CUL120 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Post-Structuralism
27 Aug 2018
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Lecture 2, 09.03.16
This lecture will outline the definitions of humanism and poststructuralism, and explore the
characteristics of each. We will look at how poststructuralism has been taken up by cultural studies
as a way of challenging humanism as a 'meaning-making' system, and the knowledge produced by
it.
Humanism vs Poststructuralism
Summary of Last Lecture:
Cultural studies dissenting and sorptive examination of how people shape their lives, and how their
lives are shaped by encounters with: other people, other institutions, other knowledge
3 definitions of culture: as improvement; a form or type of civilisation; culture as works/practices of
intellectual and artistic activity
Dichotomous logic: binary thinking that underpins our thinking about culture
cultural studies is critical of such thinking
Meaning making systems:
Humanism:
originated in the European Renaissance developed during the enlightenment
challenge to religious supremacy
‘Man’ replaces god as the arbiter of meaning
foundation of the modern humanities and dominant beliefs about the human
absolute truths/universal principles
meaning/essence of a thing is inherent in it
humans defined/differentiated by their capacity for reason
reasoning located in the mind/reasoning is a cognitive activity
reasoning is objective
reasoning enables one to access truths and or universal principles
Dichotomous logic!
Poststructuralism:
emerged post 1960’s
critique of humanism and its influences
challenges to humanism, out of France
meaning contextually specific
an effect of relations with others and with a world
examines the ‘truth effects’ of particular systems of meaning making
no absolute truths/universal principles
deconstructs binary oppositions/focuses on differences
truths actually change ( truth effects what functions as a truth at the time, which is subjective)
Meaning/identity- Where does it come from?
Humanism:
- meaning is inherent in the thing itself
- We give a name to the thing, but the process of naming has no real bearing on the thing
Poststructuralism:
- The meaning/identity of a thing is culturally produced.
- Things come to mean in specific ways
- How we understand a thing effects how we interact with it and vice versa.
Critiquing the Humanist model:
Structuralism:
Ferdinand Saussure and semiotics
Semiotics: the study of signs and sign processes
sign: the signifier and the signified
signifier= the form which the sign takes
signified= the concept the signifier represents
What is the relationship between the word/image and the concept for humanism
the letters tree and or the image on the right represents symbolises the essences of tree.
Document Summary
This lecture will outline the definitions of humanism and poststructuralism, and explore the characteristics of each. We will look at how poststructuralism has been taken up by cultural studies as a way of challenging humanism as a "meaning-making" system, and the knowledge produced by it. Cultural studies dissenting and sorptive examination of how people shape their lives, and how their lives are shaped by encounters with: other people, other institutions, other knowledge. 3 definitions of culture: as improvement; a form or type of civilisation; culture as works/practices of intellectual and artistic activity. Dichotomous logic: binary thinking that underpins our thinking about culture cultural studies is critical of such thinking. Meaning is inherent in the thing itself. We give a name to the thing, but the process of naming has no real bearing on the thing. The meaning/identity of a thing is culturally produced. Things come to mean in specific ways.
