Response to Dianna's comment on cosmopolitanism

Image: Bust of Diogenes the Cynic. From the grave, he says, "I'm a dead Greek guy. What would I know?"

Dianna, that was a wonderful and thoughtful response. Thank you!  Thank you also for highlighting Uma Narayan's works, too.  Yes, Narayan rightly points out that for all the discussion focused on untangling the knots that bind the concept of identity and national-affiliation, the  rhetoric, painted language, and dominant cognitive framework still hang on the walls closing in on the discourse on cosmopolitanism.

In noting how, even when one has the intention to dismantle the binary associations that often come with nationalism and national identity with ideas about cosmopolitanism, Dianna is right in concluding that one is still defining oneself by what one is not.  In other words, in discussing the theory of cosmopolitanism, one does so by acknowledging/affirming the antitheses to cosmopolitanism (nationalism, regionalism, ethnocentrism, et cetera).  In a way, this binary approach often limits how we can expect to think about culture in a new way since, as Dianna highlights, we are still using the same old rhetorical, nationalist tools in attempt fashion a new paradigm about being a citizen of the world.  It's pretty darn difficult to escape the naming of national identities.  (Would 'a rose by any other name would [still] smell as sweet"?)  It's even more difficult to do if we were born into geo-political nationalist culture that inculcated certain habits and systemic beliefs.

So yes, it seems like we're still using the same rhetorical tools to discuss culture, but I believe our society's frequent references to nationalities is a really an instinct for convenience at the international level (the word international has 'nation' in it, quelle surprise). This instinct shifts at the national and local levels (when there's no nationality to distinguish between, e.g. when referring to Americans, they're, well...all Americans, so we might elect to distinguish each one from the other with say, cultural political categories such as 'Independent,' 'Democrat,' 'Republican' or 'Pastafarian.'

All jokes aside, culture exists beyond national borders and boundaries -- we can look at the Kurds or diaspora, religious, and/or political communities around the world, to list a few examples, and acknowledge this fact.  Culture is also contradictory.  I think Arjun Appadurai appropriately sheds light on a path to changing the way in which we talk about cultural identity by identifying five primary imaginary "landscapes"-- ethnoscapes;  mediascapes; technoscapes; finanscapes; and ideoscapes in "Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy." I agree that nationalism will not just go away.  However, I don't believe nationalism remains fixed in our international system because of a matter of "language space" within the discourse of inclusion.  (That's a separate blog post!)

Martha Nussbaum's interpretation of cosmopolitanism is fascinating.  The idea that "we should recognize humanity wherever it occures, and give its fundamental ingredients, reason, and more capacity, our allegience and respect."  I believe one can apply ethics and have respect for other cultures within a nationality and outside a nationality.  This does not mean abolishing the idea of the nation-state or regionalism.  In contrast, this means recognizing that we are wholly capable of upholding cosmopolitanism as not only an embrace of other national cultures, but outlooks, orientations, religions, and political cultures.  This is certainly made possible by "language space," but also by action.  

This may be but a small detail, however, when Diogenes first declared that he was "kosmopolitēs," (and thus announced the birth of cosmopolitanism) it was long, long before the Peace of Westphalia and the birth of the modern nation-state.  As Nussbaum states, "Diogenes knew that the invitation to think as a world citizen was, in a sense, an invitation to be an exile from the comfort of patriotism and its east sentiments, to see our own ways of life from the point of view of justice and the good. The accident of where one is born is just that, an accident."  Diogenes' statement that he was a "citizen of the world" was qualified by his belief in the power of action over words to sustain and communicate respect for humanity.

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Dianna's Response - September 30, 2012 at 7:18 PM

First, thank you for inserting the Tagore and Yeats quotes. Having two anti-colonial writers argue for a moderated form of cosmopolitanism brings a very interesting perspective to the debate of the modern "global citizen". However, after reading your post, I found myself wondering if the "third space" is in fact possible when it is still trapped in the language of nationalism. 

Both the utopian global citizen and the Yeats/Tagore balancing act are predicated on the existence of a nationalist discourse and identity. Without knowing what nationalism is, you could not understanding its antithesis or even create the "third space". To me, that would make both ideas slightly problematic to initiate. With the "third space", nationalism is permitted, but is supposed to be tempered by respect for other cultures. But isn't that a hard thing to balance against an idea that still has power in the modern world? Even pure cosmopolitanism, which says it erases nationalism, actually doesn't because nationalism as an idea still underscores the very language of cosmopolitanism.

It is very hard to change or even erase an idea when that idea is still very much alive in the language of a culture. When it is in the discourse, it means it still has agency in the system, and can therefore impact modern ideas for good or ill. 

The reference to Tagore and Yeats brought to mind the work of Uma Narayan. Though she deals predominantly with "Third World Feminism", she spends a whole chapter in her book Dislocating Cultures talking of "Anti-Western" sentiment and how that lead to third-world nationalist movements. But as she points out, in their attempt to create a new identity for themselves, the colonized ended up appropriating the same system of cultural identity that their colonizers used ("Us" v. "Them") and just making their definition of nationalism as "Anit-Western" (14). By not changing their discourse on identity, the colonized were still bound by the meanings that discourse conveyed on them. Though it may seem like going in the exact opposite direction would free you from the shackles of a discourse you do not agree with, it actually binds you even closer, because you can only define yourself as NOT that discourse. 

Tagore and Yeats are both writing in this colonialist era, and so it fascinates me that they bring up this idea of hybridization in such a context. But even they do not offer a means to change the actual language of identity. As you noted, "national identity" is still a part of their "third space". So my question to everyone is: how can you expect to think about culture in a new way -- to include the possibility of a hybrid culture -- if you cannot change the way in which you talk about cultural identity? 

Even with social media and other communication technologies giving us access to cultures and perspectives, nationalism still plays its role, because to this day you identify yourself as Chinese, American, Indian, Moroccan, etc. Until that language can be taken out as a signifier of our identity, I will have to remain skeptical that the third-space -- even if we are occupying it -- can be sustained. Nationalism dominated international relations for so many years, and I worry that that much history and power in our world means that it will not easily share its language space with the discourse of inclusion.