According to the New Age belief:
The Age of Pisces which began with the birth of Christ is now concluding and we are preparing for the Age of Aquarius which will begin in the next century.
Now examine this summary of the Žižekian-Lacanian approach:
Instead of imaginary meanings and fillings of content we must focus on the form, i.e. the signifiers and the letter in language.
We see Žižek’s focus on form instead of content in his practice of writing books:
The quotes and sentences that we read in one of his books show up again in another of his books because they bear new meanings in a new context.
Žižek has also given a witty name to this practice: ecological recyclist self-plagiarism.
Žižek often criticizes New Ageism in his books… But can we not say the following:
1) Žižek turns his quotes and sentences into empty containers (Aquarius: water-bearer) in his theoretical practice.
2) But the New Agers are so immersed in their imaginary meanings and fillings of content (Pisces: fish swimming in water) that the signifier and the letter itself (Aquarius: empty containers) become unbearable for them.
3) This is why the New Agers cannot snap out of the spirit of the Age of Pisces and they cannot become worthy of the Age of Aquarius that they have been openly declaring.
4) Whereas Žižek is already preparing for the Age of Aquarius without openly declaring so, which means that he is more of a New Ager than the New Agers themselves.
To summarize with a simple metaphor: Pisces is the dreams projected on the screen/curtain. The empty screen/curtain itself is the Aquarius.
Let’s conclude with an anectode Žižek tells in The Parallax View (2006):
A worker [was] suspected of stealing [from his boss]: every evening, when he left the factory, the wheelbarrow he rolled in front of him was carefully inspected, but the guards did not find anything inside, it was always empty— until, finally, they got the point: what the worker was stealing were the wheelbarrows themselves…
(Turkish)
Işık Barış Fidaner is a computer scientist with a PhD from Boğaziçi University, İstanbul. Admin of Yersiz Şeyler, Editor of Žižekian Analysis, Curator of Görce Writings. Twitter: @BarisFidaner
[…] (İngilizcesi) […]
LikeLike
[…] — From the Age of Pisces to the Age of Aquarius […]
LikeLike
[…] 1) From the Age of Pisces to the Age of Aquarius […]
LikeLike