The Nervous Conditions of Cross-Cultural Literacy Cosmopolitanism in the Classroom, Orientalism’s Other “Ism”: The Nervous Conditions of Cross-Cultural Literacy

Edward Said (1935-2003) A Palestinian- American academic, Said published his most influential work, Orientalism in 1978.

Orientalism: What the West needed the East to Be

In his words, “Orientalism” defined: “Orientalism is a generic term…to describe the Western approach to the Orient; Orientalism is the discipline by which the Orient was (and is) approached systematically, as a topic of learning…But in addition, I have been using the word to designate that collection of dreams, images, and vocabularies available to anyone who has tried to talk about what lies east of the dividing line.”(73)

A History of Projection: Willful Mis-readings Guilty Binaries: WEST Vs. EAST Reason/Rationality Science Enlightened Individual Work of the Mind Masculine Agency Faith/Irrationality Religion Brainwashed Collective Pleasures of the Body Feminine Passivity

Two Rigid a Geography of Self? “no identity can ever exist by itself…without an array of opposites, negatives, and oppositions” ( 52).

Kwame Appiah (b.1954) British-born American philosopher, novelist, and scholar of African and of African American studies, best known for his contributions to the philosophy of culture.

Ethics in a World of Strangers In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture (1992) Color Conscious: The Political Morality of Race (1996). The Ethics of Identity (2005) Cosmopolitanism (2006)

Citizens of the Cosmos The Cynics of 4th Century B.C. Athens: cynical about local norms: the familiar or parochial Welcomed the foreign, the variety of the cosmos!

Am I legible?

How about me?

And me?

A Three Part Pedagogy: 1) This is about you! – an invitation to identify! 2) This was never about you! – a warning against over-identifying, colonizing the text with your own cultural assumptions 3) This is also, somehow, about you! – thinking structurally about shared conditions

Dangarembga’s Title and Epigram “The condition of native is a nervous condition.” From Jean-Paul Sartre’s introduction to Franz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth (1963)

The “Nervous” History of Rhodesia: a Timeline 1839 - The British South African Company arrives 1923 – Rhodesia becomes a British Colony 1965 – White Rhodesia declares independence from England NOTE: the novel is set during this time 1970-1974 Civil War between white minority government and black freedom fighters 1980 – Black majority rule established, new independent nation of Zimbabwe recognized 1988 – Novel is published

This is about YOU! A semi-autobiographical work of fiction, Nervous Conditions, speaks to some of the “nervous conditions” of Dangarembga’s own life, as she hopped between homes -- Rhodesia- England-Germany- Zimbabwe – as a tested cosmopolitan.

Student Biographies, the OTHER Text INDENTIFICATION: Student Biographies, the OTHER Text Local Examples of Hybridity: A self-named, Pro-life, feminist, atheist Jew; A Venezuelan-born, Mandarin-speaking Chinese Christian; A Hebrew-speaking, Russian CapeVerdian; A Portuguese-speaking, Swedish American, who is fluent in American sign language.

It’s a Family Affair What role has education played in your family? How much education did your grandparents have, for example, as compared to your parents, or to you? As you reflect on this intergenerational portrait, stop and make distinctions. Are some forms of education more valued in your family than others? Are some kinds of education viewed as suspicious, a waste of resources, or a genuine threat? Can you see evidence in your family that education produces progress?

Unexpected Similarities: a Local Reading The first batch of correspondences had to do with poverty, or what some call “the culture of poverty,” including observations about the feminization of certain kinds of labor and the emasculating effects of unemployment.

Historical thinking: CONDITIONS, over time The next set of correspondences had to do with a lack of access to education, especially for women and girls, which, for my students, often proved to be only one or two generations removed.

Fanon’s 3 Phases: the Native Intellectual 1. over-identifies with his foreign education, “[throwing] himself greedily upon Western culture.” 2. draws a clear opposition between the “bad habits drawn from the colonial world” and “the [precolonial] good old customs of the people” 3. speaks honestly to the mixed realities of the present as part of the fight against the forces of occupation.

Said Discovers a Cosmopolitan: The tender soul has fixed his love on one spot in the world; the strong person has extended his love to all places; the perfect man has extinguished his. Hugo of St. Victor, 12 century monk