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A Paradigm to Alterity

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CSUDH Habermas UWP
Temporality and Alterity
Words, Words, Words: Alterity

California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: April 4, 2001
Latest update: April 4, 2001
 E-Mailjeannecurran@habermas.org

Learning to Be Aware of the "Other"

by Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata
Copyright: Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata, and Individual Contributors, April 2001.
"Fair Use" encouraged.
I don't have time to write this basic lecture this morning. I'll bet I'm late again! But yesterday so many of you showed such intense interest in our discussion, I thought I'd better get at least some notes up for you.

Here's an example of what led me into this rush:

On Tuesday, April 3, 2001, Lisa Jean Stevens wrote:

Hi jeanne . . . very intertesting lecture today. I had read that one article about Paradigm Shift to Alterity, so it really added to my reading....about that article, I found a quote from the article that kind of helped to sum up my thoughts..."just as Fellman says he seeks neither adversarialism nor mutuality, but a balance between the two. Instrumental reason, tempered by mutuality, is the balance we are seeking." In theory, I believe this is a very rational and achievable place . . . just my thoughts.

jeanne's comments:

Lisa, I'm confused about the quote. The reference to Fellman sounds like something from our discussions. Could you clarify for me where the quote is? Tell me the file you were using, and about how far you had to scroll down.

By the way, talked to Tina yesterday and I think you will be glad to hear that she is pursuing her PhD, after leaving here!!!

jeanne's comments:

Yes, I am delighted to watch her discover that she really is a scholar.

Thanks again, Lisa J. Stevens

What I see in messages like this, and the many more that occurred during the discussion, is a remarkable lucidity and eagerness to explore. How ironic that Lisa also mentioned Tina, who was so sure when she first came to CSUDH that she "was NOT a SUDENT." And yet she made Who's Who in her senior year! Such shared enthusiasm for learning, particularly in an urban metropolitan school with "nontraditional" students, inspires me with hope that we can together "educate the masses," and realize the original goals of our land grant colleges.

So, in that spirit, here are some quick notes on our discussion yesterday:

  • The Clash of Postmodern and Traditional: The "Other"

    The thread began with distinguishing postmodern, critical, postcolonial theory from traditional social theory, and a discussion of why there is so much antagonism and intimidation from tradtionalists. This was in particular reference to your perceptions that our substitute was structurally violent in denigrating the inclusion of such theories and their comparisons to traditional theory in our theory class.

    What all these post-tradtional theories share is an empasis on the "Other" who has been left out of tradtional theory which operated on the general assumptions of dominant discourse. That translates here to mean that traditional social theory, as we study it in the U.S. (and that "in the U.S." qualifier becomes more important as we move towards globalization) privileges the subjectivity and the dominance of the "West" over the "East," or in much international sociology today, the "North" (that's us) and the "South" (that's the "Other" - so India, China, Latin America, Africa - would be included in the "Other" or the "South").

  • Postmodernism and the "Other"

    Postmodernism insists there is no overall myth, no overall history or story of mankind, no metanarrative, no religious belief that holds for everyone. Instead, postmodernists emphasize the "local" narrative, or the story of the local group, without alluding to a universal narrative or story that holds a clue to "Everyman." The "Other" is all important in postmodernism, with attention to how the voice of the "Other" has been suppressed by the privilege afforded the dominant majority of the 'North."

  • Critical Theory and the "Other"

    Critical theory, too, focuses on the "Other," as the people for whom the privileged "system" isn't working, the people who "fall through the cracks." Critical theory not only studies the social system, it also assumes a responsibility for seeking changes to make the system work better for all. Marx, as illustrated in TR Young's Early Marx, in his Critical Dictionary, notes that Marx was primarily a humanist, who wanted to improve the system on behalf of the worker, who was dominated and oppressed by the owner.

  • Postcolonial Theory and the "Other"

    Postcolonial theory goes even further to recognize that the colonized "Other" has been inundated by the dominance of the colonizer, even unto the infrastructure that was imposed in colonization, and the language in which "acceptable" ideas are expressed. Thus, Spivak talks of the difficulty in discovering the "native informant," whose imaginary has been so constrained by the dominant discourse of the colonizer that it becomes increasingly difficult to separate out the colonized self from the native self. Think how this goes back to the nature versus nurture controversy, which we do find in traditional social theory!

    Each of these approaches insists that the "Other" must be actively taken into account in today's world. Each insists upon a change that has produced injustice in the past. Each invokes denial from those who have profited from the fruits of oppression. And that leads us to puffed up bullfroggery!

    I suggest, though I do not know, that the substitute you had when I was ill is a traditionalist. You are a pretty vocal group, used to calling structural violence as you see it. I can then well imagine that the suggestion that the past had done injustices that need to be addressed led to some denial on the part of a traditionalist, who puffed up in an immediate protective response. I am basing that on the statement you reported: "Come now, we are all adults here!" I read both status ranking and paternalism in that statement. You are behaving like children, while I am behaving like an adult. Intimidation. And here we see the whole process of silencing the "Other" which postmodern theory opposes.

  • More . . .

    I gotta get to school! I'll put up more on our discussion of rape tomorrow or Friday. I'll include Susan Brownmuller's work, Catharine MacKinnon's Toward a Feminist Theory of the State, and the conceptual linking of both to the intimidation of woman. We'll discuss concsiousness raising and it's relationship to theory. And we'll include "street smarts" about the dangers of confrontation and alternative approaches.

    And, thanks to Bridget's reminder, I'll link this all to personal experience and positivism (the approach that insists that science and scientific research can lead us to "truth."