Literary Theory and the Intellectual
Reading Gramsci and West for this course was my first time to hear about their specific ‘intellectual’. For me, and for many others too I assume, an intellectual is a person who is smart and uses his intellect to achieve things, mostly new things, voicing them privately. On the one hand, this idea of an intellectual touches on Gramsci and West’s ideas of an intellectual, because of the creation of new things or ideas. But on the other hand it is different, because both say that the intellect is not what makes them an (organic) intellectual. Everyone is an intellectual, but the intellectuals that they are talking about, stand up for something they find important and make people aware of them. Therefore, the intellect is not the most important characteristic of an intellectual, but the willingness and ability to stand up for the ideas. These intellectuals, as it were, enter this idea into history.
At first I found this idea of an intellectual without intellect (or at least one without the need of an intellect) hard to grasp, but when reading more theory and reading Mosley’s The Right Mistake, I started to understand what could be valuable about such a person. As we discussed in class, the main character of The Right Mistake, Socrates, is here introduced as a sort of Jesus, and it is immediately clear what West and Gramsci mean with the idea of an organic intellectual. Socrates organises a school for anyone who wants to learn. This is something new and it spreads Socrates’ idea that everyone should be able to learn if they want to. This idea – and Socrates’ actual realisation of it – makes, in the end of the novel, the court clear Socrates from all charges.
As I was reading other students’ essays, I came across a lot of people who were saying that knowledge alone is not enough, just as experience alone is not enough. De Certeau’s know-how is something new that develops when knowledge and experience are combined. This idea fits nicely with what Gramsci and West say about the intellectual. They have to combine their knowledge and experience to bring to light something that has been suppressed or has been kept out of the public’s knowledge. The intellectual’s job, or the “function of the intellectual” is thus to make their idea public knowledge, as Socrates does in Mosley’s novel.
I found West’s explanation of why there are so many more white intellectuals than there are black ones a bit problematic. He says that it is difficult for black students to be taken seriously when choosing to study a science like literary theory than if they would for instance study law. But who says that this doesn’t count for white people as well? I cannot even begin to count how many people have (sometimes sarcastically, although trying to hide it as to not hurt my feelings) asked me what I will expect to achieve with my choice of study. They all agree that languages and literature are interesting, but none of them seem to be able to think of a way for me to make money with it – as if that’s the most important thing in the world. This joins my further incomprehension of why reading a Dickens novel would be more useful than to read for instance a James Bond novel. Both can be regarded through the same critical and theoretical frameworks and both are part of literature as a whole. I think people are still much too much attached to the idea of a canon, and that anything outside of the canon is not worth reading, as is for instance James Bond and most of the literature written by black people as well.
I think that the question of why literary theory in general – and within that, contemporary literature – is regarded as so much lower than other things to study is more important than the question of why black intellectuals are regarded with less seriousness when they choose this kind of study. Or perhaps I am just too narrow minded because of my rooting in literary theory.
Bibliography:
De Certeau, Michel. The Practice of Everyday Life. California: University of California Press,
2002.
Mosley, Walter. The Right Mistake. New York: BasicCivitas: 2008.
West, Cornel. The Dilemma of the Black Intellectual. Cambridge: South End Press, 1991.
mickeypotthoff, 
winonah is discussing. 
jetvangroningen, and 
Jeroen 11:08 am on October 31, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I think it’s not so much a question of finding differences when it comes to the low regard that exists for both literary theory and black intellectuals, as of finding the similarities. Discrimination against an area of study or a group of students are to me comparable on a theoretical level as they are both up against a set of dominant discourses that focus on excluding certain groups.
FlorisPieterse 7:44 pm on November 2, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Daya,
I too have had my strong moments of doubt as far as the “importance” of literature studies in comparison to other fields of knowledge taught at universities. And of course once we get past the question of “Is literature worth studying?” we enter the debate of “Which literature is worth studying?”
In my opinion it all depends on the context you’re analyzing something in. For example, a James Bond novel would be very interesting to analyze in a cultural or structuralist context, but much less so in a psycho-analytical context (the obvious exception being the over-use of phallic symbolism).
As for black students and literature studies, West’s argument makes quite a bit of sense to me. Whether we like it or not, large portions of the black population of many well-to-do western countries come from a poor background. I can definitely imagine this creating a feeling of responsibility among black kids with a real chance at a university education to go for something that is guaranteed to land them a well-paying, well-respected job.
This is all just speculation of course. Maybe I’ve just been watching too many movies.
rene 12:09 am on November 4, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I agree with both Floris and Jeroen. The importance of literature studies depends mostly what it is you want to achieve and in which culture you are situated. The same goes for a group of students. I’m sure that if I went to Iraq to study Christianity, people would question my motives. So, being an ethnic minority getting involved in studying a ‘semi-important studies’, people will probably tend to take you less seriously. That is probably because people expect to see people from a poor background study something that will get them a decent job – meaning a well paying job.
mickeypotthoff 12:12 pm on November 5, 2010 Permalink | Log in to Reply
An interesting essay as a whole, but I had to pick out the last part as the ”highlight” as this characterises and almost epitomises my thoughts on the importance of literary studies. I myself attach quite a lot of value to a canon, but this value has, I must admit, deteriorated somewhat ever since doing an academic course on the same James Bond you mentioned. I too, am now beginning to somewhat question the canon. However, I still think it is an important tool which should not be abandoned in favour of a literary landscape with no classics at all.