Eugene and everybody,
>Dear Kevin (my Piroshkian colleague :-) and everybody-
>
>I agree with Kevin that Bakhtin prioritized time over space in his notion of
>chronotope. Bakhtin wrote, "It can be said that it is precisely the
>chronotope that defines genre and generic distinctions, for in literature
>the primary category in the chronotope is time" (Bakhtin, 1994, Dialogic
>imagination, p. 85). However, I do not think that Bakhtin neglects space (or
>even value system). Kevin, what makes you say that? It is interesting...
Thanks for the analysis of the garage episode chronotopes, Eugene. I
thought it was a lot of fun.
No, I don't think that Bakhtin "neglects" space, but just that his
concept of the chronotope is dominated by time over space. There are
interesting discussions of time-space relations in the geography
literature. In his 1989 book, Soja argues for a kind of replacement
of the dominance of time by space to reimagine and reanalyze social
relations in the postmodern matrix. I like Doreen Massey's critique
and image of how social scientists tend to think about "society as a
kind of 3-D (and indeed more usually 2-D) slice which moves through
time." This stikes me as a useful critique of static conceptions of
space in social science (or, put in other terms, the separation of
space from time). Massey argues persuasively that we need to learn to
think and analyze in "4-D." Forgive the long quote, but she
incorporates a bit on simultaneity and a partial definition of social
space that I find useful:
"The proposition here is that this fact [that the social is
"inexorably" also spatial] be used to define the spatial. Thus, the
spatial is socially constituted. 'Space' is created out of the vast
intricacies, the incredible complexities, of the interlocking and the
non-interlocking, and the networks of relations at ever scale from
local to global. What makes a particular view of these social
relations as specifically spatial is their simultaneity. It is
simultaneity, also, which has extension and configuration. But
simultaneity is absolutely not stasis. Seeing space as a moment in
the intersection of configured social relations (rather than as an
absolute dimension) means that it cannot be seen as static. There is
no choice between flow (time) and a flat surface of instantaneous
relations (space). Space is not a 'flat' surface in that sense
because the social relations which create it are themselves dynamic
by their very nature. It is a question of a manner of thinking. It is
not the 'slice through time' which should be the dominant thought but
the simultaneous coexistence of social relations that cannot be
conceptualized as other than dynamic. Moreover, and again as a result
of the fact that it is conceptualized as created out of social
relations, space is by its very nature full of power and symbolism, a
complex web of relations of domination and subordination, of
solidarity and co-operation." (p. 156)
Doreen Massey ("Politics and space/time" in Keith & Pile, 1993, Place
and the Politics of Identity)
There's also a new book out by Jon May and Nigel Thrift called
Timespace that considers these relations from different perspectives.
I'm looking forward to reading it.
Kevin
-- Kevin Leander, Ph.D. Assistant Professor, Teaching and Learning Vanderbilt University www.vanderbilt.edu/litspace
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