FINAL BLOG ESSAY

FINAL BLOG ESSAY

Don DeLillo’s “Falling Man”, “Project Rebirth” and Roland Barthes’ “Mythologies”:

Mythologizing the Signs of 9/11

The events of September 11, 2001 altered the sociological, economic, and political landscape of the United States forever. For many weeks and months after the terrorist attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center, people walked the streets of New York City in a suspended state of unprocessed grief. It seemed as though as a New Yorker, the emotional core of all of us was temporarily removed—and we were left to our own devices as to how to effectively process our grief. We had the sensation that time had halted, our innocence was destroyed, and that the nation was traumatized almost beyond repair. People didn’t seem to be able to express their grief, and were left without a system of signs and signifiers to give this event meaning.

Personally, I will never forget hearing the everyday sounds of the birds chirping that day as I exited a taxi that I was lucky enough to secure to transport me from my office near Lincoln Center to my home in the Riverdale section of the Bronx. It struck me then that I had no prior proficiency on how to process something so devastating and violent, and I found myself staring at CNN literally for 3 days nonstop.

With an event so catastrophic, the national feeling was that we needed a national commemoration, something to physically remember all of the people in our lives who were lost. This collective desire to memorialize elevated 9/11 into a nationalist mythology, preventing its integration into a more thought provoking historical narrative. Barthes discusses this in Mythologies when he notes that myth “postulates a kind of knowledge, a past, a memory, a comparative order of facts, ideas, decisions”, yet when “it empties itself, it becomes impoverished, history evaporates, only the letter remains” (Barthes, 1972, p. 117).

Myth, according to Barthes, “is a type of speech defined by its intention…much more than by its literal sense… in spite of this, its intention is somehow frozen, purified, eternalized, made absent by this literal sense” (Barthes, 1972, p. 124). He goes on to state “myth is the most appropriate instrument for the ideological inversion which defines this society” (Ibid, p.142). The object of the mythology functions to frustrate purpose and meaning. Myth causes a duplicity of meaning, for its function “is to empty reality: it is, literally, a ceaseless flowing out, a hemorrhage, or perhaps an evaporation, in short a perceptible absence” (Ibid, p.143).

To quote Barthes:

"A conjuring trick has taken place; it has turned reality inside out, it has emptied it of history and has filled it with nature, it has removed from things their human meaning so as to make them signify a human insignificance". (p. 143)

According to Barthes, the object of the mythology does not bestow meaning upon itself, but upon the event of object to which it gestures (in this case the victims of 9/11 or the events of 9/11 itself). Barthes designates myth as a triad (or 3 pronged) pattern of semiotics instead of the dual pattern (Barthes, 1972, p.113), which consists of the signifier (the form of the myth), the signified (the mythical concept) and the sign (the myth’s signification-an amalgamation of signifier and signified).

The myth of the “faceless victims” of 9/11 was given meaning through the mainstream media with the image of the “Falling Man”. Based upon a photograph taken by Associated Press photographer Richard Drew. "Falling Man” became a symbol of all the people who decided to take control of their own fate and die the way they wanted, not in the way the terrorists intended. There were several attempts to identify the “Falling Man” and although it cannot be completely confirmed, many people believe the man to be Jonathan Briley, a 43 year-old employee of the Windows on the World restaurant.

The Falling Man seemed to be one of the pivotal myths of that day, because it "removed things from their human meaning as to make them signify a human insignificance". It pointedly demonstrated that human life can be exterminated at any time and at any place (a normal day at work), and the power lies in the fact that it made all of us think about what we would do in the same situation.

In Don DeLillo’s novel, Falling Man, the mythology of the “Falling Man” takes on a different form through the work of a performance artist. The performance artist recreates the look of the famous photograph by strapping himself into a harness and suspending himself from a high building in a heavily trafficked area, thereby hanging in the Falling Man’s well known pose. He appears several times throughout the novel, seen by the character Lianne. He seems to by a symbol of the day that Lianne and her family are trying desperately to avoid, yet their attempts are repeatedly rendered futile.

The plot of the novel centers on one family’s attempts at coping with the traumatic events of 9/11. The family uses myth to help them evade the reality of the attacks. The child of the protagonist couple (Lianne and Keith) and his friends spend their time looking towards the sky for a man named “Bill Lawton” (a modified version of “Bin Laden”), who “has a long beard. He wears a long robe” (DeLillo, p.74).

Justin (Keith and Lianne’s son) believes that the towers were hit but that they did not collapse even though his parents had told him the truth. He is creating his own mythology of the event in order to "empty reality" (as Barthes puts it) that is too painful for him to face.

Protagonist Keith Neudecker seems to be the character that was traumatized by the events of 9/11 more than the others in the novel since he witnessed them and lost several of his work colleagues and poker buddies. He seems to want to deny and avoid his feelings by gambling excessively in Las Vegas casinos and carrying on an extramarital affair with a woman named Florence. To Keith, the signs of the world he was used to no longer exist in the same way. Everything around him was different. As DeLillo states:

“It was something that belonged to another landscape, something inserted, a conjuring that resembled for the briefest second some half-seen image only half believed in the seeing, when the witness wonders what has happened to the meaning of things, to tree, street, stone, wind, simple words lost in the falling ash”. (p. 103)

DeLillo seems to constantly stress the interrelated nature of memory and language, and the loss of both that can come from living through such a traumatic event. In the narrative of Keith's escape from the site of the attacks, he never mentions speaking (a loss of language) to anyone until he gets to the hospital and is being examined (pp. 3-6). Keith seems finally able to recover his traumatic memories of 9/11 towards the very end of the novel. To quote the text:

“Things came back to him in hazy visions, like half an eye staring. These were moments he’d lost as they were happening and he had to stop walking in order to stop seeing them”. (p. 243)

Part of the mythologization of the events of 9/11 seems to be centered on the creation of a set of standard narratives (i.e. the hero accountant, the hero firefighter, the unsuspecting wife who received the final phone call from the husband or wife, the person who decided not to go to work that day). Each one of these narratives holds the promise of some type of redemption: the creation of the narrative of the hero used in the realm of public discourse or in the narrative world of a novel in one character’s attempt to reclaim his history through recovered memory.

The narrative of the redemptive hero and the narrative of the American spirit of rebirth are both prominently featured in the documentary, “Project Rebirth”. The film shows time lapse photography to demonstrate the rebuilding efforts around the World Trade Center Site, and interplays this footage with a series of compelling stories of people who lost family members or close friends on that fateful day. Each interviewee is followed over the course of several years, always interviewed on the anniversary of the attacks.

In the film, one of the most effective stories for me personally was told by Tim, a NYC Fireman who lost his best friend and boss in the attacks. In one clip, his grief has caused him to detach from his life purpose in much the same way as Keith Neudecker from “Falling Man”. One quote that sums up this well:

“I feel like I’m….I lost my track, and I don’t know…I am afraid I won’t find a track again. I’m kind of all over the place, you know? And I used to be very focused on my life, and now I just have no idea”.

The simple phrase “9/11” has become the symbol that engenders a series of images and narratives that on one hand emphasize the suffering of the American populace, and on the other hand elevate our role as a victimized nation into a redemptive hero myth that reinforces a tenacious and victorious national identity. The image of the “falling man” and other famous images from that day have taken shape in our culture to signify more than the actual visual content of the image-they allow us to process our collective memory and to collectively grieve for he memories of the patriotic loved ones who died as unsuspecting victims from simply going to work on that day.

Thoughts on Readings 4/29/09

The Politics of Nature by Bruno Latour

This week, I led the class discussion on the chapter listed above written by Bruno Latour. I am going to post some of the thoughts I used to get the class discussion started.
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Latour focuses his writings on political epistemology, or the "political philosophy of nature". Latour believes that political ecology has nothing to do with nature. In fact, he presents the idea that discussion of nature is problematic because it permits those who are participating in political discourse to "short circuit" debate.

Latour uses the allegory of the Cave as generated by Plato to define the relationship between Science and society. He believes that the Philosopher and the Scientist have to "free themselves from the tyranny of the social dimension, public life, politics, subjective feelings,popular agitation (OR THE DARK CAVE) if they want to see the truth. The social world creates a prison--but the Scientist (equipped with the pure laws of nature) is the one person who can leave the Cave and come back with "INCONTESTABLE FINDINGS THAT WILL SILENCE THE ENDLESS CHATTER OF THE IGNORANT MOB".

As Latour puts it:

"Although the world of truth differs absolutely, not relatively, from the social world, the Scientist can go back and forth from one world to the other no matter what: the passageway closed the all others is open to him alone. In him and through him, the tyranny of the social world is miraculously interrupted when he leaves, so that he will be able to contemplate the objective world at last; and it is likewise interrupted when he returns, so that like a latter-day Moses he will be able to substitute the legislation of scientific laws, which are not open to question, for the tyranny of ignorance. Without this double interruption, there can be no Science, no epistemology, no paralyzed politics, no Western conception of public life".(page 11)

Questions for discussion:

• What do you think Latour means when he refers to the tyranny of the social world?
• What does Latour mean about the scientist being like a latter-day Moses?
• Latour refers to the narrow door between the Cave and the world of Ideas now being a broad boulevard, in what ways does he mean that this change has occurred????

Latour talks about the reason behind this "double rupture" by the "epistemology police" can only be political or religious.

Question for discussion:

• What would be the relevant examples of the double rupture as it applies to recent scientific advancements?
• How has legislation been impacted by the transforming effects of the Cave? Are there ways in which the Bush administration acted as the Cave?? How???

Latour supposes that there is a Constitution that organizes public life into two houses:

HOUSE 1--OBSCURE ROOM DEPICTED BY PLATO (ignorant people in chains).

HOUSE 2--WORLD MADE OF NONHUMANS, INDIFFERENT TO HUMAN IGNORANCE AND INDIFFERENCE.

Genius of the model---role that a small percentage of VERY powerful people play who can move between the two houses.

Thoughts on Readings 4/22/09

Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus
An ancient Greek tragedy that has been read and reviewed since 415 BC. The plot deals with Prometheus, who is being punished for stealing fire, and for undermining the God of Gods, Zeus.

Aside from the formalities of the story, what is the narrative trying to tell us? What was Aeschylus trying to achieve? This is a tricky question with no clear answers, in my opinion.

The story seems to parallel the classic Western/Christian tale of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, except the fire that Prometheus stole seems to me to be more a metaphor for modern technology. We can use knowledge and technology to advance society, but what are the consequences that we don't even understand? Like many of the other writers (Dewey comes to mind) this seems to be a theme that reoccurs. However, this change seems to be happening in a evolutionary pattern--it almost seems destined by fate.

There seems to be a division among the dueling divinities, all the gods are battling (Zeus versus his brothers). So, against this background of a change of technology, there is this power stuggle.

While reading this I couldn't help but consider who the audience was for this ancient play. How was it received? Was it a religious experience seeing a play? Was it the retelling of an ancient legend? I suspect the latter, but it took on a heightened dimension seeing it unfold in dramatic form. The dramatist had to retell the story, inject it with ideologies, and create a perfect experience.

In researching this play, I saw that there were possibly two "sequel" plays in the trilogy, but that there is controversy of whether these plays actually exist. Which left me thinking, what would happen in Volume 2 and 3?? Does advancement and knowledge defeat raw power?? A constant struggle examined for centuries.......

Thoughts on Readings 4/15/09

The Public Sphere by Jurgen Habermas

Habermas discusses the historical/sociological formation of a new "bourgeois public sphere" that sprang out of the feudal sovereignty of the high middle ages. He says that in the eighteenth century the concepts of public sphere and public opinion arose for the first time. There was a split at this time whereby society appeared in clear contrast in motivations from those of the states. Similar to the distinction between "public vs. private" that was discussed in Dewey, this new construction created the concept of a collectivist public opinion.

As Habermas notes:

"The bourgeois public sphere could be understood as the sphere of private individuals assembled into a public body, which almost immediately laid claim to the officially regulated 'intellectual newspapers' for use against the public authority itself". (p. 352)

He goes further into the role that the development of a free press had on this. He states:

"The press remained an institution of the public itself, effective in the manner of a mediator and intensifier of public discussion, no longer a mere organ for the spreading of news but not yet the medium of a consumer culture". (p. 353)

Habermas stresses that the freedom of the public sphere was crucially linked to its' separation from the dominant hegemonic structure of both the church and the state. This public resource of information and ideas has collapsed in the face of consumerist culture (again, a common theme which shows itself again here).

The media transformed itself from a place where the public obtained its' ideas to a instrument of political power and a medium for advertisements which bolstered society's consumerist drives.

The Virtual Sphere: The Internet as a Public Sphere by Zizi Papacharissi

The second reading this week (written in 2002) ties directly into the first and examines if the Internet can be seen as the tool to create a new "bourgeois public sphere". As Papacharissi states: "Does cyberspace present a separate alternative to, extend, minimize, or ignore the public sphere"?

The answer is complicated and far from definitive. First, Papacharissi states that cyberspace represents more of a "public space" than a "public sphere" and that the distinction in an important one to make. As a public space, the Internet provides the forum for political and social debate--"a virtual space enhances discussion; a virtual sphere enhances democracy". (p. 380)

I felt that this essay raised a number of interesting questions around the topic without answering any of them. Papacharissi brings in the findings of many disparate scholars (Dewey, Fraser, Tcqueville), all of whom seemed to present different ideas when applied to the topic at hand.

However I have to agree with Papcharissi that having vast amounts of information at one's fingertips does NOT create a perfect situation for a public sphere to take shape. As Papcharissi states:

"At the same time, access to the Internet does not guarantee increased political activity or enlightened political discourse. Moving political discussion to a virtual space excludes those with no access to this space. Moreover, connectivity does not ensure a more representative and robust public sphere". (p.382)

Every member of my family uses the Internet to different degrees and in different ways. I use it almost every day for academic research and communication, my father uses it to shop for accessories for his sail boat, my mother only uses it occasionally for email exchange, and my sister hardly uses it at all. Hardly the environment for a robust new public sphere.

Thoughts on Readings 4/8/09

The Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblen

Thorstein Veblen (pictured) was a noted Norwegian-American sociologist and economist who believed that economic structure is informed by a Darwinian "survival of the fittest" mentality. This is to say that he believed that the type of work that you perform is typically directly related to your social status and economic class.

Reading his "Theory of the Leisure Class" made me think almost immediately of the system of "wants" vs. "needs" that was described by Marcuse. In the system outlined by Veblen, we "want" that which will make our social standing greater in the eyes of our colleagues and compatriots. And this "want" expresses itself not only in physical possessions but attaining a level of physical surroundings that impresses upon others our social and economic status.

As Veblen puts it:

"In order to gain and hold the esteem of men it is not merely to possess wealth or power. The wealth or power must be put on evidence, for esteem is awarded only on evidence. And not only does the evidence of wealth serve to impress one's importance on others and to keep their sense of his importance alive and alert, but it is of scarcely less use in building up and preserving one's self-complacency. In all but the lowest stages of culture, the normally constituted man is comforted and upheld in his self-respect by "decent surroundings" and by exemption from "menial offices". (p. 24)

Veblen asserts that the stratification of modern industrial society can be related to the simple social stratification of early tribal cultures. The inter-relationships operate in the same way, it is just that the potential rewards are much shinier. Veblen compares the role of women in barbarian society (their specific categorization as "trophies of war") to the modern view of the perfect "happy housewife" cooking and cleaning to make the domicile of her Wall Street warrior of a husband as pleasant an example of the "decent surroundings" mentioned in the quote above.

Thoughts on Readings 4/1/09

Mythologies by Roland Barthes

In "Mythologies", Roland Barthes examines the creation of modern myths by modern society through the use of a commonly accepted social value system. Barthes lays out the fundamental principles of semiotics by using a series of "mythologies" (presented in individual essays) that cover a wide range of cultural practices, events, and objects that are given meaning by a system of social signs that are widely accepted by all. These "Myths" are conveyed through a form of discourse, that is they are not defined by the object of their message, but by the method in which the message is conveyed. This discourse is not confined to oral speech, as Barthes describes it:

"It can consist of modes of writing or of representations; not only written discourse, but also photography, cinema, reporting, sport, shows, publicity, all these can serve as a support to mythical speech. Myth can be defined neither by its object nor by its material, for any material can be arbitrarily endowed with meaning...". (p. 110)

I think that these concepts are illustrated in the best way in Barthes essay on the phenomenon of wrestling entitled "The World of Wrestling". In it, Barthes distinguishes between judo or boxing (which Barthes categorizes as a sport with rules and systems of fair behavior) and wrestling (which Barthes would describe as falling into the realm of theatre). Barthes explains the emotional "story" of the wrestling match which dictates clearly how the audience should feel. The protagonist is typically fighting a salaud (French term for "Bastard"), and his looks betray his role in the fight. He is unquestionably ugly, and to quote Barthes:

"Not only is ugliness used here to signify baseness, but in addition ugliness is wholly gathered into a particularly repulsive quality of matter....so that the passionate condemnation of the crowd no longer stems from his judgement, but instead from the very depth of its humours". (p. 17)

Barthes seems to think that the role of the semiotician is to recognize these myths and to expose or point out to us the carefully constructed nature of the images to which we attribute meaning. I kept thinking of the cultural differences at play in his writings and also the way in which the evolution of social behavior over time has changed the examples that Barthes uses to illustrate his points.

For example, in the essay on stripping called "Striptease", Barthes contends that the act of removing clothing is the erotic part of the entire process. He states that when the stripper becomes totally naked, the eroticism is immediately removed and we are looking at something non-erotic. Barthes states:

"The end of the striptease is then no longer to drag into the light a hidden depth, but to signify, through the shedding of an incongruous and artificial clothing, nakedness as a natural vesture of woman, which amounts in the end to regaining a perfectly chaste state of the flesh". (p. 85)

I kept thinking about how the "accoutrements" of stripping have changed so much since the late 1950's when Barthes was writing this essay. Back then, the striptease was an art form, with eloaborate costumes designed to transport the men to places of fantasy while they admired the female form. Now, stripping is much more about the naked bodies of the dancers (aside from tiny underwear and/or high heel shoes), not about creating a theatrical fantasy through a dance which slowly exposed the dancer.

I am reminded of the legendary Bettie Page, who passed away a few months back. She was a model who became the undisputed pin-up queen of the 1950's and 1960's, taking thousands of photographs and making many short films in different costumes that were elaborate creations of imaginative fantasy. She possessed an innocence that I think embodies what Barthes is referring to as the myth of eroticism. R.I.P., Bettie Page.

Here is Bettie at her best:

Thoughts on Readings 3/11/09

One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society by Herbert Marcuse

"The most effective and enduring form of warfare against liberation is the implanting of material and intellectual needs that perpetuate obsolete forms of the struggle for existence" (p. 4)

I found this week's reading to be a very interesting and critical deconstruction of a concept that I find fascinating: how the capitalist structure can manipulate through a system of wants and satisfactions that exists below the surface of awareness. In other words, how a free market society can manipulate the psyche of the American consumer so that basic critical human needs (food, water, sleep) are so commonly accepted that they are not even recognized. These "needs" are replaced by a hierarchy of products that are certainly not essential to life but almost accepted as though they are.

As Marcuse puts it:

"The only needs that have an unqualified claim for satisfaction are the vital ones-nourishment, clothing, lodging at the attainable level of culture. The satisfaction of these needs is the prerequisite for the realization of all needs, of the unsublimated as well as the sublimated ones". (p. 5)

The distinction between wants vs. needs is clouded by the trappings of the mass consumerist culture that we live in. And the media is not the culprit according to Marcuse, this indoctrination begins way before the media has an influence over it.

Marcuse sums it up:

"The preconditioning does not start with the mass production of radio and television and with the centralization of their control. The people enter this stage as preconditioned receptacles of long standing; the decisive difference is in the flattening out of the contrast (or conflict) between the given and the possible, between the satisfied and unsatisfied needs." (p. 8)

I have often thought about the ways in which the media can use fear (of some previously unseen threat) to "scare" us into consumerist behavior. When the nightly news tells us of some deadly bacteria the COULD be creeping all over our kitchen counters, we run right out and purchase some anti-bacterial spray to solve this potential danger.

After the attacks of September 11, I was living in NYC and I clearly remember the press conference that Mayor Giuliani made the morning after when he encouraged the people of NYC to get out and SPEND, patronize your local establishments. The underlying message seemed to be, "we all will feel better if we shop and purchase products that should meet our immediate needs, and the local economy will get a boost as well!". I remember thinking that his comment was insensitive in light of the massive loss of life that day, but what was even more upsetting was the lack of backlash in the press. This supports Marcuse's construct that we are living in a "one-dimensional" society, a society in which individuals become integrated into the capitalist structure of production and consumption and oppositional thought patterns and actions of oppositional behavior are eradicated. Consumerism is a form of social power used to control thought patterns.

The media stimulates a culture of fear of not belonging which is already established, and this fear creates consumerist behavior which stimulates the economy and dampens thoughts of a revolutionary nature. As Marcuse states: "the intellectual and emotional refusal "to go along" appears neurotic and impotent" (p. 9).

Interesting to read Marcuse background and to see that one of his most vocal disciples was 1960's Left Radical Abbie Hoffman (who studied under Marcuse at Brandeis). Hoffman was the founder of the Youth International Party (the "YIPPIES"), and was a major figure in the Chicago riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

Marcuse elaborates that the consumerist culture gives way to a better way of life, and this leads to complacency and a lack of critical thought.

To quote Marcuse about what I see as a key idea:

"It is a good way of life-much better than before-and as a good way of life, it militates against qualitative change. Thus emerges a pattern of one-dimensional thought and behavior in which ideas, aspirations, and objectives that by their content, transcend the established universe of discourse and action are either repelled or reduced to terms of this universe. They are redefined by the rationality of the given system and of its quantitative extension". (p. 12)

I am again left thinking about how this reading applies to the present, specifically how the current economic crisis is curbing or halting consumerist behaviors, and whether this time will represent a positive return to core ideas and values. A society where we are not "numbed" by the promise of happiness through shopping, but one in which we are organized around a common set of humanistic goals.