Poststructuralist subject-dispersal theory in American dilution replaced inquiry with endless conversation

Evidence

The alternative direction, on the other hand, is a more sombre one, for if we accept the more extreme versions of the Foucauldian propositions (a) that whatever claims to be a fact is none other than a truth-effect produced by the ruse of discourse, and (b) that whatever claims to resist Power is already constituted as Power, then there really is nothing for Theory to do except to wander aimlessly through the effects – counting them, consuming them, producing them – and in the process submitting to the interminable whisperings of Discourse, both as Origin and as Fate. — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 112 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Any attempt to know the world as a whole, or to hold that it is open to rational comprehension, let alone the desire to change it, was to be dismissed as a contemptible attempt to construct ‘grand narratives’ and ‘totalizing (totalitarian?) knowledges’ The theorist spoke often enough of imperialism and nationalism, sometimes as dialectical opposites but increasingly as twin faces of the same falsity, bur the main business of radicalism came to reside in the rejection of rationalism itself (the Enlightenment project, as it came to be called). — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 281 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Extreme Foucauldian premises reduce theory to passive consumption of discourse — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures, 112; Discourse-centered theory treats knowing the world as totalizing and thus evades material change — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, 281; Poststructuralist theory’s repudiation of stable subjects collapsed inquiry into futile conversation

Related

• Discourse-centered theory treats knowing the world as totalizing and thus evades material change (similarity 0.89)
• Extreme Foucauldian premises reduce theory to passive consumption of discourse (similarity 0.87)
• Poststructuralist theory’s repudiation of stable subjects collapsed inquiry into futile conversation (similarity 0.85)

Broader Connections

• Extreme Foucauldian premises reduce theory to passive consumption of discourse #corroborates (0.82) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 112
• Discourse-centered theory treats knowing the world as totalizing and thus evades material change #corroborates (0.80) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 281