SELF-IDENTITY AND ALTERITY IN RENAISSANCE HUMANISM BETWEEN ELITE AND POPULAR DISCOURSES by ANNA LESIUK-CUMMINGS A DISSERTATION Presented to the Department of Romance Languages and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy June 2014 DISSERTATION APPROVAL PAGE Student: Anna Lesiuk-Cummings Title: Self-Identity and Alterity in Renaissance Humanism between Elite and Popular Discourses This dissertation has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in the Department of Romance Languages by: Massimo Lollini Chairperson/Advisor Nathalie Hester Core Member Leah Middlebrook Core Member Gordon Sayre Institutional Representative and Kimberly Andrews Espy Vice President for Research and Innovation; Dean of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree awarded June 2014 ii © 2014 Anna Lesiuk-Cummings iii DISSERTATION ABSTRACT Anna Lesiuk-Cummings Doctor of Philosophy Department of Romance Languages June 2014 Title: Self-Identity and Alterity in Renaissance Humanism between Elite and Popular Discourses There are two parallel discourses on humanism nowadays. One conceives of humanism as a worldview and a philosophical position. The other takes it to be a cultural phenomenon typical of the European Renaissance. The critics interested in considering humanism conceptually, as a rule, are not Renaissance scholars. Operating from either a postmodern or a postcolonial perspective, they often speak of humanism as the backbone of Western thought or the mainstay of European modernity and, in any case, as a bankrupt ideology of the West. Conversely, the Renaissance scholars are more concerned with the task of making sense of the idea of humanism in its original historical context than with considering it in relation to its other, later developments and remain, for the most part, unwilling to address the broader questions posed by humanism. This dissertation purports to bring the philosophical and the historical discourses on humanism together. I focus specifically on Renaissance humanism and ground my reflection firmly in textual analyses of late XV and XVI century sources. More concretely, I put forward a reading of two groups of texts. The first group includes three works exploring the arch-theme of the Renaissance, dignitas hominis, from the perspective of a relational concept of identity formation. These are: Pico della Mirandola’s Oratio (1486), iv Bovelles’s De sapiente (1511) and Vives’s Fabula de homine (1518). The second group of texts contains three works which fall into the category of Renaissance Americanist literature: Cabeza de Vaca’s Naufragios (1542), Galeotto Cei’s Viaggio e relazione delle Indie (written after 1553) and Jean de Léry’s Histoire d'un voyage faict en la terre du Brésil (1578). The bridge between these two bodies of texts is the idea, found in Pico, Bovelles and Vives, that arriving at a sense of self always involves a detour through otherness, as experienced in one’s community, Nature and God. The encounter narratives, in illustrating the impact of America on the Renaissance European traveler, bring to life what philosophers theorized in the peace and quiet of their studies – the essential indefiniteness of the self unless inhabited by meanings drawn from without. v CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Anna Lesiuk-Cummings GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene, USA Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium Uniwersytet Warszawski, Warsaw, Poland DEGREES AWARDED: Doctor of Philosophy, Romance Languages, 2014, University of Oregon Advanced Master, Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2007, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Master, Italian Studies, 2003, Uniwersytet Warszawski AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Renaissance Studies Historical and Philosophical definitions of Humanism Modernity and the Modern Self History of Ideas Early Modern Travel Literature Early Modern Literature in Italian, Spanish French and Latin PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Assistant Professor of Spanish, Latin and Italian, Mt. Angel Seminary, St. Benedict, August 2011- present Graduate Teaching Fellow in Italian, University of Oregon, Eugene, September 2007 - July 2011 GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Beall Graduate Dissertation Scholarship, Department of Romance Languages, University of Oregon, Winter 2010/2011 FFIS International Understanding Award for International Students, Friendship Foundation for International Students, University of Oregon, Spring 2009 vi Socrates-Erasmus Program Scholarship for a term of study abroad, Uniwersytet Warszawski, Fall 2000 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to thank especially Professor Massimo Lollini, my advisor for his support and assistance for the past 7 years. Professor Lollini’s interest in the idea of “humanism more than human” inspired me to pursue my own research into the ideas of self-identity and alterity in Renaissance Humanism and his complete trust and unflinching belief in this project helped me along the way. I would like to thank also Professors Nathalie Hester and Leah Middlebrook who at the early stages of my inquires offered guidance in my studies of Renaissance literature in French and Spanish. My gratitude goes also to Professor Sayre, who graciously agreed to serve on my dissertation committee as the outside member. I would also like to thank my children: Matthew, Michael and Natalia, who by their exuberant presence in my life, and by forcing me to be a mom as well as a PhD student, certainly drove home the major point of my dissertation, namely, the role of others in the identity-shaping process. My husband Andrew was a constant source of love, support, patience and encouragement. Without him, I would not have been able to finish this manuscript. Last, but not least, special thanks go to my parents for their love and firm confidence in my abilities that inspired me to pursue a career which is both a challenge and a source of contentment. viii For Andrew, Matthew, Michael and Natalia ix TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 1 II. SETTING THE STAGE: HUMANISM AND THE QUESTION OF ALTERITY .................................................................................................................. 10 The Difficulty of Defining Humanism .................................................................. 10 The Double Genealogy of Humanism ................................................................... 20 Individuality, Interiority and Subjectivity.............................................................. 26 Renaissance Humanism and Philosophy ............................................................... 31 Humanism and the Renaissance Travel Literature ............................................... 39 III. GIOVANNI PICO DELLA MIRANDOLA: THE SELF AS THE IMAGELESS IMAGE OF GOD ......................................................................................................... 46 IV. CHARLES DE BOVELLES: THE SELF AS THE MIRROR OF THE OTHER ................................................................................................................... 76 V. JUAN LUIS VIVES: THE SELF BETWEEN DIVINE MIMICRY AND SOCIETAL RESPONSIBILITY ................................................................................ 107 VI. ÁLVAR NÚÑEZ CABEZA DE VACA: THE AMERICANIZED SELF ........... 134 VII. GALEOTTO CEI: HOMELESSNESS OF THE SELF ...................................... 173 VIII. JEAN DE LÉRY: THE SELF AS THE SPACE OF THE OTHER .................. 204 IX. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................... 238 REFERENCES CITED ................................................................................................ 245 x CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION There are two parallel discourses on humanism nowadays. One conceives of humanism as a worldview and a philosophical position. The other takes it to be a cultural phenomenon typical of the European Renaissance. The critics interested in considering humanism conceptually, as a rule, are not Renaissance scholars. Operating from either a postmodern or a postcolonial perspective, they often speak of humanism as the backbone of Western thought or the mainstay of European modernity, and in any case, as a bankrupt ideology of the West. Conversely, the Renaissance scholars are more concerned with the task of making sense of the idea of humanism in its original historical context than with considering it in relation to its other, later developments and remain, for the most part, unwilling to address the broader questions posed by humanism. Yet the Renaissance, as the historical moment that brought about the crystallization of the Western notion of humanitas, deserves to be considered more fully in relation to the philosophically defined humanism. In recent years, two interesting attempts have been made to speak philosophically about humanism in terms that seem to recapture some of its original XIV and XV century meanings. Edward Said, one of the foremost postcolonial theorists and a fierce critic of Eurocentrism, in his 2004 Humanism and Democratic Criticism pledged his ongoing allegiance to the ideals of humanism. Said, in the spirit of the early humanists always in 1 search of new books, believed in redeeming the humanities by expanding the