[-empyre-] Recent work on 'semiotic splatter' / introduction

[Lawrence Upton]

I don't know if I've ever spoken here though I enjoy reading along...
So... re the UK's recent piece of insanity, leaving the EU, and the
muddle-headedness around all that among the majority who want to leave - a
common element is making England great again. Note that it is England btw,
a country that dominates the others in our "united kingdom" but is not much
of an admin reality, even though Scotland is beginning to define itself.
(I am a born Londoner but began denying my Englishness decades back on the
grounds of substantial Cornish ethnicity - I only did it to annoy
originally, and to beat the ridiculous flumery of fake history, but am now
quite happy to assert I am not English because I do not want to be
associated with the racist use that is being made of that tag)
That yearning for England is part of "it". Sometimes when I hear people
speaking of making England great again, I ask when it was that they think
it was previously great. I have yet to have a coherent answer.
"I don't know," I was told recently; "I'm not an historian". My suggestion
that it was odd to ask for a return to something that they could not
actually refer to just brought savage abuse.
The 50s were fairly miserable. The 40s were bloody awful. 30s anyone? Only
private health. Poor education. Poor law...  and we're near the edge of
living memory. I grew up in the 60s and I always felt European at least
Occasionally I ask what is meant by "great".
Generally the answer is "f off" but sometimes it is "you know... great"
& yes, just occurs to me, I recall 2001 (?) turning up in Buffalo  and
asking around for directions to SUNY (for e-poetry) brought "How the fuck
should I know?" et cetera from a number of people who had looked
approachable to me - I'd expect to get a decent answer from people looking
like that here... and it was a black guy who heard and came up and told me
what I needed to know... I acted on that and found it worked -- white
scruffs, I nearly wrote "like me" seemed aggressive and resentful....
Hardly statistical as a survey; but I offer it
The feeling here now is more than a little fascistic. Polish people are
getting it in the neck for I don't know what. Abuse and in some cases
violence. I grew up with Poles. Poland was the first country I visited and
I was welcomed. It's insane. Most of them seem to me more "English" than
the assertive but know nothing English, who seem to think they have always
been here. (They can have their birthright in Doggerland if they want it)

I'll shut up now. See if I can get a bus home

L




On 9 November 2016 at 17:40, Ana Valdés <agora158 at gmail.com> wrote:

> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>
> Alan i think the parts of Hitler and Mussolinis discourses about the
> importance of workers about the national pride and the longing for a
> imperial past are relevant in Trump’s case as well.
> I read some minutes ago 7 av each 10 of Trump’s voters wanted go back to
> the 50's.
> It means a time where the US was victorious white and wealthy where they
> imposed the world "the American way of life" as model.
> As Roland Barthes says it's a question of language :)
> Ana
>
> Den 9 nov 2016 14:34 skrev "Alan Sondheim" <sondheim at panix.com>:
>
>> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>>
>> There is a huge difference; Hitler etc. ran on a platform which was
>> (horribly) coherent; Trump splatters, not only in the attacks, but also in
>> terms of coherency. This is a very different thing; it's not to say he
>> isn't a thug - he is - but one who wants power above all, and is less
>> concerned about its deployment. -
>>
>> Alan
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 9 Nov 2016, Ana Vald?s wrote:
>>
>> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>>>
>>
>> ==
>> email archive http://sondheim.rupamsunyata.org/
>> web http://www.alansondheim.org / cell 718-813-3285
>> music: http://www.espdisk.com/alansondheim/
>> current text http://www.alansondheim.org/ug.txt
>> ==
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