this week's readings are TOUGH! i spent a good part of my reading time confused. am i smart enough to get my degree when i can't read my text book? it doesn't seem like i can make heads or tails of sentences like, "In order to grasp what follows, it is essential to realize that both he who is writing these lines and the reader who reads them are themselves subjects, and therefore ideological subjects (a tauntological proposition), i.e. that the author and the reader of these lines both live 'spontaneously or 'naturally' in ideology in the sense in which I have said that 'man is an ideological animal by nature.' (Althusser, 2009, p. 309)

so, in my very feeble attempt to understand what this sentence means, i have tried to translate.

"To understand everything else that follows, it is important to recognize that both writer and reader are subjects of a "systematic body of concepts especially about human life or culture" (Merriam Webster), where both live nauturally as ideological beings.

now, with all that work for one sentence of one reading, how on earth will i wrap my mind around codes, and sign-signifier-signified-referent?

i'm scared.

but one thing i have decided - i don't really care if jean baudrillard is correct and we are living in a world that is hyperreal. honestly, it's the only world i know, and deep inside, i feel comfortable with that.

my world, whether real or not, involves the pain and emotion of experience. as much as it hurts, it does feel real. like this young man who is now experiencing not only physical pain from his injuries, but will also experience the emotional trauma of missing his family members, and the haunting memory of being the only survivor in a major disaster. my heart breaks for him, and i would only wish that if this world is, in fact, hyperreal, there would be some way to spare him some of this pain.