Lee+Habits,+Neuroses,+Talents

Habits, Neuroses, Talents


 * **Do you have more trouble articulating your frame (social theoretical questions) or object?**

I believe my frame. Often the framing seems to be constructed after I have figured out or named my object. I say this in part because of the parenthetical which involved the word ‘question.’ I seem to usually proceed from wanted to say something, and then after the fact figuring out a question for which my statement is an answer.

• **Do you tend to project-hop or to stick to a project, and what explains this?**

Definitely project hop. Not to absolve myself of my own responsibility, I nonetheless would say it has to do with the ‘revolving list of most immediate priorities.’ Part of this is of course due to the material conditions of either not having enough uninterrupted time where something else doesn’t demand my attention, or an obvious or local venue to place my interest/project within.

• **Do you tend to be more interested in internal dynamics, or external determinations? In the terms laid out by Keller, do you tend to focus so intently on the object of your concern that context falls away (i.e. are you obsessive compulsive, rather than paranoid)? Is your desire is to name, specify and control your object? Is your desire is for figure, its ground your annoyance? Or are you paranoid, context being your focus and obsession? All is signal. Only begrudgingly will you admit that something is noise, outside the scope of your project? Figure is hard to come by. Its ground has captured your attention.**

Annoyance in general, I’ve found, has been an amazing replenishable well of motivation for working. My easiest papers/projects/theses have been those where I have been thoroughly annoyed by the internal dynamics of a field in which I am engrained. I would have to say that while I shift from figure to ground depending on whether I find fault with my interlocutor’s figure or ground, with respect to my own approach/focus it would most likely be on identifying a problematic figure in the ground of others, thereby attempting to establish a new figure for the same ground.

• **What do you do with unusual or counter examples? Are you drawn to “the deviant,” or rather repulsed by it?**

It depends. I tend towards the general in much of my thinking, namely, what can I most often assume, think, or believe which turns out most often to correct, useful, or persuasive. I do find the ‘deviant’ interesting insofar as it is an example which disproves the general rule, rather than merely falling at either end of the bell-curve.

• **Do you tend to over-impose logics on the world, or to resist the construction of coherent narratives?**

It depends upon my bias, who I’m arguing with, and the type of goal I’m pursuing. I will gladly impose my logics on the world insofar as I think that they are more correct than others, but I will also resist the construction of coherent narratives insofar as I find them limiting, damaging, or perpetuating the legitimacy of my opponents.

• **Do you tend to over-generalize, or to hold back from overarching argument?**

More often than not, over-generalize, given that I often desire for my statements to have the greatest locations of legitimacy/accuracy. Exceptions, nuance, and differences are important, but if they only speak to or about themselves, I dismiss them as irrelevant (not unimportant) to the argument, discussion, or theory at hand. Specificity matters, but not at the cost of being able to speak the multiple/plural at once.

• **Do you like to read interpretations different than your own, or do you tend to feel scooped or intimidated by them?**

Love different interpretations as they help me clarify my own interpretation, understand the greater thinking-field, and test the accuracy, resilience, and fecundity of my and other’s interpretations.

• **Do you tend to change an argument as you flesh it out, or do you tend to make the argument work, no matter what?**

Both are important to practice/experiment with as they test the arguments for strength, coherence, and gaps. One without the other results in either too much timid liquidity or too much biased solidity.

• **Do you tend to think in terms of “this is kind of like” (metaphorically)? Do you hold to examples that “say it all,” leveraging metonymic thinking?**

Most likely metaphorically, and it’s perhaps become more so given the rather over-saturation of metonymic terminology. Any truth, repeated too often or for an extended period of time, loses its hue of truthfulness as it passes into instrumental head-nodding production or propaganda.

• **Do you like gaming understanding in this way? Does it frustrate you that your answers often don’t fit easily on either side of the binaries set up by the questions? (Jakobson suggests that over attachment to a simple binary scheme is a “continuity disorder.”)**

It doesn’t frustrate because when thinking pragmatically and strategically, one often finds that certain tactics are more easy/useful/comfortable than others. While the politics of persuasion abound, likewise do the persuasion of politics (personal and otherwise).