Tradition and Change

[Benning Boy]

In short, yes. He is however also alluding to the question of why these things are worth preserving, which is that they are a vehicle of that which we call 'culture', the definition of which keeps eluding us, but which we seem so lost without.

Amongst those who study such things, there are a bazillion definitions of culture. However, the one I have found most useful in my own studies and work goes something like this:

Culture is socially shared and transmitted knowledge, both existential and normative, as expressed in act and artifact.

Put another way:

Culture is socially shared and transmitted knowledge about what is or ought to be as seen in the things people do and the things they make.

So, kilts are both something made, artifacts, and things acted with, that is they are worn. The only socially shared and transmitted knowledge I have of kilts and kilt wearing I received here. Ideas about proper highland dress have not been handed down to me by a supercilious Laird.Therefore, I'm not really a direct participant in highland kilt wearing culture. Instead I wear kilts by choice as part of a North American -- and increasingly international-- sub culture. My ideas about what a kilt is and why and how it should be worn were socially transmitted to me here by the rabble. We are a subculture, although an influential one, with broken links to the original kilt wearing culture. ( Here we could get all enthused about debating Shannon's theory of communications systems, relating to the socially shared and transmitted business, but let's not.)

I find the original claim, post #1, to be faulty, revealing confusion of facts. Starting over, presenting claims built on a working definition of culture, being sure the cultural facts squared with reality, would make the basic concepts more discussable.


Ding dong Derrida is just another danged distraction, an obstacle to open discourse.

[Domehead]

Ding dong Derrida is just another danged distraction, an obstacle to open discourse.

Mr. "Benning"

From a twice Honorably discharged US Army Veteran, both enlisted (4/325 AIR) and Commissioned (19A "Spurred" CAV Scout & 13A ALO) that statement sums up the rest of your muddled nonsense. Although, I'll give you props for exceptional use of alliteration.

Ryan M Liddell

[Benning Boy]

Impressive, Domehead, sir. Thank you for your service.

[Benning Boy]

BIG PS:

For those who don't know what the heck is going on, I offer this feeble explanation.

Derrida was a French philosopher of the late 20th Century. He was in origin an Algerian Jew. In France he didn't fit in. Like others who don't fit in, he looked for his own answers.

He was an avowed leftist. Throughout his career he was surrounded by Marxist, hardcore Stalinist Marxists. As we once said in America, he was a fellow traveler, rubbing elbows daily with Parti Communiste Français. In the beginning he did not fully subscribe to Marxist views. He was in a way a nonconformist. He didn't want to conform to orthodox communist views of Marxism, but chose to think for himself when studying Marxism. In time, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, he fully embraced Marxism. Older members may recall that before the end of the old Soviet Union, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Vladimir Gorbachev, leader of that empire instituted something called perestroika. It's a word almost untranslatable into English. Communist philosophers of that era said that perestroika meant deconstruction. Derrida's ideas were embrace by the communist party of Russia and subservient states.

There once was a German philosopher named Heidegger. He is considered to be a pillar of Nazism. He advocated the destruction of ideas in order to arrive at some idea of pure truth. Derrida sorta picked up the concept and proposed a deconstruction of ideas, instead of destruction of ideas to arrive at some sort of truth. The most obvious difference between these Fascist and Marxist philosophers is the addition of the syllable "con" to destruction, that is deconstruction as opposed to destruction. One suggested abruptness, the other an orderly disassembly.

Either is obtuse.

Dirreda's concept of deconstruction was, basically, based on the interpretation of writings. His ideas were quickly picked up by those engaged in literary criticism. In time they became popular with others, primarily academics, who are at root Marxists. Feminist studies, gender studies and queer studies, just for example, are quite often academic studies rooted in Marxism and drawing heavily on the works of Derrida and the idea of deconstruction.

Deconstruction has become the big idea within a range of academic fields, literary criticism, art criticism. and revisionist history. It's popular amongst left leaning sociologists and anthropologist, anyone who wants to overthrown things as they are and establish new, more politically correct ways of seeing things.

Younger of the rabble are probably more seduced by the concept of deconstruction, and the teachings of deconstructionist than the elders. For us, it's over our heads.

Derrida is said by more brilliant minds than mine to be undecipherable and total BS. Domehead has apparently mastered it. More power to him, I say. I have brain power sufficient for two normal persons, and have been reading hardcore philosophy since age 11 or 12, I'm now 66, and Derrida makes me want to tear my hair out.

Derrida's ideas parallel those of the Frankfurt School, something founded by primarily by German Jews who felt they didn't fit in, who sought to remake society in their own image. (No I'm not knocking Jews, it just happens that a significant portion of modern philosophy is based on ideas put forth by Jew who didn't feel like they fit into their societies.) Did you read Marcuse when young, as so many of us did? Did you get excited by it? Then you have been seduced by the Frankfort School. Add Adorno and a bunch of others to the mix.

This is a feeble and sketchy presentation at best. You can read about it all on the world wide interweb, but be prepare to wrestle with unbelievably complicated thoughts, written in almost unreadable acadmicese.

As far as I'm concerned none of this has a darned thing to do with kilting. Domehead does. All I think is needed is a an acceptable definition of culture, which I have offered one as a choice. I do think the original argument here is based on a certain romanticism, and not on fact, and needs to be revisited.

No doubt Domehead will further inform us of his understanding of Derrida, and how his ideas relate to kilt wearing. I look forward to learning more.

[bwat]

I do think the original argument here is based on a certain romanticism

I would say a large chunk of the postings on this site are written by romantics viewing the world through their rose tinted spectacles. We're probably all guilty to a certain degree but my romanticism is correct and everybody else's is wrong - there I said it

[Father Bill]

Okay guys - time to settle down and get off our hind legs.

Father Bill for the Forum Moderators

[Geoff Withnell]

Thank you. Very well said. As a wife I really like appearing on my husband's arm when he is kilted. It speaks to our heritage and our beliefs. Comments have always been positive..but then he's a handsome man in a handsome kilt!

And he is is a lucky man!

[Domehead]

With all the respect to Father Bill, not only for his calling to Vocation, but to his efforts as Forum Moderator, I reply...

I'm not trying to educate anyone. People here are already educated.

I believe (think) Nathan was offering, at my most vulgar paraphrase, that THCD invokes a schema which at a cultural level, ought to be preserved, perpetuated and perfected.

I believe (think) Mr. Cook was offering, at my most vulgar paraphrase, that THCD may very well be the inadvertent mode of individual self-expression, which must also recognize the "contemporary / alternative" modes of kilt / Highland Dress.

I offered the expanded notion that "meaning", poignantly related to culture as a subordinate of Society, is only defined by context, e.g.
I wear THCD because I don't wear Utilikilts. I don't wear THCD because I wear Utilikilts
From this premise, "meaning" and value inherent in culture is derived.

CONTEXT Within Japan; OUTSIDETEXT We looking in:
The same debates occur re: Kimono...is it only Ceremonial? Is it a regressive reminder of an era best relegated to history? Is it the embodiment of cultural artistry and societal ethos worthy of preservation, perpetuation and perfection?

Sixty-five years prior to J. Derrida, Edward Sapir postulated the same notion. Specifically, Sapir studied "individual self-expression though attire" and its transition into "fashion", e.g.
I dress as a Punker because I don't wear business suits. I don't dress as a Punker because I wear a business suits
However, the "meaning" and cultural value of each associated group must exist or the fashion-identity does not.

CONTEXT Within Scotland; OUTSIDETEXT Diaspora:
Twenty people in a room, nineteen of which are in blue business suits, one in THCD. The THCD wearer exercises "individual self-expression" only in context of that room. As well, if the nineteen had no prior knowledge of anything Scottish, the THCD wearer must either explain the context of their mode of dress or be resolute being perceived having "dressed in the dark with their toes". The minute someone from the nineteen recognizes the THCD wearer as emanating from a THCD group, it affirms "individual self-expression" as only relevant to the twenty in that room. The larger associated group and its recognized fashion are acknowledged. If we flip the script, the same thing occurs. Which is exactly what I quoted from Mr. Cook's post.

I actually agreed with both Nathan and Mr. Cook. Not only do I respect their educational backgrounds, but their creative and artistic endeavors (to both of whom are vocational) as perpetually facilitating their education. For that reason alone, they are invaluable, like Mr. Smith-MacPherson, Mr. MacDonald, Mr. Newsome, McMurdo, Calgucus and others.

Finally, I'm not a Philosopher, nor do I care about Jacques Derrida's personal history or politics (anathema to Deconstruction). The Yale School of Criticism actually thought Derrida went to extremes which did his ideas dis-service. Hence, why I offered their counter-balance.

As for these ideas and their relation to the OP...
They are absolutely on point as they go to the heart of "meaning" and value defined through culture, especially a culture which exists as diasporic or borrowed.

Ryan M Liddell

[Tarheel]

YIKES! Gents, I have a lot of reading to catch up on after this run of posts. I see the theme falling into the "agree to disagree" category. I will not be deterred from my kilting choices, even after such full conversations.

[MacEanruig]

YIKES! Gents, I have a lot of reading to catch up on after this run of posts. I see the theme falling into the "agree to disagree" category. I will not be deterred from my kilting choices, even after such full conversations.

I agree. We are all free to wear the types of kilts we choose. That being said, some prefer the more traditional dress which leans heavily on historical Scottish Highland norms. Regardless of how long this debate continues, this is a cultural standpoint in my view.

Others like the modern kilts for the convenience and utility of wear. Still, there are folks who enjoy wearing both as the occasion suits.

Personally, I am a fan of the traditional, but I find nothing wrong with anyone wearing what they desire.