[lbo-talk] Symbolic and Meaningful Action

[joanna bujes]

Literary criticism was born in the eighteenth century, when the newly 
minted bourgeoise felt the need to justify its privileges by aquiring 
and displaying good taste. The minting of literary Ph.D.'s since the 
fifties probably has more to do with taking a sizable portion of the 
intelligentia and making them politically useless than with anything else.

A knowledge of history, literature, and psychology can help one 
penetrate the many layers of conditioning to which we are subject and 
can help one understand what the collective unconscious is working 
through -- what conclusions it has reached, unbeknownst to itself. This 
is different than conspiracy theory. For example, I can go see 
"Schindler's List" and realize that it is not a movie about World War 
II, though it finds it useful as a symbolic coordinate. What the movie 
is really about is the present. What it really argues is that in the 
present intellectuals are more valuable than workers; we are all lucky 
to have a job; we all have two choices: psychotic capitalism or rational 
capitalism. I can go see "Ghostbusters" and realize that it is not a 
movie about chasing ghosts, but about relieving oneself of the burden of 
the past (past=social injustice) and accepting an entrepreneurial, 
self-serving future. And so on.

Understanding social consciousness and unconsciousness is very important 
in being able to speak effectively and to convince people that you do 
understand how the world works. Communication and working through our 
common conditioning is a form of action.

Joanna