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Literature and Philosophy ENG177. This concept map summarizes and…

- - - - The lesson of Nietzsche is the task for 'free spirits' to construct new value systems that are more attentive to the whole of our experienced reality. (1998:205, section 260; 209 section 261)
        
        In synthesizing Nietzsche's reconstructive conclusion with Butler's reified gender constructs, it is possible to highlight the moral value of breaking up such constructs to allow for the subject to reaffirm its agency more fully. This would also hold for reified racial constructs that limit the agency of marked bodies. In other words, the recognition of each other as subjects is a fundamental moral principle.
    - - To equalize the gender imbalances, the crucial task is to proceed accordingly: "men and women must, among other things and beyond their natural differentins, unequivocally affirm their brotherhood", according to Beauvoire (p. 766)
      - In the project of overcoming racism, Du Bois' recommends mutual recognition between different racialized groups, more concretely, superordinate subjectivities should "listen to the striving in the souls of black folk (Du Bois, p. 12)
- - - - The performance of gender act is judged by an audience which may “initiate a set of punishments both obvious and indirect” if it departs from established gender scripts: social interaction is thus at the very core in anchoring gender identities, in Butler's words gender is “socially compelled” (Butler, 528). In this way, the individual is constrained by the Other which makes up the audience.
  - - - The notion of social identity is developed by Proust in Swann's Way with the realization that "our social personality is a creation of the minds of others ... We fill the physical appearance of the individual we see with all the notions we have about him, and of the total picture that we form for ourselves, these notions certainly occupy the greater part" (2014:19). By this measure, another key dimension of the self is established which lies in the social identity of the individual. Interestingly, in the delivery of this claim, Proust seems to briefly abandon the immediate setting of Combray and for an equally short moment take on a narration of the metaphysical condition of intersubjectivity. The narration of the events in Combray returns immediately after this metaphysical remark and is synthesized with the immediate setting of the parents' creation of Swann: "In the end they swell his cheeks so perfectly... " (p. 19)
      - Kafka's Metamorphosis demonstrates the dynamics of intersubjectivity in several cases. For instance, Gregor and his father is highly affecting each other's life, often in ways that denote Gregor; moreover, when Gregor transforms and becomes incapable of a normal life, this loss makes the family members jolt forward in their lives. Most unexpectedly, the prospect of getting intersubjective response or recognition in front of the Other even erases the doubt of Gregor Samsa's transformation "Indeed, he really did want to open the door, to show himself and speak with the general manager; he was eager to learn what the others, who were so anxious to see him, would say when they finally laid eyes on him. If they recoiled in horror, Gregor could surrender all responsibilities and rest easy." (Kafka, 11). This prospect becomes realized when the door to Gregor’s room is opened to the despair of his parents and the manager from his work. They react with screams and horror (Kafka, 13-15). Contrary to installing panic in Gregor, this moment of intersubjective confirmation of his status as an insect rather comes to stabilize his identity,
    - - In Proust's Swann's Way, the author drags our attention to memories that operate through the body, such as through our smell, taste and movement, in ways that reason alone does not allow for (2014:6). The dramatic operations of such bodily memories are instanciated in this example "... but then the memory - not yet of the place where I was, but of several of those where I had lived and where I might have been - would come to me like help from on high to pull me out of the void from which I could not have got out on my own way; I crossed centuries of civilization in one second, and the image confusedly glimpsed of oil lamps, then of wing-collar shirts, gradually recomposed my self’s original features” (Proust, 2014. p. 5)
      - In the Lockesian account of personal identity, consciousness is the central entity that holds together individuals’ selves (Locke, 1996:144-146). More distinctly, memory over “past action or thought” is essential for personal identities. ”… and as far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person” (Locke, 1996:138). In developing this conclusion, Locke examines the thought experiments of the Prince vs Cobbler, Sober Man vs Mad Man, and Day Man vs Night Man (20-24). These experiments provoke the reader to put emphasis on the active consciousness of a person and takes issue with sourcing our understanding of the self to its body or altered forms of consciousness.
    - - A posteriori: Locke claims that our ideas are derived from experience which is governed by relations such as cause and effect, time, place (Locke, 1996:132-133). More so, he argues that we draw on the particularities of our experience in our effort of abstracting to generalities. Over time, these experiences put "ink" on the tabula rasa character of individuals.
      - A priori: Kant argues that reason allows for synthetic, ideational conclusions of experience. Such an a priori organization lies at the bottom of his categorical imperative. (Assigned Youtube Video)