Lynette Dixon
“The Seriously
Erotic Politics of Laughter” echoes the logic in Jose Munoz’s Disidentifications. While the Munoz text
isn’t one that we read for this class specifically, the theory is integral to
my final paper so it’s important that I connect the two. The process of
disidentification entails taking the modes of representation that serve to
oppress (stereotypes, institutions) and recycling them in performance in order
to gain the ability to be able to renegotiate and redefine the terms of representation
by the one who is being represented. This practice hinges upon the cultural
material that is already used to represent a group. This is precisely the
process that the Willets describe happen through comedic feminist discourse. Comedy,
as a disidentificatory practice, works to subvert structures of power and ideas
of motherhood and sexuality. “Borrowing from the shock value of the (allegedly)
obscene,” allows for “illuminating the inversions and inflaming the passions
that fuel social awareness and activism” (19) which necessary for political
change. This is a practice that embraces powerlessness, as Young describes as a
result of the exploitation of the marginalized that causes a lack of decision
making, in order to redefine and reconstruct power dynamics so that at the end
the whole concept of powerlessness itself has to be dismantled.
This idea
supports my claim that there must be a redefinition of political action that includes
art, social media, etc. Furthermore I don’t believe there is such a thing as “art
for art’s sake”,I think that politics and art are intimately linked. I think
where we have perceived art to be apolitical is where we have failed to see the
ways in which politics are being subverted. Also, I think there is something to be said
about this alternative political action as it is done through means that allows
politics to be more accessible and yet easier to use to one’s advantage because
it erases the lines between that which is political and what is not.
I find your claim that art and politics are related or should be related to be very interesting.I agree that art for arts sake is a misleading way to view and appreciate art, each work of art is a special portrayal of the artist and each artist lives and is affected by a political side of life. As beings of expression I agree again that the appreciation of art in a political and sociological sense would indeed make understanding difference in political systems more readily accessible and understood on a more profound level.
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