Abstract

The aim of this paper is to raise the level of discussion of doodles and the doodling practice and pave way to further observations about them within the fields of art, cultural and literary studies. Doodling is viewed as a marginal activity framed by broad implications of marginality that are borrowed from postmodern theory, textual and cultural studies. The doodle’s marginal position is viewed in its connection to writing understood metaphorically as the law, center, authority of language and civilization with their requirements to produce meaning and compromise. As a practice connected with educational institutions, doodling poses the questions of teacher-student interaction, of the relations between the institution’s authorities and their subordinates. Doodling is often considered inappropriate and it is constantly being censored or prohibited, but the paper argues that its value should be reinstated as it helps retain the subject’s intimacy, affirm one’s being in the face of the civilization pressures and helps improve somewhat a negative situation imposed on the person. To explicate the mechanism of resistance in doodling, this drawing activity is paralleled with Catherine Clement’s notion of syncope.