My English professor lied

I'm currently taking an English class titled, "The Object(ive)s of Literature" and we've been reading theoretical essays about fetishes, gifts and commodities (Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, Lewis Hyde... etc.). My favorite theoretical work so far was a chapter about fetishes from Leah Hagar Cohen's book Glass, Paper, Beans. In the chapter, she discusses the three main fetishes (charm, sexual and commodity) and their history. Cohen also tries to put the fetish in a positive light. (Because Freud's theory about the sexual fetish pretty much threw the positive aspects of fetishes out the window.)

In simple terms, a fetish is an object that we give power. Cohen argues that "what renders an object a fetish is entirely the faith of the beholder. A piece of specially boiled bark from the bohemia tree is no less an inducement for crops to grow--and a shine on the nose or the creak and smell of leather no less a trigger for orgasm--than are portions of the earth created with inherent property values" (Cohen 209-10). Fetishes are quite individualized and almost anything can become a fetish. A wedding ring, your grandmother's recipe for cookies, a journal, a necklace... (Most of these are charm fetishes. I understand the concept of charm fetishes more than Freud's sexual fetish and Marx's commodity fetish.. those essays were so dense.)

This was my favorite passage from the chapter:

"A world devoid of fetishes would be like a world without memory, without language or meaning, uninhabitable by human beings; a world lacking atmosphere.

And so we kick and curse at the chair we bump our shins against, and we pick up and stroke the seashell once presented to us by one we miss, and we throw away in the outside trash the hateful letter we cannot bear to have sitting in the kitchen garbage all week. And non of this is rational and none of it is savage. It is simply us, living here in the pale last crack of the twentieth century, where everything comes bar-coded and shrink-wrapped and smelling like the factory, where everything is comparable, exchangeable, reducible to price. It is simply us, as yet incapable of being blind to the presence of the sprit in things." (Cohen 205).

So wonderful. I think the idea of the fetish intrigues me because I am a bit object oriented. Objects that have been given to me, or objects that I have given meaning to are very important to me. I love how Cohen shows that the fetish is one of the ways we search for depth and meaning.

That is why I chose her work to pair with my analysis of Aimee Bender's novel An Invisible Sign of My Own (crazy brilliant book about a teacher who brings an ax to school... so fascinating). And I wrote a nice little four page essay about wax numbers and faith and fetishes and their transformational effect on the main character's life.

But my professor is a sneaky little thing. He told us the paper was due today. And we all show up, quite faithfully, with our completed papers. He starts off class with, "I must admit, I lied to you." Yes, the papers were not due today. My professor lied to get the class to bring in strong rough drafts for Writer's Workshop and peer reviews.

Hm.. lying as a pedagogical strategy. Interesting. At least I have more time to revise.