I think I’ve stumbled upon a problem that is both common among scholars, intellectuals, and intellectually curious generalists (the category I fall into) and yet rarely discussed.
The fact that they don’t talk about it could mean, of course, that it’s only a problem for me. Or it could be that other people know the answer to the problem and have considered it too obvious to be worth mentioning. Then again, they may see the problem too but not talk about it for fear that other scholars, intellectuals, and intellectually curious generalists will think they are boneheads.
This type of hemming-and-hawing is tangentially related to the problem in question: How do you know whether you should really know about something that other people already seem to know?
What I mean is that there are not only different types of knowledge, but differing assumptions about what sort of knowledge is expected to be know. For instance, there is broad base of knowledge that almost all well-rounded, highly educated share in common. There is also specific area knowledge that is known almost exclusively by people with a PhD in the relevant field of study. In the middle is the grey area, the knowledge that even if you don’t know, you know that it is something that you should probably expect to know if you hang around scholars, intellectuals, and intellectually curious generalists (let’s call them SIICGs, for short).
Take, for example, David Bentley Hart’s recent article in First Things on Heidegger’s philosophy as a meditation on the mystery of being. Even if you do not know much about the German philosopher, you recognize that as an SIICG you should be familiar with Heidegger and, duly chastised, you tell yourself that you’ll finally get around to reading Being and Time (even though, let’s be honest, you probably won’t).
This is a prime example of knowing that you should really know about someone that other people already know. I know enough to know that I should know about Heidegger—even if I don’t. But there are times when the issue is not so opaque.
And that brings me to my Žižek problem.
Slavoj Žižek is a Slovenian philosopher and critical theorist who works in the traditions of Hegelianism, Marxism, and Lacanian psychoanalysis and has purportedly made contributions to political theory, film theory, and theoretical psychoanalysis. There is even an open access journal dedicated to his work (International Journal of Žižek Studies).
Three years ago I had never heard of the guy. Now I hear about him all the time. And it’s never in the “Here’s somebody that you’ve never heard of and need to know.” No, the references are always of the type that assumes that you are so familiar with the guy that, like Plato, Heideigger, or Sting, they don’t even need to include his first name for you to understand who they are referring to.
To be honest, even now I’m hesitant to confess my ignorance about Žižek. The last time I admitted not knowing who someone was, when I confessed that I wasn’t familiar with Rene Girard, an acquaintance responded, “Seriously? You haven’t read The Scapegoat?” (I wanted to say that hadn’t had a chance since I was still working my way through the Seussian oeuvre. Instead, I just ordered the book on Amazon.)
No, I don’t know much about Žižek and I’m not sure whether I should or how I should go about learning more. It’s not like I can just read the Wikipedia entry about him and get up to speed. I’d have to read some dense, jargon-filled articles and books by him (and probably by Hegel, Marx, and Lacan too) just get to the point where I could understand enough to discuss his work intelligently—and comprehend why others are talking about him.
The problem is not an unwillingness to do my homework (though the Lacanian stuff is a bit off-putting). I’m willing to put in the effort if the result will be worth it. But therein lies the crux of the problem. How do you know ahead of time whether it’s worth it? How do you know that he isn’t merely a philosopher du jour and that by the time you are well-versed enough to hold your own in a discussion that the SSIICs will not have moved on to someone else?
Since ROFTERS are almost exclusively comprised of SSIICs, I thought I’d enlist your help in developing a heuristic to determine when learning about a person’s work is worth the effort.
Surely someone has a few useful rules-of-thumb for this problem. And if not, I’m confident we can harness the wisdom of the crowd to come to workable solution.
So what do you think: How do we know whether we should really know about someone that other people already know?
February 10th, 2011 | 3:08 pm
Read a few pages of Zizek’s books, and you will know whether he is worth reading. I did so, and his Lacanian meditation on the relationship of use of the hand in male masturbation to something-or-other about the vagina told me everything I didn’t need to know.
On the other hand, he writes interesting political essays sometimes.
February 10th, 2011 | 3:09 pm
The best measure I have come up with is to use those I already know (and appreciate) as sounding boards against which to judge the relevance of the new theorist/philosopher,etc. In other words if I come across a reference to Josef Pieper in MacIntyre I am more likely follow up on Pieper than if I come across a reference to Pieper in Time Magazine. Work I enjoy/enjoyed becomes a new though not infallible authority upon which to evaluate whether to pursue understanding unfamiliar work.
Additionally the more I seem to cross paths with a thinker, be it for apparently coincidental reasons (e.g. casual conversation,tv, etc.), or from academic reasons (research literature, books, etc.), the more I am inclined to go check out their work. At some point one has stop chalking up such “collisions” to chance. The SSIIC is kind of like a quest. It reminds me of James quote of F.J. Stephen at the end of “The Will to Believe”
“In all important transactions of life we have to take a leap in the dark…”
Of course that doesn’t answer the more vexing problem of how one initiates the quest to understand someone like Zizek on one’s own.
Personally, I stick closer to the established canon, or thinkers related to to those thinkers, as I have a largeenough deficit there (and I have a Ph.D.) Since those thinkers have stood the test of time there is less risk. At the end of the day one realizes how much all academic inquiry must either admit broad swaths of blindness or faithfully rely on the fact that if we seek we shall find.
February 10th, 2011 | 3:48 pm
A small correction: Philosophy of Right is by Hegel, not Heidegger.
February 10th, 2011 | 4:04 pm
Gregg In other words if I come across a reference to Josef Pieper in MacIntyre I am more likely follow up on Pieper than if I come across a reference to Pieper in Time Magazine.
Good suggestion. That is mostly what I do now as a default and probably the best first-step approach to the problem.
Personally, I stick closer to the established canon, or thinkers related to to those thinkers, as I have a large enough deficit there . . .
I’m the same way. There is already so much from the past that I need to catch up on that it’s hard to fit in anything new.
Anonymous A small correction: Philosophy of Right is by Hegel, not Heidegger.
Oh my. Well, I guess you can add “Can’t distinguish the works of Heidegger from Hegel: to the list things I don’t know. ; )
February 10th, 2011 | 4:20 pm
I understand your hesitancy with regards to tackling the thought of Žižek. The reason why you’ve probably heard about him has more to do with the fact that he has single handedly re-defined the notion of public intellectual, radical Christian atheist philosopher and obscene misanthrope all rolled into one, which makes him irresistible, and less to do with the SSIIC name-droppers. He doesn’t hold a tenure position which in his words means he “doesn’t have to kiss a**” and this is reflected in his writing and his youtube video lectures. For starters try this lecture that he gave at a very conservative well heeled (healed), Boston University. The very fact that uptight intellects from Boston Mass, thought they need to invite this guy, does mean something, though what exactly is open for discussion. Here is the lecture: http://snipurl.com/20o21k
His combination of high theory coupled with examples from popular culture i.e., Kungfu Panda, plus with an assortment of vulgar insinuations plus his irrepressible and lengthy asides that are both humorous and outrageous and probably obscene, and not to mention tinged with a left-wing politics that is anathema to all that is American, academic and pristine, is what makes him something that could NEVER have come out of the North American academy. That’s why you’re hearing about him. His short books, Violence, Iraq the Borrowed Kettle and First as Tragedy Then As Farce are good places to start.
February 10th, 2011 | 4:40 pm
Four years of college policy debate and I still don’t understand Zizek. Take it from me – he ain’t worth it.
February 10th, 2011 | 5:06 pm
Do a Google search with the full name of the intellectual in question with
1) “david brooks”
2) “slate magazine”
3) “92nd Street Y”
4) “new york review of books”
(Admittedly a NewYorkCentric list.)
If there’s any link which connects the 2, then the intellectual in question has migrated from “pure esoterica” into “you probably should know something about him/her”
February 10th, 2011 | 5:45 pm
Actually, jm, that search would convince me that my time would be better spent reading something else.
February 10th, 2011 | 6:13 pm
You really hadn’t heard of Girard?
February 10th, 2011 | 8:27 pm
I am also working my way through the Seussian oeuvre and don’t have time for these lightweights until I am finished.
February 10th, 2011 | 10:15 pm
Perhaps the problem, and I mean not as an accusation but as something to ponder, is that curiosity is a vice, not a virtue (the corresponding virtue is studiousness). If you desire knowledge for your own sake, rather than for the sake of something larger than yourself, then historically Christians, most especially Augustine, would suggest that you are engaging in a form of intellectual lust or that you are seeking knowledge out of pride — we want to be known as the one who knows. So perhaps the standard should be: “What project am I working on, what is the goal of my knowledge, and do I need Zizek to reach that goal?” There is a difference between what you supposedly ‘should’ know and what you actually need to know. Usually it only takes a couple of pages to figure it out and given what the people have posted above, the only project I can imagine making the study of Zizek worthwhile is a project that seeks to take him apart.
February 10th, 2011 | 11:56 pm
I’m just amazed that you figured out how to type z’s with little semi-circular v-thingies above them (is that something I should learn, too?)
February 11th, 2011 | 8:14 am
I’m lazy. If someone says something fairly interesting, I google him and see if there are any videos concerning his or her work. If there is and I still find the person compelling, I look into seeing if any essays are on-line, if there are any other public lectures, etc. I first heard of Zizek in the film, The Examined Life. I later moved on to the film, Zizek! Then I read The Puppet and the Dwarf (not recommended), The Sublime Object of Ideology (recommended), Tarrying with the Negative (recommended). I’ll probably read The Ticklish Subject in the next month or so.
I would get the “Zizek!” documentary, and if still interested, look up the hours of lectures on Youtube. This one is a good place to start:
http://tinyurl.com/66p2a7x
And, true story, the first time I heard of Rene Girard is when I saw him give an impromptu lecture at Berkeley, and I wasn’t even coming to hear him speak. I wasn’t that impressed, and still haven’t got around to reading him. Not in a hurry.
February 11th, 2011 | 8:48 am
Joe,
I just finished working on a book that seems tailor-made for you: David Fitch’s “The End of Evangelicalism? Discerning a New Faithfulness for Mission: Towards an Evangelical Political Theology,” Theopolitical Visions 8 (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2011). As an evangelical, Fitch believes Zizek is helpful for exposing how evangelicalism has become ideological in ways that inhibit the church’s mission: http://wipfandstock.com/store/The_End_of_Evangelicalism_Discerning_a_New_Faithfulness_for_Mission_Towards_an_Evangelical_Political_Theology.
I have heard Zizek lecture on several occasions but have not myself read much of his work. He is brilliant, hilarious, and odd, but I think you’ll find in Fitch’s book that he can be very useful and challenging to theologians.
February 11th, 2011 | 10:00 am
You don’t need to read Zizek’s scholarly works. There are 3 DVDs, countless youtube videos, and so on. That’s the Zizek most people are familiar with. His writings on Hegel and Lacan are for specialists.
February 11th, 2011 | 10:02 am
Joe, I was, like you, unaware of the guy until a few years ago. But I pulled one of his books from the shelf at Borders and dove in. He’s not nearly as inaccessible as the earlier deconstructionists …and as a priest friend of mine said, he really does get (appreciate) St. Paul. Which is saying a lot since he’s an atheist as far as I can make out. So I would say check him out (of the library).
February 11th, 2011 | 12:22 pm
Mr. Carter: I share your anxiety of facing the mountain of human knowledge with the Sisyphean thimble-cup of mortality. I have come to regard it as a spiritual problem, touching on gluttony.
We are finite, forgetful, flawed beings. We must make our peace with that. Humility is the beginning of all wisdom. “All I know is I know nothing.” Compare your wretched self with the immensity of the mountain, then compare the mountain to the infinity of the Lord. Your union with true wisdom dwarfs that mountain and makes prior, unaided attempts to conquer it seem naïve if not hubristic.
I gave up a soft life of pure mind at the university and I happily work in the trenches, stumbling across Žižek or Girard as providence would have it, content with my dilettantism (aided by the blessed-accursed internet). Yes, I will forever be inferior to minds more studied and more facile, such as (Dr.) David Hart’s, but I am still close to the source of all life and wisdom, and that forms the basis of all happiness.
It would be satisfying to enrich my mind intensely with “the best that has been thought and said,” but we have greater priorities and so little time. As powerful as knowledge makes one feel, it is but a means to an end, and there is hidden vanity in the surge of false vitality that often accompanies (and often drives) our pursuit of the intellectual idol. Embrace your limits, hope for transcendence, love the wisdom that teaches you how to love better.
Don’t get me wrong: I share your obsessive hunger to know. All the more reason to be vigilant of its proper place. God bless our curiosity! God allow us the tools to explore his creation! But God protect us from the nagging despair of incompleteness. God protect us from our separation from all wisdom. God protect us from that devilish lie, “If only I had a little more time in this life, I could tackle Spinoza….” Faith says our right-ordered appetites will be satiated beyond the possibility of our present understanding. Our hearts are restless till they rest in Thee, O Lord.
“For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. … For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.” — 1 Corinthians 13:9-12
“How Do You Know Whether You Should Really Know About Something That Other People Already Seem to Know?” You don’t know. There is something even greater than knowing. And that is trust.
February 11th, 2011 | 3:20 pm
John Lukacs mentioned something of this in his book THE PASSING OF THE MODERN AGE. He wrote in 1980 that the “Knowledge Explosion” was ill-named because it was not knowledge that had exploded. There was now too much even for specialists to keep up with, even in their own languages. Instead of learning more and more about less and less, people were learning less and less about more and more.
Which ties into that distinction between studiousness and mere curiosity.
February 11th, 2011 | 4:12 pm
I suggest asking strangers on the internet.
February 12th, 2011 | 10:49 am
If you have ten minutes, here’s some Žižek:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpAMbpQ8J7g
Enjoy (if you haven’t already)!
February 12th, 2011 | 12:50 pm
Here’s another suggestion for Mr. Carter:
Ask recognized experts to list, from their fields of expertise, the most important readings for the curious, yet finite (be sure to stress this), would-be generalist. I’m sure many would be happy to oblige.
Then publish that list for us all (and just be sure to include the names of your sources).
February 14th, 2011 | 12:28 pm
There are few approaches:
1. The age old system of academia on according importance is via how many times someone is cited by others. If an author is being cited a lot in everything you read. Its time to check him or her work out.
2. Get an accessible introductory book on that thinker and try to get some idea how that author approaches issues or topics or problems dear to you. If you like what she is doing with them you can continue or else drop her.
3. Establish a “series” as a framework on what you want to read (eg. you want to read all contemporary philosophical theories of love etc, which would include Zizek) and then work your way through authors that show up on that ‘series’. Of course this method works if reading is transparently integrated into your life (like daily TV watching is for most folks).
February 15th, 2011 | 1:07 pm
Start with a couple of films of his and then decide if you want to know more– “Zizek” or “The Perverts Guide to Cinema” or watch a couple of interviews on YouTube
February 16th, 2011 | 1:10 am
We can be hunter-gatherers of avant-garde information and/or we can cultivate and exchange via a “marketplace of ideas” (and buy from a variety of reputable sellers almost exactly what we crave). But I once heard television channel-surfers described as “grazers” who had to keep moving and consume tons because their diet was not nutritious.
Lacan described an “objet petit a” – the unobtainable object of desire- that he and Žižek relate to Hitchcock’s “MacGuffin”.
The first few pages of Žižek’s books and his movie and television PERFORMANCES are, I think, meant to be sensational. Some people would say that he’s skipped a few things that “the rest of us” know. But why hasn’t he been dismissed?
Žižek gets us Cinema Theorists at least to revisit Lacan- attachment, independence, and subconscious drives. I don’t know if he’s said it in so many words, but getting “us” or each one of us to accurately, succinctly, and confidently argue against either his introductory or explicated claims (or our or “our” lack of ability to do so) could go down in history as his brilliantly neo-Marxist (Hegelian, dialectical) plan.
Žižek is more worth watching than…I don’t even know who his understudies are…because he incorporates more of these tellingly tender issues and “argues” them well enough that he is a fun and challenging opponent.
Find a worthy opponent of your own…define your appetite then see who’s with you- who knows, either one might be Žižek.
February 24th, 2011 | 10:49 am
Um, what about reading the following, for a Coles-Notes-esque catch up:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/zizek/
That’s what I did, after watching his movies and before reading his books :)
March 3rd, 2011 | 10:17 am
Re: King
I have have trust that the good old days will return when religious people will stop crowbarring myth into every unrelated discussion.
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