Cultural Revolutions: Reason Versus Culture in Philosophy, Politics, and Jihad

Lawrence E. Cahoone

Published by Penn State University Press 2005

Cultural Revolutions

Reason Versus Culture in Philosophy, Politics, and Jihad

Lawrence E. Cahoone

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780271030241

Overview
Contents

About this book

In this probing examination of the meaning and function of culture in contemporary society, Lawrence Cahoone argues that reason itself is cultural, but no less reasonable for it. While recent political and philosophical movements have recognized that cognition, the self, and politics are embedded in culture, most fail to appreciate the deep changes in rationalism and liberal theory this implies, others leap directly into relativism, and nearly all fail to define culture. Cultural Revolutions systematically defines culture, gauges the consequences of the ineradicably cultural nature of cognition and action, yet argues that none of this implies relativism.

After showing where other “new culturalists” have gone wrong, Cahoone offers his own definition of culture as teleologically organized practices, artifacts, and narratives and analyzes the notion of cultural membership in relation to race, ethnicity, and “primordialism.” He provides a theory of culture’s role in how we form our sense of reality and argues that the proper conception of culture dissolves “the problem” of cultural relativism.

Applying this perspective to Islamic fundamentalism, Cahoone identifies its conflict with the West as representing the break between two of three historically distinctive forms of reason. Rather than being “irrational,” he shows, fundamentalism embodies a rationality only recently devalued—but not entirely abandoned—by the West. The persistence of plural forms of reason suggests that modernization in various world cultures is compatible with continued, even magnified, cultural differences.

Author / Editor information

Cahoone Lawrence E. :

Lawrence E. Cahoone is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the College of the Holy Cross.

Reviews

“In this engagingly written book, Cahoone addresses an eminently timely topic with a clearheadedness that is often lacking in such discussions. With arguments that are unfailingly provocative, he points out that acknowledging the cultural embeddedness of reason by no means requires us to accept a disabling relativism or to abandon our commitments to critical rationality and to intercultural dialogue and understanding. Meaningful forms of rationality can be salvaged in the wake of postmodernism and of the ‘cultural turn,’ he argues. Through a painstaking examination of the seemingly recalcitrant case of genuine or deep cultural difference, Cahoone deftly wends his way between, on the one hand, a liberal culturalism that refuses to take seriously those differences that transgress the compass of liberalism and, on the other, a postmodernism that holds cultures to be bounded, homogenous wholes. He is led to elaborate a conception of culture that allows him to carve out a distinctive and compelling position on the vexed relationship between liberalism and cultural tradition.”
—Lorenzo Simpson, SUNY-Stony Brook

“Cahoone rethinks all the basic categories of philosophy of culture in a breathtaking critical analysis of the major contending positions and articulates a clear, though complicated, new theory. It pays off brilliantly in his concluding analysis of Islam in the contentious battle of cultures (and arms). This book should be required reading not only for philosophers of culture but also for social scientists, theologians, historians, journalists, and political leaders.”
—Robert Cummings Neville, author of Normative Cultures and Boston Confucianism

“In this remarkably well-written and closely argued book, Larry Cahoone offers a truly original account of the relation between culture and reason. After providing a reliable and critical analysis of the current literature on the subject, he offers an alternative theoretical perspective of his own that helps us both to understand and criticize religious, especially Islamic, fundamentalism. This important book shows how to construct a culturally sensitive but non-relativist theory of rationality.”
—Bhikhu Parekh, University of Westminster and House of Lords

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction:The Return of the Repressed Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1 Liberalism and La Revanche de la Culture Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	11
2 Kingdoms of Ends Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
3 Who Is Culture? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	56
4 Modernity: Culture of Reason or Reason Against Culture? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	79
5 Postmodernity:Too Much Culture or Not Enough? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	98
6 Playing Reality Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	119
7 Why There Is No Problem of Cultural Relativism Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147
8 What Is the Opposite of Jihad? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	177
Conclusion: Culture’s Reasons Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	205
References Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	225

Language: English
Publisher: Penn State University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 240
Keywords: Laurence E. Cahoone; Reason versus Culture in Philosophy; Politics; and Jihad; Culture Differences; Philosophy; Cultural Relativism; Islam; Islamic Fundamentalists; political science; comparative politics; new culturalists

eBook

Published: March 25, 2005
ISBN: 9780271030241