Hope in America: Lyotard and Rorty, Dobson and Obama, and the Struggle to Maintain

Hope in Postmodern Times

A dissertation presented to

the faculty of

the Scripps College of Communication of Ohio University

In partial fulfillment

of the requirements for the degree

Doctor of Philosophy

Daniel E. Rossi Keen

August 2008

This dissertation titled

Hope in America: Lyotard and Rorty, Dobson and Obama, and the Struggle to Maintain

Hope in Postmodern Times

by

DANIEL E. ROSSI KEEN

has been approved for

the School of Communication Studies

and the Scripps College of Communication by

Gregory J. Shepherd

Professor of Communication Studies

William K. Rawlins

Stocker Professor of Communication Studies

Gregory J. Shepherd

Dean, Scripps College of Communication

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ABSTRACT

KEEN, DANIEL E. ROSSI, Ph.D., August 2008, Communication Studies

Hope in America: Lyotard and Rorty, Dobson and Obama, and the Struggle to Maintain

Hope in Postmodern Times (305 pp.)

Directors of Dissertation: Gregory J. Shepherd and William K. Rawlins

This dissertation is a reflection on the status of hope in postmodern America.

Emerging from the assumption that postmodern critiques of objective knowledge have

significantly challenged the vitality of many American’s hopes, and seeking, in part, to address this problem, I here make two broad arguments. First, I argue that postmodern challenges to objective truth need not signal the demise of hope. Second, I argue that the

very same conditions which give rise to postmodern critiques of objective knowledge

likewise provide exciting possibilities for reinvigorating hope in our current climate.

In Chapter 1, I offer an extended reflection upon the changing status of hope as demonstrated by my own historic pilgrimage. In chapter 2, I consider in detail Jean

François Lyotard’s The Postmodern Condition as well as various works by Richard

Rorty. Relying heavily upon insight from these two theorists, I identify what I refer to as paralogic communication, a type of communication that depends upon narrative legitimation and that relies heavily upon the possibility of perpetually redescribing the world. As I explain, paralogic communication, both for Lyotard and Rorty, offers a way

of sustaining hope while simultaneously rejecting objective truth.

In Chapters 3 and 4, I examine various communicative artifacts by two different

individuals: James Dobson and Barack Obama. Simply put, the goal here is to show that

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Dobson, particularly through his treatment of homosexuality and his vision for the

American family, fails to enact paralogic communication as a way of describing a future, hopeful America. Even so, Dobson continues to engender hope within those who are convinced by his appeals. Obama, on the other hand, represents an exemplar of the employment of paralogy within our current, postmodern context. As I argue, such a vision of paralogy emerges from Obama’s reliance upon America’s self-description as codified in the Declaration of Independence and simultaneously illuminates the theme of hope at the center of his presidential campaign. Moreover, I argue that such paralogic

communication helps to make sense of the considerable support that Obama has garnered

in recent months.

Taken together, I argue, the combined testimony of Lyotard, Rorty, Dobson, and

Obama (a) bring into focus some of the greatest philosophical, communicative, and social

challenges facing America today and yet nevertheless (b) point toward numerous possible articulations of hope in postmodern America.

Approved: ______

Gregory J. Shepherd

Professor of Communication Studies

Approved: ______

William K. Rawlins

Stocker Professor of Communication Studies

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In the preface to his Philosophical Investigations, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1958) wrote: “I should have liked to produce a good book. This has not come about, but the time has passed in which I could improve it” (vi). The closer I have drawn to the completion of this project, the more I have felt the weight of those sentiments expressed by Wittgenstein over half a century ago. In some ways, I must admit how frustrated I am that this process is drawing to a close, leaving me wishing I had more time, wishing I had done more research, and wishing I possessed more energy. Though I suspect (and hope!) that such a frustration will forever characterize my scholarship, I think it is quite fitting that I should end this particular project with such a sense of incompleteness. For from top to bottom, the reflections that occupy the following pages speak about gleaning hope from that which is as of yet incomplete. Indeed, it is the sense of incompletion that moves us forward, that brings us back, and that “gets us up in the morning.”

As I reflect upon the end of my formal education, I am reminded that I will continue to learn from the insight and lessons gained while studying with such fine people here at Ohio University. If a decade ago I had could somehow have known then that this would be the dissertation I would end up writing now, I could not have known how to make sense of who I would become. Such time spent at Ohio University has slowly but surely draw me into a conversation that had been going on within me for years, yet without having a voice and without having anyone to speak to. My teachers, colleagues, and friends at Ohio University have provided me with a vocabulary by which

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I can now give voice to that conversation as well as a collection of people with whom to speak. And so I should like to thank at least a couple of these individuals here.

Many thanks to Dr. Arthur Zucker, for being such an integral part of my introduction to analytic philosophy and, even more important, for introducing me to

Wittgenstein, thereby helping me to discover the importance of “letting the fly out of the bottle.” To Zach Moyer and to Luke Potter, thank you for being friends and confidants at an otherwise very lonely time. Let me, at this point, register what could be my only claim to fame, so far as the history of ideas is concerned: I was Luke Potter’s teacher for introductory logic! And to Al Lent, the only human being to have served on every one of my graduate committees: thank you for your persistent willingness to be a part of my education. I only wish that I had taken the opportunity to spend even more time learning from and with you. So too should I thank Stefanie Norander and Mellissa Broeckelman-

Post, two fabulous office mates, and even better friends. Thank you for your kind and loving spirits and those innumerable ways that you infused humanity into an oftentimes inhumane process.

To my faculty in Communication Studies, I am deeply grateful, both for your remarkable insight and for your unflappable patience. Four years ago, during our first ever conversation, Greg Shepherd remarked, “I had you pegged as a pragmatist from the very beginning.” Well Greg, I suppose that description now holds! Thank you, Greg, for your able advice and generous friendship. Though you are one of the busiest people I know, you never failed to give both of your time and your attention. And for that I am so very appreciative.

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Bill, thank you for teaching me to view life as a narrative, yet without turning life into a mere story. You have show me the nimbleness that is required of a true communication scholar. Your passion for life is infectious, and your enthusiasm about my work has spurred me on from day one. Thank you for helping me learn how to thrive!

Raymie, I suppose that you are the one who is responsible for getting me into this whole “rhetoric thing” in the first place. And so through a crazy process that I never envisioned myself being a part of, you have taught me to see the world as a rhetorical invention and to see the history of ideas as a rhetorical enterprise. So too has your kindness and generosity been humbling and quite undeserved. Thank you, Raymie, for taking me under your wing and giving me opportunities that I had no business having!

My family will be forever grateful for all that you have done to see Pamela and me though graduate school.

To Liz Ruchti and Lisa Huebner, where to begin? The two of you have utterly changed the direction of my family’s life and have had a lasting impact upon the way we will forever see the world. Though I cannot honestly say the process has always been a smooth one, it has indeed always been a virtuous one. Your friendship sparked within me the process described within these pages. Thank you for your continued kindness to my family, for your persistent performance of our friendship, and for the prospect of a continued relationship with your growing family!

Speaking of families: I cannot begin to imagine the ways in which my family has sacrificed as a result of my education. And, in fact, I am not sure that I would wish for an answer to that question. My hope is that through this process we will have laid a

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foundation for a hopeful future emerging from the seeds of the past. To my mother and

father: thank you for your kind and loving support and for enduring your grandbabies

living some three hundred miles away so that I could chase down an idea, which, by the

way, I know I “can’t eat.” Your continued hope is evidence of whatever truth is contained

within this project! To Cathy and Clarence: Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! The

completion of this dissertation is as much a testament to your tenacity as it is to mine.

Through two PhD’s, you have given of your time, your money, your comfort, and your

prayers. Thank you for allowing Pamela and me “to build our house together!” I cannot

wait to see where the next cow lands.

To the Rossi-Keen brood: thank you for daily showing me the seeds of hope and

the beautiful promise embodied within your infinitely possible futures. To Owen, I am

sorry that I could not always play with you like you wished. I promise, now that this

“stupid dissertation” is done, we’re gonna play! And to Carmine and Maria, the most

unexpected of blessings at the most ridiculous of times: you have shown me that our

family can do and become far more than we ever imagined. I look forward to growing

into hopeful futures with you.

And, finally, to Pamela, my princess, my confidant, my most valued scholar, and

my forever best friend: tirelessly you have wrestled to make me better. And this is the

greatest blessing and sweetest hope any husband can ask for. Pamela, all of my earthly

hopes begin and end with you. I cannot wait to start this next chapter of our lives

together, full of promise, and grounded in hope.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

Abstract ...... iii

Acknowledgments...... v

Chapter 1: Meditations on Postmodern Hope: Toward a Future Paralogy ...... 1

Discovering the Present in the Seeds of the Past ...... 1

The Future of the Past in the Present: Reflections on the Status of Hope ...... 17

Assumption 1: ...... 17

Assumption 2: ...... 21

Assumption 3: ...... 27

Assumption 4: ...... 30

Summary & Overview of the Project ...... 37

Conclusion ...... 45

Introduction ...... 47

Science, Narrative, and the “Problem of Legitimation” ...... 52

Scientific Knowledge: Denotation Disguised as Objective Truth ...... 55

Narrative Knowledge: Self-Legitimation by Way of Stories ...... 59

The Status of Metanarratives: Re-Interrogating The Postmodern Condition ...... 64

Paralogy: Narrative Hope in the Making ...... 77

Democracy, Narrative, and Hope: Paralogy as the Ground of Solidarity ...... 88

Conclusion ...... 110

Chapter 3: James Dobson: Truth, Hope, and the American Family ...... 113

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Introduction ...... 113

Focus on the Family: Background and Context ...... 118

Dobson and Homosexuality: Modernist Hope in a Postmodern World ...... 123

Dobson’s Rhetoric of Return and Restoration ...... 148

Dobson: Creating Hope while Rejecting Paralogy ...... 154

Conclusion ...... 165

Chapter 4: Barack Obama, Hope, and Paralogic Political Communication ...... 167

Introduction ...... 167

Barack Obama: A Postmodern Politician in the Making ...... 176

Barack Obama’s Conception of Hope in The Audacity of Hope ...... 183

Barack Obama and the Role of Religion in Public and Political Life ...... 212

Concluding Remarks ...... 229

Chapter 5: Hope in America: A Bedrock Assumption, Infinite Possible Futures ...... 235

Summary of the Project ...... 235

The Larger Picture: Pragmatism, Postmodern Hope, and Paralogic Communication 244

Remaining Questions and Future Possibilities ...... 254

Concluding Remarks ...... 268

References ...... 271

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CHAPTER 1: MEDITATIONS ON POSTMODERN HOPE: TOWARD A FUTURE

PARALOGY

Discovering the Present in the Seeds of the Past

Religious and ethical reflection began for me at an early age. I am, in fact,

unaware of a time in my life when I did not think though a grid of religious and ethical

concerns. To be sure, such sensibilities were remarkably under-developed in the early

stages. Yet this is not to say that they were therefore less powerful or explanatory. It is

simply to say that they were comprised of sensibilities as opposed to constructs,

fragments as opposed to metanarratives. They emerged from stories, snippets of the lives

of others, and reflections upon the successes and failures of heroes and anti-heroes of—in

my particular instance—the Christian faith.

Though I was certainly unaware of it at the time, I now understand that the early years of my life produced within me a framework of thinking and acting that I have never been able fully to move beyond. And as a result, both my personal and scholarly life are deeply invested in questions of meaning and purpose, right and wrong, the past and the future. For better or worse, I have always been an individual who is fascinated by (some might say obsessed with) the question “Why?” Why do people exist? Why does anything exist and where did it come from? Why should I act a certain way, and what does this have to do the origins of humankind? In what should I place my hope and why should I do so? These kinds of questions, questions of both origins and teloi, have now captivated my attention for nearly three decades.

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The German philosopher, Immanuel Kant, was similarly motivated by such

bedrock questions. In fact, Kant (1781/1996) was so bold as to say that all of his

speculative and practical reasoning could be combined into three such questions (see pp.

735ff). One of these three bedrock questions was “What ought I to do?” As mentioned above, in my early years as a reflective individual, I was consumed with the Kantian question “What ought I to do?” And, similarly, I was convinced that answers to this question necessitated answers to other important questions about origins and purpose.

Stated with perhaps a bit more erudition, answering questions about my “duties” seemed to demand a full and robust account of the world in which I found myself. It seemed to demand a story and set of principles that made sense of ethical imperatives as well as my sense of hope. It called out for an account of the ways in which I came to be and the future toward which I was directed. Answers to the question of “ought” therefore became

(at least for me) questions about literally everything.

Above, I suggested that Kant operated chiefly to answer three bedrock questions.

The first, as I have noted, was “What should I do?” It was this question that motivated

Kant to undertake his (1788/2002) Critique of Practical Reason. Preceding this Kantian text was, of course, his self-avowed (1781/1996) Copernican revolution in epistemology

(see pp. 21ff). And so, for Kant, the question of “What should I do?” was, in very consequential ways, preceded and grounded upon another of his fundamental questions:

“What can I know?”

Unknowingly following the order of enquiry enacted by Kant some three centuries earlier, I spent a number of years in search of truth and certainty. In my mid-

2 teens, this undertaking took place in fits and spurts, usually with under-qualified and even confused (though well-meaning) church people. I had tons of questions about truth and knowledge that my religious tradition tried to answer. Of course, I am now able to recognize that when asking such questions I was beginning to ask deeply epistemological questions. The problem—which is, more or less, endemic to American Christianity—was that very few people carefully interrogated the relationship between philosophical and theological matters (Wells, 1993). By and large, those within my religious tradition were content asking the question “What should I do?” And so, when I tried to get philosophical and theological answers to the question “What can I know?”, the typical response was something like “Read your bible!” Not altogether bad advice. But, not altogether good advice either. And so there was a growing discontent within me. For I sensed that the answers to such questions were crucial for understanding those matters that were most important to me. And yet so very many of the people who were supposed to understand these issues were largely consumed merely with rules, customs, and conventions. And this left me wanting more.

As a way of addressing my growing need for answers, I eventually came formally to study the history and philosophy of Christian theology. Though the motivations for this course of study were manifold, in many ways, all such motivations were driven by my growing desire to answer the Kantian question “What can I know?” Increasingly, therefore, studying the history of theology and philosophy became for me a way of understanding and making sense of my world. Studying philosophy and theology became a way of recognizing how other thinking people conceived of their most cherished

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passions, beliefs, and hopes. And, I was optimistic that such an education might also help

to provide answers to the constellation of questions about origins and teloi introduced at

the outset of this chapter.

Of course, within the Christian tradition there is a persistent and understandable deference to the canon of scripture. And so, I spent much time trying to figure out

precisely what the various texts of scripture taught. I learned Greek. I studied Hebrew. I

wrestled with issues of exegesis and hermeneutics and historical context. I studied

biblical commentaries. I researched numerous translations of the bible, and waded

through various histories of interpretation of the meaning of scripture.

In addition to studying the bible, I also studied how theologians throughout

history had applied biblical texts. I memorized various catechisms of the Christian faith, I

studied important church councils, and I interrogated my own traditions in countless

ways. I even decided to augment my undergraduate studies by completing a master’s

program in the history and philosophy of theology. Following this was another master’s

degree, this time in philosophy and Christian metaethics. Add to that a third master’s

degree and now a Ph.D. in rhetoric and culture. All of this time spent studying was

wonderful, and could not have been more instructive or formative for my way of being in

the world. And yet, even as I gained more certainty about the necessity of theological and

philosophical reflection, I found myself increasingly dissatisfied and disillusioned. For

much to my surprise, such study was by no means providing definitive answers to the

question “What can I know?”

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One might ask at this point why I was so very interested in beginning with the

question “What can I know?” Having considered my infatuation with this topic for quite

some time, I have concluded that my interest in this question grew out of three critical

assumptions that I have not clearly understood until fairly recently. The first is an assumption about the nature or status of truth. “Truth,” writes Plato, “heads the list of all things good, for gods and men alike.” Consequently, Plato exhorts his audience as follows: “Let anyone who intends to be happy and blessed be [truth’s] partner from the start, so that he may live as much of his life as possible as a man of truth.” (Laws,

V.730.c). Such a statement represents well the assumptions by which I operated for many years. For I was long convinced (a) that the pursuit of truth should be my highest goal;

(b) that truth was the sort of thing that was determinate, fixed, and attainable; and (c) that both my happiness and my blessedness were contingent upon my ability to ascertain and organize my life in accord with those truths that I assumed were written into the order of the universe.

The second assumption was closely related to the first, and dealt with what one might call the grounds or bases of normativity. Stating the matter more precisely than I could have at the time, from an early age I generally assumed that my actions should be guided and motivated by the sort of determinant, fixed, and attainable “truths” described above. For a number of reasons, I was convinced that right and wrong existed, that certain actions were better than others, and that it was my duty both to understand and to enact such virtuous states of affairs. Kenneth Burke (1954) speaks to the relationship between alleged truth and the perceived normative consequences of such when he writes,

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“In a statement as to how the world is, we have implicit judgments not only as to how the

world may become but also as to what means we should employ to make it so” (p. 14).

Early in my life, I uncritically adopted such thinking and sought to understand how the

truths of my religious heritage explained the origins of existence as well as the allegedly-

necessary demands that I assumed to be universally binding and apparent. To co-opt

Burke’s verbiage: I wanted to understand the truth of where the world (and humankind)

came from so that I could fulfill my duty to make that world (and myself) exist in accord

with the truths inherent therein.

The third assumption concerns the nature of religious hope, and was also deeply related to my aforementioned views of truth and certainty. Recently, I have come to

realize that I spent many years thinking that religious hope could only exist in direct

proportion to the certainty one retained regarding “truth” and all its consequences. Hope,

on this view, is derivative of certainty and is founded upon “truth.” One’s hopes—both

for himself and for society at large—are more or less reducible to the assumption that

truth and reality will one day coincide, that present confusion will be abolished, and that

there will emerge a correspondence between eternal truths and life in the present. Hope,

according to this view, is utterly constrained by the parameters of truthfulness. And

“hope” that challenges or ignores such truth is no real hope at all.

Having recently come to a more careful awareness of the relationship between the

sort of assumptions outlined above, I am now able to make much more sense of my years

spent formally studying philosophy and theology. Looking back, I know recognize how

central and fundamental were my assumptions concerning the nature of truth and its

6 relationship to duty and hope. Having gained a bit of distance from and critical awareness of such matters, I can now describe and label some of the various assumptions that organized my thinking in those early years of philosophical and theological training. To put the matter simply: I began studying theology intent upon figuring it all out. I wanted answers. I wanted certainty. I wanted truth. And—perhaps even more important—I was assuming that epistemological certainty would lead rather naturally to a clear ethic of life and an even clearer sense of those things in which I should place my hope. I was, I now recognize, attempting to enact a deeply modernist and thoroughly foundationalist project that might offer indisputable moorings for my knowledge, my sense of duty, and my proclivity toward hope.

As I continued to study theology, I came to discover that many Christian theologians were, as I expected, consumed with the epistemological and ethical concerns noted above. I likewise soon realized, however, that many individuals held tons of conflicting beliefs about what one can know, what one should do, and what one may hope (Stout, 1988; Long, 2003; Grenz & Olson, 1992). And all such theologians employed theological and philosophical reflection in service to their varied claims. As a result, although I set out seeking to understand theological truth, I came instead to discover far more divergence than convergence. I came to realize that one’s knowledge of theological truth is deeply contextual, communal, and negotiated (see Moltmann, 2000;

Vanhoozer, 1998; Poythress, 2001; Lints, 1993; Erickson, 1997). I came to understand that studying the history of philosophy and theology would never settle the matter of what I should believe, what I needed to do, or what I ought to hope (Wittgenstein,

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1929/1965). And so, in a remarkably ironic way, studying theology and philosophy became for me both a grounding and a de-centering force. The study of such topics did indeed teach me what people hoped in the past (and in this way informed the possible hopes that I might have in the present and future). However, studying such matters did not and (I am increasingly convinced) cannot provide the sort of indubitable foundations that I so earnestly wished to uncover.

If the study of philosophy and theology had merely introduced me to divergent and multiplicitous accounts of what was true, I would very likely not be writing this particular dissertation. After all, I undertook such a course of study hoping to examine various manifestations of philosophical thinking and religious belief. And so, I was not expecting to find utter and complete agreement. Along the way, however, I came to recognize something far more problematic than mere divergence of opinion concerning what might be called true, normative, or hopeful. I came to understand that the very categories of truth, duty, and hope themselves have been increasingly and variously challenged as foundation-less, fleeting, and as mere social constructs (Lyotard, 1984;

Rorty, 1979, 1989; James, 1995; Foucault, 1972; Gadamer, 1975; Berger & Luckmann,

1966). More than this, I came to understand that such challenges were very much related to postmodern critiques of objective knowledge and truth. Truth, I was coming to realize, was not universally understood to be the kind of fixed, determinant, and discernible entity that I once hoped. So too was the status of duty and hope up for considerable debate

(MacIntyre, 1981; Moltmann, 1964). And so each of the elements of my trinity—

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knowledge, duty, and hope—increasingly seemed to be impossibly vague bases upon

which to erect a theoretical foundation for my actions and most cherished beliefs.

As I continued to gain the sort of critical sensibilities to which I have alluded above, I was increasingly challenged to understand the character or status of many of my

most cherished hopes. For quite some time I continued to assume that the shifting,

indeterminate, and elusive products of human interaction could not possibly establish

bases for a category as esteemed as human hope. Much like Plato, I continued to long for

something that transcended this world of mere experiences. I desired something static, eternal, and sure. I continued to wish for that which was certain, something that was not a product of messy, human action. Having assumed (a) that objective truth was necessary for the existence of hope and (b) learning that objective truth was elusive at best, I quickly found myself deeply conflicted and existing in a problematic relationship both with my past and my future. For I did not wish to conclude that religious (or even secular) hope should be abandoned altogether. Hope did not seem to me to be a fiction or a myth. And yet I no longer had at my disposal the kind of certainty upon which I thought such hope needed to be constructed. I was, one might say experiencing a crisis of knowledge, of duty, and of hope. And this crisis created within me the tension out of which this project was eventually born.

For a number of reasons that I will address variously in the following chapters, I am no longer convinced that objective knowledge must serve as the bedrock either for duty or hope. Within the last several years, I have become increasingly interested to consider what it might mean both to maintain and to speak about hope in a world

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wherein appeals to objective knowledge have been disparaged and deprivileged. Lyotard

(1997) speaks to this matter in his Postmodern Fables. He writes, “You’re not done

living because you chalk it up to artifice” (p. vii). Though I do not wish to chalk human

hope “up to artifice,” I am increasingly intrigued by Lyotard’s observation. For even as I

continue to understand hope as a communicative, social, and shifting process, my own

experience suggests that the study of religion in particular, and humankind in general,

continually points toward the utter need for hope and the desire for a future beyond the

present. Such a need is not merely existential—it is a decidedly social and ethical need as

well. And so the more I encounter the disparagement of hope, the more vehemently I

wish to advocate for its viability in a world wherein the historic bases of hope have been

challenged, ridiculed, and even abandoned.

Above, I have referred extensively to Immanuel Kant’s first two questions—the

epistemological and ethical ones. Kant’s third question, however, most directly speaks to the subject of this dissertation. The question: “What may I hope?” Although Kant was not, of course, embroiled in postmodern philosophical inquiry, he nevertheless carefully inquired into the relationship between knowledge and hope. In fact, Kant (1781/1996) famously explained at one point that he “had to annul knowledge in order to make room

for faith” (31). When I first heard this assertion as an undergraduate student, I can

remember being highly critical of Kant on this point. For at the time, I understood Kant to

be enacting yet another modernist attack upon the unity of faith and reason. “Sapere

aude!—Have the faith to use your own reason!” (Kant, 1784/1996, p. 573). It was this

sort of claim that I initially read as a repudiation of Christian faith and hope. And, of

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course, many Christian philosophers and theologians have interpreted Kant’s

epistemology precisely in this vein: as a humanist critique of dependence upon god

(Schaeffer, 1976).

More recently, I have come to suspect that one discovers in Kant a profound truth, a truth that escaped me for a number of years, and—as I will argue in the following chapters—a truth that is absolutely essential for a responsible and relevant articulation of

hope in postmodern public life. Contrary to my earlier assessment, Kant is not intent

upon destroying hope. Rather, Kant seeks more fully to understand the nature or status of hope. What Kant helped to make clear is that understanding the foundations of knowledge can never offer firm grounds upon which to construct hope. Understanding how we know and what—if anything—we may be certain of does not at all settle the matter of what we may hope, what we ought to believe, and in what we may or should put our trust. Properly speaking, understanding the processes and outcomes of knowledge generation is an utterly descriptive enterprise. It explains how individuals (or cultures) bestow a certain status upon given knowledge claims. It does not, and can never, tell us what sorts of things one should believe or what one can hope for in the future

(Wittgenstein, 1929). Hope, though grounded in knowledge, transcends what we know, and points beyond itself to something that is as of yet unexperienced. And because the fruits of hope are as of yet unexperienced, they are, for Kant, unknown in a robust and proper sense.

Following Kant’s proleptic reflections upon the relationship between reason and hope, and building upon more recent explorations into the status and nature of

11 knowledge, the document that follows is a reflection on hope and those means appropriate for speaking about such in the present. Principally, I seek to challenge the assumption that the demise of objective knowledge signals the end of personal or collective hope. What I wish to argue instead is that the very same conditions which challenge the existence of objective truth simultaneously introduce striking new possibilities for re-articulating hope in the present. Another way of stating this claim is as follows: hope may exist and thrive even alongside of the demise of objective truth.

Having now articulated the central argument of this document, let me offer a word or two about the position or assumption I seek to challenge: that postmodern thought tends toward the dissolution of hope. Numerous theorists and critics of postmodern sentiment have, of course, already made this argument for me (Baudrillard, 1994;

Bauman, 1991; Rorty, 1998; 1999; Derrida 1989; 1994; Caputo, 1997; Poirier, 2007;

Deblanco, 1999; Bauckham & Hart, 1999; and Johnson, 2004). As confirmation of this assertion, consider the following passage, written by Daniel Johnson (2004) in a recent essay entitled “Contrary Hopes: Evangelical Christianity and the Decline Narrative.”

At least since Jean François Lyotard’s seminal work on how the postmodern

“incredulity toward metanarrative” has undermined modern science’s legitimating

grand narratives, social commentators of various ideological stripes have been

keen to document the effects of our apparent inability to tell certain stories with

any degree of conviction. This effort has unquestionably made its mark on

contemporary deliberations on social hope. It can be found in Jean Baudrillard’s

kaleidoscopic reflection on the vanishing of history and its shift into reverse as it

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nears the “end.” It is present in Zygmunt Bauman’s diagnosis that, as

postmodernity has nestled in alongside modernity, a life lived with ambivalence

has gradually replaced the life lived in hope. It is Richard Rorty’s taken-for-

granted starting point for his own efforts to revive the discourse of “criterion-less

hope” that he finds in the works of Emerson and Dewey. And it is the assumption

that both liberates and chastises Jacques Derrida as he opens himself up to the

coming of the tout autre, that indeterminate messianic figure that is always

coming but never comes. So whether it is judged as a lamentable or laudable

development, there is little question in such circles that the collapse of compelling

shared narratives has made conventional forms of social hoping unsustainable.

(pp. 40-41)

An entire text could easily be written about the relationship between postmodern thought and the decline of hope. In what follows, I will both assume and extend such themes. Since I myself largely reject the hyper-critical and nihilistic conclusions of postmodern thought—and since there are plenty of proponents of such views already—I will rely upon the types of texts noted in the previous paragraph to bolster the argument against hope. My goal will be both to learn from and to counter such established voices in the following chapters. For I remain unconvinced either that postmodern thought must result in the loss of hope or that all postmodern thinkers tend in this direction.

In the following pages I will often speak of postmodern thought in ways that may make it appear to be a unified and monolithic philosophical position. And as a result, the reader who finds him or herself sympathetic to much postmodern sentiment may perhaps

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find my assessment too simplistic or general. In one sense, I appreciate this critique and

have regularly felt its force while writing this document. That said, it must be noted that

what follows is not an attempt to speak in any exhaustive or highly specialized way to the

intricacies of postmodern thought. Instead, I seek within the following pages to critique

prevailing appropriations of postmodern thought among both academics and non-

academics alike. Whatever one might justifiably say about the hopeful possibilities offered by various constructive strains of postmodern thought, it remains incontestable

that the most typical and prominent employments of postmodern “theory” tend to speak

against hope’s meaningful future. It is this oftentimes less hopeful strain of postmodern

thought to which Johnson (2004) refers above. And it is this less hopeful strain of

postmodernity that I have in mind when speaking in the broad generalities that occur

throughout the remainder of this text.

One final word is in order concerning my use and understanding of the word

“hope.” I am all too aware of the fact that I have been throwing this word around quite a

bit in the preceding pages, yet without offering a clear sense of what I mean when using the term. In one sense, this should be neither surprising nor terribly problematic. After all,

the entirety of this project is intent upon determining just what it might mean to speak

meaningfully of hope in the present. I have undertaken this project, therefore, precisely

because of the fact that I remain oftentimes sketchy about the specifics of this category of

thought. In my assessment, reflecting upon a concept such as hope brings into very clear focus some of the most fundamental philosophical questions of our day. To speak of hope is to speak about expectations for the future that emerge in light of the past. It is to speak

14 about a measure of correspondence between current desires and future states of affairs. It is to speak about a sort of optimism that calls out for firm grounding, yet which no longer knows where to discover such moorings. To wrestle with the question of hope is to ask ourselves whether or not there exists anything that may be certain, anything that escapes the domain of contingency. Or, supposing that we are content thoroughly divesting ourselves of metaphysical categories such as certainty and necessity, then wrestling with the question of hope consists of wondering whether or not mere possibility, mere contingency, and ungrounded optimism constitute sufficiently firm bases upon which to justify our action and interaction in community with others. Wrestling with the question of hope is, therefore, one particularly compelling exemplar of a much broader set of contemporary philosophical challenges. For making sense of the category of hope is to understand just what it might mean to live meaningfully in a post-metaphysical, post- foundationalist, and post-modern world. And so clearly defining what hope consists in is no small task to be sure.

Recognizing the inherent limitations of defining a term that invokes the breadth of discussion suggested in the preceding paragraph, let me nevertheless attempt to establish a baseline account of what I mean when speaking of “hope.” Here, I borrow from both

Lyotard and Rorty, presaging my account of them in Chapter 2. Hope, as I currently conceive of the term, consists of certain belief in the possibility that the vocabulary I use when describing the world is sufficiently grounded, sufficiently malleable, and contains within itself those resources necessary for transforming that world in a manner consistent with such principles. Such a definition betrays an inherent tension between certainty and

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possibility, between locality and universality, and between a sort of comfortable

individualism and the need to draw others into one’s own way of seeing the world. Stated just a bit differently, the account of hope introduced above maintains the impulse towards

modernist totalization and certainty while retaining a healthy deference to postmodern

caution regarding the limitations of such concepts. It is, one might say, an attempt to

balance between a kind of hope that is neither utterly realist nor thoroughly nominalist, a

hope that borrows from the sensibilities of each. Moreover, and perhaps most important,

my definition situates hope as a decidedly communicative entity, a category that is

intimately tied to the words and forms we use for speaking of hope’s character and

substance. Hope is, on this view, “verbally built out,” yet is not for this reason any less

important or essential (James, 1995, p. 82).

The definition of hope offered here grows out of the intellectual and personal

pilgrimage described over the course of the preceding pages. The autobiographical

description of this pilgrimage is intended to provide a measure of context and explanation

for this work. More than this, it is my humble attempt to demonstrate one individual’s

honest struggles with matters that scholars all too quickly relegate to the realm of mere

theoretical concern. Philosophical and religious reflection matter deeply for our

conception of what it means to be human, to live a full life, and to exist at the nexus

between current reality and future hope. But so too do the struggles emergent from such a nexus need deeply to inform one’s philosophical and religious constructs. It is my firm desire and expectation that such reflections will be of some benefit to others and that together we might construct a more hopeful and appropriate articulation of what it means

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truly to be—and to speak about what it means to be—human in the hopeful present

moment.

The Future of the Past in the Present: Reflections on the Status of Hope

Although autobiography of the sort enacted in the previous section may be interesting in its own right, as I noted above, the brief articulation of my own experiences serves another purpose. My reason for reflecting upon the past was intended to help explain the historic context out of which my present concerns regarding hope have slowly emerged. What remains by way of introduction is for me briefly to articulate four assumptions regarding the status of hope in our current, postmodern context. Such assumptions betray a range of convictions that have never been far from my consciousness when writing this dissertation. And, taken together, these assumptions both guide and motivate the method of enquiry that is undertaken throughout the following pages.

Assumption 1:

Hope is often an unpopular and uncommon theme because we lack the communicative resources necessary for speaking of such in our current intellectual and cultural climate.

Existing as we do in a postmodern and increasingly-globalized world, we often

find ourselves struggling to understand what it means to have hope in the contemporary context. The great narratives of the past—be they narratives of economic progress, social

reform, global unity, or spiritual revival—now seem somehow too optimistic and too

shortsighted (Lyotard, 1984). Though living in a time of technological advance and

economic prosperity, characteristic features of our world instead often center around

conflict, terror, division, and loss (Tannen, 1998). Hope for one nation signals despair for

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others. One observes this in a striking way by considering the sweatshops of the third

world or the increasing threat of global warming—to name just a couple of obvious examples. Though the Cold War is thankfully over, a new era of global dissent has begun: the reign of terror and the rise of radical Islam. In these ways—and many more

besides—hope is challenged, and regularly takes a back seat to the sustenance and

management of discord and disagreement.

If social, political, and economic conditions are not enough to stifle hope’s

blossoming, one need only to understand recent developments in the history of

philosophy to discover yet another impediment to hope. Although certain elements of

philosophy have long been at odds with human hope, recent centuries have witnessed a

rise in critical and even destructive emphases within philosophical inquiry (Milbank,

1990; Bertens, 1995; Kerr, 1986; James, 1995; Rorty, 1989; Lyotard, 1984; Grenz, 1996).

The seeds of such critiques, indeed, trace back at least to the Enlightenment, a time when

hope grounded upon faith was largely supplanted by a hope rooted in humankind itself

(Buckley, 1987; Copleston, 1994; Stumpf, 1999). More recently, the limitations of

modernist optimism have become all too evident, often giving rise to the dissolution of

hope in humankind. And since a considerable number of postmodern critiques of religion,

ethics, history, theology and the like have continued to challenge the assumptions upon

which hope is based, there seems to be few firm bases upon which to ground one’s hope.

Hope is therefore often challenged or underdeveloped in our 21st century world

(Goudzwaard, Vennen & Heemst, 2007; Volf & Katerberg, 2004; Moltmann, 1964;

Bauckham & Hart, 1999; Booth 2004; Hunter, 1991).

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As I reflect upon my own struggles to understand the category of hope, I often

experience a peculiar unrest and disquiet. Such disquiet is grounded upon, and yet not entirely explained by, the situation addressed in the preceding two paragraphs. For even consumed as I am by questions of hope, I regularly find myself lacking the resources

necessary for understanding or articulating the hope that is within me. This is not to say

that I doubt that in which I hope. On the contrary! It is, however, to say that the more my

hope becomes grounded in something other than truth and certainty, the less capable I am

of articulating the basis of my hope in a meaningful way (Wittgenstein, 1929).

For many citizens of postmodern society, the inability to articulate the content and

implications of hope produces, in large part, hope’s decreasingly-common manifestation

as a meaningful and robust part of contemporary public discourse. It is not that people

fail to hope. Rather, we fail to talk about it meaningfully because (a) hope is oftentimes

surprisingly mundane (Really, anyone who goes to work or disciplines a child has hope

for and in something), and (b) the moorings we used to share that gave a common

purpose to both our pedantic and lofty hopes are regularly no longer shared. Discussing

personal grounds for hope is not only performing the difficult task of probing deeply into

matters of faith that may have long ago been abandoned, but it is also risking somehow

stepping on the diverging moorings of someone else. And these foundations, as we will

see in the following chapters, are intensely personal. And so, rather than attempt to take

something so common to humanity that it defies theorization and so personal that it

rebuffs discourse, we hope, but we do not know what motivates our longing or often even

what we long for. That is, the relative obscurity of hope emerges from uncertainty

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regarding how to speak of hope in our postmodern context. The obscurity of talk of hope emerges because, as Rorty would say, we fail to possess a “final vocabulary” sufficient to the task at hand (Rorty, 1989). For now that traditional communicative appeals to truth,

certainty, and consensus have gone largely by the wayside, the hopeful individual must

uncover new ways of speaking about hopeful categories and ways of being in the world.

In the “Preface” to the paperback edition of Jürgen Moltmann’s (1974) book

entitled The Crucified God, the author observes that “When freedom is near, the chains

begin to chafe” (p. ix). The implication, of course, is that as hope grows, one will struggle

all the more to realize concrete manifestations of that in which one hopes. As indebted as

I am to Moltmann on this point, I am afraid there may be another possible result of

hope’s presence—a result that emerges when there exists an inverse relationship between

the fullness of one’s hopes and his or her ability to articulate such fullness in a

meaningful way. Sadly, and all too often, when hope appears on the horizon, and one knows not what to make of it, one often retreats to his chains. For the struggle of freeing oneself from such chains quickly appears impossible, far too painful, and even unspeakable. Hope may have been born, but in an instant its future was denied existence because of an inability to realize the fruits of hope’s promise.

All too often, it seems to me, present hope finds itself facing a similar fate in our postmodern context. For even as humanity calls out for sources of hope, broader social, cultural, and philosophical preconditions make it appear impossible meaningfully to speak of such hope in the present. To put the matter just a bit differently, hope’s obscurity, it seems to me, emerges as a result of an understandable and deep-seated

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constellation of communicative problems and confusions. By and large, our society has

lost the communicative resources necessary for meaningfully speaking of a category like

hope in our postmodern context. And this, I am convinced, is one of the principal reasons

for hope’s regular decline in our midst. Hope calls out for its future, and we know not

how to speak of it. And this, ironically enough, leads to hope’s negation—the beginnings

of despair.

Assumption 2:

Despite the challenges facing hope’s meaningful articulation, hope continues to be necessary and relevant for the flourishing of contemporary society.

This second assumption emerges despite currents in contemporary life. Why, I

regularly wonder, do I bother getting out of bed in the morning? Why do I continue to

seek knowledge and understanding in a world that increasingly deprivileges such

notions? Why do I keep chasing after the call of duty and continuing to base my hope

upon that which is not entirely justifiable or concrete? Partly these are cynical questions that I find myself asking in the face of the absurdities of postmodern existence. Despite their cynical tone, however, such questions are remarkably serious—questions that sometimes shake me to my very foundations.

I regularly ask my students why they keep getting out of bed in the morning and what motivates their struggles. I particularly enjoy inflicting this question upon those students who come to me with questions about what they should do with their lives, how they should occupy themselves, and what sorts of futures they should pursue. Being unable to answer these questions for my students, I turn the question back on them, hoping that they might begin to interrogate why and what—and maybe even if—they

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hope. For answering such a question demands that one stare in the face of his or her own

existence, interrogate his or her most foundational assumptions, and critique his or her

own way of being in the world.

Invariably, my students struggle to provide an answer to the questions before them. And, admittedly, I sometimes struggle to provide meaningful answers myself. In spite of such evident ineptitude, however, one truth remains constant. Neither I nor my students have yet to challenge the meaningfulness of the question. Neither I nor my students have found good reason to suggest that these are questions not worth answering or questions that may profitably be avoided. And so until convinced otherwise, I remain convinced that hope is neither an incidental nor dispensable feature of human existence.

The great poet, Dante Alighieri, recognized this truth and depicted hell accordingly. A sign, standing at the entrance to Dante’s hell, reads “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here” (Dante, 1982, p. 42).

Though I have been focusing on the hopes of particular individuals in the preceding paragraphs, one must not mistakenly think that I am concerned only with the personal and existential nature of hope. For hope is not only essential for one’s personal existence. So too is hope crucial to the health of society and the movement of history.

Isocrates may have been correct to suggest that “Because there has been implanted in us the power to persuade each other and to make clear whatever we desire … we have come together and founded cities and made laws and invented arts; and, generally speaking, there is no institution devised by man which the power of speech has not helped us to establish” (Isocrates, in Brummett, 2000, pp. 40-41). Yet whatever power is bestowed

22 upon individual humans as a result of its ability to communicate, such power remains unguided and diffuse at the social and cultural level so long as it is not affirmed, bolstered, and sustained by the local and collective hopes of humanity.

Consider nearly any of history’s greatest social movements, spiritual revivals, social and political conquests, technological and scientific revolutions, philosophical and cultural achievements—even if and when misguided, such developments in history consistently emerge as a response to discernable, embodied, and collective manifestations of human hope (Dewey, 1963; Dewey, 1954; West, 1999; West, 1993a; West, 1993b;

West, 1989). William James speaks truth when observing, “The thing of deepest… significance in life does seem to be its character of progress, or that strange union of reality with ideal novelty which it continues from one moment to another to present”

(1977c, p. 657). Though James does not speak here of hope per se, the notion is, it seems to me, just below the surface. For the very idea of progress itself implies movement toward a desirable state of affairs, a movement toward that which is better, a movement toward the future in which one’s hopes have been placed.

In recent years, the loss of collective and societal hope has been a common theme in American public discourse (Clinton, 1996; Obama, 2004, 2006; Booth, 2004; Hunter,

1991). And such a lack of collective hope has been partly responsible for an increasingly fragmented and polarized public sphere (Rorty, 1989). Indeed, one of the greatest challenges emerging from postmodern critiques of modernity results from the dissolutions of so many hopeful modern narratives upon which contemporary society was built. John Gibbins (1989) speaks to this issue, asking:

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The problematic is how, if at all, order, meaning, legitimacy and morality can

exist once absolutism, objectivity, certainty, foundations, commensurability, unity

and the prioritized self, are deconstructed? Put more positively, how are society,

politics and morality possible when we accept partiality, relativity, uncertainty,

the absence of foundations, incommensurability, pluralism, fragmentation and

polyculturalism? (p. 15)

Though Gibbins does not say so explicitly, the point is clear enough: one of the greatest needs emergent in postmodernity is the struggle to retain hope in a constellation of common societal goals, even as society persistently undercuts historic foundations upon which such hopeful notions have rested. Precisely because of the fact that such commonality fails to exist, contemporary society continues to exhibit the sort of internal struggle that my autobiographical account attempted to describe. Hope continues to be necessary, and yet the historic bases of such hope are increasingly trampled under foot day after day in contemporary public discourse. And so contemporary public life grows increasingly fragmented, groundless, and without collective hope.

Recently, prominent American politicians have begun to champion the theme of hope and its indispensability in public and political life, a fact that I believe lends credence to my assumption that hope continues to be necessary and relevant even in the postmodern world. President William Jefferson Clinton became enamored of this theme nearly twenty years ago. The year 1992 saw the production of Clinton’s campaign film entitled The Man from Hope in which, according to Shawn J. Parry Giles & Trevor Parry-

Giles (2002), “Bill Clinton’s campaign for the presidency was constructed as a quest for

24 an idealistic vision of a better nation for all its people” (p. 52). Between Hope and History followed in 1996, a book that was an important element of Clinton’s efforts to secure reelection, and that was no less centered on an idealistic and hopeful vision for America.

President Clinton’s deference to hope speaks to the persistent need for such a category even in the face of historic challenges to hope’s foundations. And perhaps due in part to Clinton’s success, 2008 presidential hopeful, Barack Obama, has similarly leaned upon the possibility of hope in an often hopeless era. Note the words of the Illinois

Senator in the closing moments of his now famous 1994 DNC Keynote address:

In the end, [hope] is God’s greatest gift to us, the bedrock of this nation; the belief

in things not seen; the belief that there are better days ahead … I believe that as

we stand on the crossroads of history, we can make the right choices, and meet

the challenges that face us. Tonight, if you feel the same energy I do, the same

urgency I do, the same passion I do, the same hopefulness I do—if we do what we

must do, then I have no doubt that… this country will reclaim its promise, and out

of this long political darkness a brighter day will come. (Obama, July 27, 2004)

Much more will be said in Chapter 4 about Obama’s commitment to the category of hope. Here, I invoke Obama and his hopeful Democratic predecessor, President

Clinton, as a way of pointing toward the continued power and necessity of hope even in our present postmodern culture. It is my firm conviction that Bill Clinton and Barack

Obama recognize precisely the point I am assuming here: much of the American (and global) public hunger for something in which to hope, something to unite them, and

25 something to create sustainable dissonance that might produce hopeful futures in spite of the inevitable differences that characterize the contemporary world.

Given my assumption about the continued necessity and relevance of hope, I do not find it at all surprising that some of the era’s most successful politicians have chosen to enact a political rhetoric characterized by hope. Of course, important questions about the status of such hope remain to be answered. Do individuals such as Clinton and

Obama merely signal a return to misguided modernist hopes in disguise? Or, are such politicians instead discovering a new way of reflecting and creating hope in the postmodern era? One might also question whether or not politicians such as Clinton and

Obama are genuinely interested in lending substance to the category of hope. The cynic may suggest that the category of hope remains powerful for such individuals precisely because it is a vacuous term, a term that politicians may employ even as they avoid the actual creation of hopeful futures in and among the lives of the general public (Eisenberg,

2007). The rhetorical deference to hope, it might seem to some, is no hope at all. On the contrary, some might suggest that contemporary American political rhetoric regarding hope serves as an imitation or shadow of a genuine hope that ultimately can only emerge from somewhere beyond the political sphere.

To be sure, the kinds of questions raised in the preceding paragraph demand careful and sustained attention. And from time to time, I will take up such questions in the following chapters. My principal reason for invoking Clinton and Obama at this point is because I find them to be illustrative of one of the central assumptions motivating this project. Whatever one eventually concludes about Clinton and Obama’s political rhetoric,

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the success of such individuals suggest that even in its darkest hours, hope calls out for recognition, that society demands and is sustained by hope, and that political, social, and moral solidarity is fueled by the capital emergent from the existence of collective hope.

Failure to have hope is a failure to be fully human. And so hope remains indispensible even as it is challenged and undermined.

Assumption 3:

Contemporary society struggles to articulate a robust vision of hope as a result of critical misunderstandings concerning the implications of postmodern critiques of knowledge.

I have already begun to address this third assumption in the opening section of the current chapter. And, in Chapter 2, I will consider this matter in even greater detail. For now, let me offer a fairly condensed version of the argument that I will articulate more carefully below.

As I began to argue above, there remains little doubt that our postmodern condition is characterized by a dissolution of faith in claims to certainty, consensus, and objectivity. What has been gaining adherents for decades within professional academic circles is now increasingly echoed by popular and lay audiences as well. “There is no universal truth.” “What’s true for you may not be true for me.” “Truth is a fiction.” “Not even science can be objectively true!” These kind of claims, which may have seemed nearly heretical in the high modernist era, have now become loci communes for discussions concerning the status and nature of postmodern truth.

Although there are many reasons for the growth of the kind of sentiments offered in the preceding paragraph, such statements often produce what I consider to be a deeply problematic misunderstanding of postmodern critiques of knowledge. Not surprisingly,

27 one such problematic misunderstanding provides the subject matter for this dissertation: the assumption that the demise of objective knowledge must necessarily produce the destruction of hope.

What I will argue in the following chapters is that the postmodern mind has regularly and ironically failed to distance itself from a decidedly modernist set of assumptions concerning the unity of knowledge, duty, and hope. And it is such a continued deference to this critical modernist assumption that produces the sort of nihilism concerning hope to which I have been referring. The logic of this persistent postmodern assumption has been alluded to above, and goes something like this: since (a) hope can persist only if firmly grounded in epistemological certainty, and (b) one can no longer be certain of his or her claims to sure knowledge, then (c) one must similarly abandon assumptions regarding hope. Of course, this argument only gets off the ground so long as one assumes the first premise—and this is a critical misunderstanding of postmodern thought that I am here seeking to isolate and call into question. Reflecting back upon my autobiographical reflections offered above, one recognizes that it was precisely this misunderstanding that for so long characterized my own thinking. Where and whenever such an assumption prevails, I am convinced that postmodern thinking actually fails to be postmodern enough (for a similar argument, see Shepherd, 2001). For the assumption that there exists some sort of unified and mutually constitutive domain of knowledge, duty, and hope hearkens back in very important—and, I think, very problematic—ways to the misguided modernist penchant for system building along with its accompanying search for indubitable foundations of philosophical enquiry.

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As I will argue below, I am increasingly convinced that when taken to its fullest

manifestation, postmodern thought actually frees duty and hope from the unnecessary

constraints inherent within much modernist epistemology and creates a wide open space

for their paralogic communicative construction. This notion of paralogic communication

is the subject of Chapter 2 and emerges from my constructive re-reading of The

Postmodern Condition. When referring to paralogic communication, I am referring to a

type of communication which does not assume that it is its own justification. Paralogic

communication is therefore certain without being exclusionary, is precise without being

exhaustive, and allows for disagreement even as it assumes the provisional truth of its own position. As such, paralogic communication challenges existing logics, calls for inventive community in the face of disagreement, and therefore critiques existing structures that do not operate in a paralogic fashion. Employing Lyotard and Rorty in

Chapter 2 as my primary discussion partners, I explain that such a paralogic communication is deeply narrative in nature and attempts to recognize the inherent limitations of knowledge claims yet without devolving into hopeless nihilism or utter relativism.

As I will argue in more detail below, I think that paralogy provides a way of speaking about human hope that rejects the assumption that such notions are mutually entailing. Pursuant to this end, I will argue that Lyotard himself calls precisely for the sort of fragmentation of knowledge, duty, and hope to which I am referring here. That many have read Lyotard’s account as inimical to notions such as duty and hope speaks precisely to the sort of misunderstanding that I find among many proponents of

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postmodern sensibilities. As a way of countering this unfortunate tendency—and as a

way of reinvigorating the possibility of rearticulating hope in the present—I argue that

when properly understood, Lyotard paves the way for a helpful paralogic articulation of

shared lives and melioristic futures (James, 1977e). Rorty, I argue, extends the project

only briefly sketched by Lyotard in the closing pages of The Postmodern Condition, and does so through his use of irony and narrative discourse. Demonstrating and extending such theses will occupy much of my energy in the following chapters.

Assumption 4:

The inability to speak meaningfully about hope threatens to undermine the strength and vision of American Democracy itself.

Up to this point, I have been speaking largely about the religious and moral nature of hope. And though I did briefly raise the issue of hope and democracy above when referring to President Clinton and Senator Barack Obama, several important points were left unsaid in the preceding discussion. Most important for our purposes is how or whether the waning of hope challenges the foundations upon which the American democratic form of government was founded. Similarly—and far more important—one wonders whether American democracy can retain its strength and primacy in a postmodern world wherein hope is significantly challenged and oftentimes absent.

As noted in a previous section of this chapter, far from being merely a religious possibility or a moral ideal, hope represents a significant—though albeit amorphous— political and social force. John Dewey, in his influential (1939) text entitled Freedom and

Culture speaks implicitly about the founding fathers’ views concerning human nature, freedom, and the hopeful possibilities that emerge when human nature is provided with

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the proper conditions in which to flourish. Speaking of “the original democratic theory,”

Dewey (1939) explains that such theory “postulated a widespread desire in human nature

for personal freedom, for release from dominion over personal beliefs and conduct that is

exercised from sources external to the individual” (pp. 53-54). Dewey continues, “The

heart of the doctrine as a theory was a virtual identification of freedom with the very state

of being an individual; the extent of freedom that existed was taken to be the measure of

the degree in which individuality was realized” (54, italics added).

There are at least three things to be noted about the brief treatment of freedom and

human nature offered above. First, it is worth noting how challenges to objective knowledge have significantly altered historic understandings of concepts such as “human nature.” Once thought to be a static and even metaphysically-grounded reality, the idea of human nature has more recently been understood as resulting from numerous and decidedly non-innate forces in culture. Here, one observes yet another manifestation of the fallout from the demise of objective knowledge. Though I have focused the reader’s attention specifically upon the concept of hope, Dewey’s treatment of democracy, freedom, and human nature show us that many other viable candidates could have been given similar treatment.

Second, and precisely because of challenges to the concept of human nature, the alleged symbiosis between freedom and human nature is likewise significantly challenged. In the quote above, Dewey recounted the alleged-relationship between freedom and human nature that was generally assumed in early democratic theory. To put the matter simply, the early democratic theorists thought that human nature, when

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unfettered from exterior constraints, would quite naturally produce desirable and even

hopeful states of affairs. And so a liberal democratic form of governance was quite

understandably enacted by the founding fathers, a governmental form that relied heavily

upon the free and virtuous exercise of human freedom in service to the betterment of humankind and civic welfare. Notice, however, that in the face of challenges to the concept of human nature, the democratic form of governance initiated by the founding fathers may appear to be, perhaps, a bit less wise than originally thought. For if human

nature is not a given entity, not a static or generally-consistent kind of thing, then human

nature may or may not provide the checks and balances that are necessary to restrain

humankind in the face of unparalleled freedom. Dewey (1939) himself writes, “The

democratic tradition … was so closely allied with beliefs about human nature and about

the moral ends which political institutions should serve, that a rude shock occurs when

these affiliations breakdown” (p. 5).

Oversimplifying a very complex matter, one may suggest that the American

democratic form of governance works quite well only so long as people tend to be

similar, only so long as something more or less like a common “human nature”

prevails—or, alternatively, so long as significant norms (and accompanying sanctions)

exist to restrain the unfettered enactment of human freedom. The recent demise of

objective knowledge significantly challenges this tenuous balance between “human

nature” and unfettered human freedom. And so one discovers an odd tension at the very

heart of American democratic theory and process. Human freedom continues to play a

significant role in the foundations of American democracy, yet is increasingly a

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polysemous and even a vacuous term. Dewey (1939) himself recognizes this tension and

asks, “If belief in natural rights and natural laws as the foundation of free government is

surrendered, does the latter have any other moral basis?” (p. 5). As Dewey further

explains, this question can in no way be construed merely as an inquiry into the status of

human nature. On the contrary, Dewey (1939) explains, “The problems behind the

questions asked, the forces which give the question their urgency, go beyond the

particular beliefs which form the early psychological and moral foundations of

democracy” (p. 5). The point for Dewey, it seems, is that challenges to the existence of

“human nature” represent challenges to the entire democratic enterprise itself.

The third point to be made about early democratic theory, human nature, and

freedom returns us specifically to the topic of hope. In the preceding paragraph I have

briefly explained how challenges to the concept of “human nature” may cause significant

problems for the coherence of early democratic theory. So too do such challenges

threaten the very concept of democratic or political hope—a concept that has long been

vitally important to American democratic theory and practice. Reflecting upon the nature

of American democracy, notice what Dewey (1929) writes, “In the long run democracy

will stand or fall with the possibility of maintaining [faith in the potentialities of human

nature] and justifying it by works” (p. 126). Or, as Dewey (1929) writes elsewhere: “The

cause of democratic freedom is the cause of the fullest possible realization of human

potentialities” (p. 129). In spite of the potential challenges raised above, it would nevertheless seem that Dewey continues to believe that hope itself is a viable, possible, and continued characteristic of America’s liberal democracy. What such a hope consists

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of, however, absolutely cannot, for Dewey, be consubstantial with the hope of the

founding fathers. Dewey’s conception of hope, to state the matter in terms of the

preceding several paragraphs, must emerge from something other than the symbiosis

between human freedom and an innate human nature. Though such a mechanism may

have produced human hope in prior eras, such is the longer the case. Dewey is all too

aware of this truth, a fact that is evidenced throughout the pages of Freedom and Culture.

In fact, I do not believe that I am overstating the matter to suggest that a great deal of

Dewey’s expansive corpus struggles to understand how democratic processes might

continue to engender hope, possibility, and progress within the lives of the American

public even as historic articulations of such notions are challenged by 20th century life.

As a way of negotiating between past treatments of democracy, freedom, human

nature, and hope—to name just a few of the many themes treated by Dewey—the

preeminent American pragmatist recognizes the need for shifting vocabularies and

linguistic redescriptions of many of America’s most fundamental and historic categories.

Speaking of the founders’ description of justice and morality, for instance, Dewey (1939)

admits: “We cannot now well use their vocabulary. Changes in knowledge have outlawed

the significations of the words they commonly used” (p. 130). In another extended

passage, Dewey is even more explicit about the necessity of linguistic redescription when

speaking about American democracy and the hope that might result from such. Dewey writes:

The words in which [Thomas Jefferson] stated the moral basis of free institutions

have gone out of vogue. We repeat the opening words of the Declaration of

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Independence, but unless we translate them they are couched in a language that,

even when it comes readily to our tongue, does not penetrate today to the brain.

He wrote: “These truths are self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they

are endowed by their Creator with inherent in unalienable rights; that among these

are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Today we are wary of anything

purporting to be self-evident truth; we are not given to associating politics with

the plans of the Creator; the doctrine of natural rights which governed his style of

expression has been weakened by historic and by philosophic criticism. To put

ourselves in touch with Jefferson’s position we have therefore to translate the

word “natural” into moral. (156).

Dewey’s point is simple enough, even if the consequences of this position initiate

considerable complexities and endless debate. And, in one sense, Dewey is here making

an argument that is quite analogous to my own. Upon reading Freedom and Culture, one

might imagine Dewey making the following claim: “Challenges to objective knowledge

do not signal the demise of the theoretical bases upon which American democracy has

been constructed.” Of course, Dewey does not make his argument in quite this way. And, admittedly, Dewey is not foregrounding the epistemological problem as I am in this particular project. Instead, Dewey’s concern is to understand how social and economic processes have challenged historic theoretical foundations of democracy. The methodological move, however, is strikingly similar to the one I am seeking to undertake here.

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Dewey is at once a critic, a prophet, and an experimentalist with American

democratic culture. Far from abandoning hope, Dewey places considerable emphasis

upon this notion, and seeks to understand the American experience precisely in light of

the category of possibility, the category of hope. Failing to do this is, for Dewey, a failure

to enact the peculiarly American experiment known as democracy. Failing hopefully to experiment with the possibilities of humankind, to put the matter slightly differently, is a failure to enact a genuinely American vision of democratic society. And Dewey would have no such thing.

Though I have not exhaustively addressed each plank in the argument made in

this section, the overall landscape should by now be fairly clear. Insofar as (a) American

democracy relies heavily upon the theme of hope and (b) hope is challenged in

contemporary culture, then (c) the viability of American democracy itself is in peril

unless one can recover meaningful ways to speak about hope in our present postmodern

context. It should by now be evident that I am convinced of the truth of each of these

premises. Nevertheless, I remain decidedly unconvinced that hope must be abandoned—

either religious or secular hope. It is, of course, for precisely this reason that I have

initiated the project undertaken in his dissertation: to reflect upon what it means

meaningfully to speak of hope in the present postmodern context.

As John Dewey (1939), the ever hopeful prophet of American democracy,

reminds us: “At the end as at the beginning, the democratic method is as fundamentally

simple and as immensely difficult as is the energetic, unflagging, unceasing creation of an ever-present new road upon which we can walk together” (p. 176). What remains is to

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discover whether or not a meaningful conception of hope may indeed continue to provide

a foundation upon which this “ever present new road” can continue to be constructed

among an increasingly diverse and skeptical public.

Taken together, the preceding pages represent my initial thoughts concerning the topic at hand. The themes present here have occupied the bulk of my thinking and living over the course of the last decade. And so they will undoubtedly emerge again—both in explicit and implicit ways—in the pages that follow. What remains is to demonstrate the implications of such assumptions and to point the reader to those ways in which such assumptions might profitably illuminate the present. It is, of course, my wish that such demonstrating and pointing will itself provoke all manner of paralogic responses that themselves speak wisely into the present and that initiate the possibility of hopeful futures.

Summary & Overview of the Project

The remainder of this project will unfold in three sections. The first section consists of Chapters 1 and 2 wherein I introduce the problem to which my project responds, establish my methodology, and survey relevant literature that bears upon the argument I develop throughout the remainder of the text.

Chapter 2 accomplishes two principal objectives. I begin by conducting what I describe as a “critical and constructive re-reading” of Jean François Lyotard’s (1984) text entitled The Postmodern Condition. In so doing, I briefly outline central features of

Lyotard’s work, paying particular attention to what Lyotard refers to throughout his text as “the problem of legitimation.” Although it is possible to read Lyotard’s claim

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concerning postmodern incredulity toward metanarratives as both (a) a repudiation of objective knowledge and (b) as an impediment to the existence of genuine hope, I seek to present an alternative reading. The first claim is, I argue, supported by Lyotard’s writing.

The second, I posit, is decidedly not.

As a way of substantiating my claims, and using the writing of James K. A. Smith

(2001, 2006) as my primary interlocutor, I show how the term “metanarrative,” as

employed by Lyotard, should be understood in a far more specific way than is often the

case. Following Lyotard, I argue that a metanarrative is not merely a big story that makes

normative or even discriminatory claims. Rather, metanarratives are the product of a philosophical language game that simultaneously assumes and seeks to perform its own indubitability. As such, the fundamental feature of such metanarratives consists in the fact that they “mask their own particularity ... and deny their narrative ground even as they proceed on it as a basis” (Smith, 2006, p. 69). What the dissolution of metanarratives demands, I argue, is the creation of hope (as opposed to the discovery of such) by creative and communicative means—means not emergent from appeals to universal, indubitable, and static claims which are self-referentially “validated” by their proponents

(Rorty, 1989).

Building upon my constructive re-reading of Lyotard and his treatment of metanarratives, I proceed in Chapter 2 to develop my contention that postmodern incredulity toward metanarratives need not undercut statements of hope. To be sure, I concede, the status of such statements is importantly transformed in light of Lyotard’s argument. However, such entities need not be abandoned, disparaged, or relegated to the

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realm of fiction in the postmodern era. In fact, in dialogue with the closing portions of

The Postmodern Condition, I argue that Lyotard himself calls for the melioristic and

inventive communicative construction of hope in the present, postmodern context. Such a

call, I argue, emerges from Lyotard’s insistence upon what he calls “paralogy” as the

postmodern means of legitimation.

As I explain in greater detail in Chapter 2, paralogy consists of a type of legitimation: (a) that is not bound by preexistent logics yet that is not for that reason

utterly illogical; (b) that emerges as a result of decidedly communicative and narrative

means; (c) that seeks community rather than consensus or synthesis; (d) that tolerates and

even celebrates incommensurability and disagreement; (e) that fuels, fosters, and emerges

from the unfettered human imagination; and (f) that destabilizes present structures,

logics, and dominant narrative discourses.

One of the reasons for the existence of sloppy appropriations of Lyotard stems

from the ambiguity and brevity contained within his own account of “paralogy.”

Recognizing the limitations of Lyotard’s writing for the full-blown development of a

paralogic rhetoric of hope, I proceed in Chapter 2 to supplement and augment Lyotard’s

suggestive conclusion to The Postmodern Condition. Employing Richard Rorty’s liberal

democratic (1989) call for the ironic use of narrative discourse, I show how one of this

century’s preeminent American philosophers retains a deference to hope while adopting a

deeply pragmatist—and therefore deeply nominalist, anti-foundationalist, and

historicist—view of truth. The resulting theoretical grid is, I posit, justification for

sustaining the kind of hope that I described in the previous section—a justification that is

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rooted in postmodern critiques of knowledge, that privileges communicative (and

particularly narrative) means as the generative mechanism of hope, and that allows for the sort of paralogic quality introduced by Lyotard.

In one sense, by the end of Chapter 2 the central argument of my dissertation has

already been made. Of course, I have done so only in germinal and suggestive form. And

so what remains is to bolster, illustrate, and develop the bold claims initiated in this

second chapter. I begin this process in the second section of my dissertation (Chapters 3

and 4) wherein I seek both to illustrate and to develop the central lineaments of the

arguments initiated in the first two chapters. In this second section of the dissertation, my

work takes on a somewhat changed flavor. For here, I am a bit less concerned to provide

the sort of circumspect theoretical account characteristic of Chapters 1 and 2. My goal is

instead to consider how various themes introduced in the first section of this project

might be illustrated, developed, and even problematized by considering specific

enactments of religious hope in public life. It is in this second section, therefore, that my

method becomes more directly hermeneutical and descriptive in tone. Much of this shift

emerges from my decision to engage two specific communicative artifacts. Each of the

artifacts considered represents a form either of rejection or acceptance of the sort of

paralogic narrative legitimation introduced by Lyotard and Rorty. My goal, therefore, is

to illustrate such iterations in dialogue with specific communicative exemplars.

In Chapter 3, my attention turns to the writing of James Dobson, a contemporary

evangelical figure who, both for American and non-American Christians alike, articulates

what many consider to be a deeply hopeful manifestation of religious belief in the

40 postmodern context. Though Dobson himself does not purport to be a theologian, I argue that he nevertheless has been deeply influential among American Evangelicals in shaping public and private understandings of numerous theological constructs. Among these are notions such as the family, marriage, gender, sexuality, and the nature of political involvement. And, as I argue, such theological constructs are bolstered by deeply held assumptions about the nature of truth, history, reality, meaning, and other associated metatheoretical categories.

At first glance, the sort of concerns articulated in the previous paragraph might seem a bit tangential to my consideration of paralogic hope in the 21st century. As I demonstrate in chapter 3, this could not be further from the truth. By beginning with

Dobson, I am able to provide an example of contemporary religious rhetoric that is largely unresponsive to the sort of concerns initiated by my discussion of Lyotard and

Rorty. Using Dobson’s treatment of homosexuality as my principal means of demonstration, I show how Dobson remains committed to a metanarrative frame as a way of legitimating his varied appeals against homosexuality and its increased prominence in public life. To state the matter just a bit differently, I show how Dobson has rejected the critical and nominalist turn that I described by way of the autobiographical account offered in the opening section of this chapter.

What I argue in chapter 3 is that Dobson attempts to legitimate his various religious, cultural, and even political claims by appeal to the kind of foundationalist epistemological and metaphysical constructs that both Lyotard and Rorty reject. In particular, I show how Dobson’s treatment of homosexuality relies heavily upon what I

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describe as perceived ontologically-stable and self-referentially true categories that

emerge from Dobson’s articulation of Christian belief and practice. More important—and consistent with the character of metanarratives as described by Lyotard—Dobson’s rhetoric simultaneously performs and assumes the alleged-certainty of his metanarrative frame. As such, I argue that Dobson’s rhetoric regarding homosexuality is an exemplary—though, in my opinion, ultimately unsuccessful—attempt to legitimate the

Christian faith by deference to a metanarrative frame. Of course, this is not somehow to suggest that Dobson’s religious rhetoric should be disallowed in the public sphere. I do

suggest, however, that attempts similar to Dobson’s need more carefully to reckon with

the kind of critical apparatus developed by Lyotard and Rorty. To state the matter just a

bit differently: Dobson’s theological rhetoric very likely will, and perhaps even should,

continue to thrive in American public life. Continuing to suggest that such theological

rhetoric may be legitimated (to borrow Lyotard’s verbiage) or is absolutely and

undeniably true (to borrow from Dobson’s parlance) seems increasingly dubious if not

outright foolish.

In Chapter 4, I turn my attention to presidential hopeful Barack Obama’s rhetoric

concerning the hopeful role that religion may play in public life. Emerging from one of

the most hotly contested presidential primaries in American history, Barack Obama has

regularly foregrounded the theme of religion and politics in a way that is largely

uncharacteristic of Democratic (and even most Republican) candidates for national

political offices. Commenting on typical Democratic responses to the issue of religion in

public life, Obama recently remarked that “I think we make a mistake when we fail to

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acknowledge the power of faith in … the lives of the American people – and I think it’s

time that we join a serious debate about how to reconcile faith with our modern,

pluralistic democracy” (Obama, June 28, 2006). Numerous other examples of Obama’s

deference to religion exist, and I survey some of these examples within the pages of

Chapter 4. My goal in this chapter is therefore to demonstrate that Obama’s performance

of religious themes, language, and substance emerges in a manner consistent with the sort

of metatheoretical assumptions variously exemplified both by Lyotard and Rorty.

As I argue in Chapter 4, Obama represents an example of postmodern political

practice and communication. Although I believe that I could have demonstrated this particular aspect of Obama’s rhetoric in a number of different ways, given the focus of my dissertation I have quite naturally chosen Obama’s treatment of hope and religion as my exemplar. In the interest of narrowing the focus of my inquiry, I turn my attention specifically to Obama’s (2006) text The Audacity of Hope as a way of uncovering the centrality of hope that courses throughout his political campaign. Moreover, such a text provides a careful articulation of Obama’s view of the role of religion in public life, a view that I believe corrects fundamental problems inherent in Rorty’s treatment of this matter.

As I argue in chapter 4, Obama’s political vision is organized around a description of America rooted in The Declaration of Independence and that privileges the need for

self-creation and the pursuit of human freedom. Obama, I argue, consistently encourages

his audiences to hope not in a static or universal set of ideas or truths. Instead, Obama

remains steadfast in his call for hope in the possibility of hope itself. In this way, I argue

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that Obama is able to negotiate between historic polarities that are exemplified by the shift from modernity to postmodern thought. And, as a result of such strategies, I suggest

that Obama is able to maintain hope in an increasingly diverse contemporary America

while simultaneously adopting central tenets of postmodern thought.

As I mentioned above, the goal of this second section of my dissertation is to

illustrate varied manifestations of paralogic communication within specific social,

cultural, and political situations. As a result, Chapters 3 and 4 regularly avoid what might

appear to be glaring opportunities for critical engagement with the texts under

consideration. The reader may hope, for instance, that I would spend more time critiquing

Dobson’s view of homosexuality or that I would problematize Obama’s use of ambiguity

as a means for creating hopeful solidarity. These themes—and many others besides—are

indeed important and concern me greatly. Nevertheless, in the second section of my

dissertation such matters are necessarily subordinate to my primary concern of

illustrating how Dobson and Obama variously reject and/or enact paralogic religious

communication that speaks to the issue of hope in our present, postmodern context.

For the reader who remains dissatisfied with my lack of critical engagement with

the texts analyzed in Chapters 3 and 4, it is my hope that Chapter 5 might address this

need at least in part. Chapter 5, the singular chapter in the third and final section of this

dissertation, undertakes two principal objectives. My first objective is to articulate some

of the chief concerns that might be raised about each of the communicative artifacts

considered in the second section of this project. The flavor of this chapter is intentionally

suggestive and provocative, and therefore establishes trajectories for further consideration

44 rather than exhaustively addressing a narrow range of topics. For instance, I briefly counter the argument that Dobson ought to be marginalized or silenced in an increasingly pluralistic society. On the contrary, I suggest that Dobson’s rhetoric acts as an essential agitating force, a force that provokes the sort of paralogic response that Lyotard and

Rorty have in mind. Additionally, I interrogate Obama’s rhetoric of religion, asking whether or not Obama can truly sustain public solidarity in the face of intentional ambiguity and multiplicity. My method here is less intent upon providing decisive answers to these questions. Rather, I hope to explode these questions into manifold others that might provide trajectories for research, critique, and critical application of the theoretical construct I have developed and applied herein. Ultimately, I suggest that paralogy of one sort or another is increasingly necessary in a global, multicultural, and religiously pluralistic world. This concluding chapter is therefore envisioned as an open call for critical and constructive engagement with the germinal ideas offered throughout the pages of this dissertation.

Having offered a wide range of possible applications, developments, and, perhaps, even criticisms of the preceding four chapters, Chapter 5 closes with a summative account of the most central contributions of this project. Though relatively modest in its scope, I suggest that the central argument of this dissertation illuminates one of the most important difficulties facing postmodern theory, religious belief, and public life.

Conclusion

Regardless of one’s religious beliefs, political orientation, or social agenda, it seems impossible to avoid the issue of religious hope and its role in public life. For

45 millennia, cultures around the world have struggled to define the relationship between religion and culture. Such themes have been both ubiquitous and contested throughout our nation’s rich history. And recent social, political, and even military exigencies have drawn our attention once again to the unavoidable nature of religious hope and practice.

Expressions of religious hope are nothing less than statements concerning what it means to be human, what it means to live rightly in community with others, and what it means to organize meaningfully and justly for the sustenance of humankind. Insofar as humanity continues to persist and flourish, religion—and the hopes emergent from such—will undoubtedly remain a contentious and agitating force in public life.

My goal here is neither to ignore such differences nor to diminish one’s certainty in his or her own firmly-held hopes. My concern instead is to discover whether the postmodern condition brings with it the possibility of sustaining such difference and conflicting certainty while simultaneously creating community, solidarity, and shared hope among individuals who will forever disagree about some of the most fundamental aspects of the human condition. Whether or not this is a viable or even a desirable possibility remains to be seen. What is certain, however, is that any such project will succeed or fail based upon the ways in which we speak about the nature of hope. It is for this reason that I have approached the problem of sustaining hope amidst religious pluralism through the lens of communicative inquiry in the following pages. My desire is that such an engagement with rhetoric concerning religion and its role in public life might further illuminate hopeful possibilities for living and acting together in the face of conflicting assessments of some of the most cherished of human beliefs.

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Chapter 2: Hope Reconsidered: Lyotard, Rorty, and Paralogic Communication

Introduction

In the first chapter, I offered a brief autobiographical account of my own pilgrimage toward an interest in the theme of hope. Building upon such self reflections, I also explained a number of basic assumptions that will undergird the entirety of this project. In the process, I likewise began to articulate one of the most central contentions of this project: the existence of hope does not depend upon the persistence of objective knowledge. What I have yet to do, however, is to suggest how a responsible and informed articulation of hope might possibly proceed in our postmodern context. For as we have seen, the very same conditions that create the need for a contemporary rearticulation of hope simultaneously undercut many of the historic foundations upon which hope’s articulation has been constructed. What is necessary, therefore, is to offer a contemporary articulation of hope that neither utterly capitulates to the pessimism of the day nor devolves into irrelevance by way of its failure to account for the serious challenges facing hope’s future. I have, of course, begun this process in the preceding chapter wherein I introduced my definition of hope.

As a way of overcoming the twofold challenge articulated above—the challenge of pessimism and irrelevance—I begin this second section of my project by offering a constructive and critical dialogue with Jean François Lyotard’s (1984) critique of metanarratives as articulated in The Postmodern Condition. To be sure, the story I am telling here could have profitably unfolded in dialogue with numerous contemporary

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figures. Permit me, therefore, to offer just a word or two concerning the choice of

Lyotard as my primary interlocutor in the opening portion of this chapter.

The story that I am telling about hope and metanarratives has itself emerged out

of my own decade-long “discussion” with Lyotard’s claim about “incredulity toward metanarratives.” In the previous sentence, the reader will note that I placed quotes around the word discussion. I have done this because—to be truthful—I never carefully engaged the writing of Lyotard until fairly recently. Instead, I found myself more or less accepting the reading of Lyotard’s position that has now become fairly common among numerous postmodern intellectuals (see Baudrillard, 1994; Bauman, 1991; Rorty, 1998; 1999;

Derrida 1989; 1994; Caputo, 1997; Poirier, 2007; Deblanco, 1999; Bauckham & Hart,

1999; and Johnson, 2004). The kind of sentiment to which I am referring here is what I have described at some length in Chapter 1—the assumption that truth, duty, and hope are inextricably linked to one another and, that as the result of postmodern epistemology, duty and hope must fall by the wayside.

In many ways, the last decade of my scholarship has emerged as a response to the strain of postmodern sentiment alluded to in the preceding paragraph. And, as I have briefly illustrated, such sentiment is often associated with the writing of Jean François

Lyotard. Although such sentiments are not entirely foreign to Lyotard’s writing, neither are they wholly ascribable to Lyotard himself. It was only once I began reading Lyotard more carefully that I came to recognize my overly simplistic understanding of his work.

So too did I come to recognize some interesting resources in Lyotard, resources that rarely accompany the caricature that I had been carrying around with me. And so I

48 suppose that part of my reason for engaging Lyotard is to enact a sort of scholarly apology. To state the matter just a bit differently, I want to clarify a number of confusions that I have mistakenly held about the author of The Postmodern Condition. And, of course, framing my project in discussion with the kind of confusions hinted at above provides fortuitous opportunities for necessary discussions both germane to this project and that extend in important ways beyond this project. For these reasons—as well as the others I will spell out below—Lyotard seemed as apt a dialogue partner as any for the opening section of this chapter.

Given the proliferation of ideas that have been ascribed to Lyotard, it became immediately obvious that I needed a way to rein in the infinite number of potential dialogue partners that might inform this section. So, rather than beginning this chapter by presenting the reader with innumerable divergent appropriations of Lyotard’s text, I have instead taken up the humanist call to return ad fontes. Such a careful and constructive re- reading of Lyotard’s text helps to establish necessary parameters for the discussion that follows. Perhaps more important than this, my reading of Lyotard’s text suggests that many of the solutions to the problem of sustaining hope in the postmodern era are themselves contained within the original formulation provided in The Postmodern

Condition. In fact, as I argue, Lyotard’s “solution” not only leaves room for hope, but likewise seems to call for the inventive and—I daresay—communicative enactment of such in our postmodern context. Moreover, such a communicative “solution” to hopelessness seems (to me, at least) almost to provoke a paralogic response from

Lyotard’s readers.

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Finally—and to return briefly to themes introduced in the opening pages of this

project—I have chosen in this chapter to engage Lyotard and his statements concerning

our postmodern condition because of my firm conviction that this most important of 20th

century texts speaks in relevant and timely ways to the trinity of questions that occupied

Immanuel Kant so many years ago. Although Lyotard himself frames The Postmodern

Condition principally as an inquiry into the status of knowledge, I remain convinced that profound questions concerning duty and hope lurk ever so slightly below the surface. In fact, to risk making a claim that I cannot adequately justify here, it seems to me that the most central and consequential outcomes of The Postmodern Condition concern precisely

the second and third of Kant’s questions.

Before moving on, I wish to say another word or two concerning the relationship

between Lyotard’s The Postmodern Condition and the subject of hope. For although I will be (and have been) speaking about Lyotard and hope throughout this document, one

requires only a cursory reading of The Postmodern Condition to realize that the theme of

hope is not given sustained—or even passing—attention within the pages of the text. And

so the reader might find him or herself wondering how or whether I might justifiably

employ Lyotard’s writing in service to my own. Several responses may be raised in light

of this observation.

First, and regardless of Lyotard’s explicit intent, it remains clear that numerous

individuals have extrapolated the argument of The Postmodern Condition in ways that

challenge hope’s existence and meaningfulness. An overview of this matter has, of

course, already been offered in Chapter 1, and so I will not recount it again here.

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Reflecting back to that treatment, one is reminded that numerous thinkers recognize that

Lyotard’s writing relates in important ways to the nature of hope (Baudrillard, 1994;

Bauman, 1991; Rorty, 1998; 1999; Derrida 1989; 1994; Caputo, 1997; Poirier, 2007;

Deblanco, 1999; Bauckham & Hart, 1999; and Johnson, 2004). At the very least,

therefore, I am speaking to numerous appropriations of Lyotard’s writing—though, as I

will make clearer below, I remain convinced that I am speaking to and about both the

spirit and the content of Lyotard’s own writing as well.

Second, the explicit subject matter of Lyotard’s tome, the “condition of

knowledge in the most highly developed societies,” (p. xxiii) necessarily embroils

Lyotard in the entire trinity of Kantian questions introduced in the preceding chapter.

Such a state of affairs emerges from the Western intellectual tradition’s historic deference to “truth” and “reality” as fundamental themes and organizing principles of thought. To speak of truth is inescapably to (a) speak of the very foundations upon which so very much of Western thought has been built or, alternatively, (b) to initiate a move beyond such foundations—a move that, no matter how hard one might try, cannot escape the long shadow cast by truth. Theorizing the nature of truth is, in one way or another, an engagement with any and all ideas of consequence to the human condition. Hope is therefore necessarily implicated within the pages of The Postmodern Condition.

Third, and most important, Lyotard himself is fundamentally concerned to answer questions about how society might proceed and what culture might look like in a postmodern epistemological climate. In the closing moments of his “Introduction,”

Lyotard writes: “Here is the question: is a legitimation of the social bond, a just society,

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feasible in terms of a paradox analogous to that of scientific activity?” (p. xxv). Although

themes such as the nature of the social bond and the character of a just society ultimately take a backseat to Lyotard’s explicit and broader epistemological concerns, questions about the nature of society and justice are clearly not far from the author’s consciousness.

And, as I have tried to suggest in various ways throughout the preceding pages, to speak about such weighty notions as truth, the social bond, and justice (to name just a few) alternately sustains, challenges, bolsters, or destroys the complex constellation of ideas upon which hope—both personal and communal—has historically been constructed.

In what follows, I will try to shed even further light on the brief claims made in the preceding paragraphs. Most of all, I hope to reinvigorate reflections on the

communicative enactment of hope by appealing to and critically engaging Lyotard

himself. Such a critical engagement is, I argue, indispensable to the health of our

collective understanding of the human condition. So too is such an engagement essential

for a fuller and more humane understanding of what it means to live with hope as

inheritors of the postmodern condition that Lyotard so prophetically described nearly

three decades ago.

Science, Narrative, and the “Problem of Legitimation”

The English translation of La Condition postmoderne first found its way into the

hands of American readers in 1984. Although Jean-François Lyotard had been writing

highly-respected philosophical treatises for well over a decade, The Postmodern

Condition remains the text for which he is best and most widely known. Among

numerous American intellectuals, Lyotard’s text provided both an alleged theoretical

52 basis and an accompanying normative demand for the disruption of numerous metanarrative structures. Hans Bertens (1995) explains,

For the large majority of his American readers Lyotard’s incredulity toward

metanarratives served as welcome additional evidence that such large-scale

ideological constructs as, say, patriarchy, capitalism … or the supposed security

of the white race, fatally lacked legitimation. More in general, Lyotard’s language

games served as an effective weapon against all totalizing pretensions, with the

advantage of apparently leaving the home base of the attacker… safe and intact.

(p. 130)

Whether or not Lyotard intended the sort of effect described above, the fact remains: Lyotard’s critique of metanarratives has now given several generations of scholars both the license and the motivation for overturning many of those metanarrative structures upon which traditional manifestations of hope have rested.

As Lyotard explains in the “Introduction” to The Postmodern Condition, “The object of this study is the condition of knowledge in the most highly developed societies”

(p. xxiii). Lyotard here has in mind those postindustrial societies characterized by considerable technological transformation and innovation. According to Lyotard, the

“nature of knowledge cannot survive unchanged within this context of general transformation” (p. 4). Following “the familiar scenario of the postindustrial society as sketched by Alain Touraine, Daniel Bell, and others” (Bertens, 1995, p. 123), Lyotard suggests several changes in the status of knowledge. Such changes may be summarized as follows: (1) knowledge will be translated into computer language; (2) knowledge will

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become a commodity that may be bought and sold; (3) knowledge will cease to be an end

in itself, but will instead become merely an instrumental good; (4) the scope of knowledge will be limited to that which is translatable into quantifiable information; (5) knowledge will become an entity that is wholly exteriorized from knowing subjects; (6) knowledge will become the principle force of production and; (7) knowledge will become an indispensable player in the worldwide competition for power (pp. 3ff).

Taken together, the summary provided in the previous paragraph constitutes “the working hypothesis defining the field within which [Lyotard] intend[s] to consider the

question of the status of knowledge” (p. 6). In the context described above, scientific

knowledge faces a particularly striking challenge: something that Lyotard refers to

throughout The Postmodern Condition as “the problem of legitimation.” Lyotard

explains, “Legitimation is the process by which a ‘legislator’ dealing with scientific

discourse is authorized to prescribe the stated condition ... determining whether a

statement is to be included in that discourse for consideration by the scientific

community” (p. 8). Stated just a bit differently, the problem of legitimation asks “Who

decides what knowledge is, and who knows what needs to be decided? ( p. 9).

Undoubtedly, the careful reader will already have noticed some very important

connections between the subject matter of Lyotard’s tome and the trinity of Kantian

questions articulated in the opening chapter of this project. For Lyotard, laboring as he

does to answer challenges to the “legitimation crisis,” clearly establishes the question

“What can I know?” as the subject of his study. Of course, Lyotard does not explicitly

use such Kantian verbiage. The fact remains: The Postmodern Condition is a text

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consumed by considerations of epistemological certainty and the numerous contemporary

challenges facing such indubitability in our contemporary context.

Scientific Knowledge: Denotation Disguised as Objective Truth

As Lyotard labors to explain throughout The Postmodern Condition, two different types or classes of knowledge emerge in any careful discussion of the problem of legitimation: scientific knowledge and narrative knowledge. One of the central objectives of Lyotard’s text is, of course, to problematize the assumption that scientific and narrative knowledge are two discreet ways of knowing. When Lyotard analyzes the distinction between scientific and narrative knowledge, therefore, he is attempting to show the important historical and conceptual role this distinction has played for philosophers who are seeking to understand both epistemology and science; he is not trying to reify the historic bifurcation between science and narrative.

Though Lyotard intentionally blurs the distinction between scientific and narrative knowledge as The Postmodern Condition progresses (see Nola & Irzik, 2003), let me briefly speak of them as discreet entities in order to make some important—though ultimately permeable—distinctions. Scientific knowledge, according to Lyotard, has historically been characterized by several features. The most distinctive feature of scientific knowledge is its necessary recourse to denotative language. Building upon

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1958), Lyotard understands denotative language not merely as an incidental convention of language. Instead, Lyotard characterizes denotative language as one of many potential “language games” that comprise human communicative action.

Reflecting upon the nature of Wittgenstein’s language games, Stanley Grenz (1996)

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notes: “[Wittgenstein] asserts that each use of language occurs within a separate and

apparently self-contained system complete with its own rules … [such that] our use of

language is similar to playing a game.” Grenz continues, “Each use of language

constitutes a separate ‘language game,’ and the various games may have little to do with

one another” (p. 113). Scientific discourse represents, for Lyotard, one such

manifestation of the language game. And in this instance, the primacy of denotation constitutes the principle rule of the game.

Historically, science’s deference to denotative language games is attributable to a much broader set of assumptions about the world. At least in part, science has tended

toward precise denotation because of its historic goal: uncovering and articulating statements about the true nature of reality. Such denotative, scientific knowledge “sees

itself as standing outside and above all language games, that is outside and above

narration” (Bertens, 1995, p. 125). Stated a bit differently—and also a bit naïvely—

denotative statements attempt to avoid interpretation, subjectivity, and contestability. A

precise denotative statement therefore ostensibly allows either for the process of

legitimation (what Lyotard characterizes as a feature of 19th-century science) or

falsification (characteristic, according to Lyotard, of 20th century science). In either case,

denotative language offers a description of the world that is susceptible to empirical

testing.

Although Lyotard spends decidedly little time speaking explicitly of metaphysics

in The Postmodern Condition, it is worth my time to spend a moment or two making

explicit that which is only implicitly addressed in Lyotard’s text. For alongside of

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Lyotard’s critique of knowledge is another—and no less foundational—critique of the

Western philosophical tradition. Of course, I am speaking here of recent critiques of the constellation of metaphysical assumptions upon which so much scientific legitimation has traditionally rested. Lyotard himself discusses the move beyond historic metaphysical assumptions as a grounding for scientific legitimation. Lyotard explains that modern science

leaves behind the metaphysical search for a first proof or transcendental authority

as a response to the question: “How do you prove the proof?” Or, more generally,

“Who decides the conditions of truth?” It is recognized that the conditions of

truth, in other words, the rules of the game of science, are imminent in that game,

that they can only be established within the bonds of the debate that is already

scientific in nature, and that there’s no other proof that the rules are good than the

consensus extended to them by the experts. (p. 29)

What Lyotard here describes is a current of postmodern philosophy that had been ruminating for some time. Indeed, signs of the crisis of scientific knowledge “have been accumulating since the end of the 19th century” (p. 39). For even as premodern and

Enlightenment science articulated itself in increasingly certain ways, such certainty was regularly based upon realist assumptions about metaphysical categories. Lurking very close to the surface of Lyotard’s argument, therefore, are a number of implicit assumptions about decidedly metaphysical matters. Indeed, Lyotard’s deference to

Wittgenstein and his notion of language games itself demonstrates Lyotard’s commitment

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to one vitally important strain of metaphilosophical critique dominant throughout the 20th century.

Oversimplifying to the extreme, what nearly all post-foundationalist critiques of metaphysics and epistemology have in common is (a) the rejection of realist metaphysics as a means of undergirding epistemological certainty and (b) a deference to some sort of social and communicative processes as a way of generating the type of categories introduced in the opening chapter of this project. Knowledge, duty, and hope—all of these have lost their status as metaphysical entities among post-foundationalist philosophers (Rorty, 1989). Such categories are instead viewed as detranscendentalized communicative artifacts emerging out of the collective action of varied communities of belief and practice. The pressing question, of course, is how and whether hope may continue to thrive in such a post-foundationalist metaphysical and epistemological climate. As I will explain in greater detail below, narrative discourse plays a central role in articulating such matters within the current intellectual landscape. However, neither is narrative unchallenged by the sorts of critiques lurking just under the surface of Lyotard’s consideration of the status of knowledge in the most highly developed societies. In order to make this point explicit, however, a more careful articulation of Lyotard’s account of narrative knowledge is necessary. Let me, then, briefly consider Lyotard’s treatment of narrative knowledge, focusing particularly upon narrative’s role in the creation of those sorts of categories that were, until recently, closely tethered to the realm of metaphysics.

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Narrative Knowledge: Self-Legitimation by Way of Stories

Whereas scientific knowledge has been historically characterized principally by

its deference to denotative language, narrative knowledge follows no such conventions.

Narratives are instead characterized by various language games, among them being those

games appropriate to popular sayings, proverbs, maxims, nursery rhymes, and so on.

“The narrative form,” explains Lyotard, “lends itself to a great variety of language

games” (p. 20). Unlike scientific discourse which seeks to set itself up for empirical

testing, narrative discourse tends in a different direction. Narrative discourse instead

provides its hearer with a set of standards, grounds for judgment, or bases upon which to

act. In this way, narrative is importantly different from the language game of denotation.

And though one may be led to believe that narrative’s freedom from denotation allows it

to escape the problem of legitimation, as we will see, this is not the case.

According to Lyotard, three principal functions are performed by narrative

discourse: (1) narratives demonstrate what counts as success or failure in a given

society/institution; (2) narratives instill legitimacy upon social institutions; and (3) narratives provide positive and negative models of what it means to be integrated “into

established institutions” (p. 20). Taken together, these three functions describe how

narrative provides a sort of grid through which one’s experience may be filtered and

evaluated. Scientific discourse calls out to be verified or to be falsified. Narrative

discourse, on the other hand, initiates action and makes an implicit or explicit set of

demands upon the individual hearing the narrative. In this way, narrative serves a very

important role in the production and perpetuation of practical knowledge.

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Lyotard himself is quite explicit about the connection between narrative discourse and “the formulation of traditional knowledge” (p. 19) “Traditional” knowledge—or what Lyotard also refers to as “customary” knowledge—is not merely the acquisition of facts nor the learning of the truth or falsehood of various statements. Such knowledge is

instead an embodied process as well as a competence that relies upon and simultaneously

transcends learning in general and science in particular. Lyotard explains, “What is meant

by the term knowledge is not only a set of denotative statements.” Knowledge, for

Lyotard, “also includes notions of ‘know-how,’ ‘knowing how to live,’ ‘how to listen, etc.’” (p. 18). Consistent with the critique of postmodern knowledge initiated at the outset of The Postmodern Condition, Lyotard is here describing a sort of knowing that is not easily commodified, that is not merely instrumental, and that comports poorly with postindustrial and postmodern developments.

Reflecting upon the relationship between narrative discourse and customary knowledge, Lyotard explains: “Narration is the quintessential form of customary knowledge, in more ways than one” (p. 19). In Lyotard’s words, “What is transmitted through these narratives is the set of pragmatic rules that constitutes the social bond” (p.

21). To state the matter just a bit differently, what narratives do is provide us with “know

how.” Narratives teach us how to speak within the context of a given language game.

Narratives teach us how to hear the moves proffered by other players within the language

game being played. Narrative, according to Lyotard, is therefore in no way an incidental

or primitive feature of human society. Quite the contrary, narrative is constitutive of the

social bond—of society—itself. Narrative accomplishes things that science never could.

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And such accomplishments derive in large part from narrative’s resistance of denotative language as the primary mode of discourse.

One of the most interesting features of narrative is the manner in which it performs the function of self-legitimation. Historically, and unlike discourse associated with science, narrative has served as its own arbiter of veracity, necessity, and usefulness.

To put the matter in slightly different terms, the very performance of narrative is itself an enactment of the type of legitimation process that increasingly alludes scientific discourse. Lyotard explains:

We can hypothesize that, against all expectations, a collectivity that takes

narrative as its key form of competence has no need to remember its past. It finds

the raw material for its social bond not only in the meaning of the narratives it

recounts, but also in the act of reciting them. The narratives referenced may seem

to belong to the past, but in reality it is always contemporaneous with the act of

recitation … A culture that gives precedence to the narrative form doubtless has

no more of a need for special procedures to authorize its narratives than it has to

remember its past. (p. 22, italics added)

Unlike the scientist, who is thought to require special procedures of verification, the speaker and hearer of narrative embody and perform the legitimation process even as they are participating in a given moment of narrative activity. Narratives are themselves a constitutive and self-validating enactment of cultural norms and are therefore not efficacious or generative by nature of their content or their truth. Narratives simply are efficacious among a community who “takes narrative as its key form of competence.”

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Narratives generate culture. Narratives are, Lyotard suggests, consubstantial with that to which they give voice. And as such, narrative legitimation does not consist of a process whereby one demonstrates correspondence with an accepted axiom or indubitable principle. On the contrary, the very communicative act itself conveys its own legitimacy.

Narratives, explains Lyotard, “are legitimated by the simple fact that they do what they do” (p. 23).

The perceptive reader will have noticed several important caveats coursing throughout the preceding couple of paragraphs—caveats introduced by Lyotard upon which I have not yet focused the reader’s attention. What Lyotard signals in several different ways is that the sort of legitimation function described above is not universally efficacious. Rather, the narrative legitimation function that Lyotard describes is a local, specific, and historically-contingent process. Notice, for instance, the qualifiers that

Lyotard uses. Narrative legitimation, explains Lyotard, occurs among: (1) “a collectivity that takes narrative as its key form of competence” and (2) “a culture that gives precedence to the narrative form.” Such modifiers importantly locate the legitimation function described above within a given culture and within a given language game. As such, Lyotard has been offering a principally descriptive claim about the function of narrative. Lyotard has not been making a claim about the necessary or metaphysical status of those things which are given voice by way of narrative. The author of The

Postmodern Condition has instead been describing how the narrative form has been employed and the ways it has been understood within cultures who continue to ascribe efficacy to the narrative form. In this way, Lyotard’s claims about the “status” or “nature”

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of narrative are at least as much about the society employing narrative as they are about

the narrative form itself.

There is a second issue worth raising here, an issue that takes us back to my

previous discussion of metaphilosophy and the critique of epistemological certainty that

is grounded in realist metaphysics. By describing narrative as a self-legitimating genre,

Lyotard provides an account of our most cherished beliefs that is stated in terms of local,

contextual, and communicative practices. Frederic Jameson (1984) speaks tangentially to this issue in his “Forward” when writing about Lyotard’s attempt to rescue science from metaphilosophical critiques of realist metaphysics. Jameson writes, “Lyotard here ingeniously ‘saves’ the coherence of scientific research and experiment by recasting its now seemingly non- or post referential ‘epistemology’ in terms of linguistics, and in particular of theories of the performative” (p. ix). What Jameson here observes regarding the “salvation” of science is no less aptly applied to the products of narrative discourse.

For one of the principle outcomes of Lyotard’s text is the way that the author locates cherished social, philosophical, and cultural categories such as hope within local narrative discourse. As a result, even as Lyotard critiques cherished metanarrative frames, local narratives are brought to the fore as one of the principle generative forces in postmodern society. As I will consider in greater detail below, this generative nature of narrative will serve vitally important when answering the call for a paralogic communicative response to the need for hope.

Lest one think that Lyotard has answered the scientific problem of legitimation simply by enlisting narrative to do the work that science could not, one must understand

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that neither scientific discourse nor narrative discourse can perform the sort of

legitimation function that was often ascribed to such entities in a pre-critical—that is, a

pre-postmodern—era. Lyotard is emphatic on this point, explaining that it is “impossible

to judge the existence or validity of narrative knowledge on the basis of scientific

knowledge and vice versa: the relevant criteria are different.” Lyotard continues, “All

[one] can do is gaze in wonderment at the diversity of discursive species, just as we do

with the diversity of plant or animal species” (p. 26). The postmodern condition is one

wherein the problem of legitimation retains its centrality and its force—both in scientific and narrative discourse. To state the matter in a way consonant with Chapter 1 of this project: there is no longer any knowledge that is purely objective (and, of course, there never was such knowledge). Failure to understand this is, for Lyotard, a failure to reckon with the changing status of knowledge in postmodern society. So too is it a failure to understand the sorts of claims that exists at the center of our social, communal, and cultural practices.

The Status of Metanarratives: Re-Interrogating The Postmodern Condition

Having looked in some detail at Lyotard’s account of the historic distinctions between scientific and narrative knowledge, I may now turn toward the most crucial— and, likely, the most controversial—aspect of my reading of Lyotard’s The Postmodern

Condition. Up to this point, I have recounted Lyotard’s claims regarding the changing status of knowledge in postmodern society. In the process, we have seen how Lyotard challenges the objectivity of knowledge rooted in metanarrative frames. Along the way, I raised some important connections between Kant’s question “What can I know?” and

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Lyotard’s now-famous project. Additionally, I have examined relevant connections between The Postmodern Condition and recent metaphilosophical critiques of realist metaphysics. Perhaps most important, I have recounted how the crisis of legitimation exists as a fundamental feature of The Postmodern Condition. As a result, I have shown that, according to Lyotard, one should no longer view science or narrative as achieving some sort of objective universality or indubitability. And this brings us to Lyotard’s oft- quoted claim about incredulity toward metanarratives, a claim that emerges in the opening pages of The Postmodern Condition. “Simplifying to the extreme,” writes

Lyotard in the “Introduction” to his text, “I define postmodern as incredulity toward metanarratives” (p. xxiv).

As Hans Bertens points out in his text The Idea of the Postmodern, what makes

Lyotard’s text distinct, and that for which it is most well known, is its stance concerning the status of metanarratives. Bertens (1995) explains, “Lyotard’s point of departure is the demise of what he terms ‘metanarratives’” (p. 124). Interestingly enough, the term

“metanarrative” appears only five times in the text of The Postmodern Condition—with one usage coming in Lyotard’s now-famous aphorism. Of course, one should hope that the careful scholar would recognize that Lyotard’s simplification contains within itself a number of complex issues needing carefully to be considered. Unfortunately, however, many scholars seem to have paid little attention to Lyotard’s qualification that he was simplifying the matter, and instead have focused their attention upon what has now become the postmodern intellectual’s sound bite: “Postmodernity is incredulity toward metanarratives.”

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James K. A. Smith (2001), in his incisive essay entitled “A Little Story About

Metanarratives,” offers an explanation for Lyotard’s unfortunately-simplistic reception.

Smith writes, “For various reasons, [Lyotard’s] answer has been quickly adopted as a

succinct formulation of our present condition.” Smith (2001) suggests four reasons for

this simplistic adoption: (1) the appearance of the text both in French and in English

seems quickly to have broadened the reach of Lyotard’s argument, making it widely

available both in Europe and beyond; (2) the “deceiving simplicity” (p. 363, fn. 8) of the text made it an easy target for the scholarly sound bite culture to which it was offered; (3) the appearance of Lyotard’s aphorism in the “Preface” of the text allowed the reader immediate access to a deceptively incisive summary with relatively little work; and (4)

Lyotard’s “largely epistemological definition of postmodernism” seems, for Smith, to have been readily accepted because of broader intellectual currents within epistemological inquiry (p. 363, fn. 8).

Smith (2001) does not make his reasoning explicit on this last point, referring only to the text’s “largely epistemological definition of postmodernism” (p. 363, fn. 8).

And so one is left to infer the force of Smith’s claim. One quickly thinks of broader currents in epistemology becoming popular at this time: Kuhn (1962), Polanyi (1958),

Feyeraband (1975; 1987), and others readily come to mind. What Smith seems to be suggesting is that the author of The Postmodern Condition was addressing—at least in part—a theme that already had a considerable hearing. Lyotard simply gave a slogan to a movement that had already been gaining a large number of adherents. Lyotard gave a slogan, that is, to those many individuals who sought to challenge the existence of

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objective knowledge. The problem, of course, is that the slogan quickly created a much more inclusive movement than Lyotard himself ever envisioned. Nevertheless, the die had been cast for a widespread appropriation of Lyotard’s deceptively simple aphorism.

James K. A. Smith (2001) explains, “All of [the four factors noted above] make it prime real estate for academic squatters who get their first, don’t have to read much, and find it

‘easy’” (p. 363, fn. 8).

This is neither the time nor the place for an exhaustive study of the ambiguities contained within The Postmodern Condition. Nevertheless, a word or two may be in order regarding what are undoubtedly some intriguing features Lyotard’s book. Gary

Browning (2000), writing in a text devoted solely to Lyotard’s claims regarding the end of metanarratives, offers several worthwhile observations on the topic at hand. According to Browning, “The Postmodern Condition itself has been subject to substantial criticism, not least by Lyotard himself.” In fact, Browning (2000) explains that Lyotard “disparaged the work in later writings” (p. 22). Three reasons are given by Browning for Lyotard’s

dissatisfaction with The Postmodern Condition: (1) Lyotard felt that he commented on

scientific literature throughout the text without reading carefully enough about the topic

beforehand; (2) Lyotard was dissatisfied with “the awkwardness of its sociological and

temporal reading of postmodernity;” and (3) Lyotard thought he should have paid more

attention to varied styles of narrative rather than painting them more or less as a monolith

(p. 22).

Browning (2000) further extends the sort of critique that Lyotard himself appears

to have begun when writing that, “The argument of The Postmodern Condition is radical,

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forceful, but elliptical and problematic. A host of themes are introduced and related

together. A number of these themes suffer from being insufficiently developed and

justified” (p. 37, italics added). Among these, according to Browning, are Lyotard’s

postmodern view of science, his disparaging of the self, the brevity with which Lyotard deals with notions such as modernity and postmodernity, and—most important for my

purposes—”the insubstantial character of Lyotard’s notion of modern grand narratives”

(Browning, 2000, p. 38). As if the preceding observations were not enough, Browning concludes by offering what is perhaps his most circumspect critique of Lyotard’s text:

In retrospect… substantive aspects of its argument appear deeply problematic. It’s

reading of modernity and postmodernity is superficial. The sharp break that is

postulated as separating these conditions derives from a view of modernity that

abstracts from its complexity and from an account of grand narratives that is

tendentious in its reading of classic modern theories. Likewise, its perspectives on

language, social practice and the self are highly elliptical, just as the promotion of

a postmodern agonistic pluralism lacks supporting argumentation and justification

while ignoring questions about the overall organization of social practices. (p. 39)

Undoubtedly, the preceding several paragraphs give rise to numerous issues that I am not interested to consider in great detail here. I will leave such concerns to experts on

Lyotard and his intellectual milieu. I have chosen briefly to recount such matters, however, because I believe that they implicitly make a very important point that bears on my specific objective here. Whatever the certain and numerous virtues of Lyotard’s The

Postmodern Condition, the passages noted above make it quite clear that this work should

68 not be renowned for its precision, its accuracy, or its certitude. More to the point: I believe that the imprecision of Lyotard’s work offers justification for my constructive and critical rereading of what I take to be a centrally-important element of this most influential of 20th century texts.

How, then, should one understand Lyotard’s conception of metanarratives? Here,

I rely heavily upon the analysis of Smith (2001) as provided in (a) his article “A Little

Story About Metanarratives” and (b) his recent (2006) book called Who’s Afraid of

Postmodernism?. Reflecting upon typical uses of the word metanarrative, Smith (2001) observes the following:

Like “deconstruction,” the term “metanarrative” has become a word which has

never lacked employment, but has unfortunately been put to work doing jobs it

never asked for. In other words, the term “metanarrative” has been subject to

equivocation and thus displaced from the very specific context of Lyotard’s

employment of the concept. The result, it seems, is a straw man. (p. 355)

In his defense of Lyotard’s intended meaning, Smith begins by explaining some common ways that the term metanarrative has been misunderstood and misappropriated.

Using as his exemplar a text by Richard Middleton and Brian Walsh (1995) entitled Truth

Is Stranger Than It Use to Be, Smith illustrates what he understands to be unwarranted readings of Lyotard that course throughout this text. Smith explains that the authors make three common mistakes when appropriating Lyotard’s notion of a metanarrative.

Middleton and Walsh, according to Smith (2001), characterize metanarratives as: (a)

69 universal stories; (b) stories that are totalizing or marginalizing in character; and/or (c) mere social constructions that claim to be universal truths (pp. 355-356).

Building upon the work begun in “A Little Story About Metanarratives,” Smith continues his critique of Middleton and Walsh in his more recent book entitled Who’s

Afraid of Postmodernism? Smith (2006) explains: “Generally, it is thought that the term refers simply to big stories—grand, epic narratives that tell an overarching tale about the world. In other words, many assume that metanarratives are the target of postmodern disbelief because of their scope, because they make grand, totalizing claims about reality and universal pretensions” (p. 64, italics added).

Although Middleton and Walsh articulate a more or less commonplace set of assumptions about Lyotard’s view of metanarratives, Smith is quick to point out that this sort of characterization of metanarratives importantly misses the mark. It does so, in

Smith’s (2001) assessment, principally because of its failure to understand that Lyotard’s claims about metanarratives are principally concerned with “the epistemological problem of legitimation or justification” (p. 356). From Smith’s vantage point, the most central and distinguishing characteristic of a metanarrative resides in the way it justifies or legitimates itself. Metanarratives, writes Smith (2006) “are stories that not only tell a grand story (since even pre-modern and tribal stories do this) but also claim to be able to legitimate or prove the story’s claim by an appeal to universal reason” (p. 65, italics added). In this way, metanarratives are decidedly modern entities. They are stories that purport to offer the elusive sort of indubitability after which Descartes (1993) so famously chased in his Meditations on First Philosophy. Or, to put the matter just a bit

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differently, metanarratives are stories that seek simultaneously to describe reality and

legitimate such descriptions by way of an appeal to reason that purports to be in need of no further justification. Metanarratives, therefore, purport to offer the sort of objective and indubitable knowledge about which I wrote in Chapter 1.

Lending credence to Smith’s reading, Lyotard himself locates the notion of metanarrative within a decidedly modernist—and, I would add, a decidedly foundationalist—frame. As early as the second paragraph of the “Introduction” of The

Postmodern Condition Lyotard explains:

Science has always [viewed itself as existing] in conflict with narratives. Judged

by the yardstick of science, the majority of [narratives] proved to be fables. But to

the extent that science does not restrict itself to stating useful regularities and

seeks the truth, it is obliged to legitimate the roles of its own game. It then

produces a discourse of legitimation with respect to its own status, a discourse

called philosophy. I will use the term modern to designate any science that

legitimates itself with reference to a metadiscourse of this kind making an explicit

appeal to some grand narrative, such as the dialectics of Spirit, the hermeneutics

of meaning, the emancipation of the rational or working subject, or the creation of

wealth. (p. xxiii)

At the risk of taxing my reader’s patience, let me walk through the above quote with a measure of care. For this passage, perhaps more than any other brings into focus

Lyotard’s understanding of the relationship between scientific knowledge, narrative knowledge, the problem of legitimation, and metanarratives.

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As Lyotard explains, science and narrative have always been at odds. Science, as

explained above, has historically sought to uncover truth (objective knowledge) about the world. And as such, scientists have regularly viewed narrative knowledge as a second- class way of learning about reality. To put the matter another way, narrative does not appeal to—nor can it appeal to—something outside of itself (such as objective truth) to legitimate its description of reality. As described above, narrative is its own legitimation,

and succeeds or fails on its own merits—not on the merits of its correspondence with

something existing outside of itself.

Science, seeking to avoid the charge of subjectivity, must produce a discourse that

purports to provide the sort of objective legitimation that narrative knowledge lacks.

However—and despite historic confusion which has produced arguments to the

contrary—science has no tools by which to legitimate itself except the tools of language.

As Lyotard later explains,

Scientific knowledge cannot know and make known that it is the true knowledge

without resorting to the other, narrative, kind of knowledge, which from its point

of view is no knowledge at all. Without such recourse it would be in the position

of presupposing its own validity and would be stooping to what it condemns:

begging the question, proceeding on prejudice. (p. 29)

Faced with the inescapable inability to legitimate itself apart from appeals to

discourse, science has historically (and, I suppose, quite naturally) summoned language

in service to the pursuit of legitimation. The result of such a summoning is none other

than the creation of a discourse which Lyotard calls “philosophy.” At first glance,

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Lyotard’s suggestion that philosophy is a created discourse might appear a

counterintuitive or—to the purists among us—even heretical. For such a claim makes it

appear as though philosophy itself is a mere fiction, a fable, or a myth. Making this claim,

however, would be both to caricature Lyotard’s argument, and to fall into the sort of

hyperbolic deconstructive claims that are characteristic of many contemporary

appropriations of the term metanarrative. Numerous appropriations of Lyotard notwithstanding, the force of The Postmodern Condition is decidedly not intended to

initiate the demise of hope and all measure of certainty (see Baudrillard, 1994; Bauman,

1991; Rorty, 1998; 1999; Derrida 1989; 1994; Caputo, 1997; Poirier, 2007; Deblanco,

1999; Bauckham & Hart, 1999; and Johnson, 2004). Instead, Lyotard seeks to pull back

the curtain on any such philosophical or religious discourse that purports to rise to the

level of indubitable truth. For in such instances, humankind has allowed the language

game of philosophy to be elevated to a status that is unable to withstand the postmodern

scrutiny initiated by Lyotard’s critical gaze. Philosophical narrative has been christened

or baptized under the name of objectivity and indubitability. The result: the

metanarrative.

Modern science in particular has regularly legitimated itself by recourse to such

allegedly-indubitable philosophical constructs. Paradigmatic examples of such

philosophical constructs are referenced in the closing moments of the quote offered

above. Here, Lyotard refers to Hegel’s (1977) dialectics of Spirit, Schleiermacher’s

(1998) hermeneutics of meaning, Kant’s (1784) emancipation of the rational or working

subject, and Adam Smith’s (1976) understanding of the creation of wealth. And although

73 the sort of modernist exemplars recounted in the quote above receive the most attention in The Postmodern Condition, Lyotard seems convinced that science has always legitimated itself by recourse to philosophical narratives. In the section entitled “The

Narrative Function and the Legitimation of Knowledge” Lyotard explains, “This is not the place to chart the recurrence of the narrative in the scientific by the way of the latter’s discourses of legitimation, which include but are not limited to the great ancient, medieval, and classical philosophies” (p. 29).

The crisis of legitimation, around which the entirety of The Postmodern Condition is organized, consists of the fact that humankind can no longer naïvely appeal to such metanarratives as a way of legitimating truth claims. Until recently, the objectivity of such metanarrative frames went largely unchallenged. And so society—and science, in particular—continued to operate under the assumption that there was a means objectively to legitimate our claims to certain knowledge. For a whole host of reasons, many of which Lyotard explains throughout The Postmodern Condition, this has now been undercut. Claims to objective legitimation can no longer be abided by the discerning intellect. Epistemological certainty, to put the matter in a way that is more consonant with

Lyotard’s overarching goal in The Postmodern Condition, can no longer occur without recourse to a local and consensually-derived language game. Lyotard writes, “It is recognized that the conditions of truth, in other words, the rules of the game of science, are imminent in that game, that they can only be established within the bonds of the debate that is already scientific in nature, and that there’s no other proof that the rules are good and the consensus extended to them by the experts” (p. 29).

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With regard to my particular project, the essential point to note is that Lyotard is decidedly not claiming that we must remain incredulous toward big stories, toward sweeping axiological claims, or toward assumptions about the arche or telos of humankind. On the contrary, Lyotard is simply making the claim that we must come more appropriately to appreciate such stories for what they are—as narrative accounts that only find legitimation within the context of the accepted rules of operative language games. However, such narratives, which emerge out of and from within the context of language games, are not for that reason any less powerful or generative than their now defunct metanarrative ancestors. The fundamental features of such metanarratives are importantly not located principally in their scope or the fact that they make normative or even discriminatory claims. Rather, the fundamental feature of such metanarratives consists in the fact that they “mask their own particularity ... and deny their narrative ground even as they proceed on it as a basis” (Smith, 2006, p. 69).

Reflecting upon the exposition of Lyotard offered above, one discovers within the postmodern philosophical canon a concrete and historical manifestation of the sort of critical turn that I explained in the preceding chapter. What is most important to recognize is the deeply ironic and—at least for many—the surprisingly tempered response of Lyotard to such a critical turn. For whereas I long believed that the demise of objective knowledge signaled the end of hope, Lyotard himself makes no such assumptions. To be sure, the status of hope is importantly changed by way of Lyotard’s epistemological critique. Yet statements of hope are rendered neither meaningless nor unimportant as the result of his account. One wonders, therefore, why Lyotard’s phrase

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about “incredulity toward metanarratives” has been viewed as signaling the end of an historically-essential category such as hope. At least two fundamental reasons exist for such a line of thinking.

First, such individuals maintain the assumption that I held on to so firmly, and which I described at some length in Chapter 1. The assumption: that statements of duty and hope may only have weight in so far as they are emergent from certain, that is, objective, truth claims. In Chapter 1, I made the claim that many “disciples” of

Lyotardian sentiment actually failed to be postmodern enough. Having considered

Lyotard’s account of “legitimation” in some detail, I may now explain a bit more fully what I meant by that claim. Whatever the result of Lyotard’s writing, a careful reading of

The Postmodern Condition makes it clear that his position is one wherein knowledge, duty, and hope ought to be understood as the products of disparate language games.

Rather then assuming some sort of unified and mutually constitutive domain comprised of knowledge, duty, and hope, Lyotard importantly bifurcated such entities, and in so doing enacts a fully postmodern move. Those individuals who find themselves unable to hope as a result of Lyotard’s epistemological critique have failed fully to appreciate the fullness of his vision. Such individuals have, one might say, adopted Lyotard’s epistemology yet without benefiting from his metaphysics. For to continue to assume that the demise of knowledge signals the end of hope is to assume that hope can only be legitimate if it retains its character as a metaphysically stable category that transcends human experience, that avoids contingency, and that exists independent of human

communicative action. Such a notion is, of course, decidedly modern in its orientation.

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Failure to recognize this point is a failure to realize the fullness of Lyotard’s vision as

outlined in The Postmodern Condition.

There is a second, and related, reason why Lyotard’s claim concerning

“incredulity toward metanarratives” is believed to challenge the legitimacy of hope.

Simply put, many have misunderstood just what Lyotard means when using the term

“metanarrative.” As I have shown above, Lyotard’s account of metanarratives is far more

specific than one might initially think. Feminism, democracy, humanism, and even

Christianity—such ideological constructs are not necessarily metanarratives according to

Lyotard’s use of the term. To be sure, one might conceive of feminism, democracy,

humanism, or Christianity in terms that Lyotard would label as a metanarrative. That

said, upon properly understanding Lyotard, one discovers that decidedly few manifestations of such ideological constructs actually rise to the level of metanarratives as described by Lyotard in The Postmodern Condition. The problem with many contemporary appropriations of the term metanarrative stems from a failure to understand the limited and specific way in which Lyotard understood the term. This, when coupled with the sort of confusion described in the preceding paragraph, results in the appropriation of Lyotard’s writing in ways not properly supported either by the spirit or by the letter of The Postmodern Condition. And, as I have tried to suggest variously, this is no small or inconsequential confusion indeed.

Paralogy: Narrative Hope in the Making

Sustainedly addressed only in the closing eight pages of The Postmodern

Condition, Lyotard’s treatment of paralogy is at once both of the culmination and the

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recapitulation of themes that have been foreshadowed throughout the entirety of the text.

Somewhat surprisingly, very few scholars have taken up Lyotard’s notion of paralogy.

One notable exception is Thomas Kent, who produced two works (1989, 1993) devoted to the subject of paralogy. The earlier of Kent’s works is subsumed by the latter, a book

entitled Paralogic Rhetoric: A Theory of Communicative Interaction. Although my own treatment of Lyotard’s paralogy was developed independent of Kent’s work, an examination of Paralogic Rhetoric reveals that Kent and I adopt a more or less complementary treatment of the topic. While we develop similar ideas with admittedly different vocabularies, our fundamental understandings of paralogy nevertheless converge. As Kent (1993) explains, paralogy “seeks to subsume logic ... in that it accounts for the attribute of language-in-use that defies reduction to a codifiable process or to a system of logical relations” (p. 3). Whereas Kent’s treatment of paralogy is most invested in explaining how the paralogic nature of language produces an anti-logical event, my own treatment of paralogy focuses more upon how Lyotard’s treatment of the topic can profitably inform our understanding of specific communicative artifacts and choices.

Given the changing status of knowledge, the dissolution of metanarratives, and

the shifting and uncertain foundations of scientific inquiry, one is left wondering about

the bases upon which any form of postmodern legitimation might proceed. Lyotard, of

course, recognizes such an apparent quandary, explaining that “the problem is therefore

to determine whether it is possible to have a form of legitimation based solely on

paralogy” (p. 61).

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In the opening sentences of the final section of The Postmodern Condition,

Lyotard is quick to remind his readers that “We no longer have recourse to the grand

narratives.” In the wake of the metanarrative’s demise, explains Lyotard, “the little

narrative remains the quintessential form of imaginative invention” (p. 60, italics added).

Here, of course, Lyotard is harkening back to themes developed throughout the previous

sections of his text. As noted earlier in this chapter, narrative, for Lyotard, distinguishes itself from scientific discourse by virtue of its non-denotative character. Narrative discourse, as opposed to traditional scientific discourse, is not held captive by a set of rules that emerge from without. Narrative, as discussed above, simultaneously establishes its content as well as the standards by which to judge such content. Rather than seeking correspondence in something outside of itself, narrative discourse, in Lyotard’s view, establishes its legitimacy by virtue of the performance of the narrative. Narrative, therefore, serves as its own arbiter of veracity, necessity, usefulness, and truthfulness. In this way, narrative discourse does not produce the sort of objective or indubitable knowledge discussed in Chapter 1. Rather, narrative discourse generates a kind of knowledge that is operative only for those who accept the rules of the game being played by the progenitor of the narrative.

At the very heart and core of Lyotard’s treatment of paralogy is a narrative vision both of humankind and a communicative practice. The following words, written by

Alasdair MacIntyre (1981), indeed, may have been penned by Lyotard himself: “Man is in his actions and practice, as well as in his fictions, essentially a story-telling animal” (p.

201). It may be the case that modern humanity strayed from such narrative tendencies—

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although even this is highly debatable. Pre-modern and now postmodern humankind,

however, remain firmly in the grasp of narrative discourse. Narrative, therefore, is neither

an incidental or peripheral element of the human experience. Narrative is, to use the

words of Walter Fisher (1984), “meaningful for persons in particular and in general,

across communities as well as cultures, across time and place” (p. 8). Much like

MacIntyre and Fisher, Lyotard recognizes the fundamentally narrative nature of human

experience. More than this, and central to the argument of The Postmodern Condition,

Lyotard is convinced that narrative provides the only means through which legitimation

might possibly occur in our postmodern context.

What Lyotard referred to as “narrative knowledge” throughout the vast majority of his text now, in the closing moments of The Postmodern Condition, is given a more specific title: paralogy. By employing Lyotard’s treatment of narrative knowledge in service to a fuller understanding of paralogy, one discovers that paralogy exists somewhere between allegedly-objective (that is, denotative) scientific discourse and the wholly subjective, or even nihilistic, domain often ascribed to radically postmodern thought (Baudrillard, 1994; Bauman, 1991; Rorty, 1998; 1999; Derrida 1989; 1994;

Caputo, 1997; Poirier, 2007; Deblanco, 1999; Bauckham & Hart, 1999; and Johnson,

2004). Paralogy, relying upon all of the resources available to narrative, seeks a kind of temporal, communal, and provincial legitimation—a legitimation emergent from a given community’s language games rather than through correspondence with some eternal truth. Paralogy recognizes all too well the changing status of knowledge in postmodern society. Having given up the quest for objective legitimation, the paralogic legitimator of

80 postmodern knowledge is content having established consensus among his or her community. Lyotard himself explains, “Thus the society of the future falls less within the province of a Newtonian anthropology (such as structuralism or systems theory) than a pragmatics of language particles. There are many different language games.” (p. xxiv).

Being a communication scholar myself, Lyotard holds considerable appeal to me.

For in the closing moments of The Postmodern Condition Lyotard initiates three fundamentally postmodern methodological moves, moves which foreground the importance of communicative action: (1) Lyotard sanctions communicative practices as the only possible means of legitimation within the postmodern context; (2) Lyotard bestows upon human communication the status that was previously reserved only for the realm of metaphysics; and (3) Lyotard suggests that it is precisely our communicative practices that can save us from barbarism, that can initiate a postmodern hope. Consider the following quote wherein Lyotard fuses communication, narrative legitimation, and hope into a mutual reciprocity: “Most people have lost the nostalgia for the lost narrative.

It in no way follows they are reduced to barbarity. What saves them from [barbarism] is their knowledge that legitimation can only spring from their own linguistic practice and communicational interaction” (p. 41). The context of this passage makes it clear that when referring to the “lost narrative,” Lyotard is speaking of the varied metanarratives that were regularly privileged in a pre-postmodern era. Reflecting upon the death of such metanarratives, Lyotard here comments “We can say today that the mourning process has been completed. There is no need to start all over again” (p. 41). Although Lyotard may be incorrect to suggest that we no longer mourn the death of metaphysics, objective

81 knowledge, or our naïve hope in scientific legitimation, it seems clear that such notions have, indeed, been increasingly deprivileged in recent decades. What Lyotard here helps us to see, however, is that all hope is not lost. We do not—in Lyotard’s words—”need to start all over again” (p. 41). In fact, humankind is singularly in possession of the only tools that ever were available for one seeking legitimation: the very communicative practices that make reflection upon legitimation possible.

The rejection of objective, scientific legitimation brings with it a change in the status of reason itself. For in such a context, “reason” may no longer be described in terms of correspondence with that which is objectively true or verifiable. Lyotard explains:

Obviously, a major shift in the notion of reason accompanies this new

arrangement. The principle of the universal metalanguage is replaced by the

principle of a plurality of formal and axiomatic systems capable of arguing the

truth of the denotative statements; these systems are described by a metalanguage

that is universal but not consistent. What used to pass as paradox, and even

paralogism, in the knowledge of classical and modern science can, in certain of

these systems, acquire a new force of conviction and win the acceptance of the

community of experts. (pp. 43-44)

What I find most interesting in the preceding paragraph is Lyotard’s reference to paralogism. Unfettered from the need to seek correspondence with “objective” reality or reason, communicative space is opened up for new ways of discussing traditional issues.

One is free, for instance, to speak of a kind of hope that is not constrained by objective

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truth or the notion of a universal rationality. In a paralogic world, hope can be more than a mere continuation of existing rationalities. Paralogy instead fuels, fosters, and emerges from the unfettered human imagination. As a result, one encounters the possibility of paralogic accounts of reality that are not bound by preexistent logics yet that are not for that reason illogical. Paralogy, at its core, challenges the existence of both objective

reality and objective knowledge. And yet, paralogy does not for this reason destroy the

possibility of meaningful hope. Instead, and precisely because of its ability to challenge

existing realities and logics, paralogy initiates the hopeful possibility of describing the

world by way of new vocabularies that might create a world consistent with such hopeful

linguistic redescriptions. A paralogic world is a world wherein one might create new

hopes or sustain old ones by way of decidedly communicative and narrative processes.

One must be careful to understand the nature of such a paralogic, postmodern

hope. For the nature of hope is indeed not unchanged as a result of Lyotard’s critique of

knowledge. The resultant state of affairs is decidedly not the sort of stable and certain

knowledge that I myself sought for so very long, and which I have described at some

length in Chapter 1. Neither is the world accompanying such hope one wherein finality or

stability are the most apt descriptions either of social institutions or the beliefs thought to sustain them. For not only does a paralogic world challenge present conceptions of rationality. So too does a paralogic world challenge existing social structures and dominant narrative discourses that both sustain and emerge from such. Lyotard explains that “any consensus on the rules defining a [language] game and ‘moves’ playable within it must be local, in other words, agreed on by its present players and subject to eventual

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cancellation” (p. 66). Although one might be tempted to suggest that a “mere” language

game could not possibly deal with terribly important matters, what we have read above

should caution the reader to think otherwise. For as a result of the epistemological and

metaphysical weight accorded to our communicative practices in a paralogic world, shifts

in an operative language game represent shifts in the status of nothing less than “truth”

and “reality” itself. And it is, of course, such post-foundationalist and post-metaphysical

conclusions that have led so many to suggest the Lyotard destroys the possibility of

meaningful hope.

Rather than understanding our post-foundationalist and post-metaphysical climate

as one that is void of hope or possibility, the proponent of Lyotard’s paralogy tolerates

and even celebrates the incommensurability and disagreement introduced by paralogic

communicative practices. Speaking of the sort of postmodern knowledge emergent from

paralogic discourse, Lyotard writes, “Postmodern knowledge is not simply a tool of the

authorities; it refines our sensitivity to differences and reinforces our ability to tolerate

the incommensurable. Its principle is not the expert’s homology, but the inventor’s

paralogy” (pp. xxiv-xxv). Whereas the autobiographical account offered in Chapter 1

described an individual who is desperate to retain objective knowledge in order to save

the possibility of hope, Lyotard’s account of paralogy seems to need no such thing. Much like the technofile of today who craves ever new manifestations of technological innovation, the paralogically-minded individual finds him or herself not only tolerating

but, perhaps, even celebrating the sort of incommensurability emergent from multiple logics and shifting rationalities. Rather than lamenting the fact that such paralogic

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legitimation undercuts the possibility of hope, the individual adopting such assumptions

instead recognizes that hope is not the sort of thing that emerges solely from the chimera

of “objective” knowledge. And, in fact, ever new paralogic practices initiate an increasing spate of possibilities for describing and redescribing the world in a manner consistent with the hopes that one holds most dearly and certainly. Reflecting upon what it might mean to achieve progress—or what our author speaks of in terms of

“performativity”—Lyotard suggests that such “depends on… ‘imagination,’ which allows one either to make a new move or change the rules of the game” (p. 52). Hope, in such an environment, is not constrained by pre-existing logics, structures, or conventions.

And though this might initially appear to challenge hope, it can equally well be understood as invigorating the possibility of hope’s flourishing and fruition in our midst.

Although Lyotard does not spend a great deal of time explaining the nature or character of a hopeful, paralogic society, several important points are made about the subject in the closing moments of The Postmodern Condition. In a paralogic society,

Lyotard envisions “the evolution of social interaction” wherein “the temporary contract is

in practice supplanting permanent institutions in the professional, emotional, sexual, cultural, family, and international domains, as well as in political affairs” (p. 66). In a pre-postmodern era, the pursuit of and deference to objective truth regularly established a sense of order and permanence among varied social institutions and practices. Society, in such a climate, was often envisioned as a physical and temporal outworking of metaphysical and eternal categories (Foucault, 1970). What Lyotard speaks of, however, is a much less stable and grounded state of social affairs.

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While postmodern social contracts are indeed ambiguous, temporary, and

localized, Lyotard remains convinced of the hopeful virtues of a society based upon such

“foundations.” For in this type of society—a society wherein language games comprise the principal generative mechanism of social institutions and practices—varied social actors are called upon to interrogate, and perhaps even redescribe, the bases upon which society is currently constructed. In such an environment, Lyotard explains that social actors maintain “knowledge of language games as such and the decision to assume responsibility for their roles and effects” (p. 66). To state the matter otherwise: a paralogic society is one wherein the interpersonal, social, and communicative means of legitimation must be perpetually re-created in the present by way of communicative skill

(Rossi-Keen, 2008). For in such a climate, the “foundations” of knowledge, duty, and hope can never attain the sort of objective legitimation once thought available to scientific discourse.

In a paralogic world, legitimation is carried on by virtue of temporary contracts emergent from the narrative practices of a given community. Far from seeking consensus or synthesis, such paralogic practices seek community with others who are willing to enact and be guided by a given language game. And herein arises not only shared communicative practices, temporal agreement, or fleeting consensus. On the contrary, in such instances paralogy may give rise to the possibility of envisioning and even re- creating the world in a manner consistent with a given community’s vision of what that world should become. Paralogic legitimation is, as Lyotard describes, “a monster formed by the interweaving of various networks of heteromorphous classes of utterance” (p. 65).

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And though such a “monster” may not produce the sort of objective foundations for which I once longed, paralogy is nevertheless sufficiently capable of generating hope in the present.

In the preceding several pages, I have identified and begun to describe the following characteristics of paralogy: (a) paralogy emerges as a result of decidedly communicative and narrative means; (b) paralogy fuels, fosters, and emerges from the unfettered human imagination; (c) paralogy is not bound by preexistent logics yet is not for that reason illogical; (d) paralogy destabilizes present structures, logics, and dominant narrative discourses; (e) paralogy seeks community rather than consensus or synthesis; and (f) paralogy tolerates and even celebrates incommensurability and disagreement.

Furthermore, I have labored at length to suggest that such an account of paralogy does not contain within itself an inherent nihilism or pessimism regarding human hope. In fact,

I have even attempted to position hope as the sort of thing that is wholly within our means to create and re-create in the present. Insofar as I have been able to make such an argument by appealing to Lyotard’s writing, I believe that I will have challenged common misperceptions of the implications of The Postmodern Condition.

What I have not done in the preceding pages is to tackle the question of why narrative is uniquely situated for performing the task of paralogic legitimation. Of course,

Lyotard takes up this matter in various ways throughout The Postmodern Condition.

Even so, Lyotard’s account of narrative is admittedly in need of supplementation if it is profitably to be utilized as an interpretive frame for understanding contemporary manifestations of rhetoric concerning hope. Such supplementation is undoubtedly

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necessary for the appropriation of Lyotard’s paralogy within the specific context of an

American pluralistic democracy. In the following section, therefore, I will briefly examine the relationship between paralogy, narrative, and democracy by considering the writing of Richard Rorty. My concern is, of course, not merely that we understand that

legitimation as well as declarations of hope must proceed paralogically. More than this, I

wish for the reader to understand how narrative enacts such a process and what sort of

hope might emerge from the paralogic legitimation that Lyotard describes. My consideration of Rorty will therefore help to explain how paralogy functions in these

ways within the context of a liberal democratic society.

Democracy, Narrative, and Hope: Paralogy as the Ground of Solidarity

Although Richard Rorty and Jean François Lyotard emerge from very different

intellectual traditions, these men nevertheless share at least two fundamental

assumptions, assumptions that have been variously discussed throughout the preceding

two chapters of this project: (1) the rejection of realist metaphysics as well as the

acceptance of some form of anti-foundationalism, and (2) the adoption of one brand or

another of nominalism along with a commitment to language as a generative social and

ideological mechanism. The differences inherent in each individual’s views are

undoubtedly important and are certainly interesting. And, Rorty himself addressed many

of these most fundamental differences at some length in his (1991a) essay entitled

“Cosmopolitanism without Emancipation: A Response to Jean-François Lyotard.”

Simply stated, the distinction between Lyotard and Rorty can be summarized by

noting that Rorty remains a good bit more optimistic about the prospects for social

88 progress after the demise of metanarratives. That Lyotard himself offers only several pages on paralogy—and, when doing so, remains somewhat sketchy concerning the specifics of this matter—speaks to a guarded assessment of the robustness of hope and social solidarity that Lyotard thinks might emerge from paralogic communicative practices. And so a more careful and extended treatment of Lyotard’s corpus would, indeed, shed a less hopeful light on the story I have been telling about Lyotard up to this point. That said, the goal of this chapter has not been to suggest that Lyotard’s entire corpus is somehow intent upon bolstering a robust vision of social progress and hope. My goal has been far less ambitious: to suggest that Lyotard’s epistemology as presented in

The Postmodern Condition need not signal the end of hope and even contains within its pages prospects for generating hope by way of paralogic communicative practices.

My turn toward Rorty seeks to illustrate how his account of liberal ironism represents an American democratic embodiment, as well as an extension, of Lyotard’s paralogy. Rorty, at one point, speaks of the relationship between the work of John

Dewey, himself, and Lyotard. In his (1991c) article “Cosmopolitanism without

Emancipation: A Response to Jean-François Lyotard,” Rorty writes:

[Dewey] offered a historical narrative in which American democracy is the

embodiment of all the best features of the West, while at the same time making

fun of what Jean-François Lyotard, in his The Postmodern Condition, has called

“metanarratives.” Dewey thought that we can have a morally uplifting historical

narrative without bothering to erect a metaphysical backdrop against which this

narrative is played out, and without getting very specific about the goal toward

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which it tends…. Like Lyotard, [followers of Dewey like myself] want to drop

metanarratives. (pp. 211-212)

In the following pages, I will demonstrate that essential to Rorty’s vision of

American democracy is (a) the adoption of anti-foundationalism, nominalism, and

historicism; and (b) the recognition that linguistic redescription exists at the very heart of

the American democratic process. Alongside of such assumptions exists Rorty’s explicit commitment to the category of hope—a commitment that emerges from his critical engagement with and appropriation of American Pragmatism. What Lyotard’s account of

paralogy only potentially implies regarding the role of hope in social life, Rorty’s account

of an American pluralist democracy makes quite explicit: the sustenance and health of

American democratic life is dependent upon a malleable and multiplicitous conception of

hope as well as the paralogic creation of such in the present. My goal is briefly to

describe Rorty’s commitment to such convictions and, in the process, to extend Lyotard’s

treatment of paralogy in a manner that is well-suited to my own analyses that will follow.

At the very heart of Rorty’s vast corpus is the rejection of Platonic metaphysics.

Summarizing this view in a passage from Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity that,

admittedly, does not speak directly about Plato, Rorty (1989) writes, “The world does not

speak. Only we do” (p. 6). Elsewhere in this text, Rorty explains that “Our purposes

would be served best by ceasing to see truth as a deep matter, as a topic of philosophical

interest, or ‘true’ as a term which repays ‘analysis’” (p. 8). Much like Lyotard, Rorty

believes that one of the central necessities of our contemporary era consists of

reinterpreting the nature of philosophical inquiry itself. Rorty (1999) summarizes his

90 work in this regard as follows, “Most of what I’ve written in the last decade consists of attempts to tie in my social hopes—hopes for a global, cosmopolitan, democratic, egalitarian, classless, casteless society—with my antagonism towards Platonism” (xii).

For too long, and following the trajectory initiated by Plato’s writings, the discipline of philosophy has sought to produce “arguments against, for example, a correspondence theory of truth or the idea of the ‘intrinsic nature of reality’” (Rorty,

1989, p. 8). Echoing sentiments attributed above to Lyotard, Rorty suggests that the adoption of such philosophical goals—and numerous others like them—not only reify “a familiar and time-honored vocabulary” (p. 8). The adoption of such goals likewise contains within itself the assumption that such questions can be meaningfully answered, that notions such as “truth” or “reality” are the sort of entities that can be definitively proven, described, and—to employ Lyotard’s language—legitimated. Much like Lyotard,

Rorty rejects such assumptions outright. Instead, explains Rorty (1979), in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature: “The point of edifying philosophy is to keep the conversation going rather than to find objective truth.” (p. 377)

For Rorty, when properly conceived, philosophy becomes more a project of linguistic redescription than a project of objective legitimation. As such, Rorty (1989) describes himself as a philosopher who serves as an “auxiliary to the poet rather than the physicist” (p. 8). Unlike the physicist who seeks to uncover eternal and immutable laws of the universe, the poet instead regularly seeks insight into the temporal, the fleeting, and the provincial. Whereas the physicist describes the world in mathematical formulas, the poet seeks the perfect turn of a phrase—the proper use of language that can uniquely

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capture one specific moment in time. Recognizing the temporal and local nature of all

philosophical inquiry—and echoing sentiments explored by Lyotard himself—Rorty

seeks to redescribe philosophy as a poetic and narrative language game with all of the

contingency and temporality inherent within such an enterprise. In an essay entitled

“Philosophy as Science, as Metaphor, and as Politics” Rorty (1991d) writes, “As

Deweyian social democrats, philosophers can be politically useful in the same way as can

poets, playwrights, economists, and engineers. Members of these various professions can

serve reformist social democratic politics by providing piecemeal nudges and cautions in

respect to particular projects at particular times” (pp. 24-25).

Below, I will return in greater detail to Rorty’s employment of narrative and his

deference to poets. But first, let me offer a word or two about Rorty’s deference to

liberalism. Liberalism as a political philosophy refers, of course, to a rich and varied constellation of meanings (see, for instance, Meadowcroft, 1996; Narveson & Dimock,

2000; Avnon & de-Shalit, 1999; Barash, 1992; Gray, 1995; Simon, 2002; and Rawls,

1993). As Gray (1995) writes, “Whereas liberalism has no single unchanging nature or essence, it has a set of distinctive features which exhibits its modernity and at the same time marks it off from other modern intellectual traditions and their associated political movements” (p. xi).

Simplifying to the extreme, what all legitimate versions of liberalism share is a commitment to the liberty of the individual. The nature and extent of such liberty is expressed variously, thereby introducing considerable distinction and division within the broad array of positions that might be properly called “liberal” political philosophies.

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That such distinction and division should be characteristic of liberalism is not surprising given the rich tradition out of which contemporary manifestations of liberal thought have emerged. The roots of liberalism are, indeed, deep and well entrenched within much of the Western intellectual tradition (Rowley, 1997; Patterson, 1997; Gray, 1995).

Recognizing the varied possible manifestations of liberal thought, one may nevertheless center upon a certain set of thematics present within any properly liberal framework. Laboring to uncover such thematics, John Gray (1995) helpfully explains:

Common to all variants of the liberal tradition is a definite conception,

distinctively modern in character, of man and society. What are the several

elements of this conception? It is individualist, in that it asserts the moral primacy

of the person against the claims of any social collectivity; egalitarian, inasmuch

as it confers on all men the same moral status and denies the relevance to legal or

political order of differences in moral worth among human beings; universalist,

affirming moral unity of the human species and according a secondary importance

to specific historic associations and cultural forms; and meliorist in its affirmation

of the corrigibility and improvability of all social institutions and political

arrangements. It is this conception of man and society which gives liberalism a

definite identity which transcends its vast internal variety and complexity. (p. xii)

Although this is neither the time nor the place for an extended treatment of the connections between liberalism and postmodern thought, perhaps a word or two in this regard is nevertheless justified. Though Gray above suggests that liberalism is the result of a “conception... of man and society” that is “distinctively modern in character,” one

93 might just as easily discover important roots of postmodern thinking within the central tenets of liberal theory. Supposing that one focuses attention upon the four thematics produced above with an eye toward uncovering postmodern notions therein, one may quickly enough discover within these four tenets of liberalism germinal ideas present throughout postmodern thinking. This is particularly so when one focuses upon the individualism, egalitarianism, and, at least so far as Rorty is concerned, the meliorism latent within liberal thought.

In an essay entitled “Liberalism and Postmodernism,” Andrew Vincent (1996) makes an argument similar to the one I have suggested in the preceding paragraph: namely, that liberalism contains within itself many themes which, when fully explored, tend in the direction now evident in much postmodern thought. Vincent writes, “The postmodern conception of the individual does not represent a dynamic shift in Western thought, but a veiled extension of elements of conventional liberal thought” (p.139, italics added). Or, as Vincent later writes, “Postmodern political theory... can also be seen as an extension of the ontology of liberal individualism” (p. 148, italics added). Reflecting specifically on Rorty, Vincent is quick to point out Rorty’s belief that “postmodern openmindedness undermines liberal foundationalism” (p. 149). Vincent nevertheless concludes that postmodernism, and, in particular, Rorty’s version of liberal postmodernism, represents “the outcome of themes within liberal individualism” (p. 156, italics added). What Vincent suggests, therefore, is that Rorty’s alleged-postmodern version of liberalism relies heavily upon a relatively unchanged modernist account of liberal individualism.

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The brief account of Vincent’s essay serves to suggest a thesis that, supposing I

wished truly to justify, would require additional analysis. The thesis: that postmodern

thought—and, particularly, Lyotard’s paralogy as well as Rorty’s deference to narrative

and ironism—have deep (if nevertheless, latent) roots within modern thought in general

and liberal theory in particular. One could, I believe, fairly easily enough demonstrate,

for instance, latent connections between liberalism as a political philosophy and

Lyotard’s move away from objective or scientific legitimation. Political liberalism could,

therefore, be understood as a crucial step in a broader move toward narrative as a means

of justification for standards of truth or certainty. And though many early proponents of

political liberalism were not deeply invested in sentiments now ascribed to postmodern

philosophy, one nevertheless observes the roots of such recent philosophical

developments germinally present within the sort of liberal themes introduced by Gray above. Stated just a bit differently: although Lyotard does not make such connections, paralogy may nevertheless be understood as an outworking of liberal (and, therefore, modern) sentiments. And, similarly, so too could Rorty’s deference to liberalism be substantively grounded in deeply modernist themes. I offer these suggestions as a potential way of contextualizing both Lyotard and Rorty, and recognize that I have not fully justified such assertions here. The possibility of such justification, however, seems undeniable.

Directing our attention away from liberalism in general, let us return to Rorty’s specific manifestation of this political philosophy. At the heart of Richard Rorty’s particular embodiment of liberal democratic society is a singular directive: do not be

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cruel. Borrowing from Judith Shklar, Rorty (1989) explains: “Liberals are the sort of

people who think that cruelty is the worst thing we do” (p. xv). At first glance, this might

seem like a simplistic assertion. And for one who is seeking to develop a rich and detailed ethical framework, it undoubtedly is. What such an assumption betrays, however, is a much broader range of convictions about the most legitimate form of

society. For what Rorty embodies within his liberal maxim is not merely a proscription

about cruelty. Rorty’s liberal maximum simultaneously represents a latent affirmation that humankind should be free to chase after his or her own aspirations wherever they

lead—so long, of course, as they do not result in cruelty to others.

In a passage taken from his book Philosophy and Social Hope, Rorty further

illuminates his vision concerning human freedom. Here, Rorty focuses not so much on what humankind should not do—namely, be cruel—and focuses instead upon what such an avoidance of cruelty may produce. Rorty (1999) writes:

My candidate for the most distinctive and praiseworthy human capacity is her

ability to trust and to cooperate with other people, and in particular to work

together so as to improve the future. Under favorable circumstances, our use of

this capacity culminates in utopian political projects such as Plato’s ideal state,

Christian attempts to realize the kingdom of God here on earth, and Marx’s vision

of the victory of the proletariat. These projects aim at improving our institutions

in such a way that our descendents will be still better able to trust and cooperate,

and will be more decent people than we ourselves have managed to be. (pp. xii-

xiv)

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One of the ostensibly peculiar features of Rorty’s liberalism is its inability to legitimate itself. “For liberal ironists,” explains Rorty, “there is no answer to the question

‘Why not be cruel?’ – no noncircular theoretical backup for the belief that cruelty is horrible” (1989, p. xv). In making such a claim, Rorty initiates a substantive break with one particular element of modern liberal thought. For Rorty does not attempt to ground his liberal maxim in some sort of objective foundation, be it rationality, human nature, or a claim to a universally-binding ethical imperative. To offer such alleged justification would, for Rorty, represent a failure to understand the most basic assumptions of his liberal ironists position. Any and all attempts at justification are themselves dependent, on Rorty’s view, upon the language games that are operative within a given situation.

Rorty (1999) explains as follows: “When asked, ‘And what exactly do you consider good?’, pragmatists can only say with [Walt] Whitman, ‘variety and freedom’, or, with

[John] Dewey, ‘growth’. ‘Growth itself,’ Dewey said, ‘is the only moral end.’” (p.28).

Rorty’s liberal maxim, however it happens to be formulated, seeks to promote the indeterminate and open ended spate of possibilities emergent from the creation of human freedom and the avoidance of cruelty.

Though Rorty does not employ Lyotard’s verbiage, Rorty is nevertheless echoing

Lyotard’s account of the dissolution of metanarratives. As Lyotard explains—and as

Rorty here further illuminates—there exists no form of legitimation that transcend the bounds of narrative. Regarding even a claim as basic as Rorty’s liberal maxim there exists no noncircular justification that might satisfy one who seeks to enact persistent doubt. Liberal ironists are therefore best described as those individuals who “include

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among [their] ungroundable desires their own hope that suffering will be diminished, that

the humiliation of human beings by other human beings may cease” (Rorty, 1989, p. xv,

italics added).

One of the greatest problems associated with foundationalist metaphysics,

epistemology, or ethics is that they have regularly provided ostensible need for the enactment of cruelty toward others. For the individual in possession of “truth” is thereby

provided a justification as well as a concomitant normative demand to ensure that the

other recognizes the “truth” that he or she has been so fortunate to discover. For Rorty,

however, the contingency associated with nominalism, historicism, and anti-

foundationalism un-tethers “truth” from its impulse toward universalization. As Rorty

(1989) explains, “[liberal] society should aim at curing us of our ‘deep metaphysical

need’” along with its accompanying impulse to enact a society consistent with such

metaphysical foundations (p. 46). One of the most important outcomes of moving beyond

such a deep metaphysical need is the accompanying possibility of hope that results. For

in the absence of metaphysical need arises the possibility of redescription and the

freedom than inheres alongside the adoption of contingency.

Rorty, in a (1999b) essay entitled “Failed Prophecies, Glorious Hopes,” reflects

upon how Marx’s (1978) Communist Manifesto served to shift human conceptions of the

bases of hope. Here, Rorty writes about the power of such linguistic redescription as

embodied by Marx. Rorty writes:

We moderns are superior to the ancients—both pagan and Christian—in our

ability to imagine a utopia here on earth. The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

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witnessed, in Europe and North America, a massive shift in the locus of human

hope: a shift from eternity to future time, from speculation about how to win

divine favor to planning for the happiness of future generations. This sense that

the human future can be made different from the human past, unaided by non-

human powers, is magnificently expressed in the Manifesto. (p. 208, italics

added)

The point in offering this quote is not, of course, to laud Marx’s Communist Manifesto.

And neither is this the reason why Rorty writes of this text in such terms. The point, rather, is to illustrate the move beyond the conception of hope grounded in correspondence with some sort of static set of truths and instead to focus attention upon hope as emergent from humankind’s action and interaction with and among one another.

In the process, and like many others, Rorty posits a vision of America that itself embodies the generation of such hopeful possibilities (see Stuhr, 1997; Westbrook, 2005;

McKenna, 2001; Stout, 2001; Schlesinger, 2008; Fraser, 2002; Green, 1999; and Saito,

2005).

Reflecting back upon the previous several paragraphs, one discovers considerable parity with central elements of Lyotard’s paralogy. For though he may not use such language, what Rorty is calling for is a world wherein each individual is allowed the freedom to enact his or her own paralogic legitimation—a form of legitimation not bound by pre-existing logics, metaphysical principles, or universalistic dogmas. Supposing that one does not impinge upon the freedom of others, he or she should be left alone to describe and redescribe the world in a manner consistent with their own precepts.

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As I have noted above, Rorty is deeply concerned to move beyond traditional

correspondence theories of truth. And along with this, of course, comes Rorty’s deference

both to historicism and to nominalism. As a result, one of the traditional tools of

philosophical inquiry—namely, dialectic—is stripped of its justificatory power. Rorty

must therefore “argue” in a decidedly paralogic fashion as opposed to traditional dialectic

manner. “My strategy,” explains Rorty (1989), “will be to try to make the vocabulary in

which [objections to my view] are phrased look bad, thereby changing the subject, rather than granting the objector his choice of weapons and terrain by meeting his criticisms

head-on” (p. 44). In a (2006b) essay entitled “Persuasion is a Good Thing,” Rorty further

explains: “Philosophy is useful for summarizing previous moral insights in the form of

moral principles, but it doesn’t do much creative work” (p. 67). Unable objectively to

justify—or, scientifically to legitimate—his position, Rorty proceeds in a somewhat less

direct fashion. Rorty (1989) further explains, “Substituting dialectic for demonstration as

the method of philosophy, or getting rid of the correspondence theory of truth, is not a

discovery about the nature of a preexistent entity called ‘philosophy’ or ‘truth. It is

changing the way we talk, thereby changing what we want to do and what we think we

are” (p. 20).

For one unfamiliar with Rorty’s corpus, his reasons for choosing the title

“ironism” may already be sufficiently clear. The irony of Rorty’s position is that he must

“argue” for a set of beliefs which he could never properly justify. Rorty (1989) is even

more explicit on the nature of the ironists position. He explains:

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I shall define an “ironist” as someone who fulfills three conditions: (1) She has

radical and continuing doubts about the final vocabulary she currently uses,

because she has been impressed by other vocabularies, vocabularies taken as final

by people or books she has encountered; (2) she realizes that argument phrased in

her present vocabulary can neither underwrite nor dissolve these doubts; (3)

insofar as she philosophizes about her situation, she does not think that her

vocabulary is closer to reality than others, that it is in touch with a power not

herself… I call people of this sort “ironists” because they realize that anything can

be made to look good or bad by being redescribed, and their renunciation of the

attempt to formulate criteria of choice between final vocabularies, puts them in

the position which Sartre called “meta-stable”: never quite able to take themselves

seriously because always aware that the terms in which they describe themselves

are subject to change, always aware of the contingency and fragility of their final

vocabularies, and thus of their selves.” (pp. 73-74)

Here again, one observes Rorty making more explicit what Lyotard, in The

Postmodern Condition, only implied. Unable to appeal either to metanarrative frames or to scientific legitimation, one seeking to validate his or her position is left enacting a project that never quite rises to the level of justification or proof. And, indeed, the very notion of proof itself is rendered suspect on account of the move beyond foundationalism, correspondence, and some sort of a realist metaphysic. Rorty’s work brings into even clearer focus, therefore, the role that linguistic redescription plays in creating human community, sustaining human solidarity, and bolstering human hope.

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Recall that in our treatment of Lyotard, much attention was paid to the role of

narrative as a means of legitimation. Denotative discourse, whatever its historic virtues,

can no longer be understood as operating in some sort of objective and non-narrative

manner. As Lyotard reminds us, even the rules of objective scientific legitimation need to

be validated by recourse to narrative. Rorty extends this line of argument through his

appeal to irony, and calls upon the liberal citizen of postmodern culture to adopt a

reverence for great poets both past and present. Such a call emerges in important ways

from Rorty’s anti-foundationalism. In The Consequences of Pragmatism Rorty (1982)

explains: “When the notion of knowledge as representation goes, then the notion of inquiry is split into discrete sectors with discrete subject matters. The lines between novels, newspaper articles, and sociological research gets blurred” (p. 203).

Rorty, in the following quote, further explains the relationship between his view of knowledge and his deference to narrative. Here, Rorty fuses together notions such as narrative, linguistic redescription, the liberal utopia, and the turn against correspondence theories of truth. Rorty (1989) writes:

This process of coming to see other human beings as “one of us” rather than as

“them” is a matter of detailed description of what unfamiliar people are like and

of redescription of what we ourselves are like. This is a task not for theory but for

genres such as ethnography, the journalist’s report, the comic book, the

docudrama, and, especially, the novel. Fiction like that of Dickens, Olive

Schreiner, or Richard Wright gives us the details about kinds of suffering being

endured by people to whom we had previously not attended. Fiction like that of

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Choderlos de Laclos, Henry James, or Nabokov gives us the details about what

sorts of cruelty we ourselves are capable of, and thereby lets us redescribe

ourselves. That is why the novel, the movie, and the TV program have, gradually

but steadily, replaced the sermon and the treatise as the principal vehicles of

moral change and progress. In my liberal utopia, this replacement would receive a

kind of recognition which it still lacks. That recognition would be part of a

general turn against theory and towards narrative. Such a turn would be

emblematic of our having given up the attempt to hold all the sides of our life in a

single vision, to describe them with a single vocabulary. (p. xvi, italics added)

When speaking of narrative as he does in the preceding quote, Rorty is echoing themes present throughout much of narrative theory. What Rorty here alludes to is narrative’s ability not only to recount a story, a chain of events that have already occurred. Speaking of the relationship between reality and stories, Stephen Crites (1971) reflects, “The real is defined not in terms of those ostensibly naked events sanctioned by the advocates of historical time but just the opposite.... Stories, and the symbolic worlds they project, are not like monuments that man beholds, but like dwelling places.” Crites continues,” People live in [stories] ... They are moving forms, at once musical and narrative, which inform people’s sense of the story of which their own lives are a part”

(p. 295, italics added). When understood in this fashion, Rorty’s deference to narrative must be recognized as more than the mere preference of poetry or fictional discourse. As

Crites helps us to understand, such an understanding of narrative betrays the fact that stories not only recount the past but also inform and animate the present. The stories that

103 we tell ourselves about our own lives and the lives of others so very often become the stories that we live and to which we defer. And so to understand the world through the eyes of poets is to recognize the inherent possibility in the power of poetic linguistic redescription. Here emerges, perhaps, one of the most hopeful possibilities inherent within stories. For if we begin to live the stories we tell ourselves and if we can redescribe our lives by way of varied hopeful stories, then the stories to which we defer can begin to create hope within and among us.

Mark Freeman, in his (1997b) essay entitled “Why Narrative? Hermeneutics,

Historical Understanding, and the Significance of Stories,” speaks for the need of something which he calls “narrative psychology.” Summarizing, Freeman’s narrative psychology focuses upon “the stories people] tell of their lives” (p.171). Such an orientation (1) focuses attention primarily upon the individual life as opposed to humankind as a collectivity; (2) directs attention toward human experience within a particular context as opposed to human experience in general; (3) concerns itself with the cultural context within which such self-stories occur; and (4) recognizes the inability to appropriate the experiences of others in an objective, that is, a non-interpretive fashion. Freeman’s account of the narrative psychology of lives comports quite well with

Rorty’s justification for narrative as a fundamental mechanism within his liberal utopia.

For both Rorty and Freeman direct attention away from the universal, from the trans- historical, and from the enduring features of human experience. Focus instead is directed toward the local, the contextual, and the provisional element of varied human experiences. Learning to honor and to privilege such particularity is, both for Rorty and

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Freeman, constitutive of a broader narrative ethic—an ethic that privileges the richness and multiplicity of stories, that tolerates plurality, and that rejects the oftentimes destructive forces inherent in the building of overarching theories. Privileging local narratives is, one might suggest, part and parcel of a paralogic ethic.

Reflecting upon the brief account of ironism (and the accompanying deference to narrative) within Rorty’s writing, one might wonder why such an individual could be praised as a champion of postmodern hope. After all, Rorty (1989) himself admits that

“ironism has often seemed intrinsically hostile not only to democracy but to human solidarity” (p. xv). By extension, of course, such ironism might also be understood as deeply hostile to human hope—particularly insofar as hope is thought to depend upon true knowledge. “But,” proclaims Rorty, “it is not” (p. xv). In order to understand Rorty’s optimism, one must come to recognize that Rorty’s hope is not the result of everyone’s arriving at and living in accord with the same conception of truth. Rather, for Rorty, hope emerges in direct proportion to the amount of freedom individuals are given to enact possibility within their own lives.

Think back with me for a moment to the autobiographical account that I offered in

Chapter 1. There, I described a vision of hope that was deeply dependent upon “truth.”

To caricature my own position, one might describe my thinking as follows. Humankind has been placed on this earth by a purposive and beneficent being. For whatever reason, that being does not speak directly to us or commune with us as other humans do. And yet, this being holds the key to human hope. The goal of humankind, therefore, is to understand how this being thinks, what this being wants from humanity, and what sort of

105 world we should produce as a result. Fortunately, we have some pretty good clues that can help us to understand what this being thinks. We have a world that reflects the character of this being, we have our own powers of reason, and we even have the bible— the most important “clue book” imaginable. When you put all this stuff together and learn to interpret it properly, you can start to understand what is true. If you understand what is true then you can start to know what you should hope. Basically, you should have hope in the true and good things that can be known about this being. And you should try to make the world as consistent with these hopes as possible. This is the point of society, to create a world that reflects truth and encourages hope. And since truth is singular and this being does not change, the hopeful pursuit of truth should tend toward a world in which people agree with one another, recognize the truth, and come to look more and more similar. The search for truth, and the longing for hope, should initiate a process of convergence that is constrained by the way things were intended to be by this being. And if and as this happens, then we can really be hopeful about the future.

What I have described above in rather plebian terms, Rorty describes in the language of metaphysics. The person who attempts to enact the process just described is, according to Rorty, a metaphysician. Rorty (1989) writes:

Metaphysicians think that human beings by nature desire to know. They think this

because the vocabulary they have inherited, their common sense, provides them

with a picture of knowledge as a relation between human beings and “reality,”

and the idea that we have a need and a duty to enter into this relation. It also tells

us that “reality,” if properly asked, will help us determine what our final

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vocabulary should be. So metaphysicians believe that there are, out there in the

world, real essences which it is our duty to discover and which are disposed to

assist in their own discovery. They do not believe that anything can be made to

look good or bad by being redescribed—or, if they do, they deplore this fact and

cling to the idea that reality will help us resist such seductions. (p. 75)

No longer himself a metaphysician, Rorty remains unconvinced that metaphysics can produce legitimate grounds upon which to construct the sort of hope necessary for sustaining a liberal democracy. To be sure, for one who finds the final vocabulary of metaphysics to be important and persuasive, metaphysical reflection may very well serve as the ground for one’s private hope (recall Lyotard’s treatment of the self-validating nature of narrative). That is, Rorty allows for the fact that numerous individuals enact the sort of metaphysical quest that I have described, and, as a result, generate significant hope for themselves and those who are similarly persuaded by this constellation of beliefs. But—and here is, perhaps, the single most important linchpin of Rorty’s entire argument—such a metaphysical quest absolutely should not be utilized as the basis for a liberal democratic society. Truth, for Rorty is not the sort of thing that emerges by way of metaphysical reflection. For metaphysical reflection is, according to Rorty, a misguided byproduct of the varied Platonisms that have for so long dominated Western society and thought. As a result, a properly guided liberal Democratic America must be grounded upon something far less determinant, far more malleable, and far more suitable for the generation of pluralistic public hopes.

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For Rorty, the basis of American democracy, to put the matter in slightly different

terms, must emerge paralogically. America must be, and, for Rorty, always has been at

odds with the assumption that democracy represents the reflection or unfolding of

necessary truths. For Rorty, American democracy represents an instantiation of a certain

disposition that may be manifest in a multiplicity of ways. America remains liberal and

sustains the possibility of hope, for Rorty, only insofar as it remains true to the sentiment embodied by Rorty’s liberal maxim as outlined above. Again, to quote Rorty (1989), modern liberal societies are sustained by the belief “that life will eventually be freer, less cruel, more leisured, richer in goods and experiences, not just for our descendants but for everybody’s descendants” (p. 86).

Following John Dewey (1954), Rorty (1991a) seeks “as much intersubjective agreement as possible,” between individuals. So too does Rorty possess “the desire to extend the reference of “us” as far as we can” (“Solidarity or Objectivity?”, p. 23).

Insofar as such intersubjective agreement and recognition of the other emerges and grows, communities of solidarity may begin to emerge and even flourish within a liberal democracy. The extension of the reference of “us” will never, however, utterly unify humankind by way of its common commitment to what Lyotard might refer to as a particular metanarrative frame. Though citizens of a liberal democracy may indeed live in solidarity with one another, for Rorty, such solidarity will always be “grounded” in deeply contingent assumptions and processes. Echoing Lyotard’s treatment of paralogy,

Rorty (1989) therefore hopes to observe

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an increasing willingness to live with plurality and to stop asking for universal

validity. I want to see freely arrived at agreement as agreement on how to

accomplish common purposes (e.g., prediction and control of the behavior of

atoms or people, equalizing life-chances, decreasing cruelty), but I want to see

these common purposes against the background of an increasing sense of the

radical diversity of private purposes, of the radically poetic character of

individual lives, and of the merely poetic foundations of the “we-consciousness”

which lies behind our social institutions. (pp. 67-68, italics added)

In a text entitled Philosophy and Social Hope, Rorty further reflects upon the sorts of hopeful possibilities that may emerge from the proliferation of human freedom. In the process, Rorty employees linguistic redescription himself as a way of shifting one’s conception of America. In the process, Rorty explicitly suggests that one should understand America as a nation that is intent upon seeking the generation of hope rather than the reflection of truth. Reflecting on this possibility, Rorty (1999) notes, “Both

[America] and its most distinguished philosopher [John Dewey] suggest that we can, in politics, substitute hope for the sort of knowledge which philosophers have usually tried to attain” (p. 24). In making such a claim, Rorty envisions an American populous bound together by hope in the possibility of a better, richer, and fuller society. Rorty envisions an America wherein one is able to tell a different story about his or her life, to craft a more hopeful narrative, and to live within and out of the possibilities envisioned by such redescription. And Rorty envisions an America wherein hope is universal and yet wherein the outcomes of such hopes are utterly indeterminate. Rorty’s America, to speak

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in terms consonant with the central argument of this dissertation, is a place calling out for

ever more hopeful enactments of paralogic legitimation, enactments which continue to

bolster human freedom and allow for the process of self-creation within individual lives.

Conclusion

Reflecting upon Rorty’s liberal utopia, one discovers a culture wherein

metanarratives have been thoroughly deprivileged, wherein the notion of some sort of

objective, scientific, or universal legitimation has been exposed as the falsehood that it

truly is. Rorty’s liberal utopia consists of a world wherein linguistic redescription

constitutes to be the principal means whereby humankind not only make sense of its

world, but also whereby humankind exists both in harmony and in tension with others.

Relying heavily upon the accumulated wisdom and insight of poets both past and present,

the employment of narrative teaches us to see the world in new and exciting ways.

Narrative both represents and encourages the fostering of the inventive communicative

imagination. The result, for Rorty, is precisely what Lyotard points toward in the closing

moments of The Postmodern Condition: temporary alliances, community without consensus, and the celebration of disagreement. Rorty’s liberal utopia is, one might argue, a peculiarly American and decidedly pragmatist embodiment of the kind of culture

implied by Lyotard’s description of the postmodern condition.

Reflecting upon Rorty’s liberal utopia, what I find most striking—and what I find most important for this particular project—is Rorty’s ironic and continued deference to the category of hope. Rather then exercising the most radical or nihilistic tendencies suggested by Lyotard’s tome, Rorty instead maintains the possibility and even the

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necessity of hopeful futures. Stated more accurately, Rorty foreground’s hope as the

single, most important element operating within his liberal utopia. Hope is the

mechanism which moves forward our admittedly ironic attempts to achieve solidarity,

attempts which must always operate in the face of contingency, yet which are not for that

reason to be either disparaged or rejected. Rorty, drawing upon a theme which has always been present in liberal thought, articulates an account of the postmodern state which recognizes all of the critical tendencies of postmodern metaphilosophy, and yet refuses to reject the necessity and primacy of human hope—even if a universal or common hope cannot, ultimately, unite all of humankind.

Given Rorty’s unashamed penchant for an anti-foundationalist, post- metaphysical, and thoroughly nominalist account of philosophical inquiry, one can fairly quickly see why Rorty is often charged with falling prey to the relativistic or nihilistic tendencies inherent within much postmodern thought. Rorty himself recognizes this likely conclusion. Rorty (1989) writes, “Anyone who says… that truth is not ‘out there’ will be suspected of relativism and irrationalism. Anyone who casts doubt on the distinction between morality and prudence… will be suspected of immorality.” (p. 44).

And, indeed, Rorty has been suspected of both.

Whether or not Rorty leaves himself open to the charges mentioned in the preceding paragraph remains as a topic of much interest. That being said, and in spite of the seemingly-intractable tensions inherent within Rorty’s work, I am increasingly persuaded that Rorty’s corpus betrays an honest attempt to move beyond foundationalism and yet retain morality, rationality, and even hope. To this end, in Contingency, Irony,

111 and Solidarity Rorty (1989) writes “The fundamental premise of the book is that a belief can still regulate action, can still be thought worth dying for, among people who are quite aware that this belief is caused by nothing deeper than contingent historical circumstance” (p. 189). Rorty’s label of “ironism” is indeed both telling and important, for one holding this position possesses “consciousness of the fact that the deepest convictions one holds are the result of past poetic and creative achievements” (Rorty,

2006, p. 72). The ironist recognizes the role of language games in creating his or her most fundamental beliefs and yet nevertheless allows such beliefs to guide and even determine his or her actions.

Consistent with the pilgrimage described in chapter 1, Rorty’s treatment of contingency and irony describes an inescapable feature of the human condition.

Humankind must ever and always perform a delicate balancing act between certainty and utter provisionality, between the temporal and the eternal, between the universal and the particular. Such a necessity is neither new nor deeply problematic for Rorty. What

Lyotard calls paralogy, Rorty here labels as linguistic redescription. Both challenge traditional foundationalist assumptions about metaphysics as well as the goal of philosophy. And, most important, when taken together, such notions offer an explanation for and, perhaps, even a “justification” of varied rhetorics that emerge within America’s peculiar mode of democratic governance.

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CHAPTER 3: JAMES DOBSON: TRUTH, HOPE, AND THE AMERICAN FAMILY

Introduction

The goal of Chapter 1 was to introduce the central thesis of this dissertation while

also familiarizing the reader with a number of arguments that would be developed

throughout the remaining chapters. To that end, I spent a bit of time explaining how my own autobiographical situation gave rise to many of the themes pervading this project. At

the heart of my own story was a persistent struggle to understand the relationship

between truth and hope. As I explained in Chapter 1, it is often assumed that hope must

be derivative of truth, must correspond with some sort of reality outside of itself. In

opposition to this assumption, I offered the central claim of this dissertation: the end of

objective truth does not signal the demise of hope. Though one often has difficulty

speaking about hope in the postmodern context, this does not suggest that hope is either

dispensable or unimportant to private and public life. In fact, I even made the claim in

Chapter 1 that the failure to retain hope posed serious challenges to American democracy

itself. Reflecting the need to speak differently about hope, I offered a definition of the

concept that paid particular attention to communicative concerns as well as the

postmodern need to move beyond modernist certainty.

The fact that we struggle so mightily to articulate hope results, I argued, from a

critical misunderstanding of postmodern epistemology. Simply put, it is sometimes

assumed that postmodern critiques of knowledge contain within themselves simultaneous

challenges to hope. But, as I suggested in Chapter 1, this assumption emerges only so

long as one continues to believe that knowledge, duty, and hope represent a unified and

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mutually constitutive class of ideas. As I claimed in Chapter 1, not all postmodern

thinkers make this methodological blunder. And, for this reason, not all postmodern

“theorists” offer positions inimical to the sustenance of hope.

In Chapter 2, my intent was to develop several themes introduced in the opening pages of the dissertation. Most of all, I wished to show how two prominent postmodern thinkers remain fundamentally committed to the dissolution of objective knowledge, yet without rejecting the centrality of hope. My consideration of Lyotard labored with this goal in mind, and as a result, spent time considering several important themes found within The Postmodern Condition. Here, I considered: (1) Lyotard’s oft-quoted claim about incredulity toward metanarratives; (2) the relationship between scientific and narrative knowledge—and the legitimation function performed by each; (3) characteristics of narrative, particularly regarding its self-legitimating quality; and (4)

Lyotard’s introduction of paralogy as a means of generating hope even in the face of the dissolution of metanarratives and the end of objective legitimation for knowledge claims.

Because Lyotard is one of the most preeminent postmodern theorists, I thought it essential to engage his argument found within The Postmodern Condition. Rooted in a thorough critique of modernist science and knowledge, Lyotard’s text has been used as justification for the dissolution of personal or collective hope. My own treatment of

Lyotard’s paralogy was an attempt to counter the claim that the author’s epistemological stance dictates the rejection of hope. On the contrary, Lyotard’s introduction of paralogic legitimation offers, I argued, a kind of hopeful legitimation that is rooted in communicative practice and that resists modernist attempts at objective certainty and

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truth. In short, I sought to argue that Lyotard’s paralogy could be employed in concert

with my own definition of hope offered in Chapter 1.

Although I made what I believe to be a compelling case against viewing Lyotard

as inimical to hope, the account of paralogy introduced by the author of The Postmodern

Condition is, admittedly, both limited and germinal in character. For this reason, the

second half of Chapter 2 directed attention toward Richard Rorty, another of the central

philosophical voices within postmodern discourse. While Lyotard and Rorty emerge from

remarkably different intellectual contexts, my intent was to illustrate fundamental

similarities that such men share regarding the relationship between knowledge, language, and hope. This goal directed my attention toward Rorty’s notion of liberal ironism, as developed principally within the pages of Contingency, Irony and Solidarity. As I argued in Chapter 2, Rorty, like Lyotard, is deeply invested in postmodern critiques of certain knowledge. At the same time, and counter to prevailing sentiment among some adherents of postmodern thought, Rorty is very interested in both bolstering America’s liberal democracy and in sustaining hope. Perhaps most striking, Chapter 2 considered Rorty’s claim that America is a nation wherein hope now takes the place once occupied by truth.

Consistent with this sort of claim, I showed how Rorty is deeply invested in redescribing

the world in ways that look principally to the future and place hope in the possibilities

resulting from linguistic redescription as opposed to correspondence with truth.

The account offered in Chapter 2 was largely focused upon explicating the views

of Lyotard and Rorty. As a result, I undertook fairly little critical engagement or

application of such positions. Employing the insight of the preceding two chapters,

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Chapters 3 and 4 seek to offer such critical engagement and application of the

postmodern “theorists” already introduced. Here in Chapter 3, the goal is to consider the

rhetoric of Dr. James Dobson, the founder and voice of the influential parachurch

organization Focus on the Family. As I intend to demonstrate, Dobson remains deeply

invested in rejecting postmodern critiques both of knowledge and hope. And as a result,

Dobson represents a particularly interesting example of the non-paralogic generation of hope in our contemporary world.

With the preceding summary (of Chapters 1 and 2) and preview (of Chapter 3) behind me, only one last preliminary matter remains before I turn my focus directly to

Dobson and, later, Obama (in Chapter 4). Reflecting upon the preceding two chapters, the reader may find him or herself wondering why I have now directed my attention toward specifically religious notions of hope. And, indeed, given the very broad framing of hope that I offered in Chapters 1 and 2, this would not seem to be an altogether unjustified concern. Reflecting upon this matter, a number of responses come to mind.

The most obvious reason for choosing explicitly religious manifestations of hope is that my own interests and expertise lies here. Regardless of whatever additional elements have influenced my scholarship, I have always held a deep interest in

understanding the nature of religious belief and its manifestation in culture. And so there

are deeply autobiographical reasons for my selection of communicative exemplars.

Second, though Dobson and Obama do indeed speak of decidedly religious

concerns, neither of them are tied to narrowly-confessional manifestations of Christian

belief. To be sure, Dobson is a Nazarene, an evangelical, and according to many, a

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fundamentalist. Obama has ties to black liberation theology as well as the social gospel.

Even so, and though very different, in their public treatments of the relationship between

faith and society, both Dobson and Obama represent widely ecumenical manifestations of religious belief.

My third reason for turning to the specific exemplars of religious belief considered in Chapters 3 and 4 stems from the broad visibility and appeal of both Dobson

and Obama. Dobson and Obama are compelling examples of rhetorics of hope because

they represent widespread cultural manifestations of hope grounded in religious belief.

Both individuals have a rich following, a swath of available texts for consideration, and a

more or less developed account of the relationship between belief, hope, and its proper

manifestation within contemporary culture and political life. For this reason, both Obama

and Dobson were compelling and appropriate for the task at hand.

The final point worth mentioning is one that cannot fully be justified without

considerable care—care which I cannot appropriately exercise here. Simply stated, it

seems spurious to suggest that any robust manifestation of hope can somehow refrain from being deeply “religious” in character. Although I agree that an allegedly “secular” account of hope may avoid specifically-Christian or broadly-theistic terminology, it is not, for this reason, any less religious (see Burke, 1961; Steiner, 2006). Here, I am using the word “religion” not as synonymous with formal expressions of theological belief.

Rather, I use the word in its historic sense, in a manner consistent with its Latin origins wherein relegare held the connotation of “being committed” or “bound to” something.

To state the matter a bit differently, I assume that there exists an inescapable relationship

117 between philosophical belief and those matters which are typically labeled as more specifically religious” in nature. If the study of the history of philosophy—and, particularly the study of postmodern developments in that history—teaches anything, it is that all discourse is value laden and is shot through with all manner of axiological sensibilities. This is, at least in part, what we discovered when studying Lyotard’s treatment of narrative knowledge. And, this is a point that should become increasingly clear in the pages that follow.

The remainder of this chapter begins with a brief contextualization of Dobson’s rhetoric, focusing particularly upon Focus on the Family, the broader organization of which Dobson is a part. I then turn my attention to a sustained consideration of Dobson’s rhetoric, paying considerable attention to his treatment of homosexuality as inimical to the hope of families in particular and America in general. Having introduced and examined Dobson’s rhetoric on this topic, I then offer a brief assessment of what I consider to be liabilities inherent within Dobson’s conception of hope in America.

Finally, I conclude with a more general discussion concerning the relationship between

Dobson’s rhetoric and paralogy. Here the goal is both to extend and critically to engage my description of paralogy that emerged in Chapters 1 and 2. And, in the process, I will simultaneously be raising central issues that will be variously addressed when turning to the rhetoric of Barack Obama in Chapter 4.

Focus on the Family: Background and Context

Focus on the Family (hereafter FOTF) is an enormous organization consisting of more than 74 ministries employing nearly 1,300 people. At the center of FOTF is an

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internationally syndicated radio program that broadcasts on nearly 3,500 radio facilities in the U.S. and more than 5,000 internationally in 163 countries. As such, the listenership of this radio program is over 200 million people daily. Alongside of the radio initiative,

FOTF has a television broadcast seen on 80 stations daily in the U.S. In addition to its radio and television broadcasts, FOTF produces nearly a dozen monthly magazines that have a circulation of over 2 million readers, generates countless books, videos and print resources, and offers professional counseling and counseling referrals. Moreover, in July

2004, FOTF started a new ministry called Focus on the Family Action, a lobbying and

advocacy group that “is designed to take on the government, the media and the leftist

organizations in the defense of the family and principles of morality (FMA, p. 1/10).

Though the breadth of the ministry is expansive, defending the traditional family exists at

the very center of every facet of the organization.

According to Focus on the Family, one of the principal and most likely

challenges to a hopeful American future is the destruction of the traditional Judeo-

Christian vision of the family. FOTF is therefore deeply committed to the defense of

traditional marriage, the value and protection of children, the sanctity of human life, the

importance of social responsibility, and the defense of traditional and innate distinctions

between male and female persons (see Focus on the Family’s Mission Statement, p. 1/2).

Concomitant with its defense of traditional marriage as well as the associated themes just

described, FOTF is guided by a pervasive desire “to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ for

practical outreach to homes” (Mission Statement, p. 1/2). As such, FOTF recognizes itself as no mere social organization or political lobbying group. Rather, FOTF sees itself as

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being guided by “what we believe to be the recommendations of the Creator Himself, who ordained the family and gave it His blessing” (Mission Statement, p. 1/2).

Although there exists numerous alleged-threats to the kind of familial structure supported by FOTF, the organization believes that the increased prominence and cultural acceptance of homosexuality is by far the most pressing and potentially-destructive concern facing the American family today. And while Dobson’s oftentimes-hyperbolic account of the reach and influence of varied homosexual lifestyles is wisely viewed with a measure of caution, there can be little doubt that mainstream America has indeed witnessed a rise in the visibility of homosexuality within recent decades. As Leo Bersani, author of the (1995) text Homos writes, “Never before have gay men and women been so visible” (p. 11). What Bersani observed in 1995 is even more certain today. Popular culture in particular has seen a marked increase in attention paid to themes related to homosexuality within the 21st century. Primetime television shows such as Will and

Grace, Queer as Folk, and, more recently, A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila represent

only three of literally dozens of story lines that center around issues of homosexuality,

bisexuality, and transsexuality. An entire television network, LOGO, now exists which is

dedicated to “entertainment programming for lesbians and gays and just about anyone

who enjoys a gay point of view” (Frequently Asked Questions, p. 1/3). Not only this, but

within academe itself, continued work by various scholars has given disciplines such as

queer theory, gender studies, and women’s studies an increasingly-wide hearing. And as

a result, theorists such as Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, and Teresa de Lauretis are

firmly entrenched within the postmodern academic canon. Even inside the Christian

120 church, the traditional American bastion of conservativism, issues of homosexuality loom large. Homosexual ordination, gay marriage, the rise of “Queer Theology”—each of these in their own ways relates deeply to issues that can be appropriately framed within the context of an increasingly visible homosexual presence in American culture.

The increased visibility of homosexuality has, of course, been received variously throughout American culture. Many laud such movement as progress and as long overdue liberation for a portion of the oppressed among us. Others, however, view such alleged progress as inimical to the very future of America itself. Not only is such an alleged- progress morally reprehensible according to some opponents of homosexuality, but it likewise threatens to undermine nearly every facet of our shared existence. As such, issues related to homosexuality have become some of the primary battles in the broader culture wars of recent decades (see Hunter 1991). At the forefront of this debate, James

Dobson has now lobbied for over three decades, all the while amassing considerable resources and worldwide support for his particular understanding of Christian principles regarding the nature of the family.

Although it may initially appear that a discussion about homosexuality and the family strays from the central goal of understanding the nature of hope in postmodern

America, this is not the case. While many individuals may justifiably believe that

America’s hopes rest upon other bedrock issues, Dobson and his numerous supporters remain convinced that the traditional family represent one of the most basic institutions in the history of human existence. Consider the following quote, available on FOTF’s web site: “We believe that the institution of marriage is a sacred covenant designed by God to

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model the love of Christ for His people and to serve both the public and private good as

the basic building block of human civilization” (Focus on the Family – About Us, p. 1/2).

Many may disagree with Dobson’s particular understanding of the way families must be enacted. But far fewer would challenge Dobson’s assumption that familial relationships and interactions do indeed serve as one of the primary generative

mechanisms in sustaining culture, in providing narrative structures that contextualize and

give meaning to one’s existence, and that offer life-long bases upon which—or, in

opposition to which—most individuals construct their vision for a hopeful future. And so

I find it wholly appropriate that a discussion about the nature of families can serve as a

justifiable locus for reflecting upon the nature and status of hope in postmodern America.

Given the enormity of FOTF, it would be difficult to consider all of their literature about homosexuality and the family here in Chapter 3. Being that so very much of the work produced by FOTF family deals with marriage, a great percentage of material from this organization focuses either explicitly or implicitly on matters germane to a discussion of homosexuality and the family. And so, in studying FOTF I had to make strategic choices about where to focus my attention. In what follows I will offer an analysis of all relevant newsletters that James Dobson wrote during the roughly eight year period ranging from January 2000 to May 2008. Such newsletters are distributed monthly to numerous supporters, and many of them are likewise available on the Focus on the

Family web site. I have chosen this particular sample of articles because they are among the most widely circulated of the correspondence between FOTF and its supporters.

Moreover, such pieces are all penned by Dobson himself, and therefore are arguably

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taken as representative of the mission and objectives of the entire organization. Based

upon my reading, fourteen of the newsletters from this time period deal either significantly or exclusively with issues related to homosexuality and the family, and it is

upon these fourteen newsletters that my following analysis heavily relies.

Dobson and Homosexuality: Modernist Hope in a Postmodern World

At the heart of FOTF’s communicative appeals are a number of assumptions

about the status of truth. For a great many reasons, evangelicalism is deeply invested in

the sort of modernist conceptions of truth that were for so long part of my own

intellectual vocabulary—and which I explained in some detail in the opening chapter of

this project. As heirs to such a modernist heritage, FOTF betrays (and even exemplifies) a

great many of these sensibilities. And, as I will argue below, it is upon such notions

concerning the objective and discernible status of truth that the remainder of FOTF’s

identity and praxis emerges.

Central to the vision of FOTF is the idea that truth exists. It is real, it is attainable,

and it demands to be taken into account. The truth of which Dobson speaks is found

within the pages of the Christian Bible and is accompanied by a clear and persistent

testimony within nature itself. Referring to Romans 2:14-15, Dobson explains “that

human beings are ‘hard-wired’ with a conscience that speaks to them about right and

wrong” (FF00, p. 3/4). Anyone familiar with this passage in Romans knows, of course,

that the Apostle Paul famously refers to homosexuality. And so Dobson takes this

passage to provide a two-fold testimony against homosexuality. On the one hand,

according to Dobson, the bible itself tells us that homosexuality is wrong. On the other

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hand, it is a feature of human existence that his or her conscience attests to the wrongness

of such acts even apart from the testimony of scripture. Building upon this dual

foundation, the appeals of FOTF regularly show evidence of a two-fold strategy: a joint

appeal to the testimony of scripture and the testimony of nature.

At the heart of Dobson’s entire worldview exists a set of assumptions about what

Lyotard referred to as “the problem of legitimation.” Whereas Lyotard labors at some

length to problematize traditional means of attaining truth, Dobson himself remains

largely unaffected by such a critical turn. Dobson, therefore, thinks of himself as attaining

the sort of scientific legitimation that Lyotard finds increasingly dubious. And although

one may critique Dobson for being naïve or precritical, there are deeply theological

reasons for Dobson’s certainty. Lyotard, perceiving the world in a deeply secular fashion,

quite naturally recognizes problems for one seeking to get to the god given nature of

“reality.” And so Lyotard must turn toward paralogic legitimation both for knowledge and for the associated axiological concerns once thought to be contained within the nature of “reality” itself. For Dobson, however, no such para-logical mechanism is

necessary. The logic of creation has, for Dobson, been written into the universe, described within the pages of the Christian scriptures, and made available to humankind through the wise use of reason. Both scripture and the testimony of nature serve as their own legitimation, a legitimation not grounded upon human processes or skill. Rather, it is a legitimation that is directed by Providence and that benefits from the fact that both the necessary and sufficient conditions for the realization of such legitimation are built into the nature of reality itself.

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Reflecting upon the brief description outlined in the preceding paragraph, one

recognizes an ironic state of affairs. Is quite clear that Dobson recognizes himself to be

achieving a level of certainty previously thought to be available only by way of what

Lyotard would have referred to as “scientific legitimation.” And yet, as we have already

seen—and as will become even more clear in the following pages—Lyotard would most

likely describe Dobson’s form of legitimation in deeply narrative, that is paralogical,

terms. One thinks of the old adage “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” and is

tempted to coin a similar and admittedly awkward analog: “One man’s logic is another

man’s paralogy.” Corny as the phrase may be, it captures well the sort of sentiment

embodied by both Lyotard and Rorty: “reality” and “truth” may no longer be understood

as somehow objectively logical. Such notions must rather be understood as outcomes of

the manner in which we communicate about such. Dobson, though certainly benefiting

from the generative power inherent within linguistic redescription, does not view himself

as enacting such a contingent process, a fact that further examination of his rhetoric will

make increasingly clear.

Contained within Dobson’s account of the basis and nature of truth is a persistent appeal to clear binaries. Again, reflecting a decidedly modernist set of assumptions about both truth and “reality,” Dobson regularly speaks in “either/or” terms, allowing for no middle ground between two significantly different extremes. Rarely does Dobson speak of reality or truth as existing along a continuum, and in many instances wherein such a continuum seems appropriate, an even stronger appeal to binaries is found in its place.

Ambiguity, contextuality, and provisionality are not characteristic features of the appeals

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of FOTF. And, as a result, consistent and seemingly necessary ethical action is thought to follow from the non-existence of such ambiguity.

One clear example of such binary thinking is found at the heart of Dobson’s

project to fight homosexual activism. Time and again, Dobson speaks of “the homosexual

movement,” “the gay and lesbian movement,” and “homosexual activists” (see MOR for

consistent examples of this). As even a cursory reading of queer theory or homosexual

activist literature reveals, however, there is no single, monolithic homosexual movement

(Bersani, 1995; Lorde, 2007; Rimmerman, 2008). And, in fact, the objectives, hopes, and emphases of varied homosexual groups are deeply varied. Moreover, not all homosexuals are activists and not all activists are homosexuals who are provocatively calling for political reform. And yet Dobson speaks repeatedly as if there exists a singular movement intent upon the same agenda. As an example, consider the following passage from

Dobson’s September 2003 newsletter:

This is the real deal: most gays and lesbians do not want to marry each other. That

would entangle them in all sorts of legal constraints. Who needs a lifetime

commitment to one person? The intention here is to destroy marriage altogether.

With marriage as we know it gone, everyone would enjoy all the legal benefits of

marriage (custody rights, tax-free inheritance, joint ownership of property, health

care and spousal citizenship, etc.) without limiting the number of partners or their

gender. Nor would “couples” be bound to each other in the eyes of the law. This

is clearly where the movement is headed. If you doubt that this is the motive, read

it for yourself. (MOR, p. 3/8)

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Admittedly, Dobson qualifies the opening of this passage with the caveat that he is only

talking about most (not all) homosexuals. By the end of the passage, however, one finds

Dobson nevertheless speaking in terms of a singular movement with a clear, destructive

agenda. Not only this, but Dobson suggests that many homosexuals are united by

something other than the desire for monogamy, namely for a desire to have free and copious sex.

In another passage, Dobson suggests that homosexual activism has been constructing and moving forward an agenda for over four decades. He explains, “For

more than 40 years, the homosexual activist movement has sought to implement a master

plan that has had as its centerpiece the utter destruction of the family” (IDM, p. 1/7).

Here again, the enemy is singular and their objective is clear. It is homosexuals in general that FOTF is fighting, for all homosexuals are intent upon destroying the family,

according to Dobson.

Reflecting upon Dobson’s characterization of a monolithic opponent, it is worth

briefly returning to the treatment of paralogy offered in Chapter 2. Recall that one of the

defining features of paralogic communication is its ability to tolerate and even to

celebrate disagreement. Rorty takes this point even further when suggesting that the

nature of the social bond is itself ironically ungrounded and deeply contingent. What both

Lyotard and Rorty describe, therefore, is a collection of disparate or even conflicting

individuals who nevertheless form communities out of such multiplicity. What Dobson

calls the “homosexual activist community” or what others might call “the gay

community” oftentimes exists in such disarray. And though Evangelicalism is likewise

127 fragmented and multiplicitous, Dobson tends to focus upon a fairly straightforward and even simplistic message that allows for a more or less monolithic account of what it means to be (a) a homosexual who is interested in furthering gay rights, awareness, and equality, and (b) a Christian who is in support of the traditional family. Dobson therefore stands in striking contrast to both Rorty and Lyotard. As Lyotard himself explains,

“Consensus is only a particular state of discussion, not its end. Its end, on the contrary, is paralogy” (Lyotard, 1979, pp. 65-66). Dobson chooses to focus attention away from the inescapable paralogic consequences of genuine discussion and instead prioritizes consensus as well as a generally simplistic assessment of social movements.

Other manifestations of FOTF’s assumptions about the true nature of reality are found within Dobson’s views about sexuality, gender, and marriage. Concerning human sexuality, Dobson suggests, “The Bible also outlines a specific plan for human sexuality.

Throughout Scripture, God’s intention for human sexual relationships is clearly limited to the heterosexual union between a man and a woman in marriage” (MOR, p. 4/8). Herein, one observes the merging of Dobson’s views of the of objective status of truth (as found in scripture) with his conception of the necessary status of human sexuality and marriage.

Dobson argues that there is a specific plan for marriage (a given, an ontological foundation) that demands monogamous, heterosexual unions. How do we know? Because we have truth in scripture and scripture is clear. This is the way things are, and so this demands certain action, according to the rhetoric of FOTF.

Such certain and inherently truthful foundations extend to the nature of gender as well. As Dobson notes, “genuine, necessary differences exist between the sexes” (MOR,

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p. 4/8). There is essential boy-ness and girl-ness. Or, as Dobson suggests elsewhere, “In case you haven’t noticed, boys are different from girls. That fact was never in question for previous generations. They knew intuitively that each sex was a breed apart, and that boys were typically the more unpredictable of the two.” (SBB, p. 2/8). Dobson elaborates on such differences, suggesting that “boys are more aggressive in every society around the globe” (SBB, p. 3/8), “boys are [risk takers] because of the way they are wired neurologically and because of the influence of hormones that stimulate certain aggressive behavior” (SBB, p. 5/8), and that being a man consists of “being respectful, thoughtful and gentlemanly to women, but reacting with confidence, strength and certainty in manner.” Unfortunately, according to Dobson, “Some have wimped out, acting like whipped puppies” (RFS, p. 2/5).

Not only is gender grounded in the true nature of reality, but so too is the way in which such gender roles are taught. For the production of men, Dobson explains, “Dad is more important than mom. Mothers make boys. Fathers make men” (HTP, p. 4/8).

Emerging from the given-ness of gender, “A mother is ill equipped to teach her son what it means to be a man, just as a father cannot teach his daughter to be a woman” (MOR, p.

4/8). The proper role of the healthy parent of a boy is “to help boys identify their gender assignments and understand what it means to be a man” (HBL, p. 4/8). Elsewhere,

Dobson speaks of “true masculinity” and suggests that “the masculine temperament lends itself to two major responsibilities: to protect and to provide for the man’s family” (RFS, p. 4/5).

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In the preceding several paragraphs, one discovers a number of interesting points that should probably give Dobson pause. As we have seen, Dobson continues to speak of notions such as sexuality and gender in deeply biological and even deterministic terms.

And, indeed, much of the force of Dobson’s argument against homosexuality stems from its alleged perversion of the “true nature” of things. Even so, and as evidenced above,

Dobson remains deeply invested in teaching young children to perform their gender assignments appropriately. Failure to do so regularly produces, according to Dobson, a spate of perversions of traditional sexual orientations. That Dobson is committed to the teaching and nurturing of gender roles does not, of course, speak definitively against the existence of innately gendered identities. At the very least, however, the need to manage such identities should signal to Dobson that the true nature of things will remain deeply impotent if not given voice by communal and narrative means. Scientific truth, if and whenever it exists, will forever remain illegitimate until brought to life within a robust community wherein suitable language games exist that allow for the recognition of such legitimacy. Dobson himself relies heavily upon both the capital inherent within the idea of scientific truth and a robust set of narrative structures that lean upon such capital. And yet, at least with regard to issues surrounding sexuality, Dobson tends to downplay the generative and even determining nature of one’s narrative community.

Because there is an essential boy-ness and girl-ness and because these are most appropriately taught by mothers and fathers (in heterosexual marriages), one must, according to Dobson, retain a clear picture of what marriage was intended to be. And, just as gender is clearly outlined in both scripture and in nature, so too is the true nature of

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marriage. More than any other institution in human history, marriage is, in Dobson’s

assessment, reflective of and responsible for giving voice to and even sustaining the true

nature of reality. The traditional family (that is, the monogamous, heterosexual family) was “designed by God at the dawn of human existence” (VCA, p. 1/5). In addition to being an ancient institution, marriage “continues to be the primary institution of society to this day.” (MOR, p. 4/8).

Not only was marriage intended to function as an institution between one man and one woman. The institution of marriage is the grounding for the true nature of families as well. In various newsletters, Dobson speaks of “God’s reproductive design” (FFOO, p.

2/5), refers to “the design for marriage and parenthood described in Scripture” (FF, p.

3/5), and argues that “we know that the blueprint for the family was laid down in God’s

Holy Word” (FFOO, p. 4/5). If families, and particularly children, are to continue to exist

as healthy and stable, then the true status of the institution of marriage must be heeded.

As Dobson warns, “If the God-ordained basis for the family does indeed fail on a large

scale, children will pay a terrible price” (MOR, p. 4/8).

Consistent with the view that truth is found both in scripture and in nature,

Dobson also offers extra-biblical support for his statements about the true and given

nature of the institution of marriage and the traditional family. Dobson explains, “It is

often said that God speaks to us through two books: the Bible and the ‘book of nature’”

(MOR, p. 6/8). Even for those who do not know Christ, Dobson believes that the book of

nature provides numerous reasons why homosexual behavior is harmful to individuals

and to society as a whole. Here, Dobson leans upon historic precedent dating back at least

131 to the time Galileo’s declaration that god speaks both through the revealed world of the bible and through nature and scientific laws (see Lindberg & Numbers, 1986). And

Dobson, throughout his varied appeals, documents countless examples of what he takes to be such two-fold evidence. In making such appeals, Dobson is appealing to a long- established tradition within Christian theology that suggests that god’s truth is evident in both “special” and “general” ways. According to many Christian theologians, the testimony of nature, conscience, and reason constitute a sort of “general revelation” available to all humankind through which the testimony of god can be heard apart from more special means such as scripture, divine utterance, and miracles (Berkhof, 1996;

Grudem, 1994). It is upon this inherited theological capital that Dobson is regularly building when constructing his varied objections to homosexuality.

One might wonder how it is that Dobson can appeal both to scripture and to nature as a way of generating an allegedly-unified vision concerning the true nature of reality. After all, within recent memory, science has not been altogether kind to traditional, literalist manifestations of the Christian worldview (Clayton & Schall, 2007;

Pearcey & Thaxton, 1994). Given Dobson’s assumptions about reality, however, scientific legitimation must itself serve the received and literal teachings of scripture. As a result, Dobson regularly challenges scientific truth that fails to accord with his understanding of scripture. One discovers, therefore, that Dobson is not wholly deferential to an objective scientific mode of legitimation, even as he appeals to scientific evidence as support for his varied claims about issues such as the historic efficacy of the family and the destructive consequences of homosexuality. And here one discovers an

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ironic turn of events. Although Dobson would not likely appreciate such a characterization, his necessarily-selective appropriation of scientific legitimation again demonstrates his deference to a deeply narrative (though admittedly not altogether

paralogic) mode of legitimation. Dobson enlists science in support of his account of

reality when such science accords with this particular account of the cosmos.

One cannot, of course, fault Dobson for such savvy employments of what

Aristotle (2001) referred to as “the available means of persuasion” (Rhetoric, p. 1329). It

is nevertheless important to highlight the fact that Dobson’s regular deference to science

does not somehow free him from the necessity of narrative modes of legitimation. For the

conclusions of scientific research are not enough for Dobson. They must be vetted by the

narrative framework emergent from Dobson’s understanding of the Christian scriptures.

Here, therefore, is an embodied cultural manifestation of one of the key lessons to be

learned from our treatment of Lyotard in Chapter 2: Dobson’s hope for America is and

always has been generated at least in part by way of non-objective (that is, narrative)

truth. Though numerous evangelicals labor at length to reject or obscure such ties with

communally generated or narratively derived systems of belief, our consideration of

Dobson’s appropriation of a scientific mode of legitimation yet again brings to the fore

the following inescapable truth: a robust account of hope never was and never can be

objectively derived. Though Dobson seeks mightily to articulate a vision of hope based

upon certain truth, the very existence of that truth itself relies heavily upon narrative

modes of legitimation for its efficacy.

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In Dobson’s assessment, general revelation shows forth support for the traditional family in another important way. History itself attests to the importance and necessary

permanence of heterosexual marriage. According to Dobson, “Some institutions stand the

test of time because they are the only ones that can stand the test of time” (MOR, p. 4/8).

Dobson warns against what he calls an “untested and unprecedented social experiment”

(IDM, p. 2/7). For he contends that “only in the last few ‘milliseconds’ of human history

have we even entertained the idea that marriage is anything other than the union of a male

and a female” (MOR, p. 4/8). Because of Dobson’s perception of both the true status and

the historical moorings of such a sacred institution, it is essential that traditional marriage

be defended and supported. We are, according to Dobson, at a unique historical

crossroads, for the “God-ordained institution, which has prevailed in almost every culture

on earth since the Garden of Eden, is unraveling right in front of our eyes” (FF01, p. 1/5).

Because homosexuality exists in contradiction to traditional marriage, which, as

we have seen, is written into the order of the universe, Dobson is inclined to conclude

that homosexuality is an “illness” that must be “cured.” And so we see in the rhetoric of

FOTF somewhat of a theodicy in light of homosexuality, wherein the existence of such

corruption (or evil) is explained by way of malfunctioning, brokenness, or corruption.

The theological challenge of homosexuality therefore is no more problematic than is the

problem of cancer, or chicken pox, or multiple sclerosis. Such maladies are admittedly

difficult to explain and justify, but are nevertheless understandable results of our being

complex social and biological creatures. And homosexuality likewise falls into this

category, and calls out for quasi-medical attention.

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Considered from the vantage point described above, homosexuality is explainable

as a sort of ontological defect. When someone has become a homosexual, something has

malfunctioned within that nature of things, within his or her ontological framework. The

“given-ness” of the world was not given to us as we expected, and so we must do our best to live in light of a fallen and corrupt existence. The existence of homosexuality can be

explained as a socialization problem and as a failure to implement traditional marriage

and family as it was intended. This appears to be the kind of reasoning at the heart of

Dobson’s view of homosexuality and what society must do to overcome it.

In a passage indicative of FOTF’s views about the etiology of homosexuality,

Dobson writes:

The bottom line is that homosexuality is not primarily about sex. It is about

everything else, including loneliness, rejection, affirmation, intimacy, identity,

relationships, parenting, self-hatred, gender confusion, and a search for belonging.

This explains why the homosexual experience is so intense—and why there is

such anger expressed against those who are perceived as disrespecting gays and

lesbians or making their experience more painful. I suppose if we who are straight

had walked in the shoes of those in that “other world,” we would be angry too.

(HTP, p. 6/8)

Given the sort of explanation for homosexuality offered above, Dobson is

likewise able to suggest that “Homosexuality is not ‘chosen’ except in rare

circumstances” (HTP, p. 2/8). Since being homosexual is largely a response to inadequate

and unhealthful circumstances, Dobson explains: “Prevention is effective. Change is

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possible. Hope is available. And Christ is in the business of healing” (HTP, p. 3/8). As evidence of such prevention, hope, and healing, Dobson appeals to those who have

overcome the perverseness of homosexuality. Dobson proudly proclaims: “There are

eight hundred now former gay and lesbian individuals today who have escaped from the

homosexual lifestyle and found wholeness in their newfound heterosexuality” (HTP, p.

3/8). And so the ontological defect can be overcome, given proper treatment. Cures are

possible and hope is available. Such is the collective message of Dobson throughout the

FOTF literature.

Reflecting upon what we have seen up to this point, one might begin to

understand the reasoning behind the passion and tenacity with which FOTF supports its

vision. One might, of course, disagree with FOTF’s vision concerning truth, reality, and the hope emergent from such a divinely ordained nexus. That is, one might argue that truth is not attainable like Dobson says it is, that reality does not consist of clear binaries, that the collective witness of scripture and nature do not speak to matters of homosexuality and the family in the ways that Dobson suggests they do. One might argue against Dobson that there is no clear homosexual social and political agenda, that homosexuality is not a monolith, and that Dobson has overstated the case. One might likewise contest Dobson’s views concerning the nature of marriage, sexuality, and gender. And one might object that homosexuality is not a perversion in the way that

Dobson says it is. In all these ways, one could certainly disagree with the collective and

persistent stance of FOTF. And one is certainly entitled to do so.

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When considering our analysis of Dobson’s rhetoric in light of the central themes

of this dissertation, what I find so remarkable is the way in which Dobson is able (a) to

employ an account of allegedly objective “truth” in service to the production of personal

and collective hope and (b) to generate significant social and political action as the result

of such appeals. We have stared in the face of Dobson’s deference to objective truth as a

way of making his case against homosexuality above, and in the process we have

observed that things are not quite as clear as an initial reading of Dobson might lead one to believe. For though Dobson explicitly relies upon objective and even scientific means as a way of bolstering his rhetorical appeals, it nevertheless remains apparent that he is blatantly dependent upon all manner of narrative legitimation for the creation and sustenance of his particular worldview. I have not yet considered in any great detail

Dobson’s account of a hopeful American future. And so let us turn our attention to a more careful consideration of the social and political action that Dobson believes to be necessary in light of his assumptions about the nature of reality and truth. When considering such matters, the nature of Dobson’s hope will become increasingly clear.

The central goal of Dobson’s ministry is to protect the American family against the manifold challenges facing this institution in contemporary society. As a result, FOTF is not an institution that focuses only on the issue of homosexuality. FOTF is also deeply committed to numerous other issues such as preserving the sanctity of human life, ensuring the election of conservative judiciaries, promoting quality Christian education, and offering counseling and assistance to parents. That said, one of the most persistent, public, and controversial elements of FOTF continues to be its stance on homosexuality,

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marriage, and the associated issues surrounding gender. As a result, Dobson spends a

great deal of time informing and instructing his followers concerning what ought to be

done about continued homosexual movement.

When speaking about the desired response that Dobson seeks from his listeners,

military imagery regularly arises. The advocate for FOTF is therefore often envisioned as

a warrior engaged in battle and seeking earnestly to wage war against all enemies of the

family. Similarly, the enemies of FOTF are regularly equated with some of America’s most prominent and vilified military adversaries. Consistent with such a strategy, Dobson

at one point makes parallels between “the homosexual movement” and Vladimir Lenin’s

actions that “abolished marriage and declared the family obsolete” (MOR, p. 3/8). In the

same newsletter, Dobson refers to the passage of a constitutional amendment as follows:

This effort to save the family is our D-Day, or Gettysburg or Stalingrad. This is

the big one. If we cannot pass a Constitutional amendment protecting traditional

marriage, gay marriage will become a reality. It will no longer be a matter of if,

but when. And the answer to that question is, “soon.” (MOR, p. 5/8)

Not surprisingly, Dobson also appeals to a significant sense of urgency as a way

of rallying support for FOTF’s mission. Dobson packages such urgency variously, noting

that “This is a time of destiny for our great nation” (IDM, p. 4/7) or that “the next

generation hangs in the balance” (SCC, p. 8/9). This is, for Dobson an urgency of

unprecedented proportions. Dobson contends that “barring a miracle, the family as it has

been known for more than five millennia will crumble, presaging the fall of Western

civilization itself. (IDM, p. 1/7). Moreover, this is a unique time for Christians in history

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as “the institution of marriage is about to descend into a state of turmoil unlike any other

in human history” (MOR, p. 1/8). Such a state of affairs presages doom not only for

Christendom, but for the Western world as a whole. For “unless we act quickly, the family as it has been known for 5,000 years will be gone. With its demise will come chaos such as the world has never seen before” (MOR, p. 4/8).

Here again, one might reasonably object to Dobson’s prognosis. Assuming, however, that one ascribes such import to the traditional family and its role in society, one begins to understand the necessity of our world reflecting the true nature of reality.

Recall for a moment the themes introduced in Chapter 1 wherein I spoke of my own historic tendency to view hope as derivative of and dependent upon truth. Although

Dobson would not speak in such philosophical terms, he is indeed adopting a number of foundationalist assumptions that I tried to articulate in the opening pages of this dissertation. Recalling for a moment the substance of my opening chapter, one can fairly quickly observe how such foundationalist assumptions, when wedded to Dobson’s own

convictions about the family, not only encourage, but actually demand the sort of urgency

and radicalism pervading Dobson’s rhetoric. For in Dobson’s worldview, the

perpetuation of the traditional family serves as the principle mechanism responsible for

giving voice to truth. Void of healthy families, there will be no healthy individuals and no

healthy culture. And, for Dobson, this is not merely an opinion, but rather describes the

architecture of the universe initiated by god himself. When defending the family, Dobson

therefore believes that he is protecting and preserving the very means by which god

himself has, from eternity past, intended to mirror, to teach, and to defend truth.

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Countless individuals are consistently offended by Dobson’s straightforward and even insensitive claims about homosexuality and the family. And, of course, there exist considerable and justified reasons for such offense. It is not enough, however, merely to

reject Dobson’s appeals as xenophobic, prudish, or even hateful. What the discerning

consumer of Dobson’s rhetoric absolutely must recognize is that Dobson’s appeals—even as they are directed against homosexuality—are dependent upon Dobson’s concern for truth and not by Dobson’s disdain for homosexuals. Admittedly, the line between these two points can appear very blurry in practice. Nevertheless, there remains considerable internal consistency to Dobson’s rhetorical strategy, sense of urgency, and vision for a hopeful future. Dobson’s view of the family—and, in particular, its assumed role in sustaining the health of human culture—makes it very difficult for him to view the nature and health of the traditional family as a merely private issue. Though admittedly a private institution, for Dobson, the consequences of the actions of families have a significant impact upon public welfare.

Dobson is quite explicit about the relationship between private belief and public involvement in social life. According to Dobson, the Christian church has a moral obligation to influence the social and political arena—an obligation that the Christian church has consistently neglected, in Dobson’s opinion. Though there are manifold reasons for such neglect, Dobson pays particular attention to one such reason. He explains: “One of the reasons is that Christians are standing around debating with each other about church and state issues and refusing to use their influence in the wider culture” (SCC, p. 4/9). In Dobson’s view, such a stance is unacceptable in the American

140 political climate. Theological reflection must lead to political action according to

Dobson. And so he argues “We’re a representative Republic and you can make a difference” (FMA, p. 3/10). Dobson further explains, “I firmly believe that “engaging the culture” and “sharing the gospel message” are not two distinct things; rather, they are inexorably intertwined … we as Christians must use our influence to defend righteousness in this democratic system of government” (SCC, p. 2/9).

Recall for a moment one of Rorty’s (1989) central concerns within the pages of

Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. There, Rorty seeks to explain “how things look if we drop the demand for a theory which unifies the public and the private, and are content to treat the demands of self-creation and of human solidarity as equally valid, yet forever incommensurable” (p. xv). Reminiscent of Kuhn’s (1962) incommensurability thesis,

Rorty spoke of a plurality of paradigms wherein one’s private domain remains not only distinct from, but “forever incommensurable” with one’s attempt to theorize the nature of public action and interaction. Rorty likewise echoes Lyotard’s arguments concerning the end of metanarratives. For the incommensurability of which Rorty speaks is paramount to the suggestion that there no longer exists an overarching metanarrative frame that can unite both private and public hope. Dobson, of course, utterly rejects this radical bifurcation, and instead calls for what amounts to the fusion of private, Christian hope with public, political life and policy.

Rorty himself recognizes the likelihood that individuals such as Dobson will reject his attempt to bifurcate the public and private. Rorty (1989) makes precisely this point when writing about, “a few such people… for whom the search for private

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perfection coincides with the project of living for others.” Here, Rorty refers specifically to Christians as being among a relatively small group of individuals who seek such unity of purpose and of hope. “For most such [people],” explains Rorty, “[private and public perfection] do not [coincide]” (p. 143). Not surprisingly, Dobson performs precisely what

Rorty here describes. For Christians such as Dobson and his followers, it remains utterly unacceptable and completely unwise to suggest that the search for private perfection could somehow possibly emerge within a context wherein public perfection was not simultaneously being pursued. This is, of course, precisely the point that Dobson embodies within his attempt to save America by protecting the family. The family is a private institution at its very core, an institution that, perhaps more than any other, may be performed and prioritize in accord with individual, private, and even esoteric hopes.

And yet, for Dobson, the influence of this deeply private institution is inestimable for the health and sustenance of public life. And so Dobson labors tirelessly in the public sphere to engender within American democratic life the sort of values and beliefs that emerge from within the private context of religiously motivated and traditionally performed families.

Examples of specific political action pervade the work of FOTF. In one instance,

Dobson encouraged his supporters to contact Exxon-Mobil to “express [their] support for their decision not to cave in to pressure from gay rights groups” (VCA, p. 3/5). In another instance, Dobson urged his followers to ask their pastor “to consider emphasizing the election and its importance to the family.” Dobson continues, “Then on election day, our

California friends must get every eligible conservative voter to the polls” (VCA, p. 3/5).

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Perhaps the chief example of FOTF’s social and political involvement is seen in its creation of a ministry called Focus on the Family Action. Described by Dobson as “an agile, aggressive cultural and family advocacy organization” (Focus Action – About Us,

1/2), Focus on the Family Action represents a more aggressive and directed way of enacting the social and political goals of the broader FOTF organization. As Dobson explains:

[Focus Action] will provide a platform for informing, inspiring and rallying those

who care deeply about the family to greater involvement in the moral, cultural and

political issues that threaten our nation. Focus on the Family Action will give me

and my team much greater freedom to take our views to the public square, where

the great debate over culture, rights, freedom and values is taking place, and allow

me to ask people to take specific actions such as calling senators and congressmen

to pass important, family-friendly legislation. (Focus Action – About Us, p. 1/2)

The formidable nature of Focus on the Family Action is indeed remarkable. As reported by one of their earliest annual reports, from the months of April through

September of 2004, Focus on the Family Action brought in nearly 13.5 million dollars in support and revenue. Of that, nearly 9.1 million was spent on creating broadcasts, resources, publications, Internet sites, and “public policy awareness” during that same 6 month period. (FAAR, p. 5/10). Moreover, during the 16 month time period extending from July 1, 2004 until September 3, 2005 Focus on the Family Action produced some 74 press releases, many of which gained national recognition.

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One of the central goals of Focus on the Family Action is to correct what Dobson recognizes as a fundamental flaw in the current performance of American democratic political life. At the center both of Focus on the Family Action and the broader rhetoric of

FOTF exists a concerted effort to stop politically motivated judges whose agenda Dobson deems inimical to the traditional family. Dobson notes, “As is so often the case, a handful of unelected, leftist judges have imposed their will on the culture” (VCA, p. 1/5). Such a minority group represents perhaps the most consistent and focused of FOTF’s political enemies, for “a small group of activists among the radical left is so adept at imposing their misguided agenda on the entire nation” (VCA, p. 4/5).

Quite interestingly, Dobson does not place blame at the feet of the democratic process itself. To do so would be simultaneously to undercut his own calls to political action. Instead, what Dobson often calls for is pressure upon one particular subset of the broader democratic, political machine. As Dobson clearly and carefully notes:

Let me remind you that it is the courts that have run amok. They are out of control

and beyond the check and balances envisioned by our Founding Fathers. And the

liberal establishment in this country knows that it can accomplish all of its

harebrained schemes, not by winning popular elections, but by enticing these few

unelected judges in black robes to do their dirty work.” (MOR, p. 5/8)

By employing such a rhetorical strategy, Dobson is able to place blame at the feet of leaders within the democratic form of government without attacking the very institution itself. And in so doing, Dobson gives his ethical appeals regular and focused ways of being enacted. More than this, Dobson is able to sustain hope in the possibility of an

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America that once again reflects truth even as he remains deeply critical of many of the

outcomes produced by American democracy. Dobson therefore remains both incredibly

partisan and oftentimes quite pessimistic, yet does so while maintaining a high level of

patriotism alongside of the assumption that there remains a possibility for future hope

which will emerge from the enactment of democratic processes.

Consider the following passage from Dobson, a passage that, as Dobson

describes, “was written after the decision in Casey v. Planned Parenthood, in which

[Supreme Court Justice] Kennedy said for the first time in U.S. history that instead of our

inalienable rights being provided to us by the Creator, each individual is entitled to his

‘own understanding of reality’” (Dobson, TVR, p. 2/5, italics added). Reflecting upon

this decision, Dobson laments, “For the U.S. Supreme Court to descend into the abyss of

moral relativism is disastrous. The Constitution has been the shield, the defender of basic

liberties for 210 years, based on the law of nature and of nature’s God. Now, according

to Justice Kennedy and five of his colleagues, its meaning has become nothing more

predictable than, in Kennedy’s words, ‘the shifting sands of public opinion’” (TVR, p.

2/5, italics added). Further commenting on this decision, Dobson writes, “That ruling

turned what the founding fathers intended as a divine gift into a matter of public opinion,

shifting from moment to moment” (TVR, p. 2/5). Though Rorty would not go so far as to

suggest that linguistic redescription ought to shift the nature of “reality” from moment to

moment, Dobson here nevertheless gives voice to deeply Rortian sentiments.

In essence, Dobson’s reading of the court’s ruling could be described as follows: the United States Supreme Court rejected truth and employed linguistic redescription in

145 order to explain what has historically been understood as metaphysically stable, certain, and eternal—namely, the collection of divine truths embodied within the language of the

United States Constitution itself. Dobson makes this point even clearer when exhorting his readers, “Remember, if basic rights come from God, they are eternal. If they come from man, they are no more secure than the next Court ruling” (TVR, p. 2/5). And as the various quotes from Dobson above make clear, the rejection of truth signals the near certain demise of morality and of hope, what Dobson explains as “the abyss of moral relativism” (TVR, p. 2/5).

An important point emerges from the preceding several paragraphs, for one of the pervasive themes coursing throughout this entire document concerns the nature of hope that emerges from and is, perhaps, even guaranteed by the American democratic process.

Reading Dobson, what one discovers is that the spokesman for Focus on the Family retains a deeply modernist understanding of American democracy. For Dobson, what is most important is that democracy is founded upon concepts such as inalienable rights, natural law, and the innate dignity of humankind. Stated differently, American democracy represents, for Dobson, a more or less theistic embodiment of eternal truths.

When properly enacted, therefore, the mechanisms of democracy are themselves deeply suited to the task of maintaining the hopes of the American family and of the population at large. But, again, such hope will only emerge insofar as the democratic process produces correspondence with the collection of modernist ideals which were undoubtedly influential in the framing of the American democratic form of governance and which, increasingly, have come to be largely consubstantial with much of American evangelical

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belief and practice. It is for this reason that Dobson can retain hope in the process of

American democracy, while simultaneously lamenting the rise of what he refers to as

“judicial tyranny” (TVR, p. 2/5). Dobson, therefore, accepts a certain version of liberal

democracy, a version wherein freedom remains subservient to metaphysical truth. And so

Dobson’s hope will only emerge insofar as America remains metaphysically grounded in

and guided by certain truths.

Reflecting upon our examination of Dobson’s rhetoric, one discovers numerous

manifestations of Dobson’s modernist assumptions regarding truth. One likewise

discovers how Dobson’s vision of “reality” dictates the sort of social and political action

in which Focus on the Family is regularly involved. Focusing particularly on the issue of homosexuality and the nature of the family, we have observed a specific exemplar of

Dobson’s overarching rhetorical strategy. For regardless of the topic, Dobson grounds his personal convictions and public actions in a firm and unchanging conception of truth.

And, not surprisingly, Dobson suggests the adoption of a war-like attitude of urgency and resolve. Such urgency and resolve ought to be directed at sweeping social and political reforms that employ democratic means in service to the defense of the family. To this end, Dobson has mobilized time, resources, and political will in service to the recognition of truth within the context of the American social and political world.

When measured by nearly any standard, Dobson should be considered a remarkably successful practitioner of rhetorical skill. For Dobson’s rhetoric concerning the family’s role in sustaining the hope of America has been persuasive to literally millions of followers for over three decades now. Although Dobson has certainly been

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timely and effective, many nevertheless remain unconvinced of the wisdom inherent

within his particular vision for America. In the following section, therefore, I wish to

spend just a bit of time reflecting upon what I take to be some of the most glaring and

relevant liabilities of the rhetoric of Dobson and Focus on the Family. Here, I will pay

particular attention to those liabilities which speak to and emerge from the central themes addressed throughout this dissertation.

Dobson’s Rhetoric of Return and Restoration

As I have explained in the preceding section, I remain convinced of the virtue inherent within the intentions behind Dobson’s varied rhetorical appeals regarding homosexuality and the nature of the family. I remain decidedly less convinced, however, that Dobson speaks to this constellation of issues in a manner which I would consider wise. In fact, and in an ironic turn of events, it seems to me that that Dobson’s particular manifestation of evangelical hope may actually be contributing to the atrophy and rejection of religious hope in postmodern society. In this section, I attempt briefly to justify this claim.

As I have argued at length above, the thrust of Dobson’s rhetoric is characterized by a desire to make the world accord with “truth.” Consequently, and as we have seen in numerous ways above, Dobson seeks principally to enact a rhetoric of restoration, a rhetoric that returns the American family (and, derivatively, America itself) to the way things used to be. As America increasingly becomes characterized by postmodern thinking, Dobson seeks all the more forcefully to guide America to its historic, foundationalist, and realist roots. Homosexuality, in particular, represents one striking

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example of America’s cultural, religious, and philosophical move beyond such assumptions. And so Dobson seeks to counteract this growing alternative lifestyle by

continuing to remind his listeners how important it is to return once again to the way

things were.

I remain unconvinced that the fullness of any religious movement can be

recognized merely by describing the present in terms of that which has come before.

Instead, it seems to me that any robust manifestation of religious belief absolutely must

offer considerable and even striking hope for that which is yet to come. Jürgen Moltmann,

himself the most notable theorist of religious hope in recent decades, bolsters this claim

throughout his work, Theology of Hope, the English translation of which first appeared in

1967. Consider the following quote wherein Moltmann (1967) describes the disposition

of one who is in possession of specifically Christian hope:

The man who thus hopes will never be able to reconcile himself with the laws and

constraints of this earth, neither with the inevitability of death nor with the evil

that constantly bears further evil … Faith, wherever it develops into hope, causes

not rest but unrest, not patience but impatience. It does not calm the unquiet heart,

but is itself this unquiet heart in man. Those who hope in Christ can no longer put

up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God

means conflict with the world, for the goad of the promised future stabs

inexorably into the flesh of every unfulfilled present. If we had before our eyes

only what we see, then we should cheerfully or reluctantly reconcile ourselves

with things as they happen to be. That we do not reconcile ourselves, that there is

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no pleasant harmony between us and reality, is due to our unquenchable hope. (p.

21)

The tone of the preceding quote is indeed strikingly different than what I have identified as Dobson’s modernist tendency toward permanence, stability, and a return to the past. As Moltmann (1967) later explains, “The Christian Church has not to serve mankind in order that this world may remain what it is, or may be preserved in the state in which it is, but in order that it may transform itself and become what it is promised to be” (327). On Moltmann’s account, the realization of such a state of affairs is not likely to come about by seeking a return to a limited set of alleged metaphysically stable

“truths.”

In Moltmann’s assessment, the forward-looking nature of hope does not merely portend a set of internal or psychological dispositions. According to Moltmann (1967), the one who hopes

is in fact in search of ‘other institutions’, because it must expect true, eternal life,

the true and eternal dignity of man, true and just relationships, from the coming

kingdom of God. It will therefore endeavor to lead our modern institutions away

from their own immanent tendency towards stabilization, will make them

uncertain, historify them and open them to that elasticity which is demanded by

openness towards the future for which it hopes. In practical opposition to things as

they are, and in creative reshaping of them, Christian hope calls them in question

and thus serves the things that are to come. With its face towards the expected

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new situation, it leaves the existing situation behind and seeks for opportunities of

bringing history into ever better correspondence to the promised future. (p. 330)

As one can see, Moltmann assumes that Christian hope (when properly realized in

the world) will necessarily exegete, indict, and transform the structures of this world. And

for Moltmann, this truism demands a progression beyond either present or past states of affairs. The fullness of Moltmann’s vision is instead directed toward “a novum ultimum, towards a new creation of all things” (1967, p. 33). Or, as Moltmann (1967) writes elsewhere in Theology of Hope, the realization of eschatological hope ought to have

“mobilizing, revolutionizing, and critical effects upon history” (p. 15). As a result,

Moltmann’s theological rhetoric speaks of a world wherein all past manifestations of

“reality” are themselves limited and provisional. Moltmann instead speaks of a Christian

church that must be ever and always creating new and fuller lives and institutions in the present.

Given my reading of both Dobson and Moltmann, one of the benefits of

Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope is that it provides a kind of motivation that Dobson’s

rhetoric potentially lacks. For Moltmann’s rhetoric is decidedly disinterested in taking the world back to where it has already been. That is, Moltmann’s rhetoric does not have as its end the goal of recapturing what has been inevitably lost. Rather Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope is intent upon trying to create within the present what has never before been

manifest. And so, Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope, it could be argued, serves to infuse the present with a renewed sense of meaning and purpose. The alternative, Moltmann explains, is dramatic and damning for Christian faith and practice. As Moltmann laments,

151 living in light of unrealized or merely future hope produces a disillusioned and ineffectual Christian populous. Moltmann (1967) writes,

He hopes to live, but he does not live. He expects to be happy one day, and this

expectation causes him to pass over the happiness of the present. He is never, in

memory and hope, wholly himself and wholly in his present. Always he either

limps behind it or hastens ahead of it. Memories and hopes appear to cheat him of

the happiness of being undividedly present. They rob him of his present and drag

him into times that no longer exist or do not yet exist. They surrender him to the

non-existent and abandon him to vanity. For these times subject him to the stream

of transience – the stream that sweeps him to annihilation. (p. 26)

Undergirding Moltmann’s hopeful and revolutionary theological rhetoric is a decidedly un-modern set of assumptions about Christian theological truth. (see Rossi-

Keen 2008b, forthcoming; and Rossi-Keen 2007) Stated perhaps a bit crassly,

Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope is not dominated by pre-existing logics, but is instead provisional and future oriented. And as a result, Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope resists utter certainty and stability particularly at the level of epistemology. This is not to suggest that truth does not exist or that one cannot make certain and normative claims as Christians.

Instead, Moltmann’s provisional epistemology reminds us that even our most grounded and firm epistemic certainty is itself subject to re-creation and as-of-yet unrealized futures. Moltmann (1967) writes:

For our knowledge and comprehension of reality, and our reflections on it, that

means at least this: that in the medium of hope our theological concepts become

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not judgments which nail reality down to what it is, but anticipations which show

reality its prospects and its future possibilities. Theological concepts do not give a

fixed form to reality, but they are expanded by hope and anticipate future being.

They do not limp after reality and gaze on it with the night eyes of Minerva’s owl,

but they illuminate reality by displaying its future. Their knowledge is grounded

not in the will to dominate, but in love to the future of things. (pp. 35-36)

Having now reflected briefly upon the character of Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope, let me conclude this section by returning to the claim that I made at its outset: Dobson’s rhetoric may actually be contributing to the atrophy and rejection of hope. Given

Dobson’s convictions, he is, of course, not wrong to want to make the world the way he thinks the world should be. This is, to be sure, part and parcel of a Christian’s calling and mission. And, in some ways Dobson is also correct to suggest that America exists at a unique and historic crossroads. For the Christian church does now find itself teetering on

the edge of postmodernity. Reality (or at least our perceptions of it) have indeed changed.

However, it is precisely because of (a) the fact that America currently exists at a unique and historic crossroads and (b) that the calling of the Christian church is to recreate and redeem the present that I often find Dobson’s rhetoric troubling. For like Moltmann, I believe that the Christian church needs not simply to continue enacting the rhetoric of modernist theological methodology. The intellectual and cultural exigencies of modernity justifiably called for a rhetoric of permanence, system-building, and consensus. Such needs are not, however, so universally present in the current intellectual climate. And this, it increasingly seems to me, signals a need for an alternate and complimentary

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communicative strategy. To state the matter in a manner consistent with the central

emphases of this dissertation: our current state of affairs demands a paralogic articulation

of religious hope in our present postmodern context.

As Moltmann helps to make clear, it is principally not a return to past truths (as

conceived by modernist theological methods) that constitutes the goal of the Christian

faith. These are, to be sure, good and virtuous states of affairs. They are decidedly not,

however, the goal, sum, or substance of the Christian faith. For the Christian church

claims to exist in a world that is itself fallen, broken, and incomplete. The Christian

church purports to live in a world in need of redemption and future re-creation. The

Christian church recognizes the limits of human subjectivity and the difficulties this presents for the appropriation of Christian revelation. And so too ought evangelical

Christians to recognize that its ontological assumptions about reality are themselves in need of new creation, redemption, and as-of-yet unrealized future actualization. It is these features of the Christian message that I believe Moltmann’s rhetoric of hope clearly highlights. And, as I have begun to argue above, it is these features of Moltmann’s theological rhetoric that distinguish it from Dobson’s rhetoric of return and restoration.

Dobson: Creating Hope while Rejecting Paralogy

As a way of concluding my examination of Dobson, I would like to return attention to a somewhat more general treatment of the character and substance of paralogic communication. I have, of course, touched upon various issues related to these points in the preceding analysis of Dobson’s rhetoric. Nevertheless, several key

154 observations remain to be made, points that should now be clearer after having examined portions of Dobson’s writing in some detail.

In the opening moments of this chapter I suggested that Dobson’s rhetoric provides a specific example of the communicative creation of hope in our postmodern climate. Of course, to suggest that a given individual’s words or actions create hope immediately raises very interesting questions. In making such a claim, for instance, am I suggesting that Dobson’s rhetoric is or should be viewed as universally hopeful? Stated differently, am I making the claim that there is something intrinsically hopeful about

Dobson’s rhetoric? Or, on the other hand, and I instead merely offering an observation about the reception of Dobson’s rhetoric, about the fact that various individuals do indeed find hope within Dobson’s message?

Considering the questions raised in the preceding paragraph, I wish to be very clear about the sort of claim I am making when suggesting that Dobson’s rhetoric provides an example of hope in postmodern life. When offering this assertion, I am merely making the observation that numerous individuals find within Dobson’s rhetoric significant grounds upon which to hope in the future of America. Throughout this dissertation, I have generally attempted to avoid making the alternative kind of claims, claims that suggest what others should hope and what sorts of descriptions of reality ought to engender hope within humankind. Though I am usually not at all hesitant to make such claims, I have sought to avoid such normative concerns within the pages of this document as a way of instead focusing upon a number of central metatheoretical issues related to the nature of hope.

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The reason for making this claim about the outcome of Dobson’s rhetoric is to

point out what I believe to be a very important counterexample to the assertion that

postmodern critiques of knowledge signal the end of hope. As I have labored to explain

throughout this document, there often does exist a common connection between postmodern epistemology and one’s views concerning the nature and content of hope.

Moreover, I have suggested that an increasing number of individuals do indeed find

themselves compelled to accept one strand or another of postmodern epistemology.

Given these two realities, I have likewise found it important to argue that there exists no

necessary connection between the acceptance of such epistemology and pessimistic

views of hope. In this way, much of my effort has labored to reject the idea that some

form or another of nihilism is entailed by or contained within assumptions regarding

postmodern epistemology. I found it important to make this argument because I wish to

suggest that one could both adopt postmodern epistemology and retain hope. This is one

of the principal ways in which I have tried to demonstrate that the demise of objective

knowledge does not signal the end of hope.

In addition to the overarching strategy I have been employing throughout this

dissertation—and which I have briefly resketched in the preceding paragraph—there

exists an alternative (though, perhaps, no less powerful) way of arguing that the end of

objective knowledge need not signal the death of hope. Simply put, one might observe

the world around oneself with an eye toward cataloging various continued manifestations

of hope in our present postmodern context. Supposing one could amass a considerable

number of exemplars of hope’s continued existence, it seems to me that one would have

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discovered a powerful counterexample to the claim that the end of objective knowledge signals the demise of hope. One adopting this strategy would, in essence, be saying,

“Sure the end of objective knowledge might signal the demise of hope for you. But, it

doesn’t signal the end of hope for me! And, look, it doesn’t signal the end of hope for all

those other people either!”

The individuals retaining hope in these instances could, of course, be maintaining

hope for at least one of two reasons: (a) they could be enacting what I have, in Chapter 2, referred to as a fully postmodern account of knowledge, duty, and hope—an account

which rejects the notion that these three entities are somehow mutually constitutive; or

(b) they could be rejecting the constellation of postmodern arguments regarding

epistemology that are often believed to demand the end of hope in the first place.

Throughout Chapters 1 and 2, I have been seeking principally to argue for the adoption of

reason (a) as a way of retaining belief in the possibility of hope. By considering Dobson

here in Chapter 3, however, we have observed a robust example of an individual who

clearly has maintained hope because he has adopted a modernist sense of reason (b), and

as a result, continues to find considerable hope in the possibilities of a future America. So

too does Dobson’s worldview create a vast band of followers, followers who themselves

are either explicitly or implicitly adopting similar thinking regarding the continued

reasonability of retaining hope in postmodern America.

Having suggested that Dobson’s continued belief in hope is not at all unimportant,

let me now be a bit more explicit about why I think that this is the case. In order to

understand why I might make this claim, one need only to reflect back upon our

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treatment of Lyotard in Chapter 2. There, I spent considerable time explaining the self-

legitimating nature of narrative knowledge. Summarizing the argument I earlier made in

greater detail in Chapter 2, we observed how the very performance of narrative itself

serves as a legitimation of that same narrative. Narrative, to state the matter otherwise,

does not need to go outside of itself in order to gain legitimacy. As I have been

demonstrating variously, for a culture adopting the legitimacy of a given narrative, that

narrative is itself legitimate. Of course, this statement is tautological. But, this it is precisely the most important point being argued by both Lyotard and Rorty. For both individuals seek to move beyond a vision of truth grounded in correspondence with external or even eternal “reality.” What Lyotard and Rorty help one to discover,

therefore, is (a) that however much Dobson remains convinced that he is deriving hope

from truth, this is precisely what he can never do, and, for exactly this reason, (b) neither

can postmodern critiques of objective truth destroy Dobson’s hope. For whether Dobson

recognizes it or not, such hope does not need objective truth for its legitimation. Whereas

Dobson thinks that the postmodern critique of knowledge necessitates the end of

objective truth, postmodern critiques of knowledge need not necessitate any such thing.

And, even more striking, the very constellation of beliefs which Dobson finds so

potentially damning, ironically serves both to legitimate Dobson’s hope and to raise it to

the level of one voice among many—many of whom may be clamoring for the

sustenance of hope in the present.

To be fair, and to echo a point that I have raised a number of times now,

postmodern critiques of knowledge certainly do not leave the status of Dobson’s hope

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unchanged. For in the face of such critiques, one must concede that hope is no longer able

to rise to the level of legitimation once ascribable to scientific knowledge. This is, of

course, no small concession for Dobson. As we have seen time and again above, much of

the motivation for Dobson’s social and political action stems from the robust certainty

and universality alleged to inhere within the worldview embodied by Focus on the

Family. For Dobson to concede to the changed status of his hope, therefore, would

simultaneously render problematic many of his common enactments of rhetorical

invention. And it is beyond a doubt that challenges to such invention strategies would

dramatically affect the narrative community that has been created by Dobson and Focus on the Family. I will return to this point from a slightly different angle below. That said, I do hope that my central contention remains clear: although postmodern critiques of knowledge do not leave the status of hope unchanged, they absolutely do not—either in theory or practice—render the sustenance of hope meaningless or impossible. Dobson embodies one particular manifestation of the continued sustenance of hope in postmodern life, and thereby brings into focus many of the central issues pervading this dissertation.

The second issue to be raised in the closing moments of this chapter concerns the type of hope that Dobson creates. Above, I have suggested that Dobson’s rhetoric provides a decidedly non-paralogic example of the communicative creation of hope within postmodern society. This is not, however, to suggest that Dobson’s rhetoric fails to embody all of the characteristics of paralogic communication. And, even more interesting, the less and less America mirrors Dobson’s vision of “reality,” the more explicitly paralogic his rhetoric will become. Given the importance—and, perhaps, the

159 non-intuitive nature of this claim—let me spend just a moment or two explaining what I mean.

Recall from Chapter 2 the central features of paralogic communication. As I explained there, paralogy: (a) is not bound by preexistent logics yet is not for that reason illogical; (b) emerges as a result of decidedly rhetorical and narrative means; (c) seeks community rather than consensus or synthesis; (d) tolerates and even celebrates incommensurability and disagreement; (e) fuels, fosters, and emerges from the unfettered human imagination; and (f) destabilizes present structures, logics, and dominant narrative discourses. Reflecting upon these five characteristics of paralogic communication, and considering such characteristics in light of Dobson’s rhetoric, one is inclined to ask whether and in what ways Dobson’s creation of hope exemplifies such characteristics.

Given that my formulation of paralogic communication emerges as a result of considering decidedly postmodern thinkers, one might be quickly inclined to suggest that

Dobson’s deeply modernist rhetoric embodies none of these features of paralogic communication. Although this may be largely true, moving slowly at this point will help to illuminate even further the relationship between paralogy and prevailing social and cultural norms.

I begin with those elements of paralogic communication that require little critical discussion when considered in light of Dobson’s rhetoric. First, there is at least one element of paralogic communication that Dobson clearly does manifest. Much of this chapter has labored to demonstrate that Dobson’s legitimation is deeply narrative and communicative in nature, regardless of whether or not Dobson himself recognizes this

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reality. Much like the more specific subset of discourse I am referring to as “paralogic

communication,” so too does Dobson’s rhetoric regarding homosexuality and the family

legitimate itself by way of decidedly communicative and narrative means. Of course, and

as we have now seen demonstrated a number of ways, all attempts at legitimation must

rely upon narrative for the enactment of such. That Dobson’s rhetoric demonstrates this is, therefore, not terribly striking.

What, then, about the relationship between Dobson’s rhetoric and the human imagination? As described in Chapter 2, paralogic communication fuels, fosters, and emerges from the unfettered human imagination. In making such a claim, I was attempting to highlight one of the central features of paralogic communication: its

employment of possibility as a central locus of rhetorical invention. Unconstrained by

realist or correspondence theories of truth, paralogic communication, as I envision it, is

free to conceptualize the world in remarkably imaginative ways. Dobson, however, is

importantly restricted from doing so. As I have shown by way of a number of different

examples, Dobson’s description of the world must always seek to describe the “true” and

“given” nature of “reality.” In this way, there are significant constraints upon the sorts of

hopeful futures that Dobson can envision. I will return to this point in greater detail

below, and will therefore refrain from developing this theme any further here.

Whether or not Dobson’s rhetoric (a) seeks community rather than synthesis or

consensus or (b) tolerates incommensurability or disagreement is a bit more difficult to

gauge. Public treatments of Dobson and his followers tend to paint such individuals as

deeply fundamentalist, fanatical, and uninformed. Dobson and his followers are also

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generally characterized as separatist, exclusive, or exclusionary in nature. My own first- hand experience, however, suggests something importantly different. Having spent a week visiting and conducting research at the international headquarters of Focus on the

Family—and, during that time, having interviewed nearly all of Dobson’s senior vice presidents—I remain convinced that Dobson and the majority of his followers are, indeed, far more loving and inviting than they are discriminatory and intolerant.

Although this is not the time fully to develop this point, I will briefly note that my experience with the senior leadership of Focus on the Family was an experience characterized by openness, dialogue, and caring. While visiting, I did not in any way shy away from my concerns regarding the rhetoric of Focus on the Family. And, in fact, I was often openly critical of the organization’s public performance of its message. Stated simply, it was clear that I was not in agreement or consensus with the leadership of the organization. “Dialectic” rather than “synthesis” would be the word utilized best interaction to describe our relationship. Even so, I would not also hesitate to use the word

“community” to describe the sort of relationship that began to emerge between myself and various members of the senior leadership of the organization. In fact, my wife and I continue to be in touch—and, I would say, have even developed a friendship—with one of the senior vice presidents of Focus on the Family.

Though Dobson’s rhetoric is admittedly oftentimes frank, harsh, and pointed, I do not believe it is entirely fair to make generalizations about the interpersonal nature either of Dobson or of his followers as a result of such rhetoric. To be sure, Dobson and his followers remain accountable both for the flavor and substance of their rhetorical appeals.

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Reading such appeals in the most favorable light imaginable, however, I tend to view

such rhetoric as emerging more from oftentimes misguided moral conviction, fear, and

deep-seated concern rather than from outright hatred or the desire to hinder dialogue or

community. One moral to be learned, I suppose, is that the nature of one’s rhetoric, while

inescapably tied to one’s character and identity, is not the only window into his or her

identity. More specifically related to the central emphases of this dissertation, one might

also caution against assuming a certain and inescapable parity between one’s public and

mass mediated communicative appeals and his or her ability to establish and sustain

community within the context of a more intimate community. To state the matter slightly

differently: it is not immediately obvious what sort of relationship exists between one’s

public and scripted rhetoric and his or her private and emergent ability to form and

sustain community. And so the wise student of Dobson’s rhetoric should be hesitant to

make broad generalizations about this individual based only upon his public rhetorical

appeals.

Finally, let us reflect upon the relationship between Dobson’s rhetoric and present

structures, logics, and dominant narrative discourses. Here, questions concerning the

relationship between Dobson’s rhetoric and paralogy are, perhaps, the most complicated

and the most interesting. Suppose, for instance, that one seeks to answer the following

question: “Does Dobson’s rhetoric challenge present structures, logics, and dominant

narrative discourses?” In order to answer this question, one needs first to become fairly clear on just what those structures, logics and discourses are. If one assumes, for the sake of discussion, that Americans continue to adopt a more or less modern and Christian

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worldview, then Dobson’s rhetoric does not seem to challenge much of anything at all. In fact, considered from this vantage point, Dobson’s rhetoric serves to reify—rather than to challenge—present structures, logics, and dominant discourses. And, indeed, many understand Dobson’s treatment of homosexuality and the family in precisely this light.

Let us now shift the nature of our assumptions, positing a world wherein Lyotard and Rorty become increasingly accepted, commonplace, and even dominant voices within culture. Supposing this is the case, and supposing America is consequently viewed in increasingly postmodern terms, then all of the sudden Dobson is enacting a kind of rhetoric that we would describe as paralogic. For the more Lyotard and Rorty gained

prominence, the more Dobson’s rhetoric would challenge existing structures, logics, and

dominant discourses. Though nothing at all may have changed within the content of

Dobson’s rhetoric, shifting social, cultural, and political conditions would necessitate that

we change our description of Dobson’s rhetoric. Though in the preceding paragraph,

Dobson was envisioned as reifying existing structures, here in this paragraph a situation

has been described wherein Dobson comes to be understood as the revolutionary, as the

paralogic communicator. The relevant change between these two paragraphs does not, of

course, occur within Dobson’s rhetoric at all. The relevant change occurs within the

social, cultural, and political conditions into which Dobson speaks.

Reflecting upon the preceding paragraphs, what one discovers, therefore, is that

the title “paralogic communication” is not ascribable based merely upon the content of a given communicative exemplar. Rather, one may only appropriately describe a certain discourse as paralogic only insofar as there exists a particular kind of relationship

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between the content of the communicative appeal and the context into which it is spoken.

The description I am presenting of Dobson’s rhetoric, therefore, must now be understood

in light of this point. For the majority of this chapter, I have indeed been describing

Dobson’s rhetoric as non-paralogic in nature. And, of course, I continue to stand behind

this description, and find it quite helpful for making sense of his appeals. That I am able

to read Dobson’s rhetoric as non-paralogic, however, only emerges because I have more

or less assumed that Dobson reifies a set of assumptions that remain firmly entrenched

within much of the American intellectual consciousness. The less successful Dobson is in

reifying such appeals—and, therefore, the more postmodern America becomes—the

more aptly will the term “paralogic” be applied to Dobson’s rhetoric of homosexuality

and the family. For in such an instance it would be Dobson who is redescribing current

states of affairs, who was initiating an alternative “final vocabulary,” and who was disrupting dominant structures, logics, and discourses. The point, therefore, should by

now be clear: the title “paralogy” refers not principally to a thing or to a message, but

rather to a certain kind of relationship which arises in the face of competing descriptions

of “reality.”

Conclusion

Many open questions remain concerning the most appropriate form of religious

rhetoric concerning hope in our postmodern world. And, indeed, my concern was not to

address all such issues here. Though I did touch on such themes from time to time, our

goal is instead to introduce Dobson’s rhetoric concerning homosexuality and the family

as an example of the non-paralogic creation of religious hope. Along the way, I sought to

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gain greater clarity into the nature of paralogy itself. And of course, I likely raised additional questions by way of the analysis above. Recognizing such limitations, and leaning upon Moltmann’s suggestion that all descriptions of reality must remain provisional and incomplete, I will table our discussion of Dobson’s theological rhetoric until the concluding chapter. There, in Chapter 5, we will return to some of these themes yet again. Prior to doing so, however, I will direct our attention toward a strikingly different example of communication concerning religion and hope in postmodern life:

Barack Obama’s understanding of the role of religion and hope in postmodern political discourse.

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CHAPTER 4: BARACK OBAMA, HOPE, AND PARALOGIC POLITICAL

COMMUNICATION

Introduction

The goal of the last chapter was to consider an example of public discourse that communicatively generated hope, yet which did not do so in a fully paralogic fashion. In the process I was able to reflect upon the important relationship between the content of a given communicative act and the context into which it was offered. As I have suggested, paralogic communication arises not merely as a feature of the content of the communicative artifact itself, but rather as the result of a complex relationship between existing structures, beliefs, and social realities.

Although secondary to my primary goal of understanding paralogic communication, the treatment of Dobson offered in the last chapter provided important insight into the communicative strategies of one of the central figures at the heart of contemporary American evangelicalism. And, though I did not elaborate on this point in

Chapter 3, the persistent communicative strategy employed by Dobson is not at all unique to him. Innumerable other examples could have been offered as a way of demonstrating the grounding of hope in alleged objective truth and certain reality. Examining Dobson, therefore, provided one of many potential counterexamples to the dissolution of hope often thought to emerge from postmodern epistemology.

Reflecting on the preceding three chapters, one discovers that I have now made two primary arguments regarding the persistence of hope in light of postmodern critiques of knowledge. The first argument emerged in Chapter 2. Here, I demonstrated how both

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Lyotard and Rorty maintain hope while simultaneously moving beyond varied manifestations of modernist epistemology. In doing so, I showed that the very same texts which might be used to challenge hope’s existence nevertheless contain within themselves important resources for sustaining hope in the face of postmodern critiques of certain knowledge.

In Chapter 3, I employed a second strategy intent upon proving the thesis that hope need not be abandoned in the face of postmodern critiques of knowledge. Here, the goal was to provide an example of hopeful communication that emerged in opposition to postmodern epistemology and, largely as a result, evidenced a significant and widespread ability to engender hope within the lives of those individuals with whom Dobson’s message resonates. When faced with the conclusions of postmodern epistemology,

Dobson and his followers offer a rather straightforward solution to the alleged problem: they simply reject postmodern critiques of objective knowledge. And while this may initially seem to constitute an evasion of the matter under consideration, upon more careful consideration, we discovered that Dobson’s strategy is not altogether distinct from the “method” Rorty champions throughout his broad corpus.

Whereas Rorty seeks to redescribe the world in terms of a post-metaphysical and post-foundationalist constellation of beliefs, Dobson remains content providing descriptions of the world by way of a more traditional, modernist, and Christian “final vocabulary.” And in the process, Dobson, in a sense, does precisely what Rorty calls for.

To say the same thing slightly differently, Dobson rejects arguments in favor of redescription. That is, Dobson denies postmodern epistemology the ability to legitimate

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itself and instead seeks to reify (read: legitimate via narrative) belief in the persistence of

objectivity. Although Dobson does, to be fair, continue to speak as one who is employing

evidence in order to prove his point, my analysis showed that Dobson is nevertheless

constructing and employing expansive narrative frames which paint the world in a

manner consistent with his beliefs. What Dobson calls argument, Rorty would likely call redescription. Either way, the result is importantly similar when considered in light of my central thesis. Dobson maintains hope for his followers in the face of critiques of objective knowledge, and, ironically, does so largely by employing the sort of communicative processes that Rorty describes.

For a vast number of reasons, one might not be content maintaining the sort of hope that Dobson constructs for himself and his followers. That is, one might not wish simply to reject postmodern critiques of objective knowledge as a way of sustaining hope. Whether justified or not, various strains of postmodern epistemology have, for many people, undermined the possibility of continuing to accept the existence of objective knowledge. For many, neither truth nor reality are what they used to be—and probably never again will be (see Anderson, 1992). And so one wonders whether or not it is possible for this class of individuals to maintain hope while at the same time acquiescing to the demise of objective knowledge. Much of the burden of this particular chapter will be focused upon the question just raised.

In this chapter, I offer my third and final exemplar intent upon showing how hope

may persist in our current postmodern climate. By observing and analyzing Barack

Obama’s political communication, I seek to show how one might reject—or, at the very

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least, suspend belief in—the quest for a kind of objective knowledge that can unify the public, and yet nevertheless remain successful in communicatively generating hope. As I

will demonstrate throughout the remainder of this chapter, Barack Obama’s political

communication regarding hope and the role of religion in public life is a timely exemplar of the sustenance of public hope by way of largely paralogic means.

Given the brief description offered in the preceding paragraph, one might wonder how the approach in this chapter differs from my consideration of Lyotard and Rorty above. To be sure, my consideration of Obama will focus largely upon his employment of deeply paralogic means, means that I have indeed already ascribed both to Lyotard and to

Rorty. That being said, however, my examination of Obama’s rhetoric will likewise show considerable differences between Obama’s rhetoric and, in particular, the writing of

Richard Rorty. Let me, therefore, set the stage for the remainder of this chapter by (a) briefly recounting several central issues that were raised earlier in my extended treatment of Rorty and then (b) explaining how my treatment of Obama will evidence important differences between Obama and Rorty.

As I demonstrated at some length in Chapter 3, Richard Rorty (1989) longs for a public sphere that is “freer, less cruel, more leisured, [and] richer in goods and experiences, not just for our descendants but for everybody’s descendants” (p. 86). As we have also discovered, at the heart of Rorty’s work is the desire to see an impermeable distinction between private and public belief and hope. When speaking of hope in this way, therefore, Rorty relegates religious belief—itself one of the central loci of humankind’s historic hopes—to the private sphere. In a move that is crucially important

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to the fullness of human existence, Rorty seeks both to sustain hope in the face of

critiques of knowledge and to give significant weight to religious belief. In the process,

however, a crucial bifurcation is introduced between private religious hope and public

political hope. As a result, and as I demonstrated above, Rorty (1989) envisions a world

wherein “the demands of self-creation and of human solidarity [are] equally valid and,

yet forever incommensurable” (p. xv).

Though Rorty may indeed sustain a certain kind of hope both in public and

private life, one may justifiably wonder whether or not the cost of Rorty’s “solution” is, perhaps, too high. Consider, for instance, the following passage from Rorty (1989) where he describes in detail the fruition of such a radical bifurcation between public hope and the private search for perfection.

In its ideal form, the culture of liberalism would be one which was enlightened,

secular, through and through. It would be one in which no trace of divinity

remained, either in the form of a divinized world or in a divinized self. Such a

culture would have no room for the notion that there are nonhuman forces to

which human beings should be responsible. It would drop, or drastically

reinterpret, not only the idea of holiness but those of “devotion to truth” and of

“fulfillment of the deepest needs of the spirit.” The process of de-divinization...

would, ideally, culminate in our no longer being able to see any use for the notion

that finite, mortal, contingently existing human beings might derive the meanings

of their lives from anything except other finite, mortal, contingently existing

human beings. In such a culture, warnings of “relativism,” queries whether social

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institutions had become increasingly “rational” in modern times, and doubts about

whether the aims of liberal society were “objective moral values” would seem

merely quaint. (p. 45)

What Rorty here describes is, to be sure, a world wherein the radical bifurcation

between the public and private sphere has been made complete. Reflecting upon this

passage, one wonders whether such a state of affairs is even possible in American public

and political life. For if Rorty is to be taken seriously, then what he is describing would

seem to require a nearly wholesale linguistic redescription of many of the very

foundational tenets of American liberal democracy. Given my primary objective in this

chapter, I am not terribly interested to interrogate this question in great detail. But, it is, nevertheless, a question both worth raising and worth considering in greater depth

elsewhere.

The more pressing question is whether or not Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia is desirable. Here again, one enters into all manner of considerations that cannot be fully undertaken within the scope of this project. Perhaps most of all, such a line of inquiry forces one to stare squarely into the face of historically important questions about normativity, the “good life,” and the role of society in promoting such. To state a number of very complex matters rather simply, one might simply ask whether or not there exists either a moral or a practical necessity of retaining public discourse that unites humankind by way of something infinitely more powerful, complete, and knowledgeable than itself.

Rorty seems to think that such a divinized state of affairs is both unnecessary and undesirable. It seems self-evident, however, that many individuals—individuals who

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remain far less particularistic or divisive than James Dobson—would be unconvinced

either of the necessity or the desirability of the sort of de-divinized liberal utopia

described in the extended quote by Rorty offer above. In fact, a recent study produced by

the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that “More than nine-in-ten adults

(92%) say they believe in God or a universal spirit” (Lugo, et. al, 2008, p. 26). And so,

whether speaking of politicians, social activists, academics, entertainers, artists, or nearly

any other class of individuals prominent within in public life, divinized discourse—either

for or against historic conceptions of divinity and the implications of such—continues

utterly to pervade America’s description of itself and its identity.

This brings me to a third observation that emerges from reflecting upon the quote

offered by Rorty above. Time and again, I have argued that neither personal nor public

hope are dependent upon objective knowledge. And in the process, I have been

simultaneously speaking at length about the role of religious belief and, in particular, its historic relationship to the existence of objective truth as a means of sustaining private and public hope. Reflecting both upon the preceding chapters and upon the constellation

of issues raised in relationship to Rorty’s quote offered above, one wonders whether or

not it is possible simultaneously to adopt postmodern epistemology and yet also employ paralogic communication in service to the generation of religious hope.

Reflecting upon the preceding chapters, it becomes evident that none of the individuals considered above have sought to balance postmodern epistemology, paralogic communication, and religious hope in public life. Lyotard has much to say about the dissolution of metanarratives and the end of objective knowledge, yet only gestures

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toward the possibility of future social hope. In the process, we have seen that Lyotard

establishes the possibility of legitimation by way of paralogic communicative practices.

Nevertheless, at least within the pages of The Postmodern Condition, Lyotard has next to

nothing to say about the role of religious belief and its relationship to social hope. Rorty,

on the other hand, has far more to say about social hope and, in fact, writes at length about the possibility of a liberal utopia emergent from principally paralogic means. Along the way, however, Rorty seeks to move toward a climate wherein religion plays no role whatsoever in public life. And as a result, Rorty relegates religious belief to the private

realm of self-creation and the quest for individual perfection. Unlike both Lyotard and

Rorty, Dobson steadfastly affirms the necessity of religious belief as a crucial locus for

public discourse. And, in fact, Dobson even seeks to shape and to guide public policy in a

manner consistent with the historic testimony of the Judeo-Christian tradition. What

Dobson remains unable to do, however, is to accept postmodern critiques of objective

knowledge. For as we have seen, Dobson’s entire worldview hinges upon the existence of

objective truth and its normative role in shaping both private and public action.

Nevertheless, and largely as a result of his steadfast deference to moral truth, Dobson

remains significantly successful in creating hope among his followers.

After recounting the varied emphases of each of the authors considered in

preceding chapters, it becomes clear that we have yet to discover an individual who seeks

simultaneously to (a) accept postmodern critiques of knowledge, (b) employ paralogy, (c)

generate both public and private hope, and (d) remain deferential to the importance of

religious discourse and belief in public life. One therefore wonders whether or not the

174 adoption of such a constellation of sensibilities is either advisable or possible in our current climate. The remainder of this chapter will seek to address precisely this point, and will do so by way of an extended examination of the political communication of

Barack Obama regarding hope and the role of religious belief in public, political life.

As I will argue below, considering Obama allows us to reflect upon an example of contemporary public and political communication that is deeply Rortian in form, yet which rejects the radical bifurcation between public and private spheres that we observed when considering Rorty’s writing. Obama, I will suggest, is quite adept at employing

Rortian paralogic redescription as a means of creating and sustaining public and private hope. Obama does this, however, while remaining deferential to the importance of religious belief as a means of creating and sustaining such hope. Obama’s political communication represents, I argue, an attempt to hold in tension each of the four desiderata referred to in the preceding paragraph. As such, I label Barack Obama a

“postmodern politician” who consistently employs paralogy in order to enact a kairotic communicative manifestation of his postmodern version of the interplay between religion, politics, and the hope emergent from such.

In order to make good on the kinds of claims just introduced, I undertake the following objectives in the remainder of this chapter. In the next section, I begin by offering a brief introduction to Barack Obama’s rise to public prominence. In particular, I show how Obama’s own experience represents a unique embodiment of many of the tensions inherent within postmodern thought. Following this, I turn my attention to

Obama’s rhetoric regarding hope. Here, I show how the notion of hope represents an

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organizing theme for Obama’s campaign and explain how such a deference to hope tacitly betrays a commitment to themes introduced by Rorty above. After considering

Obama’s treatment of hope in general, I then look more specifically at Obama’s treatment

of religion in public and political life, demonstrating how Obama is able to sustain a

certain middle ground between the religious right and the de-divinized liberal utopia

proposed by Rorty. Finally, I conclude this chapter with a brief critical reflection upon

Obama’s rhetoric, thereby setting up several discussions upon which I will focus my

attention in Chapter 5.

Barack Obama: A Postmodern Politician in the Making

On June 3, 2008, following a sixteen month presidential primary that was

regarded by many as one of the most protracted and interesting races in American

history, Illinois Senator Barack Obama finally emerged as the presumptive 2008

Democratic presidential nominee. By defeating New York Senator and former First Lady,

Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama brought to an end the very first race in American

political history wherein either an African-American or a woman competed as a seriously

viable candidate for a major party presidential nomination. Reflecting upon this race in

his victory speech, Obama (June 3, 2008) commented that “we should be proud that our

party put forth one of the most talented, qualified fields of individuals ever to run for this

office…. They are leaders of this party, and leaders that America will turn to for years to

come.”

Reflecting upon the 2008 presidential primary race, what is interesting is not

merely that talented leaders were running for the Democratic presidential nomination. For

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such a claim could certainly be made about any and every presidential primary race in

American history. Reflecting upon the recent Democratic primary race—particularly in

light of the twofold theme of paralogy and hope—what I find most interesting is (a) that

two highly non-traditional candidates emerged as front runners and (b) that such

historically unlikely candidates were able to engender within the American people a

sense of hope and interest that has not often been observed in recent decades (Clayton,

2007; Fernandez-Pereda & Surowidjojo, March 3, 2008; Davies, January 7, 2008;

Tapper, 2006). Particularly with regard to Obama’s campaign, one finds indirect support

for such an increase in interest by considering recent fundraising successes. As one

observer notes, “Obama has smashed all records for presidential fundraising, bringing in

$287 million during the campaign, partly because of his success… in contributions from

small donors” (Parsons, July 11, 2008).

Reflecting upon Clinton and Obama in light of the central emphasis of this dissertation, one could suggest that both candidates evidence considerable giftedness in:

(a) transcending traditional logics without becoming illogical, (b) drawing together

coalitions and communities not entirely founded upon consensus, (c) pushing the

boundaries of America’s recent political and social imagination, and (d) destabilizing

present social, political, and cultural structures and narratives. And, of course, both

candidates were able to do so, in very large part, by way of deeply communicative means.

To state what should, by now, be fairly obvious: I believe that both Clinton and Obama

represent interesting and historically unique exemplars of what I have been referring to as

paralogic communication.

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Although a very intriguing analysis could be offered about the paralogic dimensions of Hillary Clinton’s campaign, my attention in this chapter focuses squarely upon Barack Obama. Such a decision stems, in large part, from Obama’s consistent deference to hope as the central and organizing principle of his campaign. As I will explain in a subsequent section of this chapter, Obama’s very political identity is conceived of in hopeful, paralogic terms. And yet, it is not merely Obama’s communicative practices that set him up well for a postmodern employment of paralogic communication. Indeed, Obama’s autobiography and experience likewise characterize an individual who both reflects and emerges from many of the tensions inherent within postmodern thought. As one recent commentator has suggested, “Barack Obama embodies the contradictions it takes to be a postmodern hero” (Presno, May 13, 2008).

While Presno’s assessment may be a bit overstated, it is nevertheless worth briefly considering just how Obama may be considered as an embodiment of postmodern tensions and tendencies.

In many ways, Obama’s emergence within the public American consciousness was more characteristic of a pop-culture icon than a politician. In an era wherein politicians are regularly viewed as distant, out of touch, and unconcerned with the average person, Barack Obama surprisingly emerged as a what many have described as a

“rock star” of the current American political scene (Page & Despeignes, 2004; Dauber,

2004; Leopold, 2004). And, indeed, like many individuals who rise to prominence in popular culture, Barack Obama himself became a household name, as it would seem, nearly overnight. As Monica Davey, a columnist for the New York Times, wrote in the

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months just prior to the 2004 Democratic National Convention (DNC), “Overnight, Mr.

Obama, a former civil rights lawyer, has become a treasured commodity in the

Democratic Party nationally” (Davey, 2004). Though Davey’s comments were certainly

true of Obama prior to the 2004 DNC, the Illinois Senator’s performance as keynote

DNC speaker further solidified Obama’s place in subsequent political discussions. As

Dewey Clayton (2007) explains, “Since [the 2004 DNC] keynote address, Barack Obama has become the political superstar of the Democratic Party” (p. 53).

By many accounts, Obama’s increasing popularity is somewhat unique and, perhaps, unexpected. As early as 2004, Obama was quoted as saying that even he was

“surprised by the pace of his political rise” (Zuckmann & Mendell, 2004). Consistent with such sentiment, Obama regularly reminds audiences that his “presence on this stage is pretty unlikely” (Obama, July 27, 2004). Joking about his growing status and

popularity at a December 2004 dinner at Washington’s Gridiron Club, Obama

commented that, “I’m so overexposed I make Paris Hilton look like a recluse. I figure

there’s nowhere to go from here but down, so tonight I’m announcing my retirement

from the United States Senate” (quoted in Alter, 2004). Of course, Obama has not retired,

and though he has admittedly faced increasing scrutiny since making such a claim in

2004, the consistent trajectory of Obama’s visibility and popularity has progressed in an

upward and generally positive direction.

Numerous political analysts have interrogated the various factors contributing to

Obama’s unlikely and speedy rise to fame. Though difficult to isolate, there are several

obvious elements involved in Obama’s growing popularity. One possibility for Obama’s

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emergent appeal stems from the Senator’s embodiment of broad (and perhaps even

divergent) cultural and ideological sensibilities (Dougherty, 2007; Brill, 2006; Mendell,

2008; and Wilson, 2007). As one author wrote, “Part of the attention that people are

giving Obama is due to his unique background, as the son of a white mother from Kansas and a black father from Kenya, who as a boy lived with an Indonesian stepfather in

Jakarta and later with his white grandparents in Hawaii, and who went to college in

California, graduated from Harvard Law School, and lives, when not in Washington, in

Chicago”(Bridges, February 5, 2007). Or, as Caroline Presno writes, “From his family tree to his psychological makeup, Barack Obama is a one man melting pot” (May 13,

2008).

As the result of such divergent experiences, Obama is often perceived as an individual who challenges traditional social, political, and ideological boundaries. And,

of course, Obama continues to trade on such perceptions, positioning himself simultaneously in multiple worlds. For instance, Obama is influential, educated, and privileged, yet consistently identifies himself with poor, underprivileged, black communities. Additionally, Obama is running a cutting-edge Internet and multimedia campaign, all the while employing standard print media to produce texts like The

Audacity of Hope which gain him a hearing among more traditional political constituencies (Tumulty, July 5, 2007). Similarly, Obama remains strongly committed to progressive politics while publicly and passionately identifying himself as a self-avowed

Christian. Also consistent with the Senator’s somewhat non-traditional identity, Obama

characterizes himself as one who is both well-versed in American political life and yet

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who likewise can offer something that is new and different, something that is untainted

by usual political practices, and something that will usher in a move beyond traditional partisan politics. In all these ways, as well as doubtless others, Obama brings a sort of shifting and even conflicting identity to contemporary presidential politics. And such an identity has undoubtedly contributed to Obama’s public image and popularity.

In addition to the sort of issues raised above, Obama’s popularity has been considerably bolstered by his persistent employment of the theme of hope and the need for solidarity emergent from such. This point was, of course, raised above. And, I will

turn wholeheartedly to this issue in a subsequent section of this chapter. At this point, it is

enough to note that Obama relies heavily upon the notion that his campaign represents

something new, something different, and something hopeful. In his latest (2006) book,

The Audacity of Hope, Obama writes, “A government that truly represents these

Americans… will require a different kind of politics. That politics will need to reflect our

lives as they are actually lived. It won’t be prepackaged, ready to pull off the shelf.… We

will need to remind ourselves, despite all our differences, just how much we share:

common hopes, commons dreams, a bond that will not break” (p. 25). Consistent with

this sort of sentiment, Obama regularly envisions a change in the way that American

politics are performed and understood both in Washington and beyond. Obama

consistently calls for “a different kind of politics,” a move beyond divisive partisan

political disagreement, and a recognition of a common and hopeful American future.

When making the kind of claims introduced in the last paragraph, Obama is most

certainly appealing to an increased clamoring among Americans for social and political

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change (Bertens, 1995; Lugo, 2008; Zukin et. al, 2006). Obama, of course, wisely

capitalizes upon this sort of disdain by consistently speaking about hopeful possibilities

for the future of America. The result, whether merited or not, has been to create a general

sense of hope and possibility within much of the American public. Expressing sentiment

consistent with many supporters of Obama’s campaign, former Mississippi Governor Ray

Mabus recently claimed: “I think that Obama, more than anybody else, has a chance to

unify this country. This country has been so divided, particularly by this administration,

that I think (Obama) is talking about problems in a different way. I think he’s a new voice

from a new generation. That’s what America needs now” (quoted in Wagster, May 23,

2007).

To be sure, one can certainly contest the newness of Obama’s rhetoric. One can

likewise suggest that Obama’s deference to hope is both naïve and lacking in substance

(see Tapper & Harper, February 8, 2008). One could also postulate that Obama’s

optimism and hope has yet to be tempered by significant political experience. And one

could similarly suggest that Obama’s emergent fame is more a symptom of America’s

desire for something new, flashy, and commodified than it is a result of the Senator’s

political depth and policy genius. Regardless of the potential force of such critiques, it

nevertheless seems obvious enough that Obama has struck a chord with much of the

American media and broader voting base.

In the preceding paragraphs, I have attempted to isolate several of the reasons for

Obama’s widespread and somewhat atypical appeal. However, in order more fully to understand Obama’s popularity as well as his preferred paralogic mode of

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communicating, it is necessary to look more carefully at varied communicative appeals at

the heart of his campaign. It is with this goal in mind that I next turn my attention to a

consideration of Obama’s account of hope as evidenced in his now-famous text, The

Audacity of Hope.

Barack Obama’s Conception of Hope in The Audacity of Hope

Writing about an individual such as Barack Obama is at once exciting and

remarkably challenging. The exciting part is that when writing about such a ubiquitous

individual, one cannot escape the sense that he is working on something important,

something that other people might be interested to think about, and something that really matters. The challenging part is closely related to the exciting part. Barack Obama is

everywhere, and discussions about him are everywhere. Moreover, given the realities of

both current political campaigns and the news media who follow such, there are literally

thousands of new pieces of potential research available for consideration on a daily basis.

Add to this the fact that Obama himself is constantly making appearances, oftentimes

delivering numerous speeches on any given day of the week. Additionally, there are the

various pieces of literature produced by Obama or his campaign staff, including the two

books that Obama has written, the various position statements he has provided, and the numerous pieces of legislation that he has written or supported—to name just a few of the

possible things to be considered. And since the topic of this dissertation concerns, at least

in part, the American people’s perception of various hopeful communicative appeals, one

is tempted to think that he ought to be reading web sites, blogs, and commentaries

wherein the views of such individuals can be ascertained.

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Given the realities that I have just outlined, I have had to make a number of

difficult decisions when deciding how to approach the vast body of potential research available regarding Obama’s treatment of hope. Although I have certainly done my best to remain up to date in my own reading, and to pay close attention to public perceptions of Obama, the analysis that follows relies exclusively on Obama’s now well-known

(2006) book entitled The Audacity of Hope. Although I pay particular attention to a somewhat dated text (at least by standards appropriate to contemporary American political campaigns), I believe that this strategy is both consistent with the approach I have adopted throughout this dissertation and most suited for the goals I have in mind.

What I am most concerned to understand is how Obama negotiates the historic constellation of ideas that regularly play into America’s understanding of the nature of hope. I feared that approaching this project by way of various speeches would not allow either for the focus or precision that is very clearly evidenced within the pages of The

Audacity of Hope. It is my expectation that coming to understand this more theoretical and philosophical text will shed light on Obama’s various speeches in a way that would not have occurred had I tried to work from particular speeches to a broader reconstruction of Obama’s understanding of hope. Not only this, but upon studying many of Obama’s stump speeches on the topic of either hope or religion, one finds considerable consistency and even lengthy, word-for-word quotations from the pages of The Audacity of Hope.

And so much of the analysis of this book translates directly to specific speeches that

Obama has given as well.

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Supposing that one wishes for a justification of my method that is stated in more

“scholarly” terms, then one might think of my textual selection as constituting what

Kenneth Burke (1969) referred to as “a representative anecdote.” As Burke wrote, when

seeking to understand and analyze a given corpus, “One should seek to select, as a representative anecdote, something sufficiently demarcated in character to make analysis possible, yet sufficiently complex in character to prevent the use of too few terms in one’s description” (p. 324). As Benjamin Bates (2004) explains, “Burke argues that the representative anecdote allows the rhetorician to engage an extensive body of discourse even as she or he reduces that discourse to a smaller set for closer analysis” (p. 450). This is the sort of strategy that I will be employing in the following pages in an attempt to uncover various paralogic emphases that I believe course throughout Obama’s communication regarding the nature and role of hope in American life.

Published by Crown Publishers, a division of Random House, Inc., The Audacity of Hope was first available for sale on October 17, 2006. In a manner that was surprising to many, Obama’s text rushed to the New York Times best seller list in roughly one

month’s time (Bosman, November 9, 2006). Though Obama’s book became quite

popular among a general readership, the text is not quite what one might call a typical

trade publication. As one commentator noted, The Audacity of Hope is “better described

as a distillation of [Obama’s] political philosophy than a revealing memoir” (Bosman,

November 9, 2006). Bosman’s point notwithstanding, Obama’s text remains, from time to time, quite introspective, providing insight into Obama’s political views as well as his understanding of topics such as the family, globalization, race, and religion. And as a

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result, Bosman notes, the initial success of The Audacity of Hope “had booksellers

struggling to draw comparisons” (Bosman, November 9, 2006). Having now sold over 1

million copies, The Audacity of Hope has itself become somewhat of a cultural icon, and

has certainly served to bolster Obama’s image of intrigue and novelty. And, in many

ways, the verbiage of The Audacity of Hope acted as a springboard for the broader

political communication that now characterizes the Obama campaign.

Very early in The Audacity of Hope, Barack Obama begins to express a number of

sentiments that course throughout the remainder of this text. Here in these opening pages,

Obama is writing about his early years as a politician, particularly when he was first

running as a candidate for the United States Senate. As an unknown candidate with very

little money or staff, much of Obama’s campaign consisted of one-on-one encounters

with various potential voters. Reflecting upon his considerable time spent meeting with

such people, Obama (2006) notes “just how modest people’s hopes were, and how much

of what they believed seemed to hold constant across race, region, religion, and class” (p.

7).1 As Obama recalls, the majority of such individuals hoped for fairly common and

expected states of affairs: those willing to work should be able to find a decent job, the

sick should be cared for, all children should get a good education, the American people

should be safe, and the elderly should be able to retire and yet still live a dignified

existence. As Obama remarks, “That was about it. It wasn’t much” (p. 7).

In one sense, what Obama is observing here is neither remarkable nor terribly surprising. Reflect on nearly any stump speech in American political history, and you

1 Unless otherwise noted, all subsequent page numbers in this chapter will refer to Barack Obama’s (2006) text, The Audacity of Hope. 186 will likely recall very similar verbiage being articulated at one point or another. However, the more one reads Obama, and the more one listens to him speak, the more one begins to sense that Obama has thought very carefully about this human proclivity toward hope.

Consider, for instance, the following passage:

At the core of the American experience are a set of ideals that continue to stir our

collective conscience; a common set of values that bind us together despite our

differences; a running thread of hope that makes our improbable experiment in

democracy work. These values and the ideals find expression not just in the

marble slabs of monuments or in the recitation of history books. They remain

alive in the hearts and minds of most Americans—and can inspire us to pride,

duty, and sacrifice. (p. 8)

Recall for a moment one of the central themes of postmodern thought that I have been considering from numerous vantage points: postmodernism, whatever it might be, highlights difference, fragmentation, and nonessential qualities both of humankind and of the institutions of which he or she is a part. What Obama is here articulating, however, runs quite contrary to this common strain of thought within postmodern discourse. This is not to say, however, that Obama thinks that this sort of tendency is alive and well with the American consciousness. In fact, Obama suggests that Americans all too often fail to remember such core values and the ways in which they manifest themselves within our shared American experience. And so even as Obama defers to and builds upon the sense of a common American sensibility, he is still able to lament that “We don’t even seem to possess a shared language with which to discuss our ideals, much less the tools to arrive

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at some rough consensus about how, as a nation, we might work together to bring these

ideals about…. The reality of American life has strayed from its myths” (p. 8). What

Obama calls for, therefore, is a renewed sense of hope in the commonalities that unite us

as Americans, and—perhaps even more important—as citizens of a common humanity.

Notice that Obama is not merely speaking about the importance of an idea here. It

is, I think, critically important that Obama refers to the notion of American myths, that collection of ideals that both retain a measure of truthfulness, and yet that simultaneously persist in large part because of their idealized and even fantastic character. It is interesting to note, however, that in order to gain meaningful traction within culture, such an idealized myth of a shared American consciousness and experience must become more than an inert idea. Such a myth must be performed, must be given life through narrative

legitimation among various communities of individuals who come to accept the fullness

of this myth and begin to live their lives in light of it.

Obama himself is quite aware of the fact that speaking in terms of a common

American experience is, given the current state of American politics, potentially

incendiary if not outright insensitive to genuine difference that exists in such a diverse

country. Obama himself explains, “In such a climate, any assertion of shared ideals and common values might seem hopelessly naïve, if not downright dangerous” (p. 8). And so what Obama seems to be saying is something like the following: “Look, I am all too aware of the fact that we live in a world characterized by difference and disagreement, and that I might look like a fool by arguing otherwise.” As Obama notes, however, “My argument… is that we have no choice.” (p. 8, italics added). For as Obama further

188 explains, “Perhaps more than any other time in our recent history, we need a new kind of politics, one that can excavate and build upon those shared understandings and pull us together as Americans” (p. 9). And as Obama explains, “That’s the topic of [The

Audacity of Hope]: how we might begin the process of changing our politics and our civil life” (p. 9).

Reflecting upon the previous paragraph in light of what we learned in Chapter 2, I cannot help but make connections to Rorty and his call for the poetic and ironic redescription of historic beliefs. To be sure, when appealing to the idea of a common

American experience, Obama is rehearsing a time-honored commonplace within

American public and political discourse (see West, 1989). And so this alone is not entirely new. What is intriguing, and what is at least a bit new, is the fact that Obama seems to recognize and give voice to the potential foolishness of maintaining this sort of sensibility and yet ironically plows ahead even in the face of an awareness that he cannot possibly objectively legitimate the assumption of commonality from which he is operating. What Obama is calling for, to state this point in the language of Chapter 2, is an experimental redescription of humankind in light of an historic myth (read: narrative) that has lost legitimacy in recent decades. Just as Rorty seeks to redescribe America in de-divinized liberal utopian terms, and Dobson seeks to reflect upon an America that will once again return to its historic Judeo-Christian moorings, Obama is himself involved in a widespread project of linguistic redescription and narrative legitimation intent upon changing the way the American populace views itself and its connection to others.

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In addition to manifesting the sort of ironist sensibilities outlined in the previous

paragraph, Obama is also similar to Rorty by virtue of the atheoretical nature of his

position. Obama explains: “My treatment of the issues is often partial and incomplete. I

offer no unifying theory of American government, nor do these pages provide a

manifesto for action” (p. 9). Although Obama does certainly express a number of positions that one might call theoretical or philosophical in nature, the more important element of Obama’s appeal concerns the enactment or performance of such truths. Rorty, of course, speaks of such issues in terms of his anti-foundationalist epistemology and his post metaphysical sensibilities. And though I do not wish to suggest that Obama is self- consciously articulating a philosophical position that one might justifiably describe as anti-foundationalist or post-metaphysical, Obama nevertheless seems to trade on sensibilities that one could easily enough ascribe to such philosophical positions. More will need to be said in this regard below, particularly when referencing Obama’s appeal to the Declaration of Independence. At this point, suffice it to say that what Obama is most interested in is not a static truth of a common American experience or sensibility.

Rather, Obama is most concerned to uncover the enacted possibilities that might arise from the narrative legitimation of such a truth.

Although Obama here has raised the possibility of speaking about a hopeful

American future wherein the citizens of America understand themselves as intimately united by way of a common narrative and experience, such a reality has certainly not yet been realized. And, in fact, within political life there seems to be a set of mechanisms in place that actually preclude the sort of hopeful possibility that Obama so desperately

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seeks. “Like most Americans,” explains Obama, “I find it hard to shake the feeling these

days that our democracy has gone seriously awry” (p. 22). In explaining such a state of

affairs, Obama introduces a theme that regularly appears as a part of his campaign appeals: the smallness of our politics. As Obama writes, “What’s troubling is the gap between the magnitude of our challenges and the smallness of our politics—the ease with which we are distracted by the petty and trivial, the chronic avoidance of tough decisions, the seeming inability to build a working consensus to tackle any big problem” (p. 22).

What Obama is referring to in the preceding paragraph is, in his assessment, deeply related to our persistent failure to view others as similar to us. Here, one thinks of

Rorty’s (1989) contention that “This process of coming to see other human beings as ‘one of us’ rather as ‘them’ is a matter of detailed description of what unfamiliar people are like and of redescription of what we ourselves are like” (p. xvi). Obama echoes such sentiment—albeit in slightly different language—within the pages of The Audacity of

Hope, suggesting that the smallness of our politics results, in large part, from immediately describing our situation though the language of polarity, difference, and disagreement. Such descriptions give rise to a situation wherein the most important issues facing American political life far too often give way to the most petty and trivial means of interacting with others. Though politicians may continue to operate at this level without serious consequence, the experience of everyday life among everyday people points to, in Obama’s assessment, a very different reality, a reality wherein people need to begin looking for more similarities than differences, and thereby need to look somewhere other than politics for answers. Obama explains:

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Of course, there is another story to be told, by the millions of Americans who are

going about their business every day. They are on the job or looking for work,

starting businesses, helping their kids with their homework, and struggling with

high gas bills, insufficient health insurance, and a pension that some bankruptcy

court somewhere has rendered unenforceable. They are by turns hopeful and

frightened about the future. Their lives are full of contradictions and ambiguities.

And because politics seem to speak so little what they are going through—

because they understand that politics today is a business and not a mission, and

what passes for debate is little more than spectacle—they turn inward, away from

the noise and rage and endless chatter. (pp. 24-25)

The story that Obama tells here hearkens back in very compelling ways to some of the themes I tried to develop in Chapter 1 of this dissertation. Obama here is speaking about an American populace that desires the freedom to hope, who longs for a way forward in face of considerable challenges and persistent struggle. Sadly, however,

America is far more often characterized by situations wherein the average American is both turned off by the current political machinery and either implicitly or explicitly encouraged to envision the politician (or the privileged, or the poor or, or the alternate political party—in short, everyone who is different from him or her) as radically distinct and as an impossible candidate for consensus, compromise, or shared hope (see Tannen,

1998; Rorty, 1989).

Reflecting upon the inability of government truly to meet the sorts of needs often facing average Americans, Obama offers verbiage that I quoted above and that is by now

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seemingly-ubiquitous in the American public consciousness: “A government that truly

represent these Americans—that truly serves these Americans—will require a different

kind of politics.... We need to remind ourselves, despite all of our differences, just how

much we share: common hopes, common dreams, a bond that will not break” (p. 25).

And, of course, Obama seeks desperately not only to advocate for this vision of a hopeful

America, but simultaneously to perform the legitimation of this narrative at nearly every level of his political campaign. Perhaps most exemplary in this regard was an event which took place as I was working on this chapter: Obama and his longtime Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, performed the legitimation of commonality and consensus amidst disagreement by holding a joint rally in the small New Hampshire town named “Unity”

(see Leibovich & Zeleny, June 28, 2008). As Leibovich and Zeleny note, “As has been well chronicled, this remote town near the Vermont border was chosen not just for its

Hollywood name, but also for the perfect split of votes cast in the New Hampshire primary—107 for each candidate.” Corny and as contrived as such a rally may be, the scholar of narrative and human communication cannot help but be intrigued by Obama’s

continued attempts narratively to perform and to legitimate the myth of American

commonality, and to redescribe the political process in light of such.

A persistent theme of this dissertation has been the claim that challenges facing

hope today are closely related the emergence of various postmodern sensibilities.

Although Obama himself does not speak specifically in terms of postmodernity within

the pages of The Audacity of Hope, the Senator does indeed speak to many of the

developments that social and cultural theorists would describe in deeply postmodern

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terms. In his chapter entitled “Republicans and Democrats,” for instance, Obama

provides the reader with his understanding of those historical developments taking place

throughout the 1960s.

Reflecting upon the 1960s, what Obama describes is a time wherein historic

institutions, beliefs, and practices faced widespread opposition at various levels of

society. Obama speaks of the tumultuous civil rights movement, protests against the

Vietnam war, challenges to America’s moral authority by virtue of its involvement in

Vietnam, and the increased visibility of all manner of historically-silent lifestyles that

stood in contrast to traditional values. Leaning on the precedent of (and, simultaneously,

gaining courage from) the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as well as the dissent surrounding

Vietnam, “the walls of the status quo [were] breached, [and] every form of ‘outsider’

came streaming through the gates: feminists, Latinos, hippies, Panthers, welfare moms,

gays, all asserting their rights, all insisting on recognition, all demanding a seat at the table and a piece of the pie” (p. 28).

What Obama here describes rather quickly holds considerable consequences for the American political landscape. And, thankfully, Obama spends a bit more careful time reflecting upon such consequences. Commenting upon this era, Obama explains that

“The country’s tectonic plates had shifted” (p. 28). As further explanation of such a tectonic shift, Obama explains:

[After the 1960s] politics was no longer simply a pocketbook issue but a moral

issue as well, subject to moral imperatives and moral absolutes. And politics was

decidedly personal, insinuating itself with every interaction—whether between

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black and white, men and women—and implicating itself in every assertion or

rejection of authority. Accordingly, liberalism and conservatism were now

defined in the popular imagination less by class than by attitude—the position you

took toward the traditional culture and counterculture. What mattered was not

just how you felt about the right to strike or corporate taxation, but also how you

felt about sex, drugs, and rock and roll, the Latin Mass or the Western canon. (pp.

28-29, italics added)

Understandably, Obama does not describe this historical moment in considerable detail, and is content to note that the various upheavals of this time period “have been well chronicled” (p. 27). Reflecting even upon the little that Obama has written about this era, however, one discovers some very interesting connections to the broader argument of this dissertation. For what Obama is speaking about in a cultural sense is precisely what I have been discussing throughout this project. When speaking of the civil rights movement as well as the protests against the Vietnam War, Obama is speaking of a time period wherein traditional orthodoxies—that is, traditional appeals to historically stable and objective truths—came to be challenged. Stated more explicitly in terms of hope,

Obama is speaking about a time when historic structures and traditional modes of performing public life gave way to new possibilities of hope for numerous Americans whose hopes had for so long been challenged. This was, at least in part, ushered in by the

Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Vietnam war, and the constellation of protests surrounding this historic event, however, spoke of a very different state of affairs—a state of affairs wherein hope was waning, wherein the moral authority of America itself was challenged,

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and wherein traditional institutions and hopeful narratives came under considerable and

widespread public scrutiny.

What Obama explains in germinal form is that historic American moment

wherein objective truth began to lose its footing, wherein the myth of objectivity was

exposed in broad cultural brush strokes. And as a result, explains Obama, people were

forced to take sides. Will you go with the way things used to be (and call yourself a

conservative), or are you going to align yourself with the way things are headed (and

label yourself a liberal)? This type of question, suggests Obama, increasingly began to

characterize politics at this time. And though, admittedly, Obama does not make the

broader philosophical connections that I am suggesting here, it does not seem too far a stretch to suggest that the political division which Obama described in terms of liberals and conservatives is but a subset of the much wider-reaching historic division that was becoming increasingly apparent throughout these years. That division, and many of the various problems arising from it, has, of course, been at the very center of this dissertation. For it is such a division that I have now characterized in a number of different ways: modernity versus postmodernity; hopefulness versus a loss of hope; objective truth versus narrative truth; metaphysicians versus ironists; and, here, conservatives versus liberals. Although importantly different, to be sure, there is a pattern of conflict that courses throughout all of these oppositional pairs, a pattern of conflict that

I have tried to illuminate from a number of different vantage points, and which Obama here sheds light upon within the specific context of contemporary American political life.

And while Obama does not explicitly use the verbiage of epistemology here, he is

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certainly telling a story about a world wherein traditional accounts of truth failed to

satisfy, wherein historic narratives were challenged, wherein long-standing hopes gave

way to division and a lack of optimism, and wherein “things must have seemed to be spinning out of control” (p. 30).

In an introspective passage from The Audacity of Hope, Obama suggests that he himself “always felt a curious relationship to the sixties. In a sense,” writes Obama, “I’m a product of that era” (p. 29). Obama further explains, “In my teens, I became fascinated with the Dionysian, up-for-grabs quality of the era, and through books, film, and music, I soaked in a vision of the sixties...” (p. 30). Although interesting in its own right, what I find most insightful in Obama’s self-recollection are the comments that follow. Obama writes, “Eventually, my rejection of authority spilled into self-indulgence and self- destructiveness, and by the time I enrolled in college, I’d begun to see how any challenge to convention harbored within it the possibility of its own excesses and its own orthodoxy. I started to reexamine my assumptions, and recalled the values my mother and grandparents had taught me” (p. 30). In a progression that Obama describes as a “slow, fitful process of sorting out what I believed,” the Senator recalls a time when he began to reflect upon the excesses of challenging authority as well as the virtues of traditionalism

(p. 30).

I certainly do not wish to read too much into this brief set of reflections offered by

Obama. For it is clear that such passages alone do not merit a reading of Obama as some sort of mediator between the historic divides referred to a couple of paragraphs ago. For when taken alone, such verbiage may be little more than an introspective remembering

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which helps to make sense of Obama’s past. However, if one could uncover within

Obama’s broader thinking a consistent pattern of attempted mediation between such

historic divides, one might be able to observe in this brief confession a broader theme at

the heart of Obama’s political vision. More to the point, one might, indeed, begin to

understand Obama’s treatment of the theme of hope as an attempt to overcome many of

the problematic divisions exemplified throughout the preceding several pages. As I will

argue below, it is precisely this sort of mediation that characterizes Obama’s broader

vision of politics, and more importantly, his understanding of hope.

Providing further insight into his understanding of the last five decades of

American political life, Obama offers an interesting assessment of the Clinton

presidency, an assessment that speaks in interesting ways to the attempt to mediate

between two cultural and political extremes. Obama writes, “It was Bill Clinton’s

singular contribution that he tried to transcend this ideological deadlock, recognizing not only that what had come to be meant by the labels of ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’ played to the Republican advantage, but that the categories were inadequate to address the problems we faced” (p. 34). According to Obama, Clinton represented a via media between the polarized extremes that had been for so long reified within the American consciousness. Clinton, explains Obama, “instinctively understood the falseness of the choices being presented to the American people” (p. 34). In their place, explains Obama, the American public was offered “Clinton’s Third Way,” which, according to Obama,

“went beyond splitting the difference [between Republicans and Democrats and] tapped

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into the pragmatic, nonideological attitude of the majority of Americans” (p. 34, italics

added).

Ultimately, suggests Obama, the Clinton administration was not altogether

successful in overcoming the partisan divide. At best, in Obama’s assessment, “Clinton

may have fought that movement to a draw” (p. 35). But, warns Obama, the conservative

majority “would come out stronger for it—and in George W. Bush’s first term, that

movement would take over the United States government” (pp. 35-36). Reflecting upon

this brief history, Obama admits, “This telling of this story is too neat, I know. And it

ignores critical strands and historical narrative” (p. 36). Even so, explains Obama, “I

can’t help feeling that the politics of today suffers from the case of arrested development”

(p. 36). The arrested development that Obama has in mind here consists of the failure to

produce the sort of mediating position attempted by Clinton and that, to remind the reader

of a quote offered above, tapped into the pragmatic, nonideological attitude of the majority of Americans” (p. 34, italics added).

Consistent with his assessment regarding the “arrested development” that he believes to be characteristic of contemporary American politics, Obama’s take on the current state of the Democratic Party is similarly guarded. “We Democrats,” explains

Obama, “are just, well, confused” (p. 39). In the wake of considerable Republican victories over the last several decades, “the Democratic Party has become the party of reaction... [who] increasingly feel the need to match the Republican right in stridency and hardball tactics” (p. 39). In line with such thinking, Obama laments that many Democrats are convinced that the solution to the current state of affairs is not compromise, but,

199 rather, to push just as hard in the opposite direction. As Obama explains, many think that

“if the Democrats ever want to get back into power, then they will have to take up the same approach” of reifying traditional binaries and historic divisions among political parties (p. 39). In Obama’s assessment, what is necessary is a somewhat more nuanced treatment of the subject at hand. “Ultimately,” explains Obama, “I believe any attempt by

Democrats to pursue a more sharply partisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we are in” (p. 39).

According to Obama, the “successful” strategy of the Republican right has helped to generate a voting public that has come to expect no considerable progress or compromise within political life. As Obama explains:

It’s precisely the pursuit of ideological purity, the rigid orthodoxy and the sheer

brute predictability of our current political debate, that keeps us from finding new

ways to meet the challenges we face as a country. It’s what keeps us locked in

“either/or” thinking: the notion that we can have only big government or no

government; the assumption that we must either tolerate forty-six million without

health insurance or embrace “socialized medicine.” It is such doctrinaire thinking

and stark partisanship that have turned Americans off of politics. (p. 40)

Interestingly enough, the sort of situation that Obama here describes is not, in his assessment, generally recognized as a problem at all for the conservative movement. As

Obama explains, “this is not a problem for the right; a polarized electorate—or one that easily dismisses both parties because of the nasty, dishonest tone of the debate—works perfectly well for those who seek to chip away at the very idea of government” (p. 40).

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Although Obama may be overstating the case a bit here, there is an interesting connection to be made between the sort of liberalism ascribed above to Rorty, and the state of affairs that Obama envisions as characteristic of contemporary Republican politics. Recall that classical liberalism is characterized, in large part, by its assertion of basic human freedoms. Often, such an assertion comes to be manifest by way of political philosophies and policies that encourage a very limited government. What Obama here seems to be suggesting is that those classical liberal emphases that undergird much of conservative political practice have, unfortunately, been taken too far. To state the matter just a bit differently, what Obama seems to be suggesting here is that universal human hope cannot ultimately flourish in an environment wherein a truly limited government prevails. As

Obama explains, “for those of us who believe the government has a role to play in promoting opportunity and prosperity for all Americans, a polarized electorate isn’t good enough” (p. 40, italics added).

Fortunately, according to Obama, the American people have not been blind to the limitations of conservative political practice. And so Obama suggests the emergence of a class of voters who are waiting to overcome this sort of divide. In a passage wherein

Obama articulates a number of historic polarities, polarities that themselves manifest the broad divisions exemplified by modernity versus postmodernity, Obama explains:

I imagine they are waiting for a politics with the maturity to balance idealism and

realism, to distinguish between what can and cannot be compromised, to admit

the possibility that the other side might sometimes have a point. They don’t

always understand the arguments between right and left, conservative and liberal,

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but they recognize the difference between dogma and common sense,

responsibility and irresponsibility, between those things that last and those things

that are fleeting. They are out there, waiting for Republicans and Democrats to

catch up with them. (p. 42)

What Obama here envisions is an American populace that is somehow a bit more aware of its needs that are its leaders. To be sure, the average voter may not be able to explain the sort of historic, political, or philosophical tensions at play here. And yet as

Obama see things, there nevertheless seems to be an increased clamoring for a new way forward, a way of reconciling those historic principles which continue to define humankind alongside of a more critical awareness of the need continually to reinterrogate such narratives. And, indeed, Obama is convinced that such a process has been initiated in the hearts and minds of Americans all across the country. Obama writes:

Across America, a constant cross-pollination is occurring, a not entirely orderly

but generally peaceful collision among people and cultures. Identities are

scrambling, and then cohering in new ways. Beliefs keeps slipping through the

noose of predictability. Facile expectations and simple explanations are being

constantly upended. Spend time actually talking to Americans, and you discover

that most evangelicals are more tolerant than the media would have us believe,

most secularists more spiritual. Most rich people want the poor to succeed, and

most of the poor are both more self-critical and hold higher aspirations than the

popular culture allows. Most Republican strongholds are 40 percent Democrat,

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and vice versa. The political labels of liberal or conservative rarely track people’s

personal attributes. (p. 51)

Reflecting upon this particular passage, and having now set up his discussion for

some fifty pages, Obama turns wholeheartedly to a discussion which speaks to his vision

of a hopeful America. Reflecting upon the extended quote just offered, Obama asks a

question, the answer to which deeply informs his conception of hope. Obama writes,

“What are the core values that we, as Americans, hold in common?” (p. 52). Though

political culture tends not to pay much attention to shared values, Obama explains that

“the broader question of shared values—the standards and principles that the majority of

Americans deem important in their lives, and in the life of the country—should be the

heart of our politics, the cornerstone of any meaningful debate about budgets and

projects, regulations and policies” (pp. 52-53).

Mulling over his own question, and, as a way of providing answers to such,

Obama turns his attention to one of the most sacred articulations of America’s common

creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they

are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life,

Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” As Obama explains, “Those simple words are our

starting point as Americans; they describe not only the foundation of our government but

the substance of our common creed” (p. 53, italics added). Obama continues, “The essential idea behind the declaration—that we are born into this world free, all of us; that each of us arrives with a bundle of rights that can’t be taken away by any person or any state without just cause; that through our own agency we can, and must, make our lives

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what we will—is one every American understands. It orients us, sets our course, each and

every day” (p. 53).

Interestingly enough, Obama says very little else about these particular words,

words that, indeed, exist at the heart of the American experience. What Obama does write

is that “the value of individual freedom is so deeply ingrained in us that we tend to take it for granted. It is easy to forget that at the time of our nation’s founding this idea was entirely radical in its implications, as radical as Martin Luther’s posting on the church door” (p. 53).

As I have reflected at some length on Obama’s treatment of the nature of hope, I must admit that I initially found myself wishing that the Senator would be more specific and direct regarding his view on the subject. As a careful examination of The Audacity of

Hope makes clear, however, Obama never does any such thing. Instead, what Obama does—both in this text and throughout his broader political communication—is continually to redescribe America and the experience of fellow Americans in light of two very fundamental collections of narratives, narratives that find their genesis in the quote taken from the Declaration of Independence and that together characterize a decidedly

American vision of the nature of hope.

The first collection of narratives concerns those famous words from the

Declaration of Independence. At the root of Obama’s hope is an assumption about the freedom afforded humankind as citizens of the American experiment. The assumption of human freedom, which is codified in the Declaration of Independence, and which is reflective of a truth that Obama believes reaches beyond mere human articulation, offers

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to Obama the basis or the ground upon which hope might rest. Humankind, whatever else

it might be, exists as a locus of possibility. Reflecting upon the possibilities inherent in

human freedom, Obama recognizes them as “rooted in a basic optimism about life and a

faith in free will—a confidence that through pluck and sweat and smarts, each of us can

rise above the circumstances of our birth” (p. 54).

Although Obama speaks much about the freedom of the individual, one must not

think that his vision of human freedom speaks merely to or only about singular human

beings. For inherent within Obama’s assumption about human freedom is an important

corollary: human freedom, when properly and justly recognized within community, will

promote the common good. As Obama explains, “These values also express a broader

confidence that so long as individual men and women are free to pursue their own

interests, society as a whole will prosper. Our system of self-government and our free-

market economy depend upon the majority of individual Americans adhering to these

values” (pp. 54-55). Both for the individual and for society as a whole, therefore,

Obama’s vision of hope relies upon the assumption of freedom, possibility, self-

determination, and a vision of the collective good emerging from the combination of such

virtues.

The second collection of narratives at the heart of his vision of a hopeful America

is deeply related to the first. For this latter collection of narratives describes the

individual quest to realize the fruits of human freedom, possibility, and communal justice.

Whereas the first collection of narratives seeks to describe the way Americans are, the second operative narrative describes the process of various Americans who either have

205 become or are actively seeking the process of becoming individuals who recognize the fruits of such freedom and possibility.

In the “Epilogue” to The Audacity of Hope Obama spends a bit of time reflecting upon the provenance of his now infamous 2004 DNC keynote address. As Obama explains, while writing this speech he spent time recalling the various themes that he had addressed throughout his campaign for US Senator, thinking that he might be able to use such themes as an organizing principle for his DNC address. Replaying the campaign in his mind, however, Obama suggests that what he most recalled were the people that he met while on the trail. Obama explains:

But most of all, I thought about the voices of all the people I’d met on the

campaign trail. I remembered Tim Wheeler and his wife in Galesburg, trying to

figure out how to get their teenage son the liver transplant he needed. I

remembered a young man in East Moline names Seamus Ahern who is on his way

to Iraq—the desire he had to serve his country, the look of pride and apprehension

on the face of his father. I remember a young black woman I’d met in East St.

Louis whose name I never would catch, but who told me of her efforts to attend

college even though no one in her family had ever graduated from high school. It

wasn’t just the struggles of these men and women that had moved me. Rather, it

was their determination, their self-reliance, a relentless optimism in the face of

hardship. (p. 356, italics added)

What Obama here describes is, of course, a very typical narrative, one that might easily be found in any of his stump speeches. The point of such stories is to remind his

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readers of men and women who continue, even in the face of struggle, to persevere in the

quest for the self-realization of that freedom which is inherently theirs as improbable

participants in the American experiment. Reflecting upon such individuals, Obama

writes:

It brought to mind a phrase that my pastor, Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., had once

used in a sermon. The audacity of hope. That was the best of the American spirit,

I thought—having the audacity to believe despite all the evidence to the contrary

that we can restore a sense of community to a nation torn by conflict; the gall to

believe that despite personal setbacks, the loss of a job or an illness in the family

or a childhood mired in poverty, we had some control—and therefore

responsibility—over our own fate. It was that audacity, I thought, that joined us as

one people. It was a pervasive spirit of hope that tied my own family’s story to the

larger American story, and my own story to those of the voters I sought to

represent.” (pp. 356-357, italics added).

What Obama here does, of course, is to redescribe seemingly hopeless situations in ways that imbue them with the spirit of endless possibility. The loss of a job, illness, the prospect of going off to war—by drawing attention to the American myth of self creation and the possibility inherent within such, Obama directs attention not merely to the obvious and most pressing reality, but rather toward a melioristic future which is inherently indeterminate, and, for precisely that reason, infinitely more hopeful.

Consistent with the sort of approach described above, Obama closes The Audacity of Hope by drawing attention to the lives of individuals who have recognized the fruit of

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hope’s promise within their own experience. More than this, however, Obama reflects

upon individuals who, in recognizing the fruit of hope, have simultaneously created that very same possibility for numerous other Americans. Reflecting upon a collection of individuals whose hopes have helped to sustain and even reify the myth of American possibility, Obama writes:

I think about America and those who built it. This nation’s founders, who

somehow rose above petty ambitions and narrow calculations to imagine a nation

unfurling across a continent. And those like Lincoln and King, who ultimately

laid down their lives in the service of perfecting an imperfect union. And all the

faceless, nameless men and women, slaves and soldiers and tailors and butchers,

constructing lives for themselves and their children and grandchildren, brick by

brick, rail by rail, calloused hand by calloused hand, to fill in the landscape of our

collective dreams. It is that process I wish to be a part of. My heart is filled with

love for this country. (pp. 361-362)

Taken together, these two collections of narratives are beautifully and deceptively

simple, really. Such narratives can be used as a means of redescribing a vast collection of

human situations, and can do so in a way that allows an individual to recognize within

himself nearly unlimited possibility emerging from his connection with this American

story. Such a narrative, in a sense, says absolutely nothing determinate, and yet

nevertheless calls out for its hearer to recognize Obama as the speaker of truth, the sort of

truth which connects the hearer both to Obama and to the broader American community.

By way of these two narratives, Obama offers precisely the sort of “pragmatic,

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nonideological attitude of the majority of Americans” that he so admired in Clinton’s

own political communication (p. 34). Add to this the fact that Obama himself represents,

perhaps, the paradigmatic exemplar of the unlikely fruition of the audacity of hope—a

point explored above when I first introduced Obama—and, indeed, one begins to discover why so many people have found it difficult not to be inspired to hope upon

hearing Obama speak.

In an interview conducted right around the time Obama’s second book was

published, the Illinois Senator was asked the following question: “If readers are to come

away from The Audacity of Hope with one action item…what should it be?” Obama’s

response: “Get involved in an issue that you’re passionate about. It almost doesn’t matter

what it is—improving the school system, developing strategies to wean ourselves off

foreign oil, expanding health care for kids. We give too much of our power away, to the

professional politicians, to the lobbyists, to cynicism. And our democracy suffers as a

result” (“20 Second Interview,” 2006, italics added). It almost doesn’t matter what it is!

Here is exactly the point I have been trying to make: Obama’s hope is far less concerned

to generate a specific state of affairs than it is to generate hope in the possibility of hope.

As I have repeatedly argued, one of the central problems with locating hope in

objective truth stems from the considerable challenges raised against this notion in recent

years. But, perhaps even more important is the limiting nature of hope that is grounded in

a wholly determinate state of affairs. I mentioned this point above when referring to

Dobson, suggesting that Dobson’s conception of hope deeply limited the creative

possibilities for envisioning radically new futures emergent from the assumptions of

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Christian faith. By conceptualizing hope as he does, Obama is able, I think, to avoid this sort of limitation. Instead of getting people to hope in a certain preestablished states of affairs or truism, what Obama is really doing is getting people to hope in the possibilities that can emerge from hoping itself. Obama is calling on people to believe in the potential inherent with the enactment of a process, a process which is powerfully self-validating among those who embody the hope that Obama is preaching. The concept of hope then, for Obama, becomes a sort of container or catchall phrase into which radically divergent constituencies can place their own conceptions of hope, and out of which all manner of melioristic futures may arise. There is, to state the matter differently, no singular or specific telos for Obama’s audacious call for hope. That telos, rather, is itself an infinite collection of teloi, all of which emerged from the audacious adoption of a disposition which privileges possibility, which privileges hope.

Recall back in Chapter 1, when I first introduced the definition of hope that I was adopting for this project. In Chapter 1, I describe hope as a certain belief in the possibility that the vocabulary I use when describing the world is sufficiently grounded, sufficiently malleable, and contains within itself those resources necessary for transforming that world in a manner consistent with such principles. When introducing this definition, I suggested that such a definition betrayed an inherent tension between certainty and possibility, between locality and universality, and between a sort of comfortable individualism and the need to draw others into one’s own way of seeing the world.

Moreover, I suggested that such a vision of hope maintained the impulse towards modernist totalization and certainty while retaining a healthy deference to postmodern

210 caution regarding the limitations of such concepts. Such a definition of hope, I suggested in Chapter 1, represented an attempt to balance between a kind of hope that is neither utterly realist nor thoroughly nominalist, a hope that borrows from the sensibilities of each. Perhaps most important, I suggested in Chapter 1 that my definition situated hope as a decidedly communicative entity, a category that is intimately tied to the words and forms we use for speaking of hope’s character and substance. Hope is, on this view,

“verbally built out,” yet is not for this reason any less important or essential (James,

1995, p. 82).

Of course it should now be evident that I was, in Chapter 1, prefiguring a conception of hope that was essentially paralogic in nature. And now here, in Chapter 4, I have been making the argument that Obama represents an essentially paralogic treatment of the concept of hope. And so it should not be at all surprising that Obama’s communicative creation and sustenance of hope would betray many of the sensibilities that I discussed in germinal form in Chapter 1. Reflecting my definition of hope, Obama, first of all, remains audaciously certain, even as that certainty is itself a certainty rooted in indeterminate possibility. Second, much of the audaciousness as well as the power of such a conception of hope emerges from the manner in which common, everyday situations and people are affirmatively redescribed as loci of hope and possibility. Third, and to state what is by now quite obvious, Obama’s hope gains traction in large part because of (a) the wisdom inherent within Obama’s choice of vocabulary for redescribing the world and (b) Obama’s adeptness at describing the world by way of such a hopeful final vocabulary. And yet such a conception of hope is not merely empty talk. For indeed,

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as history has borne out time and again, the creation of hopeful sensibilities within a

group of people regularly gives rise to some of the most powerful and transformative moments, moments which define families, nations, and history itself. And so Obama’s evident ability in mirroring this process speaks forcefully to the transformative potential of his chosen vocabulary for redescribing the world.

Having reflected at some length on Obama’s conception of hope, I have now pointed to a number of deeply Rortian sentiments embodied throughout Obama’s broader political communication regarding the central topic of his campaign. At its heart,

Obama’s campaign consists of a far-reaching project of linguistic redescription, an

attempt to reinvigorate a final vocabulary that envisions America and its citizens as a

locus of inestimable possibility. And yet although deeply Rortian in the form, Obama

makes a significant break with Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia. For unlike Rorty,

Obama envisions public life wherein private hope plays an integral role in public

discourse. This is particularly so, for Obama, within the realm of religion and politics.

And it is upon this theme that I will focus my attention in the following section of this

chapter.

Barack Obama and the Role of Religion in Public and Political Life

Based upon my explanation of Obama’s treatment of hope, one might expect him

to remain generally content operating at the level of indeterminacy, ambiguity, and

polysemy so far as the topic of religious expressions of hope are concerned. After all, as

soon as one begins to move away from the infinite possibilities contained within hope

itself and instead begins moving toward an actual manifestation of such hope within

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religious life, one quickly creates a fairly determinate interpretation where only

multiplicity previously existed.

Though one might expect Obama to head in the direction of Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia, this is, given Obama’s paralogic and postmodern proclivities, precisely what he cannot do. And, perhaps most interesting, it is precisely what he has not as of yet done. The most ardent of liberals might call it pandering. The most conservative of evangelicals might call it deception. Some might call it convenient and others might call it shrewd. However one chooses to describe Obama’s stance toward religion in political life, it seems impossible to escape the assessment that Obama’s generally-favorable and considerably-inclusive view of religious belief is a timely via media intent upon speaking into the American zeitgeist of which Obama’s broader political campaign is becoming an increasingly prominent part.

Although Obama does not, of course, speak explicitly about Richard Rorty in The

Audacity of Hope, he could not be much clearer in expressing an anti-Rortian position if

he tried. Obama writes:

That is one of the things that makes me a Democrat, I suppose—this idea that our

communal values, our sense of mutual responsibility and social solidarity, should

express themselves not just in the church or the mosque or the synagogue; not just

on the blocks where we live, and the places where we work, or within our own

families; but also through our government. Like many conservatives, I believe in

the power of culture to determine both individual success and social cohesion, and

I believe we ignore cultural factors at our peril. But I also believe that our

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government can play a role in shaping a culture for the better—or the worse. (p.

63)

To be fair, it is important to point out that in this passage Obama is not speaking

explicitly or only about religious belief. Instead, this passage is taken from a chapter

where Obama offers a somewhat broader approach, focusing upon the issue of values in

general. But notice, the point that Obama makes here is not merely a point about the

importance of the unchecked promotion of personal or communal values. What Obama

suggests is both that he agrees with conservatives regarding the importance of culture

(read: personal and communal values) in public life and that government can, and

presumably should, also play a role in shaping culture. It is, of course, this latter kind of

language that is likely to make religious conservatives look with suspicion upon Obama’s

deference to religion. For what Obama is here suggesting is that personal and communal

values, although deeply important, should not preclude the possibility of government shaping the priorities and beliefs of a culture as well.

Later, in his chapter focusing explicitly on religion, Obama deals more directly with his views concerning the role of religious belief in public life. As Obama recognizes,

“It is a truism that we Americans are a religious people” (p. 198). Continuing his

emphasis upon contextualizing contemporary political issues within a broader cultural history, Obama notes that the current popularity and visibility of religion might appear

surprising to some. “If fifty years ago you had asked the most prominent cultural

commentators of the time just what the future of religion in America might be, they

undoubtedly would have told you it was on the decline. The old-time religion was

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withering away, it was argued, a victim of science, higher levels of education in the general population, and the marvels of technology” (p. 199). Further reflecting upon this era, Obama suggests that “respectable folks might still attend church every Sunday….

But for the most part, traditional religious practice—and certainly religious fundamentalism—was considered incompatible with modernity, at most a refuge of the poor and uneducated from the hardships of life” (p. 199).

To the surprise of many observers, religion has not disappeared within the last sixty or so years. Obama notes, “It seems the social commentators—and, by implication, mainline Protestant and Catholic leaders—got it wrong” (p. 200). Though religious belief and practice in America has indeed changed in the last several decades, it certainly has neither disappeared nor ceased to be a vital component of public life. What, then, was the reason for such a miscalculation? “In part,” surmises Obama, “the cooling of religious enthusiasm among Americans was always exaggerated” (p. 200). More important, however, “purveyors of popular culture simply failed to appreciate the continuing role that all manner of religious expression played in communities across the country” (p.

200).

More than merely recognizing religious folks as a voting bloc, Obama seems to appreciate the perennial need for the sort of message being proclaimed by many such individuals. Given Obama’s proclivity to privilege the fruition of hope, it would, indeed,

seem a bit hypocritical for him to suggest that the fruition of religious hope should be rejected out of hand as unimportant to public life. Even more consistent with his broader

215 view of hope would be to understand religious expressions of hope as a fundamentally human outworking of the inherent possibility possessed by every human being.

Reflecting upon the importance of religious belief—and, here, Obama is speaking particularly of the religious right—for contemporary life, Obama explains that the continued prominence of religion in America

points to a hunger for the product they are selling, a hunger that goes beyond any

particular issue or cause. Each day, it seems, thousands of Americans are going

about their daily rounds—dropping off the kids at school, driving to the office,

flying to a business meeting, shopping at the mall, trying to stay on their diets—

and coming to the realization that something is missing. They are deciding that

their work, their possessions, their diversions, their sheer busyness are not

enough. They want a sense of purpose, a narrative arc to their lives, something

that will relieve a chronic loneliness or lift them above the exhausting, relentless

toll of daily life. They need an assurance that somebody out there cares about

them, is listening to them—that they are not just destined to travel down that long

highway toward nothingness. (p. 202, italics added)

Void of context, one might suspect that the verbiage above was taken from any number of the very same leaders of the religious right to whom Obama is here referring.

And, of course, that should not be surprising given Obama’s considerable ability to craft a message that resonates with a particular audience.

As I reflect upon this extended quote, I find it interesting just how cleverly this sort of description of human, existential longing fits with Obama’s more secular account

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of hope. Reading this passage, I would think that most non-religious individuals would be

hard-pressed to find anything disagreeable in the verbiage provided above. And yet there are quite clearly capitulations to traditional Christian formulations of hope scattered

throughout this particular passage. Obama speaks of the need to move beyond materialism and capitalist success, he refers to the desire for a sense of purpose or telos,

he writes about the longing to overcome loneliness and to develop community, the

perennial question about whether or not there is someone or something out there. To be

sure, each of these are only slightly veiled references to perennial loci of conservative evangelical formulations of gospel hope. And, as if these were not enough, Obama offers what would appear almost to be a repudiation of Lyotard’s claim about the dissolution of

metanarratives, proclaiming that people “want a sense of purpose, a narrative arc to their

lives” (p. 202). Obama uses the phrase “narrative arc” in place of the Lyotardian iteration:

“metanarrative.” The result, it would seem, is an interestingly polysemous claim. For on

the one hand, Obama might be critiquing that sense of incredulity toward metanarratives

that undoubtedly rules the day within much of American consciousness. Or, alternatively,

Obama could be suggesting that Americans (and all people, for that matter) continue to

need religion in order narratively to generate and legitimate stories that can make sense of

their lives, that can give them hope, that can provide the sort of unity and purpose that

contemporary life so very often seems to lack. And, of course, Obama is here likewise

suggesting that the sort of narrative arc that is so necessary to human fulfillment cannot

be found merely within the realm of politics itself.

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Without actually knowing Obama, it is difficult to ascertain exactly what level of

deference he maintains to, in particular, Christian traditions of faith and hope. Taking him

at his word, however, there would seem to be considerable indications that he maintains

sincerity and genuineness when speaking about the importance of religious belief in a meaningful life. Reflecting upon his own experience, Obama writes, “If I have any insight into this move toward a deepening religious commitment, perhaps it’s because it’s a road I have traveled” (p. 202).

Within the pages of The Audacity of Hope Obama credits specific characteristics

of “the historically black church” with helping him to “shed some of [his] skepticism and

embrace the Christian faith” (p. 206). Upon coming into contact with the historically

black church, Obama “was drawn to the power of the African American religious

tradition to spur social change, [for] out of necessity, the black church rarely had the

luxury of separating individual salvation from collective salvation” (p. 207). More than this, the black church, according to Obama, “had to serve as the center of the community’s political, economic, social as well as spiritual life; it understood in an intimate way the biblical call to feed the hungry and clothe the naked and challenge powers and principalities” (p. 207). The result, for Obama, was not some sort of metaphysical excuse for distancing oneself from the “real” world. Rather, by observing the history of struggle within the black church, Obama “was able to see faith as more than just a comfort to the weary or a hedge against death; rather, it was an active, palpable agent in the world.” Obama continues, “In the day-to-day work of the men and women I met in church each day, and their ability to ‘make a way out of no way’ and

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maintain hope and dignity in the direst of circumstances, I could see the Word made manifest” (p. 207).

Reflecting upon his continued interest in decidedly this-worldly realities, Obama expresses a sort of faith that finds its roots and its moorings in this world of experiences and genuine human interaction. In what appears to be Obama’s nod toward the American

Christian penchant for “testimonies,” Obama writes:

It was because of these newfound understandings—that religious commitment did

not require me to suspend critical thinking, disengage from the battle for

economic and social justice, or otherwise retreat from the world I knew and

loved—that I was finally able to walk down the aisle of Trinity United Church of

Christ one day and be baptized. It came about as a choice and not an epiphany;

the questions I had did not magically disappear. But kneeling beneath a cross on

the South Side of Chicago, I felt God’s Spirit beckoning me. I submitted myself to

His will, and dedicated myself to discovering His truth. (p. 208)

Further reflecting upon the role of faith in public life, Obama recounts in some detail his 2004 US Senate race against Alan Keyes. In this, another candid section of The

Audacity of Hope, Obama expresses both a number of frustrations that he had when running against Keyes as well as a number of doubts that arose within Obama’s own mind regarding his relationship to his faith commitments. Given the direct relevance of the following passage, I here quote Obama at length. Referring to Alan Keyes, Obama writes:

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His argument went something like this: America was founded on the twin

principles of God-given liberty and Christian faith. Successive liberal

administrations had hijacked the federal government to serve a godless

materialism and had thereby steadily chipped away—through regulation,

socialistic welfare programs, gun laws, compulsory attendance at public schools,

and the income tax (“the slave tax,” as Mr. Keyes called it)—at individual liberty

and traditional values. Liberal judges had further contributed to this moral decay

by perverting the First Amendment to mean the separation of church and state,

and by validating all sorts of aberrant behavior—particularly abortion and

homosexuality—that threatened to destroy the nuclear family. The answer to

American renewal, then, was simple: Restore religion generally—and Christianity

in particular—to its rightful place at the center of our public and private lives,

align the law with religious precepts, and drastically restrict the power of federal

government to legislate in areas prescribed neither by the Constitution nor by

God’s commandments. In other words, Alan Keyes presented the essential vision

of the religious right in this country, shorn of all caveat, compromise, or apology.

Within its own terms, it was entirely coherent, and provided Mr. Keyes with the

certainty and fluency of an Old Testament prophet. (pp. 211-212, italics added)

Take out the name “Alan Keyes,” and replace every instance with “James

Dobson” and one essentially discovers what could have been my concluding remarks when explaining the nature of Dobson’s hope. And so one discovers considerable parity between Obama’s reading of Alan Keyes and my own reading of James Dobson’s

220 treatment of hope, a sort of hope which is born out of religious belief, but yet is not entirely paralogic in nature.

Further reflecting upon Alan Keyes, Obama offers the reader a passage wherein he draws connections between liberal political thought and its historic—and, in Obama’s opinion, problematic—response to the religious right. “In a sense,” explains Obama, “my dilemma with Mr. Keyes mirrors the broader dilemma that liberalism has faced in answering the religious right” (p. 213). Obama then offers a quote that might as well have been taken directly out of the pages of Rorty’s Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity:

“Liberalism teaches us to be tolerant of other people’s religious beliefs, so long as those beliefs don’t cause anyone harm or impinge on another’s right to believe differently. To the extent that religious communities are content to keep to themselves and faith is neatly confined as a matter of individual conscience, such tolerance is not tested” (p. 213). What

Obama has articulated, is a recounting of Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia, a world wherein “we drop the demand for a theory which unifies the public and the private, and are content to treat the demands of self-creation and of human solidarity as equally valid, yet forever incommensurable” (Rorty, 1989, p. xv).

The problem, of course, is one that we have already encountered above: the sort of tolerance which Rorty so wished to recognize always demands to be tested in practice.

Obama makes the point just a bit differently when writing, “Religion is rarely practiced in isolation; organized religion, at least, is a very public affair. The faithful may feel compelled by their religion to actively evangelize wherever they can” (p. 213). Even more problematic, explains Obama, “They may feel that a secular state promotes values

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that directly offend their beliefs. They may want the larger society to validate and

reinforce their views. And when the religiously motivated assert themselves politically to

achieve these aims, liberals get very nervous” (p. 213).

According to Obama, for too long the strategy of liberals has been to dismiss,

deflect, and generally seek at all costs to avoid a substantive discussion about the

reasonableness or justifiability of religious belief influencing public life. Obama explains,

“Those of us in public office may try to avoid the conversation about religious values

altogether, fearful of offending anyone and claiming that—regardless of our personal

beliefs—constitutional principles tie our hands on issues like abortion or school prayer”

(p. 213). Of course, one need not think very hard nor dig very deeply to uncover the

rehearsal of this sort of commonplace played out within contemporary American political

life.

In Obama’s assessment, there are other potential strategies that one might

discover when encountering a discussion about religion in public life. “Some on the left

(although not those in public office) go further, dismissing religion in the public square as inherently irrational, and therefore dangerous—and noting that, with its emphasis on personal salvation and the policing of private morality, religious talk has given conservatives cover to ignore questions of public morality, like poverty or corporate malfeasance” (p. 213).

The problem with such strategies, according to Obama, is that over time—and, particularly, when faced with substantive articulations of religious belief—these

strategies will not produce healthy states of affairs for the American democratic process.

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“Such strategies of avoidance may work for progressives,” explains Obama, “when the

opponent is Alan Keyes. But over the long haul, I think we make a mistake when we fail

to acknowledge the power of faith in the lives of the American people, and so avoid

joining a serious debate about how to reconcile faith with our modern, pluralistic

democracy” (pp. 213-214). When suggesting that such a strategy is a “mistake” Obama

has several things in mind. The first is something I have already talked about, and, is

likely the most self-evident and widely accepted, even among traditionally liberal

political strategists. As Obama explains, “To begin with, it’s bad politics. There are a

whole lot of religious people in America, including a majority of Democrats. When we

abandon the field of religious discourse... others will fill the vacuum. And those who do are likely to be those with the most insular views of faith, or who cynically use religion to justify a partisan ends” (p. 214).

Obama is concerned with typical liberal responses concerning religion in public life for a second reason. And here, Obama becomes even more direct about the virtues of religion and morality as a part of public discussion. Obama explains, “More fundamentally, the discomfort of some progressives with any hint of religiosity has often inhibited us from effectively addressing issues in moral terms” (p. 214). As Obama explains, “Some of the problem is rhetorical: Scrub language of all religious content and we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice” (p. 214). Here, Obama is referring to a feature of his political communication that is, indeed, endemic both to his success and his political identity. Obama, whatever else he is, is a wordsmith, a man who paints images

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in the mind by way of rhetorical devices, one whose vision for America relies upon the

turn of a phrase or the employment of a historically rich and timely quote. “Imagine,”

writes Obama, “Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address without reference to ‘the judgments

of the Lord,’ or King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech without reference to ‘all God’s

children.’ Their summoning of a higher truth helped inspire what had seemed impossible

and move the nation to embrace a common destiny” (p. 214).

In addition to the rhetorical limitations imposed by such a moratorium on religious discourse, Obama thinks there is a far greater problem at play. According to

Obama, “Our fear of getting ‘preachy’ may also lead us to discount the role that values and culture play in addressing some of our most urgent social problems” (p. 215). It is here, of course, that Obama’s connection both to the historically black church and to various strains of liberation theology become most clear. Obama explains, “After all, the problems of poverty and racism, the uninsured and the unemployed, are not simply technical problems in search of the perfect ten-point plan. They are also rooted in societal indifference and individual callousness.... Solving these problems will require changes in government policy; it will also require changes in hearts and minds” (pp. 214-215).

Given the stance that Obama has articulated regarding the role of religion in public life, one can envision numerous liberal or otherwise anti-religious individuals becoming quite concerned about the prospect of such an individual serving as commander-in-chief. Presumably as a way of assuaging such concern, and introducing at least a bit of clever humor, Obama makes it very clear that “I am not suggesting that every progressive suddenly latch on to religious terminology or that we abandon a fight

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for institutional change in favor of ‘a thousand points of light’” (p. 215). What Obama is

calling upon, rather, is for all individuals to recognize a point that I have been making

variously throughout this project: all discourse, whether explicitly religious or not, is

value-laden in character. All discourse, to state the matter differently, betrays

fundamentally moral and ethical assumptions. And so suggesting that politics should

avoid religious discourse as a way of distancing itself from issues of morality is not only

impossible, in a sense, but also foolish, and, I believe, outright dangerous. For if one truly

believes that this sort of thing is possible, then he or she is unknowingly smuggling all manner of moralities into his or her allegedly value free public discourse, all the while thinking that he or she has somehow risen above the fray and avoided the folly of religious people, people who engage issues of morality in public life.

Obama both articulates and moves beyond the kind of point I made in the end of the last paragraph. As the Senator explains, “I am suggesting that if we progressives shed some light on our own biases, we might recognize the values that both religious and secular people share when it comes to the moral and material direction of our country”

(p. 216, italics added). More than this, Obama makes a claim that both returns the issue of religion to his broader theme of hope, and that contextualizes it within a wide-ranging project of renewing America. For as Obama explains, it is insufficient simply to engage faith as a way of keeping the religious right from holding or gaining sway within

American political life. More than this, it is important “to engage all persons of faith in the larger project of American renewal” (p. 216). More than merely being viewed as a nuisance, the religious right should, at least on the account outlined by Obama here, come

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to be recognized as a resource for the generation and sustenance of a hopeful American

renewal.

In a very skillful way, Obama, up to this point, has avoided making any specific

proclamations about just how religious belief should inform public discourse. So far, he

has offered numerous affirmative claims about the role of religion in public life. But he

has not yet given a single example of the enactment of such belief in practice. Of course,

this is neither surprising nor unwise. After all, in typical Obama-like fashion, the Senator

has been building a coalition of agreement, possibility, and hope. And, to be both honest

and fair, considering specific and oftentimes intractable debates about religion and

politics is no way to amass such a coalition. Briefly, Obama seeks to address this concern

in the closing moments of his chapter on faith. Given the centrality of this portion of

Obama’s argument, I again quote him again at some length. Obama writes:

This brings us to a different point—the manner in which religious views should

inform public debate and guide elected officials. Surely, secularists are wrong

when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering the

public square; Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, William Jennings Bryan,

Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King Jr.—indeed, the majority of great reformers in

American history—not only were motivated by faith but repeatedly used religious

language to argue their causes. To say that men and women should not inject their

“personal morality” into public-policy debates is a practical absurdity; our law is

by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-

Christian tradition. What our deliberative, pluralistic democracy does demand is

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that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than

religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals must be subject to

argument and amenable to reason. (pp. 218-219)

Mulling over this quote in light of our treatment of Dobson brings into focus one

of the central arguments I made in Chapter 3. In Chapter 3, we discovered how Dobson regularly grounded his appeals against homosexuality both in faith and in reason. Here, in

Chapter 4, we have observed Obama making a similar appeal to the court of reason. What becomes clear when considering either Dobson or Obama, however, is that an appeal to reason does not really settle much at all. In fact, if the mandates of reason were universally obvious, and if both Dobson and Obama were appealing to such mandates, then one would expect that Dobson and Obama could reach a very high level of agreement based upon the arguments available through and by reasonable means. Of

course, this is not the case, a point that both our consideration of Dobson and Obama

makes quite clear. I raise this point again here because I think it illuminates a very

interesting issue, one that cuts not only against Dobson, but also against Obama’s position.

Presumably as a way of trying to be as clear as possible regarding the dictates of reason and the appropriate employment of religious belief in public deliberation, Obama makes a very interesting distinction between religious belief and the kind of beliefs amenable to debate and reason. As Obama explains, “At some fundamental level, religion does not allow for compromise. It insists on the impossible. If God has spoken, then followers are expected to live up to God’s edicts, regardless of the consequences. To base

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one’s life on such uncompromising commitments may be sublime; to base our policy

making on such commitments would be a dangerous thing” (pp. 219-220). Of course, in

making such a claim, Obama is trading here upon a certain time honored conception of universal reason. And to all but the most radical among us, such a conception of reason does indeed seem to hold considerable weight. What Obama is arguing, therefore, is that religious belief very much should figure into public debate insofar as such religious belief can allow one to enter into discussion wherein the necessity for compromise remains highly likely. As Obama explains, “The best we can do is act in accordance with those things that are possible for all of us to know, understanding that a part of what we know to be true—as individuals or communities of faith—will be true for us alone” (220).

And so in a manner quite suited to my broader discussion of the relationship between epistemology and hope, Obama concludes the substantive portion of his argument by suggesting both that we must base public deliberation on those things which we know to be true and that truth itself is an inherently multiplicitous sort of entity.

Interestingly enough, one discovers here yet another manifestation of a “Third Way,” for

Obama is both retaining modernist sensibilities (when suggesting that public deliberation should be based upon certain knowledge) and yet simultaneously articulating central tenets of postmodern epistemology (when conceding that knowledge itself is largely context specific and communally based). In this way, Obama is able to retain certain sensibilities articulated by Rorty, yet without adopting his radically de-divinized liberal utopia. For on Obama’s account, what recedes into the background of public debate is not religious belief in general. Rather, what recedes into the background, and is thereby

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relegated to the realm of private self-creation, are those manifestations of religious belief

that are so thoroughly sectarian or community specific that they do not gain a wide

hearing within the court of reason itself. The result, both for Obama and for those likely

to be persuaded by his argument, is a world wherein religious belief remains a vital

resource for the generation both of private and public hope, a resource rooted in the

history of America, a resource strongly tied to those principles articulated in the

Declaration of Independence, and a resource amenable to the paralogic articulation of all

manner of possibility and optimism.

Concluding Remarks

The argument of this chapter has, admittedly, taken us down a long and winding

path. Along the way, we gained familiarity with Obama’s emergence on the political

scene, paying particular attention to the ways in which he embodied numerous

postmodern sensibilities. Both by addressing Obama’s general account of hope and his

vision of religion in public life, we were able to uncover how Obama’s political

communication served as a paralogic manifestation of contemporary political

communication which seeks both to create and sustain hope in contemporary American society. More than this, we observed how Obama’s vision of religion echoes Rortian sentiments, yet without falling prey to the radicalism of his de-divinized liberal utopia.

And along the way I was also able to make some interesting connections between Obama and my earlier treatment of Dobson.

Reflecting upon the central arguments of this chapter, one discovers that Obama’s political communication betrays a pattern of thought that I have now explained a number

229 of times throughout this dissertation. In Chapter 1, I recounted my own experience of trying to retain hope in the face of the demise of objective knowledge. In so doing, I was expressing my own struggle to adopt central tenets of postmodern epistemology yet without falling prey to its excesses. As I described in Chapter 1, this need to balance between dogmatism and relativism, between hope and despair, has characterized much of my life for more than a decade. And, of course, I suggested that this was a broader feature of contemporary life as well. Though I did not use this specific language in Chapter 1, what I was recounting was, to use the language of this chapter, my own struggle to recognize a “Third Way” of conceptualizing hope in our current, postmodern era.

In Chapter 2, we discovered that throughout the pages of The Postmodern

Condition Lyotard suggests a certain view of history wherein our current era is characterized by “incredulity toward metanarratives.” My re-reading of Lyotard argued that many individuals have taken Lyotard’s claim regarding metanarratives and have failed adequately to temper the radicalism inherent within such a claim. And so I argued, therefore, that Lyotard himself recognized the need to negotiate between two significantly divergent extremes, and, as a result, Lyotard offered his reader—albeit in germinal form—the notion of paralogy. For Lyotard, the generation of hope must necessarily proceed as a deeply negotiated process, a process which reifies neither objective nor completely narrative means of legitimating the bases upon which a society hopes. Lyotard too, one might suggest, offered a “Third Way” of conceptualizing the bases upon which hope is constructed, a way that privileges the narrative, communal, and negotiated nature of human hope.

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Also in Chapter 2, I made the argument that Rorty importantly expanded the kind

of thinking initiated by Lyotard in The Postmodern Condition. As we observed, Rorty

sought to describe a world that was able to balance any manner of extremes, so long as the means of private, self-creation never introduced cruelty into the lives of others.

Though, ultimately, I have expressed some reservations about Rorty’s bifurcation of public and private worlds, I certainly remain appreciative of his attempt to envision a world wherein people may become as politically “conservative” or “liberal” as they like.

Rorty, like Lyotard, represents one particular attempt at providing an alternative way of negotiating traditional, modernist sensibilities alongside of more progressive, postmodern visions of the world. The problem for Rorty, however, is that his “Third Way” utterly

silences the voice of private (and, particularly, religious) hope in public life. Though his

is admittedly a strategy for negotiating between historic extremes, ultimately, Rorty’s de- divinized liberal utopia is not something that a many Americans are yet likely to accept as fully palatable.

James Dobson, the focus of Chapter 3, represents the paradigmatic example of an individual who reifies a conservative ideology. For many historic, methodological, and religious reasons, Dobson is deeply interested to reject both any semblance of liberalism and any measure of compromise. Of course, I did not express my treatment of Dobson in terms of liberalism, conservatism, or any sort of “Third Way,” and instead spoke in terms of epistemology and communicative strategies. Looking back at my treatment of Dobson now, however, we are able to observe this matter in a slightly different light. There, I argued that Dobson represents the “arrested development” of traditional conservative

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religious belief. For as I argued in Chapter 3, Dobson seeks to return America to the way

it used to be, to its historic and conservative moorings. And, for Dobson, this is the only possible means of sustaining hope in the present. The irony, of course, is that Dobson himself employs deeply Rortian communicative strategies in service to his conservative vision. And, as I argued, such an arrested development threatens to undermine very many of the rich and historic bases upon which a robust and hopeful vision of the interplay between religion and public hope might yet be constructed.

And then there is Obama. As I have suggested at various stages throughout this chapter, I envision Obama as offering an account of hope that is deeply Rortian in form, and yet which retains the possibility of speaking about hope in religious terms. As we have now observed, Obama recognizes recent American political history largely as a failure adequately to negotiate the tensions emergent between modern and postmodern sensibilities. In the process, Obama offers a way of speaking about hope that neither excises religion from public life nor reifies its conclusions. This balancing act, I have argued, represents a timely and sophisticated “Third Way” that seeks to negotiate various polarities entrenched in recent decades as the result of the shift from modern to postmodern conceptions of envisioning the world. And so although we have turned our attention to politics, we yet again find ourselves looking at the same old problem in a different key.

It should by now come as no surprise to the reader that as I have studied Obama, I have found myself resonating deeply both with his treatment of hope and with his vision of religion in public life. In what would seem to be a testimony to Obama’s skill, I find

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myself seduced by his hopeful vision of America, even as I continue to disagree with a

number of his policy positions. As I reflect upon this issue at some length, I have

tentatively decided that what most connects me to Obama’s political communication is

his willingness to engage troubling and contestable issues in a fairly honest and public

manner. As I reflect upon Obama, it increasingly seems to me that he is an individual

who exists within the various tensions embodied by postmodern life and simultaneously performs his struggle with such tensions in a way that is refreshingly open to the public.

Such a struggle, I suppose, resonates both with my own history and with my proclivity toward the contested issues of human existence. Perhaps most of all, I find myself intrigued by the stories that Obama tells about his engagement with messy issues, stories that generally do not answer my most fundamental questions in a terribly direct way, yet which nevertheless seem somehow to draw me into a broader narrative that resonates with my own experiences and struggles. In this way, Obama’s thought represents a timely and wise embodiment of paralogic communication, an embodiment that at once emerges from and speaks into some of the most pressing concerns in contemporary life.

Whether or not Obama is successful in his quest for the American presidency remains uncertain. What seems quite clear, at least to this author, is that Obama has demonstrated considerable success in understanding the needs of the present moment, the multiplicity of audiences to whom he speaks, and, as Aristotle (2001) would say, the

“available means of persuasion” appropriate for our current social and political climate

(p. 1329). What is even more compelling is that Obama has accomplished such communicative successes neither by capitulating to postmodern sensibilities nor ignoring

233 them all together. Though questions may indeed remain regarding Obama’s paralogical political communication, it seems quite clear that Obama has stared squarely into the face of the central problem of this dissertation and has found a way to maintain hope in a postmodern world even so.

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CHAPTER 5: HOPE IN AMERICA: A BEDROCK ASSUMPTION, INFINITE

POSSIBLE FUTURES

Here in the last chapter I have three primary objectives. First, I intend to offer the reader a brief summary of the argument produced up to this point. The goal here, of course, is to draw together in fairly short order what has now been scattered over a number of pages. And, in the process, perhaps some of the central lineaments of this project might become clear in a slightly different way as a result of such framing. The second goal of this concluding chapter is to consider how historic descriptions of

“America” and “the American experiment” represent a broader context in which to situate the specific argument I have made here. To this end, I will briefly comment on

American pragmatism and its consonance with and development of themes that have been woven through this document. Finally, I will offer a bit of self-analysis, reflecting upon the questions that remain as well as the potential weakness of this particular project.

Summary of the Project

To begin my overview of the central themes of this dissertation, I should first like to say a word or two about the title I have chosen to describe this project. By now, it may be apparent that I intended for there to be a twofold meaning conjured up when reading the title of this dissertation: Hope in America. On the one hand, this title should be read as a descriptive phrase, a phrase which outlines the subject matter of this project. Read in this light, the title Hope in America should lead the reader to expect the pages of this text to provide an account of the status of hope in the current United States of America.

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In one sense, it is a bit laughable to suggest that I have provided any sort of circumspect account of American hope within these relatively brief pages. For if the combined testimony of this dissertation has taught us anything, it is that it is remarkably difficult to speak univocally about anything, much less a concept as complex as hope, or as ambiguous as America. And so, to be a bit more accurate, I should probably suggest that my title, Hope in America offers an account of the status of hope as experienced by one particular citizen currently participating in the American experiment. Along the way, perhaps I have also spoken in a limited fashion either to or about the hopes of others.

This first sense of meaning in the title is not, however, the only sense in which I wish for the reader to understand the phrase Hope in America. For I also desire this title

to be recognized as an imperative sentence, a phrase that conjures up within the reader a

sense of necessity and even a call to action, a phrase that might even have an exclamation

point placed at its end. Although intended to be somewhat emphatic, such a claim is not

intended to sound some sort of nationalist or patriotic alarm. Rather, what I intend by this

sense of the title Hope in America! is for my reader to recognize a hopeful sensibility and

the commitment to a radically melioristic process at the heart of America’s historic self-

description. There is, to state the matter a bit differently, something remarkably hopeful

about the American experiment which, to this author, at least, signals a profound sense of possibility for overcoming the potential demise of hope thought to be ushered in by postmodern critiques of objective knowledge.

In Chapter 1, I spent considerable time reflecting upon the first of these two connotations of my title by recounting my own attempt to maintain hope within the

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American religious, political, and philosophical context. In the process, I tried to articulate a pattern of thought that was not unique simply to me, but that I believe characterizes the thinking of many people seeking to reconcile their religious faith with the continued desire to hope in an increasingly postmodern America. As I suggested in

Chapter 1, the status of American hope is significantly challenged by that strain of postmodern thought which celebrates the end of objective knowledge and the various

constellations of beliefs assumed to be dependent upon such objectivity. Recognizing the

strength of such a challenge to hope’s continued existence, and yet remaining

unconvinced that hope must fall prey to such a challenge, in Chapter 1 I offered the

central claim of this dissertation regarding the status of hope in America: the alleged-

demise of objective knowledge need not signal the end of hope. As a corollary to this, I

likewise suggested that the very same conditions that challenge hope’s continued

existence contain within themselves the possibilities for yet again speaking hope into our

current, postmodern American climate.

Chapter 2 offered a bit of a diversion from my focus upon expressly American

thinkers, as I spent a bit of time reflecting upon the writing of Jean François Lyotard.

Though not an American theorist, it was necessary to consider Lyotard’s work because of

the significant impact his writing has had upon the broader American philosophical and

cultural landscape. Most crucial in this regard is Lyotard’s well-worn suggestion that

postmodernity is characterized by incredulity toward metanarratives. For it would seem

that incredulity toward metanarratives would signal a similar sort of incredulity both

toward historic religious belief and, even, toward America itself. Indeed, one would be

237 hard-pressed to describe either religious belief or American identity without recourse to wide-ranging narratives, narratives that are embedded deeply within the consciousness both of institutions and of the individuals who sustain such narratives. And so if

Lyotard’s claim is—and, more particularly, if various interpretations of that claim are— to be taken seriously, then religious belief, America’s self-description, and all manner of hopeful assumptions would seem to be considerably undermined by prevailing postmodern thought.

Fortunately, the story told by Lyotard may not be nearly so grim as many would have one to believe. For much of the burden of my treatment of Lyotard was intent upon demonstrating the claim I made above, namely that postmodern thought contains within itself many of the resources necessary for reviving hope in our contemporary context. In order to substantiate this claim, I spent considerable time explicating Lyotard’s conception of legitimation—both scientific and narrative—as well as his treatment of the term “metanarratives.” As Chapter 2 showed, Lyotard has a far more circumscribed understanding of the term than many of his more zealous commentators might lead one to believe. Indeed, the vast majority of religious systems as well as political theories fail to rise the level of what Lyotard would describe as a metanarrative. And so at least one plank of the contemporary challenge to the sustenance of hope was undermined in

Chapter 2.

Building upon my constructive rereading of Lyotard’s treatment of metanarratives, I also offered an interpretation of the last several pages of The

Postmodern Condition, suggesting that Lyotard there provides a way forward in the face

238 of his thoroughgoing critique of the status of knowledge in postmodern society. It was here, of course, that I first began to explain in detail what I meant by the phrase paralogic communication. As I showed, Lyotard recognizes the considerable challenges one faces when seeking to legitimate his or her knowledge claims. Nevertheless, I explained how

Lyotard champions narrative in service to a process of legitimation that can indeed be constructive in nature. As I began to explain, whatever the status of hope in America, such hope must increasingly reconcile itself with the varied characteristics of paralogy that I described in some detail in Chapter 2.

Given the rather germinal nature of Lyotard’s account of paralogy, the development of this construct had to be supplemented by additional discussion and engagement with other like-minded theorists. It was here, of course, that I turned to the

American philosophical landscape. In the writings of Richard Rorty we uncovered an extension of Lyotard’s paralogy (by way of Rorty’s ironism), a thoroughgoing critique and analysis of the historic constellation of beliefs upon which numerous visions of hope have been constructed (by way of Rorty’s post-foundationalism and nominalism), and an account of the future possibilities for a hopeful America that emerged in direct conversation with the various philosophical critiques just mentioned (by way of Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia). The result, for Rorty, was the vision for a future America wherein hope is conceptualized in two radically bifurcated spheres: the realm of private self-creation and the realm of public discourse and deliberation.

Though I have ultimately expressed concern about Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia, a theme began to emerge in my treatment of Rorty that would prove to be

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instructive for the remainder of this project. For above all else, what Rorty’s vast corpus

seeks to encourage is a conception of American hope rooted not in a static constellation of metaphysical principles, but in an account of American hope grounded upon little else than a thoroughly communicative process of description and redescription.

Chapter 3 continued the theme of focusing upon hope in America, this time by considering James Dobson, an individual who is remarkably anti-postmodern in his beliefs regarding the possibilities for the sustenance of hope in a future America. The sum and substance of Dobson’s anti-postmodernism stems, of course, from the fact that he so thoroughly rejects various critiques of objective knowledge that are quite characteristic of contemporary thought. As a way of demonstrating this conviction, I looked primarily at Dobson’s treatment of homosexuality and the implicit anti-hopeful results for America that Dobson considers to be emergent from such allegedly abhorrent behavior. In the process, we were able to discover the sum and substance of Dobson’s vision for a hopeful future America, a vision which consists of an America that once again reflects the twofold testimony of truth available both by reason and by revelation.

As I reflected upon Dobson and his rhetoric regarding homosexuality, the family, and the future of America, we discovered that the message of Focus on the Family continues to represent a wide-reaching source of hope literally for millions of people. The recognition of such a truism was no mere sociological observation, but rather served as compelling evidence for opposing the prevailing idea that the end of objective knowledge might signal the demise of hope in America. For as we discovered by considering

Dobson, the very assumptions at the heart of postmodern critiques of knowledge are

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themselves easily enough rejected in service to the creation and sustenance of hope

among a community of individuals who fail to be persuaded by such an epistemological

stance. And so critiques of modernist religion notwithstanding, Dobson continues to

engender hope within the hearts and minds of millions of men and women who are

persuaded by the sorts of narratives characteristic of Focus on the Family.

The lessons learned from considering Dobson did not stop there. For in addition to his resolute and explicit objection to the conclusions of much postmodern epistemology, my analysis was able to show that Dobson nevertheless generated hope through means that were often not altogether distinct from the sort of narrative redescription outlined throughout Rorty’s corpus. Such a claim, at least in part, served to illuminate a two-sided thesis. On the one hand, truth—as well as the hope often thought to emerge in concert with such truth—must always be given voice and sustained by thoroughly communicative and narrative means. Dobson, though reliant upon modernist sensibilities, nevertheless remains impotent in his employment of such sensibilities void of a robust and deftly articulated set of narrative frames, narratives that serve both to

generate and to solidify the truth of his appeals within the lives of his various followers.

On the other hand, by considering Dobson, I started to address a theme that would course

throughout the remainder of the document. Just as Dobson remains reliant upon narrative

legitimation for the enactment of religious belief, it is also true that any robust narrative

frame betrays in itself all manner of normative and even religious assumptions. To put

the claim slightly differently: all discourse is religious by nature and all religion is

discursive by nature. The corollary to this is, of course, that manifestations of hope must

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always emerge from communicative means and will betray all manner of religious and

normative sensibilities. As I explained in Chapter 3, the suggestion that all discourse is

religious does not constitute an attempt to paint all discourse as narrowly or

confessionally theological in nature. Rather, the claim is meant to suggest that every

communicative action both assumes and reifies various value systems and visions of the

way reality ought to be and what it might become.

One final lesson learned from my consideration of Dobson was that the

emergence of paralogic communication depends upon an intricate interplay between both

the content of a message and the context into which it is spoken. It was primarily because of this sort of observation that, in Chapter 4, I spent considerable time reflecting upon the current context within which American politics are being performed. In doing so, of course, I carved out a fairly limited slice of this context, focusing particularly upon the

communicative appeals of Barack Obama and paying particularly close attention to his

conception of hope as well as his treatment of the role of religion in public life. In the

process, I made the suggestion that Obama was quite Rortian in form, yet rejected the

kind of de-divinized liberal utopia called for by the great American pragmatist philosopher. And in this way, I argued that Obama made space for religious belief at the heart of public discourse, albeit religious belief of a certain tenor or character.

Furthermore, when examining Obama’s treatment of hope and religion in public life, I suggested that the Senator’s body of political communication could helpfully be understood as a via media between various modern and postmodern sensibilities. And, in

Chapter 4 I explained a number of the varied polarities than I had in mind: modernity

242 versus postmodernity; hopefulness versus a loss of hope; objective truth versus narrative truth; metaphysicians versus ironists; and conservatives versus liberals. The point here was not to suggest that Obama somehow had a robust philosophical account that provided a detailed description of how to reconcile any particularity contained within such historic polarities; rather, the point was to suggest that Obama embodied an assumption which, at its core, consisted of the enactment of a process that privileges both objectivity and subjectivity, that both embraces hope and recognizes the challenges to its continued manifestation, that operates from bedrock assumptions and that yet recognizes the need to give voice to such assumptions via narrative and even paralogic means, and that accounts for the possibility of metaphysical descriptions of reality, yet does not allow such descriptions to preclude the possibility of redescription, debate, or outright disagreement. In a word, I argued, Obama’s hope consists of the hope in possibility. And though hoping in a melioristic future is itself a singular bedrock belief, the results and outcomes of that melioristic mindset must forever be conceptualized as containing within themselves infinite possibility and promise.

In sum, the preceding four chapters (a) introduce the problem of continuing to hope in America, (b) contextualize this matter as rooted in the shift from modernity to postmodernity, and (c) attempt to overcome the challenges facing hope by re-evaluating the possible resources for the sustenance of hope from within postmodern thought itself.

The “solution” offered is rooted in communicative re-description and acts as a “Third way” of balancing between modern accounts of hope rooted in objectivity and more recent views of the hopelessness emerging from the postmodern, subjective turn. Hope,

243 to state the matter simply, need not be abandoned because of postmodern critiques of objective knowledge.

The Larger Picture: Pragmatism, Postmodern Hope, and Paralogic Communication

In the preceding chapters, I have been particularly focused upon the possibilities of continuing to hope in postmodern America. As a result of such concerns, I have produced a document that employs hope as the central organizing theme, and thereby seeks to uncover what various philosophical and communicative artifacts might have to say about the current condition of hope in America. Along the way, we have encountered several conflicting visions of what America is and might become. And ultimately, I have argued that Obama’s description of America is quite well suited to the prevailing mindset of the day.

During the course of my analysis, I have consistently employed the writings of

Richard Rorty, and have occasionally referred to the work of both William James and

John Dewey. Taking my cues from such American pragmatists, I have envisioned an account of hope that is processual rather than static and that relies heavily upon a particular vision of the American experiment. Indeed, for folks familiar with the pragmatist tradition, the language of America as an “experiment” should be reminiscent of the writings of Dewey, West, and even Emerson (Dewey, 1916, 1939, 1954; West

1989, 1993a, 1993b, 1999; Emerson, 1965; 1982). It was Emerson, after all, who explained that “There are no fixtures in nature” and that “The universe is fluid and volatile” (1965, p. 295). West, commenting on Emerson and deeply influenced by

Dewey, explains that “the fundamental way the world is, is itself incomplete and in flux,

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always the result of and a beckon to the experimental makings, workings, and doings of human beings.” West continues, “Language, tradition, society, nature, and the self are

shot through with contingency, change, and challenge” (West, 1989, p. 15). Perhaps most

explicit in connecting American Democracy and hope is, of course, John Dewey. Dewey

speaks of “an abiding faith in democracy” (1963, p. 164) and of democratic ideals that

“must affect all modes of human association [including] the family, the school, industry,

[and] religion” (1954, p. 143). Commenting on the need for such widespread democratic

ideals, Dewey suggests that “the prime condition of a democratically organized public is

a kind of knowledge and insight which does not yet exist” (1954, p. 166). And yet, one

should not lose hope, for Dewey explains that although “the democratic road is the hard one to take [because] it is the road that places the greatest burden of responsibility upon the greatest number of human beings… the cause of democratic freedom is [nevertheless] the cause of the fullest possible realization of human possibilities” (1939, p. 129). And, derivatively, the cause and realization of democratic freedom becomes, for Dewey, the greatest possible means for the enactment and perpetration of human hopes.

The reason for raising such an historic context here is to make several points that that have only been addressed either implicitly or sporadically throughout this document.

Reflecting upon this project as well as the richness of the American pragmatist tradition,

one realizes that conceptualizations of hope both emerge from and recursively shape

one’s vision of what America is and might become. More than this, and to revisit a theme

introduced in the opening pages of this document, the inability to articulate a robust

account of hope is not merely a challenge to individual lives and melioristic futures.

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Given the inescapable connections between hope, freedom, possibility and historic accounts of American democracy, challenges to the existence of hope simultaneously serve as challenges to the American way of life itself. This is, of course, a theme that courses throughout Dewey’s writing, that motivates Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia, and that shapes West’s articulation of a prophetic pragmatism that “understands pragmatism as a political form of cultural criticism and locates politics in the everyday experiences of ordinary people” (1999, p. 151).

From the very first pages of this document, I have been attempting to stake out a position that remains highly deferential to postmodern epistemology yet without abandoning hope. In the preceding chapter, I showed how America’s self-description as embodied in The Declaration of Independence represents the codification of philosophical ideals that desire to strike such a balance. And, of course, this theme could be even more powerfully articulated by employing a genealogy of American pragmatism that focused particularly upon the theme of hope. After all, pragmatism is, one might argue, the most hopeful manifestation of postmodern sensibilities—a philosophical

“system” that retains antifoundationalism, that moves beyond metaphysics and that embraces democratic participation as a way of creating a hopeful and “ever-present new road upon which we can walk together” (Dewey, 1939, p. 176).

Reflecting upon the broader sensibilities that Obama embodies throughout his vision of hope and his views on religion, one could quite naturally recognize him as a political embodiment of such pragmatist philosophical ideals. For in Obama, one encounters a very powerful answer to the question “How can one hope in America?” In

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answering this question, one recognizes the second sense of the title of this dissertation.

For by employing the virtues of Obama’s position (and by building upon pragmatist sensibilities), one can now recognize that hoping in America consists of a hope in the possibilities latent within hoping in hope itself. To hope in America, therefore, is to recognize the melioristic potential that might yet result from the enactment of a process that privileges human freedom and that allows for the realization of such freedom. To hope in America is to long for—and to create those conditions that might make possible—robust communities of paralogic communicators who ironically yet passionately re-describe America in ways amenable to the needs of the day. To sustain hope in America is, one might say, to “Hope in America!” and the melioristic potential embodied by the enactment of the American experiment itself.

Of course, in order to recognize Obama as an embodiment of the sort of pragmatist-laden sentiment gestured toward above, one must understand my treatment of

Obama as extending far beyond a claim merely about a successful politician in a

particular context. One must, I would argue, recognize in Obama a kind of wisdom that

clearly takes heed of an age old caution: the caution never to totalize or privilege too

thoroughly one side of an historic oppositional pair. One must see in Obama an implicit

attempt to overcome the potentially-nihilistic results of antifoundationalism and the end

of metaphysics. And, of course, my account of Obama’s hope has attempted to

demonstrate such a philosophically pragmatic sensibility. Consistent with such a

philosophical stance, my consideration of Obama’s political communication has shown

that Obama privileges hope, but yet does not privilege a terribly static notion of hope.

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Like Cornel West, Obama possesses “a hope that is grounded in a particular messy

struggle and [that] is tarnished by any kind of naïve projections of a better future, so that

it is hope on the tight rope rather than a Utopian projection that looks over and beyond

the present and oftentimes loses sight of the present” (West, 1993b, p. 67, italics in

original). Likewise, we have observed how Obama privileges human freedom, yet

recognizes that such freedom can and should be manifest in an infinitely multiple number

of ways. Furthermore, we have witnessed Obama speak of the importance of religious

belief, yet without privileging religious principles over the virtues of public deliberation.

In all these ways, we have observed Obama holding together and keeping in tension a

number of forces that have historically stood in opposition to one another. And, in the process, we have seen Obama embody a sensibility that I have described as characteristic of America’s self-description of herself as offered in the Declaration of Independence.

The point here, of course, is not to canonize Obama. I simply use Obama because I think

he represents a very timely and intriguing exemplar of the pattern of thinking and the

process of mediation that historically has and, hopefully, always will exist at the heart of

the American experiment.

Ultimately, what Obama is able to do so very well is to refuse the temptation to

enact stasis, thereby allowing himself to be both remarkably nimble and yet fairly

sophisticated in his treatment of complex issues. And, Obama is not alone in attempting

this sort of synthesis. In fact, I would suggest that any of the greatest thinkers throughout

history have recognized this necessity. Aristotle spoke to this concern over two millennia

ago by way of his “Golden Mean.” Kant’s epistemology sought neither to privilege the

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“concept” or the “percept,” that which was “within the mind” or that which was “without

in the world.” Hegel, the great dialectician, wrestled mightily to conceptualize history

itself as emerging from the infinite interplay between thesis and antithesis, the former

both giving way to and yet soon becoming the latter. More recently, Heidegger has struggled to reconcile “Being” with “becoming,” the eternal with the temporal. Within the realm of theology, Jürgen Moltmann’s social trinitarianism seeks to envision god

himself as a being who privileges neither permanence nor change, neither the individual

nor the relationship. And then there is the spirit of American democracy, E pluribus

unum—”Out of the Many, One”—itself one of the most striking historical examples of

the codification of a philosophical ideal that seeks a measure of permanence out of

perpetual change. Although I am not suggesting that Obama exists on the order of

Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Moltmann, or Heidegger, I am arguing that Obama’s success

derives in large part from his ability to negotiate this class of historic oppositions that

such men famously sought to hold in tension. To state the matter differently: I am

suggesting that Obama’s paralogic political communication represents a performance of

that which was has long been in place within America’s historic self-description as

codified in the Declaration of Independence and that likewise finds considerable

resonance within American pragmatist thought.

Though it may seem odd to place Obama alongside of individuals such as

Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, and Heidegger, I would argue that what I am suggesting here is neither terribly novel nor remarkably controversial. One can more or less observe the

truth of what I am saying simply by reflecting on many of the greatest achievements of

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the human condition. For it would not seem to be too much of an overstatement to suggest that a great many of the most remarkable achievements of humankind emerge out of precisely this sensibility or impulse. William James, yet another great American pragmatist, locates what he calls “the solid meaning of life” in this sort of interplay between the static and that which is changing. James, in a (1977c) essay entitled “What

Makes a Life Significant” explains that “the solid meaning of life is always the same eternal thing,—the marriage, namely, of some unhabitual ideal, however special, with some fidelity, courage, and endurance; with some man’s or woman’s pains.—And,

whatever or wherever life may be, there will always be the chance for that marriage to

take place” (p. 659).

Admittedly, James is not using the same verbiage that I am employing here.

Nevertheless, James is certainly speaking about the same sort of impulse or sensibility to

which I have been referring, the impulse or sensibility to enact a process that is rooted in

an attempt to see an ideal through to its fruition, even in the persistent face of inescapable

odds. James is speaking about the desire to hold two warring oppositions in tension with

one another, an eternal relationship that, when rightly fed, produces drastic results. Here,

James suggests, that it is this nexus which produces what he refers to as “the solid

meaning of life.” Supposing one would like some potentially less lofty examples,

consider the following. Science represents an attempt to totalize the infinite. Great

literature attempts to describe the ineffable. Religion attempts to unite humanity and

divinity, the temporal and the eternal. Philosophy seeks to know the unknowable. Politics

attempts to reconcile freedom and justice. All of these enterprises, at their very core

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represent impossible quests, contain within themselves a blueprint for failure, and yet,

when taken together, embody what is best about the human spirit. And, I would argue, that it is precisely through this sort of process that the creation and sustenance of the postmodern hope might yet continue to emerge and bear fruit in contemporary American life.

One of the key features of the various pragmatists highlighted above is the importance that each individual places upon those communicative processes that make possible the sustenance of hope in contemporary life. Hope, whatever it might be and however it might be grounded, gains a hearing and grows into its future by deeply communicative means. This is a point that is well understood within the American pragmatist tradition. Leaning rather heavily upon this tradition, I have focused upon the communicative nature of hope throughout this project. With the previous several pages in mind, I may now be even more explicit regarding my deference to American pragmatism.

For what I have called “paralogic communication” throughout this document is itself an

embodiment of those sensibilities ascribed to such American pragmatists recounted here.

As I have suggested, such paralogic communication itself consists of the enactment of a

process, a process that views humankind and even reality itself as innate loci of

possibility. And, of course, such possibility emerges in large part from humankind’s

ability to redescribe the world in ever new and hopeful ways. Like pragmatist thought in

general, such paralogic communication does not seek any sort of metaphysically

grounded or indubitable hope. Rather, such paralogic communication seeks to produce

hope that is commensurate with the kind of pragmatist sensibilities outlined above. Such

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hope privileges possibility, emerges from the unfettered human imagination, challenges

the necessity of preexistent logics, tends toward the destabilization of present structures,

and privileges community and incommensurability rather than consensus or synthesis. In

these ways, hope that emerges from paralogic communicative means is able deftly to

negotiate between the static and the transitory, between the particular and the individual,

and between hopefulness and the demise of hope’s future.

At its core, America represents an attempt to negotiate between historic polarities

and philosophical positions: the one and the many, community and the individual, freedom and justice. Communication itself similarly represents an attempt to negotiate between oneself and the other, between what is local and what it universal. Paralogic communication, as I have expressed it within the pages of this document, embodies a similar (if albeit more specific) manifestation of this attempt at mediating between historic polarities. For at its core, paralogic communication seeks to overcome what is perhaps the most central challenge facing humankind: the challenge of negotiating between extremes and of generating hopeful descriptions of reality precisely as the result of such means. America represents a cultural manifestation of this attempt.

Communication of any stripe enacts this process to a limited degree—insofar as any and all communication seeks to bring one alongside of the other, to generate shared meanings and descriptions of reality. Paralogic communication, then, represents a more specific

(and, perhaps, more noble) manifestation of this attempt to employ communication in service to culturally and personally constructive ends. And, as I have been arguing throughout this document, it is by employing this particular process that one might

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overcome those challenges facing hope as the result of much postmodern thought. Albeit

hope with a different sort of “grounding,” it is not for that reason any less hopeful. For

paralogic communication offers the promise of deeply communal, negotiated, and

melioristic hopes that are emergent from and responsive to the needs of the past and the

future. The enactment of such a process is, to be sure, no small task. The possibilities

generated by such a process, however, make the employment of paralogic

communication both a worthy and even necessary endeavor in postmodern American life.

At its most basic level, the central contribution of this dissertation concerns the melioristic employment of human communication as a means of maintaining hope in

postmodern times. As a way of labeling and identifying such hopeful communicative

action, I have referred throughout this document to the sort of “paralogic

communication” described above. Though my consideration of paralogic communication

has demanded engagement with a wide-ranging set of concerns, all such discussions were

intended to illuminate this central concept that first occupied my careful attention in

Chapter 2. To speak of paralogic communication is to speak of one of the most powerful, constructive, and hopeful enactments of the human condition. To employ paralogic communication is to engage with the most fundamental and important assumptions of a given human community. To be taken up and even swept away by paralogic communication is to be embroiled in one of the most fulfilling and enriching of all human

experiences. I remain convinced that such states of affairs are both necessary and possible

in contemporary life. Even more, I remain convinced that the only hope to be found in our postmodern world is hope that is communally and communicatively generated, a sort

253 of hope that marries together the needs of the present with the resources of the past, a sort of hope that negotiates between historic polarities and speaks meaningfully to present societal needs.

As Isocrates wrote so many years ago, “there is no institution devised by man which the power of speech has not helped us to establish” (Isocrates, in Brummett, 2000, pp. 40-41). Neither is their any sort of hope that has emerged apart from such powers of speech. Paralogic communication, as I have described it here, consists of those enactments of human communication that speak most hopefully and clearly into present cultural contexts. This has been the central focus of this project. And, I would argue, such paralogic communicative enactments should increasingly occupy the attention of any individual seeking both to create and sustain hope in our present, postmodern era.

Remaining Questions and Future Possibilities

To this point, I have gone to considerable lengths to outline the virtues of this project. The most important lessons to be learned have therefore been variously illuminated and defended: (a) hope is essential to human existence and to the American way of life; (b) postmodern epistemology need not and does not signal the end of meaningful articulations of hope; (c) postmodern thought contains within itself the resources necessary for articulating hope in the present; (d) the articulation of contemporary hope must increasingly take on the form of paralogic communication; (e) hope must increasingly be conceptualized as resulting from a process rather than the adoption of a static set of beliefs; and (f) American democracy represents an attempt to privilege hope while balancing between traditional modernist and postmodern

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sensibilities. The demonstration and defense of such claims has, of course, brought us

into contact with specific communicative exemplars of the sorts of themes and theses

noted here. And, of course, I hope that I have also shed light upon such specific thinkers

as well. What I have not yet done is to reflect upon potential objections to and limitations

of this particular approach to the topic at hand. And so I should like to do so in this brief

section.

The preceding chapters represent my attempt both to reinvigorate hope and to

place hope yet again on firm ground. Nevertheless, one might object to my suggestion

that the preceding reflections offer any sort of firm basis or strong grounding upon which to justify the continued existence of hope. On the one hand, I can certainly understand the reasoning behind such a critique. After all, it is precisely this sort of worldview that I myself articulated at length in Chapter 1. Undoubtedly, the theory of hope that I have begun to articulate in this project by and large relents to postmodern critiques of knowledge, recognizes the inescapable need for narrative legitimation, and conceptualizes hope as something provisional and future oriented. And, in this way, the conception of hope outlined here will never rise to the level of indubitability sought by the strong foundationalist, one who remains committed to a literalist interpretation of religious texts, or one who supposes that hope can emerge only from the widespread acceptance of a particular political ideology.

While recognizing that the account of hope’s continued existence that I have offered will remain unattractive to many individuals, I must, of course, reject the conclusion that I have failed to offer any sort of basis or grounding upon which to justify

255 the continued existence of hope in postmodern America. What I have offered is, to be sure, emergent from or grounded upon the process of speaking about and redescribing the world in ways that instantiate a given community’s conception of hope. But to say that hope emerges within a community as the result of a process is not to say that it fails to have moorings or ceases to be grounded. And, neither is this to suggest that there fails to be more or less legitimate articulations of hope. One of the points I been trying to make throughout this entire project is that historic verbiage and self-descriptions notwithstanding, all religious, philosophical, or political theories themselves emerge from a complex, contingent, and deeply communicative process of narrative legitimation whereby the truth of a given assertion gains traction and grows into its future by way of its continued acceptance among the members of a given community. This is not to say that some such truths are ipso facto any less true than others. And, neither is it to say that they are all equally well-suited to accomplishing the same conception of hope that you or

I might wish to see instantiated in the lives of our most cherished communities.

Particularly in the last chapter, I have directed the reader’s attention toward the

American landscape, suggesting that Barack Obama has employed paralogic communication regarding hope as a way of grounding his political campaign and framing his vision for a future hopeful America. In the process, I made the broader argument that

America’s historic self-description—a self-description that I have located in the

Declaration of Independence and that Obama continually demonstrates by way of his performance of paralogic political communication—contains within itself a sort of tension between universality and locality that provides considerable resources for

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speaking into our current cultural context. Moreover, I have suggested that Obama employs such resources remarkably well by enacting paralogic political communication that is rooted in such a self-description, and that works itself out through encouraging this process of self redescription to be repeated within the lives of particular individuals operating at successively less encompassing spheres.

When proposing my particular interpretation of Obama as well as the current status of hope in America, I should point out that I am not here suggesting that Obama’s vision and performance of hope represents the best or the only way of sustaining hopeful futures. Rather, what I have been suggesting is that Obama’s performance and vision of hope is remarkably well suited to our current social, philosophical, and political climate.

I can, however, imagine many other ways in which hope might be instantiated in a widespread cultural fashion yet which did not proceed by way of the paralogic articulation of a liberal democratic system of governance. And, in fact, at least part of the burden of my treatment of Dobson was to suggest an instance of one individual (as well as a large group of followers) who retains a robust vision of hope through the adoption of radically divergent assumptions.

“But wait,” I can imagine some readers objecting, “you’re not being fair to

Dobson and you have offered a glowing assessment of Obama!” Here, one encounters yet another potential objection to the account of hope that I have developed in the preceding chapters. Reflecting upon such a critique, I must remind such readers of my central objective in this dissertation: to reflect upon and to articulate the means available for speaking of hope in an increasingly postmodern social, political, and philosophical world.

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I absolutely do not suggest that Dobson fails to create hope among his listeners. And, in fact, I made this point time and again throughout Chapter 2. What I do assert is that

Dobson’s preferred vision for a hopeful future America, as well as his performance of such hope, increasingly fails to resonate with, speak to, and generate hope among many individuals within contemporary American society. Furthermore, I am increasingly convinced that the pattern of thinking and speaking embodied by Obama’s paralogic political communication—which emerges from America’s historic self-description—is remarkably well suited for speaking to contemporary culture, for balancing the impulse toward stasis and flux, and for creating and sustaining hope in our current, postmodern climate. If this represents a nod toward Obama and a knock against Dobson, then I suppose I stand guilty as charged. But such guilt stems not from my assumption about the truthfulness or virtue of such individuals. Rather, it stems from my assessment of their ability to understand and to employ the available means of persuasion provided by contemporary American culture.

A third potential objection to my account of hope concerns the issue of metaphysics, a topic that up until this point I have generally avoided. I particular, have tried not to make specific adjudications as to the status of metaphysics or the products of metaphysical speculation. In fact, as I reflect upon the combined testimony of this document, I can recall only one moment in the entire manuscript wherein any explicit comments were made about my own position on such matters. And at such a point I spoke rather firmly about my desire neither to reject nor to disparage metaphysical concerns. Given my relative silence on this front, I can imagine that the very same class

258 of readers mentioned above might suggest that regardless of my intentions, I have unknowingly succumbed to the spirit of Rorty’s de-divinized liberal utopia and have ended up articulating what is essentially a secular account of hope. Simply stated: I disagree. But, suspecting that such terseness will not quite suffice, let me say just a bit more.

As I reflect upon the preceding four chapters, I remain quite convinced that the vision of hope I have articulated allows for the possibility of a paralogic conception of hope based upon robustly theological and deeply metaphysical foundational beliefs.

Indeed, I find nothing within this dissertation to suggest that a paralogic conception of hope must reject foundational beliefs. In fact, the paradigmatic account of American hope that I have focused so heavily upon is itself wholly dependent upon the adoption and performance of a bedrock assumption: the assumption of human free will and the infinite possibility emergent from the recognition and enactment of such freedom. I would think—and in my own life have attempted to demonstrate—that the performance of foundational religious beliefs may themselves likewise prove to be deeply appropriate and powerful starting points for the communal performance and adoption of religious hope. What I have rejected (and here, I am relenting to Rorty’s critique) is the idea that a metaphysical description of such foundational religious assumptions can, in our current philosophical climate, rise to the level of indubitability or certainty once ascribed to such metaphysical realities. And so what I am suggesting is that within the current American religious context the power of religious hope—though, so far as I am concerned, very likely rooted in metaphysical realities—gains a hearing and grows into its powerful future

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increasingly by way of deeply communicative, narrative, performative, and paralogic

means. This is intended neither to reject nor to disparage assumptions that were historically described by way of metaphysical terminology or assumptions. And neither is it to make some sort of ultimate adjudication as to the actual nature of such metaphysical realities. This is rather to understand that metaphysical descriptions of such beliefs will

be decreasingly suitable for creating widespread public consensus about the truth of one’s

position and the hope resultant from such.

The point raised in the preceding paragraph relates to one last matter left over

from Chapter 4, a matter that I suggested would need to be treated here in the conclusion.

And, in considering this matter, yet another potential objection to my position might be

voiced. The reader may recall that in the preceding chapter a question was raised about

the need to translate religious belief into discourse suitable for public debate and

amenable to the court of reason. As Obama wrote in the closing moments of his chapter

on religion, “The best we can do [in public life] is act in accordance with those things that

are possible for all of us to know, understanding that a part of what we know to be true— as individuals or communities of faith—will be true for us alone” (2006, p. 220).

Reflecting upon this quote, I acknowledge that such a claim might seem deeply limiting for one concerned to infuse public deliberation with the fruit of religious hope. And so one might object that what I have spoken of as a hopeful articulation of religious hope should instead be understood as the silencing of explicitly religious belief.

Ten years ago I myself would have been deeply offended by Obama’s suggestion that I must somehow limit what I say or translate what I believe into discourse amenable

260 to the masses. I would have been even more deeply offended by the assertion that my particular community of faith was articulating something that was merely “true for us alone.” Sometime long before I initiated the process of writing Chapter 4, however, I somehow became far less offended by the sort of assertion offered by Obama above. In fact, somewhere along the line I started to find myself agreeing with the sort of sentiment characterized by the Senator. And so, I suppose, it is worth briefly asking, “What changed?”

Partly what changed is nothing more and nothing less than the process I described in the opening pages of this dissertation. In large part because of my understanding of postmodern critiques of knowledge, the scope of things about which I am absolutely certain has, to be honest, grown a good bit more limited in recent years. This is not to say that I have become utterly skeptical or that I have rejected “the faith.” On the contrary, I have become incredibly more resolute and firm regarding the truth of those things which

I hold to be most true. In a great many respects, my hope is surer that it has ever been!

However, I think it is also fair to say that the bases of my faith and the fullness of my hope have, in the process, changed in a way that I am not yet—and may never be—able entirely to articulate. What I can say is that, increasingly, my faith and my hope are at once rooted in something far simpler and yet more deeply profound than can be captured by way of historic conceptions of truth. My faith and my hope increasingly emerge from the observation of the fruit, wisdom, and character that emerges within individuals who embody and exemplify a disposition of faith and a longing for hope. Many times, such an observation occurs among people who are themselves part of my community of faith.

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Other times, such observation occurs among those with whom I have no personal connection or with whom I resolutely disagree about nearly everything. In each instance, however, I recognize within such individuals the results (albeit oftentimes fragmentary or partial) of a process or a disposition, a disposition which at once seeks desperately to realize the modernist impulse toward totalization, all the while recognizing the considerable provisionality (read: irony) of his or her beliefs. Such a process and disposition, it seems to me, inescapably emerges from and points toward the generation of hope. And this disposition and process seem somehow deeply at odds with the sort of certainty that I chased after for so long.

I think the other thing that has changed within me it is a fuller conception of the radical diversity of the world around me. It was generally easy for me to assume the possibility of organizing the world by way of my conception of truth when my particular vision of the world was quite limited. And though I am certainly not suggesting that I have become a student of humanity or a traveler of the globe, I remain certain that I have gained a sufficiently enhanced perspective on culture such that I can no longer abide the assumption that others should, by virtue of our common humanity, believe univocally what I think they should believe. Particularly at the level of national governance in a country so increasingly diverse as America, I find myself decreasingly convinced that I should simply expect the American political process to reflect my beliefs. In fact, the more I think about a number of my bedrock religious assumptions, the more convinced I am that I should expect precisely the opposite.

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Let me now be even a bit more explicit about my own historic association with

various American evangelical communities of faith. After all, at least so far as this

particular project has been framed, the most spirited debate encountered has been a

debate between a more or less secular (or, at least, a radically ecumenical) form of liberal

democracy and a fairly robust articulation of conservative evangelicalism. The more I

reflect upon the assumptions undergirding religious hope within evangelical America, the

more obvious it is to me that evangelicals generally should expect to encounter cultural

conditions which demand (a) that they work tirelessly to bring private communal

manifestations of belief into the broader cultural consciousness in a manner amenable to

the public; (b) that they create ever-increasing spheres of public influence which recognize the truth of their previously-provincial set of beliefs; and (c) that they bring to the world a manner of living and a way of hoping that generates within others the desire to live as they have chosen to live. This, it increasingly seems to me, should be the assumption from which evangelical religious belief and practice begins. And so I remained increasingly surprised when evangelicals feign outrage or incredulity toward a growing postmodern culture that increasingly finds it difficult to accept historic performances of belief that are either uniquely Christian or particularly evangelical in character. On the contrary, I think it is most reasonable for evangelicals to assume that the broader culture will resolutely refuse to instantiate religious hopes within the lives of

public consciousness. For by the religious person’s own admission, religious hope

emerges only among the initiated and within the life of the believer.

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Recognizing the sort of assertions made in the preceding paragraph might, of

course, give the conservative evangelical much about which to disagree. Supposing,

however, that one adopts the broad contours of my argument, I would suggest that such

assumptions—while, admittedly, reflecting a considerable challenge to historic

articulations of evangelicalism—likewise contain within themselves the possibility of reinvigorating religious hope in contemporary America. For contained within both the preceding several paragraphs and in Obama’s treatment of religion in public life exists a very intriguing call for people of religious faith, a call for such individuals to discover anew the various resources available for articulating the relevance of long-standing truths. And, indeed, if the religious individual seeks to be involved in the political process in a constructive way, then such an individual must become more adept at articulating such historic hopes in a manner that resonates with prevailing cultural, social, and political sensibilities. Such a possibility is, of course, guaranteed by virtue of one’s membership in the experiment of American democracy. And, I would argue, such a possibility has far too often been squandered, instead giving way to a bewildered

nostalgia for an irretrievable past.

To be sure, the discerning reader will undoubtedly have numerous other

objections or concerns with this project. I would be disappointed if this were not the case.

What I have articulated here are those objections that seem, to me, at least, to be the most

obvious and compelling challenges that might be raised against the spirit of my argument.

Certainly, the addressing of such concerns would produce an expansion and even more

careful articulation of the central thesis introduced here. Reflecting upon how such an

264

enterprise might proceed, let me offer several comments on possible expansions,

applications, and extensions of the current iteration of my central thesis.

In the “Acknowledgments” of this dissertation, I expressed my frustration about the limitations of this project, lamenting that I wished for more time, more detailed research, and more energy. As I reflect upon the greatest limitations of this project, several obvious concerns come to mind. The first emerges as a direct result of the scope of the project. I fairly short order, I have attempted to challenge prevailing assumptions about postmodern thought, offer a mediating position between modernity and postmodernity, theorize hope, reflect upon the current state of American evangelicalism,

comment on the American political landscape, and contextualize such varied endeavors

within the history of western philosophy. Even as I recount such wide-ranging emphases,

I find myself at least a bit embarrassed at the arrogance of attempting such a project. For along the way, I have certainly tread upon ground that requires more careful attention

than I have given it here. In particular, I find myself a bit concerned that I have not

always adequately staked out the postmodern sentiment that I am critiquing or that I am

employing. Moreover, I should like to have spent more time justifying my rather

optimistic reading of Lyotard’s writing. Regarding Dobson, I fear that I have not

thoroughly addressed the role of faith claims in the creation and sustenance of hope. So

far as both Rorty and Obama are concerned, I suspect that I have not been quite critical

enough of their considerable optimism. For though I have spent much time arguing on

behalf of a melioristic account of the universe, there are considerable and insurmountable

impediments to the creation and sustenance of hope that I have not spoken of at all.

265

More broadly speaking, I walk away from this project wishing I had spent more time critiquing the dismissal of metaphysical matters in contemporary thought. Though I remain convinced that metaphysical matters must always be given voice by way of thoroughly communicative means, I fear that I may have unduly disparaged metaphysical realities in a way that is inconsistent with my vision of reality. I can imagine a reader getting the impression that I am nothing more and nothing less than an adopter of post- metaphysical sensibilities, even though I wish for my view of such matters to be more nuanced than what is contained within the preceding pages. Personally, I am deeply invested in metaphysical beliefs and a realm that transcends the world of mere physical experience. And, I strongly suspect that innumerable metaphysical preconditions are necessary for the realization of worldly hope in the present—that human free will, that the idea of hope, and that existence itself depend upon that which does not manifest itself in fullness or apparentness. Though I may never prove or justifiably legitimate the necessity of extra-historical or metaphysical realities as paving the way for such preconditions, I suspect that void of such postulates, there remains a considerable weakness to the theoretical consistency and psychological efficacy of hope. However, I suspect that I have likely obscured such convictions by way of what I have produced in the preceding pages.

An additional limitation of this particular analysis stems from the lack of attention paid to the various physical conditions necessary for giving rise to psychological manifestations of hope. When writing about Dobson, I made the suggestion that what was most important was not whether his account of reality was true, but rather whether his

266

account of reality was perceived to be true. Though I remain content with the formulation

of the matter as articulated in Chapter 3, I think that it is important not to privilege hope

merely as a psychological reality, a disposition that emerges void of social, cultural, and

physical realities. I can imagine a critical theorist, for instance, suggesting that I have

paid far too little attention to the material conditions necessary for the generation of hope,

and that I have reified a deeply modern and philosophical description of hope that ignores

the physical and cultural contexts necessary for giving rise to psychological hope. Given

more time, more research, and more energy, I do believe that I could answer such a

challenge, and could develop the claim that what I have produced here is consistent with

such a fuller account of hope’s genesis. As the project now stands, however, I do believe

I am susceptible this sort of criticism.

Yet another limitation of this project is its lack of grounding within a rich

tradition of philosophies of hope. Though I have been deeply influenced by various theological accounts of hope, I have generally allowed such commitments to go unexplored here (with the exception of the brief section on Moltmann in Chapter 3). So far as philosophies of hope are concerned, I have avoided this literature altogether in the preceding pages. The emphasis of my project as well as the character of my thesis tended away from such literatures. Nevertheless, a fuller account of the persistence of hope—in any and all cultural, philosophical, or material situations—could certainly benefit from a more robust consideration of the philosophy of hope.

Finally, I think it is worth mentioning the limitations of this project that emerge from my limited number of communicative exemplars. Though my writing was informed

267 by the broad corpus of Dobson and Obama’s work, what I have offered here represents a somewhat limited treatment of their accounts of hope. This is perhaps particularly so with

Dobson. A fuller reading of his work would certainly shed fuller light upon the reasoning behind his vision of a future, hopeful America, even if the same pattern of justification— grounding hope in objective “truths”—would be found at every turn. So too with Obama,

I am certain that a fuller account of his writing and speaking would offer numerous other vantage points from which to engage the themes introduced above. Most of all, I believe that this project could benefit from studying Obama’s communicative performance of hope, thereby reflecting upon the communicative savvy that allows for the generation of hopeful futures among significantly divergent people. This is something I have barely considered at all here, and I am certain that such a consideration would be undoubtedly beneficial for understanding the nature of Obama’s paralogic communication and hope.

Concluding Remarks

By and large, the testimony of this dissertation has been one of disagreement, competing narratives, and disparate hopes. For what I have recounted is a story about numerous and even conflicting visions of the future of this diverse and ever-changing country. Reflecting upon such diversity and disagreement, we must ask one last time,

“Can there, then, continue to be hope in America?” The answer should, and must continue to be “Of course!” As we have observed, for all of its flaws and limitations, our

American context is, in fact, quite well-suited to the continued creation and sustenance of such hope. To be sure, a wise, robust, and timely articulation of hope will require our greatest strengths, our most concerted efforts, and our most developed virtues. But this

268

sort of effort and result is what has always been necessary for the manifestation of those

most noble of human creations. Indeed, the fact that hope continues to thrive even in the

face of postmodern challenges to the historic constellation of beliefs upon which it has been constructed should itself be a source of optimism, a source of hope. Although recent decades may not have been terribly kind to hope’s future, such decades have nevertheless observed countless possibilities for the rearticulation of future hope.

The importance of hope’s future cannot be overstated. Whether in private life or public life, religious contexts or secular settings, among the young or the elderly, in

America or beyond her borders—hope serves as a means of sustenance and as a reason to

persist at the oftentimes difficult project of constructing a human life and a meaningful

future. Where there is no hope, there is no future, no meaningful way of being in the

world. To be hopeful is to be convinced that there is something about the human

experience that merits preservation, that requires cultivation, and that demands

perfecting. And void of the gift of hope, the project of living quickly spirals into mere

existence and mere biological preservation. To be hopeful is to be human. And to share

that hope with and among others is, as they say, divine.

“Hope in America”—both a way of describing the content of this project and an

implicit call to create and sustain hope’s future even in the present. At the most basic

level, this has been the subject of this entire project. Though limited and undoubtedly

colored by my own vision of a hopeful future, it is my own desire, my own hope, that

what has been offered here might help to initiate that eternal process whereby humankind

seeks desperately to understand, to synthesize, and to articulate a sense of community,

269 meaning, and hope that emerges from the peculiar mix of limitations and possibilities offered in the present.

270

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