One often gets the impression that what is known as social constructionism has won the day, in so far as people seem to be slaves to the belief that everyone is conclusively “constructed” — that is, “determined” — by the cultural practices and beliefs they have adopted in the course of growing up. This is not the case, and there are several cogent reasons to resist the relativistic (and, in the final analysis, racist) implications of social constructionism.
In terms of discourse theory one might say that social constructionism amounts to the claim that one is “spoken by discourse’, specifically by the dominant discourse of the day. For instance, according to this perspective, during the apartheid era, the dominant modern racist discourse, according to which one is essentially determined (culturally, intellectually, socially, etc) by the pigmentation of your skin, would have shaped whites and blacks alike — whites, to believe, without exception, in their unalterable supremacy, and blacks to believe, across the board, in their inevitable inferiority.
However, the very fact that some black people could adopt a critical counter-discursive stance — for example, Biko’s discourse of black consciousness — towards such a racist discourse, is already ample demonstration that social constructionism is misguided: one never has to be a slave to the discursive influences in one’s life-world.
Similarly, the emergence of feminist thought and practice demonstrates the validity of Foucault’s claim, that, where a discourse (in this case patriarchy) exercises its power (by structuring social and political life along the axes of asymmetrical power relations — something that discourses unavoidably do), the possibility of a counter-discourse is created.
It is unfortunately the case that many, if not most people choose (not even consciously) to submit to the dominant, mainstream discourses that comprise the social space of their lives. In the present era this is predominantly the discourse of neoliberal capitalism, and it is easy to understand why most people submit docilely to its sway — the lure of material wealth is difficult to resist when one witnesses the advantages and privileges enjoyed by the wealthy, in contrast to the sufferings of the poor. And the discourse of empathy for the poor, as it was practically enacted by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, among others, does not seem to have much of a purchase on people’s lives these days (although pockets of admirable charity continue to exist). We live in a self-centred, materialistic (as opposed to “materialist”, in the philosophical sense) era.
In South Africa it is especially imperative that certain discourses not be accorded hegemonic status, given their potentially divisive, if not explosive, status, in the wake of the murder of Eugene Terre’Blanche. It would be easy, on both sides of the racial spectrum, for a resurrection of the crudest racist discourses to occur — where the promise of a politically, culturally and racially diversified, but nevertheless “nationally” unified, South Africa fades, while the spectre of a politically, culturally and racially divided country raises its ugly head.
As with all discourses which eventually attain mainstream, dominant status, such divisive discourses could start small, with only a handful of people succumbing to the illusion of, for example, some kind of political and social utopia of either white cultural purity, hermetically sealed off in an impossible geographic domain, or its antithesis, an exclusively black South Africa, supposedly purged of white “settlers” or ‘boere”. Overreacting to Terre’Blanche’s death could feed the first illusion; imitating Malema’s superfluous, demagogic performance of a song that ought to be disowned by the ANC — which, in case its members have not noticed, is now a political party, and no longer a liberation movement — could feed the second.
One can only hope that the Malema phenomenon is not a case of the logic that both Baudrillard and Foucault have discerned as operating in certain domains — leading Baudrillard to comment that Disneyland exists to hide the fact that all of America is Disneyland, and Foucault to observe that prisons exist to hide the truth, that we live in a carceral (prison-like) society. The implications of such a logic should be clear: as long as certain ostensible contrasts can be maintained, the pervasiveness of a homogeneous, deleterious state of affairs remains unnoticed. Work it out. I, for one, would prefer to believe that this is not the case with Malema in relation to the ANC as a whole.
Fortunately, however, there are unmistakable signs that many, if not most South Africans are not susceptible to the potential discursive dominance of the rhetoric surrounding the anachronistic resurgence of either black chauvinism or white political extremism. The cultural richness of South Africa, often obscured by the simplistic polarisation of its people into “blacks” and “whites”, is such that this country could — if good sense prevails — be a model of democratic co-existence of different cultures and different people (right down to the level of different individuals who may seem to share the “same” culture). To fall prey to polarising discourses of any kind would represent a serious retrogression — one that would undo a lot of the salutary developments that have occurred since the demise of apartheid.
@Khotso, Bert, Master Bates – are any of us really aware of the content of our own contradictions? Even in the course of we engaging in serious laptop activism? Only others can see/be impacted by our blind spots as far as I understand it.
The danger in our own stance (counter constructionism) is that we might deny those negative tendencies in ourselves. Are we unconsciously fighting for exclusive rights to the moral high ground instead of working simultaneously for a collective confrontation of the context that produces our favourite scapegoats?
Its not only up to Malema to start ‘promoting & accelerating policies within the ANC itself’. We all have a moral duty to (i) confront our own contradictions as part of fallible humanity, (ii) ‘to face with courage’ our history, our present and our future.
Would Malema, (with or without his conscious or unconscious co-operation), be the convenient scapegoat he has become if this society were more equal?
In this view, a counter discourse is simply a beginning to get our collective head straight. It’s this society’s urgent need to construct equality of conditions and opportunity (amongst others) that will get us closer to the desired ‘freedom and democracy for all’ – as imperfect and contradictory as that may be (given the duality of human nature). – (Ab)norma(l) (M)other
Sorry, I don’t know how ‘we’ got into the second sentence. Freud might have an opinion.
To live together in peace one have to resolve conflict caused by apparent differences and to to that one have to discuss issues. It is very difficult to hear those on the ground when sitting in a tower, not so difficult to speak down to them if you own the only microphone (media). Misunderstanding of what was intended increase with the “distance” between antagonists. In this case the distance is, education, language, culture, way of life. Malema has become an icon of hope for those on the ground who sees themself as outcast from the towers of power and the elitists who occupy them of whatever colour.
Julius Malema is not aware of the contradiction. I think what you are doing for now is to make him aware of it. This issue about him brings one to the issue of “The (im-)possibility of communication” which you have clearly outlined. I think, Bishop Desmond Tutu’s ‘signature’ (who is said to have coined “Rainbow Nation” term, if I am correct!)is unrepeatable on his side. That is he cannot properly copy the notion of the rainbow. He has just ‘countersigned’, and he is now busy writing his own ‘unique’ message.
@Sarah, As tends to be the case with these virtual, dismembered discussions; the metaphors quickly become mangled & our lines of thought disjointed. This makes it quite difficult to retain a central thrust to the debate.
This fragmentation is probably a reasonable approximation of the way discourses function at the level of the individual in society. We latch onto pieces of verbiage; incorporate, discard, mould and invent. In this respect I think you make a valid point regarding our blind spots & self-righteous scape goats. We really know very little about our selves. Thanks for the mirrors…(Nor-(m)an)
@ Master Bates
“Realpolitik has no care for the logical; it is a discourse of laughable paradox in the service of subverting the sincerity of good sense.”
@Sarah
“Would Malema, (with or without his conscious or unconscious co-operation), be the convenient scapegoat he has become if this society were more equal?”
If we put these two perspectives together we can a form of ‘self-making’ that eschews thinking. “Laughable paradox” is what we see in the absurd and unsupported assertions of Malema, Fikule,Floyd, Motshekga, Mbete, Duarte. Logic and rationality are deliberately excluded and attempts to introduce logic or rationality into the discourse are rebuffed as “anti-revolutionary” or “western” or “white tendencies”.
Self-making and scape-goating are mutually exclusive enterprises but it seems that Malema has brought them together. The ‘self’ is ‘making’ is a ‘scapegoat’. “We” did not create Malema as a scapegoat, he did that himself. As Master Bates observed above, realpolitik is the subversion of sense. It is deliberately absurd and it cuts off rational discourse whilst at the same time creating a persona that gratifies the power-seeking ego. It also moves the debate (how our society should function) away from finding common ground and authentic solutions. The ‘persona’ created in place of an authentic ‘self’ takes on a life of its own. It becomes an automaton rather an autonomous person.
Creating (or discovering) an authentic self is both a psychological and philosophical excursion into the origins of identity, self-awareness.
TBC
Thinking people find discourse impossible in the face of absurd Malema-isms which is his objective: to alienate as many rational people as possible. He is creating his own version of SA that has nothing do to with genuine equality, democratic mutuality, or ‘development’. His goal is the opposite. When I cited dictators in my entries above, the characteristics they shared are those we see in Malema: irrationality, intolerance of criticism or opposition, megalomania, recklessness and ruthlessness to cite only a few.
No matter how we frame it, we come back to education as the vehicle for self-making and the antidote to false dictatorial personae of realpolitik.
True self-awareness is possible because we are conscious beings, able to take a step back and observe critically the working of our minds. We create all discourse through the mind and minds will differ and divide us but our self-awareness is a unifier. Not in the sense of sacrificing the self, but in the sense of recognising that although we may differ radically, we share a capacity that does not depend on intellect or point of view. We share the trait of consciousness from which mind is derived.
On a superficial level we share observable traits: bodies, emotions, and thoughts. What Koestler referred to as the “ghost in the machine’, the animating factor of mind is like the wind: we can experience it but we can’t see it. Before we can create a ‘self’ we need to find the ‘ghost’.
@Siobhan
To place even further emphasis on the tragically subversive nature of realpolitik; consider the findings of a recent study on rates of HIV infection in S.A. by the Harvard School of Public Health. The study suggests that ANC “policy has led to 330,000 unnecessary deaths” over the past 5 years. They also argue that current levels of infection i.e. 18% of the population (5.7 million South Africans) could have been significantly lower, had simple, proven, educational measures been put in place in 2002/3.
Unfortunately for millions of our fellow citizens infected by this terrible virus, realpolitik has ensured that good sense did not prevail. Instead we were fed a discourse ranging from downright ignorance through to weird voodoo science. A stupid, stubborn stance with the seemingly singular purpose of denying the obvious. As you say, Siobhan, the great gifts bestowed on us by the Greeks, (e.g. Aristotle’s enduring analysis of Rhetoric), cannot be easily brought to bear on such ignorance, but we must not submit. Certainly, a government that lacks an ethic of care inevitably exploits its citizens in the interests of maintaining power. But it remains the task of the few to uphold the virtues of justice & coherence in society by reminding us of the factory of fallacies perpetrated by the political machinery of governments everywhere. I could write an ongoing blog that identifies this week’s example of cum hoc ergo proctor hoc. The power of knowledge is not yet dead!
@Siobhan, I need to read your response again so that I can grasp fully what you are communicating (seriously philosophically challenged), and to give myself time to fully suspend my default position so that i can respond with integrity.
Talk to you soon.
s
@Siobhan – I will respond to the heart of the matter here – (the frame of the comment you are responding to). To (mis)quote? Bert –‘… as long as certain ostensible contrasts can be maintained, the pervasiveness of a homogeneous, deleterious state of affairs remains (conveniently)unnoticed.’
If we take the person of Malema out of the equation, my comment about a convenient scapegoat still stands. I disagree that ‘we’(our society) did not create a scapegoat – (his own culpability aside for the moment).
It is a convenient distraction to focus ONLY on the ‘noise’ that Malema, (with media effect) generates. More pertinent, are the fertile conditions and context that he draws his power from. Whatever it is that makes any person powerful, is the same thing that can take that power away – in this case, massive inequality (which by the way, you do not comment on directly except to point out how Malema makes discourse by ’rational’ people impossible). If the self silenced ‘rational’ people were to apply their hearts and minds to leveling the playing fields – would what Malema advocates be necessary or evoke such fear and consternation? I think not.
I guess I am fixated on our collective complicity as a society, and my belief that we ignore our own contradictions as mere mortals, at our peril.
For the record, while education is a huge catalyst in my own selfmaking, it is also a source of great discomfort in a sea of inequality – my HDI status aside.
Great discussion.
@Master Bates
Good example of the damage done by choosing real politik over governance.
The ANC are reaping the whirlwind of their own policies: liberation before education. Without education, there is no liberation. And without liberation there is no awareness.
Liberation is a matter of awareness, the freedom that is inherent in consciousness and that is already part of every human being.
Minds differ, which is as it should be, but awareness is our common ground. To experience it is to be liberated, to be free of the discourse that divides us and to be free of any constructed or false self.
The cultivation of awareness causes individuals to drop all assumptions about what Martin Buber referred to as ‘the Other’. Definitions exist in the mind, not in the realm of consciousness which exists even when we are not thinking. That is what we have in common as humans. It is the unifying factor that requires no effort of will or intellect or emotion. No change of beliefs.
Once you have the experience of being aware outside the realm of the mind and emotions, it becomes apparent that we have a common meeting ground–respect for the existence of others who share consciousness. There is no ego, no struggle for dominance, no ideology. Just the experience of being.
It is not exclusive, it is all-inclusive. It is not elitist. It is the ultimate egalitarian experience beyond intellect, beyond emotion, beyond will. It just IS.
@Sarah, please, see next entry.
@Sarah Thank you for responding to my comments with your own. I think we are actually closer together than the statements below might suggest.
“If the self silenced ‘rational’ people were to apply their hearts and minds to leveling the playing fields – would what Malema advocates be necessary or evoke such fear and consternation? I think not.
I guess I am fixated on our collective complicity as a society, and my belief that we ignore our own contradictions as mere mortals, at our peril.”
Philosophically challenged you are not. Sarah!
Self-making and “…our collective complicity as a society…”
Tall order! I guess I see the above exchanges amongst us like this:
The elegant and brilliant theoretician (guess who), the pragmatic political analyst, and the ‘relapsing/remitting mystic’ who can also be ruthlessly practical at times. We are coming at the issue of self-making in the political and social context of SA from three ‘angles’ to to speak.
I think I have shot my bolt on self-making for the moment so on to collective complicity. Without debating the appropriate disposition of ‘blame’, let me say that I do not feel guilt is a good motivator. Guilt seems to me to separate and divide not to unite. Whether we feel guilty about the injustices in the world is irrelevant. What I think matters is that we look at the circumstances of impoverished, enslaved, or oppressed people and see those circumstances as remediable and make an effort to improve them.
tbc
Complicity cont’d
Suffering, starving, frightened people want it all to stop regardless of who might have been complicit (or not) in the formation of circumstances that caused or contributed to their suffering. I believe Compassion is what is needed, not guilt. Compassion moves us to act; guilt enervates and paralyses.
The more clearly we see how humans are connected, the more compassionate we become. We are separate bodies, separate wills, separate minds but we share conscious awareness–even Julius! But he fights it and he is a prime example of what happens when humans cut themselves off from their conscious awareness through the misuse of will and ego.
It seems to me that Julius and his chosen ‘role models’ all do the same thing. They create a political persona instead of an individuated, aware self. No amount of white quilt can change that. The situation that Julius and the ANC, etc, create daily is the reality that we must decide how to deal with. Regardless of our good intentions, those who wish establish a national unity of purpose are at the mercy of a ruling party that maintains an overwhelming majority that divides us into factions.
Our democracy is, of necessity, adversarial and that is what he have to work with. We cannot unify the country but we may be able to unify the opposition parties into a consensus party that might be able to mitigate the damage caused by the Malemas if not avoid it altogether.
@Bert,
“To fall prey to polarising discourses of any kind would represent a serious retrogression — one that would undo a lot of the salutary developments that have occurred since the demise of apartheid.”
It is a retrogression. And we already in it. We now have to try to claw our way back to a moderate centre made more difficult everyday by the toleration for the primary sources of divisiveness: the YL and its leaders and the ideologues in government who cut off discussion or nullify it by paying lip service to democratic discourse and then dismantling another functioning unit (Scorpions, JSC, NPA, etc,). If the principles of a constitutional democracy are not in themselves enough to convince the ruling party of the wisdom of seeking non-divisive approaches to nation building, what would be enough?
Sorry to end on a pessimistic note but the essential agreement to live as a democracy has not been achieved as long as the majority party undermine the constitution without actually repealing it.
@Siobhan, you crack me up. After googling a few jawbreakers, I agree, we do appear to be close – except when you lapse into party political positioning and blaming.
My guess is, that if the people whose present actions you so despise, had the opportunity to be exposed to normal lives instead of fighting for oxygen, we might be in a better situation.
Insulting anyone about what they ‘lack’, certainly does not serve as an incentive for them to be attracted to the implied remedy – tertiary ‘education’. Particularly if it appears that those who are so educated take the all powerful role of defining/limiting/insulting them.
When I talk about our collective complicity it is to insert the idea that none of us are above reproach. We draw from the same poisoned well if we hate those whose behaviour we regard as hateful.
I think adversarial party politics only serve to divide us. We think its justified to build up rather than break down enemy images. We stop seeing what’s good in those from the ‘enemy camp’, suspicious of their every move, doubting their sincerity, demonising instead of humanising them – without realising how we get tainted in the process.
I have yet to see a political party that simply forges ahead, are seen to level the playing fields, and wins the majority over by delivery, not grandstanding and refining their ability to highlight the faults in their equally fallible opponents,rather than truly making the society equal.
tbc
So Siobhan, I struggle when people are demonised. My instinct is to ask ‘why is that person displaying that behaviour’; and ‘if that situation/reason/cause/trigger could be removed/dealt with, would that person need to display that behaviour?
So yes, we need to remove injustice, but first we need to learn to ‘see’ it in all its forms – starting by acknowledging our own blindness.
Sarah,
Re: The elegant and brilliant theoretician (Bert), the pragmatic political analyst,(many of those above) and the ‘relapsing/remitting mystic (moi).
Re: “I believe Compassion is what is needed, not guilt. Compassion moves us to act; guilt enervates and paralyses.”
I do not debate whether ‘we’ are ‘complicit’ in creating the circumstances in which we find ourselves (all Sa-cans, all colours). I sense I am a good bit older (not wiser!) than you and my experience influences my perceptions of the ‘divisive discourse’ SA is engaged in. I am not suggesting that tertiary education is the answer to all woes. However, ‘liberation before education’ and ‘exile’ have left the vast majority of SA’s population in a ‘knowledge vacuum’, one that is harming their chances of attaining the promises (currently misunderstood or poorly understood) of democratic as opposed to authoritarian rule.
The ANC has failed to educate the mass of the population–not just in schools—but through the media about the basic principles of living in a society in which the Constitution–not the president or other leader–takes precedence above any private agenda. Constitutional Democracy is a personal responsibility as well as a personal right. It is a cultural sea change for people who have lived all their lives under authoritarianism. It is ‘freeing’ only in so far as it is understood.
The ANCYL and its leaders have made clear that they do not understand the basic principles of democratic life and intend to re-impose authoritarianism.
Cont’d.
In the context of Bert’s ‘discourses’ and the need for self-making as way to avoid being ‘spoken’ by a discourse, we have a dilemma. Attempts to ‘reach’ Malema, Shivambu,and Mbalula at the level of intellect and reason fail because the use of intellect and reason has itself been demonised as ‘white’ and ‘western’. No matter how altruistic our motives in trying to ‘reach out’ to Malema et al, they must at least be open to the possibility of being ‘reached’.
All attempts–even those of Zuma!–to establish common ground on which to meet Malema are rejected and deflected onto tangential issues. Even the question of the ownership of the country’s natural resources is tangential in the sense that it serves to distract us from the failure of the government to meet its obligations of due care to the poor of the country.
We do not need to nationalise anything in order to provide a decent life for all SA-cans. We had the means to do it in every budget since 1995. But instead of using the taxes collected by SARS to do the job of housing, educating, providing public health care, etc, to all, the government diverted several HUNDRED BILLION RANDS into wasteful expenditure and the private bank accounts of corrupt officials. People have died during the ANC’s ‘watch’ because of massive dereliction on the part of the government.
The only meeting place left is in human consciousness itself outside the discourse.
@Siobhan, thanks for your response. Your final sentence resonates. Thanks too for the link you posted.
I watched a movie on international poverty last night, in the company of people who consider themselves to be ‘workers’. It made me realise that I waste my time on these blogs. There’s a blindness here that is scary. My time will be better spent having conversations with my family and friends who struggle every day to make ends meet, rob Peter to pay Paul, and wish only for ‘enough’ to live a life of dignity.
Thanks, it was nice to ‘meet’ you online.