Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/09/11
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Now you are inventing history - or perhaps you are inventing Susan Sontag. But of course a quote that needs a couple of pages of explanation is profound, or is it the other way round? All the best! Raimo photos at http://personal.inet.fi/private/raimo.korhonen - -----Alkuperäinen viesti----- Lähettäjä: Chandos Michael Brown <cmbrow@wm.edu> Vastaanottaja: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us> Päivä: 08. syyskuuta 2000 18:35 Aihe: RE: [Leica] Re: LUGPhoto Quotes To Brighten Your Day >I speak as no especial admirer of Sontag and as a reasonably well-regarded >professional historian of some twenty years. Your criticism makes sense >only if one assumes the most naive position of regarding the "past" as >everything that chronologically precedes the 'now," which is patently not >Sontag's meaning. We do "invent" the past in that it contains no implicit >narrative--we construct narratives in our attempts to describe or interpret >a body of evidence that is otherwise inchoate. The literature on this, >across the broadest possible range of political ideologies, is vast, and it >would mere pedantry to recite it here. > >Historians of American historians will provide numerous examples of >misprision, misrepresentation, and outright falsehood that ought make us >blush when we claim immunity from ideology--from Smith's invention of the >Pocahontas episode in 1607--to the treatment of slavery in America, to such >contemporary historical "biographies" as -Dutch-. > >Many on the LUG love to relate the use of their Leica gear as impromptu >weapons in securing a favored position to document an event. Why, one >might ask, if not to lay claim to an 'authorative' representation of the >moment? If such a photo were to become emblematic, to appear, for >instance, as an illustration in a college history textbook, would we >dismiss the photographer's aggressive shaping of the image as >inconsequential to its content? I doubt it. > >Chandos > > >At 02:57 PM 9/8/2000 +0100, you wrote: >>It sucks of 'psuedo speak', something which sounds profound but is in fact >>merely a cleverly phrased set of superficial words. > > > >Chandos Michael Brown >Assoc. Prof., History and American Studies >College of William and Mary > >http://www.wm.edu/CAS/ASP/faculty/brown >