Peter McCarthy
I completed my PhD (Social Sciences) in 1997 at the Unversity of Technology, Sydney. The thesis - the 'Fantasy of Exile' - was a critique of what I viewed then as a malady of cultural and political criticism, expressed well enough as a sort of 'dysposition'. The work stands as a challenge to the liberal orthodoxies concerning the representation of the diasporic experience and in the doing sets itself apart from this relatively modern discursive enterprise. While running counter to the mainstream of cultural studies, it does so from within that discourse, drawing from the same sources but delivering a contrary position. Counter to the affectivity expressed in the subject of existential philosophy and literature, this work poses the expressive subject as the product of a confounding contradiction between an existential homeland and the margins of that very homeland. While the subject exists in a certain ‘metastability’ (Sartre), it nonetheless finds its very roots in the contradictry stability of a metaphysical and narrative homeland. And in the doing, any purported positionality on a plethora of currently fashionable causes is null.
This work culminated in a book deal with Palgrave in 2009 - 'Writing Disapora in the West: Intimacy, Identity and the New Marginalism'. Distinguished Humanities Professor Gregory Jusdanis of Ohio State University saw it like this:
'Not shying away from controversy, indeed inviting it, Peter McCarthy has written a bold book that deconstructs the assumptions of diaspora studies. He demonstrates that postcolonial and poststructuralist theorists have appropriated and identified with the subject of their study - marginalization. By adopting epistemological privilege for the diasporic experience, they claim explanatory insight into human affairs. The book will both infuriate and inspire those interested in diaspora, transnationalism, and postcolonialism.' - Gregory Jusdanis, Distinguished Humanities Professor, Ohio State University, USA.
I worked at five major universities in NSW between 1985 and 2000 and spent 18 years at UTS at first a Research Fellow, then a Research Associate. My substantive role during these times has been that of a policy adviser for various Governments (NSW, Victoria and Papua New Guinea).
Supervisors: Stephen Muecke, Noel King, Hort Ruthrof, Wayne Hudson
Phone: +61 408667066
Address: Melbourne, Victoria
This work culminated in a book deal with Palgrave in 2009 - 'Writing Disapora in the West: Intimacy, Identity and the New Marginalism'. Distinguished Humanities Professor Gregory Jusdanis of Ohio State University saw it like this:
'Not shying away from controversy, indeed inviting it, Peter McCarthy has written a bold book that deconstructs the assumptions of diaspora studies. He demonstrates that postcolonial and poststructuralist theorists have appropriated and identified with the subject of their study - marginalization. By adopting epistemological privilege for the diasporic experience, they claim explanatory insight into human affairs. The book will both infuriate and inspire those interested in diaspora, transnationalism, and postcolonialism.' - Gregory Jusdanis, Distinguished Humanities Professor, Ohio State University, USA.
I worked at five major universities in NSW between 1985 and 2000 and spent 18 years at UTS at first a Research Fellow, then a Research Associate. My substantive role during these times has been that of a policy adviser for various Governments (NSW, Victoria and Papua New Guinea).
Supervisors: Stephen Muecke, Noel King, Hort Ruthrof, Wayne Hudson
Phone: +61 408667066
Address: Melbourne, Victoria
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Paper presented at Border Visions: Borderlands and Film — Joint Conference of Central Connecticut State University and the Literature/Film Association New Britain, Connecticut October 12-14, 2011
surface: the latter valorised to the extent depth is rendered entirely in surface phenomena, in the gleaming (or decaying) facades of a merely projected and represented (this term is itself anathema to the postmodern but is nevertheless party to the compromise), repeated and replicated civilisation; the
former, merely accommodated as myth, a ruse, an anachronism. A collaboration has taken place.
Paper presented at Border Visions: Borderlands and Film — Joint Conference of Central Connecticut State University and the Literature/Film Association New Britain, Connecticut October 12-14, 2011
surface: the latter valorised to the extent depth is rendered entirely in surface phenomena, in the gleaming (or decaying) facades of a merely projected and represented (this term is itself anathema to the postmodern but is nevertheless party to the compromise), repeated and replicated civilisation; the
former, merely accommodated as myth, a ruse, an anachronism. A collaboration has taken place.