An Introduction to Gender-Related
Epistemologies and Modes of Rhetoric
Those
of us whose research and instruction do not directly touch upon feminist issues
may find ourselves perplexed by perspectives that challenge traditional, and
seemingly rational, assumptions. As an
example, consider the assertions in this passage:
[T]he [female] basic writers in our
study appear to perceive . . . that they are being asked to abandon a familiar
way of knowing (through personal experience and the subjective sharing of that
experience) in favor of an alien way of knowing (through analytical reasoning
and win-or-lose argumentation). Thus,
these basic writers are faced with competing epistemologies . . . between
their own subjectivism and the mechanical expectations of the academic
discourse community, but for most the gap is not bridgeable. . . . We do not suggest that women's language be
"corrected" or that subjective world views be criticized. (Hunter, et
al. 74, 80)
As I did, some of us may question
the characterization of analytical reasoning or argumentation as "an alien
way of knowing" and resist the endorsement of "subjective world
views." We may also balk at the
assertion that "the gap" between subjectivism and academic modes of
thinking "is not bridgeable."
At the least, we may wonder, "Do we actually empower students by
honoring, even privileging, subjectivism and intuition at the expense of
logical reasoning? Would such a stance
merely endorse a brand of pluralism that pays tribute to political correctness
at the expense of long-tested tradition?"
At
least these are the kinds of questions that led me to search through literature
on women's language and women's ways of thinking. Now I wonder, "Are these even the right
questions, and by asking them do we narrow our choices to either/or
dichotomies?" However we phrase the
questions, the reality is that attention to gender differences--in knowledge
construction and language--is shaping the liberal arts curriculum and
institution in ways that many of us do not fully understand or appreciate. Although differences between academic (male)
and oppositional (female) epistemologies and between their styles of rhetoric
often appear to be irreconcilable, I want to suggest that in our classrooms and
in our professional conversations with colleagues, an understanding of
female-related epistemologies and styles of rhetoric can enrich and unify our
various work in the academy.
Before
moving into my discussion, I need to delineate some of its limits. First, this paper provides only a basic
introduction to female epistemologies and rhetoric. Second, I never intend to suggest that all women think one way and all men think another way, only that a
substantial body of work argues that our socialization processes tend
to influence women to think and verbally communicate more naturally in one way
and men to do so in another way. Each
gender can and does employ both ways of constructing knowledge and both
rhetorical styles.
MALE
AND FEMALE EPISTEMOLOGIES
Models
describing male and female epistemological systems center on the work of
Lawrence Kohlberg and colleagues in describing patterns of moral development
among men; the work of William Perry and associates for describing intellectual
development among male college students; the work of Carol Gilligan and Nona
Lyons, among others, to describe moral development among women; and the work of
Mary Belenky and others to describe intellectual development of women. Since many of us in academia are already
somewhat familiar with the work of Kohlberg and Perry and since all of us are
familiar with male-related patterns of thinking and rhetoric that guide our
work in the academy, I will focus primarily on describing women's ways of
constructing moral and intellectual knowledge.
Models of Moral
Development
Table
1 summarizes characteristics associated with masculine and feminine ways of
negotiating moral dilemmas. In the
traditional male framework--A Morality of Reciprocity‑-the rights of the
individual are to be protected from encroachment by others, and separateness
and objectivity are deemed essential for reaching fair decisions that treat
everyone equally. Only by applying
uniform principles and established rules in an impersonal manner can justice
best be served. Too close an involvement
with persons or issues threatens objectivity and fairness. At the heart of this morality lies the
principle of reciprocity, or the ethic of The Golden Rule: "Do unto others as you would have them
do unto you." That is, one puts
oneself in the place of the other, looking at the situation from this new
position. However, placing oneself in
the position of the other is not the same as imagining oneself as the other. Thus, individualism, or the integrity of
one's separate and distinct self, is maintained in a morality of reciprocity.
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Table 1:
Characteristics of Male (Reciprocity) and Female (Response) Epistemologies of Morality*
A
MORALITY OF RECIPROCITY
|
A
MORALITY OF RESPONSE
|
Emphasis on INDIVIDUATION,
with respect for the individual rights of self and others. The individual sees self as SEPARATE from others and views
moral dilemmas from a DISTANCE
and with OBJECTIVITY.
Concern with the individual RIGHTS
of others and with JUDGMENTS
based upon established PRINCIPLES
of JUSTICE and FAIRNESS.
Relationships seen as RECIPROCAL,
i.e., guided by The Golden Rule of "Do unto others as you would have
them do unto you," implying that one sees oneself in the other's
position but not as the other.
Test of a moral resolution to conflict is whether
principles of justice and fairness have been applied and adhered to, so that
the rights and freedoms of the individual have not been infringed by
others. Because the test rests on
pre-established rules and principles, the success of the resolution is
immediately known.
|
Emphasis on INTERCONNECTEDNESS, seeing the
self as connected to others through a WEB
OF RELATIONSHIPS and viewing moral dilemmas SUBJECTIVELY and INTERPERSONALLY,
with aim being to maintain or restore relationship.
Concern with NEEDS
of others and with providing appropriate CARE based upon SUBJECTIVE
UNDERSTANDING of other's particular situation and circumstance. |
Relationships seen CONTEXTUALLY, i.e., relinquishing one's own personal
perspective and seeing others as they see themselves in their own terms and
in their own unique situations.
Test of a moral resolution
to conflict is whether relationships have been saved, harm to others has been
averted, or suffering has been relieved in such a way that community remains
unbroken. Because the test rests on
the ongoing process of strengthening ties between people, success of the
resolution is not immediately known.
|
*See the following references:
Gilligan; Gilligan and Attanucci; Lyons, "Listening"; and
Lyons, "Two Perspectives."
_
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A
Morality of Response, on the other hand, values not separateness and individualism, but connectedness. Instead of serving justice from a blindly
objective perspective, a morality of response privileges attempts to enter the
feelings and experiences of those involved in order to understand their
conflicting dilemmas and thereby to build or maintain interpersonal
connections. Separateness from others is
seen as a painful rent in the fabric of human relationships. In this concern with others' needs, responsiveness
and care—provided through subjective understanding—guide attempts toward
resolution. Ethical dilemmas are seen
contextually rather than reciprocally.
That is, instead of placing oneself in the other's perspective and asking,
"How would I like to be treated
in this situation?" a morality of response compels one to try to put aside
her own perspective and to see others as they see themselves, in their own
terms, in their own unique situations: "How
would they like to be treated, and
what can I do to understand their feelings in their situation?"
The
qualities of separation and connectedness most essentially capture the
differences between male and female epistemologies (both moral and
intellectual). In summarizing studies
investigating attitudes toward intimacy,
Gilligan notes that while women typically value close personal ties, men
often perceive danger in intimate relationships because of the potential for
entrapment and betrayal; while men value competition and its attendant
individualism and separateness, women see danger in the impersonal distance
inherent in competitive achievement because they fear being isolated or left
alone by such competitive success.
"Thus," concludes Gilligan, "each sex perceives a danger
which the other does not see--men in connection, women in separation"
(42). As we shall see later, these
deeply-felt attitudes toward separation and intimacy profoundly influence male
and female models of knowledge construction and gender-related rhetorical
styles.
Models of Intellectual
Development
Those
qualities associated with subjectivity, responsiveness, interconnectedness, and
contextual thinking that we find in A Morality of Response also influence the
intellectual development of women. In Women's Ways of Knowing, Mary Field
Belenky and colleagues describe "epistemological perspectives from which women know and view the world"
(15). The researchers do not claim that
these perspectives have been proved to describe sequential stages of
intellectual development (as Perry's scheme claims). Still, they provide valuable descriptions of
increasingly complex and mature viewpoints on knowledge construction, and at
least one women's college has modeled a curriculum on the viewpoints as stages of intellectual development
within women (Carfagna).
As
Table 2 shows, five categories of knowledge construction compose Belenky et
al.'s paradigm. The least sophisticated
position is Silence, characterized by a belief that knowledge lies with others
and by a sense of powerlessness. Women
in the second position, Received Knowledge, believe that knowledge of self and
world derives from definitions and data passively absorbed from (male)
Authorities, much like Perry's Dualistic learners.
The
third position, Subjective Knowledge, contains two subcategories. Women characterized by The Inner Voice have
lost faith in Authorities, and so for them trustworthy knowledge and truth lie
within. As one of Belenky's subjects put
it, "I can know only with my gut."
In general, Subjective Knowers distrust logical analysis and abstract
language, which can be used as weapons against personal truths. In the second subcategory, The Quest for
Self, women locate knowledge not just in intuition but also in observation and
analysis; thus, rational analysis begins to complement subjective knowing.
The
fourth epistemological category is Procedural Knowledge, containing three
subcategories. In the first subcategory,
The Voice of Reason, intuition gives way to reasoned reflection, the subjective
voice gives way to a more critical one, and language becomes a tool for
analytic thought and procedures.
Separate Knowing, the second subcategory, emphasizes objective
knowledge, where feeling is subordinated to objective procedures (or
reason). In the third subcategory,
Connected Knowing, truth emerges through the interconnectedness that care and
empathy create with an object of study.
Connected Knowers value empathetically-examined experience, multiple perspective
taking, and an open, trusting stance that receives
the other rather than projects the
self onto the other.
The
final epistemological position is Constructed Knowledge. Here, knowledge is an integrated construction
of reason, intuition, and the expertise of others. Through these means, Constructed Knowers see
knowledge as created, not pre-existent and given. Feeling informs and expands thinking, leading
to a preference for conversational modes of rhetoric (where cooperation
replaces dominance) over didactic modes (which stress separateness and
competition).
_
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_ _ _ _ _
Table 2: Categories of Women's Intellectual
Development*
EPISTEMOLOGICAL CATEGORY
|
CHARACTERISTICS
|
Silence
|
Life seen in terms of polarities. Belief that authority, knowledge, and truth
lie outside the self, in others.
Passive and voiceless. Words
have little meaning; authority displayed through force, not through shared
verbal understanding.
|
Received Knowledge
|
Dualistic thinking and intolerance of ambiguity. Authority displayed through words, so
learning comes through passive listening.
Truth and answers lie outside self with Authorities, so is a
dependency on others.
"Authority-right-they"
as opposed to "Authority-right-we."
Sense of self derived from others' definitions.
|
Subjective
Knowledge:
The Inner
Voice
The Quest for Self
|
Firsthand experience as
source of trusted knowledge: "I
can know only with my gut."
Truth, knowledge, and authority lie within, not with others. Remnants of dualistic thinking
(right/wrong) with faith in intuition because Authorities have failed to give
appropriate answers. Also a tolerance
for multiple personal truths since pitting one's truth against another's can
risk antagonism and severing of connections with others. Truth is private matter not to be imposed
on others. Distrust of logic, analysis,
abstract use of language, which can undermine feelings and personal
truths. Words, instead, should
communicate and connect individual to others.
Tentative, unsettled view of self.
Shift toward view that knowledge comes not just from
one's intuitive feelings, but also from observing oneself and others and from
analyzing one's own and others' experiences.
Procedures can be developed for such systematic analysis and for
learning (but have not been fully investigated).
|
Procedural
Knowledge:
The Voice of Reason
Separate
Knowing
Connected
Knowing
|
Emphasis on reasoned
reflection and techniques for constructing answers. Language no longer silences the individual
voice, but comes to be a tool for analytic thought. Awareness that "gut" and
intuition may deceive, that truth may not be immediately accessible, and that
there exists hierarchy of truths (some are truer than others). Personal voice gives way to more objective,
critical voice. Sense that control can
now be gained over world outside the self by using analytic procedures of the
authorities (which once may have seemed threatening or oppressive).
Emphasis on objective knowledge, which implies
distance between self and object and mastery over it (hierarchic
relationships). Feeling is replaced by
dispassionate, objective analysis, and truth emerges through impersonal
procedures (reason). Imitation of how They
(Authorities) want one to think.
Adoption of a skeptical (doubting) stance. Multiple perspective taking is achieved by
projecting self onto others and their situations (reciprocity). Personal voice and language replaced by
public voice and language.
Emphasis on understanding, which involves intimacy
between self and object, entails acceptance, and precludes evaluation (which
implies distance and hierarchy).
Knowing involves connection between knower and object and
understanding of other's point of view.
Truth emerges through care and response to object of study. Search for how they (others) actually
think. Thus, personal experiences
provide trustworthy knowledge, and empathy lies at heart of knowing. Multiple perspective taking is achieved by
adopting an open, trusting stance that receives (rather than projects onto)
the other. Personal voice and language
become the public voice and language.
|
Constructed Knowledge
|
Emphasis on knowledge that
integrates reason, intuitively-felt knowledge, and expertise of others in an
effort to allow the self a place in the process of knowing. Such thinking recognizes inevitability of
conflict and tolerates ambiguity and internal contradiction. Knowledge is not given but constructed, and
the knower (self) is part of the known.
Truths are contextual; hence, active listening is essential, as is
giving equal value to experience and abstract reasoning. Feeling necessarily informs and expands
thinking, leading to a preference for conversational modes of rhetoric (where
cooperation replaces dominance) over didactic modes (which stress separateness
and competition). Committed action is
seen in terms of self, others, and abstract reasons.
|
*See Belenky et al., Women's Ways of Knowing.
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While
there may appear to be some commonality between Perry's Commitment in
Relativism and Belenky et al.'s Constructed Knowledge, one of the primary
differences between the patterns of intellectual growth of women and men
concerns the kinds of commitments mature women and men make. According to Perry's study, these commitments
primarily concern career and self, placing oneself in a position of authority
and control that uniquely differentiates the individual from others. Mature women, on the other hand, emphasize
the authority of the personal voice within a chorus of other voices. Connectedness with other people, not just
with job and abstractions, defines mature commitment for most women. More recent studies have found that
post-graduate males also come to value connectedness with others (Belenky et
al.).
MODES
OF RHETORIC
If
it is true that males tend to place a high value on individualism and
competition, and concomitantly on separation and hierarchic relationships, then
it seems likely that men's rhetoric would stress similar values. Likewise, if females tend to place a high
premium on connectedness and empathy--and on acts of responsive caring from
which such empathy and interconnectedness derive--then we would expect a female
rhetoric to reflect those values. And in
general that is what numerous studies have found.
At
the risk of oversimplification, the descriptions in Table 3 summarize common
traits of male and female modes of rhetoric.
Whereas male rhetoric typically proceeds linearly within a closed
structure where deductive reasoning leads to proof of an announced conclusion
or thesis, female rhetoric unfolds indirectly as the author provides thick
backgrounding, sometimes in loosely connected digressions. Female rhetoric, then, permits an open
structure wherein exploration and interconnectedness with readers attain more
importance than arriving at a definitive conclusion. Such an emphasis on interconnectedness
requires an intersubjective and responsive stance drawing together writer,
reader, and subject so that equality among the three, rather than auctorial
superiority, leads to shared understanding and reconciliation. Male rhetoric, by contrast, values an
objective or adversarial stance from which difference can be observed, cleanly
tested, and conquered as some assertions are challenged and others logically
proved. In this frame, male thinking and
writing thrust forward to make a point and to reduce uncertainty or ambiguity
by offering generalizations that simplify amorphous complexity. Subjectivity and personal experience
undermine the necessary objectivity to carry out this kind of analysis. In a female rhetoric, however, personal
experience and feelings are trusted sources of knowledge, as well as valued
avenues of connection between writer and audience. Exploration and sharing of the personal
enhance relationship and trust. Reducing
complexity to generalizations is less valued than the entertaining of multiple
personal truths. All this suggests that
expository or argumentative modes of presentation best serve a male rhetoric,
while digressive, narrative, or autobiographical modes of presentation
characterize a female rhetoric.
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Table 3: Characteristics of Male and Female Modes of
Rhetoric
MALE
RHETORIC
|
FEMALE RHETORIC
|
LINEAR, deductive, hierarchical, beginning with a thesis and
stressing topic sentences.
CLOSED STRUCTURE in that the
thesis announces the topic and emphasizes one or more conclusions, which the
body of the essay proves. The essay is
proof of AUTHORITY as it
asserts and then thrusts forward to prove the one right answer or position
through LOGICAL REASONING. Emphasis on PRODUCT.
OBJECTIVE STANCE that places
distance between writer, subject, and audience.
ADVERSARIAL STANCE that makes
rhetoric seem like VERBAL COMBAT. Objective is to persuade others to give up
their viewpoints and to agree with author and to see other writers as wrong
(or less correct). Academic writing
is a competitive game where difference is conquered and corrected. Value on ASSERTING.
VALUING OF DISTANCED,
OBJECTIVE STANCE since subjectivity can be deceiving and since the
single personal experience may be atypical or aberrant. Thus, exposition and argument are preferred
modes of academic discourse, while personal narrative is not highly valued.
Writing must MAKE A POINT and offer GENERALIZATIONS. Writing that does not do so is incoherent.
|
INDIRECT, generative, discovery-oriented, less formally
structured, with full background explanations.
OPEN STRUCTURE in that reaching
conclusions isn't the overriding purpose.
The open quality allows INTERCONNECTEDNESS
among writer, audience, and subject and allows EXPLORATION without pressure to reach a final conclusion or
the one right answer. Emphasis on PROCESS.
INTERSUBJECTIVE STANCE that sees
connections between writer, subject, and audience.
RESPONSIVE STANCE that values UNDERSTANDING OF DIFFERENCE rather
than the superiority of one perspective (or writer) over the other. Objective is to reach shared understanding
or reconciliation. Value on LISTENING,
so writing is an act of response, not of competition.
VALUING OF PERSONAL
EXPERIENCE since truth resides there.
An emphasis on personal and multiple truths rather than on a
single Truth. Thus, autobiography and
first-person narrative are appropriate discourse modes.
Writing EXPLORES FEELINGS, IDEAS, OR ISSUES
without necessarily generalizing (which is a hierarchic pattern of thought)
or asserting a point.
|
*See the following references:
Annas; Bolker; Catano; Chase; Flynn, "Composing"; Flynn,
"Composing 'Composing'"; Farrell, "The Female and Male
Modes"; Frey; Hiatt; Lakoff; Lamb; Lassner; Lunsford; Peterson; and
Popkin.
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_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
As
illustrations of these different rhetorical styles, I offer two examples. The first is the opening paragraph of Thomas
J. Farrell's "For the Rise of Higher Masculinity," a reply to an
article that had appeared in an earlier issue of College English:
In "The Miltonic
Ideal," (CE, April 1979), a
perversely wrongheaded piece of work, Diana George takes Walter J. Ong, S.J.,
to task for what she takes him to have said in "Agonistic Structures in
Academia: Past to Present," (Daedalus, 103 [1974], 229-38). . .
. The major problem with Professor
George's reading of [Ong's] article is that she keeps connecting what Ong says
about female fighting, which he mentions only briefly in his article (p. 235),
with what he says about the student demonstrations of the late sixties. George seems to have connected the two
because the word "lethal" appears in the description of each. In what follows I shall try to disconnect some
of the unconnected things that George has connected. In addition, I shall comment on substantive
issues raised in the two articles and argue that higher masculinity is called
for today. I shall close with some
admonitory remarks about feminist and other academic studies. . . . (468)
Perhaps most striking about Mr.
Farrell's rhetoric is the voice, characterized by his diction ("perversely
wrongheaded") and formal style. In
both voice and substance, the introduction serves as a prologue to verbal combat
in which an adversary is taken "to task" and issued "some
admonitory remarks" to clarify the issue.
This adversarial stance is supported by a highly-structured, linear
progression of ideas, beginning with a thesis (a preformulated generalization)
and continuing through the remainder of the article. There is a definite point to be made in this
article, a point that rests in large part upon the authority that the author
crafts through his choice of diction, style, and stance. In broad terms, that point is to prove
another wrong while simultaneously demonstrating the writer's own authority and
logical correctness. Granted, Farrell's
example represents an extreme case of the male style, but not an uncommon
example.
The
second example typifies, more or less, qualities of a female rhetoric. Since female rhetoric has not been valued as
an academic style, few instances of academic writing in a female mode exist, at
least in traditional, mainstream journals.
To use examples from the same academic discipline (English studies) and
genre (a response to an academic article), let me quote the opening paragraphs
of Jane Tompkins' "Me and My Shadow":
There are two voices
inside me answering, answering to, Ellen's essay. One is the voice of a critic who wants to correct
a mistake in the essay's view of epistemology.
The other is the voice of a person who wants to write about her
feelings. (I have wanted to do this for
a long time but have felt too embarrassed.)
This person feels it is wrong to criticize the essay philosophically,
and even beside the point, because a critique of the kind the critic has in
mind only insulates academic discourse further from the issues that make
feminism matter. That make her matter. The critic, meanwhile, believes such
feelings, and the attitudes that inform them, are soft-minded, self-indulgent,
and unprofessional.
These beings exist
separately but not apart. One writes for
professional journals; the other in diaries, late at night. One uses words like "context" and
"intelligibility," likes to win arguments, see her name in print, and
give graduate students hardheaded advice.
The other has hardly ever been heard from. She had a short story published once in a
university literary magazine, but her works exist chiefly in notebooks and
manila folders labelled "Journal" and "Private." This person talks on the telephone a lot to
her friends, has seen psychiatrists, likes cappuccino, worries about the state
of her soul. Her father is ill right
now, and she has a friend who recently committed suicide. . . . (169)
Unlike Farrell's article, Tompkins'
response expresses only a hint at verbal combat, and that from the voice of
"the critic," which never achieves dominance over the personal
voice. Also striking is Tompkins' use of
Davidow's first name, Ellen. Clearly,
tone and style reflect a personal stance that seeks connection with subject and
audience. The emphasis on subjectivity
and interconnectedness is further evidenced in the autobiographical revelations
about other kinds of private writing, about telephone conversations,
psychiatric therapy, father and friends--digressions that would seem wholly
irrelevant in a male rhetorical model.
And yet Tompkins' rhetorical style holds a strong appeal for some
academic readers, an appeal that stems from its openness and its iconoclastic
shattering of the impersonal academic model.
These
differences in knowledge construction and rhetorical styles are more than
superficial ones. They bear not just on
how knowledge is constructed, but also on what is acceptable as knowledge and
what is not; they bear on the value that the academic community accords to
difference and pluralism; they bear on the psychological and political effects
of disempowerment; they bear on the potential for acceptance, inclusion, and
change.
Obviously,
these issues raise many questions, but I want to focus on only two. Although the first question may seem to be of
interest only to English professors, it has ramifications for the entire
curriculum, since most instruction and learning are expressed through language:
Question
1: How do we reconcile the differences of
opinion between those academics who argue that, early on, students should be
guided toward using academic discourse (e.g., Bartholomae; Farrell; "The
Male and Female Modes;" Piggott) and the views of other academics who
insist that asking female students to write in traditional (male) modes
requires them to relinquish or repress their own voices and truths (e.g.,
Flynn, "Composing;" Hunter et al.; Lassner)?
The second question addresses the
broader issues of conflict and resolution between female and male
epistemologies:
Question
2: Are these gender-related epistemologies and
rhetorical styles so different as to be irreconcilable?
The answers to these questions
influence whether the academy divides itself into competing factions or
embraces difference and pluralism as means to inclusion and growth.
In
answer to Question 1, concerning the professional ethics of teaching academic
forms of discourse, I turn to Nancy Sommers to offer an indirect answer, one
she probably did not intend. About
midway through her article "Between the Drafts," Sommers quotes from
one of her early conference talks. Upon
hindsight, she recognizes in the text of that talk the
fictionalized self I invented, that
anemic researcher, who set herself apart from her most passionate convictions.
. . . I [was] a distant,
imponderable, impersonal voice . . . [who spoke] in an inherited
academic voice. . . . I disguised myself
behind the authority of "the researcher," . . . never gazing inward,
never trusting my own authority as a writer. . . . Against all the voices I embody . . . I must
bring a voice of my own. I must enter
the dialogue on my own authority, knowing that other voices have enabled mine,
but no longer can I subordinate mine to theirs. (27, 29)
In my marginal comments, I asked
Sommers, "When you composed that presentation early in your career, did
you have authority? Would a self-assured
sense of authority have been wholly possible then, considering the audience to
whom you were presenting yourself and your research? Aren't the submission to authority and the
imitation of its voice prerequisites to creating one's own authoritative
voice?" In other words, while our
personal voice may speak clearly and strongly to ourselves and our trusted
friends, when we address authorities whom we do not know, we "borrow"
a voice similar to their own, and I don't see that borrowing necessarily as
bad. Sommers unintentionally hints at a similar notion in her essay's final
paragraph:
It is in the thrill of the pull between someone else's authority and
our own, between submission and independence that we must discover how to
define ourselves. In the uncertainty of
that struggle, we have a chance of finding the voice of our own authority. Finding it, we can speak convincingly . . .
at long last. (31)
This
process, I would suggest, approximates one way we arrive at Connected Knowing
and the authority with which the personal voice of the Connected Knower
speaks. By means of the speaker's
experiences and her empathic as well
as analytically derived knowledge of a subject, her voice reflects the
authority of her subject. Moreover,
because she has worked and spoken within the community of her audience, they
have come to know and trust her.
Sommers' voice, then, even when questioning the academic community, has
come to be representative of authority within that community. One way to arrive at that advanced level of
knowledge construction and to develop a personal and authoritative voice in a
discipline is through the imitative path that Sommers perhaps too harshly
chides herself for having followed.
Anyone who has read Jane Tompkins' "Fighting Words: Unlearning to Write the Critical Essay"
can hear the very personal voice of authority, but a voice that has developed‑‑and
matured--from the very adversarial attacks that Tompkins now wincingly reflects
on. This kind of rhetorical authority is
neither dry bombast nor gushy confessionalism; it asserts without attacking,
revealing a truth where abstraction and person intersect and where each is
revealed through the other.
So
I think there is a point of conciliation between the two epistemologies and the
two rhetorical styles, and it is at the Constructed Knowing stage of
intellectual development, where the self, assured of its integrity by its
openness both to experience and to reflective analysis, finally creates its own
authority in connection with a chosen community.
In
answer to the second question, concerning the inevitability of conflict between
the two epistemologies, I turn to psychologist Carl Jung. According to Jung's theories, the unconscious
archetype of the anima embodies characteristics associated with the maternal
Eros: connectivity, relationship,
preservation, and love. The unconscious
archetype of the animus embodies qualities associated with the paternal
Logos: reflection, reason, law, and purpose. In the individual's journey toward an
integrated Self, anima and animus must unite and complement each other. The Self cannot be whole if anima dominates
or if animus wages a war of control.
A
similar balance, I suggest, might guide our personal and academic
epistemologies. We need not value one
mode of knowledge construction or one mode of rhetoric as superior, but instead
should see each as a welcome counterpart and balance to the other. Recognizing and accepting the strengths of
both epistemologies and rhetorics would do much to move us beyond defending the
shortcomings of each. For instance, the
kind of subjectivity that fails to look outside the "gut" may never
move beyond the limits of solipsism; on the other hand, that interior reliance
on self may also signal a personal growth beyond dependence on others and
anticipate further growth toward integrating intuition and reason. We need to be attuned to the signs that might
indicate developmental growth rather than developmental arrest. In our rhetoric, we and our students might
discover a greater creativity and openness to ideas if we abandoned
demonstrations of superiority. Our work,
and the rhetoric that describes and drives it, can still build upon that of
others, but without the attendant hubris.
I have to admit that I cannot clearly see right now what this new rhetoric
would look like, but I do think it is important that we listen to those who are
creating it and respond to it honestly, but not competitively.
The
kind of pluralism I am suggesting is both accepting and critical, but not
indiscriminate and not judgmental. It
represents the kind of perspective which says that "subjective world
views" should be both accepted (temporarily) and criticized (but not
condemned). It also suggests that
pointing to a so-called unbridgeable gap between students' "subjectivism
and the mechanical expectations of the academic discourse community"
(Hunter et al.) directs attention toward the void that sustains difference
rather than looks for lines of connection between alternate ways of knowing and
expression. When those kinds of lines
are drawn, pluralism embraces a rich and varied unity.
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