Discourse Stacks, Closure, Hegemony, and Complimentary Solutions

"...in enclosing 'situations of concern' and 'solutions' which address them within perceived boundaries, we are adopting a selective and artificial approach which can at best help only in making limited sense of reality, which by its complexity is almost certainly beyond our comprehension" D'arcy, B.G.

In contrast

"Derrida finds the root of this metaphysics, which he calls “metaphysics of pure presence", in logos, which is internal to language itself. He calls this “Logocentrism”, which is a tendency towards definitive truth-values through forced closure of structures 

All these terms are part of his strategy; he wants to use trace to “indicate a way out of the closure imposed by the system…”.[8] Trace is, again, not presence but an empty simulation of it:" Bass A

"Closed Systems" are artificial constructs generated by individual perceptions

Non Permeable boundaries - external interactions are not recognised within the enclosure

Creativity Re: Reproduction of 'normal' subject positions & "rational" choices/movements c.f body/power c.f.Foucault (Docile Bodies)

             (Enclosed?)Situated Subject Position                                                       Discourse Stack

The central pole represent the extended 'identification' of an aspect of the common base, a subject position in time: identity

The discs represent cultural layers/discourses: each containing 'objects', 'actions' and 'names'

The  top of the stack is where we  find an individual situated ; located subject position 

"A discourse is a system of words, actions, rules, beliefs, and institutions that share common values. Particular discourses sustain particular worldviews. We might even think of a discourse as a worldview in action. Discourses tend to be invisible--taken for granted as part of the fabric of reality."   Fairclough

"Do not think objects, Heidegger counseled, think fields. Do not think subject, think experience."   Hicks p60

Foucault has identified the strategy explicitly and clearly: 

“Discourses are tactical elements or blocks operating in the field of force relations; there can exist different and even contrasts of perception where subject and object are understood as one" 

c.f   situation, considered environment, potential environment

the enquirer whose interest is in the situation S may recognise the interactions between S (viable system ("self")) and its environment thus perceiving a permeable boundary (a) however at some point beyond a the enquirer (may) derive(s) total closure at (b) "non self"
c.f Massumi (1992)

c.f micro & macro  c.f personal and Collective

c.f. (S) situation (our closed perspective), (C) considered environment (conceptual / academic /meta consideration), (E) potential environment (open perspective reality?, speculation / intuition / collective unconscious / commons ?) c.f poles and base  

perhaps some forms of  inclusive listening, eg meditation, or derive: (ref definition of derive as a dynamic form of inclusive listening, c.f Chomsky on frameworks) makes the layers opaque/transparent (perhaps removes them). Does the "Society of the Spectacle" (DeBord, G) attempt this, or does it makes the layers appear solid 'real'? 

absolute closure may be at boundary (b) the models' concepts of natural resources obscuring that beyond, making the models only accessible to human capacity….(Popper 1972')

non the less attempts are made to listen beyond boundary (b)  the considered environment, to the potential/real environment… the present ground?

Shuttering Out - Hegemony

Natural Collective Self (Present Ground) shared commons, layerd textured surface, Pole and Base = Present ground? before they are covered by the untransparent layers, discourses?,  binary constructs in computer databases (Douglas)?,  stereotyped perspectives?, bounded rationality (Simon)?, personal constructions? (Kelly 1957), overlays?

The  foundation of the stack is where we find the Commons  (our inclusive We-ness) (a meta narrative?)
(the inclusive channel of public Discourse?)

Another aspect of this theory is that of transparency of layers

To the specific situated individual subject position, certain layers of the stack with their  words, actions, rules, beliefs, and institutions are transparent, some are not, some can be changed, some cannot...

If a layer is not transparent then the actions/objects/names of that layer are taken as given, they are 'facts' not assumptions... here is how cultural stacks depict ideology….c.f dashed boundary - hegemonic strength

Can the specific subject position change the transparency of layers an change the values within the layers: here is where we find the importance of meta-language, to be able to discuss access to values...

When access to these layers are available  via transparency the 'common layer meta-narrative' is able to be discussed in relation to the subject position as compare with just imposing an ideology...

The transparency of layers is directly related to  designed perceived affordance  and affect

"for in design, we care much more about what the user perceives than what is actually true. What the designer cares about is whether the user perceives that some action is possible (or in the case of perceived non-affordances, not possible)."

Norman

c.f 

"I use the concept of affect as away of talking about a margin of manouverability, the 'where we might be able to go' and 'what we might be able to do' in every present situation. I guess 'affect' is a word I use for 'hope': 

Massumi

Massumi is concerned with human value , Norman is concerned with design value...

Levels of creative enquiry may only be concerned with an objective task, in a closed situation i.e. the transparency of deep cultural levels may not be addressed, though they may well influence the enquiry

They may concern wider human values...social and ecological values

Yet most design tasks take place in the context of a 'functional' user /subject position, are wider values always relevant?

"The environment with is reconstructed ever more hastily for repressive control and for profit, at the same time becomes ever more fragile and incites further vandalism, Capitalism in its spectacular stage, rebuilds a fake(1) version of everything, and produces the means of destruction"
Society of the Spectacle (DeBord, G)
(1) and oppositional?

To retain and extend the hope (and affect)  Massumi is concerned with in such a context  may require the following...

" the abandomment of conditioned influences, , abandonment of reassurances about reality, and ultimately the sacrifice of ones Weltangschuung. as long as these influences remain intact, thepossibility of unending enquiry remains a myth" D'arcy

(Think about these )

Example : engineer a may be a music fan/sport fan so he has 

* an engineer layer with tools and skills
* a music genre fan with accessories and clothes 

* "sports fan" layer with accessories and actions

* he has a "human" layer with human needs (Shelter, love, food etc)

Some of these layers and there attributes may be more accessible/transparent to him than others...

If they are not transparent then he is subject to ideology...

Discussing a particular attribute of the engineer within a particular layer is not the same as discussing the stack, they are a different type of discussion...

Discussing the layer within the layer would be a meta-discussion (different from a meta narrative) it would show self awareness- reflexivity.....

Bridging the specific technical (The limb) with the collective  commons (the social body)?

Social Research is concerned with norms of name, action and object in the layers of the stack...?

But only in relation to an individual do they become enacted....

The academic tradition has an aim of creating/enabling access to knowledge:  transparent cultural layers as experienced from specific subject positions...

Does the market has an interest in defining the top of the stack as real(discursive self) and obscuring/creating distrust of  the more communal levels?

Does it drive an ontology of exclusion?
Is this  done by fixing subject positions that lack knowledge of alternatives to products sold?

These alternatives may be simple material replacements, or different relations/interpretations that sit at different cultural levels of the stack 

Information overload can also obscure access to alternatives...

We could perhaps explore Gaaltungs Transcend via this: see article  (re Habermas/Bourdieu/ Foucault/)

What about comparing types of creativity: (1) access to emergence   (2) construction

See App - Designed Affordance

Affordance (1/2)

Can humanistic technological development counter this (c.f the 'Fridge Friend' example on "The Contextualiser" - app example  temporal present information re sharing local knowledge about collecting wild food publicly on the ipad on the fridge) or via something cheaper  and ubiquitous of the same type?

...Caricature,Stereotyping and Humiliation of those who suggest alternatives may also play a role, here the top discs acts as  distorting lenses to the other discs and common base (eg Present ground - natural resources)

"there can be no ideal speech situation without practical equality"  Habermas ( we are apparently a long way from this re language and technology, other possible empathetic methods may have been excluded)

The inner rectangle represents the technological 'objective', subject to languages dualism and the technical progress that goes with it. The outer, the environment (arguably inaccessible or accessible depending on your philosophy), between them,  a communicative space (of academic/public/media discourse?) potentially for inter subjective agreement such as suggested   by Popper in science, also  by Habermas and Rorty whereby the 'opposing' limbs, personalised and collaborative  that emerge as we move up the functional hierarchy are enabled by the humanistic technology such as that potentially available on technology such as the IPad App to work together (or be revealed to work in harmony) such as in the example of the Fridge Friend which I will explain to interested parties.

The Transparency of layers is depicted by the dashed lines in the App.

(The buddhist approach as I understand it is referred to (this is speculative)...To listen inclusively to the environment enables the apparent boundaries to dissolve, the layers become transparent and the present ground within and without is revealed as connected...)

This could be argued to contrast with an aspect of the construction based market/language driven dualistic scenario driven by consumption and production rituals in both the material and linguistic(academic?) realms.

Depiction of binary capital instability

Obviously certain forms of production and consumption are necessary. However the current system maintains a binary instability of the "self" in the context of reduced production/consumption of those unnecessary unsustainable "goods"
overly promoted by commercial marketing and its consequences (the "system of signs" (Barthes)), and the military industrial complex.

If we take a strong post-structuralist position (in response?), it seems to me the academic project falls apart, for example any claims to be able to mark this essay/blog are ridiculous as the tutor is simply marking their selection of an infinite number of interpretations the text offers (Barthes) And if we completely abandon meta narrative for exclusive  closed autopoetic system of local discourse what of the inclusive commons physical, social, conceptual, spiritual (dependent origination)? what is left but the notoriously exclusive  ghost of capital...? (Derrida 1994) and it's profitable  sectarian disputes, and profitable control based replacements for an excluded common source of  inherent, emergent harmony.(dependent origination)

While the capitalist  ghost dominates, assumed closure is convenient  and  rational within the local institution (1) (Chomsky )   as it is cheaper in the short term, whether the assumed closed discourse adapts to a changing environment and hence survives in Ashbys sense of Ultrastability  is questionable. There lies the importance, and difficulty, of open research, the relation between quantitive and qualitative, and the extension of rationality beyond the local language games (Checkland (1999), Wittgenstein) and their influences (Foucualt) to the excluded potential complimentarity that for example complexity theory (Wynne) has reminded us of in  descriptions of self-similarity. To the 'becoming-other' mentioned by Massumi (1992 p140). That an  individualist segmented distinction orientated institution alienated from its inclusive emergent roots is capable of heeding this is another question.

Re the dualism that can be a problem at certain levels, the routes between include, 'communicative discourse' (Habermas) and Inclusive Listening (Derive), understanding personal construction (Kelly) Understanding other communicative styles (Massumi & Manning) (reflexivity), and an undistorted relation to the construction driven perspectives, eg via Soft Systems theory (Checkland P.), Viable Systems (Beer S.). Also (Macy. J) offers some insight and paths.


(An explanation of seeing beyond the flat plane of oppositional symbolic scenarios in the context of construction  will be added for those cognitive types trained to respect those above nature.)

To add and compare with discourse stacks    :

In  Derrida's own words :  deconstruction "doesn't destroy but analyses the  layers and formation of  concepts, offers a genalogical analysis of trajectory of concept...  and analyses hidden assumptions". eg subject   human rights -  become aware of historical components of concept and all its determinations (human subject - female subject , european). He argues it doesn't undermine rationality in a universal sense,  but  a particular norm of rationality (associated with the universal claims  of Aristotelian binary oppositions and Cartesian Dualism and the idea of a rational coherent conscious ego) which it can be argued  manifests in hegemony  and hence  deconstruction can be seen as a step to a future, more  inclusive rationality that respects difference (differance?).   This could perhaps be fruitfully compared/contrasted with Habermas's Communicative Rationality and Discourse Ethics(ref). 

1. 
   

Ashby (1956)  "An Introduction to Cybernetics" Chapman & Hall.
Checkland (1999) "Systems thinking Systems Practice" p A20
Chomsky  http://blip.tv/learning-without-frontiers/noam-chomsky-the-purpose-of-education-5925460
Davies and Harre (2004) "The Discursive Production of Selves"
De Bord (1967) Society of the Spectacle

Derrida J, (1978) "Writing and Difference" trans. Alan Bass (London & New York: Routledge, 1978), p. 393
Derrida J (1994)  "What is Ideology" in "Spectres of Marx"

D'arcy B.G. & Jayaratna N. (1983) "Systems Closure and Enquiry" 
Fairclough (1992) "Discource Analysis"
Foucault  (1978)  Docile Bodies
Hicks S. (2004) "Explaining Postmodernism"
Massumi (1992) "A Users guide to Capitalism and Schizophrenia" , Interview (on practical hope) http://www.international-festival.org/node/111
Massumi B, & Manning     http://www.inflexions.org,
Norman D. (2002) "The Design of Everyday Things"
Popper(1972) "The Logic of Scientific Discovery"
Vickers (1965) "The Art of Judgement"
Wynne B, (2004) "Reflexing Complexity"