Ugh, what a book! I already cannot wait to return to this delicious conversation between two incredible minds. I am going to stick with the theme of "conversation," as it is again what has struck me throughout this half of the book (probably because it is what they wrap up on, so to speak). hooks states that she wants to close their conversation by "talking about where is the place of love in all this" (119). Hall responds: "...love is many things. It is also a conversation, the right kind of conversation. It is also a pleasure in the fullest giving birth to conversation. It has something to do with the nature of the inventiveness...that somehow can get lost, and its boundaries dissolve as something new arises which is neither one nor the other, but a space in between" (120). This blurred form is what I am interested in, as they continue to discuss the form of jazz and improvisation in line with the conversation. How can we hold space for these forms of conversation when we so often get into the routine of academic discussions? Furthermore, in a time when going "back to the couch" and our personal lives are so intertwined with our politics, how can we hold space for the kind of self-reflexivity and vulnerable discussion of experiences that Hall and hooks demonstrate throughout their conversation?
Althusser makes a point that ISAs operate as "unified" under the ruling ideology. To what extent are certain ISAs unified if they are "the site of class struggle" playing out, holding the potential for "ruptures" (to use Hall's phrase) with dominant ideologies? Here, I am thinking about the University of Iowa's COVID policies and how its rules are practiced and applied in many different ways throughout campus, as administrative burdens and scale make it difficult to oversee large numbers of employees. More generally, as junior scholars, grad students, and/or individuals doing cultural studies work, does it make more sense for us to do deep and nuanced readings of theorists such as Marx and Althusser in our work, or to cite others who have expanded these traditions over the years?
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