Remarx: Ditto

in

Publication Type:

Journal Article

Authors:

Kapadia, J.

Source:

Rethinking Marxism, Volume 20, Issue 4, Number 4, p.688 (2008)

Keywords:

20-4

Abstract:

Duplicating, copying, the same as what has been said---in short, ditto. For Jesal Kapadia, coeditor (with Susan Jahoda) of the RM arts section, this apparently ``insignificant sort of word'' has both a long history (with its root in the Latin dictus) and a haunting significance when it serves to connect the worlds of so-called high culture (including art and architecture) and the everyday world of practical invention. It evokes an original as well as a copy of the original---but fails to inform us which is which. It also blurs the boundary between the two worlds, and forces us to discover elements of one in the other---since we can see the solving of problems in the production of aesthetic objects as well as beauty in the arrangement of the elements of the supposedly technical solutions.