tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post4000451685671846960..comments2024-03-19T02:14:31.704-04:00Comments on <center>OnFiction</center>: Fiction and Human RightsKeith Oatleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16419339550879570935noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-6818323786199499722012-03-21T18:35:07.230-04:002012-03-21T18:35:07.230-04:00Thank you very much, Anil, for your comment. Sorry...Thank you very much, Anil, for your comment. Sorry for my delay in answering.<br /><br />I find what you are saying very thought provoking. <br /><br />First, I agree that the ancients not only had a sense of empathy, but used it in public. For instance, I imagine that some of what Quintilian wrote about can be thought of in terms of empathy. So, I am sorry to have given a wrong impression here. <br /><br />As to Lynn Hunt, I suppose I might have been unduly influenced by her. She is a historian, and I am not. I found her argument that the political movement of human rights had a distinctive starting point in the eighteenth century, and was influenced by fiction, persuasive. She does not say that fiction was the only influence, and I hope that in my post I didn't imply that, but she does argue that fiction was one of the influences.Keith Oatleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16419339550879570935noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-4630842847736376642012-03-14T11:55:07.960-04:002012-03-14T11:55:07.960-04:00@bill. Thanks for the link and write up. Late to t...@bill. Thanks for the link and write up. Late to the conversation, but would like to make a couple of comments.<br /><br />1. It's really far-fetched to think the ancients did not have the refined sense of empathy that we so modestly claim for ourselves. Almost all cultures had elaborate codes of proper conduct and some were quite specific about the rights and responsibilities of various groups. I'm not sure we needed to wait till 'Pamela' came along to appreciate the Other.<br /><br />2. The gradual growth in awareness of human rights-- not just this or that group's rights-- needn't be due to fiction at all. Walter Ong argued quite persuasively I think the changes we now identify as modernism originated in the shift from oral traditions to written ones. I've experienced text-illiterate or poorly-literate readers getting totally sucked into a story; they are the ones who can't help themselves from identifying with a character, even going so far as to confuse the truth-status of what they're seeing. More modern participants are able to keep their distance from the text or image. What we are seeing today might be a return to the oral-visual traditions of the past, again something Ong talked about. There's something really weird about writing.<br /><br />Of course, it'll probably help if I actually read Hunt's book. :)Anil Menonhttp://anilmenon.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-91878015641764313262010-02-04T16:04:12.459-05:002010-02-04T16:04:12.459-05:00Thank you, Bill, for this question. Lynn Hunt does...Thank you, Bill, for this question. Lynn Hunt does not discuss <i>Uncle Tom's Cabin</i> in her book. She has a good discussion (in her Chapter 1) of eighteenth-century fiction and its influences. She focuses principally on Richardson's <i>Pamela</i> and <i>Clarissa,</i> and on Rousseau's <i>Julie</i>, but she also mentions other novels, as well as the very affecting autobiography, written in high eighteenth-century style, of a slave who became educated, bought his freedom, and settled in England, Oludah Equiano: <i>The interesting narrative of the life of Oludah Equiano</i> which was published in 1789 and had strong influence on the abolition of the slave trade in Britain. Hunt does have sections on the abolition of slavery, first in France, and later elsewhere, including Haiti and the United States, but in these sections her argument has progressed to the relation between declarations of rights and practicalities of establishing and maintaining legal equality for people, including black people.Keith Oatleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16419339550879570935noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-47241370219456041892010-02-04T12:14:38.091-05:002010-02-04T12:14:38.091-05:00Did Hunt discuss "Uncle Tom's Cabin,"...Did Hunt discuss "Uncle Tom's Cabin," Keith? It was the best-selling novel in 19th century America and the "Bible" is the only book that outsold it. It certainly helped catalyze abolitionist sentiment and thereby played a role in the, alas bloody, elimination of slavery. Note, however, that Stowe's depiction of blacks would not meet current standards, but that didn't stop people from empathizing with the black characters in the book and, through that, coming to the conclusion that actual existing slavery was morally wrong.Bill Benzonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08360044945265178991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-47572582509916404652010-02-04T12:05:14.225-05:002010-02-04T12:05:14.225-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Bill Benzonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08360044945265178991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-14068611333308534532010-02-02T17:15:36.142-05:002010-02-02T17:15:36.142-05:00Thank you very much, Bill, for this comment. You p...Thank you very much, Bill, for this comment. You put the issue beautifully. <br /><br />An avatar, as I understand it, is a body of another which has been entered by a human mind. The literary term for this kind of entry of the mind into another is identification. <br /><br />James Cameron is a very psychological movie-maker, I think, and in <i>Avatar</i> he arranges first that we identify with Jake Sully who, as you point out, is in a wheelchair. Then, in turn, Jake Sully himself enters a set of three identifications (so there is a recursion). Jake Sully identifies first with someone like himself, the marine colonel in charge of the military mission to the Na'vi, then with someone less like himself, Grace the anthropologist who is seeking to understand the Na'vi to see whether they can be cajoled, and then finally with someone quite unlike himself, a Na'vi princess. Not only does Jake Sully fall in love with the Na'vi princess but we are given to understand that with her the avatarish entry into otherness is complete.Keith Oatleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16419339550879570935noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5455277388900637928.post-43791531383546647882010-02-02T15:30:29.927-05:002010-02-02T15:30:29.927-05:00This post is interesting in view of recent argumen...This post is interesting in view of recent arguments about <i>Avatar</i>. There is <a href="http://io9.com/5422666/when-will-white-people-stop-making-movies-like-avatar" rel="nofollow">an argument that says</a> the movie is a version of the "late imperialist romance" in which the racial Other (in this case, the Na'vi) is merely a vehicle for the self-realization of white protagonist (from an imperialist society). Yet, if, through that protagonist, the audience comes to identify with that Other, then maybe the film can contribute to people's ability to identify with those who are different from them. And then we've got to consider the fact that the protagonist in this case, Jake Sully, is a paraplegic, which means that audience members have to <a href="http://www.thevalve.org/go/valve/article/avatar_and_disability/" rel="nofollow">identify with a paraplegic</a> if they want to get to the goodies.Bill Benzonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08360044945265178991noreply@blogger.com