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issue No.

2, 2015

WHEN IS PHILOSOPHY INTERCULTURAL?

Table of Contents

Outlooks and perspectives

Ram Adhar Mall pp. 1-6


Andrea Rehberg pp. 7-8

Essays

Yvonne Förster:
Intercultural Philosophy Investigating the Mind in East-West-Dialogue pp. 9-12

Christiana Idika:
The Primacy of Question and the Task of Intercultural Philosophy pp. 13-30

Giuseppe Capuano:
For a history of philosophies: how the relationship between equals
makes philosophy intercultural pp. 31-43

Britta Saal:
Philosophizing with Children – A Cultural Technique pp. 44-56

Interview

Dr. Shaifali Sandhya on Culture, Delusions, and Social Reality pp. 57-67

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When is philosophy intercultural?


Outlooks and perspectives

Ram Adhar Mall

1. When is philosophy intercultural?

First of all: “intercultural philosophy“ is in fact a tautology. Because


philosophizing always takes place in an in-between of cultures, philosophies,
and religions. This is why I'd rather read the question of the conference “When
is philosphy intercultural?“ as “How and why is philosophy intercultural?“

Philosophy as a cultural product always expresses a specific “philosophical


culture“. As it always takes place and develops in the centre of a critical
discourse between different “philosophical cultures“, it is as such always “inter-
cultural“. This is about pluralities there are several “cultures of philosophy“ at
work within the same “culture of philosophy“. There are, for example, many
different philosophical cultures within the “one“ German philosophy – like
Hegel and Schopenhauer. And only philosophical positions with a claim to
absoluteness would take that fact as an offense.

The recent situation of hermeneutics is defined through a fourfold


hermeneutical dialectic: First of all the understanding of Europe through
Europe's eyes, i.e. the European self-hermeneutics. Secondly, the European
understanding of non-European cultures, philosophies, religions, etc.; i.e. its
extrinsic hermeneutics. Thirdly, the self-concept of those non-European
cultures, philosophies, religions; i.e. their respective self-hermeneutics. And,
eventually, the concept of Europe as seen by Non-European cultures,
philosophies, and religions.

It's essentially in this situation, that the very question confronts us: Who
understands whom “better” or “best“, and why, and how? And as such: When
and how is philosophy intercultural?

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The European mind has often presented itself with the self-inflicted claim to
understanding the non-European mind better than the non-European mind
would understand itself. The fact that, today, non-Europeans interpret Europe,
shows the thoroughly monologuous character of the centuries-old European
hermeneutics. This “having-become-interpretable“ of Europe through Non-
Europe is of course more of a surprise to Europe than to the rest of the world.
This issue has to be provided for by some philosophy.

Thus, I would like to answer the question “When is philosophy intercultural?“


as follows: philosophy is intercultural whenever an attitude speaks from it that
would avoid absolutizing it's own position, i.e. the singular answer, and instead
recognize and accept its own origins as being one amongst many positions,
following the principle of located placelessness.

The renowned religious philosopher Mircea Eliade (in The Search for the
Origins) put it like this: “I have often pointed out: Western philosophy [and I
would add, mutatis mutandis, this counts for all philosophies alike] cannot
move endlessly only within its own traditions, without eventually becoming
provincial.“

2. What concept lies behind the term “interculturalism“?

The concept of interculturalism is directed against a universalisation of one


specific culture (philosophy, religion, culture of thought). Interculturalism is not
a trans-cultural instance. The term does not point to any kind of trans- concept,
but instead aims at the searching and finding of overlaps, intersections,
common grounds. Difference is the basic experience. This basic experience is
the focus of the concept of interculturalism.

In the political reading, interculturalism is the name of a democratic and


pluralistic approach that looks for discourse, that promotes exchange, that has
no fear of the arbitrary. That's because it stresses each respective position,
conviction, or reading, but brings those into dialogue with the other. The
political reading assumes that even political wisdom is not the sole property of
any specific party or lobby, group, or ideology.

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The practice of intercultural philosophy is not a specific theory. It's not a


discipline, a convention, or a school, but it offers an orientation within the
practice of philosophizing. Interculturalism in the sense of an intercultural
philosophy is a position, an attitude, that accompanies each process of
philosophizing, respectively. Philosophy is intercultural whenever it reflects
upon its own doings, whenever it puts itself into perspective and integrates
into the indisputable plurality and diversity of truths and spellings.

From this position stems a self transforming process that shows the
philosopher both as being committed to a philosophia perennis, and as
remaining constantly in an open process of questioning and philosophizing.
Interculturalism points to the inescapable encounter of cultures and,
consequently, to the encounter of cultures of thought. This shows: the intra-
cultural is also always intercultural.

Interculturalism is a concept that shows how everything depends on how we


deal with differences, not on how we overcome them.

3. The concept of interculturalism is subject to many different


interpretations. Whence the ambiguity of this term?

Intercultural philosophy, as interculturalism, is itself subject to differences and


changes; it is subject to that same fourfold hermeneutic dialectics. Equally, the
term of interculturalism has to resist both its instrumentalisation by the politics
of the day (“Intercultural Competence“, “Diversity Management“), as well as it
has to stand up to several misunderstandings. One of these
misunderstandings, for example, is the belief that interculturalism would point
merely to the non-European, or would merely stand for the intention to
translate a somehow strange issue into something of its own.

On one hand, the concept of interculturalism is undergoing a healthy, dynamic


development, as it stays abreast of the events of the day and is subject to an
ongoing discourse. On the other hand, it is just as necessary to avoid reducing
the concept as such to a mere reaction to, or construction of, the political
phenomena of the day.

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The approach to interculturalism that I have chosen leads towards a tolerant


pluralism. This concept is therefore not just about some kind of correctness,
may it be of the philosophical, cultural, political, or religious kind. Rather, the
idea points to an epistemological comprehension of that de facto pluralistic,
but not non-committing or even arbitrary, structure within thinking, feeling, and
the will. The project that is behind the concept of interculturalism is in fact the
cultivation of a renouncement of the absolutization, the universalisation, or the
supremacy of one's own position of thought. And as such, it is indeed quite
tangible. Using this comprehension to lift the concept of culturalism out of its
ambiguity and abstractness, is therefore a sign of the self transforming process
of the philosopher.

4. The international interrelations of many societal spheres increasingly


provoke a clash of different cultures. Could this be a reason why
intercultural philosophy is now especially important?

The recent events remind us rather that the conflict that interculturalism points
to and which it induces, has not only not been pacified so far, but it may even
gain more and more brisance in the future. We are facing the question how we,
how individuals, deal with differences.

The project of intercultural philosophizing shows an overdue paradigm shift


within the current discourse – mainly the discourse of philosophies and
religions in the philosophical context of the world. A paradigm shift that helps
us overcome our well frog perspective, meaning the lopsidedness and
eagerness to absolutise our own perspectives – both inter- and intraculturally.
It's true, we are condemned to a point of view. The mistake however would not
lie in the fact that we cannot live without a point of view, but it would lie in the
fact that we tend to render a specific perspective – namely our own – in terms
of absolutes. Holding a position and a conviction is in itself good and just, as
long as we understand this position or conviction of ours as being one amongst
many. This evokes the courage and tolerance to listen to the truth of the
others.

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The intercultural philosophical attitude aims at a temporal, spatial, and


philosophical-historiographical correction thesis. It does not object to centres,
but to centrisms. It also rejects both the fear of arbitrariness and radical
relativism, and instead advocates a tolerant pluralism, a considerate
relationalism.

Intercultural philosophical orientation looks closely in order to find out what


philosophers do whenever they philosophize. Because they all philosophize.
And they often do different things in the name of philosophy – sometimes
radically different things. However, they nevertheless philosophize. This kind of
difference in philosophy is something that connectively separates all
philosophers, as it also disjunctively unites them. This is the overlapping. The
courage and tolerant openness to detect and then endure connective overlaps
and enlightening differences, have been of crucial importance at all times. It is
still, as ever has been, our task to head off into the dawn of a world philosophy,
as Jaspers would put it.

5. Where are the limits, and where are the options of intercultural
philosophy to take part in present political discourses?

The limits of intercultural philosophy lie wherever it runs the risk of becoming a
construction, a convention, discipline, or reaction. As an attitude that
accompanies every philosophical process and thus every discussion and
political discourse, it becomes effective wherever we negotiate truths, find
consensus or join efforts in finding the meaning of a common spirit. It takes its
effects through its renouncement of supremacy, through its eschewal of
absolutization, through the modesty of the speaker. This is how the discourse
learns its openness and non-violence – the avoidance of both theoretical
violence, e.g. as would be any universalization or absolutization of truth (i.e. the
claim to absolute truth), and the avoidance of practical violence. Intercultural
philosophy seeks to be not more or less than this approach, this attitude of
renunciation of absolutization. Hence, it accompanies each discourse and each
act with the belief that the will to understand and the will to being understood
are inseparable.

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Fight every point of view – theoretically, argumentatively, as far as possible –


that allows and suffers no other position next to it. Any claim to absolute rights
or absolute validity, are fundamentalistic, intolerant and violent already on the
theoretical level. Therefore, we want to practice a reflexive-meditative ethics of
theoretical and practical non-violence. Thus interculturalism can be both a
regulative idea and a corrective for political discourse. Dissent exists, and
consensus is to be achieved. It's the consensus that lies on our target course.

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When is philosophy intercultural?


Outlooks and perspectives

Andrea Rehberg

1. When is philosophy intercultural?

I think philosophy is intrinsically intercultural and that means it is always

intercultural. One is always in dialogue with a 'different' culture, whether an

American is reading eighteenth-century German philosophy or an Italian is

reading twenty-first-century Italian philosophy. But even when we read texts

from 'our own' culture, this is, in the broad sense, intercultural. The reason is

that no one has intellectual dominance or control over the culture from which

the texts and the ideas they engage with emerge. Culture is always 'beyond',

'in alterity', even fluctuating and perpetually shifting, whether it is the culture to

which I consider myself to belong or another one.

2. What does ‘interculturality’ stand for, from your point of view?

Above all, it stands for intellectual and ethical humility, for the realisation that

one's own perspective – necessarily in flux as it is anyway (see above) – is only

one of myriad other perspectives, none of which has a privilege over any of the

others; secondly, it means a dialogue that explicitly understands itself as being

in dialogue with all manner of otherness; thirdly, it means an active and

inquisitive engagement with the other, however it shows itself.

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3. Interculturality has a variety of meanings. What do you think is the

reason for this?

I think this is precisely a function of the multi-perspectival nature of

interculturality mentioned above. That there is no consensus as to its meaning

is, moreover, an asset, by which it precisely affirms its intrinsic nature, rather

than a weakness, due to lack of identity.

4. The present global encounter of cultures also leads to clashes of

cultures. Do you think this makes intercultural philosophy an urgent need

today?

Yes, I think so, but I also think that it is an entirely unavoidable effect of the

opening up of previously closed horizons between different cultures.

5. What do you think about the scope of intercultural philosophy? What

about its role with regard to political discourses?

Just as I think that the ethical dimension belongs to intercultural philosophy

from the start, so do I think does its political aspect. Beyond that, if you're

implicitly asking whether intercultural philosophers should intervene in political

discourses, I'm not so sure. It depends on how it's done. It might be very

productive and beneficial for both sides but it could also be problematic,

especially if philosophers allow themselves to be instrumentalised by political

discourses or interests of the day. I'd like to know more about what you have in

mind in this question…

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INTERCULTURAL PHILOSOPHY
INVESTIGATING THE MIND IN EAST-WEST-DIALOGUE

Yvonne Förster

I am going to tackle the question of intercultural philosophy from within my

field of research, which is philosophy of mind, more precisely theories of

embodiment that combine phenomenological approaches and neuroscientific

results. In this field the question of interculturality is quite intimidating.

Approaching texts from Buddhist or other eastern traditions means being

confronted with a variety of languages that cannot be understood if one has

not studied ancient Asian languages. The next obstacle is that one usually has

to deal with texts from religious backgrounds, which need a very careful

interpretation to understand the theoretical implications. This seems a huge

hurdle to intercultural thinking to say the least. Even reading the translations is

not very helpful since without deeper knowledge of the background and

language, interpretations are often no more than educated guesses.

So one could ask: Why bothering reading texts from other traditions? We have

come so far in researching consciousness and the mind. And already there are

two cultures within the western tradition that compete and have to be

mediated: The philosophical tradition and the scientific branches of

Neuroscience and Cognitive Science. Both ways to research consciousness

require not only translation in order to communicate with each other, they are

already in themselves structured interdisciplinary or have different approaches

fueling different discourses. The whole scenery seems like a prism of different

perspectives already within western science.

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The gap between humanities and the empirical sciences or life sciences is only

one of them. Both fields are in itself structured by differences. And furthermore

the humanities and social sciences adopt the neuroscientific paradigm within

their own territory. There is a big wave of disciplines that add the prefix neuro-

to their names and start new branches such as Neurophilosophy,

Neurosociology, Neurotheology and many more. Here a new culture of science

arises, that is a hybrid of empirical sciences and humanities or social sciences.

One could easily say that this is a form of scientific interculturality.

It is a question indeed how we should define interculturality. Something being

thought or done intercultural seems to be a very positive thing. But when do

we really think or work in an intercultural way? When does something count as

another culture? Does interculturality always entail other languages, other

cultures of thought? And if so, how could someone working in Philosophy and

not being linguist successfully realize an intercultural approach? An even more

complicated: How to choose the traditions that could contribute to a certain

question from the wide range of possible ideas and discourses? These are

questions I do not have answers for. I will limit my considerations to one

example I found very helpful in understanding certain problems in my field of

research.

The problem of consciousness is tackled from two different perspectives.

Neuroscience and cognitive sciences predominantly use third-person-data,

which are gathered in various measuring, observing and imaging techniques.

Some philosophers like Patricia Churchland or Thomas Metzinger work on the

philosophical implications of those findings and opt for a naturalization of

consciousness, for the acknowledgement that we are in fact our brains. There

are other thinkers, who see a methodological problem in this account. These

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mainly phenomenological informed thinkers such as Alva Noë or Evan

Thompson hold that the perspective of first-person-experience needs to be

integrated in scientific investigations of consciousness. Thompson speaks of

the primacy of experience because first-person-experience is what defines

consciousness and furthermore scientists cannot abstract from using their

experience to investigate consciousness.

This is the reason why Thompson argues that we need a methodological

approach to investigate first-person-experience and henceforth use it for

interpreting third-person-data. In Western philosophy Edmund Husserl has

developed the phenomenological method to investigate consciousness and

intentionality. This method has been already widely deployed in

interdisciplinary projects, where neuroscientists and philosophers join forces.

Prominent thinkers in this area are Francisco Varela, Daniel Dennett or Thomas

Fuchs in Germany.

In contemporary scientific investigations another tradition becomes more and

more important. This is the Eastern contemplative tradition. Meditation is a

practice that leads to the capability of observing one’s own mind more

carefully than in usual everyday life situations. Trained meditators and even

more Buddhist monks develop an extremely refined sense of the fine-grained

shifts in attention and modes of consciousness. These rich forms of experience

serve as heuristic means in the interpretation of third-person-data in

neuroscientific investigations. There is a growing number of researchers that

work in this interdisciplinary field.

Another way to delve into Eastern contemplative knowledge is to read the old

texts from the various traditions of Buddhism, Hinduism, Daoism or

Confucianism. To do so, one needs to rely on experts that can mediate this old

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knowledge and translate it into a language understandable by Western

scholars. This is complex process and there are more and more researchers,

who engage in this endeavor. One of them is Evan Thompson, a Canadian

Philosopher with additional background in Asian Studies. In his recent book on

“Waking, Dreaming, Being” (2015) he brings neuroscientific investigations,

Western philosophy and contemplative approaches into dialogue. The strength

of this intercultural investigation into the modes of consciousness lies in the

neutral way, in which Thompson explores the different fields. He shows, how

the ancient Buddhist texts can inform western science and enter a real

dialogue beyond religious or ideological constraints. His reading of Buddhist

epistemological and metaphysical thought shows that the contemplative

traditions contain a wide range of descriptions and theories of modes of

consciousness that add to Western thought in a surprising way. These text

sometimes even seem to mediate between Western philosophy and empirical

science.

These kinds of investigations need expertise and an ability to understand both

sides. But with growing interest in other traditions of thought also the number

researcher grows who dedicate their work to bridging these gaps and

communicating these otherwise hardly accessible fields of wisdom. This

tendency hopefully will result in more opportunities for Eastern-Western

dialogues and mutual inspiration.

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THE PRIMACY OF QUESTION AND THE TASK OF INTERCULTURAL


PHILOSOPHY

Christiana Idika

The question of one and the many which is among other things a central

problem in philosophy seems to have gone beyond merely concepts and

categories. Primarily, one would say that the part and the whole or the

universal and the particular has assumed a more complex dimension because it

is no longer about objects and things but a plurality of human beings, cultural

forms, philosophies, modes of reflections, thinking values and norms. These

are no longer issues bordered within a particular tradition, culture, space and

time; rather globalisation is restructuring our immediate grasp of reality and

positing multiple sides of reality. Such that the former immediate grasp of

reality that shape philosophical questions within such bordered spaces are only

assuming just a part of a whole reality. Hence, dealing with pluralism is not

simply a task of philosophy (Berlin, Concepts and Categoris, 1999) but its

challenge. Wimmer would certainly be right, that if philosophy is to provide

answers to its original question, its method and orientation must change. The

alternative method or orientation one may say, is intercultural philosophy.

However, what does one imply by interculturally oriented philosophy and what

does philosophy need to be intercultural? Any viable answer should

presuppose the notion of interculturality and consequently what primacy of

question has to do with intercultural philosophy.

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II

On the idea of Interculturality

In everyday life, in the media and academic circles the term interculturality has

assumed a conventional use. In fact, it has become one of the buzzwords in the

emergence of globalisation and its consequences. One hears expressions like

intercultural dance, intercultural music, intercultural centre, intercultural

evening among others. In some cases, it has been used as a substitute for

international. It is now used to refer to activities where different cultures

perform. The notion of culture has a complex historical development in the

West because the notion depends on the hegemonic relationship between the

West and the rest. However, this historical complexity cannot explain the

simultaneous change and permanence in culture. Moreover, within this

historical development of the notion of culture, one discovers that it has

elements of hegemonic centrism. Hence, the possibility of interculturality that

rejects absolute and dogmatic position about reality and the questions it poses

must interpret culture as interrogative results. It should have the capacity to

capture and explain the inner dialectics inherent in culture as a concept and as

a way of life. This is important to understand what Panikkar means; when he

argued that interculturality is neither one (single) culture nor a disconnected

plurality but a complete form of human culture.

Both the prefix ‘inter’ and the suffix ‘cultural’ signifies more than mere

performance or presence of different cultures in a program or project. That

means interculturality is not a combination of cultures. ‘Intercultural is not an

‘appendage’ such that whatever it is appended to automatically becomes

intercultural. Though there are cultural exchanges because of global processes,

however, this exchange is either cross-cultural or transcultural, both of which

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are merely descriptive and possibly without normative implications.

Interculturality is both descriptive because it describes a particular form of

cultural encounter and normative because it has a normative consequence. The

'inter' in ‘intercultural’ means a meeting of or encounter as something inherent

in 'culture.' If culture is a noun, cultural is the adjective, which moves one into a

realm of difference (Appadurai, 1996:12). Furthermore, as Mall rightly

observed, much of what we do in the name of intercultural studies today is

oriented from the perspective of Western thought and shows signs of the

West’s asymmetry and hegemony. This one-sidedness is the result of historical

contingency that made European thought the main paradigm of reference

(Mall, 2000:13). Consequently, every other intellectual or philosophical

perspective is viewed as a footnote to European thought. Indeed, one may not

separate European thought as a reference point from the historical hegemony

of Europe in their encounter with other cultures. Subsequently, interculturality

will have to deconstruct the hegemonic structures, if it will realise its task as

articulated by Mall. According to Mall, interculturality rejects the claim of

supremacy of one culture; of one value, or method of thinking over others. It

rejects the domination of one culture over the other. Mall argues,

interculturality is a mental and philosophical attitude that accompanies every

cultural configuration of the philosophia perennis, preventing it from

absolutising itself. Therefore, interculturally oriented philosophy will have to

deconstruct the conception of otherness by which other philosophical

traditions are to be encountered on their own terms.

Furthermore, interculturality could be dialogue or polylogue but it is never a

monologue. The term interculturality, Mall articulates, is neither a trendy

expression nor compensation for non-Western cultures that is born out of

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inferiority complex. It is not just a move made while confronting the actual

cultural encounters today Mall, 2006:134). Interculturality is tolerant to plurality

and seeks for overlapping structures that make communication across

traditions and cultures possible while it at the same time allow each to retain its

individual character (Mall, 2000:6). It means a plural understanding of cultures,

values and methods and modes of thinking. As a result, since pluralism is not

only the task of philosophy but its challenge, an interculturally oriented

philosophy will have a ‘Pluralitätsfähigkeit’ i.e. plurality ability. This is important

for intercultural philosophy to realise the task assigned it, namely: to mediate

between the universal question of philosophy and cultural contingencies of the

answers that form the bedrock of world philosophies.

Additionally, interculturality is not the same thing as consensus. Nicholas

Rescher rightly claims, “consensus is a matter of agreement” (Rescher, 1993:5).

Consensus theory builds on the idea of one truth, one good and one morality.

It claims that philosophical argumentation must yield a convergence of

answers. The difficulty is not whether there is one universal truth, good and

morality. Rather, the difficulty is how do we reach this universal truth, and

whose truth. For the first part of the difficulty, Kant assumes that consensus as

a touchstone of truth is rooted in reason or rationality. One may ask in the

words of Alasdair Macintyre (1988) which rationality? Indeed, it appears that by

the universalisation of the concept, it is taken for granted that what it means

and the answers to the question it raises are already decided. Clearly, within

the European or American philosophy its meaning and implications are still

contested. Therefore, the question of the concept of rationality remains open.

In fact, in a situation where the concept itself has a one-sided interpretation an

intercultural orientation will necessarily imply seeking the meaning of the

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concept of rationality within different cultures. Nevertheless, it does not seem

that taking such approach will likely lead to a consensus about truth, whether

epistemic, cognitive or moral. Furthermore, Jürgen Habermas considered

consensus as something inherent in communication. This might be the case,

but communication must be grounded in understanding. Consensus as

agreement seems different from understanding. People may agree without

understanding and understand without agreeing (Rancière, 1999). Clearly, a

person who wants to understand must question what lies behind what is said.

The person must understand what is said as an answer to a question (Gadamer,

2003:270). Here lies the principle of understanding in communication.

Communication aims more at understanding rather than mere consensus.

Moreover, consensus as a product of rational argumentation has nothing to do

with truth. Rational argumentation is about setting up a premise and arguing to

establish the truth of the premise. In such a setup, people argue to win or

argue their co-arguers down. Gadamer maintains that in a dialogue or

polylogue situation, one allows oneself to be conducted by the subject matter

to which the participants are oriented. It requires that one does not try to

argue the other down. Rather, Gadamer continues, it entails that one really

considers the weight of the other’s opinion (Gadamer, 2003:367). Following

this argument, interculturality is not consensus.

Besides, interculturality is neither comparativity nor complementarity.

Comparisons run the risk of evaluation and to evaluate a standard is required.

The dilemma will then be who sets the standard and by what criteria.

Complementarity also runs the risk of instrumentalising the other. According to

Levinas, the existence of the ‘other’ does not concern us by reason of his of her

power and freedom which we should have to subjugate and utilize for

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ourselves (Lévinas, 1994: 89). Nevertheless, though Lévinas believe in the

absolute otherness of the other, interculturality is not pure alterity. Rather, it is

an in-between, because there can be no absolute otherness, the self and the

other are different in some ways and same in some other ways.

Thus, interculturality does not just describe today’s cultural encounters but

offers the norms that could characterize such encounters for better

understanding across cultures. Hence, interculturality is descriptive as well as

normative. Interculturality is an overlap and space for creativity. It means

changing perspectives and positions to see the world differently. Changing

perspectives involves the recognition of the other’s perspective as having a

worth of its own in its own terms. That means interrogating one’s culture in the

face of another culture. It also means interrogating the other culture in the face

of one’s culture. In each case, it requires that the ‘other’ be allowed to respond

to the questions.

Therefore, central to the goal of interculturality is the deconstruction of

otherness and subsequently, deconstructing the existing intellectual hegemony

in philosophy. Ancillary to this deconstruction task is the necessity for a

pluralitätsfähigkeit on the part of philosophy. Both the task of deconstruction

and pluralitätsfähigkeit requires primacy of question.

This paper argues for the primacy of question as a constitutive element of

intercultural philosophy.

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III

On the Primacy of Question

Philosophy as an inquiry begins with reflection on its contents not so much

about the method of thinking and argumentation that is involved. This is so

because the arguments or methods are only ancillary. Moreover, the notion of

thinking and logical inferences whether formal or informal are not yet settled.

For instance, what does one do when one thinks? How do we distinguish a

thinking process that is philosophical from the one that is not philosophical?

These issues are not addressed in this paper. Rather, the present paper builds

on the claim that question is the primary off-shoot of philosophy.

In the works of some African and African American philosophers, one finds the

distinction made between philosophy born out of wonder in the historicity of

philosophy in the West and that born of struggle or frustration in the historicity

of philosophy in African America and Africa respectively (Harris, 2002;

Chimakonam, 2015:4-9). In contrast, one may argue that the simple act of

wonder or mere feeling of frustration is not the philosophy itself. In fact,

wonder can end in admiration and struggles or frustration may also end in

despair. However, philosophy begins, when wonder begets questions and

frustration lead to questioning. In other words, philosophy begins when human

beings start to pose question on the realities that confront them. In this sense,

‘I wonder why the sky is blue’ becomes different from ‘the wonder of the blue

sky feels me with awe or admiration.’ In the same manner, ‘I am frustrated with

being enslaved or colonised’ will be different from ‘I wonder why I should be

made a slave, denied my status as a human being, colonised and stripped of

all human dignity.’ The latter parts of the two comparisons are the beginning of

reflection. In both wonder and frustration, the human person is confronted with

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a reality that generates questions. The search for an answer to these questions

gives rise to philosophical thoughts. Using Gadamer’s analysis, wonder and

frustration are elements of the experience of a historical conscious subject.

Hence, as he affirms, “we cannot have experience without asking questions”

(Gadamer, 2003:362). To question points to ‘knowledge of not knowing’ and

this Gadamer acclaims “opens the true superiority of questioning” (ibid).

Questioning challenges all dogmatic and fixed views, it places prejudice and

foreknowledge within the brackets of the question. That means, following

Gadamer, if every experience involves question primarily and we cannot have

the same experience twice, whereby if an experience repeats itself, it implies

not necessarily a correction but an extended knowledge not only of the new

experience but also of what we know earlier (ibid: 353). Consequently, “as

against the fixity of opinions, questioning makes the object and all its

possibilities fluid” (ibid: 367). In other words, the nature of question is to make

the thing questioned indeterminate because questioning brings out the

undetermined possibilities of a thing (ibid: 375). In fact, “to ask a question

means to bring into open. The openness of what is in question consists in the

fact that the answer is not settled. It must still be undetermined, awaiting a

decisive answer” (ibid: 365). Because, question is the basis of knowledge, it has

priority over it and to question presupposes that one do not know and must

necessarily wish to know (ibid: 363). The indeterminacy of answers to question

and that to question presuppose the desire to know contrast with some other

views on the structure of question. For instance, Hamblin (1958) claims that

knowing a question, that is, asking the correct question is equivalent to

knowing what counts as an answer. He shares this view with Polanyi (1958),

who maintains that a thinker approaches a problem with the assumption that

the answer is there. There are possibles ways of understanding both positions

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in relation to Gadamer. The problem that arises from Hamblin’s argument is

genuine. The problem that seems to give legitimacy to Hamblin’s claim is that

one must know the answer to one’s question to know when the answer is

given. Indeed, if question opens the way to knowledge, if question arises

because there is something in one’s experience that challenges one’s previous

experience, then one must ask to know.Therefore, it cannot be the case that

one must necessarily know the answer to one’s question, whether one is asking

oneself or the other. In the case of Polanyi, indeed there must be an answer to

a question but this answer is undetermined. One finds traces of question as an

access to knowledge in Socratic dialogue as presented by Plato. In other

words, firstly, to seek knowledge whether of reality, morality or knowledge as

such, which is the concern of philosophy has the structure of question.

Secondly, dialogue is enacted within the structures of question. Therefore, if

interculturality necessarily involves dialogue or polylogue, there is a primacy of

question.

One can say that questioning provides the creative space for Interculturality.

The logic of question and answer is the avenue to achieve interculturality. The

needed dialogue or polylogue is enacted through question and answer

because dialogue or polylogue has an interrogative structure. Interculturality

means approaching difference as something that gives meaning across

boundary (Blasco & Gustafsson, 2004). In consequence, this meaning requires

questioning. The logic of question and answer makes communication possible.

In fact, it makes interculturality a continuous communication.

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IV

The Primacy of Question and Interculturality of Philosophy

The cultural contingency of thought, philosophers and philosophy, in general,

is the normative ground of intercultural philosophy. Thus, For Wimmer (2014),

intercultural philosophy is fundamental to every thinking that acknowledges

this cultural contingency. Hence, in view of the primacy of question in

intercultural philosophy, this paper agrees with Mall, that rather than

concentrating on philosophical answers, concentrating on the questions that

gave rise to the answers is more promising.

The nature of philosophy rejects the idea of a consensus; there cannot be

agreement on the concepts, with which it concerns itself. Moreover, as already

argued, the fact that consensus tends to operate on a one-sidedly defined

concept and assumes a dogmatic uniformity, it contradicts the main task of

intercultural philosophy.

Intercultural philosophy is not complementarities of world philosophies, for the

reasons indicated earlier. It is not a comparative philosophy since for a

comparative to take place there is always the slippery slope of looking for

standard of comparison. It is not a philosophy of pure alterity of other

philosophies. Alterity lay emphasis on the absolute otherness of world

philosophies, the globalising processes of knowledge, and mobility in which

realities are being encountered from different perspectives, intermingling of

thought and hybrid structures in thinking and knowledge production makes an

absolute otherness of philosophies unthinkable.

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It is not simply about equal consideration of world philosophies as bearer of

partial or complete truth about the subjects of philosophy because it would

entail getting into the whole difficulties of equality and terms of equality or

even extreme relativism.

Rather, the primacy of question (structured or unstructured) is central to

intercultural philosophy. The hypothesis is that since philosophies constitute

efforts to answer questions, then the task of intercultural philosophy is to ask

questions about the questions for which world philosophies seek to answer

than the answers. Indeed, “no work of philosophy can be understood until the

reader knows the question to which the text is intended as an answer”

(Collingwood, 1939: 31, 55). In the same, no philosophical tradition, especially

in those traditions that have no written text, can be understood, until the

hearer or the intercultural philosopher knows the question for which what is

said is intended to be an answer. The voice that speaks to us from the past

poses a question. In order to answer the question, we the interrogated must

ourselves begin to ask questions. We can say that we understand only when we

understand the question to which ‘the voice’ is the answer (Gadamer,

2003:374).

However much a person trying to understand may leave open

the truth of what is said, however much he may dismiss the

immediate meaning of the object and consider its deeper

significance instead, and take the latter not as true but merely

as meaningful, so that the possibility of its truth remains

unsettled, this is the real and fundamental nature of a

question: namely to make things indeterminate. Questions

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always bring out the indeterminate possibilities of a thing. ...

Questioning opens up possibilities of meaning (Gadamer,

2003:374 - 375).

Subsequently, we must stress something clearly, and that is the person trying

to understand would have to leave open the truth of what is said. Rather, s/he

should aim at uncovering the deeper meaning of that which is “said” in the

philosophical tradition of some cultures or the cultural other. This is so

because, “the possibility of its truth remains unsettled.” Thus, question as

primary in intercultural philosophy makes things “indeterminate” and, brings

out “indetermined possibilities” for all that are concerned with regards to

understanding the matter at stake. The matter at stake includes but not limited

to methods and concepts. Besides, to understand what is said is to understand

it as the answer to a question. This question is the concern of intercultural

philosophy. It is through knowing this question can we hermeneutically

understand the historical development of philosophies of the world without

using one’s concepts, and methods to judge the historicity and methodology

of philosophy in other traditions. This is so because the dissimilarities could be

a matter of concepts and language. However, this does not delineate the fact

that the person seeking meaning or understanding is no longer a ‘historically

affected consciousness’ (Gadamer, 2003:376). This means that we are situated.

The notion of situation implies that we are not standing outside our

philosophical and cultural traditions. Consequently, we are unable to have

objective knowledge of it; not because of deficiency in reflection, but, due to

our historical situatedness (Gadamer, 2003: 300 – 302).

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The primacy of question presupposes suspension of prejudice and judgement.

The formation of prejudice and stereotypes is based on the process of

categorisation, thus, for example, black is a category, and stereotypes are the

images that add bias to the category (Cristoffanini, 2004). “Categorization of

human beings is made principally through a key, semiotic system: language

allows us to present people, groups, and happenings in simplified or enriched

forms, in prejudiced or tolerant ways” (ibid: 85). To be noted is that the ‘other’

is not a mere object to be assumed under one’s categories and given a place

in one’s world. Rather, the ‘other’ inhabits a world that is fundamentally other

than and which is essentially different (Lévinas, 1969: 13). Thus, categorisations

run the tendency of stereotyping the ‘other.’ Once there are stereotypes, the

possibility of productive and communicative encounter is hindered.

Stereotypes could destroy the autonomy of the cultural ‘other.’ Recognition in

the intercultural understanding of the ‘other,’ calls for listening rather than

imposing meaning on the ‘other.’

Hence, suspension of prejudice demands that all previous knowledge be

confronted by the question. It offers a condition of openness to the other.

Indeed, it takes into consideration Wimmer’s observation that the other is

silenced before its voice is heard in the historicity of philosophy. Hence, in

questioning by which the answer is not determined, intercultural philosophy

creates the possibility of becoming aware of the otherness of the ‘other;’ “the

indissoluble individuality of the other person” (Gadamer, 2003: 305).

The ‘other’ refers to that which is other than what is already meant. It includes

among others cultures, opinions, ideas, beliefs, philosophies, etc. “If culture is

about collective identities, then such identification depends on the existence of

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something ‘other,’ against which the self can be posited” (Blasco & Gustafsson,

2004:13). The consciousness of this ‘other’ arises from differentiation. Hence,

we are not just different (self); we are different from something ‘other.’ Thus,

the making of difference is the foundation of otherness. Otherness is identified

as difference opposed to sameness. The ‘other’ is that ‘other’ that does not

think eat, look, and laugh the way one does.

The concept of ‘self’ and ‘other’ might be collective like ‘us’ and ‘them.’ In

constituting the ‘other’ whether, as individual-other or the collective-other,

there is a simultaneous understanding of ‘self,’ whether as individual-‘self’ or a

collective-‘self.’ In the intellectual works of some Western thinkers, their

construction of the ‘other’ has a consequence on the claim Europe make on

the history of philosophy, method and mode of thinking or reflection. Thinkers

such as Hegel, Kant and some others not only elevate abstract reason above

humanity itself but they ascribe this reason to a particular humanity that is

masculine and European. Consequently, the other in question, that is, the

feminine and non-European can neither reason nor critically think. The result is

the exclusion, from the on-set anything other than masculine and European

from the intellectual stream. The result in the contemporary era is the exclusive

definition of what reason or rationality is; what critical thinking is. The result is,

either the excluded other meets this one-sided understanding of 'rationality,

and critical thinking' or it is taken as not reasoning and critically thinking at all.

The task of intercultural philosophy is not necessarily changing the matter of

philosophy but deconstructing this hegemonic mindset that supposes that it

can express the totality of the human experience just with concepts of one

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particular culture (Wimmer, 2004: 145). The ‘other’ must be recognised as a

partner in creating meaning.

In engaging with the ‘other,’ intercultural orientation and, in this case,

intercultural philosophy entails changing perspectives. Therefore where the

task assigned to intercultural philosophy is to find a liminal space between

absolute dogmatic universalism and indifferent ethnocentric relativism, it

follows that the liminal space is created within the structures of question. This

implies, transposing ourselves by which we rise to a higher universality that

overcomes not only our own particularity but also that of the other. This

universality is undetermined just as the answer to a question is undetermined.

Consequently, a question brings what is questioned to the open and places it

in a particular perspective. The openness of what is in a question consists in the

fact that the answer is undetermined (Gadamer, 2003).

Conclusion

Therefore, questioning from an intercultural perspective provides the ground

for an authentic polylogue among world philosophies in the light of the

contemporary reconstellation of philosophical problems. The idea of

intercultural philosophy also implies not simply an acknowledgement of world

philosophies, of which necessitates pluralism of philosophies. Rather,

intercultural philosophy with the tool of primacy of question contrary to

consensus, comparativity, complementarity and alterity, should possess

plurality ability to live with dissensus; search for understanding. To reach an

understanding is not merely a matter of putting oneself forward and effectively

asserting one’s own point of view. Rather, it is a process of transformation into

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a communion in which we do not remain what we were (Gadamer, 2003:378).

Asking questions protects the questioner from making the mistake of assuming

his/her cultural basis as a given standard. One could say that Questioning

liberates the interrogator from the fixity of stereotypes and prejudices.

in asking questions, we recognise the cultural other as a subject, a partner, a

qualified source of information especially about the subject matters –

himself/herself and his/her culture.

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Bibliography

Appadurai, Arjun. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization,

Minneapolis, Minn: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.

Berlin, Isaiah. Concepts and Categories: Philosophical Essays, (London: Pimlico,

1999).

Blasco, Maribel and Jan Gustafsson, eds. Intercultural Alternatives: Critical

Perspectives on Intercultural Encounters in Theory and Practice. Denmark,

Herndon, VA: Copenhagen Business School Press, 2004

Chimakonam, J. O. (ed.), Atụọlụ Ọmalụ: Some Unanswered Questions in

Contemporary African Philosophy, Maryland: University Press of America, 2015

Collingwood, R.G., (1939), An Autobiography, Oxford University Press, 1983

Hamblin, C, L, “Questions” Australian Journal of Philosophy, XXXVI (1958), pp.

161 – 168.

Hans-Geroge Gadamer, Truth and Method, 2nd revised Edition, translated and

revised by Weinsheimer, J./Marshall, D. G., Continuum, New York 2003.

Harris, Leonard, Philosophy Born of Struggle: Anthology of Afro American

Philosophy from 1917, 2nd edition, (Dubuque, USA: Kendall Hunt Publishing,

2002).

Lévinas, Emmanuel. Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority 24. Pittsburgh:

Duquesne University Press, 1994.

Maclntyre, Alasdair, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? London: Duckworth,

1988

Mall, R. A., “Tradition und Rationalität. Eine interkulturelle philosophische

Perspektive”, in: Beckmann, C., (et al), eds. Tradition und Traditionsbruch

zwischen Skepsis und Dogmatik: Interkulturelle Philosophische Perspektiven,

Armsterdam: Rodopi, 2006. p.19.

Mall, Ram A. Intercultural Philosophy. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

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Polanyi, M. Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy, Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 1958

Rancière, Jacques, Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy. Trans. Rose Julie,

(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999).

Rescher, Nicholas, Pluralism: Against The Demand For Consensus, Oxford,

Clarendon Press, 1993

Wimmer, F. M., Interkulturelle Philosophie. Eine Einführung, WUV Facultas

Verlag, Wien 2004.

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FOR A HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHIES: HOW THE RELATIONSHIP
BETWEEN EQUALS MAKES PHILOSOPHY INTERCULTURAL

Giuseppe Capuano

Abstract

This paper analyzes the relationship between equals as a basic element of


intercultural philosophy, putting it into a perspective which tries to valorize not
only the two (or more) elements included in a relationship, but also highlight the
importance of the concept itself, following Giangiorgio Pasqualotto’s concept of
relationship with three interdependent variables.

In the light of a renewal of the discipline and an attempt to overcome the crisis

stressed in the latest Unesco documentation, those features are highlighted

which render philosophy intercultural, and lead, on the one hand, to a

theoretical rethinking in order to undermine the Western ethnocentrism which

pervades it, and, on the other hand, show its practical positive effects (ethical,

political, and especially pedagogical). Adopting this orientation and direction,

this paper presents the hypothesis of a transformation of the traditional history

of philosophy into a history of philosophies, to ensure to every philosophical

tradition the acknowledgement and the respect of their peculiarities, analyzed

in an interrelational way.

In a world that leads, more and more often, to the contamination and the

contact between people and cultures, whether one likes it or not, the

requirement of interculturality in academia and scholastic places will eventually

become an urgency. On the one hand we have technological, economic and

communicative globalization, and on the other, the transformation of

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migrations from the phenomenal to the structural. The importance of research

in this area suggests it requires more than an afterthought not only about how

we currently live together, but also about the future possibility of new

contaminations which will have a huge impact on present/future identities.

Clarification will not only be needed for the here and now, but for how cultures

and cultural identities will be affected in the future (in a neverending

regenerative cycle).

Several schools of thoughts have tried to rise up to this challenge, through

varied fields of knowledge. Three of the more common research tools used in

this area of interest are static pluralism, dynamic pluralism and transculturalism.

The first one is well-known as multiculturalism, and it analyzes the living

together, peaceful or not, between two or more cultures. It describes the

reality of this phenomenon in a static way, highlighting the presence of various

cultures within a country, acknowledging and saving their traditions and

differences. However, it is registered as static data, blocks with no interaction

or exchange, almost a motionless image of a “plurality of monocultures”. It

acknowledges mutual respect that is, it could be argued, equally unconcerned

as it were.

Transculturalism (in which is also included what many authors call

“metaculture”) is similar to interculturality in its aims. However, it does get

disoriented in looking for the formulation of a “beyond the cultures” in which

the differences are saved for the purpose of a global human culture, on the

model of a new Humanism. Once again the limits of this perspective are in its

static nature and in the comparing of fixed structures, which results in geting

involved with the quagmires of aculturalism. Moreover, the uniform view of the

fragmented reality is not authentic enough to be considered appropriate and,

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in the margin, hides underneath the cloak of ethnocentrism, which strongly

limits its extent. With dynamic pluralism (the analysis of the real significant

exchanges that have happened or are still happening, between two or more

cultures, stressing both similarities and differences, and allowing to learn from

one another) that is set within the context of how interculturality is perceived,

then in this occasion “culture” is meant as a set – coherent but not necessarily

peaceful inside – of different products highly symbolic (rites, languages, texts,

arts, habits, values), geo-chronologically stratified but neither static nor

unchangeable. In fact, this dynamic nature is of great relevance because it is

one of the most fundamental features of cultural systems (never given for

granted) and, thanks to the fluidity of its elements, it is more open to external

acts. One goal for sure would be to analyze every origin of cultural tradition

more deeply: after all it could be said that no culture exists independently, or

free comparison to at least one other, «in this sense it can be said that every

culture makes itself only as interculture, that is as result – in every step of its

genesis and development – of cultural exchanges»1.

The Japanese philosopher Nishida Kitaró, as cited by Marcello Ghilardi,

highlighted this very sentiment:


to explain how every identity is never isolated or independent, but always related with
all the others; […] we are not talking about “A is not-A” but rather “A-because-not-A
is A”. […] Nishida does not mean to break the law of noncontradiction, but put it into
perspective, because he recognizes it as unfit for understanding the reality; he does
not mean to break grammatical rules “A is not not-A” and “B is not-A”, otherwise he
should drop rational argument. He rather tries to make a thought where A is not only
A, and not-A is not only not-A. A and not-A simply are two different faces of the same
thing. A is A and not-A is not-A, but none of them is real whether they are not
member of themselves at the same time.2

1
G. Pasqualotto: Intercultura e globalizzazione in Id. (edited by), Per una filosofia interculturale,
Milano-Udine, Mimesis 2008, pp. 15-34, p. 15.
2
M. Ghilardi: Pensare l'identità in Giappone: intercultura come trasformazione, in: G.
Pasqualotto (edited by), Per una filosofia interculturale, cit., pp. 213-254, pp. 241-243.

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Transposed on a cultural level, this idea means that no independent or fixed

culture can exist without relationships with others; the opposition standing

between cultures is just a «mutual determination relationship». But thinking

about traditions as independent systems involves a hierarchy of cultures, where

the balance of power rewards cultural identities with the strongest tradition. If

every cultural element were without comparison (of similarity or difference),

then every single piece would be reneged inside the pluricultural framework, in

particular the intercultural. After all, inside the suffix inter, there is the dynamic

examination of exchanges and interactions between cultural systems.

To answer the question “Does something specifically intercultural exist?” is to

say that if something cultural has to exist, for identity or difference, it will be

intercultural at the same time. Therefore, what role can be played by

philosophy in this context? Philosophies are for sure one of the most significant

and relevant cultural products, because they characterize traditions without

identifying themselves with them, leading to one philosophy, at least, for one

culture. If we don’t want to be judged as talking through our hats about

philosophies, in fact we are required to try and break a habit, at first

psychologically and linguistically, but subsequently, that identifies only the

western tradition with the term “philosophy”, marginalizing everything that was

not developed under the auspices of Greece first and Europe and USA later, as

philosophical subproducts and/or superstitions.

It makes sense to speak of intercultural philosophy but not of philosophy in

general, because only specifications go in singular (European/Indian/Chinese

philosophy etc.), while it would be better speaking of philosophyies when it is

understood as a general doctrine: «'Philosophies' because it concerns, as I it

always has and always will, a multiple vision – we cannot limit it to any one

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vision of philosophy; even less, to a 'pre-eminent' philosophy»3. This would be

a great starting point which would lead to equal dignity for every philosophical

system, now on the same level as the other. In return this would pave an

interpretation of relationships truly intercultural. It is actually the relationship

that changes philosophy into intercultural philosophy, revealing it as an open

problematic field between two or more elements that are, although still

compared, at least now on the same level.

Giangiorgio Pasqualotto did an excellent job in describing how it should be a

practical to create a working intercultural system, and he did it trying to show

the difference between comparative philosophy and philosophy as comparison

(then intercultural). Where humanities are concerned there still is a widespread

conviction that the comparing subject cannot be influenced or partially

influence the comparison outcome, this creating the myths of an impartial

comparing subject and an impartial comparison itself. Pasqualotto denies this

possibility, pointing not only to the subject's impact on what they compare, but

also the partiality of the relationship elements. In the humanities – and more

specifically in intercultural comparison or research – an uncontaminated and

objective comparison cannot and will not exist. The different poles are

interdependent, not generating a closed background where no dialogue is

allowed, but an open, problematic (in a positive way) field where every subject

knows their position inter res, opening new and wide perspectives and

influencing in an active and decisive way the life of those concerned in the

relationship:

3
Unesco, Philosophy: a school of freedom. Teaching philosophy and learning to philosophize:
status and prospects, Paris, 2007, URL:
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0015/001541/154173e.pdf, last check 06/08/2015, p. 239.

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like the comparing subject is influenced by the comparison activity because the
compared elements – especially thanks to the comparison – give off unedited answers
to given problems, so the compared elements are modified by the subject
comparative activity, because they answer to this questions.4

Philosophy as comparison (not yet comparative) is the first step that

interculturality must take to embrace philosophy, accepting at the same time

the partiality of every point of view and consequently the impossibility of any

tradition to dominate another. The second step, which has to follow

immediately, is then admitting that every culture’s axiological equality, without

possibility of making hierarchy or submissions, levels every unmotivated

pretension of superiority and accepts everybody’s peculiarities. Relationship

and equality are the corner stones not only of interculturality but especially that

of intercultural philosophy. There cannot be helpful cultural connection without

mutuality of positions or equality without comparison.

This is not to be meant as relativism, but instead as a new concept of


“relationism”, for what

is it true that every point of view, because subjective, is relative but is even more true
that it gets more aware of being necessarily and always beyond its pure subjectivity
when it realizes of being composed of relationships.5

The dichotomous concept of relationships has to be overcome for it always

fosters the closest element to the comparing subject. In return it has to leave

the Hegelian ghost (often unconscious) of a comparison between other-ness in

which the subject aims only to return to himself, even in case of auto-

perfectionism. Obviously this kind of relationship is more preferable than

4
G. Pasqualotto: La comparazione tra Oriente e Occidente, in: FILOSOFIA POLITICA, a. XVIII,
n. 1, april 2004, pp. 65-77, p. 72.
5
G. Pasqualotto: Dalla prospettiva della filosofia comparata all'orizzonte della filosofia
interculturale, in: Id. (edited by), Per una filosofia interculturale, cit., pp. 35-57, p. 48. Cf. also
Id., La comparazione fra Oriente e Occidente, cit., p. 69, note 9.

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others less “emphatic”, but its ego-referred consequences would misrepresent

the universalistic pretension6 of every philosophical system (which is right when

it is not meant as will of predominance over or above the others):

if we stay inside of a two variables logic, it always stands the suspect that the
subjective variable will be protagonist, even when it allows to be put in discussion by
the strongest and declares of giving up with every sign of «reduction to itself». On the
contrary, if we choose the three variables situation, the subject pretensions will be
reduced by the objectivity of the problematic space, of the vital field produced and
fed by processual realities of the problems which define the conditions of possibility of
the relationship.7

Rethinking the connection between philosophical traditions as a three variables

relationship and appropriating of that gnoseological modesty8 for there is no

cultural hierarchy, philosophy can be redirected towards the intercultural path,

a direction that is suitable for it and proliferates numerous and positive

changes, both theoretical and practical. As for the first one, interculturality

would guarantee philosophy so much more analytic depth, allowing it to clear

the stratified interlacements between the roots of different philosophies,

highlighting significant knots ignored until now or bent to exalt Western

thought. This would also affect the chance to place more accurately any

thought inside the new philosophical universe, where every tradition will be on

the same level as the others, and the relations, present or past, determine

6
«The universalistic pretension of the “Western” philosophical thought is contested for its
inability in theming and understanding the issues that contemporary poliphony and polilogic
rise, inability due to its assertive character and little ready to a dialogue not express in its
terms» (A. Chiricosta, Filosofia interculturale e valori asiatici, Varese, O Barra O Edizioni, 2013,
p. 12). The aim is leaving this kind of conception and finally considering «a situated universality
that can be inflected plurally: a “universal in context”» (Ivi, p. 13).
7
G. Pasqualotto: La comparazione fra Oriente e Occidente, cit., pp. 75-76.
8
Cf. R.A. Mall: Philosophie im Vergleich der Kulturen. Interkulturelle Philosophie – eine neue
Orientierung, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft 1995.

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changeable reference points for every cultural identity9. As for the practical

aspect, this new philosophical intercultural orientation would be useful in terms

of new ethical-political perspectives aimed at integration, acknowledgement,

and the respect of differences (one could suggest for instance that there is

usually never a serene debate about the universality of human rights), and,

above all, it could be translated onto a pedagogical level, in accordance with

the intercultural direction took by schools thirty years ago. Moreover, the

redefinition of the subject in an intercultural way would allow the reconciliation

with one of the peculiarities, now even more defined during the latter

centuries: philosophy as an attitude. Even if it is universally belied that the

more academic the subject is, then this supposedly guarantees it a scientific

and checked development, on the other hand an hypertrophy of this aspect

has lead it to forget its universal presence.

It will only be down to a re-thinking of these two moments, academic and

universal – not opposite or separated – that will give the right worth to

philosophy as an attitude. In Italy we say “to take something with philosophy”

in this sense, which means to relax and be stoic. However and it must be

ardently stressed, thinking of philosophy as an attitude is not easy. This is

probably due to the idea of philosophy and the way it has been inherited from

one generation to another, and how its academic meaning prevails. One’s

ability to critique, the analytic thought and that rational sensitivity, typically

philosophical, are a universal heritage we must promote and develop. Those

are both the basic but fundamental elements of a citizen’s awareness of

belonging to a greater part. This feeling of citizenship is able to largely

contribute to the resolution of many present conflicts.

9
A wonderful cartographic example of this is represented by E. Holenstein, Philosophie-Atlas:
Orte und Wege des Denkens, Ammann Verlag, Zürich 2004.

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The real intercultural philosophy begins with that gnoseological modesty

conceived by Mall, where every tradition has equal relevance to the others

interrelated (or to be interrelated) by difference or commonality. Beyond the

effects aforementioned, adopting such a perspective could have positive

repercussions on the perception of philosophy as an attitude, or better still, a

critical openness to the other-ness. That is why intercultural philosophy is not a

proper research field but a predisposition. It will need to revolutionize

philosophical thinking in this direction, as then the didactics and the thought

will process again, in a virtuous cycle well described by Morin.10

Starting from these considerations, it is possible to conjecture a re-thinking of

the traditional scholastic subject “history of philosophy” in the sense of a

“history of philosophies”. Specifically, Italian secondary school adopts a

philosophical syllabus according to the skills development demanded by U E

2020 program (Europe 2020)11. There are general and common rules for each

address where philosophy is taught, with more specific rules because of the

demands put in place by the schools and what subjects need to be stressed in

the curriculum. Yet in common profile it is possible to change traditional

syllabuses, as understood in this opening paragraph:

10
What is meant here is what Morin calls “cycling causality” and applies to the pedagogical
area: «The strongest concept is that of self-regenerating or recursive ring, where the effects
and the products get necessary to the production and to the cause that caused and produced
them. An evident example of this kind of ring are we ourselves, who are products of a
biological reproducing cycle in which we will become producers» (E. Morin, Insegnare a vivere.
Manifesto per cambiare l’educazione, Milano, Raffaello Cortina Editore 2015, p. 75).
11
«Europe 2020 is the European Union’s ten-year jobs and growth strategy. It was launched in
2010 to create the conditions for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth»
(http://ec.europa.eu/europe2020/europe-2020-in-anutshell/index_en.htm, last check on
08/18/2015). In this program converged all the recommendations about education and
instruction formerly included in the Lisbon Strategy.

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at the end of the high school time the student should be awake of the meaning of the
philosophical thought as peculiar and fundamental part of human reason which, in
different periods and different cultural traditions, steadily propose again the question
about knowledge, human being and the meaning of being. Moreover he should know
in an organic way, the fundamental knots in historical development of Western
thought, contextualizing every author or theme in a historical-cultural framework and
also the potentially universalistic reach that every philosophy has.12

How can philosophy have both a universalistic method and specific practice

without teaching its relationship with the otherness that helped define itself?

How can someone talk of Western thought without at least citing the general

developments of the oriental or southern one? If the advice for the syllabus

openly talks about “the reach that every philosophy has” we cannot ignore the

fact anymore that more philosophies should be more accessible, instead of the

imbibing Western philosophy, which dominates the present Italian syllabus. In

response to the intransigents, Rosario Diana commented:

does this mean that we should be ready to change what Harold Bloom calls “the
Western canon”, that is the list (made by his own) of the writers become immortals by
authority, genius and originality? […] Will Kant vanish, replaced by Confucio, or
Manzoni replaced by The Arabian nights? […] What said until now nothing has to do
with the important work of unmasking every ethnocentric hybris, still alive and acting
in many fields of knowledge. Changing the Homeric epic with the Indian one in the
syllabus would be unfair for both of them, because the question is not to put the
second one in the place of the first one but, if anything, to show both of them in a way
that the student could understand that our narration is not the configuration that only
existed in the world. It is one beside the others, but it is also ours: actually this claim of
belonging will be made more incisive by the awareness and the acknowledgment of
other similar stories of the origins.13

12
http://www.indire.it/lucabas/lkmw_file/licei2010///FILOSOFIA_prof.unico.pdf (last check on
06/22/2015), italics mine.
13
R. Diana, F. Specchio: Humanities per una società interculturale. Un contributo teorico-
pratico, in G. Cacciatore, G. D’Anna, R. Diana, F. Santoianni (edited by), Per una relazione
interculturale. Prospettive interdisciplinari, Milano-Udine, Mimesis 2012, pp. 135-149, pp. 140-
141.

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This would be an arduous such as pleasant journey between philosophies, able

to explain the mutual inferences, stress the exchanges and the encounters,

underline the elements of commonality and difference, both explicit and less

superficial: this will affects in no way the subject, nor, in time, in its contents (on

the contrary). As for the first case, the majority of professors mourn an

insufficient availability of hours to explain different syllabuses, which often

leads to tormented cuts of essential authors and/or schools of thought:

nevertheless, at least as the first part of inserting intercultural philosophy in

secondary schools is concerned, it is possible to imagine some integrations in

specific moments of the didactic path. For example, Arabic philosophy, starting

from the 9th century commentators, were even sacrificing originality to make

their philosophy more “functional” to the Western thought development.

Furthermore and little closer to home, what about the clashing between of

German, Japanese and Chinese philosophy in the 18th century? Finally, let’s

not brush aside the postcolonial developments of the African philosophy after

WWII. In Italy, the fifth year high school syllabus comes after a biennium strictly

programmed – it is the only one that can enable professors to insert their own

personal touch. Here, an urgent rethinking in an intercultural way is desperately

needed, for such freedom is often meant but not delivered. However, the

blame cannot always be levied at the professor doorstep, but instead also goes

to failings at an institutional level, either due to a mismanagement, bad

management or no management at all. This grey area that has now ensued,

has caused many of the most innovative and interesting ideas of the XX

century to be completely lost.

Having an intercultural philosophical attitude is not that different from what

happens on an intracultural level: during any historiographic analysis, a

sequence of thinkers is reviewed looking for those shades of cultures that have

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produced a specific cultural system; cultures that are not different from ours,

differ at least in time, if not in contents.

These are only a few examples of the many (more specific and even

interdisciplinary models are given in the numerous volumes about our

relationships with the “other” thoughts), models that would represent a

significant change not only in the didactics, but also in the students’

perception, making them aware of the plurality that embraces and affects them

at the same time14, saving the meaning of philosophy as attitude. I have

attempted to illustrate that such an approach, adopted on an international

scale, would also have as a further consequences an advancement or at least a

renewal of the subject, the teaching of which would generally be in crisis, even

in a high formative development zone like Italy. According to the latest results

of an UNESCO survey15, this crisis would be probably caused by the inability of

the subject to read and understand our reality. Intercultural philosophy is an

exclusive lens with which we can observe, understand and modify the fabric of

those distinct and intertwined pluralities which are most definitely outlining the

new global horizon.

14
Not just an external plurality, but also internal to the students themselves, who rationally
have to choose every day an identity to wear (cf. A. Sen, Identity and Violence: The Illusion of
Destiny, Penguin Books, India 2007).
15
Supra note 3.

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Bibliograpy
Diana, R., Specchio, F.: Humanities per una società interculturale. Un
contributo teorico-pratico, in: Cacciatore, G., D’Anna, G., Diana, R., Santoianni,
F., (edited by), Per una relazione interculturale. Prospettive interdisciplinari,
Milano-Udine, Mimesis 2012, pp. 135-149.
Ghilardi, M.: Pensare l'identità in Giappone: intercultura come trasformazione,
in: G. Pasqualotto (edited by), Per una filosofia interculturale, Milano-Udine,
Mimesis 2008, pp. 213-254.
Holenstein, E.: Philosophie-Atlas: Orte und Wege des Denkens, Ammann
Verlag, Zürich 2004.
Mall, R.A.: Philosophie im Vergleich der Kulturen. Interkulturelle Philosophie –
eine neue Orientierung, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft 1995.
Morin, E.: Insegnare a vivere. Manifesto per cambiare l’educazione, Milano,
Raffaello Cortina Editore 2015.
Pasqualotto, G.: Intercultura e globalizzazione in Id. (edited by), Per una
filosofia interculturale, cit., pp. 15-34.
Pasqualotto, G.: Dalla prospettiva della filosofia comparata all'orizzonte della
filosofia interculturale, in Id. (edited by), Per una filosofia interculturale, cit., pp.
35-57.
Pasqualotto, G.: La comparazione tra Oriente e Occidente, in: Filisofia Politica,
a. XVIII, n. 1, april 2004, pp. 65-77.
Sen, A: Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny, Penguin Books, India
2007.
UNESCO, Philosophy: a school of freedom. Teaching philosophy and learning
to philosophize: status and prospects, Paris, 2007, URL:
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0015/001541/154173e.pdf, last check
06/08/2015.

Sitography
http://ec.europa.eu/europe2020/europe-2020-in-anutshell/index_en.htm, last
check on 08/18/2015.
http://www.indire.it/lucabas/lkmw_file/licei2010///FILOSOFI A_prof.unico.pdf,
last check on 06/22/2015.

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PHILOSOPHIZING WITH CHILDREN – A CULTURAL TECHNIQUE


Britta Saal

Thomas Jackson at Waikiki Elementary School.

Cover picture of Educational Perspectives. Journal of the College of Education / UH Manoa,

Vol. 14, No. 1&2, 2012

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Introduction

It doesn’t need much to do philosophy with children: a few cushions in a circle,

a philosophical question, a community ball and some time. But is this already

philosophy? Just to give a short answer: Yes, it is. This answer builds on three

pillars, the first of which is the understanding of philosophy as an activity. This

understanding was clearly formulated by Ludwig Wittgenstein who wrote in the

Tractatus (4.112, transl. C. K. Ogden): “The object of philosophy is the logical

clarification of thoughts. Philosophy is not a theory but an activity.” Putting the

focus on actively philosophizing means to understand thinking as a finally

interminable process, marked by asking questions, reflecting, taking different

perspectives etc. Thus, the priority of the philosophizing subject lies in

profound reflection and not in creating a whole theory. The second pillar is the

Socratic approach, which means practicing philosophy in a community in form

of a dialogue or maybe better: polylogue. What is essentially here is the

concrete opening up of different perspectives by the individual members of

the community.

The third pillar, finally, is the amount of numerous experiences of vital

philosophizing with children since now already nearly 50 years. The

P4C(philosophy for children)-movement started in the late 1960s when the

philosophy didactic Matthew Lipman had the impression that his students were

far away from independent and critical thinking. His aim was to change this fact

by teaching already children basic thinking skills like e.g. logical reasoning,

questioning, establishing connections, developing arguments and hypotheses,

etc. Thus, in 1974 he founded the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy

for Children (IAPC) at Montclair State University, New Jersey. Lipman published

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philosophical children’s books, like e.g. Harry Stottlemeier’s Discovery 1 (first

published 1974) or Pixie (first published 1981) as well as numerous didactic

materials. Currently, P4C is practiced in more than 50 countries worldwide.

Concerning the notion P4C, the ‘for’ does not refer to philosophy

classes for children, but to an appropriate way for children of dealing with

philosophy. In German one also finds the expression Kinderphilosophie

(children’s philosophy), first used by Karl Jaspers in his Introduction to

Philosophy in a very similar way.2 But since this notion could also imply that –

on one hand – there is a philosophy formulated by children or – on the other

hand – that it is nothing but trifles, 3 the term might be less suitable than

‘philosophy with children’ or ‘philosophizing with children’ (Philosophieren mit

Kindern). I prefer these notions since they explicitly stress the philosophical

activity with and of children.

In 1984 Thomas Jackson, who studied with Lipman after receiving his

PhD in Comparative Philosophy in 1979, introduced P4C in Hawai’i. In 1987 he

became a full time specialist at the Department of Philosophy, UH Manoa and

director of the ‘Philosophy in the Schools’ project, a joint effort between the

Department of Philosophy and the Hawai’i Department of Education. By

putting a stronger focus on the community and the aspect of intellectual safety

he slightly modified Lipman’s approach. Jackson also was less didactic and

worked out a simple basic method called Plain Vanilla that can be adopted in

each context. Being active now for more than 30 years the P4C-family in

Hawai’i, supported by the Uehiro Foundation on Ethics and Education, can

record a lot of success: There is a recognizable growth of children’s and youth’s

1
The book title bears phonetic resemblance to ‘Aristotle’.
2
See in the German edition p. 11 and in the English edition p. 10.
3
See here E. Martens: Philosophieren mit Kindern. Eine Einführung in die Philosophie.
Stuttgart 1999, p. 26.

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self-confidence in their ability to judge and reflect, there is now the obligatory

P4C-training for teachers and there is the new project of ‘philosophers in

residence’ to support teachers for a special period in the P4C-practice.

Since I started to know about the practice of doing philosophy with

children in 2008 I was very much attracted by Jackson’s approach and activities.

So I was glad having the opportunity this March 2015 to visit “Dr. J.” – the way

everybody, including the children, call him – in Hawai’i. Being there, I was

impressed by the easy and natural cooperation between the departments of

philosophy and education. For my activities in philosophizing with children for

the most part I adopt the P4C-Hawaiian style and at the same time

experimenting with it. In the following I like to introduce Jackson’s main ideas

underlying the P4C-Hawaiian practice.

P4C-Hawai’i – Never in a Rush: Gently Philosophizing in

Community

P / p Philosophy

In order to answer the “monster question” of “What is philosophy?”, Thomas

Jackson avoids the trap of this debate by distinguishing “Big-P-Philosophy”

and “little-p-philosophy”. By this distinction he does not intend to play off one

of them against each other, but rather likes to counter a limited and one-sided

understanding of philosophy which is normally aligned with the Big-P-

Philosophy. The big P describes the academic philosophy and the classical –

that is to say the occidental – canon. It is, thus, what largely is associated with

the philosophy: the “big names”. For most people it is surrounded by an aloof

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aura and seems to be difficult, sophisticated, and accessible only to a select

few. Correspondingly, philosophy studies are marked to a large part by

learning something about the philosophies of canonical philosophers.

In contrast, the little-p-philosophy is much easier to access. It directly

refers to any human being and means actively thinking by oneself. Jackson

fundamentally assumes that we are all born with a “sense of wonder” which is

the basis for independently philosophizing. By this, of course, he does not

mean the diverse pub talks or a mere exchange of opinions and ideas.

Philosophizing rather means “to scratch beneath the surface” and going deep

into a question and into the heart of things. For this kind of inquiry to happen,

one needs especially an intellectual and emotional safe community as well as

specific thinking tools: the “good thinker’s toolkit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pylLnHzfwI0

The Community of Inquiry and Intellectual Safety

Concerning the importance of the community for the process of thinking,

Amber S. Makaiau, a P4C-researcher and high school teacher who received

numerous awards for outstanding and responsive teaching, stresses: “Our

ability to be good thinkers is highly contingent on our ability to work as a

community”. 4
Like already mentioned, putting a special focus on the

community has been outstanding for Jackson’s approach to P4C. He wrote:

“The survival of wonder […] requires […] a special kind of community. […] [It]

requires a refuge and safety”.5 For this idea of an intellectual safe community

there are two guiding principles: The Hawaiian Pu’uhonua, a ‘Place of Refuge’,

4
See: http://www.seeqs.org/community-building-with-p4c-hawaii.html
5
T. Jackson: Philosophy for Children Hawaiian Style – ‘On Not Being in a Rush…’. In: Thinking.
The Journal of Philosophy for Children, Vol. 17, No. 1&2 (2004), pp. 4-8, here p. 5.

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and the ‘community of inquiry’, introduced by the pragmatists Charles Sanders

Peirce and John Dewey. The notion ‘community of inquiry’ stresses especially

the interaction between scientists and the process of inquiry. Inquiry itself, like

Matthew Lipman puts it, is a “self-corrective practice in which a subject matter

is investigated with the aim of discovering or inventing ways of dealing with

what is problematic”.6

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmTgPKdcKyw

For a community to be intellectual safe it must be created an atmosphere in

which each individual member feels as a part of the community and, by this,

feels safe to be able to ask any question as long as respect for the other

persons is honored. In short, it must be created a feel-good situation.

According to Jackson, the most important element is here sitting in a circle to

be able to see each other’s faces. In the further course, an effective strategy to

establish a connecting feeling is creating a ‘community ball’. This ball can be

replaced also by a cuddle toy or something like that, but is ideally made

together out of yarn in the first meeting. To do the ball, each member –

including the facilitator/teacher – is wrapping a thread on a card board while at

the same answering to some questions each person will answer in turn. Once

finished, the ball is a connectional sign of the community and authorizes the

person who holds it to speak, like a ‘talking stick’ in the Native American

tradition. However, it is also possible to pass the ball in case one receives it,

but does not like to speak.

Another strategy is the introduction of so called ‘magic words’. These

are abbreviations for longer expressions sounding, as a positive side-effect, like

a secret language and less prescriptive. English examples of those words are

6
M. Lipman: Thinking in Education. New York 2003, p. 184.

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‘SPLAT’ (speak a bit louder please), ‘IDUS’ (I don’t understand) or ‘OMT’ (one

more time please) which correspond in German to the words ‘BIL’ (bitte lauter),

‘ISTEN’ (ich verstehen das nicht) or ‘NOMBI’ (noch einmal bitte). The list of

magic words can be varied and extended as the community feels. Each group

in any language can develop its own set. With the aid of such connecting

strategies, community building becomes the basic process for the subsequent

fruitful inquiry.

Gently Socratic Inquiry

For the feeling of emotional and intellectual safety to arise, a fundamental

attitude of sincerity, openness, and gentleness is essential. This is why Jackson

calls the philosophical inquiry with children not just ‘Socratic inquiry’, but

‘gently Socratic inquiry’. Very important is here to take time. One of Jackson’s

most favorite sayings is: “We are not in a rush to get anywhere”, because this

‘not being in a rush’ enables the sense of wonder to unfold. By this, the

children’s true own voices as well as questioning and the ability to think for

themselves are nurtured and stimulated. The children have to realize that the

posed questions are no traps they are lead into for being compromised as

stupid; unfortunately in schools this happens far too often. Encountering

children with an honest, sincere, and open gentleness let them lose their

timidity and they open up – also among one another.

Subsequently, a deep going inquiry can start, which “scratches beneath

the surface”. It is Jackson’s conviction – and the experience has confirmed –

that any deepening inquiry will fall on fruitful soil only in such an open and safe

atmosphere where true and active self-reflection is encouraged. In no way

posing questions is concerned with trapping or manipulation. This also requires

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that the facilitator/teacher her-/himself constantly realizes that she/he as well

does neither know the course and outcome of the inquiry nor the one right

answer. What is mediated by this is the view that philosophers are independent

thinkers and no ‘know-it-alls’.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNX_SvkrzjA

Scratching Beneath the Surface with the Good Thinker’s Toolkit

“[A]lthough we aren’t in a rush to get anywhere, we do have an expectation

that we will get somewhere”, Jackson wrote.7 Therefore, the “good thinker’s

toolkit” is a helpful means for giving the inquiry shape and direction – even

though not at all forced. The toolkit as a whole is called in English WRAITEC

(the letters will change, of course, depending on the language) and consists in

detail of seven (self-made) letter cards, introduced to the community little by

little. The particular thinking tools are used to ask for meanings and clarification,

to ask for reasons, to detect assumptions, to reflect on inferences, to question

what is taken for granted, and to seek examples and counterexamples:8

W – What do you mean by …? This tool indicates the need for further

clarification.

R – Reasons: Why is it like that? This tool indicates the need for

supporting an opinion with reasons.

7
T. Jackson: The Art and Craft of ‘Gently Socratic’ Inquiry. In: A. L. Costa (Ed.): Developing
Minds. A Resource Book for Teaching Thinking. Alexandria, VA 2001, pp. 459-465, here p. 462.
8
http://p4chawaii.org/wp-content/uploads/PI-Good-Thinker%E2%80%99s-Tool-Kit-2.0.pdf

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A – Assumptions This tool indicates the need for detecting

the underlying assumptions of the

position.

I – Inferences/Implications/ This tool indicates the need for thinking

If…then… about consequences and conclusions of

statements.

T – Truth: Is this (really) true? This tool indicates the need for

questioning what is taken for granted.

E – Examples This tool indicates the need for proving a

claim as true.

C – Counterexamples This tool indicates the need for proving a

claim as not true.

By introducing the thinking tools, the primary objective is to encourage the

children by and by using and applying the tools themselves and, by doing so,

to lead their inquiry into depth and get some insights. Insight thereby,

according to Jackson, can happen in three ways, each of which owns its merit.

The first form of insight is to realize the complexity of a topic, even though

after the inquiry one is more confused than before. The second form of insight

is to detect connections one didn’t see before. The third form of insight, finally,

is to find an answer. In the same inquiry all three forms of insight can happen

and vary individually.

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Plain Vanilla

Any inquiry arises out of questions. The philosophical inquiry with children is

first of all the children’s inquiry. Therefore, the questions and interests of the

children are the main sources for their inquiry. That is to say, when children

come up themselves with questions, those always should be given the priority.

In case some impulses are needed, Jackson suggests a strategy for to find

starting questions for the inquiry. This strategy, which may it also make easier

for teachers, is called ‘Plain Vanilla’. The name refers to the plain taste of vanilla

ice cream, besides one can choose also between varieties of different ice

cream flavors. This is to say, this strategy is a very basic one and can be varied

in many ways. Nevertheless, the Plain-Vanilla-process has proved to be very

useful and effective. In short, there are five steps:

1) READING a text, picture book, watching a video, hearing a song etc.

2) QUESTION: Each child creates a philosophical question in response to the

stimulus.

3) VOTING democratically on the question the children want to discuss.

4) DIALOGUE/INQUIRY: The person whose question has been voted on

explains some background. Then the inquiry starts by using the good thinker’s

toolkit.

5) REFLECTION/EVALUATION at the end of the inquiry. This can be oral,

written, blind or face to face. Important is to initiate a reflection process.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqiHX_fdwqM

In all of this, the most important thing is making the children realize that the

topics come from them and that they determine the course by their interests.

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Once the children realized this, the quality and seriousness of their thinking is

truly amazing. As written above, Jackson always stresses that p4c Hawai’i is not

in a rush to get anywhere. But in the end we always can realize that “we have,

nevertheless, gotten somewhere … and the reason we have ‘gotten

somewhere’ is because we have not been in a rush!”9 (Jackson 2004, p. 8)

9
Jackson 2004, p. 8.

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References

(All internet sources have been accessed lastly October 13, 2015.)

Educational Perspectives. Journal of the College of Education, University of

Hawai‘i at Manoa, Vol. 14, No. 1&2 (2012), Special issue: Philosophy for

Children:

https://coe.hawaii.edu/sites/default/files/field/attachments/publications/

Vol44-1-2.pdf

Jackson, Thomas E.: “The Art and Craft of ‘Gently Socratic’ Inquiry”, in: Arthur

L. Costa (ed.): Developing Minds. A Resource Book for Teaching

Thinking. Alexandria, VA: 2001, 3rd edition, pp. 459-465.

Jackson, Thomas E.: “Philosophy for Children Hawaiian Style – ‘On Not Being

in a Rush…’”, in Thinking. The Journal of Philosophy for Children (Upper

Montclair, NJ: Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for

Children/IAPC), Vol. 17, No. 1&2 (2004), pp. 4-8.

Jaspers, Karl: Einführung in die Philosophie. München 1953; Engl.: Way to

Wisdom. An Introduction to Philosophy. New Haven 1960.

Lipman, Matthew: Thinking in Education, 2nd ed. New York 2003.

Martens, Ekkehard: Philosophieren mit Kindern. Eine Einführung in die

Philosophie. Stuttgart 1999.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig: Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, translated by C. K.

Ogden. London: 1981.

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Links

Interview with T. Jackson: https://vimeo.com/58100033

URL P4C-Hawai’i: http://p4chawaii.org/

URL IAPC-Montclair: http://www.montclair.edu/cehs/academics/centers-and-

institutes/iapc/

URL SEEQS: http://www.seeqs.org/community-building-with-p4c-hawaii.html

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Interview with Prof. Dr. Shaifali Sandhya (Chicago)

Culture, Delusions, and Social Reality:


Shaifali Sandhya on Intercultural Differences in the Formation and
Development of Delusional Beliefs

InterCultural Philosophy: Dear Professor Sandhya, on a recent occasion you gave

a talk in Bonn on the cultural shaping of delusions. Could you shortly explain first

off what is defined as a delusion in terms of clinical psychology?

Professor Sandhya: A delusion is a false belief idiosyncratic to the individual that

is unusual (but non-bizarre) in the context of the patient’s culture, in this case both

the US and Indian cultures, and the patient cannot be persuaded that the belief is

incorrect, despite all evidence to the contrary or the weight of opinion of other

trusted people. Delusions can be of various types, the two discussed here will be:

jealousy and persecution. Delusions must be distinguished from overvalued ideas,

which are beliefs that are socially shared or not clearly false but continue to be

held despite lack of proof that they are correct, such as superiority of one’s race or

political party.

OK, there may be hallucinations of touch or smell within the patient’s delusional

experience but they take a backseat or they are specific to the delusion and they

won’t be prominent. Also, the patient will experience the delusion for at least a

month before being given the diagnosis and other concerns will be ruled out,

such as schizophrenia or substance-induced psychotic disorders.

InterCultural Philosophy: Your most recent findings on delusions, their

connections to an individual’s respective cultural background, and their influences

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on cognition, sense, and sexuality are in part based on and connected to Anisha, a

patient you have been treating in the course of the last year. What is her story in

general?

Professor Sandhya: Anisha was born to a religious, pious, god-fearing and

traditional family in southern India. She spent her early childhood in Bangalore, a

large metropolitan city in south India. Anisha’s mother is in her mid-60s and a

home-maker, and her father, in his early 70s, holds a doctorate from IIT Madras, a

premier educational institute. Anisha reports “good” relations with her sister and a

“good” relationship to her parents. She is “very attached” to her mother and her

father is her role model. The youngest of five girls, she was doted upon by her

family and idealized her father.

When she was 21 years old, Anisha was introduced to Vasu by a family friend. At

the time, Vasu had just gotten a job as an engineer in Chicago. For thousands of

years, parents in India have arranged marriage for their children in India; Vasu had

long understood too that when he married it would be to someone his parents

had selected. He had come back to India for 30 days, determined to find his

future bride during this period. He scoured the ubiquitous marriage sites, more

than 1500 today and upon his parents’ approval, for a suitable partner – one who

is fair, educated, and docile, and eventually he provided Anisha’s family with his

marriage proposal. Following the proposal, his parents came for Anisha’s viewing,

a largely public meeting where the future bride is displayed to the groom’s family

and judged on all aspects – ranging from her mannerisms, hobbies, speech,

docility to elders, and so forth. Following the meeting, he felt she would be a

suitable bride, and they married within the month, in August 1996. Theirs was a

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growing number of the new semi-arranged marriages. A few months later, in

November 1996 Anisha arrived in the U.S. In the initial years of their marriage, she

reports having a “normal sex life” and “normal married life.”

After two years of marriage, their fights started to erupt over excessive intrusion of

her in-laws in their married life, their ongoing criticism of her behaviors and over

Vasu’s financial assistance to his parents that was siphoning their savings. One day

as arguments over financial help to his parents occurred, he started to hit her. The

first instance of violence occurred when Anisha’s first child was still an infant.

Anisha called the police who arrived, but since Vasu was remorseful and promised

the violence would never occur again, she did not file any charges. But after this

episode, Anisha began to feel overwhelmed with hopelessness, that “No matter

what his family will do to me, he will always support them.” Mental breakdown of

young Indian wives in the face of family stress is common in Indian families, and a

form of psychotic breakdown is delusional disorder; such marital strife without the

necessary support in a new culture may have initiated its start in Anisha.

Vasu’s absence contributed to Anisha’s heightening despair – and she started to

believe he was having an affair with his female colleague. Soon, that thought

morphed into the belief that her husband had not one affair but several affairs,

including some with women he met on Craigslist. She cited as proof “messages

exchanged with other females” but never alluding to the nature of the messages.

When Vasu was scheduled to work on New Year’s Day, Anisha grew more

suspicious as she was expecting him to be off work.

It seems like Anisha’s growing alienation, hopelessness, and distress fueled her

vigilance to catch him red-handed in the act. For instance, she believed

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erroneously that Vasu was using the job in another country in part as a cover for

his affair. In order to find proof, she put together an elaborate plan: she hired a

private investigator, installed a GPS tracker in his car, and tracked his online

behavior. Her efforts did not result in any substantial results: the investigator

reported only a large cash withdrawal coinciding with the colleague’s birthday, at

best an interesting correlation; the GPS tracker took her to the airport parking lot

where Vasu had parked his car during his visit to Toronto and not a seedy motel

she had presumably expected; the surveillance tools too, did not reveal any racy

affairs. All of her tracking efforts to catch him red-handed did not bear fruit and

Vasu continued to deny that he was having an affair, and began to accuse Anisha

(not unjustly) of being obsessive and invasive… Being told that she was imagining

the whole thing only made Anisha more desperate and distressed, and the vicious

cycle continued.

Anisha’s delusional ideation is unique in two different ways: once someone with a

delusion accepts an idea based on one evidence rather than the other, they are

less likely than a healthy person to give it up (“bias against disconfirmatory

evidence”). There is also a suggestion of conflating several unremarkable pieces

of observations – her husband’s late nights at work and checking Craigslist – as

one remarkable one: Philippa Garety and colleagues refer to it as a tendency to

“jump to conclusions” and base their research on that hypothesis.1

InterCultural Philosophy: Looking at the concrete contents of Anisha’s delusions

and the contexts and entities they are about, it appears that the content and

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
1
See Garety, Philippa et al.: “Reasoning, emotions, and delusional conviction in psychosis”, in:
Journal of Abnormal Psychology, Vol. 114 (2005), No. 3, pp. 373-384.

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nature of her false beliefs might be shaped by her upbringing in India – especially

when it comes to sexuality – and current technological shifts. In what ways do her

experiences and cultural imprints in sexuality and technology factor into the

delusional viewpoint she is taking on her environment?

Professor Sandhya: In the post-Snowden world where leaked classified

counterintelligence information was not only made possible through sophisticated

digital tools but also revealed that espionage, and eavesdropping was done on

millions of unsuspecting people by the National Security Agency in America,

Germany, and countless other countries, Anisha’s constructed unreality that her

home is bugged is hardly far-fetched.

Furthermore, suspiciousness is not unique to Anisha. Ever wondered who is

texting your partner late in the evening? Banal deception between couples is very

much a fabric of intimate relationships. Recently researchers from the London

School of Economics and Nottingham Trent University in their survey of a 1000

individuals with an average age of 49 years and married 19 years found that

suspicious wives are twice as likely to spy as suspicious husbands. While suspicious

wives will pore over text messages diligently, check the browser histories, and

secretly read their husband’s emails, check their Facebook accounts, and such

textual and technological surveillance does not abate even after 19 years of

marriage! Suspiciousness, it seems, is rife in close relationships, globally.

The cultural plasticity of technology in delusions was explored by Joel and Ian

Gold by studying so-called “Truman Show delusions” in delusional patients.2 Their

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2
See Gold, Joel/Gold, Ian: “The Truman Show delusion. Psychosis in the global village”, in:
Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, Vol. 17 (2012), No. 4, pp. 455-472.

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work further confirms research which suggests that beliefs seem to be sensitive to

technology,3 and the Internet.4 In The Truman Show from 1998, Truman Burbank

played by Jim Carrey is adopted in utero by a television company and every

moment in his life is being captured by the camera. His closest intimates are paid

actors and his community is a simulated world; as its inauthenticity dawned on

Truman, he escaped it. We often believe that a strong boundary separates the

mentally ill from the mentally healthy but research by the Golds shows how mental

illness is porous and permeable to our social contexts, and also pervasive. Culture

or cultural processes act as a trigger that shape the way general psychopathology

is going to be translated partially or completely into specific psychopathology.

InterCultural Philosophy: With regard to your monograph Love will follow: Why

the Indian Marriage is burning,5 you have pointed out that the case of Anisha and

Vasu also serves as an example for the general situation that while in most parts of

the world, the first years of a marriage are perceived by men and women to be the

“honeymoon phase”, in India’s culture the opposite is often the case. Can you

elaborate on this and to what extent unfulfilled expectations and the strong wish to

get out of an unsatisfactory marriage may also be relevant to Anisha’s delusions

and the functional or useful role they can actually play for her?

Professor Sandhya: Conflicts can be resolved in mature, intermediate, immature

or psychotic ways – and not necessarily on psychotic defenses alone, and in this, it
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
3
See Eytan, Ariel et al.: “Electronic Chips Implant: A New Culture-bound Syndrome?”, in:
Psychiatry. Interpersonal and Biological Processes, Vol. 65 (2002), No. 1, pp. 72-74.
4
See Bell, Vaughan et al.: “‘Internet delusions’: a case series and theoretical integration”, in:
Psychopathology, Vol. 38 (2005), No. 3, pp. 144-150.
5
See Sandhya, Shaifali: Love Will Follow. Why the Indian Marriage is burning. Noida: Random
House India 2010.

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is maladaptive to her.

Why doesn’t Anisha have access to that part of the cultural norms that helps her

deploy mature defenses? Anisha’s struggling with her marital tensions has roots in

cultural development and culturally formed ways of dealing with conflict. There

are cultural underpinnings of conflict and adaptation: The myriad of levels of

culture (economic, biological and interpersonal/emotional/affective) and the multi-

determined evolution of culture in which the individual’s needs influence culture

just as culture influences the individual.

It’s true that in modern India today, a domestic revolution is unfolding in Indian

homes and divorces have exploded exponentially but divorce is not an option for

religious communities such as Anisha’s. For much of the history of Hindu marriage,

divorce did not occur; when it did, it occurred in extraordinarily rare cases of a

spouse’s insanity, impotency, or adultery, or among the lowest of castes, and as a

remedy for an ailing marriage, divorce was considered a fate worse than disease.

Even though there are radical social changes occurring in the domestic revolution

in Indian homes such as: later marriages, an increasing emphasis on education for

girls, splintering of the extended family into nuclear households, increase in live-in

relationships, greater awareness of how their own sexual pleasure might

contribute to marital satisfaction, and a rise in pre-marital and extramarital affairs,

divorced women face considerable social ostracism. In both India and the U.S.,

however, it is possible for husbands to philander using modern technology and it

is justified and acceptable, especially in her religious conservative family, to

abandon a cheating partner and to abandon an unhappy marriage.

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Faced with the potential wrath and blame from her conservative family, her

delusions have usefulness for her, as they align with the social understandings of

her cultural heritage and buffer her from ostracism. Indeed, Vaillant, an expert in

the adaptive processes of schizophrenia and defense mechanisms, writes that

delusions are the most distorted forms of adaptation involving a break with

external reality to suit the inner needs of the person. Seen from this lens of the

symptom pool, Anisha’s unconsciously latching onto her husband’s behavior as an

explanation for her behavior can be seen as one of the only avenues available to

her. In pursuing her dogged belief of his philandering ways, she is taking troubling

emotions and internal conflicts that might be indistinct or frustrating beyond

expression and distilling them into a symptom or behavior that is a culturally

recognized signal of suffering.

Her delusions might then be seen as altering the expression of her conflict and

creating a parallel but profoundly distorted reality, but one that might serve five

adaptive functions for Anisha: attenuate her intra-psychic conflict and buffer her

from her growing despair, save face in her religious community when divorce

occurs, maintain her perception of herself as a good mother and wife and

preserve her self-esteem, create engagement with others, and enable her to

abandon a dissatisfying and dead marriage.

InterCultural Philosophy: In your talk, you have also pointed out that due to the

culturally informed nature of delusions, there are estimations on a significant

amount of ‘smaller’ delusions within each society’s population that simply do not

become clinically relevant since they remain under a certain threshold of attention

or bizarreness. Can you elaborate on these estimations and findings and what

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typical examples of such often undiscovered or unregarded delusions there are?

Professor Sandhya: Delusions are flavored by local culture: patients in China

believe that they are the chief disciple of the Buddha (Yip, 2003);6 Saudi sufferers

of “turabosis” believe they are covered by sand;7 in West Bengal where humans

may legally marry dogs, suffering from the delusion of being pregnant with

puppies is a possibility.8 Similarly, technology plays a significant role in Anisha’s

life and colors her delusion; on one hand, she believes she will find proof of her

husband’s infidelity through installing spyware and on the other, she believes

others are hacking her thoughts through spyware.

InterCultural Philosophy: In the discussion following your talk, it became clear

that from an abstract viewpoint outside a respective culture, one could actually call

large parts of its population delusional regarding certain aspects of public life or

reality in general. Examples include e.g. the ancient Greeks’ belief in the pantheon

or the conviction, widespread in medieval Europe, that there are witches. There

might hence be a possibility to include empirical psychology’s findings on

delusional beliefs and their connection to cultural standards into a more holistic

theoretical analysis of the cultural and ideological undercurrents forming our

perception and our concepts of the self, society and their relation to

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6
See Yip, K.: “Traditional Chinese religious beliefs and superstitions in delusions and hallucinations
of Chinese schizophrenic patients”, in: International Journal of Social Psychiatry, Vol. 49 (2003),
No. 2, pp. 97-111.
7
See Qureshi, N.A./Al-Habeeb, T.A./Al-Ghamdy, Y.S.: “Making psychiatric sense of sand: a case of
delusional disorder in Saudi Arabia”, in: Transcultural Psychiatry, Vol. 41 (2004), No. 2, pp. 271-
280.
8
See Chowdhury, A.N. et al.: “Puppy pregnancy in humans: a culture-bound disorder in rural West
Bengal, India”, in: International Journal of Social Psychiatry, Vol. 49 (2003), No. 3, pp. 35-42.

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one another. Do you think that the theoretical and empirical work on delusions

could contribute to such a critical theory of society, e.g. in terms of a critique of

ideology? And if so, to what extent do you think that psychology would have to

question and reevaluate itself again in the process, considering the fact that it is

culturally formed as well?

Professor Sandhya: What are some critical issues in recognizing a delusion?

Truth? Not really – because the truth changes across social groups and through

history. Take the ancient Aztec conviction that the flow of human blood would

keep the sun rising; their belief that their existence depended on tearing out the

heart of another human being, and it cost 20,000 humans to be sacrificed each

year or, the 25% of Americans who continue to believe that Obama is Muslim and

from Kenya, or 48% of those who believe in UFOs, or 90% of those Americans

who believe in the existence of God? And what of the German intellectuals like

Nietzsche, Herder, and Wagner who pursued with much fascination and obsession

Greek mythology?

Depending on the belief and time in history, a large proportion of society can be

ideational – not sensate thinkers relying on Science. Delusions, then, are mental

constructions so egocentric that they need a social following, some friends, and

fabric to be believable or not. Judgments of madness, then, rely on whether

someone believes in our story or not, otherwise we run the risk of our beliefs

turning into delusions, our character reduced to insanity, and being like Anisha.

The interview was conducted by Jens Pier.

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Further Reading:

Bell, Vaughan et al.: “‘Internet delusions’: a case series and theoretical


integration”, in: Psychopathology, Vol. 38 (2005), No. 3, pp. 144-150.
Chowdhury, A.N. et al.: “Puppy pregnancy in humans: a culture-bound disorder in
rural West Bengal, India”, in: International Journal of Social Psychiatry, Vol. 49
(2003), No. 3, pp. 35-42.
Eytan, Ariel et al.: “Electronic Chips Implant: A New Culture-bound Syndrome?”,
in: Psychiatry. Interpersonal and Biological Processes, Vol. 65 (2002), No. 1, pp.
72-74.
Garety, Philippa et al.: “Reasoning, emotions, and delusional conviction in
psychosis”, in: Journal of Abnormal Psychology, Vol. 114 (2005), No. 3, pp.
373-384.
Gold, Joel/Gold, Ian: “The Truman Show delusion. Psychosis in the global
village”, in: Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, Vol. 17 (2012), No. 4, pp. 455-472.
Qureshi, N.A./Al-Habeeb, T.A./Al-Ghamdy, Y.S.: “Making psychiatric sense of
sand: a case of delusional disorder in Saudi Arabia”, in: Transcultural Psychiatry,
Vol. 41 (2004), No. 2, pp. 271-280.
Sandhya, Shaifali: Love Will Follow. Why the Indian Marriage is burning. Noida:
Random House India 2010.
Yip, K.: “Traditional Chinese religious beliefs and superstitions in delusions and
hallucinations of Chinese schizophrenic patients”, in: International Journal of
Social Psychiatry, Vol. 49 (2003), No. 2, pp. 97-111.

Shaifali Sandhya is a clinical and cultural psychologist with a professional focus on

interpersonal relationships and cultural implications for the individual's psyche.

Having worked in both education and psychotherapy, she currently acts as a

counselor and therapist for families and couples in Chicago. Major results of her

work and research are to be found in her monograph Love Will Follow: Why the

Indian Marriage is Burning, Noida: Random House India 2010.

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