Pulled this one out of my drafts folder and thought I’d finally post it. If you want to read Derrida, read the works below in the following order before you start: Plato: Phaedrus, Phaedo, Ion, Republic: Book VII Descartes : Meditations Spinoza: Ethics G.W. Leibniz: Theodicy, Monadology, Discourse on Metaphysics. See Dewey on Leibniz. Rousseau: Essay on the Origins of Language, Confessions, Discourse on theContinue reading “Notes on Derrida 2: A Reading Regimen”
Category Archives: Literary Theory
The Shape of Beckett’s Waiting
I recently recovered a first-semester graduate paper of mine about Samuel Beckett’s play Waiting for Godot. I believe I wrote it as a final paper for a graduate class on Irish literature taught by Dr. John Warner. He advocated for my admission to the program on the basis of my senior undergraduate honor’s thesis onContinue reading “The Shape of Beckett’s Waiting”
“Laughing with a Mouth of Blood”: St. Vincent’s Gothic Grotesque
Many of St. Vincent’s songs, videos, and stage acts use grotesque scenarios and images to examine the roles we play and the identities we create and embody as well as the anxieties associated with them. They employ “exaggeration, distortion, or unexpected combination” to construct and inhabit subjectivities that are inescapably hybrid and often monstrous: simultaneouslyContinue reading ““Laughing with a Mouth of Blood”: St. Vincent’s Gothic Grotesque”
“A Woman with an Attitude”: Male and Female Gothic and Siouxsie and the Banshees
Notably, the [1976 Thames Television interview with the Sex Pistols] also showcases Siouxsie’s measured response, one that encapsulates what her life and music has always been about — a challenge to patriarchal structures through measured control mixed with playful dismissiveness. Diana Edelman, Women in Rock, Women in Romanticism, p. 123 Diana Edelman contributed chapter 6Continue reading ““A Woman with an Attitude”: Male and Female Gothic and Siouxsie and the Banshees”
New Site Redesign
I’ve changed the title of this website to “The Philosophy of Contemporary Song” to better reflect site content over the next year. With a new title comes a new look. I’ll be blogging more soon about my latest book, Women in Rock, Women in Romanticism, then about Bob Dylan’s The Philosophy of Modern Song andContinue reading “New Site Redesign”
The Philosophy of Contemporary Song 