A First Blog Post

So this is blogging. Blah Blahg Blog. And here I am. I've never posted a blog before--though I've always meant to. I suppose I just needed a little push to get it started. So I send out my thanks to Nanotext, for making me do this once and for all.

I would also like to thank Mr. Nanotext, as well as Mr. Austin and Mr. Derrida for pushing me to great questioning of life, the universe and everything--or maybe just some things--through the means of deconstructive literary analysis. Gee whiz, I thought I had a good handle on philosophy and the language arts, but I suppose I'm wrong.

Or am I?

I'm stuck considering the idea of "context," these past couple weeks, just as many men before me have. Perhaps, in one context, the word may convey the idea of... Let's say: "a situational determinative of meaning," or something of that sort. That was my understanding of context for most of my life--something that determines what stuff means. But woe is me, I had never considered that a context might have had a context...

This is what, I suppose, is the groundwork for the deconstruction presented in Austin and Derrida's writings. Now, I'm only beginning to dig deeper into these ideas--but what I'm understanding right now is this:

A context can change depending on anything--one could say a context can change depending on its context, which is thus alterable depending on its context, and so on and so forth. This, I hope, is the general idea of Austin and Derrida--to suggest communication is something perhaps subjective of context, moreover all words can mean different things depending on when they're used, who uses them, who's hearing them, why they're said, etc. etc.

So for a few days I was at a loss, as I'm sure you would be if you too had:

1. Never heard of deconstruction
2. Never considered context's intricacies and inner workings
3. Never seen Cronenberg's Shivers, or for that matter, never analyzed a horror film
4. Never considered a beneficial goal to skepticism

However upon some deep and thorough mind scraping I've been able to figure this stuff out in a general way. I get the point of deconstruction, and I understand it's not like skepticism at all--it's just a method of breaking stuff down to it's roots of impossibility and infinite, sometimes paradoxical nature. And no, it's not a reason to be depressed, nor is it a reason to give up--but rather it's enlightening! As Mr. Nanotext Prichard has made it clear, by witnessing such irregularity and ever-changing definition in literature/communication, how can anyone help but be left in awe of the way words affect us on a daily basis? We truly can't explain them. We truly can't. Really.

So I break stuff down, shred it to pieces, break it apart, and attempt to find meaning, all the while knowing that the deeper I go, the farther I'll get from it. And that's the point! Meaning is subjective to context, which is something that is seemingly undeterminable. How stellar. How majestic! How infinite and divine!

It occurs to me only now why it is that I am supposed to be the acid-blood from Alien... Or perhaps I can see now why I am parasitic in nature. Depending on the context, of course, I could be the blood burning through the floor and ceiling--a metaphor of course, "I" being the blood, the "floor/ceiling" being any text I can imagine. I am a parasite, squirming through text, living and breathing with it, changing depending on context of context, blah blahg blog...

Until later tonight,

-Cowboy Sterling