scholarly journals Representation, Ideology and Writing from Below: On the Paradox of Standpoint Epistemology and the Limits of Intersectionality

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Hussey
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Politics Of Representation ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Ideology Critique ◽  
Cartesian Dualism ◽  
Feminist Standpoint ◽  
Standpoint Epistemology ◽  
Important Form

Feminist standpoint epistemology (FSE) is an important form of writing from below; that is, writing from embodied experience. FSE and other forms of writing from below involve practices of representation that are mediated by ideology. In this article, I tease out some of the complexities and limitations of feminist efforts to use FSE to situate and embody thought. Some feminist standpoint theorists understand Cartesian dualism as a dualism or a division that can be collapsed or reversed, but I show that what is called “Cartesian dualism” is in fact a paradox and therefore cannot be overcome but must be grappled with on an ongoing basis in our efforts to write from below. The article begins with an exploration of the basic tenets and presumptions of two schools of FSE. While neither school can evade the politics of representation, I show that one is able to withstand an intersectional critique whilst the other is not. Having unpacked these schools of FSE, I reflect on Himani Bannerji’s ideology critique of intersectionality to lay bare the limitations of this concept that some writers from below deploy and to advance a reflexive materialist epistemology.

‘Wisselbare Woorde’

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carrol Clarkson
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
The Other ◽  
Frantz Fanon ◽  
Politics Of Representation ◽  
Black Consciousness ◽  
Nadine Gordimer ◽  
Contact Zones ◽  
Critical Problems ◽  
Ethics And Politics

Carrol Clarkson’s chapter wrestles with the contentious question of Coetzee’s relation to the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa of the 1970s and early 1980s, which took its philosophical bearings from Frantz Fanon and found expression in the writings of Steve Biko. Clarkson focuses on the ways in which Coetzee departed from the ideas about writing and resistance that were circulating in his contemporary South Africa, particularly as articulated by novelist Nadine Gordimer. Clarkson discusses two related literary-critical problems: an ethics and politics of representation, and an ethics and politics of address, showing how Coetzee explores a tension between freedom of expression and responsibility to the other. In the slippage from saying to addressing we are led to further thought about modes and sites of consciousness—and hence accountabilities—in the interlocutory contact zones of the post-colony. The chapter invites a sharper appreciation of what a postcolonial philosophy might be.

Premchand, nationalism and civil resistance in colonial North India

2019 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-194
Author(s):  
Shailendra Kumar Singh
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
The Other ◽  
Moral Duty ◽  
North India ◽  
Politics Of Representation ◽  
Field Of Study ◽  
Apparent Lack ◽  
Civil Resistance ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One

The theme of nationalism in the works of Premchand, the pre-eminent Urdu–Hindi writer of the 1920s and 1930s, not only serves as an organising principle but also constitutes a protean and contentious field of study, which has resulted in conflicting interpretations. On the one hand, his nationalist narratives are categorically denounced for their apparent lack of radicalism, while on the other hand, they are unequivocally valorised for their so-called subversive content. Both these diametrically opposed schools of criticism, however, share a common lacuna, that is, both of them tend to conflate the writer’s nationalist narratives with his peasant discourse, thereby precluding the possibility of different themes yielding different interpretations. This article examines the theme of nationalism in Premchand’s works, in general, and the question of civil resistance in particular, in order to demonstrate how the writer’s politics of representation in his nationalist writings differs from the one that we find in his peasant narratives. It argues that as opposed to the authorial valorisation of the fictive peasant’s conformity to the exploitative status quo, civil resistance in Premchand’s nationalist narratives is not only necessary and desirable but also synonymous with dharma (moral duty) itself.

Unveiling the subject behind diversity: Exploring the micro-politics of representation in ethnic minority creatives’ identity work

Organization ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 330-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrizia Zanoni ◽  
Annelies Thoelen ◽  
Sierk Ybema
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Minority ◽  
Identity Work ◽  
Creative Industries ◽  
The Other ◽  
Politics Of Representation ◽  
Cultural Industries ◽  
Creative Work ◽  
The West ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Creative Subject

Much literature on the cultural industries celebrates ethnicity as a source of creativity. Despite its positive connotation, this discourse reduces ethnic minority creatives to manifestations of a collective ethnic identity automatically leading to creativity, creating a paradox of creativity without a creative subject. Approaching creatives with an ethnic minority background as agents, this article investigates how they self-reflectively and purposely discursively construct ethnicity as a source of creativity in their identity work. Empirically, we analyze interviews with well-established creatives with an ethnic minority background active in Belgium. Most respondents construct their ethnic background as ‘hybrid’, ‘exotic’, or ‘liminal’ to craft an identity as creatives and claim creativity for their work. Only few refuse to discursively deploy ethnicity as a source of creativity, crafting more individualized identities as creatives. Our study contributes to the literature on power and ethnicity in the creative industries by documenting ethnic minority creatives’ discursive micro-struggle over what is creative work and who qualifies as a creative. Specifically, we show their counterpolitics of representation of ethnicity in the creative industries through the re-signification of the relation between the ‘west’ and the ‘other’ in less disadvantageous terms. Despite such re-signification, the continued relevance of the discourse of ethnicity as a key marker of difference suggests that ethnicity remains a principle of unequal organization of the creative industries.

scholarly journals Whose Knowledge?

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Guro Parr Klyve
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Mental Health Care ◽  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Feminist Epistemology ◽  
Epistemic Injustice ◽  
Feminist Standpoint ◽  
Research With Children ◽  
Standpoint Epistemology ◽  
Point Of Departure

In this essay, I will discuss the importance of having an awareness about epistemic justice, epistemic ignorance and epistemic injustice, and why this awareness is important in connection to children and patients in mental health care. I also suggest ways to avoid epistemic injustice when working with, and doing research with, children in mental health care. In doing so, I tie this to feminist epistemology where conceptions such as knowledge, knowers and objectivity are questioned, and dominant conceptions and practices of knowledge production are perceived as a systematic disadvantage of women and other subordinated groups (Anderson, 2017). I am as well linking this to queer epistemology which differs from feminist standpoint epistemology in the idea of the identity being “a point of departure for shared consciousness” (Hall, 2017, p. 163).

Adapting Böhme’s Bipolar Model

2020 ◽  
pp. 125-161
Author(s):  
Peter Cheyne
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Crucial Importance ◽  
Mental Powers ◽  
Important Form

Chapter 5 argues for the crucial importance for Coleridge’s philosophy of Böhme, whose works he annotated more than any other writer. Section 5.1 discusses Coleridge’s views of various mystics and of the poles of mysticism: one side valued for its sensuous connection, yet found prone to mistake inner idiosyncrasies for noetic insight; the other side, the transcendence-directed contemplation of mystics such as the Christian neo-Platonic Victorines. Section 5.2 argues that the chiasmic crux of Böhme’s thinking inspired three Coleridgean mainstays: the interpenetration of opposites, the intercirculation of energies, and the chiasmus between higher and lower levels. Section 5.3 further argues that an important form of Coleridge’s pentadic logical schemata, which includes his pentad of the ‘Powers of Nature’ and his ‘Order of the Mental Powers’, derives from his fusing Böhme’s transmutational, chiasmic schema of ‘The Seven Forms of Spirits’ with the Christian neo-Platonic, linear, hierarchical ascent from sensus to contemplatio.

Genetic Counseling and the Disabled: Feminism Examines the Stance of Those Who Stand at the Gate

Hypatia ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 118-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annette Patterson ◽  
Martha Satz
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Counseling ◽  
Genetic Counselors ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Concept ◽  
Systematic Bias ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Feminist Standpoint ◽  
The Disabled ◽  
Standpoint Epistemology

This essay examines the possible systematic bias against the disabled in the structure and practice of genetic counseling. Finding that the profession's “nondirective” imperative remains problematic, the authors recommend that methodology developed by feminist standpoint epistemology be used to incorporate the perspective of disabled individuals in genetic counselors' education and practice, thereby reforming society's view of the disabled and preventing possible negative effects of genetic counseling on the self-concept and material circumstance of disabled individuals.

Standpoint Epistemology Without the “Standpoint”?: An Examination of Epistemic Privilege and Epistemic Authority

Hypatia ◽  
1997 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marianne Janack
Keyword(s):  
Standpoint Theory ◽  
Epistemic Authority ◽  
Feminist Standpoint Theory ◽  
Feminist Standpoint ◽  
Standpoint Epistemology

In this paper I argue that the distinction between epistemic privilege and epistemic authority is an important one for feminist epistemologists who are sympathetic to feminist standpoint theory, I argue that, while the first concept is elusive, the second is really the important one for a successful feminist standpoint project.

“He made her feel the beauty”

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 209-239
Author(s):  
Paul Sopčák
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
The Other ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Literary Reading ◽  
Denial Of Death ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Human Finitude

In this paper, I discuss claims according to which literary reading may initiate a form of reflection that leads to “a shift in understanding” (e.g., Miall, 2006, p. 145). I focus particularly on reflection on one’s own finitude and draw on phenomenology to distinguish between two current models of “shifts in understanding” through reading literature: one involves shifts in abstract beliefs and the other involves shifts in embodied and experiential understandings. I argue that for some readers the engagement with literary texts not only moves them from the denial of death to the understanding of their own finitude, but that it also affords them an embodied experience of this finitude, as opposed to an abstract acknowledgement of it. I begin by describing the difference between knowing about one’s death and the experience of one’s finitude. I then present a phenomenological alternative to current suggestions for how literary texts may initiate “a shift in understanding.” Finally, I present a series of empirical studies that investigate readers’ engagements with texts dealing with human finitude.

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