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241. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Irina Polyakova Drama of Life: Philosophical Biography as an Event in Russian Culture
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This article discusses attempts of Russian philosophers of the 19th and 20th centuries (e.g. Vladimir Solovyev, Vladimir Ern, Nikolay Berdyaev) to suggest thegenre of “philosophical biography” as a special kind of philosophical work. So, philosophical biography is treated as an understanding of life. The most important features of philosophical biography in Russian thinkers’ interpretation are as follows: the focus on comprehension of life-drama, in which thoughts and senses act as personal events; the demand of spiritual affinity as a condition for understanding; and the creation of spiritual image as the main task of biography.
242. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Constantin Stoenescu The Ethos of Modern Science and the “Religious Melting Pot”: About the Topicality of Merton’s Thesis
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My aim in this paper is to discuss the topicality of Merton’s thesis with a twofold meaning: as an idea which has its own place in the sociology of science and as an idea which is currently in its area of research. Merton asserts that the development of science in 17th century England was aided by the Puritan ethic. This does not means that science was caused by Puritanism, but only that Puritanism provided major support for the scientific activity. Because secularization and integration were two complementary processes, the relationship between science and religion was not simple. I connect Merton’s thesis with Weber’s thesisabout Protestantism and capitalism and try to see it in the light of the cultural climate of its time. Finally, I argue that Merton offers a unified analysis of scienceas a social institution.
243. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Wei Zhang Rational a priori or Emotional a priori? Husserl and Scheler’s Criticisms of Kant Regarding the Foundation of Ethics
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Based on the dispute between Protagoras and Socrates on the origin of ethics, one can ask the question of whether the principle of ethics is reason orfeeling/emotion, or whether ethics is grounded on reason or feeling/emotion. The development of Kant’s thoughts on ethics shows the tension between reason and feeling/emotion. In Kant’s final critical ethics, he held to a principle of “rational a priori.” On the one hand, this is presented as the rational a priori principle being the binding principle of judgment. On the other hand, it is presented as the doctrine of “rational fact” as the ultimate argument of his ethics. Husserl believed that Kant’s doctrine of a rational a priori totally disregarded the a priori essential laws of feeling. Like Husserl, Scheler criticized Kant’s doctrine of a rational a priori, and therefore developed his own theory of an “emotional a priori”. Both of them focused their critiques on the grounding level of ethics. Scheler, however, did not follow Husserl all the way, but criticized him and reflected on his thoughts. At last, he revealed the primary status of a phenomenological material ethics of value.
244. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Isaac E. Ukpokolo Between Group Mind and Common Good: Interrogating the African Socio-Political Condition
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The paper is challenged with the seeming contradiction resulting from the prevalent conception of the group mind and common good in African and Westerncultures or societies. Many African scholars have theorized about the communalistic nature of African communities which leads to the flourishing of group consciousness as opposed to individualistic attitudes. This is often discussed against the background of the liberalism of Western societies which tend to elevate individual consciousness and self-realization over that of the group. With this picture in mind, one would expect the common good to flourish in the former more than the latter. Present African socio-political conditions examined against similar scenarios in the West makes it glaringly obvious that the exact opposite is the case. Being that the group mind principle needed for the attainment of the common good seems absent in contemporary African states, the paper therefore recommends that a critical self-examination is needed by the African states in order to develop a genuinely African group consciousness for the attainment of the common good.
245. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Mohd Faizal Musa Javanese Sufism and Prophetic Literature
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Part of the “Islamic literature” furore in Indonesia is the discourse of “Prophetic Literature,” founded by Abdul Hadi W.M. The background of “PropheticLiterature” is Sufism. Other ingredients that formulated “Prophetic Literature” are mysticism, “Javanese Sufism” and perennial philosophies concerned withspiritual experience and human effort to gain the love of God. The ambitious objective of “Prophetic Literature” is to form a healthy environment in society throughthe purification of the souls of the readers. It also aims to energize the spirit of the colonized people in the East through promoting good deeds and kindness whilst preventing corruption and wickedness. “Prophetic Literature” prioritized the human and re-positioned man as the Caliph of Allah. The fundamental and dominant theme of “Prophetic Literature” is monotheism. “Prophetic Literature” is not interested in any particular form, but it emphasizes traditional elements, such as the return to the “roots of local culture,” including “Javanese Sufism,” as it core sources. Similar to “Sufi literature,” the appearance of “Prophetic Literature” is shown through the use of symbols. Authors are measured by their ability to compose symbols, and to send hidden meanings in their works.
246. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Maximiliano E. Korstanje, Geoffrey Skoll Breaking the Symbolic Alienation: The New Role and Chalenges of Critical Philosophy in Next Millennium
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Many scholars in recent years have focused their efforts on revealing the connection of philosophy and authority. Basically, from Nietzsche onwards, philosophyhas witnessed ongoing efforts for “will to power” by some philosophers and of course this motivated many philosophers to take part in politics. Nonetheless, thismoot point engendered a serious risk and not only contrasted with the Socratic contributions, but also paved the way for the advent of a new way of making politics where philosophy and scientific prestige are being manipulated following certain interests. By comparing the US and Argentinian climates, this paper explores to what extent philosophy can and must remain independent of politics. Even though one might think of Heidegger as a clear example of this relationship, there are many other philosophers who were interested in politics and committed to political parties. One of the aspects that characterizes this new way of politics is the theatrification of reality, and philosophers are part of this process. To some extent, the prestige given to scholars for their contribution to society is being conferred to some privileged groups to gain more legitimacy, precisely in a world where the classical institutions are gradually declining.
247. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Asunción López-Varela Azcárate Intertextuality and Intermediality as Cross-cultural Comunication Tools: A Critical Inquiry
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Cross-cultural communication is about generating dialogical positions across cultural barriers. Communication is achieved when participants are able to construct meaning across varied sign systems. Oral communication makes use of a wide range of signs that contribute to make meaning, from eye contact to gestures and speech. In written/printed communication, together with the reproduction of visual images through painting, photography, etc., the most important resource is the textual format. Texts are grounded on a cognitive deictic basis and work alongside the cause-effect relationship that links events in human working memory. This relationship frequently posits a hierarchical dependency between the understanding of visual images, textuality and narrativity. Although texts are vehicles of contextualized information and cultural positions are often presented in a historiographical way, culture is not just about textuality; it is also about multimodality, that is, the use of symbolic forms that employ simultaneously several material-semiotic resources to create a kind of common framework of socially acceptable behaviours and customs which arise both from individual personal experiences and from shared cultural and ethical values. Signs areused to represent these values and, in turn, these representations affect their further emotional interiorization. This creates particular strong moments of remembrance and recollection in human memory. In addition, the production, distribution and reception of culture has always been dependent on changing material formats and technologies, from manuscripts to printed books, from mural painting to photography, and from architecture to virtual recreations on a computer screen. In recent years, the interest in intertextual and intermedial configurations is mostly due to the growth of hypermedia paradigms, and is reflected in the increasing number of disciplinary publications and conferences devoted to the topic. This paper shall explore the reasons behind a renewed interest in intertextual and intermedial manifestations in cross-cultural communication.
248. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Giuseppe Cacciatore Intercultural Ethics and “Critical” Universalism
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The aim of this article is the analysis of a new model of intercultural ethics. In this way I propose a “creative” and dynamic version of universalism, which canbe used as a model for the construction of a pluralistic and intercultural philosophical perspective.
249. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Scott H. Boyd Considering a Theory of Autopoietic Culture
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This article questions the predominance of pragmatism and fixed points of reference in academic paradigms regarding culture and proposes a theory of autopoietic culture based on a theory of living forms developed by the biologists Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela. The central part of the theory of autopoietic culture is that culture, something originating with humanity and reflected upon by the same, is an autonomous and autonomic unity that is a network of processes and production of components that are continuously generated and “recursively participate through their interactions in the generation and realization of the network of process of production of components which produced them” (Maturana, 1999: 149, 153). This article briefly refers to the theories of Thomas Sebeok, Juri Lotman, Niklas Luhmann and Pierre Bourdieu, which have similar components to the theory of autopoietic culture. The article concludes that within autopoietic culture whatever we would consider describing as a cultural element is not as significant as the processes within which it is part in the construction of its own boundary of discernment; our description of the process is always conducted with other observers in a linguistic domain; our existence carries its own ontogeny and creates perturbations in the structure (elements) which we distinguish; and there are an unknown number of elements and processes continuing in time within the unity that define the unity and are beyond our ability to distinguish.
250. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Che Mahzan Ahmad Notes on Ethno-Pragmatics as a Device for Intercultural Communication Intelligence (ICQ)
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Ethno-pragmatics as device to understand the culturally Other is essential when we believe that there is a nexus of intimate relationships between languageand culture. The whole idea of ethno-pragmatics is to understand local life-worlds in the wake of celebrating particularism in inter-cultural communication. Ethnopragmatics basically appreciates language practices in terms that make sense to the people concerned, whether in terms of indigenous values, beliefs, attitudes, social categories or emotions, and so on. Understanding cultural keywords is pertinent in ethno-pragmatics. These living words provide the best key to a culture’s values and assumptions, and they are embedded in the cultural scripts of the society/community. With the above positioning, we suggested that ethno-pragmatics be the device for intercultural communication intelligence (ICQ). In this work we employed a cultural script quest in order to capture/understand the tapestry of Malay culture. Bahasa (“language”) is one of the main Malay cultural keywords. The Malays relate bahasa to various norms and beliefs that encompass their life-world. Bahasa is molecularly related to their emotions, sense-making and aesthetics. As an illustration, we provide ICQ-at-work with halus as a technique of utilizing bahasa for successful speech-acts. Specifically, we narrate on Malay “indirectness” as a way of having conversation with the culturally Other.
251. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
I Made Gede Arimbawa Exploitation of Bali Traditional Symbols on Today’s Design
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Based on the views of Hindus in Bali, the application of ornaments in the form of Balinese traditional symbols should follow the rules of the prevailing tradition.The symbols are created to show the cosmology and philosophy based on the teachings of Hinduism as indigenous in Bali and function as a means of a sacred ritual. But in reality the designers in Bali often exploit the symbols by “mutilating” and applying them to undue places, motivated by a desire to create a product or environment characterized by Balinese ethnicity. For example, Acintya relief, Karang Bhoma, Garuda Wisnu and others are applied as façade decorations for shops and banks, or they are created in the form of a statue to decorate crossroads, or used for decoration of the human body in the form of a tattoo and so forth. Seen from a semiotic approach, these actions can damage the structure of the meaning of symbols, because they bring about the interruption of the established relations of the signifier and signified and they form symbol fragments with unclear relations to meaning. Similarly, in today’s designs stamped with such decoration, they appear awkward and meaningless. From such behaviour, that practice creates styles such as pastiche, parody, kitsch, camp and so forth.
252. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Robert C. Trundle Art as Certifiably Good or Bad: A Defence by Modal Logic
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Connections of beauty to science, whereby scientific truth informs truth about art, is denied by a Humean-Kantian-positivist tradition. Its denial of even scientifictheories being known to be true proceeds pari passu with denying any known truth in the less rigorous sciences such as aesthetics that, for Aristotle, studiesbeauty’s cause. Related to causation is a modern problem of “knowing we know”: knowledge in science presupposes a causal principle whose truth is not known when expressed as a truth-functional conditional. But by conditionals that are modal, among other things, this and other knotty epistemological problems may be resolved – resulting axiologically in claims about art that may be as certifiably true as the truths in biology, psychology and medicine that inform those claims.
253. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Monica Riccio Democracy as a “Universal Value” and an Intercultural Ethics
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This article questions the universal value attributed to the idea of democracy within a global intercultural context. The point is: do “mature” Western democracies,with their history, their nature and their limits, meet the needs of intercultural ethics? A first factual finding shows that outside, at the frontiers of “mature” democracies, all possible openings to the exercise of democratic freedoms, to the protection of human rights, and to any hybrid form of relationship and dialogue are near to nothing. Not even within Western liberal democracies do egalitarian guarantees, which in any case are the heart and soul of the culture of democratic societies, manage to make room for the recognition of differences in equality and for truly dialogic practices. When they face up to the needs of a possible ethical culture, the principles that underpin contemporary democracies (one of them being universal equality) show an unpliability and an ambivalence often concealed up to now. Conversely, an a posteriori and artificially progressive pattern of the historical course of democracies has been constructed that has ended up “triumphing” and attaining the global, universal “success” of our days.
254. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 8 > Issue: 2
Giuseppe D’Anna On the Correlativistic Construction of the Other. For an Analytical Anti-Spectacular Interculturalism: Nicolai Hartmann, György Lukács and Guy Debord
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In this paper I would like to demonstrate that the “society of spectacle” notably influences our idea of the other and our intercultural thought and practice.In this way the imagination is not a free creative capability of a human being, but a political and social instrument of power of the society of spectacle.
255. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Chao Wang Comparative Literature, Variation Theory, and a New Construction of World Literature(s)
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In "Comparative Literature, Variation Theory, and a New Construction of World Literature(s)" Wang Chao discusses Shunqing Cao's "variation theory" as a framework in the discipline of comparative literature and its applicability for a new construction of world literature(s). Wang argues that Goethe's concept of world literature can be expanded and developed for a new construction of the idea of world literature(s). Wang's principal argument is that comparative literature in today's heterogeneity and cross-cultural variabilities can be revived with the notions of variation and its connecting aspect of world literature. Both variation theory and perspectives of the concept of "new world literature" are based in recent insights in comparative literature, on variations of literary exchange, on interpretation in cross-civilization literary circulation, translation, and production. Wang proposes that these views broaden and adjust the boundary of comparability, thus injecting much-needed vitality into comparative literature and world literature research.
256. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Peina Zhuang On Variations of Classical Chinese Literary Theory for a Framework of Global Literary History
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In "On Variations of Classical Chinese Literary Theory for a Framework of Global Literary History" Peina Zhuang discusses texts of classical Chinese literary theory as a reservoir for philosophical reflections on literary art. The aesthetics of Chinese literature originate in Confucianism and Taoism and hence represent an important background for any discussion of ancient, modern, or contemporary Chinese literature and literary history. Zhuang analyzes texts of classical Chinese literary theory within such a framework of a literary history and aims at furthering Chinese literature to become an integral part of world literatures. Further, Zhuang argues that "history" and "literary history" present a different picture of works on classical Chinese literary theory owing to the variation caused in representing their literary and aesthetic features. Zhuang also posits that the translation of Chinese literary texts to Western languages, while relevant and important, is not enough to advance Chinese literature from a peripheral status to a status of recognition hence the importance of scholarship with regard to literary history specifically.
257. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Yina Cao Cross-cultural Communication and Cultural Variation
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In "Cross-cultural Communication and Cultural Variation" Yina Cao discusses the concept of "cultural variation" (Cao Shunqing) as an extension of the discipline of comparative literature. She argues that the concept of cultural variation explains many problems in the field of cross-cultural communication while it can also provide a unique research perspective for the phenomenon of cultural integration. By summarizing and sorting out the problems which need to be solved in "cultural variation" and the core cases of cultural variation (e.g., "journey to the West"), Cao discusses the phenomenon of aphasia in the process of cultural foreignization, cultural transmission, and cultural variation and attempts to imagine a new approach in scholarship in order to explore new theoretical tools for the future of the discipline of comparative literature with the use of Cao's variation theory.
258. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Shunqing Cao, Xin Chen Formations of World Literature(s) and Shaw's The Man of Destiny in Chinese and Japanese Translation
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In "Formations of World Literature(s) and Shaw's The Man of Destiny in Chinese and Japanese Translation" Shunqing Cao and Xin Chen expand Franco Moretti's dictum that "world literature is not an object, it's a problem" to elaborate that the concept of world literature(s) is in some sense a problematic one, which is itself under a process of problematization. Cao and Chen discuss how variation and heterogeneity contribute to a more in-depth understanding of formations of world literature(s). Taking the Bernar Shaw's The Man of Destiny they discuss the writer's presence in world literature from a bi-lateral perspective: Shaw's work in the English-speaking West and Shaw in Asia. For the former, Shaw stands in a specific place in recent postcolonial Irish Studies and thus raise problems for their research paradigm. For the latter, Cao and Chen present an analytical comparison between a Chinese and a Japanese translation of The Man of Destiny. Cao and Chen argue that by such a bilateral approach we may recognize the importance of heterogeneity so as to obtain further reflections on present discussions of world literature(s).
259. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Yi Li, Qian Xiaoyu The Xueheng School (学衡派), Babbitt's New Humanism, and the May Fourth Movement (五四新文学运动)
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In "The Xueheng School (学衡派), Babbitt's New Humanism, and the May Fourth Movement (五四新文学运动)" Li Yi discusses modern Chinese literary history. On the one hand, it is known that scholars have been discussing key figures of the May Fourth Movement by positioning the Xueheng School to the opposite side of the former. Hence in scholarship and criticism the location of the Xueheng School as a restoration group of feudalism resulted in understanding the School as hindering the development of modern culture. However, since the 1990s the Xueheng School inspired interest in the concept of restoring ancient Chinese thought. Some scholars even repeat the ideas of the Xueheng School and regard the efforts of Xueheng scholars as overall and profound cultural pursuits which would diminish some of the extreme ideas of the May Fourth Movement. Li argues that neither of the two views on the Xueheng School are accurate and discusses the Xueheng School's achievements in view of Irving Babbitt's idea of "New Humanism."
260. Cultura International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology: Volume > 18 > Issue: 1
Weidong Zhou Cultural Variation and Cultural Creation in Chinese Biographical Writing and Carnegie's Work
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In "Cultural Variation and Cultural Creation in Chinese Biographical Writing and Carnegie's Work" Weidong Zhou discusses the impact on Chinese biographical writing via biographies written in Chinese and translated from English about Andrew Carnegie's life and work. The interpretation of Carnegie's philanthropy includes Chinese traditional cultural concepts such as "righteousness," "cause and effect," and "self-cultivation" which constitute the unique understanding of "philanthropy" in modern Chinese literature. From a "moral model" to "successful person" the overall images following Carnegie can reflect the processes of acceptance of Western "individualism." Zhu argues that Carnegie's example was shaped as a "Youth Idol" in the May Fourth Movement from which the unique route of modernization in Chinese literature and culture can be traced.