THE DENIGRATION OF VISION iN TWENTIETH-CENTURY FRENCH THOUGHT Martin Jay UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS BERKELEY LOS ANGELES LONDON a a3 149 aun 263 329 381 435 493 543 587 595, Contents Acknowledgments Introduction ‘CHAPTER ONE: The Noblest of the Senses: Vision from Plato to Descartes CHAPTER TWO; Dialectic of EnLIGHTenment (CHAPTER THREE: The Crisis of the Ancien Scopic Régime: From the Impressionists to Bergson (CHAPTER FOUR: The Disenchantment of the Bye: Bataille and the Surrealists (CHAPTER FIVE: Sartre, MeeleauePonty, and the Search for a New Ontology of Sight CHAPTER St: Lacan, Althusser, and the Specular Subject of Ideology CHAYTER SEVEN; From che Empire of the Gaze to the Society of the Spectacle: Foucault and Debord (CHAPTER EIGHT: The Camera as Memento Mori: Barthes, Metz, and the Cahiers du Cinéma CCHANTER NINE: “Phallogocularcentrism": Dertida and Irigaray (CHAPTER TEN: The Ethics of Blindness and the Postmodern Sublime: Levinas and Lyotard Conclusion IndexIntroduction Even a rapid glance at the language we commonly use will demonstrate the ubiquity of visual metaphors. If we actively focus our attention on them, vigilandly keeping an eye out for those deeply embedded as well as those on the surface, we can gain an illuminating insight into the complex. mirroring of perception and language. Depending, of course, on one's ‘oudook o point of view, the prevalence of such metaphors will be ac- ‘counted an obstacle or an aid ro aur knowledge of reality. fc is, however, no idle speculation or figment of imagination to claim that ifblinded to their importance, we will damage our ability to inspect the world outside and introspect the world within. And our prospects for escaping their thrall, if indeed thac is even a foreseeable goal, will be greatly dimmed, In lieu of an exhaustive survey of such metaphors, whose scope is far t00 broad to allow an easy synopsis, this opening paragraph should sug- {gest how ineluctable the modality of the wisual actualy is, at least in our linguistic practice. I hope by now that you, optique lecteur, can see what I mean.! 1. There are some rwenry-one visual metaphors in this paragraph, many of them ‘embedded in words thacno longer seem directly dependent on them. Thus, forex ample, vigilant is derived from the Latin vigilere, 10 watch, which in its French form weilleris the root of surveillance. Demonstrate comes from the Latin monstrare, 0 show. lnspers, prospec, intraspec (and other words like aspect or circumspect all detive from the Latin specere tolook ator observe, Specelate has the sire root, Sepe comes from the Latin sopium, 9 translation of a Greck word for to look at o¢ examine, ‘Synopsis from che Greee word for general view. These arc larenc or dead metaphors, 1‘sing: For example, the psychologists Michacl Argyle and Mark Cook have tecently concluded that “the use of che gaze in human social beh. ior docs not vary much berween cultutes: eis a cultural universal” Boe fhe implications of the work of another paychologis, James Gibson, sug Best otherwise. Gibson contrasts cwo basic visual pricties, which pro. dluce what he calls “the visual world” and the “visual field” In rhe formes sight is ecologically interewined withthe other senses to generate ths experience of “depth shapes.” wheres inthe later sight ie devacted by faating the eyes to produce “projected shapes” instead. A plate for Sraple willbe experineed as round in the visual wotld, but at anclipee tures might be differentiated acording co how radically they distinguish between the visual field and the visual world, But whether we identify che lter wich “aatura” vision is no seleyi- stent. Ina series of essays, the philosopher Marx Wastofsky has argued for ‘radically cultucalist reading ofall visual experience, inching Gibson fre dondiant modes." Alternately talking about “visual posture” “vis sual scenarios,” “syes of sexing,” or “culsral optics,” he concludes ther 10 ames. Gtbson, The Peeption ofthe Vial World (Boston, 1950); Senses Conde Tae spel ers Boston, 1968); The Eloi Appmach o Vinal oven ree Fo ascset defense of Gibon se Jn Hel, Perpion and Coons, tion (Betkeey, 1983), dada Wet “Picts, Representations and the Understanding” Logi cae rt Ese in Hor of Nelo Goodman, eR. Raulner and Scheffer fade Tapes 1972) “Pecsption, Representation and che Forme of Action, Tawar og ‘isovcalEpsemoogy” in is Medes Repraeuon and ihe Sonic Usa ‘ne Beston, 1972); "Pieucing and Representing in Pipeion nnd Pag a lation od. Calvin E Nodine and Dennis F ister (New York, 1979), Vere pace The Role of Recension in Vinal Reception,” in The Penis af Pinar cl M, Hagen, vl. 2 (New York, 1980); Cameras Cal Ser: Repro 4° nteopuction “human vision is itself an artifact, produced by other artifacts, namely pictures." All perexption, he contends, is the result of historical changes jn representation. Wareofsky thus presents an intentionalist account of visuality, which verges on making it a product of collective human will. Judging from the current state of scientific research on sight, which helps in concepeualizing the “natural” capacities and limitations of the «ee, Wartofsky’s hostility to any physiological explanation of human vi- sual experience may, however, be excessive. Certain fairly fundamental characteristics seem ro exist, which no amount of cultural mediation can radically alter. As a diurnal animal sanding on its hind legs, the early hhuman being developed its sensorium in such a way as to give sight an ability to differentiate and assimilate most external stimuli in a way supe- rior to the other four senses.“ Smell, which is so important for animals on, tion, Photography and Human Vislon.” Aferimage, 7, 9 (1980), pp. 8-9; “Sight, Symlon STs aurea pins vote es (1981), pp. 23-385 “The Paradox of Painting: Pictorial Representation and the Di- mensional of Visual Space” Soil Rear, 51, # (Winter, 198). p. 865-83, For sin pls for curl poston se Robes D. Romany The Dex potic Eye: An Ilustration of Merabletic Phenomenology and ts Implications,” in The Changing Reality of Madern Mans ed Dreyer Keuges (Cape Town, 1984), and “Techmalogy as Symptom and Dream (Landon, 1989). 12, Warcofiky, “Pieuring and Representing” p. 314 helpful recent suenmaries ofthe status of scientific knowicdge abour vision, Se MH ican, Poon ane anion oh nae lea Gravel Deciphering the Sense The Expanding Wold of Human Perio (New York, 1980); Anthony Smith, The Body (London, 1985; John ry Seng: sion. Bais and Mind (Ono, 1980); Seven Pikes, e., Vinal Coitn (Can bridge, Mass, 1985); Wate J. Freeman, “The Physiology of Perception,” Siemfic American 264, 2 (Febuary, 1991). Cowie ly pcholgncdty Ne Chomsky has also attempted to establish a modula concept of the mind in wl Stelpeapon send eunivataan Secon tn nee Medilarny of Mind: An Essay on Faculty rchology (Cambridge, Mass, 1983). 14, The anthropologist Edvard T, Hall has conjectused char even before hominids sod on their hid les won was important: “Orginal a gound-dveling ani mal ms ancecor wa aed byitenpeit competion and changes ia she evi ronment to deser the ground and take tthe tees. Arboral life calls for keen vision and decreases dependence on smell, which is crucial for cerrestial organisms. Thus INTRODUCTION 5,all fours, was reduced in importance, a fateful transformation that Preud ‘was to conjecture was the very foundation of human civilization."° Vision was the last of the human senses to develop fully its very complexity always proving a difficult case for incremental theories of evolution, Ie also temains the last of the senses to develop in the fetus, only in fact ing its true importance for the survival ofthe neonate some time after birth.'6 The infant, ic is sometimes argued, experiences a synesthetic con- Fusion ofthe senses without vision fully differentiated from the est. Smell and touch ate apparently more functionally vit carly stage of development. With the maturation of che child, however, the superior capacity of the eyes to process certain kinds of data from without is soon established. Having some eighteen times more nerve endings chan the cochlear nerve (ofthe car, its nearest competitor, the optic nerve with its 800,000 fibers is able so transfer an astonishing amount of information co the brain, and ata tate of assimilation far greater chan that of any other sense organ. In each eye, over 120 million tods take in information on some five hun- dred levels of lightness and darkness, while more than seven million cones allow us to distinguish among more than one million combina- tions of color, The eye is aso able to accomplish its tasks at afar greater remove than any other sense, hearing and smell being only a diseant sec- ‘ond and third.” Despite the frequent characterization of vision as atemporal and static, the eye can only do its job by being in almost constant motion. Either it than sight at chis very "man's sense of smell ceased co develop and his power of sight were greatly enhanced.” See Hall, The Hidden Dimension (Garden Cig, NY., 1982), p. 39. 15. Sigmund Freud, Civilisation and ts Discontents, tans. James Scachey (New York, 1961), pp. 46-47. 16. Rivlin and Gravelle,p. 79. It might be noted that hey posita much wider senso- ‘iuen chan che generally accepted five senses, Based on expetiments witha varity of animals, science has noted some seventeen diflcent ways in which organisms can sespond ro the environment, Some of these may have a residual olein human behav. it, which possibly accounts forthe existence of so-called excesensory perception, Sal chey acknowledge that humans tend to rely om sight more than any other cave, 6 mtropuction ‘rapidly jumps from one briefly fixated point vo another through what are known as saccadic movements (named afier the French for jerk, saccade, bby Emile Javal, who discovered them in 1878)" or it follows a moving, object across a visual field. Its so-called vestibulo-acular reflex makes it ‘urn in the opposite direction of a rapid head movement to retain a con- tinuity of image and its “vergence system” constantly fuses short and long-range focus into one coherent visual experience,” Even during sleep, as scientists only learned in the 1960s, rapid eye movement is the norm, Although it is, ofcourse, possible to fix the guze, we cannot really freeze the movement of the eye for very long without incurring incoler- able strain, Although che optical mechanism of vision has been well understood since the time of Kepler,” who established the laws of refraction govern- ing the transmission of light rays through the cornea, viscous humors, and lenses of the eyeball onto the retinal wall at its zeas, the precise manner of its sranslation into meaningful images in the mind remains somewhat clouded. The image received is reversed and inverted, but the physiclogi- cal cum paychological processes whivh “read” ic correctly are still incor pletely known, The binocular or stereoscopic integration of data from the ‘wo eyes into one image with apparene three-dimensional depth is also 12, According ro Hall, “Up to cwenty feet the ear is very efficient. At about one hhundeed fet, one-way vocal communication is possible, ata somewhat slower rte than at conversational discances, while a rwo-way conversation is very considerably alezed. Beyond this distance, the auditory cues with which man works begin to break dover rapidly. The unaided cye, on the other hand, sweeps up an extraordinary amount of information within a hundzed-yard radius and is still quite efficient for human interaction ata mile" (The Hidden Dimension, p. 43). 18, Bmile Javal, Annales doelnigue (Pris, 1878). 19, For a discussion of thee rystems, sce Argyle and Cook, pp. 16-17, See alo ‘Claude Gandelman, “The ‘Scanning’ of Piceuces,” Communication and Cagnition, 19, (1986), pp. 3-24, 20, For an excellent history of optics up through Kepler, see David C. Lindberg, “Theories of Vision from Al-Kindi to Kepler (Chicago, 1976). See also the various histo ‘es of Vasco Ronchi, most nobly Optics: The Science of Vion. crans, Edward Rasen (ew York, 1957), and The Nerure of Fight: An Flicorical Survey cans. V, Barocas London, 1975). Inoouction 7nor yet fully understood. Indecd, with all the advances science has made incxplaining human vision, its complexities are such that many qucstions remain unanswered, Significantly, atempts to duplicate it through com- puter simulation have met so far with only very modest success." If the eye’ powers are appreciated by science, so too are it limitations, Human vision can see light waves that are only a fraction of the total spectrum—in fact, less than 1 percent with such phenomena as ultravio- let light, visible ta other species, excluded.* In addition, the human eye hhasa blind spor where the optic nerve connects with the retina. Normally ‘ignored because the vision of the other eye compensates for it, the blind spots existence nonetheless suggests a metaphoric “hole” in vision, which, as we will have ample occasion to witness, critics of ocularcent Bleefully exploit. Human vision is also limited by its capacity to focus on objects only a certain distance from the eye, a distance that normally in- creases with age. Thus the eye's superiority at sensing objects from afar is balanced by its inferiority a seeing those very close. Finally, we ate often fooled by visual experience that cams out to be illusory, an inclination ‘generated perhaps by our overwhelming, habitual belief in its apparent ‘reliability. Here the compensating sense is usually touch, as we seek con- fication through direct physical contact. One final aspect of the contemporary natural fic understanding of vision merits comment. Unlike the other senses of smell, touch, or taste, there seems to bea close, if complicated, clationship berween sight aru language, both of which come into theie own at approximately the same moment of maturation. As Robert Rivlin and Karen Gravelle note, “The ability to visualize something internally is closely linked with the ability describe i vecbally. Verbal and written descriptions create highly specific mental images... The link between vision, visual memory, and verbaliztion can be quite sarling.”® There is cherefore something re- 21, See William J. Broad. “Computer Quest vo Macch Human Vision Srymied,” ‘mcernsional Perl Tribune (Qxober 4, 1984), p. 7. 22. Rivio and Gravel, p. 53, 8 INTRODUCTION vealing in the ambiguities surrounding the word “image,” which can sig- nify graphic, optical, perceptual, mental, or verbal phenomena.* The implications ofthis final poine are very significant for the problem noted earlier: the permeability of the boundary between the “natural” and the “cultural” component in what we call vision, Although perception is intimately tied up with language as a generic phenomenon, different peoples of course speak different tongues. As a result, che universality of visual experience cannot be automatically assumed, if that experience isin part mediated linguistically. Natural science, therefore, iself suggests the possibly of culrural variables, at least vo some degree. It implies, in other words, the inevitable catanglement of vision and what has been called “visuality’—the distinct historical manifestations of visual experience in allits possible modes.” Observation, to put it another way, means observ ing the racit culeural rules of different scopic regimes. ‘The cultural variability of ocular experience will be even more evident if we consider it, as ic were, from a different perspective. The eye, it has Jong been recognized, is more than the passive receptor of light and colos, Ie isalso the most expresive of che seuse organs, with the only competitor being touch. Although the anciene theory of light rays emanating from the eye, the theory called excramission, has long since been discredited, 2* 23 Ii pp 8-89. Fora don fhe camper ition bevien ec aul td etlviaal channel of conmuntatan se age ted Ck pie 24 Foran zune nag WT Michel “Whar ean nag in kor y Tex, Meolegy (Chicago, 1986). For a more restrictive notion of soon heey ne UN eta a “ag onde, 170) 2.Foradamion he tiene ea Fen Veranda ae 1960, peal teers pce 26. eps thle ny oing fm hee vas dc the phenomenon of lighting eye sagh telecon, ih Bependy eae shina Dear nee Le Dp eet can ose St tea In 74, hoes meta hd a itcasinred es the ik of coed fasion pen ee om hing See Si Te od pa INTRODUCTION 9icexpressed a symbolic truth, For the eye—broadly understood as inchad- ing the complex of muscles, les, and even hair around the eyeball can