An Introduction to Gender-Related Epistemologies and Modes of Rhetoric

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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