ሪሴስታንስግ

I sometimes wonder who reads my blog. I can read the stats about how many page views I get and what country they're from and that tells me some things, but it would be interesting to know more. On the other hand, it's good not knowing, because it frees me from any compulsion I might have to write what I think my audience wants to read. I have no idea who my audience is. I know that I always get the vast majority of page views from the United States. For my old blog, Germany came in second for page views, and I think Australia was third.

My new blog hasn't been going that long, so I think new trends might emerge over time, but so far it's been interesting to see that I'm getting quite a lot of page views from central and eastern European countries - like, Czechia, Romania, Slovakia, Ukraine. And Germany is still fairly high on the list. Besides that, I seem to get some page views from all over the world. 

But yes, I wonder how people access my blog. Like, I have some posts that do really well - get a lot of page views - and some that don't. Some posts (not many) continue to get page-views over time - like, a year or two after I post it, it's still getting around 20 page views a month or something like that. I wonder how that works. Like, where is it that people are accessing it from? 

Sometimes I spend a lot of time and....it's not work or effort, but let's say, investment...I invest a lot in a post, and it doesn't get many views. Other times I'll write something really quickly and it's kind of unstructured and stream-of-consciousness, and that post will get a lot of views. 

I think, in general, because this blog is new, I don't get the amount of page views that I had started to get after my old blog had been going for a few years. It's a bit dis-heartening sometimes. With my old blog, I was used to, as soon as I posted and shared on facebook, twitter and pinterest, I would get around 12 to 20 views straight away and then, I would keep looking back at the stats page and refreshing and the amount of page views would keep climbing or go down but then up again and sometimes, over the course of the next couple of days, there would be periodic spikes. The same thing still happens with my new blog, just on a smaller scale. 

I'm pretty sure that most of my page views come from twitter, because I don't have that many friends on facebook, or followers on pinterest, but I have a lot more followers on twitter. But yes, as to which of them are reading my blog and why, and how many return readers I have, I have no idea. Sometimes I have wished that my blog was more interactive - that people would make comments or that my posts would stimulate some kind of discussion. I do get some 'likes', which I always appreciate, and some people I know in 'real' life have given me some feedback - usually positive but, at times, I have used my blog to have a bit of an indirect dig at some people - a veiled attack - and sometimes the other person has let me know that they did in fact feel attacked. And sometimes I have received positive feedback on social media.  

It's probably a good thing that I don't know my audience and what brings them to my blog and what they want. It means that I write what I want. It's a weird thing, in a way - writing, but you don't know who it's for. I've always found that different types of writing take time to get used to. Over time, a kind of formula evolves, but it's a complex one, otherwise what you write would be formulaic, but this formula is a kind of structure within which you can create something fresh and new. 

something about modernism

2 things I've discovered recently:

• some people really hate post-modernism 
• when those people (and probably others) talk about modernity and modernism, they're not talking about the modernism that emerged in the early 20th century and led in to post-modernism; they're talking about the enlightenment, the scientific revolution and thinkers like Bacon, Locke and Descartes.  

That second point is really new to me, and interestingly, that's probably because I learnt about modernism in a modern university, which, like all modern universities, so the argument goes, is in thrall to post-modernism and wants to frame post-modernism as a movement of progress (from the modernism of the early 20th century), not the rejection of reason and all the positive developments that flowed from the enlightenment, as the critics of post-modernism suggest. It blew my mind when someone (an academic) I was listening to on youtube said that modernism has been around for centuries....that's news to me. 

What really interests me is the allliance that opposing post-modernism has formed between Christianity and parts of academia. It's really striking. There are whole books and long talks on youtube representing the Christian critique of post-modernism, and others representing an academic critique of post-modernism, and their arguments are similar in many ways. Why it's interesting is that the enlightenment was in many ways an anti-religious movement. It was very humanistic.

What forged this alliance is the common perceived enemy of left wing ideology, cultural Marxism, critical theory, social justice, etc. But, leaving aside the historical issue, and just considering current issues, it makes sense that both Christians and some academics would be vehemently opposed to post-modernism. 

The academics' opposition to these ideologies is based on a perception that they represent what some call 'grievance studies' where the validity of ideas and arguments is judged not by the quality of the reasoning they represent (so the argument goes) but by compliance with an ideology which favours certain groups percieved to have been traditionally disadvantaged and seeks to undermine groups that have been traditionally advantaged. 

I think the main Christian opposition to post-modernism is related to moral relativism and the conclusions it leads to. But again, this is why it's so interesting that this alliance between Christianity and some parts of academia has been formed, because it was this impulse that we see in post-modernism now, to reject traditional moral imperitives, that was also a major theme in the enlightenment. 

To be really blunt, the enlightenment thinkers and the modern academics who oppose post-modernism, want to exalt reason. The enlightenment thinkers wanted to turn away from traditional thinking, which was dominated by Christian ideology, and figure things out using reason. The modern academics' opposition to critical theory is that it represents flawed scholarship - flawed because it is subjugated to ideology rather than reason. Christians' opposition to critical theory is more concerned with the ideology itself because (not all but many) Christians believe that social changes associated with critical theory are contrary to God's will. But, even though I'm saying that the humanist academics and Christians are allies in this contest, there are real differences nevertheless, which become clear when the humanist academics go into the details of their arguments. There are thinkers like Kant and Kierkegaard who were religious, and contributed to the development of modern Christian theology but apparently were part of the counter-enlightenment. Nietsche was famously anti-God but had a major impact on the development of philosophy. 

For me personally, these revelations are quite exciting. I love the idea that modernism begins with Locke, Descartes, Bacon and the scientific revolution.....there's much to explore in that. And then the idea that Kant, Rousseau and Kierkegaard represented an opposing impulse is also very interesting. More recently, the work of Ayn Rand embodies and illuminates the distinction between the academic opposition to post-modernism and the Christian opposition to it because she advocated reason as the only way of attaining knowledge and rejected faith and religion completely. 

There's a very interesting, very much live, current debate about post-modernism and related issues. Also, this gives me an interesting context within which to place works of literary criticism. So....lots of reading and writing to come. 

Late addition: I wrote above that Kant was part of the counter-enlightenment (after hearing that argument made by an anti-post-modernism academic), but just now, I was listening to a youtube talk that directly disputes that....and I'm kind of happy about that. Kant is so central to western philosophy, literature and humanities, so I like the idea that he made a positive contribution to the enlightenment. 

The video I'm listening to now (which is pro-post-modernism) absolutely shreds the one I was listening to earlier when writing the above (which was critical of post-modernism)....it's hilarious. The thing is though....it's the one that I don't agree with (the former) that inspired me to want to read, write, think and interrogate my views - provoked me to want to research and think for myself and form my own views. 

creative work

today is Sunday and it's exactly 2 weeks since I wrote a post saying that I was having an unproductive day, and went on to write about David Foster Wallace. Last Sunday I couldn't write that, because there was some work I had to do, but this week, having just finished my latest work project last Friday, I'm having a couple of days off, so I can have an unproductive day.....but maybe 'unproductive' is the wrong word.

unproductive is a negative word ||| is spending time partaking of freedom of action and expression and the kind of disinterested (which doesn't mean uninteresting) pursuit of knowledge that is only possible when one is free to browse and sample - is that unproductive? Some of the best - and most valuable, in terms of monetary value and otherwise - work, is produced from that position. 

we call them 'works' of art or literature or music, but i wonder whether that's the right word. in any case, it's understood that this use of the word 'work' is different from its use related to what most of us do to make money. 

and there's no accountability for this kind of work. no one is going to keep tabs on your creative productivity or assess you against KPIs. nobody can really be your boss or your supervisor with this kind of work, because creative work is your own personal work. no one else is an expert in it. no one else knows what you're supposed to do. 

what we consume when we're not working, is other peoples' work - artists and sports-people of all kinds. that disjunction between what the artist is doing - their work - and how we perceive it - our enjoyment - is matched by a disjunction on their part, actually. that's the strange thing about creativity....the output corresponds to something within and resonates with it, but it's not a straightforward correspondence. The best example I can think of to explain this in terms of my own experience, is playing guitar. Writing is not the best example because, with writing, it's easy to imagination a direct correspondence between the output and what lies within...like, I'm expressing in my writing the issues and ideas that are on my mind. 

but with playing guitar, I found that, after I had learnt and practiced a lot, I got to a point where I could just play extempore, and improvise. And it felt really good to do that. What I was playing corresponded with something within me. 

introducing language adds another dimension, because then I think there's more of a correspondence between the artist and the reader/viewer/listener. There will be differences of course. If I write a song, that song won't mean exactly the same thing to a listener as it does to me, but I have more control over the meaning that they make from it than if it was just an instrumental piece. It would be interesting if we could somehow study this - if we could look at the work of, say, Beethoven, and see if there is a correspondence between his inner state in composing his music and the inner state evoked in the listener. 

context

I really enjoyed reading Barthes: A Biography (English tranlsation by Andrew Brown 2017, original in French by Tiphaine Samoyault, 2015) and I didn't really know why. But just now, referring back to it and thinking about it, I think it's because Samoyault entwines Barthes's ideas with his life and relates those ideas and that life to other thinkers, like Foucault and Kristeva. 

so there's a very nice fusion of the intellectual life and the lived experience, and it establishes a kind of relationship between you, the reader, and the subject - Roland Barthes. It's interesting to think about this in relation to Barthes's idea of 'the death of the author'. On the one hand, Samoyault doesn't intrude on the text. Her concern is to tell us about Barthes. But, on the other hand, it is her unique capabilities and sensibilities that enable her to do this so well. So, by forgoing the role of the intermediary, she acts as a very effective intermediary. 

and I think that gives us some insight into the true meaning of Roland Barthes's famous idea of  'the death of the author'....actually, when I use the word 'true', I'm probably just talking about a meaning that I feel comfortable with and that I like - a meaning that I find interesting and thought provoking. It's not about saying that a text is not the expression of the author or that texts are composed by historical and social forces (although some people pretty much do end up expressing these kinds of views). It's about the role of the reader in constructing meaning and the way that the actual life of the author has very little bearing on that process. Like, for example, a lot of people enjoy the 'Game of Thrones' books and TV series, but they aren't that interested in George R. R. Martin, and most importantly, nobody needs to ask Martin what the real or true meaning of the texts is. Enjoying the books and the TV show may lead people to take an interest in George R. R. Martin, and it's always interesting to hear a writer's view about their own work, but they are different matters. When you're watching Game of Thrones, you don't even think about George R. R. Martin - you're thinking about the characters and the story. 

This separation of the text from the author is a good example, actually, of how birth is a also a kind of death. As soon as you express something, it becomes a thing in its own right, and the fact that it is separate, even from you, the one who expressed it, is born out by the way that you engage with it. We write to get a sense of what we think. Somehow we don't know, and we are as surprised as anyone at what comes out. That's what makes conversation so interesting.

social media

i remember the first time i looked at tumblr....i didn't get it. the main distniguishing factor back then (in 2014) was that it had a lot of movement, while facebook and twitter didn't have that. now all the platforms have it. it's normal for pictures to move. 

the other thing was that I didn't get the style of it. i thought it would be informative and serious. i followed tumblrs about teaching and they had these moving images with captions that had nothing to do with teaching...they were a kind of satire. it seemed really busy. in each post, there were multiple frames and in each frame the action would advance a little bit more....it seemed frenetic and it was disorienting. 

but it was like that with all the different websites....i didn't understand twitter, facebook, pinterest, linked in, when I first started using them. probably the one that took me the longest to get was reddit because it seemed to have very definite rules and you needed to know the rules to play. 

east and west

the volleyball hit the end of i think it was my thumb and it took weeks to heal....i remember the guy whose specialty was standing behind the baseline and when the ball was just about to land - just inside the line - he would dive and punch the ball into the air and over the net

i remember moving from an apartment complex to a flat with a bay window and an ocean view and wood floors...the apartment complex was new and clean, but the flat was one of the nicest places i've lived and there was a bookshop there all my life i've been near the beach or outwest....moving further and further outwest until visting places that were closer to the city was like going back in time and then, when I moved east, visiting places in the west was like going back in time

what to write

I have 4 youtube subscribers now. That's a 400% increase since last year! woo hoo! 

I sometimes toy with the idea of doing a vlog. At the moment, I'm more keen to wrte a book though. I hear a question from the crowd.....hey - what kind of book? Originally (by which I mean a couple of days ago) I was planning to write something kind of academic....like a published thesis....but that's problematic. Not only is it a lot of work, which would probably take years, even though I do have a draft already, but the bigger problem is to do with copyright. When you write and sell a book, you can't just quote from texts the way you do when you're writing an essay or thesis as a student. You have to get permission to quote from someone else's work. 

So, I'm just not down for that any more. I do love writing essays though, so I was thinking that I could write a series of 'personal' essays. I can still quote from texts because most of the literary texts that I like the most are old and in the public domain...you can access them on websites like project gutenberg and archive.org. I just won't be engaging with 'cutting edge' scholarship, but I'm not that keen to do that anyway. Or if I do, I can just write about their ideas without quoting from their work. I'll be giving my take on their ideas. 

I like the idea of writing creatively but not having to write a story, and I like the idea of writing essays without being restricted to the rules of writing academic essays.