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Showing posts from December, 2016

The King’s Speech: On Zizek’s Speech Impediment

First, I would like to point out that in no way am I offering any sort of diagnosis of Slavoj Zizek’s speech impediment.   This article/essay is a simple exercise in perception, and yes, a Zizekian analysis.   What do we get when we apply Zizek’s theories to Zizek himself?   The answer may or may not be surprising, depending on whether you are a Zizek follower or an anti-Zizek propagandist.    In an analysis of The King’s Speech, Zizek points out that the king’s stuttering makes the king self-conscious and in a way embarrassed.   As a divine ruler, the king of England should be a confident authority figure perfectly capable of assuming the role of the head of state.   Delivering messages to the masses through oratory on the radio is just one of the ways that the king’s authority is projected to the public and if the people hear that in the voice of the king is a slight imperfection, this may be read as a fault that might preclude the king from carrying out his divine duty, f

Popeye Trumpism and the Pitfalls of Authenticity

As disconcerting as the election of Trump was, nothing is more telling than the fact that authenticity is coming back into the lexicon of everyday use, courtesy of the populist right and the crypto-rightism of figures like Alex Jones.   When Hillary said she was two different people in public and in private she might in fact have been sincere, pointing out a simple truth.   In fact most of us act differently in front of different people. We are a different person in front of our friends or in front of our parents.   The same goes for the public and private spheres.   We not only act differently, we speak differently without realizing that we do so.   That Trump is seen as authentic because he seems to be the same person everywhere he appears, only shows how perfectly he plays his part in public.   Are we to assume that President Trump will be the same person as Apprentice Trump, the boardroom Trump, and the bedroom Trump? I can only surmise that Trump’s election is taking humanity b