GIORGIO AGAMBEN, JM COETZEE, and KAZUO ISHIGURO a Dissertati
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THE DISCOURSE OF HUMAN DIGNITY AND TECHNIQUES OF DISEMPOWERMENT: GIORGIO AGAMBEN, J. M. COETZEE, AND KAZUO ISHIGURO A Dissertation by MALEK HARDAN MOHAMMAD Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY December 2010 Major Subject: English The Discourse of Human Dignity and Techniques of Disempowerment: Giorgio Agamben, J. M. Coetzee, and Kazuo Ishiguro Copyright 2010 Malek Hardan Mohammad THE DISCOURSE OF HUMAN DIGNITY AND TECHNIQUES OF DISEMPOWERMENT: GIORGIO AGAMBEN, J. M. COETZEE, AND KAZUO ISHIGURO A Dissertation by MALEK HARDAN MOHAMMAD Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Approved by: Chair of Committee, David McWhirter Committee Members, Marian Eide Katherine Kelly Stjepan Mestrovic Head of Department, Jimmie Killingsworth December 2010 Major Subject: English iii ABSTRACT The Discourse of Human Dignity and Techniques of Disempowerment: Giorgio Agamben, J. M. Coetzee, and Kazuo Ishiguro. (December 2010) Malek Hardan Mohammad, B.A, University of Aleppo; M.A., Angelo State University Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. David McWhirter A multidisciplinary approach is needed to critique the frequently invoked but seldom questioned notion of ―human dignity,‖ a discursive tool that is subtly serving abusive power structures while seemingly promoting human rights. The discourse of human dignity misrepresents the meaning of empowerment for modern citizens, making them interested more in political gestures and less in profit, comfort and protection from abuse. Dignity‘s epistemes— self-assertion, recognition, political action, public-spiritedness, responsibility, resistance, the denial of animal instinct, sacrifice—should not be human ideals, for they are exactly the opposite of the sovereign‘s characteristics and because they are responsible for recursive violence that preserves the status quo. They should be replaced with ethics based on sensuous interest, instinct, and natural-spiritedness (a sense of mystical oneness with other living beings). This dissertation answers Foucault‘s question about how the modern state endows citizens with a political subjectivity while simultaneously subjecting them to a totalized system, exposing human dignity as just the link between individuation and totalization. It questions Agamben‘s notion of the indistinction between political life and natural life, arguing that sovereign power, using the discourse of human dignity, creates a clear distinction. The human dignity discourse keeps the human within political life, representing such life as the middle point iv between the instinctive life of the animal and the mechanical life of the laborer. In reality, the dissertation shows, these two demonized modes of life are the same mode, which should be championed as a valuable and empowered state of being. In the literary field, a close examination reveals that J. M. Coetzee‘s fiction subverts the human dignity discourse while Kazuo Ishiguro‘s work is enmeshed in it. Coetzee generates sympathy for humans who lack the sense of human dignity and act on mere instinct. He offers ―disgrace‖ as a spiritual-ethical state of sensuality, acceptance and humility and promotes an agenda of desire-based rights in lieu of dignity-based ones. His writings also eschew authorial dignity as they discount the values of newness and originality in favor of expression attuned to desire, even when such moves appear selfish and politically irresponsible. v DEDICATION To Mariko Nishibe, whose place in my heart is beyond discourse vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my committee chair, Dr. David McWhirter, for his patience, support and inspiration throughout the course of this research, and particularly in those times when things came close to falling apart. I would like also to thank my committee members, Dr. Eide, Dr. Kelly, and Dr. Mestrovic, for their valued guidance and suggestions. Many thanks also go to our department head, Dr. Jimmie Killingsworth, and my old friend and mentor, Dr. Chris Ellery from Angelo State University. I am also indebted to my special friends, Hyangmi Lee and Kohei Furuya, for their dedication and for making my time at Texas A&M University a better experience. I have also drawn tremendous support from my family, particularly my brother Mohammad and my mother Azrah Al-Barjas. Last but not least, my soul mate Dr. Sahit Murat Kara and his family gave me a home away from home and should be addressed directly: Murat, I could not have done it without you. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... iii DEDICATION ....................................................................................................... v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................... vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ....................................................................................... vii CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION: HUMAN DIGNITY AND SOVEREIGN POWER 1 Kantian Dignity............................................................................ 7 Existing Criticisms of Kantian Dignity ......................................... 12 Hannah Arendt: Human Dignity as Political Action ..................... 15 Human Dignity as the Hidden Link between Subject-Formation and Subjection.............................................................................. 17 Agamben on the Link between Subject-Formation and Subjection 18 Correcting and Adding to Agamben‘s Thesis……………………. 21 Human Dignity and the Reversed Understanding of Empowerment ..................................................................................................... 22 Derrida: The Sovereign Is Irresponsible ....................................... 23 Dignity and Political Violence…………………………………… 24 Fukuyama: Revolt for Dignity, Not Profit .................................... 25 Dignity, Circular Violence and Sovereign Power...……………… 28 The ―Uncomfortable Paradox‖: Human Dignity and Dangerous Worldviews .................................................................................. 30 Coetzee: Racism and the Stigmatization of Zoē ............................ 33 An Informed Look at the Role of Dignity in Human Rights………………………..…………………………………… 36 An Alternative View: Transients without Dignity ......................... 41 The Post-Dignity Figure of the Muselmann .................................. 42 Rousseau‘s Post-Dignity Claim .................................................... 46 Natural-Spiritedness as an Alternative to the Discourse of Human Dignity ......................................................................................... 49 The Animal, the Divine, and the Sovereign……………………… 50 Looking Forward ......................................................................... 55 II J. M. COETZEE, BEYOND DIGNITY ............................................. 56 viii CHAPTER Page Conversion from Dignity: In the Heart of the Country and Waiting for the Barbarians ........................................................................ 58 Coetzee‘s Ethics of Natural-Spiritedness ...................................... 71 Michael K: The Sovereign Life of Instinct ................................... 74 The Ethics of Disgrace …………………………………………... 90 Replacing Dignity-Based Rights with Desire-Based Rights ……. 97 III IRRESPONSIBLE DIGNITAS AND RESPONSIBLE DIGNITY: AN INTERLOCUTION WITH AGAMBEN AND ISHIGURO ............... 105 Review of Chapter I ..................................................................... 106 Addition to the Argument Advanced in Chapter I ......................... 107 Back with Agamben: Dignitas as Freedom and Sovereignty ......... 108 Dignity-Bearing Fiction: Ishiguro and the Demonization of Dignitas...………………………………………………………… 117 Human Dignity as an Act against Instinct ………………………. 144 The Muselmann‘s Instinct ………………………………………. 151 Who Is the Homo Sacer? ………………………………………... 153 IV DIGNITAS AND WRITING: THE CASE OF COETZEE .................. 155 Recognition: Coetzee and the Canon ……………………………. 156 Writing as an Irresponsible Desire ………………………………. 166 Writing as Ritual …………………………………………………. 174 V CONCLUSIONS ................................................................................ 194 WORKS CITED .................................................................................................... 196 VITA ..................................................................................................................... 207 1 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION: HUMAN DIGNITY AND SOVEREIGN POWER This dissertation argues that the notion of human dignity is in fact a subtle discursive tool in the service of abusive power structures. The notion of human dignity is more a function of sovereign power than a deep and abiding concept in the service of human rights. Human dignity is vital to a state-compromised liberal discourse of individual autonomy and identity to the same extent that the value of cultural and hierarchical ―dignity‖ has long been central to the more forthrightly abusive language of national identity and social class. Egalitarian human dignity is a mere variation on the same concept that has been variously but consistently defined by power, be it the dignity that means rank and distinction or the monotheistic dignity of the human‘s privileged but tormented relation