The
Detached Individual, the Dangerous Pair, and the Spirit of the Community:
Josiah Royce on the Metaphysics of Mediation
Charles Anthony Earls, University
of Wyoming
Whatever happens between
two people, a third entity is created
which can, in some cases, attain such definition and strength as to
be a completely different person.
—Pat Cadigan, Mindplayers
Among the various lines of demarcation distinguishing modernity from postmodernity
is a shift in focus from the inwardness of an individual psyche to the self
as being in relation to others. Alternative ways of conceptualizing the
self that de-emphasize the individual as a closed system and underscore
the externalization of the person characterize postmodern discourse. Of
course, viewing the individual as essentially self-reliant and able to be
pulled up by his or her own bootstraps is a trademark of popular thought
in the United States. Most of us view relationships as something apart from
our "real" life. While the predicate of nearly every sentence we might
use to describe or characterize our selves refers in some manner to another
person, usually, we define ourselves as self-contained. Even though each
of us, at some point in our lives, resolved, or attempted to resolve, the
crisis of our identity in terms of connection with others, we insist upon
conceptualizing our selves as separate and independent. Perhaps it is the
structure of our language that forces us to do so, perhaps it is our culture's
emphasis on individuality, or maybe it is a by-product of the capitalistic
accentuation of conspicuous consumption. Whatever the reason, it does nothing
toward aiding us in our quest for relatedness and intimacy.
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