GOING NAKED INTO THE JUNGLE ALONE

by

Stephen Chilton, Associate Professor
Department of Political Science
University of Minnesota - Duluth
Duluth, MN 55812-2496 (U.S.A.)

Tel: 218-726-8162 FAX: 218-726-6386
INTERNET: schilton@d.umn.edu
WWW: www.d.umn.edu/~schilton

REVISED: March 17, 2000

DRAFT: NOT FOR QUOTATION OR CITATION WITHOUT AUTHOR'S PERMISSION

Invited presentation, prepared for the program on The Transfer of Ideas Across Cultures, celebrating the 40^th anniversary of the Fulbright Association, St. Catherine's College, Minneapolis, Minnesota, October 23, 1993. As ever, I am indebted to V. Lois Erickson for encouragement and intelligent commentary.

GOING NAKED INTO THE JUNGLE ALONE

ABSTRACT

xx

GOING NAKED INTO THE JUNGLE ALONE

Getting along with other people is becoming more important relative to the development of new technical knowledge:

Even more than a crisis with failing oxygen or the participants' average loss of almost 14 percent of body weight, she said, "human group dynamics" emerged as their / biggest challenge.

Only the knowledge that they were mutually interdependent in the fragile ecological system held them together, despite tensions and incompatibilities that she said were worse than any she had experienced on seagoing voyages as a marine biologist. [A comment from Abigail Alling, one of the members of the "Biosphere 8" experiment; reported in the Duluth News-Tribune, September 27, 1993, pp.1A, 5A.]

Hence the topic of this program: What happens to disciplinary knowledge when transferred to other cultures?

• I'm going to start with Michel Foucault, move on to Habermas. There are two issues involved: issues of meaning and issues of power. Jean Cameron dealt with meaning, but I'm going to deal with power as well.
• [Concentrate on a conflict of power, not of meaning]
• Two meanings of "discipline":
• a practice, a way of knowledge, a means of knowing God or the Truth
• punishment to correct deviation from the above
• Both of these involve power.
• How do our academic disciplines involve power? To count as knowledge ["What counts as Truth?"], a discipline must be able to enforce its standards and ways of relating, including being able to overcome or suppress objections. "These are legitimate methods. These are legitimate topics / themes."
• Cultures broadly are forms of knowledge, in that they enforce standards, social categories, legitimate ways of relating. "This is social reality. This is legitimate sexuality. This is legitimate authority."
• Except for political scientists, we are mostly unaware of the power mechanisms built in until they're challenged (or when they're set up).
• invisible: Navy Seals, Army Rangers, Marine Recon unitss--all located around Washington to prevent a coup by one of the others.
• made visible during rebellion: segregation, Bull Connor, fire hoses, etc.; AIM (American Indian Movement)
• visible when created: John Gaventa Power and Powerlessness: Quiescence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley; Indian wars.
• We cannot transmit knowledge without the simultaneous transmission, creation, or prior existence of the supporting power configurations. For example: in Somalia, we think our good intentions justify and thereby should shield us, but they don't. We fail to recognize their impact on existing power structures.
• This bleak Foucaultian picture devours itself. All is power.
• Alternative: Habermas.
• Communicative speech acts [about conflict of meaning]: oriented toward producing understanding and agreement. Requires we see the Other as existing in our moral universe.
• Strategic speech acts [about conflict of agendas]: oriented toward producing compliance with one's agenda. "Their concerns don't matter, because they aren't legitimate."
• Two images: missionaries sent naked into the jungle alone. Ursula LeGuin The Left Hand of Darkness: Genly Ai, the "First Mobile".
• Fulbright fellows are like that:
• very narrow responsibilities; outside of those responsibilities, they are just people.
• can encounter others as equals.
• Problem: we still have to deal with power. Some suggestions:
• not to fight it, which feeds it. [A sad headline in the 10/23/93 Minneapolis Star Tribune: "War Needed against Violence".]
• be aware of it, aware of agendas.
• be smart in dealing with it; aikido or jiujitsu: throw them, and you have a brief opportunity for communicative speech acts.

The University of Minnesota is an equal opportunity educator and employer.
Copyright © 2000 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.