Traces 5: Universities in Translation: The Mental Labour of Globalization

Articulation, Not Translation: Knowledge-Production in an Age of Globalization

Articulation, Not Translation T R A C E S : 5 165 arTiculaTion, noT TranslaTion: KnowledGe-ProducTion in an aGe oF Globalization1 dinG-Tzann lii Knowledge Without a Body The process of knowledge production in a university has always taken place within the closed system of the academic community, thus separating itself from the broader social life and real world. Instead of engaging in, and reflecting upon real life, academics read journals or other published work to formulate their research questions. Many of these questions are, of course, very important, and it is nonsense to oppose reading articles in journals in an unqualified manner. Indeed, knowledge production is impossible without entering into the theoretical exchanges which are mostly carried out in published work. However, to read is one thing, to formulate a research question is another. When only reading has completely replaced engagement of the real world, the question formulated is mainly a result of logical induction/deduction, and is therefore not a “real” question for the real world, but a logical and abstract question derived from the academic system. This is where the problem begins. When the academic world becomes divorced from the real world, knowledge becomes separated from life. It is not necessary for all knowledge to be useful to humans. However, when most knowledge is not related to humans and exists as an independent and self-referential system, knowledge becomes a source of domination and alienation. This is where the problem of science and technology Ding-tzann Lii 166 T R A C E S : 5 is often said to lie. We keep manufacturing systematic knowledge without any effort to go back to the real world, and to put our theoretical constructions into dialogue with the world. The term “dialogue” here means that we must employ our flesh-body to perceive the world as it interacts with the theory, in order to find out what the theory really means to us as human beings. To do so is to put the abstract theories back into our real world, where they are imbued with flesh and blood; they come back to life again. Subsequent research questions should be the result of this dialogue, instead of coming directly from the publication system itself. However, the role of publication within the academy has become so dominant that we tend to follow the internal logic of the system without bothering to go outside and communicate with the real world. Our knowledge has consequently lost its material substratum. When we lose our bodies, the knowledge will inevitably lose the material substratum from which it comes, and become bodiless. Knowledge as Ontological Practices When knowledge loses its body, our culture and society also lose their material base. As indicated above, theory is a specific type of knowledge which allows us to take a particular perspective to look at the world. Without the assistance of a theory, we don’t even have a tool to grasp the world. However, through the mediation of a theoretical tool, the world is not only made understandable, becoming clearer, more orderly; it is also rearranged, and becomes simpler and more clear-cut. To put it more concretely, as a theory functions to grasp a world, it sets in motion a process of signification. Gradually, the world becomes what the theory signifies, and the complex nature of the world is simplified. Epistemology indeed has an ontological effect, creating a world in the image of its own perspective. The social and cultural complexities which can’t be integrated into the theoretical system are conceptually excluded from the real world, and a simpler, new world which accords with the conceptual image emerges. In other words, the world has lost its body and become a theoretical construct. This is especially true for local societies when, in a globalized age, the theory is imported from an advanced society. In an age of globalization, the production and circulation of knowledge is organized into a global system of publication networks, especially in the English- Articulation, Not Translation T R A C E S : 5 167 speaking world. Almost all of the most important publications are in English, and non-English-speaking people are forced to read, and gradually, to publish in English.This is especially true in the developing countries. InTaiwan, for example, most of the literature for graduate students is in English, with Chinese texts only as supplements.Therefore, university faculty inTaiwan are...