D O C U M E N T
14th September, 2000
Hi, folks:
Enjoy the dance to the tune of emancipation..
Carl.
POSTMODERN POLKA*
* "Postmodern" -- no entry provided;
"Polka -- a vivacious couple dance of
Bohemian origin with three steps and a
hop in duple time"
Webster's Third New International
Dictionary, 1971
Modernity is out,
Postmodernity is in,
Deconstructionists abound,
Marxists are in quarantine.
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
Dancing polka all night long,
Derrida and Lyotard
Teaching them postmodern songs.
Deconstructed communism
Spells national catharsis,
What is, then, postmodernism --
Last refuge of a Marxist?
Differand and episteme,
Hypertalia and discourse --
None of this you'll understand
Without going to the source.
Go to Nietzsche, read de Man,
Heidegger and Kierkegaard,
Study Igor Guberman,
Lacan, Foucault and Baudrillard.
Intertextuality
Brackets all reality,
Annihilates morality,
Encourages pastiche.
Kak na Diminy imeniny,
Ispekli my karavai,
Vot takoi vyshiny,
Vot takoi niziny.
Apocalypse is in the air,
Hip-hop-hopping everywhere,
Masquerading's no sin,
Check your Mikhail Bakhtin.
Truth is fiction, being is naught,
Grand narrative is overwrought,
Texts are with desires fraught,
(This is what I have been taught).
Skepticism? Obscurantism?
Irreverence or rudeness?
Playfulness or self-indulgence?
Who can tell the difference.
Bellyaching is discouraged,
Bring in ironic attitude.
Is this really stoic courage
Or simply moral turpitude?
Freude, schoner Gotterfunken,
Tochter aus Elisium
Wir betreten feuertrunken
Himmlische, dein Heiligthum.
Deconstruction is the obverse
Of arch-Hegelean heresy,
It's dialectics in reverse --
Digging for alterity.
Engagement must be deconstructive,
Screw the body politic,
Is this inverted Aufhebung
Or supermarginality?
We are hooked to teleprompters,
Wired to the media.
A hyperpastiche comes your way
>From the Russian cyclopedia.
Laclusliki, Ladustiki,
Gde bylee u babushki,
Chto elee -- kashku,
Chto peelee -- brazhku.
Democracy is domination,
Stalin is a hit man.
La differance -- a nice excuse
To defer commitment.
No need to take a stance,
Cause everything's political.
Hypercritical are pomos,
Or are they hypocritical?
Deine Zauber binden wieder,
was der Mode Schwerd getheilt;
Alle Menschen werden Bruder,
wo dein saniter Flugel weilt.
It's the world in the making
Versus world under erasure,
Time to stop eternal faking
(Or is it faked eternity?).
Pragmatists are in distress,
They also hate dualities,
But Mead and Peirce had always stressed
Obdurate realities.
James and Dewey are postmodern,
Well, you know, to some extent.
Richard Rorty, Richard Bernstein,
Richard Shusterman consent.
So, in actu and in situ,
Like a seasoned pragmatist,
Preach what you like to practice,
Practice what you like to preach.
Ditch your facile postpoliteness,
Dump in-your-face democracy,
Try felicity and kindness,
Once again you'll bear the lightness
and unforgetfulness of being.
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