When I read Metz’ From the imaginary signifier, I couldn’t avoid the temptation to consider myself a fetishist in regards to. I have been always fascinating by the magic of these “shadows” in comparison of theatre, literature or painting.

The first element that intrigued me was the psychoanalytic approach from Freud and Lacan, establishing analogies with the mirror stage and the sense of lack that maintains the object of desire from the distance. As one progresses on the reading, Metz’ arguments will make a statement (i.e. cinema is the most perceptual art since it mobilizes a larger number of axes of perception) and then showed that this affirmation is not an absolute as everything happens in absence, so technically speaking it would be the least perceptual. It is precisely its unique form of perception what makes cinema so different.

Another point that it would be interesting to discuss is position of the spectator in the middle of all duplications: the projection of bringing live to objects by make them appear on camera and the introjection at the level of the consciousness (698). So, when we talk about movies are we also projecting them by bringing them up to the conversation and internalizing the content by reflecting on them?

In terms of the process of identification, what I found revealing is the fact that the subject sees himself/herself as all perceiving rather than saying the identification is with the characters on the movie, which would be a secondary or tertiary identification (700). As technology progresses, this process will present new challenges; I’m thinking about the current popularity of 3D when sometimes it does not add anything different to particular films. Is this perception of projecting reality beyond the screen a replacement for what we used to perceive in a regular movie or a reinforcement? How is the consciousness affected for this special effect of fiction within a fiction film? Do we “wake up” every time we see an object coming out of the screen, and then we go back to a lethargic stage when we forget we see a 3D movie? Or, it might be a mere distraction.

This week, I was very interested in Butlers’ excerpt of Performative acts and gender constitution as I relate her critique to feminism to our discussion last class.  When considering gender within the simplistic dichotomy patriarchy/women oppression, one’s assumes the universalism in terms of gender being homogeneous within each category (all men as oppressors and all women as victims). Subsequently, as we noted in class, the use of “we” erases all differences of race, class or gender in this case that might unify in order to achieve some goals at first, but then alienate those who cannot identify with the generic model.

But life is not that simple. Authors such as Butler, Sedgwick or Halberstam just argued how the lines among sex, gender and sexuality easily become blurry when analyzing social constructions, discourses or even characters that once traditional identifies as representative of masculinity (James Bond).

To be honest, I am still confused about these concepts as I still believe we are born with a distinctive set of chromosomes that serves to place us in different categories (regardless how arbitrary this classification is), either female, male or hermaphrodite. Now, as we enter in all social, cultural, political etc. constructions we identify ourselves, perceive our bodies and our bodies/identities are perceived in multiple, infinite ways even within a predominant heterosexual framework. Then I will agree with Butler that sexuality and gender are constructed, “(gender) then can be neither true nor false, neither real nor apparent and yet one is completed to live in a world in which genders constitute univocal signifiers.” (908) However, I am not sure that her proposal to reduce gender to a sustained performative act on a social stage would accomplish to change or acknowledge the influence of rigid parameters such as heterosexual framework and sexual difference. She does mention that we have to “reread the texts of Western philosophy” from the point of view of the marginalized and “establish philosophy as a cultural practice” (910) when in reality we still observe a system of social punishment for those who do act according to the norm or when political correctness avoids conflict and, therefore, open discussion.

I would very appreciate if we can work on the transfers or conceptual common grounds between sex, gender and sexuality, so I can see the gray areas.

The discourse of feminisms (in plural) is definitely an aspect that is many times overlooked when observing the way women have come to terms with their identity and establish their place in a political, private, public and intimate contexts. Questioning structures of power and inequality not always results in the simple elimination of the external force that install such structures, as Rubin says in her introduction (770), because our own perspective is also destabilized, renewed and redefined in the process. The emancipation and awareness is also painful for women who have lived with the belief of achieving happiness as long as the foundation of social relations, unequal or equal, remains intact.

Far from a unified, homogeneous movement, Western feminism reproduced the same structure of negligence to different determinations that affect women inside the movement. Lorde (856) looked into her own case when explaining all the layers that interact in her identity and its implications: African American (or Black to be more precise), lesbian, women and how not even African American literature is included in women’s literature or any literature course in general in her critique to the movement from the inside. Heng reveals in a similar way the dynamics and determinations that the State, society and the market play in the development of particular feminisms in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, usually judged by Western feminists for not following a confrontational, opposed-to-the-state activism or for having ground in the tradition or folklore as archaic ideas, ignoring the need for legitimation in the local context.

The complexity toward adopting and defending feminist ideals in the 3rd world also includes the “theoretical dependence” taboo that undermines any serious attempt to question ancient frames of thought and representation. When I lived in Colombia  in the 1990s and volunteered in an shelter for abused women, the executive board was always afraid of adopting a feminist approach as the organization would be seen as copying a foreign discourse that has no sustainable ground in Colombian society, and the same women in need might refuse to ask for help. Another fear was to be perceived as “too leftist”. Since the organization received funding from the government, they wanted to avoid being identified as a guerrilla-supporter- organization. In that case, we can observe how male oppression is not the only determinant in the emergence, development and survival of a movement that need to recognize all the variables (social stigma, economic and political conditions) at play in specific contexts.

Something interesting that I also observed while was there was the different attitudes and contradictions toward self-proclaimed “feminist”. The first reaction women and men had toward the feminist was that she was miserable, bitter, lesbian and that was raped once at least. Surprisingly, women in Colombia are encouraged to study and work although there is still inequality in a lot of areas (i.e. salary), but it is still expected that they carry out all domestic tasks if there are not female maids around. Usually, when this structure is questioned by a girl, is another woman (the mother) who corrects the deviant behavior. I always thought our emancipation in the public sphere (vote, representation) served to increase our burden as it was not accompanied by education and acceptance in the private/intimate sphere.  Of course, this does mean we have to go back in order to be the “angel of the house” and have an “easier” life, but to be aware about internal mindsets in both women and men about feminism.

Based on what we discussed last week and this week’s readings, I am very interested in the role of consciousness in the way the individual or the subject interacts with and through language and ideology, and if living in the truth of ideology is a conscious decision.

Bakhtin, for example, highlights the importance of the awakening moment when an individual (an illiterate peasant in his extreme example) realizes there are variegated languages that juxtapose, encounter, interact and contradict each other just like in a novel, and he faces the moment of choosing one (678).

Before that, the individual just use various (not variegated) languages automatically. What triggers that moment of consciousness? If we say during the mirror stage when the child determines his identity as a separate entity and recognize the Other, then I don’t think children will have the capacity of realization and Bakhtin is not proposing that either as the peasant might have gone through that stage and not necessarily choose a specific orientation at such an early age.

It seems to me that we have the faculty to choose at some point, according to Bakhtin, between the Authoritative discourse and the Internally persuasive discourse, this latter enabling multiplicity of the semantic structure, an open window where languages can have a dialogue.

In contrast, Althusser’s perspective is more deterministic and blunt: ideology is false consciousness and consciousness is seen as the means by which ideology will preserve the order or, in his words “the imaginary relationship to their real conditions of existence” (693). If man is by nature a subject (“individuals are always-already subjects” p. 700). Then one cannot even talk about an “awakening moment” or the mirror recognition (although he suggests that this is what is really in question) since ideology will interpellate us since always and our ‘free’ subjection will always be mediated by an illusion.

As a side note, the way Althusser wrote the text with self-reflecting quotes such as “To speak in a Marxist language…” (694) or “And I shall be expected to use a more directly Marxist vocabulary” (697) or the justification of quoting Aristotle by saying Marx had a very high regard for him (695) were very comical, and make me wonder about his intention. As he insisted that one might be able to observe the distortion ideology displays in front of us if we don’t live in its truth, should these quotes be interpreted as a claim of distance from Marx while still using a Marxist framework for his analysis?

Back to the topic of consciousness and ideology, Zizek replies to Althusser arguing that ideology is not simply a false consciousness but it’s this reality which is “already to be conceived as ideological” (716). This implies blindness or a cynical attitude in which subjects are conscious of the ideological discourse and the distorted reality offered to them but still live in its truth because they find reasons to retain the mask (718). The solution to break the cycle would be rather than unmasking, to confront the Real of our desire (723), but how? He doesn’t say and perhaps there is no way to do it as reality is always mediated by the language and other structures as Lacan said.