Re: Cultural stances

Eugene Matusov (ematusov who-is-at cats.ucsc.edu)
Tue, 06 Feb 1996 16:54:40 -0800

Hello everybody--

Thanks, Jay, for intersting response. Your personal position is very
interesting one. However, following Bakhtin, I personally prefer "quiet"
("uspokoennoe" in Russian) relationship to myself and my own culture.

Jay, can you e-mail me your review of David Olson's book "The world on
paper," please?

I just finished reading your book "Talking science." It is very interesting
and informative book. Thanks for writing it.

Eugene
At 11:13 PM 2/5/96 EST, Jay Lemke wrote:
>
>Analyst neutrality
>
>Eugene notes, correctly, an asymmetry in my view of appropriate
>stance for an analyst in respect to (1) his/her own culture, (2)
>all other cultures.
>
>I believe that in case (2), while an analyst may feel critical
>toward another culture, such feelings should be regarded as data
>about his/her own culture and its relations to the Other, i.e. as
>grist for the mill of our own reflexivity. Our dominant stance
>should be be humility: I cannot possibly form as adequate a view
>of another culture as I can of my own, cannot know it from
>inside, cannot perceive its self-interests, its needs, its pain.
>This humility appears in the context of our dominant ideologies
>of scientific objectivity as a sort of neutrality, but that is a
>misunderstanding, and an impossible ideal.
>
>But in regard to case (1), my own culture(s), I have exactly the
>opposite view. It is my responsibility as analyst to be
>hypercritical, to identify every possible weakness and flaw and
>site for potential improvement that my analytical perspectives
>allow. I believe that I am both qualified and morally licensed to
>damn middle-class culture wherever possible.
>
>Perhaps this asymmetry may give some the impression that I am an
>uncritical admirer of all things Other (I am not), and that I
>count my own culture the worst of all possible lifeways (I
>don't). I cannot help but enjoy and feel comfortable with many
>aspects of my own culture (and I need to be critically on guard
>against this congruence of enculturated habitus and positioned
>experience). I cannot help but feel repelled by some aspects of
>other cultures (but this is again data about me, not about them).
>I do not imagine myself happier living in any Other culture, but
>I can well imagine myself and many others happier living in a
>different future of my own culture(s). And so I must imagine that
>difference, through critique. JAY.
>
>PS. In addition to this asymmetry, there is of course another
>relevant one: power differences between cultures and castes. The
>powerful are wise to welcome the criticisms of less powerful
>Others, whose viewpoints are never wholly outside the social
>system that links dominant and dominated. The latter also need to
>criticize the former as part of their own liberation, but for the
>more powerful to criticize the less is weakly grounded not only
>intellectually but also morally. Examples on request.
>
>-----------
>
>
>JAY LEMKE.
>City University of New York.
>BITNET: JLLBC who-is-at CUNYVM
>INTERNET: JLLBC who-is-at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
>
>

------------------------
Eugene Matusov
UC Santa Cruz