The Art of Seeing and Hearing the Other

This seminar is the first of a series as part of the AHRC-funded initiative "Ethics and Aesthetics of Encountering the Other: New Frameworks for Engaging with Difference (ETHER)"

How we see and hear the other is often shaped through our attachment to ideas, images and ideologies about ourselves, others and the world. Language ideologies, for instance, delineate what counts as language and as legitimate ways of language use. They set boundaries inside which another is heard, encountered and judged (Inoue, 2003; Piller, 2016). This kind of meeting, however, precludes genuine contact because the listening/looking subject’s ideological preoccupations always put another in the position of an object (‘it’) to be comprehended, made sense of or assimilated. Anthropological philosophy, on the other hand, has entertained the possibility that an authentic encounter with difference can be achieved with a relational shift from ‘I-it’ to ‘I-Thou’ (Buber, 2013). The latter requires the subject’s pre-reflective way of being-in-the world which regards oneself and the other as whole human beings who cannot be reduced to cultural categories (Levinas, 1972). The seminar will examine how the two stances are negotiated in real-life encounters and identify theoretical principles for enabling authentic meetings across divides.

20 April 2021 9.30-14.30

Provocation. Dagmar Dyke; Sophie Herxheimer; Sarah-Jane Mason; Adam Jaffer; Thandanani Gumede; Helen Finch; Thea Pitman; Parinita Shetty; Cornelia F. Bock; Lara-Stephanie Krause; Stepahnie Jo Kent; Awad Ibrahim

Keynote: Rosine Kelz (philosopher, IASS, Potsdam)

21 April 2021 13.00-16.45

Creative Lab led by Artist in Residence: Pavel Fischer & Jakub Jedlinsky (violinists, Prague)

Conversation led by Ana Deumert (sociolinguist, University of Cape Town)

You can register via Eventbrite.