Whitman and the political landscape of America in 2017

"I resist any thing better than my own diversity," - Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

For me, it was impossible to read this quote from Section 17 of Song of Myself without immediately abstracting it into its capacity to be applied to the contemporary society of the United States, particularly in regards to the divided political spectrum that has recently manifested itself.

While Whitman embodies his "knit of identity" and celebrates his "multitudes", the political landscape of the United States has seen an even divide along the lines of conservatism and liberalism, white despite their traditional ideological opposition concerning such matters as taxation, the economy and legislation for varying degrees of social security, their differences are often reduced currently to a one-dimensional explanation wherein the left is considered pro-diversity and the right is considered as anti-diversity.

To some extent, this is reflected in the critical psychological literature wherein it can be empirically measured that those of a conservative political disposition are high in trait orderliness, meaning that they like things, both literally and figuratively, to remain static and to have well-defined borders. In contrast, those on the left side of the political spectrum are high in traits openness and low in conscientiousness, meaning that generally, they enjoy the fusion and deconstruction of these borders to coalesce various ideas and create new possibilities that transcend rigid categorization. Recently, this has manifested itself in President trump's campaign pledge to build a protective wall along the Southern border of the United States with the goal of greatly reducing the numbers of illegal immigrants crossing this border into the United States from Mexico below.

Returning to Whitman as our stimulus for discussion, the question then becomes: Does America resist any thing better than its own diversity?

While the existence of this diversity is not subject to debate, given the myriad of distinct ethnic groups and cultural movements that exist within the United States (hence the popularization of the term 'Melting Pot'), it is clear that some strains of American culture are in open rebellion against the celebration of this diversity. On a personal note, I would find it incredibly interesting to teleport Whitman's ghost to 2017 and gather his thoughts on the current state of American diversity and its subsequent response across the vast swathe of distinct religious, cultural and political communities in this country. Would he celebrate America's diversity as an extension of his own?

Paul Gilroy and W.E.B Du Bois on Slave songs

"Black people singing slave songs as mass entertainment set new public standards of authenticity for black cultural expression. The legitimacy of these new cultural forms was established precisely through their stance from the racial codes of minstrelsy."

"Du Bois places black music as the central sign of black cultural value, integrity, and autonomy." 

- Paul Gilroy, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (1993) 

Here, Gilroy (with reference to W.E.B Du Bois' The Souls of Black Folk) expands on a focal theme from our recent study in class. Specifically he defines the musical output of the black community in terms of its capacity to translate authentic and valuable cultural expression, validate the cultural legitimacy of this community within the very communities from which they were marginalized and to  consistently establish their autonomy as a people throughout the various stages of their tumultuous history.

While Gilroy acknowledges that such meanings originate in the slave songs, he also argues that they transcend them and as such, are now applicable to more modern black musical movements, the most notable in recent times being the hip-hop movement beginning in the 1970s. In itself, this comprises an interesting and powerful insight into the role of music for this community as we consider its potential as a political tool wherein such music applies a kind of Joseph Nye-esque 'Soft Power' on its audience, influencing them in their stance and understanding of "black cultural expression". It is also interesting to note that the persistence of black diaspora music (originating with the slave song) as a statement of autonomy is one that parallels the way in which other motifs have been implemented by this community. Consider for example, how the appropriation of Christian principles has been used effectively by such writers as Olaudah Equiano and Frederick Douglass in order to, as with the elements of music described by Gilroy, establish a kind of cultural legitimacy and act as a persuasive statement for their autonomy.

Finally, it is worth noting that Gilroy's statement that "Black people singing slave songs as mass entertainment set new public standards for black cultural expression" is predicated on the idea that, fundamentally, black diaspora culture has been consistently measured and examined in terms of its reception at the hands of the dominant white cultures within which it has traditionally been practiced. Accordingly, Gilroy forces us to reconsider the dominant historical narrative from the black perspective and to understand the specific social structure within which black music has been explored and performed, culminating in such cultural movements as the Harlem renaissance.

 

'What to the American Indian is Colombus Day?'

When Frederick Douglass asks 'What to the slave is the Fourth of July?' - he exposes the meta-historical naivety of the nationalist and democratic ideologies upon which the celebrations of Indepence day are predicated. He reveals the rife hypocrisy upon which the nation of America was founded and developed, a hypocrisy that was considered superfluous to America's prosperity and, accordingly, a hypocrisy that went largely without contestation by the very cultures responsible for its  existence and centrality to the collective identity of this American Nation.

Douglass posed this poignant question in 1852, and it is now 2017. However, my personal experiences and studies since arriving in Montana have brought me into close contact (personal, academic and professional) with the diverse cultures of the American Indian Nations that live here and have now led me to consider the implications of Douglass' writing for these indigenous communities as they deal with their own sense of identity, visibility and validity in modern America. Even a rudimentary historical understanding of such cultures will reveal the ease with which Douglass' question can be quickly transferred from an enslaved and dehumanised African-American demographic to a marginalised and massacred Native American population.

While the Fourth of July constitutes a celebration of America's independence and by association, a general outpouring of patriotism and nationalist sentiments, the federally-recognised celebration of Colombus day (the second Monday of every October) applauds Christopher Colombus for his discovery of America which ultimately, would culminate in the colonisation of America and its inception as a sovereign power. However, as the Fourth of July was racially selective in its recognition of independence and freedom, so too is Colombus day a projection of the dominant European-derived culture under which their sense of exceptionalism is reinforced while conveniently ignoring the holocaust of North America's indigenous peoples instigated by the eponymous explorer.

While the response from these Native communities to the holiday was and is less visible than that of Frederick Douglass (perhaps an indication of their near-complete expulsion from the dominant society within which they live in the reservation system), it is nonetheless poignant and striking in its similarities with the popularised African-American equivalent. As demonstrated by Douglass, much contemporary Native media uses Colombus Day as an opportunity to contest the dominant narrative of Colombus as the hero and intrepid explorer and insert their own voice into this narrative in order to reveal its artificial nature and to articulate an objective perspective on his discoveries and their implications. Although this issue is vast and almost inexhaustible in its complexity and tendency to segue into further discussions, it is one that remains pertinent to our study of such issues as race in early American Literature. Finally, it is worth noting that several cities and regions across the United States have since declined to recognise Colombus Day for its one-dimensional narrative and its inevitable ability to incite violence against an already troubled national demographic of American Indians. Indeed, such cities as Los Angeles, CA and Albuquerque, NM have since replaced Colombus Day with 'Indigenous People's Day' in an effort to reverse the harm caused by its predecessor and to highlight the dynamic role they occupy in America in the twenty-first century.

Dickinson & the Materiality of Literature: A personal example

Reflecting on our recent class work on the poetry of Emily Dickinson and specifically, the way in which she presented her work in a way that subverts our understanding of what typically constitutes our engagement with a text - I noticed that in my personal writings, I had actually demonstrated a vaguely similar approach.

The images above show some of my notes written at various times across a week I spent in the downtown area of Las Vegas, NV in August 2017. Although I have not had the time to process these initial thoughts into a series of short stories and articles (which is the final goal), these notes represent my raw reactions to my brief time in the city while also referencing other works of pop culture and literature which have influenced me. Although somewhat obscure, the main subject of my writing here concerned the desert as a landscape, the death of the American dream, the extreme and savage nature of Las Vegas and the way in which an individual might interact with this environment in order to find what they are looking for, both literally and metaphorically.

However, one of my favorite things about writing out these notes in my hotel room, and one of my favorite things about looking back on them - is that they are written on the customized paper of the specific hotel I was staying at. There is something sadistically ironic and pleasing to me about writing a fun critique of the environment I was in while writing it on materials which, in some sense, represent my own subscription to this culture which in my writing, I claim to (partially) oppose.

To me, this recalls Dickinson's notion of the physical materials used to present literature being implicated in the overall meaning that this literature translates to its reader. Strangely, this is not something I had contemplated before having dealt with Dickinson's work in this class - but I have since spent some time thinking this through and considering to what extent my subconscious had enjoyed writing on the hotel paper because of the ways in which it informed my understanding of the notes I had written. Although I haven't formed a cohesive conclusion about how Dickinson's practice might relate to my notes from Las Vegas, I do believe that there is some significance here & I like the idea that this idea of materiality in literature is something that has persisted in the field.

Jack White: A Modern case study in imbuing everyday objects with Art

Often described as the 'Willy Wonka' of rock, Detroit's Jack White sits somewhere between mad professor and traditional musician. This began in 2004 when White was in a two-piece band called 'The Upholsterers' while working as an upholsterer himself. After distributing their first single conventionally through a record label with subsequent concerts to promote and perform the material, White decided to shake things up with a radical re-definition of what it meant to record and release a song. White only printed one hundred copies of their second single 'Your Furniture Was Always Dead... I Was Just Afraid To Tell You' and subsequently hid the copies randomly inside subtle holes and cavities he had made, and then covered within the physical pieces of furniture he worked on as an upholsterer.

For me, this immediately recalled some of the methods implemented by Dickinson in the presentation of her poetry, specifically through her 'envelope poems' as well as the fascicles, to a lesser extent. Between the work of both Dickinson and White, there is this idea that art somehow takes on greater value or significance when it is presented, examined, or experienced literally and figuratively through mundane elements of every day life. The reasons for this are ambiguous by definition. However, we might speculate that the inherent irony in appropriating every-day objects in order to construct vast and elaborate meanings, forces us to reconsider our interpretation of the work's content at multiple levels of analysis, thus rendering it thought-provoking. Furthermore, there is an element of surprise here as we would not expect an envelope to provide the medium for philosophical ruminations on the nature of existence - just as we would not expect to accidentally break a table and then find a vinyl recording inside among the splinters and sawdust.

In the case of White's single, two of the hundred singles have been reported to his current record label as having been found. The rest, as stated in the article posted below, are "no doubt sitting in random suburban Detroit living rooms" which I think is astonishing in the sense that it challenges our common understanding of the artist's usual behaviors. Typically, artists and writers seek to inform and influence (as epitomized by such writers as Emerson and Thoreau) but to hide one's own work in this way, circumvents this segment of the artistic process and renders the artistic output private. This too is reflected in Dickinson's 'envelope poems' which we can infer from the medium in which they are presented, are personal and profound in nature but are also intended to communicate meaning, just not in an explicit or large way as we might expect from other writers.

Evidently, the respective motives of Dickinson and White will remain unknown, however their specific and eccentric methods are certainly intriguing and encourage me to reflect personally on my own artistic output while also forcing me to consider the significance of such methods in the meanings they construct in their work.

Emily Dickinson & Alice in Wonderland: The Fall & Consciousness

"And then a Plank in Reason, broke,

And I dropped down, and down - 

And hit a World, at every plunge,

And Finished knowing - then -"

- Emily Dickinson

Dickinson concludes this poem on sheet two of her sixteenth fascicle with a passage wherein she describes a "Plank in Reason" breaking before falling through a series of worlds and that this leads to her having "Finished knowing". This idea, I believe, is astonishing in its capacity to reveal meaning at multiple levels of analysis and inform our understanding not just of her work from a literary perspective, but in terms of the truths it states that are profoundly ingrained into our human psyche. This passage reminded me immediately of 'Alice in Wonderland' wherein the eponymous character famously falls down the rabbit hole, thus commencing her journey of discovery and at a deeper level, the emergence of her consciousness.

Although somewhat simplistic, it is widely accepted that Alice's fall down the rabbit hole is emblematic of a kind of philosophical quest for knowledge, even if it is undertaken inadvertently. Essentially, Alice must leave the normal or 'adult' world constricted by the laws of nature and an anthropocentric culture in order to discover true meaning and knowledge. I would argue that it is exactly this archetype that is articulated here by Dickinson as she completes her quest for knowledge through her unintended descent through a different world. The notion of this quest as being undertaken unwittingly is evidenced in the idea that the plank "broke" - evidently, this cannot be planned or designed, thus her falling is a process that begins contrary to her interests and desires. This in itself, is significant. It suggests perhaps that the path to enlightenment or truth as the highest value is one that requires hardship and self-sacrifice that may be accepted voluntarily (as we saw in the writings of Thoreau at Walden pond) or forced upon us seemingly at random, as is the case in Dickinson's poem and for Alice in Carroll's novel.

Furthermore, the idea that "Reason" itself must be broken in order for this journey to begin is somewhat ambiguous but equally relevant, I would argue. The first conclusion that seems logical to me is to identify human-defined "Reason" as a barrier to the sphere of enlightenment on a cosmic level (the idea of truth and its interactions with the cosmos is also dealt with by both Emerson & Thoreau). This is replicated in Alice's adventures wherein the laws of the world she knows, perhaps alternatively defined as "Reason" must be suspended or escaped in order for her journey of enlightenment to occur successfully.

I don't know what to make of these ideas exactly, but it's some idea and I think their persistence in the Western literary consciousness is a testimony to their capacity to articulate the truth.

Henry David Thoreau & the Jungian Shadow

"We are conscious of an animal in us, which awakens in proportion as our higher nature slumbers" - Henry David Thoreau, Walden

This concept articulated here by Thoreau, although simplistically defined, is extraordinary in its depth and capacity to inform our understanding of Thoreau's experience at Walden pond and, by extension, the nature of the human condition itself. This is because, although pre-dating the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung, Thoreau has epitomized one of Jung's core discoveries and theoretical components to the human psyche: the shadow.

In brief, the Jungian shadow refers to the unconscious elements of our personality and individual psychology, often popularized as our 'dark side'. Jung himself wrote that "no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort" and that doing so "involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real". Accordingly, I would argue that it is exactly this notion that is discovered (perhaps inadvertently) by Thoreau. In becoming conscious of "an animal in us", Thoreau learns to integrate the savage elements of his being into his daily life in a manner which invariably facilitates his profound revelations at Walden and often acts as a catalyst for great philosophical insight into a range of issues including; theories on the human's erection of monuments, travel, education and various ideologies of individualism and self-sufficiency.

This is further supported by Jung who writes that, becoming conscious of the shadow is "the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge, and it therefore, as a rule, meets with considerable resistance". Such are the inconceivable similarities between the experiences articulated by Thoreau and the concept of the Jungian shadow that they can be traced together, practically word for word. The introspective and personal nature of Thoreau's quest means that, by definition, his philosophical conclusions and personal intellectual development must be considered as 'self-knowledge', despite the fact that they perhaps hold relevance to the wider society. Furthermore, the idea of this consciousness meeting "with considerable resistance" is absolutely supported when Thoreau writes how he "cannot fish without falling a little in self-respect", with many more quotes from distinct passages acting as a variation on the theme.

If we conclude then, that Thoreau has become conscious of a certain inherent savage element to his nature, his shadow; how then does this inform our interpretation of Walden?

I would simply argue that it imbues the text with an undeniable element of truth. While we might dispute Thoreau's specific claims and conclusions, the Jungian mechanisms by which they were formed and on which he modeled his experience cannot be dismissed or doubted so easily. Jung's shadow, whether or not we are cognizant of its presence, is a defining characteristic of the human condition and our interactions with our own ambiguous consciousness. Indeed, the prevalence of the shadow archetype throughout our modern society and pop-culture is a testimony to its quiet, yet powerful capacity to shape our lives and experiences. It's the reason why Bilbo has to drop his identity as a harmless hobbit and betray his "higher nature" to become a burglar before he can conquer the dragon and steal the gold. It's the reason why James Dean must become a juvenile delinquent before constructing the archetypal Hollywood happy ending in 'Rebel Without a Cause'.

In voluntarily becoming conscious of your shadow, you immediately have a higher respect for yourself because you understand that you are capable of being a monster. It is exactly these ideas that are reached by Thoreau during his time at Walden and this should quickly enhance our understanding of his experience and by extension, the text that constitutes its product.




















Animalistic quote

- Thoreau has interacted with the primitive or savage elements of his human condition by doing what he has done at Walden.

- However, he has used this reversion as a catalyst for great philosophical insight into a range of issues (monuments, travel, education)

- This epitomizes the Carl Jung's idea of the shadow, even though it pre-dates it.

- in Pop culture - Bilbo becoms burglar to fight dragon