Unfortunately, pages 192 and 193 were missing from the reading. I dont give an account of those pages.
Grosz begins by tracing out the relation of non-subjective forces to principles of pleasure and desire. Here she takes a very much molecular approach to both ideas, introducing a notion of forces which is composed of particles and which is pure movement without direction. This initial distinction is made in alignment with Nietzsche, employing the notion that it is forces which continually constitute and destroy subjects and not the other way round. From there Grosz goes on to ask how forces can be read in relation to pleasure and desire. Her answer is that both pleasure and desire are the registrations of the movement of forces. These are the sensory receptors of something which is operative outside of them. Thus by the time the subject can feel a desire or pleasure, already those forces have had their impact upon that subject.
Grosz points out that for Foucault, there is an intersection of force in the form of power with pleasure as that which both induces participation in channelings of pleasure and that which produces resistances to the power which has consolidated technologies of pleasure.
She goes on to discuss a Deleuzian conception of pleasure. Unfortunately these are the pages which are missing.
Grosz's conclusion based on these two views is that the goal of feminists should not be to consolidate a politics surrounding the use of pleasure or concerning desire. Rather, the attempt should be to all ow the human to "liberate from its own orbit" the imperceptible forces which together compose pleasure and desire. Thus the engagement of groups in alternative sexualities should not be read as itself directly or necessarily political but instead as creative. The participation in an outlawed sexuality can then viewed as productive of a new assemblage which will itself reconfigure the subject. These new formations of subjectivity will then continuously realign with new formations of pleasure and desire, ever- reconfiguring, ever reconstituting a subject who remains always changing and thus always elusive of the grasping clutch of power systems.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
If the subject is a constellation, an unusual permutation of diverse forces, doesn't that constellation itself also become a force? Since the demarcation of a particular force must entail some kind of reduction, why is The Subject different? Isn't desire itself a constellation of belligerent impulses?
I was also some what confused about what was force and what was by-products of forces. On page 190 she says that pleasure and pain are the corporeal registrations of forces, which I interpreted as "passive" effects. Then on the next page pleasure is said to induce itself in its engagement with power, which made me think of inter-active forces. Finally on p.195 pleasure and power are discribed as assemblages composed of forces. So my conclusion was that there are no autonomous "pleasure forces" or "power forces" but pleasure and power inherit the characteristics of forces since they are made up of them. Maybe the same goes for the subject, although the term is rather fictitious in this subhuman dimension.
Another thing that I was wondering about: on p.186-7 she says force is usually identified with coercion and authority and thus with masculinity. But this identification maneuver humanizes force which is something Grosz wants to avoid. On the other hand, isn't this exactly what Iriagary does in her project of sexual difference, when she reads ideas, forms, concepts as masculine and argues that the feminine does not yet exist? Does Irigaray then also humanize ontology? Does Grosz following Irigaray humanize science when she asks in ch.13 whether male sexuality may be the origin of number itself? I just find this inconsistent. At some times it is okay to sexualize and humanize, and at others it isn't..? Also, why is it that the Nietzsche-Deleuze's philosophy on active forces and will to power does not receive the same kind of scrutiny concerning their possible masculine inheritance, as does for instance the numerical sciences?
I was struck by Jenny's comment on the passive character of pleasure and pain if they are effectively registrations of the primary movement of forces. I believe it is true that the nature of these forces indicates a passivity in the individuating field of their reception. The registration of these forces, their very impact and incision upon the surfaces of a subjectivity is exactly passivity, receptivity. This passivity is a kind of involuntary absorption.
Jenny then notes that pleasure is also described in a kind of empowered activation. I think this is also true and not at all oppositional to passivity. Subjectivities are operative through multiple varied forms of synthesis. The registration or impact of forces upon a subjectivity as passive receiver is a passive synthesis manifesting sensation. Pleasure, at this stage, is without principle. Subjectivity is also active synthesis. This active synthesis effects consciousness in modes of memory and projection. The forceful excitation of passive sensation is organized into an egoism and a temporality. An assemblage is constituted to channel forces and control reception, harnessing sensation to transform into activity, projection into the future.
Though this active synthesis asserts a control over reception, receptivity itself necessitates a passivity prior to intention, thus subjectivity is neither simply passive or active but necessarily both.
i also thought that the relation between force and registration and subjectivity is a little confusing. I though anderson posited a good starting point for exploring the question. i think syntehsis is a good way of looking at subjectivity but i think that it doesnt locate subjectivity the way it would help for me to.
in saying pleasure/pain are registrations which induce, i think their role is complicated. i think they do have to be aligned with subjectivity as a form of synthesis, but, in saying that, i think the notion of registration is itself complicated. because subjectivity functions as a multiple registry of a host of forces, the question arises for me as to whether each forces sense itself or whether the collision of each force with another produces a registration.
Post a Comment