John Walker's Electronic House

On a well-earned break from my dissertation. So not entirely sure why I’m sat at my computer, other than to add more text to the top of this blog so that hideous photo of me moves further down.

I receive some assurance from Housemate Hicks that it doesn’t look a great deal like me. However, I think the camera may be developing psychic powers, as the picture does look exactly how I feel.

I’ve written 8000 words in the last two days. But it’s not lovely creative writing like,

“Once upon a time there was a happy digger called Jake. Jake liked to dig holes in things, like huge sandpits, the sides of hospitals or people’s children. One day Jake was struck by lightning, and he died.”

It’s horrible, academic writing like this:

“In fact, Thomspon goes on to argue that it is a contradiction in terms to suggest that the presence of an author’s ideology determines the reader’s ability to interpret the text in an autonomous fashion (Thomspon 2004, p.146). If the text is capable of deciding a reader’s autonomy, then the reader surely has no autonomy at all! – they are at the liberty of the nature of the text. To imply that an ideology within a text necessarily imposes any control over the reader’s interpretation is to obfuscate, or perhaps even completely dismiss, any notion of a constructionist vocabulary. If a constructionist approach to communication is accepted, then it must be that the manner in which we interpret those meanings held entirely in the language is dependent upon our experiences, and the understandings we have learned and associated with those symbols. It is by these means that one person may read one meaning into a story, and another something quite separate, without either being ‘wrong’, nor indeed the text implying one or the other. The author’s intent is unknown, and even if stated, not relevant to the interpretation of either reader.”

And that appears to be quite significantly more draining to generate. Especially if it’s to make any sense… Um.

(Just think of the Google hits I’ll get for that paragraph)

Possibly the most disturbing development (even more disturbing than the turgid prose above) is the new-found insanity I have developed. I have taken to typing a word that rhymes with the word I intend to write, and then to go on to write the intended word anyway. Earlier I managed to write “book hook” in the middle of a sentence.

Proof reading my dissertation shall be a treat!