Thursday, March 31, 2016

Disadvantages of Humanizing: The Trouble With Empathy

The prospect of creating a “network of concerns” for global rhetorics sounded challenging and ambiguous from the start. The first and most fundamental challenge I faced was how to create the network itself in an online medium. The network I created ended up being structured more closely to that of a grouping of concepts. The center of the grouping had four categories: Identity, Privilege, Hegemony, and Language. These categories were then populated with textual examples from each author to support the assertion that those categories were prevalent in each text. The second part of the network involved three secondary charts, one for each author that contained their central idea and critical dilemma and textual support surrounding the idea.

I approached this project differently because I wanted to see if I could explain relational connection without relying only on convergence and divergence. I wanted to locate these authors’ ideas in relation to the four major concerns I chose. To work from the inside out and come up with a new means of organizing ideas. If I could go back and redo an aspect of the project I more clearly articulate the connection between each author and my guiding categories. This way it would have been easier to show exactly where each authors ideology was on the spectrum and which of the four concerns their work focused on the most.

This assignment gave me the opportunity to consider the arguments of these authors through the Burke-like terministic screens of, Identity, Privilege, Hegemony, and Language. This allowed a more focused understanding of the works as they relate to the field of Global Rhetorics and as they relate to each other. Lisa R. Arnold was largely concerned with the pedagogical implications of language and monolingual bias. Her article read more like a critical case study of the Syrian Protestant College (Beirut). She adds a historical dimension to the translingual issues that exist within rhetoric and composition studies. “The archives suggest that the issue of language- including which language should be taught and why, the effect of language on student identities and the power and cultural value attached to language and education-was of central concern to the colleges founders, ultimately determining the pedagogical approaches taken and curricular decisions made at SPC in its early years” (Arnold 277).  Because of the very clear historical and pedagogical roots of this essay Arnolds interests fall between Language and Privilege in the network of concerns. She is primarily focused on advocating for a de-privileging of monolingualism in the academic community and a more fluid inclusion of language and culture.

Saba Fatima’s essay, though not officially situated within the world of rhetoric and composition, has many of the same themes and concerns as the other readings that accompany it in this analysis. Fatima focuses specifically on Muslim-American Scripts and the importance of “cultivating affective responses” to these scripts (Fatima 353). Fatima works from within the Muslim tradition to create an awareness of scripts and norms of depersonalization. “Our scripts are mediated by our social location within systems of domination. In other words, our scripts as Muslim-Americans differ when we travel abroad, when we speak on terrorism in American public discourse, or when we see the coverage of American wars from within the comfort of our homes” (Fatima 342).  According to Fatima’s logic the scripts that we operate on can affect the way we are situated in society. Her ideology falls between Identity and Hegemony on the network of concerns. This notion of scripts as guiding forces in national discourse was something I had never considered before but really spoke to my interests. She frames her perspective as that of a stranger in their country who is viewed as untrustworthy and overly empathetic.

Marilyn M. Cooper is concerned with the “process of rejecting pure identity” (Cooper 93). She is focused specifically on deconstructing the hegemonic notion of national identity. “A nonessentials notion of identity- often referred to as a power modern identity or self- has been developing in academic discussion in recent years” (Cooper 91). Cooper wants us to move our thinking away from essentialism and toward a more hybrid understanding of identity. I found Coopers ideas the most difficult to connect to the network of concerns because her goal was not immediately clear, however I also found this work the most dynamic because of its ambiguity. The focus on language in this piece locates it more firmly in the academic sphere, and gives the article a slightly more pedagogical tone. However I found that it was possible to separate the academic intentions of the theoretical discussion of national identity. “It is the assumption once again that identity is a matter of control that makes the goal of national identity seem oppressive, to leave us with the equally unsatisfactory options of the melting pot of the tower of babel: either we completely resolve our differences rationally and agree on the values that ground our actions or we are incapable of any productive action or interaction” (Cooper 100). Cooper does a seamless job of incorporating issues of national identity and academic concerns of language and monolingualism.


These three readings strongly informed my understanding of language and the role it plays in nationalism and academia. Looking at language from the perspective of a Muslim-American allowed me to consider the vantage point that they have in the United States. I framed my readings of Arnold and Cooper through the experience of Fatima’s narrative of Muslim-American experience. Each author brought so much of their own experience and individualized vocabulary to that table that it was hard to read them in conversation with one another because they were so dense and intricate on their own.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.