Sunday, September 18, 2011

The Creation of Collectivities

Asch's story also made me consider the role and definition of collectivities. The narrator describes sleeping in a "flophouse" with other men: "And then I began to hear that these men sleeping were beginning to breathe in and out together, as if they somehow had become one homeless unemployed..." (302). In this passage, the idea of the "oneness" of the homeless men necessitates a certain "otherness" on the part of the narrator, whose function here is to observe rather than take part in their poverty. It is because the narrator is not poor and unemployed, and thus not part of the group defined by these characteristics, that he sense the togetherness of the group he is witnessing. Perhaps the idea of collectivity is linked to the idea of separateness, in this way. While there is a group unified by common traits, there must be other groups or individuals who don't have these traits for the idea of a collectivity to exist.

In Campbell's essay, she states that "agency is invention...of personae, subject positions, and collectivities" (5). Thus, it is not so much that collectivities claim agency, as it is that collectivities are created through the use of agency and perform actions based on a shared socio-historical past. "'The people' are a materiality brought into being by discourse" (5). It is text that creates collectivities. To me, this suggests that, according to Campbell, there is no room for existence outside of textual collectivities because texts aim towards a readership, not a particular reader. As the writer is creating his reader, the reader conforms to be the correct type of reader. Although there are different collectivities united by different traits, it is not possible to be separate from any group and therefore outside of the society, history, and discourse that inform human actions. It is not "otherness" which brings the idea of certain collectivities into being, but the idea of classifying an audience as a "togetherness."

1 comment:

  1. Miranda, you have articulated nicely some of the ways in which Campbell's "agency" is reciprocal.

    How easy do you think it would be to take that last idea and apply it to Asch's "In Search of America"? I ask because I struggled to articulate something in my comment on Shaun's post above, about the usefulness of *place* in Asch's narration. As a narrative device, *place* seems to give Asch a way to demonstrate his otherness and his sense of wandering at the same time.

    However, your post is making me rethink that. Maybe it isn't *place* that makes a way for Asch to do this, but rather *separation*.

    It makes me want to do a more careful study of collectivities throughout the story.

    -Prof. Graban

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