Re: Bakhtin, moral answerability...

From: Helena Worthen (hworthen@igc.org)
Date: Sat Feb 17 2001 - 10:37:46 PST


Hello -- I'm clipping from Judy's last message, which responded to Ana, Jay
and Paul, to indicate that I'm trying to follow through with what has been
built already.

But my first impression of Hicks' article was that she is drawing the moral
core of Bakhtin's work from his urging us to note how discourse in the novel
exemplifies how much work goes into "richly seeing," "engaging," etc the other
party or parties in the discourse; that this work is inherently moral (an
engagement), and heavy (rather than light).

Thus far I'm fine with this.

What puzzles me is that "richly seeing" etc is only elaborated by Hicks as
"loving contemplation" or "compassionate." That is, that the only
characteristic of close attention to the words and meaning and position of
one's partner in a dialogue is loving or compassionate. Or that what is moral
or ethical is always loving or compassionate.

I would propose that close attention to the words and meaning and
position of
one's partner in a dialogue, while essential to creating a moral or ethical
response, does not have to be loving or compassionate. I would argue
that the
intensity of attention and the quality (lover or antagonist) are separate
characteristics. I'd also suggest that lover and antagonist are not the only
types of moral/ethical responses.

Come to think of it, if no word is neutral (I agree) and no social discourse
exists that is not "charged with the value contexts of its previous usage"
(Hicks p. 238), then we should be ready to appreciate that there are all kinds
of moral/ethical standings that are not loving or compassionate, but are still
morally engaged. "Bad" is moral, too!

I guess what I'm coming to, here, is that while Hicks brings us back to the
value-laden character of social discourse, she skids around speaking of
it as
dialectic.

My rountable at the Bakhtin conference -- attended, I should say right away,
by only 3 -- count 'em, 3 -- (but much appreciated) participants -- was about
how you can use the Bahktinian analytic framework to unpack what's going
on in
the grievance process, in which a workplace problem is brought to a
negotiation with management through a union representative. The context is
adversarial; the process forces and shapes a dialogue; the kind of attention
that the adversaries HAVE to pay to the words of their opposite partner
is as
intense as what Hicks describes but it is not loving or compassionate; it's
the kind of attention that a prisoner might pay to the lock on his door.

So -- can I get a response to the notion that while "Appropriation of the
discourses of others entails a high degree of engagement and work," as Hicks
says on page 239, and while it certainly is moral engagement in an ethically
loaded context, it is not necessarily loving or compassionate except in the
sense that all intense attention (even stalking, I guess) is an
expression of
love ---?

Helena Worthen

Judith Diamondstone wrote:

> I realize that not everyone has yet read the Hicks article, but I'd like to
> respond to comments already made by Ana, Jay, and Paul. Ana writes:
>
> >If one
> >cannot situate agency in an INDIVIDUAL, if one does not VALUE an
> individual, then on one
> >hand one cannot talk about individual moral answerability, and on the
> other, destruction
> >of individuals cannot be construed as a crime.
>
> I agree with this, and I understand it to be the overarching argument of
> Deborah's article......
>

-----

> .... In Bakhtin's later works, there is no sense of neutrality.
> Ventriloquation, reaccentuating discourse, is HARD WORK, a struggle;
> everyday life is a struggle; genuine moral engagement is a battle with
> centripetal forces, with powers of categorization, the naming of the real.
>
> To imbue an activity with moral purpose, I believe, with Ana & others, that
> we must theorize individuated selves and the processes of individuation
> that stop ONLY when we accede to the authoritative word. The going word.
> The buzz. What Bakhtin, Pierce, and many others concerned with meanings and
> the social make clear is that there are no answers, there is only a
> holding-in-view the uncertainties and conflicts that constitute our objects
> and ourselves, that _put at risk_ whatever it is we do, IF WE DO IT WELL.
> That make us vulnerable to one another.
>
> Which sounds too much like an answer, because that's how we tend to end our
> texts,
> at 11 pm
> Judy



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