Computers Quote by Camille Paglia
““Enough already of Lacan, Derrida, and Foucault poured like ketchup over everything. Lacan: the French fog machine; a grey-flannel worry-bone for toothless academic pups; a twerpy, cape-twirling Dracula dragging his flocking stooges to the crypt. Lacan is a Freud T-shirt shrunk down to the teeny-weeny Saussure torso. The entire school of Saussure, inluding Levi-Strauss, write their muffled prose of people with cotton wool wrapped around their heads; they're like walking Q-tips. Derrida: a Gloomy Gus one-trick pony, stuck on a rhetorical trope already available in the varied armory of New Criticism. Derrida's method: masturbating without pleasure. It's a birdbrain game for birdseed stakes. Neo-Foucaldian New Historicism: a high-wax bowling alley where you score points just by knockng down the pins.””
About This Quote
Source Essay: The New Yorker, 2005
Paglia satirically critiques postmodern theory, arguing that thinkers like Lacan, Derrida, and Foucault have become overused, empty jargon that obscures rather than clarifies meaning.
In simple terms: Postmodern theory is seen as pretentious and unhelpful.
Key Takeaway
Question the value of dense academic language.
Themes
intellectual elitism
language
meaning
critique
philosophy
Mood
skeptical
ironic
provocative
Type
critical
philosophical
When to use this quote
- university seminars
- literary criticism
- public debates
- media analysis
- education reform
Key Concepts
postmodernism
deconstruction
psychoanalysis
structuralism
academic discourse
Questions to Reflect On
- What are the merits of deconstruction?
- How can theory be made accessible?
A Different Perspective
The critique may dismiss valuable insights from these thinkers, reducing complex ideas to caricature.
