Positionality Disturbed

Rosalind Coward and John Ellis Language and Materialism

On S/Z, Barthes's study of Balzac's Sarazine

On the level of the writing itself, the identity between the signifier and the signified is disturbed. Then, the sexual opposition which is necessary for reproduction is displaced by the entry of a third, troubling term. Finally, gold is shown us being a troubling form of wealth, a new form that is no longer simply the index of physical wealth. These three forms of disturbance are three 'routes of entry' into the symbolic code, 'none of which is privileged'. They are equally the three major forms of exchange by which society reproduces itself (language, sexuality and economics), each of which requires a fixed positionality (addressor-addressee; masculine-feminine; buyer-seller). The disturbance in this text originates in the area of sexual positionality, but its effects are felt equally and necessarily in each of these areas: positionality is disturbed, so each of these modes of reproduction becomes impossible.

This excerpt was found in a folder containing another sheet referencing three types of action in the business sphere: propose, give away, add value.

And so for day 1852
08.01.2012