Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (European Perspectives) (European Perspectives Series)

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If you could just cut it off and remove it, you would; but what you settle on doing is exercising and trying to eat right, but mostly just hating it. From the basic introduction, she delves into a more rigorous definition through different aspects of her subject matter, which in parts became far too complex and challenging for the likes of me. In Powers of Horror Kristeva examines the notion of abjection through literature, she traces the role the abject has played in the progression of history, most notably in religion which she spends much time contemplating on.

The orphaned turd, once of us, is now abject, viscerally other, yet unlike many other others it has no function; it has no place; it has no purpose: it is shit.Kristeva has the idea that we are 'subjects in process' and that there is no such thing as a fixed or stable identity. Because you can see yourself as part of an accident, you’re drawn to it even though you dread the thought. This seems obvious, but if we apply it to the subject it suggests that the conceptualization of other people as such precedes the formation of the "I. Where the integrity of that slash (/) in the self /other mental construction is threatened by representations which collapse or disrupt the sign/referent template underpinning it. Whether she wasn't aware of that information or left it out because it didn't fit her argument, I have no idea.

It is something rejected from which does one does not part, from which one does not protect oneself as from an object. In either case the notion of the self coalesces around (and to some degree is conditioned by) representations originating from without, rather than emanating from within like how it feels. Once these items are outside of the body, they are abject due to the threat they pose to the “full” or “complete” subject. It was good when it turned you away from your mother’s breast and made you interested in eating solid food, but when it gets you repulsed by anyone with a big belly, including yourself, the side effects start to outweigh the benefits.

I also wonder whether this desensitization is dependent upon a clinical context or if it would "adhere" to the material across a spectrum of other hypothetical situations.