Theory: Still Dead

Here's another article about why theory is dead. These things are getting sad. But, it's better than the old norm, which was that there were two sorts of articles published about theory:
1) Theory is an anti-American cartel out to destroy our culture. Any academic who opposes it loses their job, and the only thing that can stop it is conservatives, who are actually pretty opposed to culture too, but not if we're talking 16th century culture.
2) Theory will save academia and anyone who isn't a fan is a right-wing fascist who is horribly threatened by Lacan, in spite of the fact that nobody on earth can understand what Lacan is saying.

At least this article was written by someone who understands that the debate over theory should be an intellectual debate instead of a political one. Best lines:

When an avant garde succeeds it is institutionalized, routinized, and finally trivialized, but this is not where recent theory most fell short. Nor should its major flaw be found in its obtuseness toward earlier theory, which John Ellis establishes so clearly in his essay. Such exuberant claims to novelty are a reflex of any avant garde, though they sit badly in anything that passes for scholarship. Theory respected no foundations but its own, which it rarely questioned. But its chief weakness lay in its hostile or neglectful dealings with literature itself. If we asked what made the critics of theory so incensed, it was this loss of the literary by those who should have been its most ardent guardians.

No kidding. It's generally pretty annoying to see academics treat great works of literature like evidence at a crime scene instead of... well, records of the greatest sensibilities of the species. We're stewards of culture. Or we're nothing.