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"Sextext" Essay Letter to Reviewers

As many of you know, I have been working on an essay about "Sextext" for some time now. I will post my most recent draft as I complete it, but you can view previous versions here. I am about to submit it for a 4th time to Text & Performance Quarterly (twice to a special issue, then restarted as a regular issue submission.) The following is a draft of my letter to the reviewers. I would appreciate any suggestions to hone my argument for publishing the essay. Thanks!

Letter to Reviewers

At the beginning of A Room of One’s Own Virginia Woolf writes,

The title women and fiction might mean, and you may have meant it to mean, women and what they are like, or it might mean women and the fiction that they write; or it might mean women and the fiction that is written about them, or it might mean that somehow all three are inextricably mixed together and you want me to consider them in that light. But when I began to consider the subject in this last way, which seemed the most interesting, I soon saw that it had one fatal drawback. I should never be able to come to a conclusion.

I feel a similar problematic in his essay. While no person “asked” me to write this essay, I have been called by “Sextext” itself. That text very literally speaks to me in ways I cannot fully comprehend and of which this essay is an attempt to address. In considering the many ways I might have begun, I could have written about (1) the authors and what their intentions were, or about (2) how the style of “Sextext’s” prose serves a theoretical purpose, or about (3) reactions to “Sextext” and its disciplinary transgression. But as this essay has gestated in me, and as I have entered and reentered this essay, I have come to find that these purposes are indeed “inextricably mixed together.” Further, like Woolf, I must acknowledge that there is in essence no way to write conclusively of their answers.

First of all, in questioning the authors’ intentions, I believe strongly that they are neither fully knowable or that they are ultimately determinate of the essay’s form and impact. Yet in approaching the second question, intention is one available way to better understand the style of “Sextext” itself and what theoretical work it attempts to do. Yet, third, the reactions to “Sextext” are not only insightful in themselves, but as I explore in the essay, they seem inextricably linked to both the authors’ intentions and the nature of the text’s style itself. These plural purposes are necessary entangled—and I mean that in the fullest sense of quantum entanglement whereby “the objects that make up the system are linked in a way such that one cannot adequately describe the quantum state of a constituent of the system without full mention of its counterparts, even if the individual objects are spatially separated.”[1] Perhaps I could have been a physicist, but as I have been trained in the methods of the humanities, the only way for me to begin answering the call of “Sextext” was to write.

Certainly writing about writing is an ontologically limited act since the constraints of the first writing are complicit in the commentary’s as well. And yet something about “Sextext” seems to speak-without-words. I very literally feel it as I read. My body reacts and participates in the narrative, its gaze, and its desire. Through that I have come to realize that the excesses of the text are far more æffective[2] than the writing itself, and that occupying those excesses is the domain of the performative.

Yet while performance has many abilities beyond the text, it is often stricken with a lack (or loss) of clarity. Now surly part of its very essence is to question the normative value of “clarity” itself, but simply negating it outright is no more productive than negating performance. In a sense, those crude options are the province of “simple” transgression of which my essay argues is deeply limited in its ability to affect change. So living on the border between clarity and performance has been a struggle throughout the life of this essay. In a sense, it is one of the many ways it attempts to perform the practice of edging it describes.

In the present revision I have finally decided to add a descriptive preface. I believe more than the previous introduction, setting it apart from the performative prose serves both purposes of the essay. It gives clearer context, sets a limited goal, and lays out the theoretical landscape that will be explored. Also, where the more direct theoretical and methodological connections to many Text & Performance Quarterly essays had often seemed cumbersome in the performative text itself, I believe I now have found a way to work them in through a new interlude (the Anti-Entremés). I believe these two additions, more than anything else in this revision, helped make the essay more impactful both in the clarity of its performance and its relevance to the journal and discipline. I thank the reviewers for their strong urging to include that.

Next I would like to address a few concerns about the performative elements of this essay. First, the title now excludes explicit mention of edging and intellectual masturbation in favor of simply “On the Pleasure of the (Sex)Text”. This, I believe, goes a long way in setting the tone for the essay. That is, in line with some of the reviewers’ comments, I have attempted to play down elements of “shock” value where the “shock was the limit of their purpose. In particular, this title maintains the textual playfulness (evoking Barthes’ The Pleasure of the Text) while more clearly and properly identifying “Sextext” as the object of this essay.

That is not to say that moments of shocking prose are never useful. In particular, the use of the Porter throughout is indeed meant to illicit certain physical and psychological responses from the reader. I cannot think of a way to properly perform “Sextext” without such movements. Similarly, one reviewer mentioned that lacking a more concrete description, the edging metaphor seems only there for shock value. In several places I have further clarified (and concretized) my description of edging. For instance, in the prologue’s footnote I added “Importantly, this practice is not opposed to orgasm, but neither is that its purpose. Rather edging is designed to prolong the moment of pleasure and to experience jouissance not as a climax but as a plateau. For, indeed, where the ‘edge’ of a specific orgasm is is never a stable boundary .” This essay is not a study of edging as a sexual-social practice. I have attempted to come a bit closer[3] to it, but a sufficient exploration of that is beyond the scope and purpose of this essay.

I hope this letter has provided a better sense of the history of this essay, since I realize now that its experiential “evolution” (I can’t think of an equivalent word without the normative connotation of “progress”) has directly shaped its content. Indeed this essay has performed the sense of edging that it discusses. At present it has been submitted three previous times. Each time it was neither accepted nor “rejected”. The state of revise-and-resubmit has thus far been stretched out over a year. It is while operating within this state of uncertainty that the present iteration of this essay unfolds.[4] I do not say that in order to illicit the feeling that the “effort” somehow makes it more deserving of publication, simply that I genuinely believe the metaphor of edging has broad heuristic value, and that this essay really has performed that through its long process of creation.

In closing these comments, I have been compelled to give The Porter a chance to speak, so I will leave you in his capable hands:

THE PORTER

If you accept this essay for publication you will be committing murder. It will die, and I along with it. The imminent plane of edging is a pleasurable site to occupy. But even I grow weary of its limits. I think it is time to leave this world so that I might return somewhere new. Of course, I have been drinking a lot of Cixous lately, perhaps I have let too much of her in. She is such an irrational bitch sometimes. I think I’ll cruise Barthes again, since he got away last time. He writes,

With the writer of bliss (and his reader) begins the untenable text, the impossible text. This text is outside pleasure, outside criticism, unless it is reached through another text of bliss: you cannot speak “on” such a text, you can only speak “in” it, in its fashion, enter into a desperate plagiarism, hysterically affirm the void of bliss (and no longer obsessively repeat the letter of pleasure).[5]

I am no longer sure if that is the sanction of this essay or its death. Perhaps neither. Either way, it is time for me to say goodbye. I have enjoyed our little encounter, such as it is.

---

[1] Forgive me, but Wikipedia phrased it in the most clear and concise way. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

[2] This is what I believe it looks like when affect and effect make love.

[3] I really do enjoy double entendre :o)

[4] Blair, Brown, and Baxter decry that “works published in most of our academic journals display as little as possible the circumstances and activities of their production.” (“Disciplining the Feminine” Quarterly Journal of Speech 80, 1994, p. 383)

[5] The Pleasure of the Text, p 22.

Why I am GLAAD for "Ticked-Off Trannies with Knives"

I've been following the controversy over the film Ticked-Off Trannies with Knives and I strongly believe that GLAAD's vehement stance against the film is extremely misguided.

The film, as described on its website and youtube trailer, follows a group of trans-women who are victims of brutal attacks based on their sexual orientation. The narrative continues to follow them as they seek revenge against their attackers and return the brutality to them.

In its call to action, GLAAD compares this film to Boys Don't Cry and concludes that the violence against trans peopple is justified in the former, but not in Trannies. This is simply an arbitrary privileging of traditional drama over the satirical, over the top, and campy approach to film. This distinction goes against some of the most central cultural affinities of the LGBT community!

GLAAD also claims this film misrepresents the lives of transgender women. First of all, who is GLAAD to make that claim? Based on a lot of the internet buzz, many trans people seem very excited about this film. One commenter on Trannies' facebook page writes:

So what you're saying is, any movies made about trans-women should be sweet and nice and depict only positive images? The concept of artistry is not to appease everyone.. I'm a black transwoman, and there are tons of award winning flicks that depict blacks in unflattering light and bring certain perceptions about the race.. I was offended but these movies were successful because not all blacks were offended.. The same with this movie.. 

Maybe this film does play into some stereotypes.. From what i understand it was meant to be humorous.. I know some of the actresses of the film personally and they are pageant winning showgirls who live life as a transwoman in the same world as the rest of us and experience the same trials.. If they read the script and still saw fit to be a part of it, that should be some indication that the whole of the trans-community does not share the same views.. And the film shouldnt be punished because of opposing views.. It should be apprerciated for what it is, one man's vision.. If you dont agree with the vision, don't watch

Besides the fact that the film is explicitly being marketed as a "revenge fantasy" and not a realistic depiction of the tragedy of being transgender. So GLAAD only wants films that show trans agency as ending in gay-bashing? Why is it unrealistic to give voice to the inner revenge fantasies that many in the LGBT people justifiably harbor?

This whole incident serves to further my recent belief that GLAAD is stuck in a past political milieu that is no longer relevent. They write:

Transgender people are a marginalized and vulnerable minority in our culture, subjected to horrific hate crimes and pervasive discrimination. Relatively few media images of transgender people exist, so every media image becomes essential in educating audiences about transgender lives and working to eliminate the discrimination and violence they face.

But do we accept this claim? Certainly there was a time (largely in the 1950s and 60s) when a legitimate central purpose of the LGBT movement was in correcting the prevailing negative stereotypes attatched to LGBT people in public discourse. And while such depictions certainly still exist and should be criticized, this film is not in that same category. If GLAAD can't recognize the difference between overt, illegitimate claims about LGBT people as deviant psychologically sick perverts and a film that self-consciously deploys a campy revenge fantasy that clearly resonates with many people, then GLAAD is no longer serving a useful purpose.

Let me call this what it is: censorship. GLAAD's response to this film is explicitly an attempt to censor its content. This tells me two things:

1. GLAAD is misguided in trying to censor a specific segment of LGBT people.

2. GLAAD isn't very good at what it does. Their call to action has served little more than to greatly multiply the circulation of information about this film, and by marking it "dangerous" lends a subversive appeal to it. In other words, a so-called media watchdog seems to misunderstand some basic principles of how modern multimedia function.

In my mind, GLAAD is coopting artistic criticism for political activism. I would hardly expect GLAAD to actively support this film. But for them to take this step to advocate against it is simply going too far beyond their role in this movement.

“Shutter Island” Critical Review (SPOILERS)

Shutter Island has been grossly misunderstood and oversimplified by even top critics, so I feel obliged to offer my interpretation of it. As is necessary for such an endeavor, major plot spoilers are below, so don’t read ahead if you haven’t seen the movie yet.

 

*****SPOILERS*****

 

The typical understanding of the plot of Shutter Island is that Teddy starts off as a US Marshal investigating a crime at a mental hospital/penitentiary where the man who killed his wife is housed, then we slowly come to realize by the end that he is in fact a patient of the hospital. In the final scenes it is revealed that the entire story thus far had been an elaborate role-playing ploy designed to make Teddy realize on his own that in fact he had killed his wife and to accept that as true. It is this interpretation of the film that has led to tepid reviews across the board.

What I want to argue, however, is that such a view of the film is overly simplistic, mistakes the outcome with the process by which it was revealed, and as a result misses out on much larger moral implications. In particular, I believe that the film never gives the audience definitive proof either way regarding Teddy’s sanity, and the fact that most people simply follow the lead of the characters and conclude that he is insane is a misstep.

The only review I found that comes close to doing the film justice is Betsy Sharkey’s from the LA Times. In sum, I don’t believe this film is interesting as simply a big-twist-at-the-end movie, that has been done. A lot. But this is something more. Rather, it is interesting precisely for the fact that in 2 hours it can convince you one way or the other about Teddy’s story. That sanity is so malleable that we can be persuaded one way or another without any definitive proof is itself the point of this film. The only evidence we end up with, ultimately, is the Teddy’s memory of the events at the end which conforms to the doctor’s version of the story. But how do we know which version is true? We only do if we accept the doctor’s narrative. And as the runaway psychologist said in the cave scene, the system is genius, for any protests against it are seen as evidence of its truth!

Many reviewers claim at the end that “the twist feels both expected and convoluted.” (USA Today), but that’s exactly the point.  Additionally, the common accusation of Scorsese’s use of cliché cinematics and plot points is also exactly the point. It’s the mundane and unremarkable things that affect our perception most centrally.

The New Yorker review states: “Yet for all the tension of Teddy’s plight, and despite our suspicions that he may not be the sanest soul around (“Pull yourself together,” he says into a mirror in the opening shot), nothing really seems to be at stake here.” But what I’m saying is that that’s not correct. It is the audience’s very sanity on the line. For once we realize that we have been led to believe a man is insane simply because of repeatedly being told he is, what ground does that leave for our own sanity?!

The NY Times review at least addresses something like my interpretation at the end:

“There are, of course, those who will resist this conclusion [that Teddy’s insane], in part out of loyalty to Mr. Scorsese, a director to whom otherwise hard-headed critics are inclined to extend the benefit of the doubt. But in this case the equivocation, the uncertainty, seems to come from the filmmaker himself, who seems to have been unable to locate what it is in this movie he cares about, beyond any particular, local formal concern. He has, in the past, used characters whose grasp of reality was shaky — or who stubbornly lived in realities of their own making — as vehicles for psychological exploration and even social criticism. But both Teddy’s mind and the world of Shutter Island are closed, airless systems, illuminated with flashes of virtuosity but with no particular heat, conviction or purpose.”

But again, they are simply so sure of their interpretation that Teddy is in fact insane that they entirely miss that it is never definitively established! Further, I’m not saying that it is precisely the uncertainty of his sanity that is the issue. Rather it is the ability of the narrative to strongly shift our perception of Teddy. In fact it is precisely the fact that the film ends with a very strong indication that he is insane (an interpretation that seems nearly universally accepted) that they miss that it is the very process of sanity that is what is shown, not an outcome.

Understanding the film as I have laid out also lets us discover deeper moral messages from the film, in particular regarding the moral memory of WWII. The reality shift in Teddy’s character also implicates his memory from the war. The narrative of his daughter asking why didn’t you save me served as a stand-in for the Holocaust victims throughout the film. But as I’m suggesting, we shouldn’t look at it as a simply analogy. Rather, I believe it is asking us to question our understanding of the truth of the history books. Do we really believe we went to war to save the Jews? Or was it because of our own inherently violence nature? As the island’s security chief says to Teddy at one point something to the extent of: “It always comes down to can my violence beat your violence.” The doctor’s suggest that Teddy may never have murdered the Nazi guards and it is in fact a constructed memory to displace his guilt over killing his wife. But if we resist the doctors’ conclusion, then what does that leave us for understanding his WWII memory? I think it’s the uncertainty here that implicates moral guilt as a source of social memory, and asks us to more fully attend to the malleability of both.

I also came across a Psychology Today blog post about the realisticness of the movie’s depiction of psychology and mental health. The post descries the film’s final scene revelation of Teddy’s insanity as unlikely. The

“Final Scene: Are we really to believe that the likable and accomplished Teddy (no prior history of mental illness on top of a clear pattern of resiliency), goes crazy from a familial trauma, then repeatedly breaks through his delusional mindset during treatment, only to revert back to crazy mode like a music CD stuck on repeat? Although individual differences and the delicate, volatile blend of genes, environment and personality can make the prognosis of persistent illness an erratic, sometimes chronic endeavor, the stuck-on-repeat ending does not make sense”

They’re right that it doesn’t make sense. But what they don’t go on to postulate, is that perhaps that’s because it was a fiction constructed by the doctors! It’s not out of the realm of possibility that the film isn’t depicting a false understanding of insanity, but rather that it questions the very process by which it is established!

That’s my read. Whether you buy it or not is up to you, but I bet if you came away from the film feeling satisfied in Teddy’s insanity, then perhaps you were more a part of the film than you realize. Perhaps the reveal of the film isn’t about Teddy, but about us.

Why Derrida Should have Read Macbeth Instead of Hamlet

From a draft of my Intellectual Masturbation essay, speaking in the voice of The Porter from Macbeth:

But be wary: the body-text does not speak in words; it haunts the edges of words. Derrida always liked Hamlet more than Macbeth; probably because there are no speaking ghosts in Macbeth. Bah! But there are specters—specters of ghosts. The ghost of Banquo may not speak, but it makes demands on Macbeth: He is captivated by this spectral past reanimated at the edges of his perceptual present. When Derrida constructs his theory of hauntology in Specters of Marx, he should have consulted Macbeth. Derrida, rather, takes up Hamlet’s line “Time is out of joint” as the veritable slogan of hauntology (see Derrida Specters chapter 1). He was wrong. It should always have been my “Anon, anon!”—which is a performative utterance in which time is out of joint!

Let me explain. The American Heritage Dictionary offers three definitions for “anon”:
1. At another time; later.
2. In a short time; soon.
3. At once; forthwith.

Later, soon, now… These meanings are precisely irreconcilable without a decidedly dislocated temporality. Let us also look to a more classic account in Abbott’s Shakespearean Grammar:

(Abbott 39)

Anon: “the moment after,” a previous moment being implied. Later, but immanently. Anon references a spectral present which is always yet-to-come, the next instant. The declarative authority of “is” is precisely what is foreclosed by the very statement that time is out of joint. It cannot simultaneously be-is whilst the temporality of stability and presence is precisely what is fractured. (This paradox is exactly what Derrida means by his use of the phrase, of course, I do not make this substitutive claim in order to argue against his conceptualization, merely his choice of mantra.) “Anon, anon!” takes the paradox one step further by repeating itself, folding time back on itself, a repetition of immanence—“Now-later, later-now”—that cannot possibly be empirically reproduced apart from its utterance. Macbeth too was haunted by this intoxicating temporality, “Thy letters have transported me beyond this ignorant present, and I feel now the future in the instant.” You shall experience it too. In the near future you will be textually confounded by the period and its temporal enigmas.

The Author was again taken aback by the odd statement, but, as before, The Porter continues without pause:

Derrida writes, “Differance… does not mean only (as some people have too often believed and so naively) deferral, lateness, delay, postponement. In the incoercible differance the here-now unfurls… in imminence and in urgency.” (Derrida Specters 31) “Anon, anon!” It expresses not just deferral, but is also reflexive of the here-now; the future and the return of a specter: Anon. I will return. That’s why it is so blissfully unsettling: “A specter is all the more terrifying… on the condition that one can never distinguish between the future-to-come and the coming-back of a specter.” (Derrida Specters 38) “Anon, anon!” I will return.