1 Introduction to 'Ideology' 2 Ideology and the Paradox of Subjectivity 3
Notes 1 Introduction to ‘Ideology’ 1. Bell, unlike Francis Fukuyama, carefully avoids equating the end of ideology with utopia or near-utopia. 2 Ideology and the Paradox of Subjectivity 1. In his ‘De la Métaphysique de Kant,’ de Tracy explicitly excoriates Kant for his lack of scientific method and chides him for developing ‘the inverse of reasoning’ in the Critique of Pure Reason (cited in Kennedy 1978, 118–19). 2. In ‘The Poet,’ Emerson calls for a radical poetic aesthetic that would eschew the artificial constraints of meter and adopt an ‘organic form.’ Interestingly, Emerson also developed the concept of the ‘oversoul,’ which owes much to Hegel’s Geist. 3. In his Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (1915–17), Freud dissects the subject into three parts: super-ego, ego, and id. These correspond roughly to conscience, consciousness, and desire. The ego attempts to regulate between the super-ego and the id. 4. Freud fails to suggest, however, that religion fulfills its ostensible moral purpose: ‘in every age immorality has found no less support in religion than morality has’ (1964, 68). 5. Zizek distinguishes between cynicism – the classic ideological response to social reality – and ‘kynicism,’ the ‘popular, plebian rejec- tion of the official culture by means of irony and sarcasm’ (1989, 29). In the latter instance, subjects appeal not to reason, but to parody. The subject mocks the gravity of official doctrine by exposing the self-interest of the principals. Saturday Night Live and Mad TV, for example, lampoon the ultra-earnestness of political candidates through caricature. In one such skit, Bill Clinton’s famous empathy (‘I feel your pain’) is undercut by a portrait in which he cannot restrain his sexual impulses for even a moment.
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