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Chiasmus

Chiasmus CHIASMUS/235 al.) into universities to sponsor teaching and research on Asia, Africa, South America, Eastern Europe—research largely centered on issues of development and political process. Culture entered the discussion only insofar as it affected these two concerns. Departments were transformed: in the case of Harvard, a philological and literary department of much distinction, though little political effect, reshaped itself to put most of its attention, money, and positions into nineteenthand twentieth-century modernization studies with John King Fairbank (later to play a role in Nixon’s journey to China) at its head. A new science with new kinds of knowledge, or newly prominent kinds of existing knowledge, was thus created by a point of view, the nervous point of view of a new superpower dedicated to the containment of communism and the winning of hearts and minds. Gayatri Spivak’s proposal to re-purpose Area Studies is meant to preserve the discipline but change its point of view. She is often paraphrased as advocating either the abandonment of Comparative Literature or its merger with Area Studies. I see the recommendation as more in the nature of a chiasmus, that figure of impossible reconciliations. “As for example ‘the cup of Ares,’” says Aristotle http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Comparative Literature Duke University Press

Chiasmus

SAUSSY, HAUN
Comparative Literature , Volume 57 (3) – Jan 1, 2005
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Publisher
Duke University Press
Copyright
Copyright 2005 by University of Oregon
ISSN
0010-4124
eISSN
1945-8517
DOI
10.1215/-57-3-234
Publisher site
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Abstract

CHIASMUS/235 al.) into universities to sponsor teaching and research on Asia, Africa, South America, Eastern Europe—research largely centered on issues of development and political process. Culture entered the discussion only insofar as it affected these two concerns. Departments were transformed: in the case of Harvard, a philological and literary department of much distinction, though little political effect, reshaped itself to put most of its attention, money, and positions into nineteenthand twentieth-century modernization studies with John King Fairbank (later to play a role in Nixon’s journey to China) at its head. A new science with new kinds of knowledge, or newly prominent kinds of existing knowledge, was thus created by a point of view, the nervous point of view of a new superpower dedicated to the containment of communism and the winning of hearts and minds. Gayatri Spivak’s proposal to re-purpose Area Studies is meant to preserve the discipline but change its point of view. She is often paraphrased as advocating either the abandonment of Comparative Literature or its merger with Area Studies. I see the recommendation as more in the nature of a chiasmus, that figure of impossible reconciliations. “As for example ‘the cup of Ares,’” says Aristotle

Journal

Comparative Literature – Duke University Press

Published: Jan 1, 2005

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