Adamic Language, Gender, and Naming in John Milton’s Paradise Lost

            When dealing with Adamic Language in Paradise Lost there are many arguments as to what Adam’s conception of language was, and more importantly how he acquired his language. Of particular interest is Adam’s naming of the animals. The whole concept of Adamic Language revolves around the fact that his names were the right ones, in other words they were perfect and each name fit with each creature. This paper will analyze various strands of Adamic Language and make the case that Adam’s language was preordained to him by God even before his creation or that his language was heavenly inspire and not merely approved after the fact.

Christopher Eagle’s essay “‘Thou Serpent That Name Best’: On Adamic Language and Obscurity in Paradise Lost” (2007) focuses on the Milton Controversy and how each camp (the Satanist and anti-Satanist) dealt with the Milton’s syntax and obscure language. Some blamed Milton’s language for being too self-aware and grandiose by calling attention to itself instead of what the language is signifying (Eagle 183). This is what Eagle describes as obscurity in Milton’s language, the density in syntax and richness in style which F.R. Leavis saw as Milton having “a feeling for words rather than a capacity for feeling through words” (Eagle 183). What critics of both camps over the centuries tend to agree upon is on a shared quest for the perfect language, “a language in which word corresponds to thing adequately and with clarity, with the specificity of a proper name, or the irrefutability of a logical syllogism” (Eagle 183). Eagle goes on to state that this preoccupation by Milton scholars of both camps was “rooted in the Biblical terms of a lost Adamic language and the possibility of its retrieval” (183). Eagle uses the obscurity of Milton’s language as a tool in order to interpret Adam’s prelapsarian language.

            Eagle mentions Genesis 2.19 in which God grants Adam the power to name as the moment understood to Milton and his contemporaries as “the scriptural basis for an understanding of language in a prelapsarian state” (184). This Adamic language was perfect in every sense including accuracy and clarity (Eagle 184). And Milton himself agreed in Tetrachordon that Adam must of have perfect knowledge of the animals which he named, a case that he also makes in Christian Doctrine[1], which Eagle mentions. But here is where Eagle tends to disagree with Milton, or at least acknowledges that there may be other ways of interpreting the perfection of Adamic Language:

However, if we resist allowing Milton’s remarks in Tetrachordon to close the discussion too quickly, we find that Paradise Lost, much like Genesis 2.19, does not definitively endorse the assertion that the rightness of Adam’s names is predicated on his a priori knowledge. Again, as Eco points out, the primary ambiguity of the claim stems from whether Adam (human though as yet unfallen), should be said to have named rightly (de veritas), or only by right (de ordinatio), or more playfully, as he pleases (ad placitum). In Platonic terms, the question is whether Milton’s Adam is a Cratylist knower of essences, imbued with a priori knowledge, or a Hermogenist name-maker, imbued with authority over consensus. (186)

What Eagle is pointing towards in the above lines is whether Adam had foreknowledge of the animals’ nature instilled by him through God in order to name the animals, or if with God’s divine approval he picked the names of the animals. In other words, are the names perfect because they correspond with each animal intrinsically, or are they perfect merely because God gave Adam the power to name? If the first case is true, and Adam has a priori knowledge of the animals, then his names are perfect by divine intervention. If, on the other hand, the second case is true then his names are perfect by divine approval. The first makes Adam seem like a god naming them “as they passed” (8.352) because he has intrinsic knowledge of them. The second instance makes him seem less like a god and more human prone to misnaming but still having God’s approval. In other words he has knowledge of the animals because he names them (or as he is naming them): “I named them, as they passed, and understood / Their nature, with such knowledge God endued / My sudden apprehension” (8.352-354). He names them first and then he understands their nature.

            I tend to agree with Stanley Fish and other critics in taking the first stance of Adam’s naming-knowing, that is to say he had a priori knowledge of the animals. He had intrinsic knowledge of them animals instilled by him through God, and his naming merely expounded the knowledge that he already possessed. As Raphael is retracing the story of the creation and naming of the animals he proclaims to Adam: “And thou their natures know’st, and gav’st them names” (7.493). Raphael proclaims that Adam did not name the animals in some random fashion, but rather that he had some knowledge of “their natures”. His ability to name is a gift from Milton’s God, and so is his knowledge of nature. The concept of Adamic Language is grounded on the assertion that “Adam’s knowledge (of the animals) is infused by him directly by God” (Fish 104),  as Stanley Fish argues in Surprised by Sin, a stance that several critics agree and comment on.

One of those critics is John Leonard who agrees with Fish in his essay “Language and Knowledge in Paradise Lost” when he argues that the “effortlessness of Adam’s naming (‘sudden apprehension’) testifies to the completeness of his understanding” (131). Leonard is pointing to the a crucial scene in Book 8 in which Adam is recounting how he came to name the animals: “I named them, as they passed, and understood / Their nature, with such knowledge God endued / My sudden apprehension” (8.352-354). When Adam states that he understood the animals’ nature he is pointing towards the knowledge that everything is good, based upon the fact that everything in Paradise is made in God’s image including Adam. Adam’s ability to name, or rather the names he gives the animals, is natural and divinely inspired. In other words, Adam had possessed a “perfect wisdom which was his birthright in Paradise” (Leonard 133) and this was the sole factor behind “Adam’s ability to call things by their proper names” (Leonard 133). 

Adam’s ability to name things is given to him by God the moment he is created. When Adam awoke for the first time in Eden he immediately starting naming things and knew this knowledge was good:

                        But who I was, or where, or from what cause,

                        Knew not; to speak I tried, and forthwith spake,

                        My tongue obeyed and readily could name

                        Whate’er I saw. (8.270-273)

It is of interest to note that Adam had the ability to name things as soon as he could speak. Milton in the above passage implies that the first things Adam spoke were names, in other words his arrival at language happened through naming. Milton in a passage from Christian Doctrine suggests that Adam’s ability and knowledge of naming was granted to him as a result of his creation, and not in some extemporaneous, spur-of-the-moment way: “Since man was formed in the image of God, he must have been endowed with natural wisdom, holiness and righteousness. . .Moreover he could not have given the names to the animals in that extempore way, without very great intelligence” (1208-09). God could not create Adam without this innate ability to name, and since Adam was created in his image his ability to name had to be perfect and congruent. If Adam was created in God’s image then he had to be perfect which means that his language and naming had to be perfect as well. His naming is a by-product of his holiness. But of course Adam fell and with it he forfeited his perfection which places his prelapsarian language in an interesting place. 

            It seems that Adam in a prelapsarian state had true knowledge of nature and the goodness behind it. Adam’s names given to the animals is a permanent reminder of the perfection and goodness of Paradise to the fallen Adam. Milton’s God entrusted Adam with naming the animals (“I bring them to receive/ From thee their names” 8.343-344) and it’s clear that there could be no mistake in Adam’s naming: “Adam’s superior knowledge, and the names he gives the animals are thought to be exact, corresponding in each case to the essence of the species. Adam’s knowledge is infused by him directly by God, and the names he imposes, like God’s, are accurate, intensively, and extensively” (Fish 104). Adam’s language is perfect and this perfection is a by-product of his holiness and godly image. Fish above might be implying that Adam himself was like a god or was the God in Paradise  even though Adam did not create the animals he does have an intimate knowledge of them, and this intimate knowledge is not based on experience but rather is a byproduct of his prelapsarian state. His naming not only brings him knowledge of the animals, but also knowledge of himself: “To name creatures in Paradise was to know their essences. . .Adam’s names brings him self-knowledge and knowledge about the animals” (Leonard 131). It might be argued that the knowledge that naming brings him is that everything  around him is good, including himself. This knowledge will cause much despair and anger in Adam later on after the Fall.

            After Milton’s God creates Paradise he acknowledges the intricate goodness behind it: “Here finished he, and all that he had made / Viewed, and behold all was entirely good” 7.548-549). This goodness is not added unto nature after it is created, but rather it is natural. The basic essence of nature is that it is good and everything in it including Adam is good as well. So how does man fall if Paradise and Adam are good? The only way the serpent succeeds in fooling Eve is through language, but it is not the same language that God grants Adam. When Adam first acquires language Adam narrates that “to speak I tried, and forthwith spake, / My tongue obeyed” (8.270-271). Adam’s tongue is obeying his need for language, and his language is a gift from God (so his language is holy/Godly). His tongue seems to be inspired by God. On the other hand, when the Serpent seeks language “with serpent tongue/ Organic, or impulse of vocal air” (9.529-530). Organic means relating to a living entity or “belonging or inherent in a living being” (OED). So, is the serpent tongue a distinct and different living entity than the serpent’s body? Is there a distinction? The figurative language behind “impulse of vocal air” is impressive, but what does it mean? So it is clear that the serpent’s tongue is not inspired by God, so where does the serpent get the power to talk man’s language? It seems that both Adam’s and the Serpent’s tongue are their own entities, but Adam’s tongue obeys him whereas the Serpent’s tongue is acting upon an impulse. As Leonard points out “Satan finds words for his temptation, but it is not certain that he finds a tongue to speak them” (Leonard 140), by tongue he seems to be pointing towards language which belonged only to man.

            The serpent succeeds in fooling Eve and causes the Fall of Man by using the most basic application of human language, which is the ability to argue. Adam already knew, based on his own naming experience, that “language is knowledge” (Leonard 141), and in Adam’s case it was the knowledge that his names and nature were good. The Serpent uses this knowledge of good in order to instill the knowledge of evil into Eve’s mind. Interestingly, after the Fall when Eve tries to console Adam he replies angrily: “Out of my sight / thou Serpent, that name best / Befits thee with him leagued, thyself as false / And hateful” (10.867-869). Adam compares Eve to the serpent, to Satan himself, and by doing so blames Eve completely for the Fall. Although he later repents and tries to take complete blame for the Fall it is Eve who volunteers herself for punishment by uttering her famous line “Me me only just object of this ire” (10.936). In this speech in Book 10 she takes full blame for the Fall, and by doing so makes a case for her own voice and equality in their partnership. Leah Whittington in her essay “Vergil’s Nisus and the Language of Self-Sacrifice in Paradise Lost (2010) argues that Eve’s speech “initiates a conversation in which the seeds of dialogue, sown by her penitence, begin to germinate” (605), by offering to sacrifice herself for both of them Eve is taking full responsibility for the world around her even though it was originally meant for Adam, but a closer look at Eve’s language reveals an inclination towards sympathy and care for the world around her.

            Crucial to Eve’s understanding of language and Adam’s knowledge-by-naming argument is Eve’s naming. In order to fully grasp the perfection of Adamic Language we must look at Eve’s naming of the flowers and how her naming relates Adam’s a priori knowledge. Kristen Poole in her article “Naming, Paradise Lost, and the Gendered Discourse of Perfect Language Schemes” (2008) makes the case that “the early modern discourse about perfect language [. . .] is simply androcentric” (538). Poole is pointing to the seventeenth century search among scholars for the language of Adam as naturally gendered biased: “The androcentrism of this search for this search for perfect language is [. . .] inured to the masculine bias inherent in “Adamic” [. . .] seemingly privileging the voice of Adam over that of Eve” (538).  Even this paper on Adamic Language unintentionally privileges Adam over Eve. In other words, there is a gendered binary that arises whenever we talk about Adamic Language simply because by focusing on the language of Adam we are completely ignoring the language of Eve. The gender binary is there, we just chose to ignore or unintentionally not acknowledge it. But in order to fully grasp the knowledge behind Adamic Language our interpretations must be informed by Eve’s language as well.

            Milton was aware of the gender binary inherent in the discussion of perfect language and he illustrated this by giving a participatory role in Edenic Language (the language of Eden) and giving her the power to name the flowers. Milton “deviated from the story of Genesis, in which Adam alone conferred names upon the animals” (Poole 539) in order to provide a comparison or rather “competing linguistic models” (Poole 539) of the original language of Eden and even nature. By inserting Eve in the process of naming Milton is swaying us away from the arguments of intrinsic knowledge in Adamic Language and is instead introducing us to the gendered discourse inherent in such arguments. In other words, before we can make an argument for Adam’s a priori knowledge of the animals first we must acknowledge that Adam’s language is part of a binary (a binary whose other side gets overwhelmingly ignored). 

            Poole takes an interesting view of Adamic Language, one which closely relates to Fish’s argument of Adam’s a priori knowledge and my own argument of Adam having intrinsic knowledge of the animals:

Adam’s naming is not the imposition of his own set of signifiers; his naming is more aptly considered as his reading of a language that is already a part of nature [. . .] the natural world was created with divine “signatures” already imprinted upon it. The “Spirit of every [Beast] was figured in them”: names are not separate entities from the animals. Rather [. . .] the relationship of word and thing, signifier and signified is organic, integrated, whole. Names are an expression of creation’s “Essence”; the names are part of creation, and were visible to Adam. Words and the Word are one. (543)

Poole seems to be saying that he names that Adam imposed on the animals are right and perfect because the those were the names that nature (God) infused in them. Adam was merely a messenger pronouncing the names that he were already there. Raphael tends to agree with this assessment: “Thus far to try thee, Adam, I was pleased, / And find thee knowing not of beasts alone, / Which thou hast rightly named, but of thyself” (8.437-439). He has “rightly named” them not because Heaven agrees with the names he has chosen, but because they are perfect in every way and correspond with each animal’s nature since “Adam’s knowledge is infused by him directly by God” (Fish 104).

            If Adam’s naming is somehow a source of knowledge form God, then what of Eve’s naming? Where does her inspiration come from? Unfortunately, Eve does not a scene (like Adam) in the poem when she names the flowers. Her naming is merely an utterance, and everybody in the poem seems to about it besides herself. In Book XI, after the anger Michael informs Adam that they must “[no] longer in this Paradise to dwell” (XI.259), Eve overhears this and after lamenting over her exit from Paradise she recites:

                                                                                                O flow’rs,

                                                That never will in other climate grow,

                                                My early visitation, and my last

                                                At ev’n, which I bred up with tender hand

                                                From the first op’ning bud, and gave ye names

Who now shall rear ye to the sun                    (XI. 273-277)

This is the only proof the poem provides of Eve’s naming. Unlike Adam’s naming which is alluded to in several passages, Eve’s naming is merely glanced over in one of the last books of the poem. In Adam’s naming scene that animals come to him and he names them as they pass, but Eve names the flowers as they are born (or grown). In a sense she helps create them or nurture them into being: “I bred up with tender hand” (XI.276). Her naming is more personal and the names seem to be of her own creation, and maybe not divinely inspired. By breeding them into existence and “rear[ing]” (XI.277) them she seems to have intimate knowledge of each flower and appropriately names them. So her knowledge is intrinsic, like Adam’s, but it comes from a natural place. Her knowledge to name stems from motherhood (from breeding) and nature, and not directly from the Heavens.

            It’s clear form the passage above that Eve’s language (insofar as naming is concerned)  arises from a different place (mainly nature) than Adam’s, and further examination of her character reveals that her connection to nature and the world around her is etched in her psyche from her creation. Kristen Poole interestingly points out that the “merging of Eve and her environment is consistent with the poem’s portrayal of her relationship to the natural world” (555), by this is specifically pointing towards the scene when Eve first awakes and sees her reflection in the lake. Poole uses Eve’s inability to recognize her own reflection as evidence that Eve identifies herself as belonging to the environment and fully integrate in it and not as a separate entity (Poole 556). She seems to have no dominion over her environment (like Adam) and instead sees her world as a part of herself (or herself as a part of the world) and not the owner of it. This seems to contradict God’s instruction to Adam: “This Paradise I give thee, count it thine / To till and keep” (8.319-320). Do these instructions relate to Eve as well? Or is Adam as a male the sole protector and owner of Paradise? Eve in sense a does “till and keep” (8.319-320) the environment around her but in a different way than Adam.

Works Cited

Danielson, Dennis Richard. The Cambridge Companion to Milton. Second ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999. Print.

Eagle, Christopher. ""Thou Serpent That Name Best": On Adamic Language and Obscurity in Paradise Lost." Milton Quarterly 41.3 (2007): 183-94. Print.

Fish, Stanley Eugene. Surprised by Sin: The Reader in Paradise Lost. Second ed. Cambridge (Massachusetts): Harvard UP, 1998. Print.

Milton, John. The Complete Poetry and Essential Prose of John Milton. Ed. William Kerrigan, John Peter Rumrich, and Stephen M. Fallon. New York: Modern Library, 2007. Print.

Poole, Kristen. "Naming, Paradise Lost, and the Gendered Discourse of Perfect Language Schemes." English Literary Renaissance 38.3 (2008): 535-59. Print.

Whittington, Leah. "Vergil’s Nisus and the Language of Self-Sacrifice in Paradise Lost." Modern Philology 107.4 (2010): 588-606. Print.

           

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[1] “Since man was formed in the image of God, he must have been endowed with natural wisdom, holiness and righteousness. . .Moreover he could not have given the names to the animals in that extempore way, without very great intelligence” (Milton 1208-09).

From Totalitarianism to Cosmopolitanism: Issues of identity in a Global Culture in Kawyne Anthony Appiah’s “Cosmopolitan Patriots” and Jura Souranta and Tere Vaden’s “Wikiwolrd”

Both Suoranta and Vaden in their e-book “Wikiworld” and Kwame Anthony Appiah, in his article “Cosmopolitan Patriots envision a different world from the one we live in today. Both argue for a uniquely different future of our world grounded on cultural pluralism and shared culture. While Appiah’s sees a world connected by a common culture grounded on cultural hybridization, Suoranta and Vaden see a culture grounded on a shared technological culture. The similarities between these two visions of the world abound and the differences are plenty as well. But what both, intentionally or unintentionally, miss to mention seems more important.

Similarities

            Appiah sees a future world in “which each local form of human life [is] the result of long-term and persistent processes of cultural hybridization” (619). Appiah is arguing that “patriotism” and “cosmopolitanism” do not have to be mutually exclusive but can be combined, hence the title of his article. The essence of Appiah’s argument is that no culture is created alone by itself but, as history has shown us, cultures are created and eliminated by annexation, colonization, etc. So to him the concept of cosmopolitanism makes perfect sense.

Appiah celebrates the fact that “that there are different local human ways of being” (621), and this is at the core of cosmopolitanism. Appiah emphasizes the fact that “human cultural difference is actively desirable” (621). For him cosmopolitanism does not mean that every culture will become part of a global cosmopolitan culture. He agrees that some cultural backlash might occur, and this is perfectly fine as long as those cultures meet “certain general ethical constraints as long, in particular, as political institutions respect basic human rights” (621). In making this comment, Appiah urges us to pay attention to those “political institutions” (621) that do not respect human dignity and reflect on how culture was/is created in those places.[1] For Appiah culture making and culture elimination are not mutually exclusive, but part of the same cultural cycle:

. . . as forms of culture disappear, new forms are created, and they are created locally, which means they have exactly the regional inflections that the cosmopolitan celebrates. The disappearance of old cultural forms is consistent with a rich variety of forms of human life, just because new cultural forms, which differ from each other, are being created all the time as well. (619)

                Suoranta and Vaden see a similar view of the world in “Wikiworld”. For them the one cultural constant today, and in the future, is technology (or to put it more simplistic, the internet). For them the one constant among all the young people all around the world are ICT’s, or information and communication technologies. For them ICT’s promises to “deliver digital information to any place at any time” (Suorante and Vaden 54). This digital revolution has the potential to create a shared culture, like Appiah’s cosmopolitanism, around ICT’s. In Souranta and Vaden’s own words “[t]his is the great democratic potential of digital technology” (54).

            For Suoranta and Vaden “it is crucial to grasp the importance of focusing on the use and development of technology that responds to the actual needs of the people” (183), but people’s needs are never the same and are different for everyone. This is where ICT’s come in. If we entertain the idea that “everyone is a rooted cosmopolitan, attached to a home of one's own, with its own cultural particularities, but taking pleasure from the presence of other, different places that are home to other, different people” (Appiah 618) then I would argue ICT’s come into play by fostering these relationships between different people of different cultures. The overarching similarity between these two concepts of the world is that both see the world as widely interconnected. Both seem to announce a different world order coming in the near future. While one (Wikiworld) seems more possible than the other, both nevertheless hark to a semi-utopia of sorts.

           

            Further similarities arise when identity comes into the picture. Both pieces of work seem to agree that a broad global culture will inevitably change the way individuals think of themselves, their place in the world, and their relationship with those around them.  

            In Chapter 2 of Wikiworld titled “Digital Literacy and Political Economy” the Souranta and Vaden argue that in a consumerist, competitive society “individual is no longer the autonomous subject of enlightenment, but rather a heteronomous postmodern chameleon and nomad, rearranging herself and her identity according to the situation, always slipping from the pincers of totalizing systems” (34-35). This is more obvious in the realm of ICT’s where individuals can opt-out of their cultural identity. How does re-arranging one’s identity lead to the end of totalitarianism? The concept of the “heteronomous postmodern chameleon” sounds a lot like the cosmopolitan patriot, whose identity is not created by her mother country but can be re-arranged and take on different colors. Old pre-digital society had a totalizing effect, at least in those un-capitalistic political institutions, and an individuals identity was nothing  more than a product of that society. But now, at least according to the authors, an individual’s identity will never be totalizing and concrete, but a mixture. Souranta and Vaden comment on how “the centralized subject of totalitarianism and authoritarianism is replaced by a multitude of voices generated by the immateriality of work in the information age” (36). The information age does not just replace totalitarianism, but also has the power to re-adjust the identities of those individuals internally colonized in capitalistic societies.

Cheryl A. McLean in her digital literacy study titled ““A Space Called Home: An Immigrant Adolescent’s Digital Literacy Practices” argues that an “individuals' identities come out of the active negotiation of a range of Discourses and literacy practices across cultures and contexts” (14), In other words, cultural identity is tied up with a whole host of different contextual discourses and practices, much like the concept of cosmopolitanism, or to a larger extent Wikiworld. Mclean argues that all these discourses and practices are being “used by young persons to create transnational linkages and reinvent and position their national identities” (15). I introduce McLean here to specify how Souranta and Vaden’s theory of cultural identity is congruent with hers.

Both concepts of identity focus in how an external factor (capitalist economy and digital literacies) can changed an individual’s perception of herself in relation to others. It is important to showcase what factors change and mold society as well as the individual. For example, if “reality contains a virtual aspect that connects the seemingly solid everyday objects to a necessary but invisible web of connections, influxions, and investments” (Souranta and Vaden 35), then that virtual aspect of society has to be accounted for. Who are the major players in this virtual aspect of society? Who has a stake in this virtual reality? And so on. Souranta and Vaden state that this is a “necessary” connection since we live in a consumerist world and society. But does “necessary” connote “negative?  What are the human factors involved in this connection to this necessary reality? By connecting ourselves to this virtual reality we are conforming our identity to an outer mechanism. Similarly, the digital literacy practices

have forced Zeek to modify, adapt, and conform her language use. However, in so doing, some core aspects of her voice and identities are silenced. When individuals silence or confine their language of intimacy, the practice brings with it another layer of conflict: guilt and resistance associated with the use of the master discourse. (17).

The master discourse here of course is English, but this concept of the master discourse can also be applied to that virtual reality mentioned above. Whether its ICT’s or a lingua franca, digital literacy practices force you to mold your identity for different circumstances.

           

Differences

The main difference between Appiah’s cosmopolitanism and the concept of the Wikiworld is that the concept of the Wikiworld is grounded on current cultural reality. By this I mean that Appiah’s concept of cosmopolitanism strays too far into the utopian realm. He does not seems to realize that not everyone will have the need, or desire, to be part a global cosmopolitan culture, especially those internally colonized and he also refuses to see how other facets that define our culture (besides nationhood), will play a part in a global culture.

A case in point put forward by Simon Ortiz in his narrative “Our Homeland, a National Sacrifice Area”. Simon Ortiz comments on how the West was won at the expense of the Native American nation. For Ortiz “Otherness” means hybridization, and hybridization for him has negative connotations, as does homogenization. This is where Appiah and Ortiz are in conflict. Take for example Appiah’s view of culture making form the above quoted paragraph.

             

We can sense that Appiah does not relate cultural elimination as negative or bad as long as it helps create new cultures (in other words, homogenization) that foster cosmopolitan ideals. By focusing on homogenization through a cosmopolitan prism, Appiah overlooks the deeper problem of internal colonization and cultural subjugation. Ortiz makes the dangers of homogenization explicitly clear. Ortiz acknowledges that he cannot describe his feeling of “otherness”, but that it is a sensation nonetheless (338). The sad irony is that the U.S., at least in the narrative, has not come to terms with the internal colonization going on: “Government bureaucrats / said Indians were insensitive / to U.S. heritage” (339). Clearly for Ortiz culture homogenization is not congruent with a “rich variety . . . of human life (Appiah 619), on the contrary it is consistent with cultural purging.

            Having just argued that culture making is not in of itself a uniquely positive thing, let us now turn our attention to Appiah’s concept of common culture and Ortiz’s relation to it. In his article Appiah makes the point that “recognizing that we in America are not centered on a national common culture is [. . .]consistent with recognizing that (with, no doubt, a few exceptions) American citizens do have a common culture (628). While it is true that Americans do not have a common culture, it does not necessarily follow that because of this American are sharing a non-existing common culture. It is those “few exceptions” (Appiah 628) that make an American common culture impossible. First of all, those few exceptions will always exists and will continue to resist a common American culture. The Native Americans in Ortiz’s narrative are an example of those resistors and exceptions; they are the “national sacrifice” embedded in the title of his work.

           

The above example of Native Americans showcases how not everyone fits into Appiah’s concept of cosmopolitanism. Furthermore, Appiah celebrates the fact that “that there are different local human ways of being” (621), and this is at the core of cosmopolitanism. Appiah emphasizes the fact that “human cultural difference is actively desirable” (621). For him cosmopolitanism does not mean that every culture will become part of a global cosmopolitan culture. He agrees that some cultural backlash might occur, and this is perfectly fine as long as those cultures meet “certain general ethical constraints as long, in particular, as political institutions respect basic human rights” (621). In making this comment, Appiah urges us to pay attention to those “political institutions” that do not respect human dignity and reflect on how culture was/is created in those places (621)

What are those political institutions that do not respect human dignity? Who are they? How are they created? And who (which states) sustain these political institutions? Appiah completely breezes by this concept and does not delve deeper into this problem. Can it be possible that those Western cosmopolitans are sustaining those inhuman political institutions by arguing for a global culture?

           

Suoranta and Vaden know very well that the subjugation and elimination of cultures should be accepted in the process of producing a global culture. In chapter 6 titled “Stages of Freedom” the authors start off the chapter strongly:

Behind the veil of a multitude of resistances and critiques, we should see the shape of certain "unmoved movers" (proton kinun). Capitalism is one of them; the particularities of the fight of developing countries against prohibitive tolls and tariffs, of the fight of Indian rice farmers against RiceTec and its patents, of the fight against privatization of water, of the fight against liberating markets by armed force, constitute, in fact, a generality: the generality of a capitalist mode of production. And do not even the current ethnic conflicts point to the same: the decline and destruction of local cultures is a continuation of the colonisation that swallowed Finland in the 13th century and many other "peripheries" a lot later. These are not a series of isolated aggressions, but a direct consequence of a sustained Western impulse for trade and conquest.

In other words, the cultural subjugation, elimination, and blending (however you slice it) in the name of a global culture (in this example, Western capitalism) is nothing new. And I believe by pointing to colonization and Western capitalism the authors are warning us that the drive towards a global culture has dire consequences, and we should be careful of jumping on the global culture wagon. The Western world has been at the forefront of at every attempt of a global culture in history. It is interesting how both cosmopolitanism and the Wikiworld are Western concepts, or at least driven by Western concepts.

            The Wikiworld is driven by ICT’s which are products of Western capitalism. So is this idea of a Wikiworld another globalized Western product being sold (or outsourced) to the rest of the world, like capitalism? If I am reading Suoranta and Vaden correctly, the correct answer is yes, but no. Yes, the Wikiworld driven by consumers of ICT’s all over the globe is becoming globalized. But of course it will never become a global phenomenon because the global corporations who produce ICT’s will not allow it. Suoranta and Vaden ask “Is not the technological control of the globe one with a specific model of society, namely Western capitalism?” (152). Yes and that is why a truly global technological culture, like the Wikiworld, will never be fully global in scale, because as noted earlier it is the drive to create a global culture that is preventing such a global culture from coming to fruition. In the process of creating a global culture other cultures have to be subjugated and eliminated, and in the process an under or counterculture is created, thereby hindering the global culture process itself.

            The main reason why a Western global culture undermines it own existence is because “the West sees the rest of the world as a resource, as a natural producer of commodities” (Suoranta and Vaden 152). The most problematic aspect about this is that “the last in the long chain of commodities is catastrophe, and the accompanying catastrophe aid[s] industry” (Suoranta and Vaden 152). In other words, the West is crating the ultimate decline of the west, along with the decline of the rest of the world. By seeing the rest of the world as a producer of commodities we are inedvedtedly creating the misery and poverty present in the third world. To put it more succinctly:

Misery is reproduced as symbolic source, a necessary fuel for the Western moral and sentimental balance. We are the consumers of this spectacle, and the whole West feeds like cannibals on catastrophe mediated by news broadcasting in their cynicaltone and our humanitarian help in a moralistic mode. Baudrillard insists that we are just as dependent on this drug, produced by the developing countries, as other drugs. (Baudrillard 1995, 84-85.) The irony is that global capitalism is strong, dynamic and perverse enough to both produce the drugs it needs and to outsource the misery to the others. (152)

This is the main difference between Appiah’s cosmopolitanism and Suoranta and Vaden’s Wikiworld. That is to say that the Wikiworld is consciously aware of the economic processes imbedded in the world, and sees itself as part-and-parcel of that world (or at least sees that it’s place in the world will be unique). Appiah refuses to see or recognize that a global culture will never be possible, because cosmopolitanism, Wikiworld, global culture, etc, leads to cultural subjugation. More importantly, he does not realize that it is the Western world that creates and tolerates those political institutions or nations that do not respect basic human rights and do not meet “certain general ethical constraints” (621).

           

Sourranta and Vaden mention one concept that will most likely become part of the global culture in the future:

If and when the new racism of the West is characterised by economic divisions, securing the stability of the existing division, it is good to pay attention to how information societies are protected from those seeking a better living.

This new racism is nothing new. Although it initially pointed to culture coded as racism. For example, when a culture privileges one language over another the creation and practice of what Ronald Schmidt in his article “Racialization and Language Policy: The Case of the USA” has quoted as “New Racism” (154), or racism coded as culture is created. Under New Racism “specific cultural forms have come to signify racialized identities, particularly where traditional biologically-based racist attributions have become socially and politically disreputable” (154). By systematically and culturally privileging one language over another, in a multi-ethnic melting-pot society such as America, the assimilationists (those against language policy) are perpetuating an “unjust social inequality between different ethnolinguistic groups that are equally American” (Schmidt 154). Furthermore, the concept of equal treatment under the law is completely diminished when a state privileges one language in a society that is essentially multilingual (Schmidt 154). This brings us to an important point, that is that language just like literacy can be utilized as a hierarchicalagent in a society. Furtehrmore, Souranta and Vaden argue that economic divisions will soon be under the banner of New Racism as well.

           

By placing greater importance on one language and literacy, or one economic level over another we are justifying racism and cultural prejudice, or at the very least acknowledging linguistic, social, and cultural stratification are unequal processes. By seeking an English-only policy and favoring a Western-only literacy (or accepting the Great Divide theory) we are homogenizing language and/or literacy. And soon income levels as well.

            In the process of hierarchizing languages and literacies a society might gain a common culture, such as an American common culture. By prioritizing a language and form of literacy as superior than others a culture will undoubtedly become defined as common. In other words, by hierarchizing we are establishing what is culturally relevant and what is not. While this process can be advantageous in purporting a national unified image abroad, it can also lead to some disadvantages in a culture. For example, by defining what is culturally relevant a culture might be further alienating those internally colonized and furthermore, it might also lose that cultural openness that makes it attractive to foreigners and immigrants alike. Souranta and Vaden are pointing out that if we are not careful our perpetration of Western values abroad will lead to New Racism under economic terms.

           

Works Cited

Appiah, Kwayne Anthony. “Cosmopolitan Patriots.” Critical Inquiry 23.3 (1997): 617-629.

McLean, Cheryl A. “A Space Called Home: An Immigrant Adolescent’s Digital Literacy Practices.” Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy 54.1 (2010): 13-22.

Schmidt, Ronald Sr. “Racialization and Language Policy: The Case of the USA.” Multilingua 21 (2002): 141-161.

Souranta, Juha and Tere Vaden. Wikiworld: Political Economy of Digital Literacy, and the Promise of Participator Media. Tampere, Finland: Paulo Freire Research Center, 2008.

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[1] What strikes as important in Appiah’s concept, and where I think he missed a golden opportunity for insightful research, is that Appiah seems to connotate that those “political institutions” (621) that do not respect human dignity are non-Western. As Suoranta and Vaden showcase, that is not necessarily the case. This interesting, if not mind-boggling, point will be highlighted further in the differences section.

P. S. Greenspan “Guilt and Virtue”

            In his article title “Guilt and Virtue” P.S. Greenspan seeks to displace guilt from the grips of ethics of duty, or duty ethics (in his article Greenspan uses both terms interchangeably). Briefly, ethics of duty “takes acts [or actions] as the primary objects of moral evaluation” (Greenspan 57). In other words, human acts or actions determine the degree of our morality. Greenspan sees this placement of guilt within duty ethics as problematic and seeks instead to interpret guilt through “virtue ethics” (Greenspan 57) and not duty ethics. The ethics of virtue according to Greenspan “emphasizes the evaluation of persons and personal traits in connection with notions of character” (57). Greenspan here signals that acts should not be the sole factors in determining guilt, but that guilt should be evaluated as a defining label of a person’s character and personal traits. If an act is viewed as wrong “or a violation of moral obligation” then according to duty ethics guilt should ensue after this particular act; Greenspan seems to disagree with this theory and instead links guilt with violations of one’s virtue, or “moral perfection” (Greenspan 57).

            Greenspan sees guilt as a “requirement of imperfect virtue” (58), in other words, one cannot be both perfectly virtuous and guilty simultaneously. Greenspan borrows this idea that one cannot be both virtuous and guilty from Aristotle, who suggests that guilt or shame is not a virtue and hence is a lapse from moral perfection (Greenspan 58). Then the question arises, what does it mean to have virtue, or better yet, what defines a complete virtuous person? Greenspan sees the answer in admiration: “[t]he question of overall virtue…asks whether someone is an admirable person…on the whole, as opposed to being admirable only with some qualification” (60).  What Greenspan is saying is that virtue is not quantifiable according to status or title, but rather virtue is part of person’s character. A person cannot be virtuous simply because he holds a respectable title that connotes virtue (such as President, King, Senator, etc.) but rather virtue precedes a person’s title. Given this situation we can see where problems start to arise given Aristotle’s theory of virtue.

            Virtue is not something that is automatically acquired but rather is measured or “graded” (Greenspan 61) according to a person’s sense of guilt and moral worth. Guilt does not diminish a person’s sense of virtue or virtuousness but rather enhances it.  Given that guilt requires a “heightened sensitivity to one’s own moral wrongs” (Greenspan 61), guilt does not seem to diminish a person’s moral worthiness. Virtue is not measured solely by actions, but rather lies in a person’s sense of guilt and overall character. Given the aforementioned definition of virtue, guilt then is “better in a way than perfect virtue” (Greenspan 61) because it designates a person’s responsibility for past wrongdoings and in doing so indicates a person’s awareness of their own morality and moral faults. Therefore, the presence of guilt establishes the presence of virtue (and not the lack thereof) since guilt is part of a person’s character. This all connects to Greenspan’s idea of an “admirable person” (60) insofar as an “admirable person” has to feel guilt for his actions in order to have virtue (based on virtue ethics and not duty ethics), an idea that we will come back to in interpreting Crime and Punishment and The Sense of an Ending.

Julian Barnes The Sense of an Ending

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes deals with guilt and remorse and what we decide to do with both. In the novel, Tony is constantly battling over his guilt, and his relationships seem volatile because of this. His sense of guilt and remorse, in my view, comes from a misunderstanding of his experiences and the unreliability of his memories. But what seems more important to Tony’s character is how he deals with his guilt and remorse how this influences his acts/actions.  And in my view this encapsulates his whole character, and influences the actions he takes. He has a misunderstanding of his past, and this turns into guilt, which then turns into anger, which then turns into bad decisions, like sending the profanity laced letter to Adrian and Veronica. Tony’s character will be interpreted according to Greenspan’s idea of the “admirable person” (60) and his guilt, acts/actions will be interpreted using Greenspan’s Ethics of Duty guilt theory.

            We all make bad decisions, some that affect our life more than others, but it’s impossible to change the past. When we try to change the past, which is an impossibility, we are drowned with remorse. In the novel Tony the narrator defines remorse as stronger than guilt and the feeling that occurs when you come to the realization that the past is unchangeable. The bad decisions and actions/acts that Tony makes are irreversible. Furthermore, remorse is the feeling that enough time has passed that making amends or asking for forgiveness would be ineffective. The problem with Tony is his remorse. Tony in the novel does not understand nor grasp his guilt/remorse and does not understand that his guilt/remorse might be misguided or beyond repair.

            Take for example his relationship with Veronica. This relationship seems to have scarred him (no matter how short it lasted) for life and he even talks about the circumstances of this relationship to his wife (when they were married). He seems to want to grasp a complete and succinct understanding of this past relationship, but what he experienced, remembers, and feels guilt for are all completely different things. He seems to have guilt for breaking up with Veronica and then sleeping with her, but this guilt does not necessarily mean he has to act on it. We experience guilt every day, in my view, but we have to choose our battles and sometimes the wiser choice is not to act on your guilt and just live with it (with the memories and feelings).

            Looking back over the tragically insulting letter that he sent Adrian and Veronica in which he stated that “it would be unjust to inflict in some innocent foetus the prospect of discovering that it was the fruit of your loins” (Barnes 105), Tony starts to feel a sentiment of regret and guilt. This was by far the stupidest thing he could have done, and he certainly should feel guilt and even remorse over it. He tries to wash away his guilt and responsibility by arguing that the young snobbish Tony that wrote that letter is not the same Tony re-reading it years later: “I didn’t recognize that part of myself from which the letter came” (Barnes 107). Certainly the fifty-or sixty-something year old Tony is not the same young Tony who wrote letter, but he is still culpable. I would argue that he does recognize that young self, but does not like his young self. In some way he is still the same, still acting recklessly and deceiving himself.

            So the question arises: does Tony hold any virtue? Following Greenspan’s argument one must have guilt in order to have virtue. Tony certainly has guilt, but what does this say about his character? Greenspan states that one must have a “heightened sensitivity to one’s own moral wrongs” (Greenspan 61) in order for a sentiment/emotion to be defined as guilt. Tony definitely exhibits this sentiment after re-reading his letter to Adrian and Veronica: “And so, for the first time, I began to feel a more general remorse—a feeling somewhere between self-pity and self-hatred—about my whole life” (Barnes 109). His sensitivity towards his own wrongs is heightened to an extreme that it borders on self-hatred. Tony’s guilt is overbearing and causes recklessness in his life. But what is Tony to do with his guilt? He seems honestly apologetic to Veronica, but of course the feeling is not mutual, and she responds with her ever-clever remark: “’You just don’t get it, do you?’”(Barnes 110). Veronica seems to insinuate that Tony does not understand the circumstances behind his guilt. In other words, he seems detached from his guilt, and acts upon it simply because he feels guilt but not because he understands the “why” behind the guilt. He feels guilty because it is the morally right thing to do in order to try to right his wrongs. But he still seems detached from the whole experience. His actions are motivated by guilt, but is this enough to have virtue?     

            If we reject the theoretical trajectory behind Ethics of Duty, and instead interpret Tony through the theoretical framework of Ethics of Virtue we can see how Tony can be interpreted as a virtuous person and even an “admirable person” (Greenspan 60).  As mentioned earlier Duty Ethics defines virtue primarily through the acts or actions that a person takes, regardless of the person’s character or guilt. Duty Ethics leaves little breathing room as far as moral evaluation is concerned. It seems that the moral compass in Duty Ethics are acts/actions and nothing else. If an action violates a person’s moral perfection then a person does not exhibit virtue, according to the theory behind Ethics of Duty. In other words, once Tony starts feeling guilty for the letter, he has already lost his virtue (according to Ethics of Duty). The letter signifies the act/action that violated his moral perfection and guilt signifies his “imperfect virtue” (Greenspan 58)

            Through an Ethics of Virtue lens Tony seems to exhibit the characteristics of a morally upright person. He reveals guilt for his actions, but this guilt is part of a larger “evaluation of […] personal traits in connection with notions of character” (Greenspan 57).  Virtue should be evaluated as part of, or along with, a person overall character, and Tony seems to agree:

Does character develop over time? In novels, of course it does: otherwise there wouldn’t be much of a story. But in life? I sometimes wonder. Our attitudes and opinions change, we develop new habits and eccentricities; but that’s something different, more like decoration. Perhaps character resembles intelligence, except that character peaks a little later: between twenty and thirty, say. And after that, we’re just stuck with what we’ve got. We’re on our own. If so, that would explain a lot of lives, wouldn’t it? And also—if this isn’t too grand a word—our tragedy.  (Barnes 113)  

In the above passage Tony is arguing that he is not the same person, and does not hold the same character, as he did when he wrote the letter. If guilt is part of his character now then his guilt should be evaluated along with his other personal traits like love for his daughter and his family. an “admirable person” (Greenspan 60) has to feel guilt for his actions in order to have virtue (based on virtue ethics), then Tony’s guilt can be evaluated as evidence of his virtue. Given that his guilt is evidence if his virtue then we can safely conclude that Tony is an “admirable person” given that “[t]he question of overall virtue…asks whether someone is an admirable person…on the whole, as opposed to being admirable only with some qualification” (Greenspan 60). 

Emmanuel Levinas “Ethics and Infinity”

            In the collection of conversations titled Ethics and Infinity the philosopher Emmanuel Levinas summarizes his various theories on the Other. The Other is any other human being, but the knowledge and perception of the Other lies in the face. Levinas concludes that “you turn yourself toward the Other as toward an object” (85) but you do not achieve knowledge/perception of the Other as a human until you encounter “a nose, eyes, a forehead, a chin” (Levinas 85). In other words, the humanity of the Other lies in the face.

            Once the Other’s humanity is encountered through the face, an ethical responsibility towards the Other unfolds. By looking at the face of the Other an ethic duty arises in which “the relation toward the face is straightaway ethical” (Levinas 87).  By this Levinas means that once we have encountered the face a requirement towards responsibility ensues, a responsibility to not kill. Because of the humanity behind the face of the Other Levinas insists that the “face is what one cannot kill” (87). This is the ethical responsibility behind the face, once we have encountered the face of the Other we cannot kill it, based on our mutual humanity and knowledge/perception of this humanity.

            Levinas overall theoretical framework behind the Other is extremely complex, especially as it relates to overall justice. If we take the axiom “Thou shalt not kill” as valid, then Levinas argues that justice ensues from this axiom when multiplied. The face of the Other commands the axiom “Thou shalt not kill” as an order (89) and this command ensues when the Other is next to you. Multiplied this axiom many times over to cover all of humanity, and this command, “Thou shalt not kill”, becomes justice. Levinas insists that the “multiplicity of men and the presence of someone else next to the Other. . .condition[s] [our] laws and establish[es] justice” (89). The ethical responsibility to not kill the Other when multiplied manifold over humanity creates justice. Ethics precedes justice.

Feodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment

Raskolnikov’s dream of a murdered mare symbolizes the Nihilist movement and its theme of utilizing violence to achieve social, political, and economic change, it is also a metaphor for Raskolnikov’s inner psychology, which helps us understand his reasoning for murdering Ivanovna, the pawn broker.  

            The Nihilist movement of 19th century Russia centered on the concept that social, political, and economic change cannot come about without the destruction of the current political and social institutions. This movement accepted violence as not only morally right but necessary. The central event of the Nihilist movement was the assassination of Alexander II. Of course, violence for the sake of violence is never morally right nor acceptable, and the dream of the dying mare illustrates the morally objectionable action of the Nihilist.

            In the scene, the horse gets whipped and eventually murdered for no particular reason other than for the drunken enjoyment of the crowd. From a psychological perspective, the dream symbolizes Raskolnikov’s bipolarity towards violence and his society. By bipolarity, I mean his contempt toward violence in his society (evident in the dream), his use of violence (by killing pawnbroker), and his defense of violence (by writing his essay later in the novel). In the dream, Raskolnikov interferes with the violence going on and even gets a whip landed on him: “one of the whips stung his face, but he did not feel it; he was wringing his hands and crying aloud” (Dostoevsky 49). Even though in the dream he is a child, he consciously objects to the violence perpetrated by the group.  This act symbolizes his perversion towards his society and their acceptance of violence. He seems broken hearted that the horse is being whipped mercilessly with no concern for her well-being. The crowd is drunk with both liquor and with the madness of violence. He interferes because he rejects the violence, but at the same time, he accepts and defends the ideology behind the violence.

            Right after Raskolnikov wakes up from the dream, he immediately starts thinking about the crime and if he should go through with it. He starts to psycho-analyze himself and his dream: “I must have realized that I should never carry it out, so why have I gone on tormenting myself until now?” (Dostoevsky 51). But his bipolarity toward violence comes through and the irony lies in the fact that he actually goes through with the murder of the pawnbroker a couple of pages after this event. As the novel goes on, he convinces himself that his violent act will have positive consequences for his society. But he does not realize the perversion behind his reasoning. Raskolnikov gets so caught up in his own mind and ideas that he loses sight of who he is, his morality, and his humanity. His article, “On Crime,” focuses on his Napoleonic ideas and justification of violence.            

           

           

           

I have just published a short collection of short stories. https://www.amazon.com/Short-Stories-Rodrigo-Haro/dp/1791842615/ref=sr_1_fkmr2_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1547415817&sr=8-2-fkmr2&keywords=short+stories+rodrigo+hero