Voices and Selves: Beyond the Modern-Postmodern Divide

Arthur O. Lovejoy famously referred to thirteen pragmatisms. If he were called on to enumerate postmodernisms, no doubt he would increase this number tenfold.¹ Fortunately I need not follow his lead for the task at hand, namely, to discuss whether the pragmatic tradition can narrow the divide between modernism and postmodernism on the topic of cosmopolitanism. To do so I will focus on specific sets of ideas that have been associated with these terms. So, for example, modernists have been viewed as defenders of some form of universality, ethical or conceptual, and of a responsible, self-actuating, authentic subject. Postmodernists look toward particularity and alterity, and stress that notions of a unitary subject are misguided, as are ideas of authenticity, implying as they do a univocal identity. Postmodernists often claim that modernists are overt or covert essentialists in their understanding of the self. Of course these generalizations are open to contestation and exceptions, but we must start somewhere. An added complexity is that it is not even clear that there is a modern/postmodernist divide. The case has been made innumerable times that postmodernism— or I should say postmodernisms—are merely a host of assorted trajectories within modernity. I will not engage this question here; instead, as noted, I will address ideas that have been associated with these traditions. My approach is pragmatic. It is in sympathy with Rorty's invocation of Dewey at the beginning of his article "Cosmopolitanism without Emancipation: A Response to Jean-François Lyotard":

[Dewey] neither erects an exciting new binary opposition in terms of which to praise the good and damn the bad, nor does he distinguish between bad binary oppositions and some wonderful new form of discourse which will somehow avoid using any such oppositions. He just urges us to be on our guard against using intellectual tools which were useful in a certain sociocultural environment after that environment has changed, to be aware that we may have to invent new tools to cope with new situations.²

And to this I would add the obvious: we may not have to invent new tools so much as see alternative possibilities for tools that we already have.

The question at hand is whether there are resources within philosophical pragmatism, specifically George Herbert Mead's approach, for overcoming the seeming rift between modernists and postmodernists with regard to the idea of a cosmopolitan self or individual. Specifically, I want to offer an approach to cosmopolitanism that will treat the individual as multi-voiced and particular, which leans in the direction of the postmodern, while also bringing into play ideas of universality that are often associated with the Enlightenment. I will do so in part by discussing the example of someone who appears to share attributes of both camps and should be well known to the reader, Barack Obama. I am not interested in his political judgments here. I am interested in a story that can be told about him, one that Zadie Smith tells. My goal is not to supply a fully developed theory of cosmopolitanism, which is clearly beyond the scope of this paper. My goal is to generate discussion about an approach to cosmopolitanism that moves beyond or sidesteps some of the rifts that we associate with the terms "postmodern" and "modernity," for example, regarding notions of authenticity and universality. We need not jettison the latter two terms in developing a viable cosmopolitanism, especially if we see them as old tools that can be used in somewhat new ways. I will be asserting propositions in this paper that require further support, many of which I have defended elsewhere.³ This paper is a substantially revised version of a plenary talk that I gave to the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy in 2009.

A fear of cross-culturalism can be linked to religious or ethnic sensibilities that view purity or singularity of voice as a necessary condition for virtue or salvation. An intermingling of cultural sensibilities muddies the waters, so to speak, and can undermine one's ability to maintain univocality. Even more threatening in this regard is...