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homework

The Most Painful Sentence I Have Had to Parse

Okay, my new rule is that I can blog when I finish a bit o homework. So right now, I’m trying to patiently work my way through sentences likes these, sentences out of my worst academic posturing nightmares: “From this perspective on language and discourse, destabilizing basic constructs–interrogating, contesting, and rein-scribing entrenched, sedimented, and naturalized assumptions–becomes a political imperative.” Not so bad a sentence when wrestled on its own, but a bit leaden when imbedded in a 22 page article. When I can get my mind to focus on the meaning despite the fact that my eyes just want to pass right over the words “discursive demarcations,” I feel I have won a small victory. I’m not against a neo-marxist turn to the study of discourse, per say, I just wish this article had plainer words, and reduced the droning verbiage in half. Here’s a gem: “Discursive demarcations–the acts of naming, classifying, and categorizing–necessary to all language usage are in themselves considered acts of power which demarcate the center from the periphery, the normal from the deviant, the same from the different, self from the Other.” 18 more pages to go. Wish me luck.
In fact, I’m pretty sure, I have yet to come to the most painful sentence I will have to parse.