you are correct. i was being loose with my language. i meant to say that
the traditional, dominant, and most-often-accepted language of political
equality supports a limited conception of personhood. i was thinking of
somthing like "all men are created equal" and how many people that
excluded.
but, i have to say that i do not believe that "language is the only hope
of progress."
i am not sure i believe in progress, first of all.
but there are other modes of knowing and communicating besides verbal or
written language. if you are offering a more expansive definition, i would
love to hear it.
>
>
>>what about a personalized, subjective, context-dependent approach?
>
>Every approach is personalized, subjective, and especially
>context-dependent. Shared experience of these is the basis of community.
this is as problematic a statement as "all men are created equal"
what is shared is more than what is talked about as shared or common, it
includes things like what people do or don't do, who gets to do or talk
about what, how often the shared experience, or common vision, or
community rules, (i see all these phrases as overlapping sections of a
continuum), are invoked to control which behaviors and what type of
people.
>
>
>>the journey of a thousand miles that begins with one step.
>>the step towards my self.
>
>Such an emphasis on self-reflexiveness is a dangerous kind of selfishness.
>Today's societies are severely afflicted with a solipsism that borders on
>the pathological. The trip inwards is fine, inevitable in fact, as long as
>it is not at the expense of social reflexivity.
i disagree. i think that the pathological labels fits activities like
consumerism (how much stuff do i need to be happy? i'm not happy, yet, so
i must need more stuff) or femininity (how many more pounds do i need to
loose in order to be a real woman? what am i doing wrong that makes my man
so angry with me?) or other practices that view one self as a unitary
being in a darwinian world. none of that is what i think of as
self-reflection.
maybe soul-reflection better expresses it, but that creates its own set of
problems.
you also wrote.
"My point is that diversity _is_ the human condition (perhaps that of life)
and so requires no further definition or promotion. It's a first principle,
I think."
i agree whole-heartedly,
but how to express this first principle in a caring, connected,
non-dualistic way?
how to avoid the self-social dichotomy?
kathie
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
life's backwards,
life's backwards,
people, turn around.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^sinead o'connor and john reynolds
fire on babylon: universal mother^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Katherine_Goff who-is-at ceo.cudenver.edu
http://ceo.cudenver.edu/~katherine_goff/index.html