Wars of Position: The Cultural Politics of Left and Right

by Timothy Brennan

Taking stock of contemporary social, cultural, and political currents, Timothy Brennan explores key turning points in the recent history of American intellectual life. He contends that a certain social-democratic vision of politics has been banished from public discussion, leading to an unlikely convergence of the political right and the academic left and a deadening of critical opposition. Brennan challenges the conventional view that affiliations based on political belief, claims upon the state, or the public interest have been rendered obsolete by the march of events in the years before and after Reagan. Instead, he lays out a new path for a future infused with a sense of intellectual and political possibility.

In highlighting the shift in America's intellectual culture, Brennan makes the case for seeing belief as an identity. As much as race or ethnicity, political belief, Brennan argues, is itself an identity-one that remains unrecognized and without legal protections while possessing its own distinctive culture. Brennan also champions the idea of cosmopolitanism and critiques those theorists who relegate the left to the status of postcolonial "other."

Wars of Position documents how alternative views were chased from the public stage by strategic acts of censorship, including within supposedly dissident wings of the humanities. He explores how the humanities entered the cultural and political mainstream and settled into an awkward secular religion of the "middle way." In a series of interrelated chapters, Brennan considers narratives of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Clinton impeachment; reexamines Salman Rushdie's pre-fatwa writing to illuminate its radical social leanings; presents a startling new interpretation of Edward Said; looks at the fatal reception of Antonio Gramsci within postcolonial history and criticism; and offers a stinging critique of Hardt and Negri's Empire and the influence of Italian radicalism on contemporary cultural theory. Throughout the work, Brennan also draws on and critiques the ideas and influence of Heidegger, Lyotard, Kristeva, and other influential theorists.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Theory

360 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 2006

Reviews

[Rowan Compton · Rating 4 out of 5]

pretty good

[Chris Tempel · Rating 5 out of 5]

In America it is common to find Heidegger on the shelf next to Hegel!

This book is a cogent account of theory in U.S. universities at a "turn" near the years 1975-1985. The book does a number of things very well, and deserves much time and thought. one part of the book which I find very valuable (as i am part of the Left and not a part of universities) is that it compares the status and political content of now fashionable theory--Deleuze, Foucault, Kristeva, Arendt and Derrida-- against those that I see are mostly used as a counter-example to rotten opinions and Americanisms of today-- Edward Said, Stuart Hall, Bourdieu in the 70s as well as Gramsci and Luxembourg.

This book also argues against the media narrative that theory is inconsequential, and that it is generally left wing, instead of right wing or Nazi. I would like to write more later.

[Bhaskar Sunkara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Could have been a lot less dense, but for academic writing it was tolerable. One of the better books of its type that I've ever read.

[Jim Good · Rating 1 out of 5]

Over intellectual look into leftist politics post-Reagan and how it changed. Uses terms like “theory” and “intellectual” to mean Marxism (I think), and therefore tends to over expound rather than describe his case. Maybe I’m just not that smart, but I didn’t understand many of his terms and references.

[Justin P · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll add a few points missing from other reviews below.

First, I'd suggest anyone who has questioned the motives of academia after Vietnam should read Brennan. Especially for folks wondering where recent historical revisioning originates, as Brennan frames the introduction of the book. Now onto a few important points ...

Brennan applies a religious lens about the political ideology of academia. That is rather unique ... but I found it refreshing. A religious lens allows Brennan to argue that a professor today reads from a cannon -- a curated set of texts -- and that's OK until the reader is reminded that religious people often blindly follow ideologies. Brennan argues that academia today based their authority of the lived experience of the oppressed. Or the object of critique gets targeted as profane because the religion-a-la-academia holds that object's being-ness as unacceptable (to use Durkheim's sacred/profane dichotomy). This is a rather unique critique of academia, mixing religious belief with political ideology, especially coming from an academic like Brennan who is not known for religious or political studies.

And Brennan attempts to trace the genealogical lineage of recent intellectualism. Basically his conclusion is the rise of neo-conservatism in the 1970s and 1980s shifted the New Left of the 1960s and poststructuralists towards a New Critique and the New Historicism. Brenna calls this the "turn", a reference to the linguistic turn but the book constrains that meaning. Acceptable intellectual approaches before the "turn" are rejected by the New Critique, like Hegel's dialectic is given lip service but genuine synthesis is not the goal. This implies that intellectuals are not simply critiquing politics but are themselves pushed/pulled by political swings towards a goal. Brennan goes into each of the happenings that resulted in this shift. An interesting point, that is more in Brennan's wheelhouse, is the genealogy is revealed via language and culture that seems legitimate, especially to the public. Yet, this academic culture of the "turn" does not seek genuine discourse. Intellectuals who do not critique colonial governments in the prescribed way will be censored, and Brennan notes examples who've had difficulties publishing or retaining posts. And that conclusion leads to ...

The most damning conclusion from this book is when Brennan accuses the New Critique after the 1980s "turn" of misunderstanding postcolonial studies. His approach revisits Edward Said, who Brennan personally knew and was advised by; and he responds to the essentialism or reductionist view that postcolonialism is simply about giving voice to the subaltern. No, that is naive, says Brennan; the New Critique co-opted Said for their own purpose as their own critique of Eurocentrism. New Critique intellectuals do not hold shorter goals like defense for or re-centering of peoples oppressed by colonial/imperial governments (as critical theory would have its adherents naively believe). Brennan argues that these intellectuals have stepped off the deep end, diverged from Said, and now critique governments for merely existing. In other words, the academic "turn" in criticism has an ultimate goal of anarchy. This is a damning conclusion. It means intellectuals, academics, professors today who work in postcolonial studies are actually working towards anarchy.

Brennan's book is the only academic work I've read that has the guts to "critique the critique" in a way that accuses academia of participating in a form of religious zealotry with a political endgame. Brennan attempts to answer questions like: When did these intellectuals emerge with a common language based on a canon of texts? How many different classes/groups will accumulate as oppressed/suppressed/repressed until the critique is complete? What is the point of all this postcolonial critique? I had prematurely come to a similar conclusion myself before reading this book. Brennan offers readers the academic heft from an academic who lived through the "turn" to make the argument that poststructuralists and postcolonial studies morphed into political endgame while the public is none the wiser.

It is dense reading, as other reviewers noted. I translated Brennan's voice in my mind to reduce the heavy academic jargon that he used.

[Kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

So to me, this book was really too dense to serve any good. There were quite a few valid points yet no cohesive goal to the book other than theory is eclipsing Marxism or that Marxism is getting shoved out the back door.

As for his critiques, the Said commentary was way too dense, having not read any Said prior to reading this. The Hardt and Negri criticism was quite harsh yet I have not read Empire yet to judge how well placed Brennan's criticism was. His criticism of post-colonial studies was interesting yet I'm not sure just how on target it was.

Ultimately, I was recommended to read this book without having any background on much of what he was critiquing. Despite this, I was able to get some concepts out of it and it wasn't a worthless read. I highly recommend prospective readers of this to be well versed in Marxist/Critical Theory or much of what is being talked about will completely go over one's head.