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Human Beings and Freedom: an Interdisciplinary Perspective

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Human Beings and Freedom: an Interdisciplinary Perspective Human Beings and Freedom: An Interdisciplinary Perspective Human Beings and Freedom An Interdisciplinary Perspective Edited by J.L. Shaw Michael Hemmingsen Punthi Pustak Kolkata – 2011 PUBLISHING INFORMATION THIS PAGE Contents List of Contributors .............................................................................................. i Introduction ......................................................................................................... vii Could This Women‘s World Champ Be a Man?‖: Caster Semenya and the Limits of Being Human .........................................1 Anita Brady This Woman is Also an African ......................................................................20 Robbie Shilliam Naturalising Gender ............................................................................................23 James Meffan The Disorder of Things: Foucault, Disciplinary Procedures and Enlightenment Discourse ..................................................................................27 Tony Schirato Foucault and the Politics of Self ......................................................................35 Pat Moloney Parrhēsia and the Problem of Moral Authority ..........................................41 David Rosenbloom Reassessing the Right to Laughter: Humour, Dissent and the Liberal Imagination ............................................................................................45 Nicholas Holm Tracking Footprints? ..........................................................................................64 Mike Lloyd Laughter from a Historical Perspective .........................................................70 Dolores E. Janiewski The Political Role of Freedom and Equality as Human Values ..............76 Marc Stewart Wilson & Christopher G. Sibley Flexible Freedom, Promiscuous Equality ...................................................120 Simon Keller Enlarging the Context: A Transdisciplinary Perspective ........................126 Arthur Buehler After Post-Socialism: Social Theory, Utopia, and the Work of Castoriadis in a Global Age ............................................................................130 Chamsy el-Ojeili Against Overcorrection: Risking the Universal ........................................146 Kate Schick Globalisation and the (Temporary) Death of Grand Social Theories ..................................................................................................150 James H. Liu Creating Lines of Flight and Activating Resistance: Deleuze and Guattari‘s War Machine ..........................................................158 Robert Deuchars Romanticising Resistance?: Deuchars, Deleuze and the Possibility of Living Differently ...................................................................186 Ben Thirkell-White The War Machine, Power and Humans as Social Animals ....................192 Ronald Fischer The Nature of Human Beings: East and West ...........................................196 J. L. Shaw Reason and Persons in the Classical Greek World ...................................218 Xavier Márquez Alternative Models of Freedom in Buddhism ...........................................225 Michael Radich Bibliography .......................................................................................................230 Index .....................................................................................................................264 i List of Contributors Anita Brady is a Lecturer in the Department of Media Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of her publications include: Understanding Judith Butler; ―Camp Mothers of the Nation?: Reading Untouchable Girls‖; and ―The Transgendered Kiwi‖. Art Buehler is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Religious Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include: Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of the Mediating Sufi Shaykh; Analytical Indexes for the Collected Letters of Ahmad Sirhindi; and ―Tales of Renewal: Establishing Ahmad Sirhindi as the Reformer of the Second Millennium‖. Robert Deuchars is a Lecturer in the Department of Political Science & International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. He is the author of The International Political Economy of Risk: Rationalism, Calculation and Power, Ashgate, 2004. His recent publications include ―Deleuze, DeLanda and Social Complexity: Implications for the International,‖ in the Journal of International Political Theory; and ―Towards the Global Social: Sociological Reflections on Governance and Risk in the Context of the Current Financial Crisis', in the Cambridge Review of International Affairs. Ronald Fischer is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Psychology at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include: What is more important for national well-being: Money or autonomy? A meta-analysis of well-being, burnout and anxiety across 63 societies.‖; ―Cultural and institutional determinants of Social Dominance Orientation: A cross-cultural meta-analysis of 27 societies‖; and ―Are societal values linked to global peace and conflict?‖. Michael Hemmingsen is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Philosophy at McMaster University, Canada. He is the author of ―Post-Modern Cosmopolitanism and Discourse Ethics‖; and ―Post-Modern Cosmopolitanism as an Ethic of List of Contributors ii Encounter‖. His work focuses on the Frankfurt School, meta-ethics, political theory, and moral exchange and discourse between diverse societies and cultures. Nicholas Holm is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of English & Cultural Studies at McMaster University, Canada. His currently working on a dissertation addressing the manner in which popular aesthetics, in particular humour, can produce different forms of politics. Some of his publications include: ―F--k You, I won't Do What You Tell Me‖: A Critical Analysis of Rebellion, Revolution and the Dionysian in Popular Music‖; ―Watching the Paranoid: Conspiracy Theorizing Surveillance‖; and ―Ex(or)cising the spirit of Japan: Ringu, The Ring and the persistence of Japan‖. Dolores E. Janiewski is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. She is the author of books such as: New Rights New Zealand: Myths Market and Moralities; Reading Benedict/Reading Mead: Feminism, Race, and Imperial Visions; and Sisterhood Denied: Race, Gender and Class in a New South Community. Simon Keller is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include: The Limits of Loyalty; ―Welfare as Success‖; and ―Virtue Ethics is Self-Effacing‖ James Liu is a Professor in the School of Psychology at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, as well as the Deputy Director of its Centre for Applied Cross Cultural Research. His research focuses on a cross-cultural and political psychology of inter-group relations. He specialises in the study of social representations of history and global consciousness. He is editor of the Asian Journal of Social Psychology, and has more than 120 academic publications. His edited volumes include New Zealand Identities: Departures and Destinations, Restorative Justice and Practices in New Zealand, Ages Ahead: Promoting intergenerational relationships, and Progress in Asian Social Psychology, Volumes 2 and 6. James was born in Taiwan and in the Midwestern United States, where he obtained a Bachelor‘s Degree in Computer Science from the University of Illinois. He worked as an aerospace engineer, and then completed a PhD in iii List of Contributors social psychology in 1992 at UCLA. A naturalised citizen of two countries, he describes himself as a ―Chinese-American-New Zealander‖. Mike Lloyd is a Senior Lecturer in the Sociology and Social Policy programme at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Recent publications include: ―Miss Grimshaw and the White Elephant: Categorisation in a Risqué Humour Competition‖ in Humor: International Journal of Humor Research; ―‗When Jemaine Met Keitha: Flight of the Conchords Tackle Australia‖ in Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies‖; and ―Where Did That Fokker Come From? The Age's Adventures of Naked Man Cartoon Caption Competition‖ in Media International Australia. Xavier Márquez is a Lecturer in the Political Science & International Relations Programme at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include: ―Knowledge and Law in PLato's States man and Laws: A Response to Klosko‖; ―La loi de la nature et la nature de la loi dans la pensée politique de Cicéron‖; ―Theory and Practice in Plato‘s Statesman‖; and ―Measure and the Arts in Plato's Statesman‖. James Meffan is a Lecturer in the Department of English at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include ―Ethics Before Politics: J. M. Coetzee‘s Disgrace‖; ―Home is a Failed Idea‖; and ―‗Culturalism Gone Mad‘: The Play of Cultural Rhetoric in the Invention of New Zealand National Identity‖. Pat Moloney is a Senior Lecturer the Political Science & International Relations Programme at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Some of his publications include: Sexuality Down Under: Social and Historical Perspectives; On the Left: Essays on the History of Socialism in New Zealand; and ―Abandonando el Jardín del Edén: Autoridad Política y Autoridad Lingüística en
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