ShadowBrute, or Government the Myth The Story of Governance by Mutual Cooperation

Date of Award

2006

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Humanities

First Advisor

Wallace, Miriam

Keywords

Myth, Perrault, Charles, ShadowBrute, Mutual Cooperation, Government

Area of Concentration

Literature

Abstract

My thesis, ShadowBrute, or Government the Myth: the Story of Governance by Mutual Cooperation, exposes government�s mythic construction of power and proposes theoretical and practical strategies for dismantling and replacing the fa�ade. While the government can manipulate writing (especially fiction) to subjugate its citizenry, the subjugated can appropriate these means to subvert the power of the subjugators. Fiction endeavors to lift the ideological veil obscuring reality by expanding the scope of possibilities and engendering speculation. Plato�s Foundation Myth establishes a basis to begin analyzing how government is �naturalized� through pervasive, statist ideology. The purpose, if not the parable, of Plato and his statist heirs still thrives: the myth of the necessity and absolute legitimacy of government has been comprehensively sustained and fully ingrained in subsequent generations throughout history and throughout the world. Chapter 1, �Demystifying the State�s Projection of Power,� examines political theory which advocates eliminating state-government by decentralizing and privatizing the judicial system to challenge this ideology. The chapter also investigates models of effective socialization through stateless education. Chapter 2, �Employing Myth to Supplant Myth: Perrault�s Appropriation of the Semiotic Systems Utilized by Louis XIV and His Court,� examines the political and literary milieu of Louis XIV�s absolutist regime in seventeenth century France and explores linguistic and structural models for literary criticism to situate the fairy tales of French author, Charles Perrault. By appropriating the same signs and semiotic systems utilized by the court, Perrault exposed Louis XIV�s exploitation of myth to construct �reality.� Perrault employed myth to combat and supplant myth. Following Perrault�s example, Chapter 3, �Implementing a New Signifier: A Fictional Application of the Two Natural Laws in the ShadowBrute,� restores an ideology founded on natural rights and natural law, through a fictional application of the political theory presented in Chapter 1. My novel, ShadowBrute, not only reveals the corruption inherent in government but also presents an alternative model for social governance without government. In response to Thoreau who encouraged every man to �make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it� (511), this thesis argues that perhaps the expedient is not to make known what kind of government but rather what kind of society is desirable. To advocate governance without government may be the only means to a truly liberated community.

Rights

This bibliographic record is available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication. The New College of Florida, as creator of this bibliographic record, has waived all rights to it worldwide under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights, to the extent allowed by law.

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