Deming continued on page 30 Richard Deming, focus editor. Recently, I had the opportunity to tour the sewers of Vienna, a city I dearly love. Afterwards, numerous people asked me why I would do that, spend time in the grotty underground, given the remarkable beauty of Viennese traditional and modernist architecture? Why wouldn’t I just spend more time taking in, for instance, the grandeur of the Hofburg? To begin with, there is a metaphoric significance to the fact that in the very city where Freud developed his ideas about the unconscious, one can actually be given a tour of the underground. Indeed, the health of the city is dependent on that sewer, and has been for centuries. My guide, a retired historian, pointed out that few people ever think about where the water they use to drink, wash, and cook comes from. They never ask about that ordinary but crucial aspect of their lives. To know the sewer, to acknowledge its complex and important history and function is to know better how the city itself works and how its infrastructure shapes daily living. Yet people seem to consciously, willfully avoid thinking about what exists beneath their feet. The trope speaks for itself. Each day, our phones, computers, and tablets shout at us a variety of reminders, warnings, and declarations that indicate whatever else it might be, our moment in history is anything but ordinary. From looming climate catastrophe to a dizzying range of technological innovations one almost never dreamed would be possible, it certainly seems an inescapable, incontrovertible claim that the Ordinary is lost to us. In his essay included in this issue’s special focus, political theorist Thomas Dumm makes the stakes clear: “The question we face is whether the very idea of the ordinary as a place of meaning and a resource for life can survive in the face of the catastrophic.” Yet, by the same token, has there ever been a time that, while living in it, one would have comfortably described the era as ordinary? Although it seems true that we are on the edge of very real crises, it might be that ordinary is a descriptor that cannot be applied to eras and times, and has much more to do with one’s own life. It has a different measure, and, perhaps, its opposite may not be, or may not always be extraordinary, just as a term such as normal seems to mean something different from ordinary. Normal is perhaps a value assigned by others, and authorized by the collective, whereas ordinary is determined from within. It may be that some of the crises of our time arise from an ongoing repression of the Ordinary as a focus of our attention. From Heraclitus to Ludwig Wittgenstein and Sigmund Freud to Stanley Cavell, there has long been within certain strains of thought an argument that finds the Ordinary, that which is most familiar to any one of us, is actually that which is most unknown to us, most unfamiliar, and, therefore, remains deeply mysterious. The Ordinary often eludes thinking because by its very nature we come to consider — if, that is, we ever do consider it — as not warranting any sustained, serious thought. Familiarity, so it seems, breeds indifference, Yet, the problem becomes evident: we overlook, consciously and unconsciously, the very things and experiences that are most determining of what we call — if we call it anything — our daily life. Defining the Ordinary is a crucial part of the problem of discussing it. What counts as the Ordinary? Is a flower ordinary? Is a comb? Is washing the dishes ordinary? Yes, perhaps, one is inclined to say, but something about attaching the word to a thing or even a routine action might be misleading. To a certain extent, thinking about the Ordinary is a broadly philosophical and even phenomenological endeavor, and in such regards the term indicates one’s relationship to an action or thing or circumstance. Calling something ordinary signifies a relationship familiar enough that our sense of the relationship helps us to define to and for ourselves who we take ourselves to be. This seems to be why David LaRocca in his discussion of Toril Moi’s Revolution of the Ordinary highlights a certain self-reflexivity as not only a feature of her work, but as an acknowledgment of a self’s investment in what constitutes what one takes to be the Ordinary. The Ordinary shows a self to itself. Stanley Cavell, in his collection of essays titled In Quest of the Ordinary posits, “the ordinariness in question speaks of an intimacy with existence, and of an intimacy lost, that matches skepticism’s despair of the world.” Gerald Bruns, in “Retrieval of the Ordinary (How It Sounds),” echoing Cavell, refers to the need to perpetually rediscover the conditions of such intimacy, which, again and again, retreats into the deadening of mere habit. What is lost in the face of that alienated intimacy is perhaps the potential for a deep and comprehensive acknowledgement of the self, of the self as being always a network of relationships to other people and other things. Generally speaking, an interest in tracking the Ordinary is motivated by the feeling that something, some intimacy, some potential knowledge that could illuminate one’s sense of the world and how one inhabits it remains to be found. Within this feeling, we see commingled colors of mourning, hope, and skepticism, much as the analysand might feel when committing to the process of analysis, a decision that has to be remade almost daily. Moreover, once found, once discovered, that intimacy is likely to not be static. That is to say, the intimacy is discovered but not permanently achieved. Once one becomes consciously intimate,

中文翻译：

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焦点简介：平凡

Deming 继续第 30 页 Richard Deming，焦点编辑。最近，我有机会参观了我深爱的城市维也纳的下水道。之后，很多人问我，鉴于维也纳传统和现代主义建筑的非凡之美，我为什么要这样做，在地下洞穴中度过时光？我为什么不花更多的时间去欣赏一下霍夫堡宫的宏伟？首先，在弗洛伊德发展他的无意识思想的城市中，人们实际上可以参观地下，这一事实具有隐喻意义。事实上，这座城市的健康依赖于下水道，并且已经持续了几个世纪。我的导游是一位退休的历史学家，他指出，很少有人会考虑他们用来饮用、洗涤和烹饪的水来自哪里。他们从不询问他们生活中那个平凡但至关重要的方面。了解下水道，承认其复杂而重要的历史和功能，就是更好地了解城市本身的运作方式以及其基础设施如何塑造日常生活。然而，人们似乎有意识地、故意地避免思考脚下存在的东西。比喻不言自明。每天，我们的手机、电脑和平板电脑都向我们发出各种提醒、警告和声明，表明无论它可能是什么，我们的历史时刻绝不是普通的。从迫在眉睫的气候灾难到一系列令人眼花缭乱的技术创新，几乎是做梦都不敢想的，这似乎是一个不可避免的、无可争议的说法，即普通人已经失去了我们。在本期特别关注的文章中，政治理论家托马斯·达姆 (Thomas Dumm) 明确指出：“我们面临的问题是，将普通人视为意义之地和生命资源的想法能否在灾难面前继续存在。” 然而，出于同样的原因，是否曾有一个时代，在生活中，人们会轻松地将那个时代描述为平凡？虽然看起来我们正处于非常真实的危机边缘，但平凡可能是一个无法适用于时代和时代的描述词，更多的是与自己的生活有关。它有一个不同的衡量标准，也许它的对立面可能不是，也可能并不总是非凡的，就像正常这样的术语似乎意味着与普通不同的东西。正常可能是他人赋予的价值，集体授权的价值，而普通则是由内部决定的。我们这个时代的一些危机可能源于对作为我们关注焦点的普通人的持续镇压。从赫拉克利特到路德维希·维特根斯坦，从西格蒙德·弗洛伊德到斯坦利·卡维尔，长期以来，在某些思想脉络中一直存在着这样一种论点，即我们每个人最熟悉的平凡，实际上是我们最不知道的，最不为人知的。不熟悉，因此仍然非常神秘。普通人经常回避思考，因为就其本质而言，我们开始考虑——也就是说，如果我们真的考虑过——不保证任何持续的、严肃的思考。熟悉，似乎，滋生冷漠，然而，问题变得明显：我们有意识和无意识地忽略了最能决定我们称之为——如果我们称之为任何东西——我们的日常生活的事物和经历。定义普通是讨论它的问题的关键部分。什么才算普通？一朵花是普通的吗？是梳子吗？洗碗很普通吗？是的，也许，人们倾向于这么说，但是将这个词附加到事物或什至日常行为上的某些事情可能会产生误导。在某种程度上，对平凡的思考是一种广泛的哲学甚至现象学的努力，在这方面，该术语表示一个人与行为、事物或环境的关系。称某事为普通意味着一种足够熟悉的关系，以至于我们对这种关系的感觉有助于我们为自己定义我们认为自己是谁。这似乎就是为什么大卫·拉罗卡在讨论托里尔·莫伊的平凡革命时强调了某种自我反思性，这不仅是她作品的一个特征，但作为对自己对构成一个人的平凡事物的投资的承认。普通人向自己展示了自我。斯坦利·卡维尔 (Stanley Cavell) 在其题为《探索平凡》(In Quest of the Ordinary) 的随笔集中，“所讨论的平凡讲述了一种与存在的亲密关系，以及一种失去的亲密关系，这与怀疑主义对世界的绝望相匹配。” 杰拉尔德·布伦斯 (Gerald Bruns) 在“恢复平凡（听起来如何）”中呼应卡维尔，指的是需要不断地重新发现这种亲密关系的条件，而这种亲密关系一次又一次地退回到单纯的习惯的沉闷中。面对这种疏远的亲密关系，失去的可能是对自我的深刻而全面的认识，自我始终是与其他人和其他事物的关系网络。一般来说，对追踪普通人的兴趣是由这样一种感觉所激发的：某种亲密关系、一些潜在的知识，可以阐明一个人对世界的感知以及一个人如何居住在世界上还有待发现。在这种感觉中，我们看到了哀悼、希望和怀疑的混合色彩，就像分析者在进行分析过程时可能会有的感觉一样，几乎每天都必须重新做出决定。而且，一旦发现，一旦发现，那种亲密感很可能不是一成不变的。也就是说，亲密是被发现的，但不是永久的。一旦一个人变得有意识地亲密，希望和怀疑，就像分析者在致力于分析过程时可能感受到的一样，几乎每天都必须重新做出决定。而且，一旦发现，一旦发现，那种亲密感很可能不是一成不变的。也就是说，亲密是被发现的，但不是永久的。一旦一个人变得有意识地亲密，希望和怀疑，就像分析者在致力于分析过程时可能感受到的一样，几乎每天都必须重新做出决定。而且，一旦发现，一旦发现，那种亲密感很可能不是一成不变的。也就是说，亲密是被发现的，但不是永久的。一旦一个人变得有意识地亲密，