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COSMOPOLITAN HOSPITALITY Eleanor Byrne

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COSMOPOLITAN HOSPITALITY Eleanor Byrne TRICK QUESTIONS: COSMOPOLITAN HOSPITALITY Eleanor Byrne This paper consists of two texts. The first explores the limits of cosmopolitanism in practice, taking as its subject theLife in the UK Citizenship Test, inaugurated under the Labour Government in 2005. It argues that the test exemplifies the predicament of all attempts at cosmopolitan hospitality as unconditional welcoming, through a discussion of the relation between questioning and welcoming the stranger. Establishing the relationship between cosmopolitanism and hospitality as envisaged in Derrida’s reading of Kant it asks what kind of cosmopolitan hospitality is either possible or desirable by exploring what Derrida calls the ‘perversions’ inherent in the structures of hospitality. It focuses on the concept of the ‘trick questions’ that the state asks the foreigner observed by Derrida in his reading of The Apology of Socrates; questions that seem to invite answers but foreclose the possibilities of a free response. The second text asks how this logic that Derrida identifies can be pushed or coaxed into new ways of addressing the perceived threats of ‘unconditional’ hospitality through a reading of ‘unconditional hospitality’ as queer in the work of Tove Jansson Eleanor Byrne, Manchester Metropolitan University Ellie Byrne is Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Literature at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK. Her research and teaching covers twentieth century British and Postcolonial literature and theory. She has written on Salman Rushdie, intersections between postmodernism and postcolonial theory and postcolonial archives. Recent publications include a monograph, Homi K. Bhabha, (Palgrave, 2009), ‘Texting Obama’ Comparative American Studies, vol.10, Double issue 2–3 (Co-Editor), 2012. She is currently researching a monograph on the representation of Hawaii in contemporary literature and culture. Trick questions: cosmopolitan hospitality (Eleanor Byrne, Manchester Metropolitan University) DOI: 10.5456/issn.5050-3679/2013s08eb OPEN ARTS JOURNAL, ISSUE 1, pp. 68-77, SUMMER 2013 ISSN 2050-3679 www.openartsjournal.org 68 11 Chua, L. (1998) Gold by the Inch, New York, Grove 29 Shaxson, N. (2011) Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and Press. the Men Who Stole the World, London, Bodley Head. 12 Dasgupta, R. (2006) Tokyo Cancelled, London, Harper 30 Sigmundsdóttir, A. (2011) ‘Is Icelandic citizenship Perennial. for sale?’ The Guardian, 7 April, http://www.guardian. co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/07/icelandic-citizenship- 13 Desai, K. (2006) The Inheritance of Loss, London, golden-geese (accessed 8 April 2011). Hamish Hamilton. 31 United Nations (1945) Charter of the United Nations 14 Dickinson, J. and Bailey, A.J. (2007) ‘(Re)membering and Statute of the International Court of Justice, together diaspora: uneven geographies of Indian dual citizenship’, with Interim Arrangements concluded by the Governments Political Geography, vol.26, no.7, pp.757–74. represented at the United Nations Conference on 15 Doty, R.L. (1996) ‘Immigration and national identity: International Organization, Berkeley, California University constructing the nation’, Review of International Studies, Press. vol.22, no.3, pp.235–55. 32 Wallerstein, I. (2004) World-Systems Analysis: An 16 Fanon, F. (1967) The Wretched of the Earth, Introduction, Durham, NC, Duke University Press. Harmondsworth, Penguin. 33 Xiaoping, D. (1987) ‘More on “one country, two 17 Gellner, E. (1983) Nations and Nationalism, Ithaca, systems”’, Beijing Review, vol.30, no.14, pp.21–2. Cornell University Press. 18 Hemon, A. (2008) The Lazarus Project, London, Picador. 19 Hobsbawm, E. (1992) Nations and Nationalism Since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Trick QuesTions: 20 Kant, I. (2010) ‘Idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan purpose’, in G.W. Brown and D. Held cosmopoliTan (eds), The Cosmopolitanism Reader, Cambridge, Polity, HospiTaliTy pp.15–26. eleanor Byrne 21 Marsh, N. (2011) ‘Desire and disease in the speculative economy: a critique of the language of abstract crisis’, Journal of Cultural Economy, vol.4, no.3, pp.301–14. This paper consists of two texts. The first explores the limits 22 Medley, J. and Carrol, L.A. (2010) ‘The hungry ghost: of cosmopolitanism in practice, taking as its subject the Life policy, capitalist transformation and laboring bodies in the UK Citizenship Test, inaugurated under the Labour in Southeast Asia’, in L. Connell and N. Marsh (eds) Government in 2005. It argues that the test exemplifies Literature and Globalization: A Reader. London, Routledge, the predicament of all attempts at cosmopolitan hospitality pp.282–97. as unconditional welcoming, through a discussion of the relation between questioning and welcoming the stranger. 23 Mitchell, D. (1999) Ghostwritten: A Novel in Nine Parts, Establishing the relationship between cosmopolitanism London, Sceptre. and hospitality as envisaged in Derrida’s reading of Kant 24 Mitchell, D. (2004) Cloud Atlas, London, Sceptre. it asks what kind of cosmopolitan hospitality is either 25 Moretti, F. (2000) ‘Conjectures on world literature’, possible or desirable by exploring what Derrida calls the New Left Review, vol.1, pp.54–68. ‘perversions’ inherent in the structures of hospitality. It focuses on the concept of the ‘trick questions’ that the state 26 Moretti, F. (2003) ‘More conjectures’, New Left asks the foreigner observed by Derrida in his reading of Review, vol. 20, pp.73–81. The Apology of Socrates; questions that seem to invite 27 Nussbaum, M.C. (2010) ‘Patriotism and answers but foreclose the possibilities of a free response. cosmopolitanism’, in G.W. Brown and D. Held (eds), The The second text asks how this logic that Derrida identifies Cosmopolitanism Reader, Cambridge, Polity, pp.155–62. can be pushed or coaxed into new ways of addressing the perceived threats of ‘unconditional’ hospitality through a 28 Palan, R. (2006) The Offshore World: Sovereign reading of ‘unconditional hospitality’ as queer in the work of Markets, Virtual Places and Nomad Millionaires, Ithaca, Tove Jansson. Cornell University Press. OPEN ARTS JOURNAL, ISSUE 1, SUMMER 2013 ISSN 2050-3679 www.openartsjournal.org 69 TeXT 1 the above definition.1 However, as Derrida notes in On Cosmopolitanism (his address to the International unconditional Hospitality and Parliament of Writers in Strasbourg in 1999), Kant’s cosmopolitanism model of cosmopolitanism does not embrace The intercourse, more or less close, which has unconditional hospitality – rather, he places two limits 2 ‘ been everywhere steadily increasing between on it. First, hospitality is not a right of residence, but the nations of the earth, has now extended so a right of visitation; Kant limits the right of residence enormously that a violation of right on one part to that which is to be made dependent on treaties of the world is felt all over it. Hence the idea between states. Second, even though hospitality is a of a cosmopolitan right is no fantastical, high- ‘law’, it depends on state sovereignty and as such it is flown notion of right, but a complement of the controlled by the laws of the state and the state police unwritten code of law – constitutional as well as (Derrida, 2001, p.22). For Derrida, Kant’s project fails international law – necessary for the public rights at this point because the principle of unconditional of mankind in general and thus for the realisation hospitality has already been discounted, and thinking of perpetual peace. unconditional hospitality, even if it cannot be enacted, ’ must be part of any project for international peace. (Kant, [1795] 1972, Perpetual Peace: Derrida’s extensive discussions of hospitality as A Philosophical Essay, p.142). ‘a contradictory conception, a thwarted conception or a contraception of waiting’ (Derrida, 2000, p.00), Q. 20. Is the statement below TRUE or FALSE? have contributed to an important interrogation of the ‘The UN aims to prevent war and to promote two contradictory impulses at work in the concept/ international peace and security’. conception of hospitality. In ‘Hostipitality’ (2000) he Life In The UK Citizenship Test, PRACTICE TEST notes that hospitality is an aporia. To offer hospitality 12. Passing the Life in the UK Test, Official Practice is to ‘extend an invitation’, but ‘radical hospitality Questions and Answers, (2009). consists in receiving without invitation’ – thus even the existence of an invitation enables some limit to be In Perpetual Peace, Kant’s seminal account of the placed on hospitality. Hospitality has to protect itself principle of a cosmopolitanism that can achieve from itself, auto-immunize itself in some way. Hence, world peace, he defines the Third Definitive Article of in Derrida’s model, unconditional or pure hospitality is Perpetual Peace: ‘the rights of men, as citizens of the always impossible. world, shall be limited to the conditions of universal hospitality’ (Kant, p.137). This is not philanthropy, Hospitality gives and takes more than once in bestowed by a generous or loving host, but a right, ‘ its own home. It gives, it offers, it holds out, but ‘a right of visitation’, insisted upon because of man’s what it gives, offers, holds out, is the greeting ‘common right of possession on the surface of the which comprehends and makes or lets come earth on which, as it is a globe we cannot be infinitely into one’s home, folding the foreign other into scattered, and must in the end reconcile ourselves to the internal law of the host which tends to begin existence side by side’ (pp.137–8). by dictating the law of its language and its own It is this ‘right’ of visitation that ensures the 1 ‘But to this perfection compare the inhospitable actions cosmopolitan project of perpetual peace, ‘In this way of the civilized and especially of the commercial states of our far distant territories may enter into peaceful relations part of the world. The injustice which they show to lands and with one another. These relations may at last come peoples they visit (which is equivalent to conquering them) under the public control of law and thus the human is carried by them to terrifying lengths.
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