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Friday, May 19, 2006
The Onion on Literary Studies
Like those yearly articles that make fun of MLA conference presentation titles, but actually funny: Heroic Computer Dies To Save World From Master’s Thesis
A courageous young notebook computer committed a fatal, self-inflicted execution error late Sunday night, selflessly giving its own life so that professors, academic advisors, classmates, and even future generations of college students would never have to read Jill Samoskevich’s 227-page master’s thesis, sources close to the Brandeis University English graduate student reported Monday.
“This fearless little machine saved me from unspoken hours of exasperated head-scratching and eyestrain, as well as years of agonizing self-doubt over my decision to devote my life to teaching,” said professor John Rebson, who had already read through three drafts of Samoskevich’s sprawling, 38,000-word dissertation, titled A Hermeneutical Exploration Of Onomatopoeia In The Works Of William Carlos Williams As It May Or May Not Relate To Post-Agrarian Appalachia. “It was an incredible act of bravery. This laptop sacrificed itself in order to put an end to Jill’s senseless rambling."
It only gets better.
Comments
Isn’t it kind of mean-spirited, though?
So you’re saying you think it might be an Onion piece, Jonathan?
But still. Alcoholism and depression? That’s the outrage of Caliban seeing himself in a mirror.
Well, then. I guess if you like seeing Caliban in the mirror, the Onion comes out - like - once a week, isn’t it?
Not talking about myself or those like me--but rather the famously hard-drinkin’ Onion staff. I will not add a modifying phrase insisting upon the clarity of the original statement.
Maybe we should change it to the dislike of Romanticism, then.
Does the Onion staff drink hard? I had not known that. I am sorry. At some point, between the mean spirits and the other sort of spirits, I lost track.
That’s what is said. Then there’s the whole Wisconsin thing. They seem to have a different attitude towards beer in the Midwest.
I actually thought the thesis sounded enticing, and I was curious about her deployment of Gadamer.
The Onion corporate offices are now in New York and they have offices in six other states. Hopefully there is much less drinking going on at these other offices. Though, some are in the Midwest.
In my younger days, I was a test subject for the Onion’s mixology column (now defunct). Occasionally I wonder how I survived.
But you know. We’re all older now. Although we did drink the Czech beer hall in Astoria dry for Joe’s wedding.
I’m launching an investigation into the disappearance of your senses of humor. This might take a while…
I am not really concerned about the levels of drinking at the Onion staff. I was trying to be sarcastic and I was defending both The Onion and flyover country. I’ve read and enjoyed The Onion for years. In fact, if alcohol is the secret to their success- they should keep it up.
Beg pardon- I am not alluding to the Onion drinking issue- bottoms up as far as I’m concerned- but am I right in discerning a slight rankling of feathers by the Good Sir Jonathan and Sir John over the piece itself? Seems like the article hits the nail on the head when it comes to esoterically motivated literary thesis.
So, Greg, you think that the author should have more fully critiqued Cruiksanter’s critique of Williams’ eugenicist textuality?
Well, ahem, I think your question kinda proves my point doesn’t it? It reminds me somewhat of Richard Feynman’s quip to Murray Gell-Mann. Gell-man was known to place incredible emphasis on the proper pronunciation of words and names, often resorting to traditional, obscure pronunciations to the point that one had to valiantly decipher what he was trying to say. After one such odd turn of phrase at a physics symposiam, Feynman, in his thick Long Island accent, exclaimed, “I thought the point of language was to communicate!”
The author of the William Carlos Williams piece is purported not to have even understood the work itself, putting her one step below Gell-Mann, who at least was overclarifying as opposed to “Samoskevich“‘s muddled text (or, in the words of the Onion piece, “overindulgent, impenetrable drivel"). The Onion was clearly satirizing unclear theses, and full props go to them. My English professor couldn’t have said it better: “Just state your idea. State it clearly. I’m 76 years old and I don’t have time to read crap anymore.”
Feynmann’s quip--and his physics--was insufficently historicized. What is laughably called “chromodynamics” is, of course, always already chromologodynamics.
Jonathan,
I’ve been scratching my head and I think you are kidding with us. Or at least with people, like me, that are not are not well versed in Quantum Mechanics. What is chromologodynamics? I assume that you injected logos into chromodynamics there to allude to logocentrism or something. I’m not sure.
I agree with Greg. The Onion piece is relevant because it satirizes those who are willfully obscure. I find it funny that popular books about physics are written in clear concise language attempting to make difficult concepts of the world of the very small and very large somewhat understandable while much of literary theory is an attempt to make concepts that pertain to common human experience impenetrable.
Christopher, what a great contrast! I doubt you would ever find a book on literary theory called Six Easy Pieces.
Jonathan, I am scratching my head as well. True, Feynman’s quip was anecdotal, but do we need a seal from the Office of Historical Record to understand it?
William Empson wrote one, I believe.
And theory-vs-Theory confusion is summoned from the deeps once again. “Seven Types of Ambiguity” is not literary theory in the contemporary sense.
Perhaps I was referring to the unpublished ms. “Six Topoi of Similitude,” due out any moment from the Mandarinate Press.
Actually, I think one should say that it IS literary theory but isn’t Theory.
Yep, but when Greg and Christopher complain about the style parodied in the Onion article, they’re talking about the Theory style. Jonathan, by pretending to misunderstand, is simply being Jonathan.
Not knowing Jonathan, I cannot assess how serious he is about this topic (and why should he be? It’s the friggin’ ONION for crying out loud Let’s talk about Colbert at the Washington Press dinner. Now THAT’S satire with a slice of apple pie, boy howdy...), but initially he labeled the piece “kind of mean-spirited.” I don’t think the article was warm gooshy fuzzy because it was pointing out a relevant tendency in Theory/theory to be obscure for the sake of being obscure, a trap many grad students fall into, if I’m not mistaken.
From what I can tell, the thesis described in the article does not use Theory at all. It’s a straight-up literary study, trying to decode the historical references in a text. One could almost call it “naive.”