. Think of the Annals as a perfect example of this rather blunt approach I'm describing here. However, the <I>invention</I> of an event (or the severity of an event, for example, imagining that the so-called Anarchy spread throughout England) breaks that mechanistic relation between cause and effect. One might even say--and note my deferral of responsibility for this idea through the use of the third-person impersonal--that such an invention, such a disregard for the 'actual' event, helps free the writer (for good or ill) from the inhuman burden of the past.<BR/><BR/>(q: can Benjamin help me here?)Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-61336232890309757872007-05-14T10:21:00.000-04:002007-05-14T10:21:00.000-04:00Most immediately I had this in mind (from discussi...Most immediately I had this in mind (from discussion of 12thc anarchy).<BR/><BR/><BR/>"Karl Steel said... <BR/>I agree that what's important isn't what 'really happened' but the representation of the period by contemporary writers.<BR/><BR/>More than that, if there isn't "actually" anarchy (whatever that means in this context), and if there's nevertheless a historiographical expression of trauma, it's far, far more interesting than a simple cause and effect relation between events and records of events."N50https://www.blogger.com/profile/02927387227571782287noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-77513165373997340242007-05-14T10:14:00.000-04:002007-05-14T10:14:00.000-04:00Quick note just to say that, yes, N50, the BABEL h...Quick note just to say that, yes, N50, the BABEL humanisms papers will be up and running at the BABEL website within the week, and I'll post on the link for that here, too. Also, the BABEL manifesto will be posted here, likely today or tomorrow. Cheers.Eileen Joyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13756965845120441308noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-46914698318221683492007-05-14T10:10:00.000-04:002007-05-14T10:10:00.000-04:00Karl saying that what happened in the past doesn't...<I>Karl saying that what happened in the past doesn't matter</I><BR/><BR/>Hm? Where did I say that?Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-32996665155625201302007-05-14T09:59:00.000-04:002007-05-14T09:59:00.000-04:00Humanism - it continues to bug me - specifically t...Humanism - it continues to bug me - specifically the relationship between literature/philosophy and the <I>sometimes</I> more material approaches of history/archaeology - and trying to fully articulate my concern with people like Karl saying that what happened in the past doesn't matter - only perception matters. The more experience I have of cross disciplinary humanisms (and the influence of post-structual philosophies in all of them) the more confused I feel. Maybe I'll try a coherent post about this some day. Meanwhile I hope you do post the Babel sessions - I am definitely intrigued.N50https://www.blogger.com/profile/02927387227571782287noreply@blogger.com