Paul, you wrote:
The notion that meaning is "infused with subjectivity"
>seems almost trivial when taken in the limited sense that all meaning is
>given to a subject, occurs for a subject, etc. On the other hand, to extend
>it much farther is problematic. Individuals don't create meaning or have
>private meanings in any "objective" sense, meaning is the product of
>social-historical action, of practice, of labor. From the activity
>theoretic perspective, as far as I understand it (cf. Toulmin's essay in
>Perspectives on Activity Theory) the creation of meaning in activity
>generates he possibility of subjectivity, that is as subject of a higher
>order mental process, a subject capable of reflecting on its own experience,
>a subject capable of what Bateson might have called Level III learning.
I agree with everything up to the last statement; Bateson would have called
reflective thoughtful action as Learning II (as distinct from Learning 0
and Learning I).
>This is subject beyond the reflex stage at which a dog is taught to salivate
>or any organism recoils from pain, is drawn to pleasure.
>
>What seems to come through the backdoor ....is the idea that morality for
>Bakhtin might have something to do with taking into account an other's
>emotions in framing "one's response". I have never seen anything even
>approaching this in anything I've read by Bakhtin and I'm wondering if
>anyone can point me to such a passage in any of his works.
I find that a puzzling claim, unless you mean by emotion something divorced
from intentionality. I understand Bakhtin to be arguing against such a
divorce.
>You have to admit that it would be a terribly weak foundation for morality.
>One can give any number of examples but it should suffice to point to the
>way in which children are taught morality which usually involves ignoring if
>not purposefully seeking to modify the emotional responses that comes from
>their short-term, selfish interests.
Whose child-rearing are you referring to?
I agree that taking the "other" into
>account is fundamental in defining morality (cf., Habermas 1974) but I
>really question the proposed role for "the other's emotions" in any
>consistent moral framework.
I can't conceive of a moral framework without a significant role for "the
other's emotions" -- which are, after all, simply a barometer for one's
relationship to the environment. If you see emotions as threatening or
manipulative, I can understand your rejection of them. But if you see
another's emotion as a guage of your effect on them, then it seems to me
that that is where morality -- taking the other into account -- begins:
right there.
Judy
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Mar 01 2001 - 01:01:15 PST