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scribbles · of · a · mumbler
mumblings of a scribbler
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"Jeremy Fernando's The Suicide-Bomber; and her gift of death calls for the ability to respond to intentional death. It is a brilliant study about the blank spot within the becoming of teleology, and the game of 'finitude'." --Hubertus von Amelunxen
This book is an attempt to defend the undefendable: the suicide bomber as a figure of thinking, a figure that foregrounds the singularity of each event; and it is this un-understandability—which is part of understanding itself—that the suicide bomber never lets us forget. For, the suicide bomber is the poet par excellence, reminding us of the possibility of an event; not because of the effects of her actions, but due to the gift of her life, and more importantly the unknowability that is her death. And like with poetry, all analysis only makes it worse. In this manner, (s)he remains an unending question for us; a question that even questions itself as a question. And if one maintains the question, one is always already other to everything, other even to one’s self. In this way, the gap between the self and the other is maintained such that this space is never taken hostage. For, the moment this space of negotiation is gone, we are in the realm of terror.
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"This work is responsible for initiating a new generation of reflections that make our philosophical certitudes tremble. Grappling with the implications of non-phenomenal reading, Jeremy Fernando scans the works of outstanding thinkers whose insight weighs heavily on our relation to language and world. Fernando locates the constitutive blindness that stalls the ethical imperative while giving it new meaning." — Avital Ronell, Professor of German, English, French, and Comparative Literature, New York University; and author of The Telephone Book, Stupidity, Crack Wars, and The Test Drive
"There are no encounters in theory, it is said--for theory, whatever its claims, cannot open to the event. As Jeremy Fernando demonstrates masterfully in Reading Blindly, theory must become reading to give the encounter to thought. Here, in a rich and always-challenging meditation, reading is understood from an ethical turn that prompts us to rethink ethics itself." — Christopher Fynsk,Director of the Centre for Modern Thought, The University of Aberdeen; and author of Infant Figures, Language and Relation, and The Claim of Language
Product DescriptionReading Blindly attempts to conceive of the possibility of an ethics of reading--"reading" being understood as the relation to an other that occurs prior to any semantic or formal identification, and therefore prior to any attempt at assimilating what is being read to the one who reads. Hence, "reading" can no longer be understood in the classical tradition of hermeneutics as a deciphering according to an established set of rules as this would only give a minimum of correspondence, or relation, between the reader, and what is read. In fact, "reading" can no longer be understood as an act, since an act by necessity would impose the rules of the reader upon the structure of what (s)he encounters; in other words the reader would impose herself upon the text. Since it is neither an act nor a rule-governed operation, "reading" needs to be thought as an event of an encounter with an other--and more precisely an other which is not the other as identified by the reader, but heterogeneous in relation to any identifying determination. Being an encounter with an undeterminable other--an other who is other than other--"reading" is hence an unconditional relation, a relation therefore to no fixed object of relation. Hence, "reading" can be claimed to be the ethical relation par excellence. Since "reading" is a pre-relational relationality, what the reader encounters, however, may only be encountered before any phenomenon: "reading" is hence a non-phenomenal event or even the event of the undoing of all phenomenality. This is a radical reconstitution of reading positing blindness as that which both allows reading to take place and is also its limit. As there is always an aspect of choice in reading--one has to choose to remain open to the possibility of the other-- Reading Blindly, by extension, is also a rethinking of ethics; constantly keeping in mind the impossibility of articulating an ethics which is not prescriptive. Hence, Reading Blindly is ultimately an attempt at the impossible: to speak of reading as an event. And since this is un-theorizable--lest it becomes a prescriptive theory-- Reading Blindly is the positing of reading as reading, through reading, where texts are read as a test site for reading itself. Ostensibly, Reading Blindly works at the intersections of literature and philosophy; and will interest readers who are concerned with either discipline. However as reading is re-constituted as a pre-relational relationality, it is also a re-thinking of communication itself--a rethinking of the space between; the medium in which all communication occurs--and by extension, the very possibility of communicating with each other, with another. As such, this work is, in the final gesture, a meditation on the finitude and exteriority in literature, philosophy--calling into question the very possibility of correspondence, and relationality--and hence knowledge itself. For all that can be posited is that reading first and foremost is an acknowledgement that the text is ultimately unknowable; where reading is positing, and which exposes itself to nothing--and is in fidelity to nothing--but the possibility of reading. |
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Jeremy Fernando 070709 http://www.graciemag.com/news/145/ARTICLE/14877/2009-07-07.html
In the after-math of the 2009 of the World Jujitsu Championship, the difficult question posed by Luca Atalla still rings strong; ‘should athletes from the same team face each other in competition’? The irony of course was that Sergio Morales and Marcelo Garcia from Alliance decided to close out their division, whilst Roger Gracie and Romulo Barrral from Gracie Barra disputed theirs; this is of course in contrast to the opinions which arose from their respective camps only a short time ago. Regardless of this, one should take the words of Flavio Almeida and Romero ‘Jacare’ Calvacanti with the utmost seriousness, and consider them as such. The Gracie Barra point of view is that competitions are a team effort: in that sense, if team-mates reach the finals, the job of the team is done; in other words, the team has proved its point that it is superior. There is of course an echo of Carlos Gracie Sr. in all of this, especially in his take that it is pointless for jujitsu practitioners to fight in vale-tudo matches any longer; the point has long been established that without jujitsu, one will be greatly incapacitated in a fight. The Alliance leader, ‘Jacare’ Calvacanti, points out that in the earlier years of jujitsu competitions, it was common for team-mates to battle each other in finals. Regardless of whoever won, both were still team-mates and more importantly friends; in other words, competitions only displayed who was better on that day: in the greater scheme of things, it meant very little. One can of course hear the spectre of Helio Gracie here: to him modern jujitsu competitions are meaningless; the whole point of jujitsu is to give the small man a chance in a fight against a larger aggressor. At the heart of the art is the ability to defend oneself; the sportive variation was a variation at best – an arena to hone one’s body, one’s reactions, one’s spirit. In that sense, winning or losing on the mats was irrelevant; the true test is in a situation where one had to fight for one’s – or a loved one’s – life. And in many instances, the confidence that jujitsu gives one is more than enough to avert the situation. Perhaps the difference in opinion stems from the very philosophies on which they are based. If jujitsu is perceived to be a sport, then the concept of teams – and by extension strategies, secrets, and esprit de corps – comes to the fore. This is magnified when one takes into account the call for the professionalism of the sport; for that is always already accompanied by commodification. One can detect a symptom of this logic in the standardization of the belt system. Whilst there are many merits of a certification system – foremost amongst them is that no one can just claim to be a ‘BJJ Black Belt’ and dupe people of hard earned cash – it also run contrary to the spirit of jujitsu. This is especially true when one takes into account the attempt to standardize the time between belts. What sets BJJ apart from many other arts is the absolute trust in the instructor to grade her/ his students: in many cases, there is no reason to hand out a belt except for the fact that the instructor feels that the student ‘is ready’. Hence, the grading system is an intuitive system; moreover, since the belt always already carries the name of the said instructor, this suggests that by awarding that belt, the instructor is also putting her/ his reputation on the line. It is no coincidence that the black belt has always been equated with earning a PhD: both are stages where the person achieves her/ his viva voce, voice of life. Hence when one is awarded a black belt, the instructor is also saying ‘now you are ready to express the art in your own way, in your own voice’. This is captured beautifully in Royce Gracie’s famous quip, “the belt only covers two inches of your ass; you have to cover the rest yourself.” It is this unknowable aspect of jujitsu – after all one can never know what ‘ready’ means much less transmit, teach, it to another – that Rickson Gracie has encapsulated in the elegant name he has given to his approach, that of “invisible jujitsu.” This is an approach to an art that acknowledges that part of the art always lies outside the person; that it is an intuitive aspect that can only be glimpsed at momentarily, through years and years of rolling, feeling, touching. And it is for this reason that jujitsu is arte suave, the gentle art. In this sense, whilst many have focused on the efficiency of jujitsu, or even on the gentleness of the leverage, it is Rickson that reminds us that it is first and foremost an art; and art in the precise sense of a craft at its highest level, where it consumes the practitioner, and often in ways which are exterior to one’s cognitive ability. Hence at the highest level, not only is jujitsu invisible to the eye, but it remains invisible to one; it expresses itself through one. It is this poetic approach to jujitsu that opens the register that the gentle art is also arte bela, the beautiful art; for what is art if it is not enigmatic. With this in mind, the opening question of whether team-mates should dispute a medal at a championship becomes moot. This does not take away anything from the achievement of the athletes who won, lost, competed at the Mundials, or in fact any tournament; many sacrifices, much training, and great dedication, has been given in order to even step onto the mats in the first place. However one should not forget that this – and in particular winning or losing – has very little to do with jujitsu itself. And even less to do with its status as a beautiful art. Jeremy Fernando is the Jean Baudrillard Fellow at the European Graduate School, and a Research Fellow at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His work explores the intersections of literature, philosophy, and the media; and is the author of Reflections on (T)error. He has spent many years in judo dojos, and even though wears a black belt, spends much time looking at the ceiling; he has also refined tapping out to an art, complete with rhythm and all. |
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By Jeremy Fernando | March 2009 |
http://thepublicsphere.com/2009/03/defence-of-stupidity/
Every year, on the fourteenth day of February, one is bound to hear numerous complaints from just about everyone (besides florists) about how Valentine’s Day is mere commercialism. The ones amongst the nay-sayers who maintain a soft spot for Karl Marx would proceed to call it the commodification of relationships; those who prefer the gods would claim that the sanctity of relationships has been profaned; the gender theorists would note how the fact that males buy the gifts only serves to highlight the unequal power-relation between the genders. Whichever side they come from - and whichever variation of the arguments they choose - it all boils down to this: they are decrying the fact that relationships have moved from the private to the public sphere. The underlying logic is that love is between two persons only and should remain between them; love should remain an unmediated experience between the two persons in that relationship. Which of course completely misses the point. If we consider the fact that relationships are the result of a negotiation between two persons, then there must be a space between them for this very negotiation to occur. Otherwise, all that is happening is that one person is subsuming the other within their own sphere of understanding. This would be understanding at its most banal - and perverse - form; that of bringing the other person under one’s stance. If that were the case, there would no longer be any relationship; all negotiation is gone and the other person is effectively effaced. Hence whenever one hears the phrase “I understand my partner,” one should be wary; clearly that person’s version of a relationship is a masturbatory one. In this sense, any relationship between two (or more) persons always already carries with it the unknown, and always unknowable. The other person is an enigma, remains enigmatic, to you. This is the only way in which the proclamation “I love you” remains singular, remains a love that is about the person as a singular person - and not merely about the qualities of the person, what the person is. For if the other person comes under your own schema, then the love for the other person is also a completely transparent love, one that you can know thoroughly, calculate; the other person becomes nothing more than a check-list. To compound matters, if it is the qualities that you love, by extension, if those qualities go away, so does the love. Only when the love for the other person is an enigmatic one, one that cannot be understood, can that love potentially be an event. If it is an event, then strictly speaking it cannot be known before it happens; in fact, at best it can be glimpsed as it is happening, or perhaps even only realized retrospectively. Hence at the point in which it happens, it is a love that comes from elsewhere; this strange phenomenon is best captured in the colloquial phrase, ‘I was struck by love’ or even more so by ‘I was blinded by love.’ This is a blinding in the very precise sense of, ‘I have no idea why or when it happened; before I knew it, I was in love.’ Cupid is blind for this reason: not just because love is random (and can happen to anyone at any time) but more importantly because even after it happens, both the reason you are in love, and the person you are in love with, remain blind to you. Since there is an unknowable relationship with the other person, the only way you can approach it is via a ritual. This is the lesson that religions have taught us: since one is never able to phenomenally experience the god(s), one has no choice but to approach them through rituals. These rituals are strictly speaking meaningless - the actual content is interchangeable - but it is the form that is important. Rituals allow us momentary glimpses at secrets, and secrets are never about content. Rather, secrets entail the recognition that they are secrets; the secret lies in their form as secret. This can be seen when we consider how group secrets work; since the entire group knows the secret, clearly the content of the secret is not as important as the fact that only members within the group are privy to this secret. Occasionally the actual secret content can be so trivial that even other people outside the group might know the information; they just do not realize its significance. For instance, if I used my date of birth as my bank-account password, merely knowing when I was born would not instantly give you the key to my life savings. In order for that to happen, you would have had to recognize the significance of the knowledge of my birthday. This of course means that you have to know that you know something. Since the god(s) are, strictly speaking, unknowable, this suggests that rituals put one in a position to potentially experience the god(s). The meaningless gestures on Valentine’s Day play precisely this ritual role. It is not so much what you give the other person, but the fact that you give it to them. The gift in this sense is very much akin to an offering; the gift opens the possibility of an exchange. Gift-giving does not guarantee that you will like what is returned; there is always a reciprocation of the gift, but what is returned to you is never known in advance, until the moment it is received. This of course means that the worst thing that one can do is not to give the gift: that would be akin to a cutting off of all possibilities, a complete closing of all communication with the other person. This at the same time also means that you cannot wait for the other person to give you something before you get them their gift: if that were the scenario, the return gift would be nothing more than a calculated return, where the relationship is nothing more than an accounting figure, where the other would be once again reduced to a statistic, a mere return of investment. The only manner in which both persons can give true gifts is to offer them independently of the other person, whilst keeping them in mind. In this way, the two gifts are always already both uncalculated (in the sense of not knowing what the return is) and the reciprocation for the other (without knowing whether the other person actually has a gift in the first place). Of course this would seem like an irrational, even stupid, way of buying gifts. The stupidity involved actually saves the relationship from being merely banal. And more importantly, prevents it from entering the mere profane. It is the stupidity of Valentine’s Day - complete with it kitsch-ness - that protects the sacredness of relationships, precisely by being completely and utterly meaningless …
Jeremy Fernando is a Teaching Fellow at the English Division of the School of Humanities and Social Science, Nanyang Technological University. He is also a doctoral candidate at the European Graduate School where Avital Ronell and Werner Hamacher are his mentors, and Fernando is the author of Reflections on (T)error. |
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 esther tan: the spaces between the stars are nothing to worry about [oil on canvas, 2009] |
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Jeremy Fernando 9 January 2009 http://malaysiakini.com/opinions/96094 Clearly we have reached a point where the sexuality of the subject, or more precisely, the sexual orientation of the subject in a state is in focus. Hetero-sexuality is the legitimized sexual relationship, whilst homo-sexuality is generally frowned upon, but in terms of state regulation and public opinion. It would be too easy to launch into the standard Marxist analysis (where the subject is alienated from her own body and is now a datum of information) or even open the register of Fascism (where the private and public spheres are no longer separated). However, in the interest of fairness, perhaps one should consider the defenders of the logic that ‘the only legitimate sexual relation is a hetero-sexual one’ on their own terms. The most commonly cited one is that the sanctity of marriage demands that some form of exclusion is made. Whilst this exclusive gesture is always already part of any institution (what good is a membership if everyone can be a member), premising entry of sexuality does open up some interesting considerations. For instance, can someone who is bi-sexual claim half a membership? This might seem like idle speculation but if sexuality (or more precisely the biological sex of the person you are in a relationship with) is the only factor, this must surely be a possibility. If marriage is indeed sacrosanct – a sacred union – this would also mean that it cannot be spoken of. Otherwise by definition it enters the realm of the profane. Perhaps this gives us a certain insight into ‘homo-phobia’, one that can be found within the marriage vow itself. Taking the Christian wedding as an instance – after all, the Christians are usually the poster boys of homo-phobia – one cannot but notice that the standard ending goes along the lines of, “what God has joined man must not divide.” This suggests that the union is not very stable: in fact it is completely fragile; otherwise it would have read ‘what man cannot divide’. And this is precisely what is sacred about marriage; the fact that the union is ultimately an unknowable one, known at best only to the gods. This means that every union between two people, is a union that is made in absolute blindness to the possibility (or impossibility) of this very union. And this is what homo-sexual relationship foreground. Not the fact that there is some God who disapproves of it (even if this were so, would it not be a vain proposition to presume that one is privy to Divine likes and dislikes). But more pertinently that a homo-sexual relationship reminds all hetero-sexual unions that any union is always already one based on an assumption; groundless, baseless and completely unstable. But the question that remains is why homo-sexual relationships are more pronounced in reminding us of this fragility. This is due to the fact that if a relationship – any relationship – has no basis except for a leap of faith, this means that all relationality lies in the imaginary. This is an imaginary not so much in the sense of one being in a masturbatory relationship with one-self, in the form of a narcissistic relationship, but rather that the possibility of responding with another person (one who always will remain other to your self, alien, and ultimately unknowable) must be imagined in the first place. And since imagination can only come about in and through your own self, this suggests that the very realm of any relationship is one that is played out through your own imaginary sphere. By extension, since you can never escape your own biological being, this also already means that any relationship you form with another, always already comes through an imaginary sphere of the same biology. All relationships begin with a homo-imaginary sphere. This brings us back to the very basis of Christianity itself and its claim that all relationships that last must be God-centred. Unless we fall back on vanity and makes assumptions to the Divine Will, we will have to admit that this space, in which all relationships that last are based, must be an imaginary space. This is in no way a claim that God is imagined – or a make belief. After all, the atheistic view is a mere reversal of the fundamentalist believer: both are too certain, too absolute. What this suggests is that this space – that we have termed God – is a space of potentiality, and perhaps of beauty, and even love. This is captured perfectly in the words “I love you”; words that are never original – always already a quotation, and perhaps even a repetition. However, the significance of the statement is that it is meaningful in a particular time and space; it is a singular statement that is important at that moment, and for that person: there is no replicability to it. An examination of the statement would reveal that there is a calling forth of an ‘I’, as if the self and the ‘I’ are momentarily separated, in a certain relationality – that of love – with a ‘you’, as if the ‘you’ and the person before the self uttering the statement are also separated. This becomes even more obvious in the response – assuming there is one – to the statement: “I love you”; an exact replication that says absolutely nothing more nor less than the first statement. And in this reversal lies the very secret to love and relationships: reciprocity; not of any object, or anything material, but the reciprocation of reciprocity itself, a return of the statement that puts the two persons in a relationship with each other. I offer you a statement in which I am unsure of my relationship with my own self, but still offer myself up in a relationship with you, whomever you are; and you offer me this very statement in return. And in between, in this imaginary space between the two persons, is the potentiality of love, of relationality. In this sense, all homo-phobia is a rejection of this un-sureness, an attempt to fix relationship between two stable biological beings (as if this were even possible). Ironically though, in its attempt to concretize relationships within a hetero-sexual sphere, the possibility of this space – where the ‘I’, the self, the other, and the ‘you’ negotiate – is also effaced. This is not to say that the only true relationships are homo-sexual. Every person can choose to be in a relationship with another person, regardless of any category, biological, gendered, or otherwise. However, a rejection of the possibility of a homo-sexual relationship is also the rejection of the possibility of every relationship. There is a reason why the rainbow has long been associated with homo-sexuality. For without this space to imagine, there is no more hope for relationality itself … --- Jeremy Fernando is a Teaching Fellow at the English Division of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University. The focus of his research is an attempt to respond to the intersections of literature, media, and philosophy. He is also the author of Reflections on (T)error. |
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Jeremy Fernando http://malaysiakini.com/opinions/9326718 November 2008 Whenever one brings up the Uniquely Singapore campaign, (s)he can be assured of howls of derision. It is not so much that it is bad, for that would be a matter of taste (and hence surely you would find someone that actually likes it), but that it is an absurd campaign. The most telling sign would be the fact that the city state is branded as a ‘global city’: whilst there is nothing intrinsically problematic about situation oneself as global, it would suggest that there is nothing unique about Singapore, that it can be like any other city in the world. The state of Singapore and globalization has always been synonymous. Perhaps one can argue that this has been a brilliant economic strategy: one would be hard pressed to contradict that, even in the face of the current economic crisis; after all it is a world-wide recession. However, the fact that Singapore’s economy (and psyche of its people) is so closely linked to the world economy suggests that the people here are inter-changeable with people from everywhere else. A simple example would be the Foreign Talent Scheme adopted by the Singapore Sports Council: the underlying logic is that as long as you are productive (that is you can generate surplus value in the form of medals), you are Singaporean. In this sense, the strategy of the state is that of the perfect seductress: she who gains power not through a show of strength (and personality and identity) but precisely through a demonstration of emptiness and weakness. The state of Singapore is the one who utters, “I can be whatever you want me to be.” And this is why one finds banners lining the streets with information concerning the upcoming Korean festival, or the Fashion Week, or Oktoberfest; all under the over-arching banner of Uniquely Singapore. And this is also precisely why we will always be safe from terrorism. For there are no iconic targets in Singapore to attack: and this is what the Uniquely Singapore campaign is attempting to convey. When read in this way, the Uniquely Singapore campaign is a brilliant strategy by the state to attempt to secure the safety of its people. By showing that there is absolutely nothing inherently Singaporean about Singapore, the state is taking away any possible target that terrorist groups might be considering. Of course at this point one might attempt to suggest that The Esplanade might be a potential icon: after all, it does take up a significant portion of the famous skyline of Singapore. However, one must not forget – and in fact one is never allowed to forget – that The Esplanade is merely a poor replica of the Sydney Opera House; which is a way of saying, ‘if you want to blow something up, why not blow up the real thing’. The same logic applies to the Singapore Flyer: ‘go take out the London Eye instead’. For many years, the Merlion had the potential to be iconic. Even though many claim that it is hideous, there is no denying the fact that it is unique – there is perhaps no other union between a lion and a fish anywhere else in the world. Which means that for a long time, it was potentially a target: after all, the only reason that terrorist groups would blow something up is due to its iconic status and the fact that it is unique to that particular place. The state’s response to this potential threat was an enlightened one; one that Sun Tzu would have been proud of. Instead of attempted to secure the Merlion with armed guards and the latest gizmos from the security industry (which is what most states would have done), the potential threat was dissipated by making its iconic status disappear, not by removing the Merlion (which would have been akin to blowing it up for the terrorist groups) but by multiplying it, by building other Merlions (at the moment there are five such statues within the state and one each in China and Japan). The moment there is more than one Merlion, none of them are unique: the mistake of the Twin Towers was of course the fact that they were not two separate towers, but part of one icon. In April 2007, Singapore Airlines changed it advertising agency and there were many worried cries over the future of the Singapore Girl: after all, she has long been the symbol not just of the airline but also of the state. It is of no coincidence that the only terror attack suffered by the state involved the Singapore Girl: on 26 March 1991, SQ 117 was hijacked by four male passengers. The response of the state again was enlightened: in 1995, the policy of hiring stewardesses from only Singapore and Malaysia was changed – now females from China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea and Taiwan are also included in the recruitment drive. From that point, the Singapore Girl is no longer uniquely Singaporean (or Malayan if you must), anybody and everybody can be a Singapore Girl as long as she fits the criterion. In this respect, all fears over the new direction of the advertising campaign are unfounded: since the Singapore Girl can now be anyone, she is now an empty icon, one that can be anything that anyone wants her to be. All of these strategies came together on 9 March 2004, when the Uniquely Singapore campaign was officially launched. And from that moment, we could all feel much safer … Jeremy Fernando is a Teaching Fellow at the English Division, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University. He is also the author of Reflections of (T)error and is based in Singapore. |
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