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文化研究 – 開欄文
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1. 我了解文化的過程
我在高一 – 高二時，讀了家父的《中國文化之前途》後(出版年代不詳)，第一次從知識角度接觸到文化的概念。我當時寫了一篇讀後感，發表在《建中青年》。過了60年，現在已經不記得那篇文章的內容。當然，我後來也拜讀了家父的《古代中國文化與中國知識份子》(第5版)。
初中時從歷史課本學到國家積弱一百多年，內憂外患不斷；在國民黨「反共抗俄」教育下，「外有強敵」的陰影揮之不去。很自然的培養出追求富國強兵的意識。初、高中時，在經濟學和社會學的入門書之外，也看了《孫子兵法》和《戰爭藝術》。
大一時修了「社會學」這門課；教授是一位愛爾蘭神父，他非常詼諧。課堂中笑聲四起，更加深了我對社會學的興趣。開始工作後讀了一些介紹世界各地區文化的書(請見「參考資料」)。下班後在加州庫比蒂諾市的迪安薩社區大學修了一門「文化人類學」(Haviland 1983)。上了這門課以後，我從李基教授的《人類的成長》開始，進一步閱讀考古學、考古人類學、人類演化史、人類出非洲史、人類遷徙史、基因人類學、和population等領域的科普書籍和報導。
1980年以後，由於試圖了解「結構主義」，進而接觸到「後結構主義」和「後現代主義」。我花了相當多時間閱讀「後現代」理論諸大師的著作，寫過相關的一篇書評。也開始從「文化研究」領域的角度進一步了解「文化」。
對哲學的興趣，讓我有機會了解語言學(1959，書林)和符號學(1986)的理論。我從初中時就對「行為」和指導行為的「原則」很好奇；對倫理學的探索先後把我帶進社會學、心理學、和認知科學等相關領域的涉獵。我也就能夠從認知科學和心理學(1992)的角度來了解「文化」。理學院的訓練和在高科技產業界工作經驗，則使我養成從現實角度了解事情和事理的傾向。
以上是我試圖了解「文化」這個概念的簡單歷程，也是我相信自己能夠就「文化」相關議題略表淺見的依據。
我本來想把我對「文化」這個概念的了解，寫成一篇系統性的論文；斷斷續續地寫了近三年，終究因為老邁而無法成章。只在這篇拙作中簡要的做了說明(該文第3節)。
此外，我在網上曾多次討論「文化」議題(討論1、討論2、討論3 – 此欄有多篇討論「文化」的文章)；各位可以根據它們和上引拙作，評鑑一下我對文化的了解是否成立和說得通。
請參考本欄的姐妹欄：《古代文化/文明小檔案》。
2. 本部落格「文化研究」目錄
待增補。
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我沒研究過「破音字」；但是我知道英文中也有「雙關語」；而造成(英文)「雙關語」效果的方式之一是利用「諧音」。
由於「雙關語」要靠各種語言在其發音、結溝、文法、性質、和意義等層面的獨特性來達成，自然就具有「文化」上的特殊性。西方語系中基於「諧音」的「雙關語」，幾乎不可能翻譯成中文；但英、法語言各自這類「雙關語」之間，互相翻譯的機率可能高達30-40%。
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胡兄研究過破音字嗎?
中國古代小說家運用破音字寫出
拐彎罵皇帝的小說
避免殺頭的厄運
這在西洋文學是不可能做到的!
(請參考:西遊記罵誰?一文)
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我認為你標題中「反映」兩字用得相當簡潔扼要。
我不是很清楚「表徵」的意思，原本以為它類似「表達」、「顯示」、「象徵」這類詞彙。上網搜尋後，找到以下的說明：
「釋義
事實的表現足以證明某種意義。
例：國民平均所得的高低是國家開發進步程度的表徵。」
由於「釋義」中有「證明」一詞，倒讓我產生了些迷惑；我的問題是：
你認為：
「語言」和「文化」之間，有「證明」這種關係嗎？(1)
歡迎你多花點時間，進一步談談：
1) 你所了解的，「語言」和「文化」兩者間的種種關係。
2) 語言能夠「反映」文化的「原因」或「特性」。
附註：
1. 此處不排除《教育部國語辭典簡編本》的編者們用詞不當。借用該《簡編本》的文字，我會這樣來「釋義」：
「事實的『呈現』足以『顯示』某個『概念』的狀態』，或該『概念』蘊含的意義」。
請參考《維基百科》對該詞的說明。
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語言、行為和感覺-Antonella Gismundi
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我會試著寫一篇文章，比較深入的討論作者吉絲芒迪女士所提到現象和概念。
Speaking a different language can change how you act and feel
Antonella Gismundi, Edited by Matt Huston, 10/31/24
Edited by Matt Huston
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For many multilinguals, switching between tongues can lead to shifts in personality, revealing the malleability of the self. (1)
As I take my seat on the plane to Bologna, the realisation washes over me: I will soon be home. It’s in the quick whisper that I overhear, the joke shared in an accent that I’ve missed, or the laughter of a child in a familiar intonation. These sounds in my native language, Italian, ease me back into an old reality. (2)
I’ve been living in Taiwan for more than a decade. When I first arrived, fresh out of university with a one-way ticket, my plan was to study Chinese for six months and return to Italy. Instead, I stayed, completed my Chinese course, earned a master’s degree, and gradually built a life in Taipei, where I now hold a corporate job. (3)
Every year, though, I return to Italy to visit my family, and with each trip I feel as if I’m leaving behind parts of my trilingual identity that I have no use for during my stay in the Italian countryside. There’s the straightforward and outgoing persona I adopt when speaking English, a second language that has gradually overtaken my thoughts and dreams. And there is my Chinese-language side: corporate, polite and detached. (4)
When I’m in Taiwan, Chinese is the language of work and everyday interactions with acquaintances and strangers. Even after more than a decade of practice, it feels limiting when I try to connect with others on a deeper level. For me, speaking in Chinese feels like being stuck in a less articulate version of myself. I fail to capture nuances that come naturally in Italian or English, and I painfully notice my inability to express the full range of my emotions, opinions and knowledge. (5)
The sense of loss, of there being a ‘missing piece’ when one speaks in a different language, can be unnerving. For some, what is lost could be a desirable side of their personality, like being able to exchange small talk or banter confidently. Navigating social interactions might get especially daunting for those who are learning languages in which social roles and hierarchies are embedded in various language forms and structures. In Japanese, for example, verb morphology shifts according to the relative status of the person you are speaking to. When speaking to your boss, you would use polite forms, and when discussing your boss with an external client, you would need to use humbling forms to refer to your superior. These layers of linguistic complexity may leave even advanced learners feeling hyperaware of every word they utter. (6)
Yet, where some experience hesitation, others might see an opportunity for boldness. It’s possible to embrace the diluted emotionality that comes with speaking a second language. This detachment can allow one to break free from the social inhibitions of a first language. I have felt this myself in English. In this language, driven by a ‘why not’ attitude, I found myself stepping onto a stage for the first time and trying out different kinds of performance, eventually landing a theatre gig during my student years. The thought of attempting the same in Italian makes me crumble with anxiety. But in English? The stakes felt lower, and I embraced a side of myself that might never have emerged otherwise. (7)
This sort of detachment might explain why some multilinguals code-switch to a non-native language when using emotionally charged or taboo words. If you speak more than one language, ask yourself: in which language do you find it easier to say ‘I love you’? And in which one do you swear more liberally? For me, cursing in a foreign language feels strangely playful, as if it gives me permission to access a different version of myself, perhaps one less bound by social accountability. (8)
Feeling like another version of yourself seems to be fairly common among those who switch from a native to a non-native language. In one survey of more than 1,000 multilinguals, 65 per cent reported feeling ‘like a different person’ when they used different languages. Prompted for further thoughts, these respondents cited not only different levels of naturalness across their languages, but also differences in the attitudes or perspectives they adopted, their emotionality or expressivity, and other qualities. A person’s level of proficiency and cultural immersion seem to be significant factors: a fluent speaker who is living abroad and constantly exposed to local cultural norms is far more likely to experience this ‘feeling like a different person’ phenomenon. (9)
Research across several languages, countries and cultures has also found evidence of specific personality differences depending on which language someone is using. A landmark study published in 2006 involved Spanish-English bilinguals in the United States and Mexico who took personality tests in both languages. Participants tended to score higher in extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness when responding in English – patterns that echoed personality data previously observed in monolingual people from the respective countries. In a more recent example, researchers asked Swedish-English bilinguals to fill out a personality questionnaire for an imaginary job interview, using either Swedish or English, at either a Swedish or American company. In one of these experiments, participants who filled out the questionnaire in English had higher extraversion scores. In a somewhat different experiment that included open-ended interview questions, participants using Swedish rated themselves as more agreeable and conscientious. (10)
While these studies relied on people rating aspects of their own personalities, some research has explored differences in how people are perceived by others depending on the language they use. In one study, Hong Kong Cantonese-English bilinguals spoke with two different interviewers – who varied in terms of their ethnicity and the language they used – and these conversations were observed by external raters. During their conversations with ethnically Chinese interviewers, the bilinguals were rated as more extraverted, assertive and open when using English rather than Cantonese. (11)
This makes me wonder: am I also perceived differently depending on which language I’m speaking? What does my language reveal – or conceal – about who I am? While it is difficult to clearly discern these variations within myself, I have observed them in others. For example, I once misjudged a friend as curt and distant, having interacted with them only in English. It was only when I saw them conversing in their native Chinese that I realised how warm and engaging they truly were. It was as if I were meeting a completely different person. (12)
For many multilinguals who feel like or seem like a different person depending on which language they are using, language and cultural cues might be priming different self-perceptions, triggering shifts in personality trait expression in ways that align with the corresponding linguistic and social environment. For someone who is working in a Taiwanese cultural context and trying to fit in with the way others speak and act, ideals such as loyalty and hard work might become especially salient and something to emphasise in one’s self; whereas, in the US, it might be qualities like assertiveness and initiative. Even as a multilingual person’s core self remains a constant, their present context might change the lens through which they perceive their own identity – including which aspects become amplified or toned down in their mind – as well as how they interact with others. (13)
In social psychology, tweaking your behaviour based on contextual cues in order to suit community norms has been described as ‘cultural frame switching’. Interacting in a particular language can serve as one of these cues. The cultural frame-switching model also suggests that people with a higher degree of cultural awareness are more susceptible to cultural priming. (14)
How is this cultural awareness developed? Speakers with a higher degree of immersion – those who live abroad or have strong community ties – are more likely to develop ‘pragmatic competence’ in their target language. This kind of competence goes beyond the accurate use of vocabulary and grammar: it involves understanding and using language in socially appropriate ways. It means knowing not just what to say, but also when and how to say it, and being able to predict how it will be received. This is essential for social functioning in the society where a language is spoken, and it is hard to acquire in a classroom context, without authentic interactions with other speakers. Motivation and adaptability are also crucial in this process of internalising new language conventions. (15)
Not everyone is willing to adapt, or to adapt in full. Some language learners deliberately resist adopting certain native-speaker norms – a phenomenon known as ‘pragmatic resistance’. A non-native speaker might understand what native speakers are expected to do and say in certain social situations (such as when accepting an invitation, apologising, or responding to criticism), but still decline to follow these norms. This resistance is not solely about discomfort with a particular norm; it can also be about preserving a sense of authenticity and personal integrity. To give an example: in Taiwan, in some contexts, women are expected to speak in a higher-pitched tone and to punctuate their statements with sentence-final particles (such as 喔 ō, 啦 la, and 耶 yé) that add a coquettish flair to their speech. Doing this never felt natural to me, and, as a result, I have often been told I ‘sound like a man’ in Chinese. (16)
Pragmatic competence and pragmatic resistance are continuously balanced and renegotiated, as multilinguals ‘try on’ different social identities throughout their learning journey. Each social interaction, observation and experience adds to this dynamic, as individuals work out how to move between worlds fluidly – and to dial up or down different aspects of themselves – while remaining sufficiently true to themselves. (17)
Embracing the idea of wearing different ‘masks’ can transform a potential source of uneasiness into something amusing, even empowering. When I was writing my dissertation in Chinese, having to use a language in which I lacked complete fluency freed me from the perfectionism that had always haunted my academic work. What initially felt like a gap in my abilities, a ‘missing piece’, became an opportunity for self-realisation. (18)
The experience of shifting personalities and expressions, while not universal – and certainly not identical for everyone – offers a fascinating glimpse into the human capacity for adaptation. By observing and reflecting on these shifts, multilinguals can turn what might seem like a challenge into an avenue for growth. As they switch between languages, they can approach their interactions with introspection and awareness, each transition potentially unlocking new insights into who they are and who they could be. (19)
Antonella Gismundi is a data analyst with a background in linguistics and psychology. She lives in Taipei, Taiwan.
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12萬年前的喪葬文化 -- David Nield
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Neanderthals Buried Their Dead, But In Strangely Different Ways
David Nield, 11/04/24
Early Homo sapiens and their Neanderthal cousins started burying their dead around the same time and roughly the same place, some 120,000 years ago. This suggests the two species may have had, at least in part, a shared culture at the time.
A new study of these ancient burial sites across the Levant region in western Asia reveals other similarities and differences in how these two closely-related groups of human buried their dead.
Finding a number of the sites date earlier than other Neanderthal burials in Europe and Homo sapiens burials in Africa, the study suggests this is where the practice of burying the dead first began.
And according to the researchers, from Tel Aviv University and the University of Haifa in Israel, the 17 Neanderthal sites and 15 Homo sapiens sites show that as well as some cultural overlap, there may have been competition too.
Three of the Homo sapiens burials that were analyzed, with a double burial (A), a burial with a boar mandible (B) in green, and a burial with a deer antler (C) in red. (Been et al., L'Anthropologie, 2024) (請至原網頁觀看照片/圖片)
"We hypothesize that the growing frequency of burials by these two populations in western Asia is linked to the intensified competition for resources and space resulting from the arrival of these populations," write the researchers in their published paper.
The difference between intentionally buried bodies and bones that have been blanketed by the elements where they drop isn't always clear. The researchers looked for distinct skeleton positions, grave goods or markers, and evidence of digging to come to their conclusions.
They found that both Neanderthals and H. sapiens would bury people of any age, though infant deaths were more common with the Neanderthals. Both groups also included a variety of goods with the graves, including small stones, animal bones, or horns.
However, Neanderthals tended to bury their dead deeper in caves, whereas H. sapiens were buried in cave entrances or rock shelters. What's more, H. sapiens skeletons were usually in something like a fetal position, whereas Neanderthal skeletons were discovered in any one of a variety of arrangements.
The differences don't stop there either. Neanderthal burials made greater use of rocks – perhaps as rudimentary gravestones – while H. sapiens burials featured more decorative items, including ochre and shells, that the Neanderthals didn't include.
"While Neanderthals and Homo sapiens share many aspects of their material culture to the level that they cannot be distinguished, when it comes to burials the picture is more complicated," write the researchers.
While there would've been some population pressure during the Middle Paleolithic, with both groups of hominins arriving in the Levant at similar times, the researchers think that only partly explains the sudden introduction of burials.
It's also worth noting that after the Neanderthals went extinct around 50,000 years ago, human burials seemed to stop in this part of the world for tens of thousands of years – another intriguing data point worth investigating further.
"The next burial outbreak in the Levant appeared at the end of the Paleolithic era, accompanying the early sedentary society and the last hunter-gatherers – the Natufians," write the researchers.
The research has been published in L'Anthropologie.
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用餐文化：TGI Fridays 的起與落 -- Emily Heil
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這是「文化」影響和決定「經濟活動」的案例(該欄2024/11/02 12:22)。此外，作者生動的文筆也很值得欣賞。
For nearly 60 years, TGI Fridays sold fun. The party may soon be over.
Emily Heil, 11/02/24
For nearly 60 years, TGI Fridays sold fun. The party may soon be over.
At TGI Fridays, the proposition has always been clear: When you arrive at any of the chain’s locations, you are there not just for the loaded potato skins or bourbon-sauced steaks or candy-colored cocktails, but for something more elemental: fun. For more than a half century, the brand has offered customers refuge in a place that exists perpetually in that moment after the final school buzzer sounds or the laptop is snapped shut or the shift is clocked.
The decor sets the kick-up-your-heels tone: Every Fridays location features walls loaded with a pastiche of kitschy objects, from trophy fish to salvaged street signs, evoking the aesthetic of mid- to late-20th century suburban family rec rooms. In those basement lairs, novelty lamps and neon beer signs and maybe an arcade game in the corner signified that this was nothing like that uptight living room upstairs. Here, they said, we let our hair down.
That’s the TGI Friday’s ethos - or what’s left of it. Over the last week, the chain has closed at least 50 outposts. (The company did not respond to emails asking for details, but its website’s store locator lists 163 locations, down from 213 listed last week.) It closed dozens more earlier this year. A possible bankruptcy looms. Last month, Bloomberg reported that the chain is preparing for a Chapter 11 filing, and experts say it might be looking to shutter unprofitable locations and emerge with a smaller footprint.
So what happened? Well, diners apparently stopped wanting dinner to be fun. Or at least their idea of fun changed.
Younger customers just aren’t looking for the same kind of experience that casual-dining chains offer, notes Alex Susskind, director of Cornell’s Institute for Food and Beverage Management. “They’re the touch-tech generation, where they’re pressing some buttons on Grubhub and it’s showing up at their door,” he said. “Going to a restaurant and having a server serve them or a bartender mix a drink in front of them is just not something that’s attractive.”
Jonathan Maze, editor in chief of the trade publication Restaurant Business, agrees. “They’re not going out and eating and drinking with their friends as much as they used to - if they’re drinking at all,” he said. “They’re probably more likely eating delivery food.”
Of course, TGI Friday’s isn’t alone in this decidedly un-fun malaise. Fellow chains Red Lobster and Buca Di Beppo have declared bankruptcy, and Denny’s is reportedly planning a wave of closures. Changing customer tastes are only part of the perfect storm of problems that have plagued them, experts say.
Cash-strapped customers are increasingly turning to fast-casual options such as Chipotle for quick meals. And those with the means to splurge on a night out aren’t drawn to traditional casual dining chains, he notes. (Chili’s is one brand that has bucked the decline by offering a combination of budget-friendly deals and smart marketing.) “The people that have the resources in an environment like this are going out and having a good time,” Maze said. “But a lot of them are not going to necessarily go to TGI Fridays to do that.”
The entire Fridays vibe goes against prevailing dining trends. At many chains, character is out and sleekness reigns. Take Pizza Hut, which over the years has shed its Tiffany-style lamps, red-checked tablecloths and well-known rooflines for clean lines and glinting metal chairs. Buca Di Beppo represented the peak of kooky chain-restaurant decor, and before its bankruptcy, executives had toned down the wackiest bits.
At Fridays, boozy drinks remain a signature, despite modern tastes tacking toward lighter drinks. The 1988 movie “Cocktail,” in which Tom Cruise plays a struggling business school student who finds success in the razzle-dazzle world of “flair” cocktailing, filmed scenes in a TGI Fridays; a bartender from the chain helped Cruise train his bottle-flipping skills. Company lore has it that the high-octane Long Island iced tea was invented there.
Even now, the full-page menu boasts concoctions including a Henny Hurricane, a Dragon Fruit Margarita and a Fridays Original Lit Long Island Tea. While many restaurants are leaning into nonalcoholic offerings, Fridays lists only one booze-free cocktail, the 4-Citrus Mock-arita.
At a recent visit to a Fridays in suburban Maryland, the party atmosphere still seemed to thrive in the bar, where the Caps game was drawing hoots and cheers and people who were either regulars (or just really friendly) greeted one another with fist bumps. But the dining room where we were seated felt too cavernous to be festive, and the R&B soundtrack seemed to bounce around the empty tables.
My husband and I settled into a booth and ordered the loaded potato skins, a dish the chain has previously claimed credit for inventing. (Like with many foods, its origins aren’t clear, and others, including Washington’s Prime Rib steak house, have also insisted on their own parentage of the spuds.) Even without the benefit of nostalgia - I don’t recall ever going to a TGI Fridays growing up - I’m an instant fan. What’s not to like about puffy potatoes in crispy shells covered in gooey cheddar and bacon? They’re a welcome accompaniment to my slightly sweet margarita, which I’ve ordered instead of the Long Island iced tea. I knew I should try the restaurant’s classic libation, but I was intimidated by the too-heady swirl of vodka, rum, gin, triple sec and Coke; it was a school night, and I had notes to take.
In the end, I didn’t have much to scribble; the rest of the meal was forgettable. Which is fine! And not the point really. In fact, I’d probably even reorder the sirloin steak with garlic-butter sauce the next time I found myself hangry at a strip mall, if the place is still around. The prices (sample: $24.19 for that steak and two sides, $11.59 for the potato skins) were reasonable, particularly in this era of eye-popping restaurant bills.
The relatively empty dining room, though, kept things from feeling festive - and it might be an indication of another of the chain’s problems. Large properties, the kind that used to seat 200 or 300 guests, mean big rent checks or high property taxes if the restaurant or its franchisees own the buildings. “They have a business model that was based on people being in their restaurants and spending money on food and alcohol, and now, basically half of that business is probably gone,” Susskind said. “That’s a conservative estimate.”
Good times, though, are in the Fridays DNA. The first location of what would later become the massive chain opened in New York City’s Upper East Side in 1965, as a pioneering kind of establishment called a “singles bar,” with original owner Alan Stillman claiming that he founded the place to meet the stewardesses and models who lived in his neighborhood. At the time, there were few places where men and women could gather: Such hot spots as P.J. Clarke’s were for crowds of post-work guys in suits. TGI Fridays, along with a handful of other new mingle-markets, represented a bona fide cultural moment.
As Stillman began opening outposts around the country, the chain eventually expanded its idea of a good time, shifting its marketing in the late 1980s to appeal more to family dining. It eventually grew to more than 850 locations, including overseas, with outposts opening from Paris to Beijing to Moscow. The number of U.S. locations stood at 269 by the end of last year, according to data by Technomic. The chain has changed ownership hands several times, and is currently owned by the private equity firm TriArtisan Capital Advisors.
Over the years, the perception of TGI Fridays might be best tracked in its fictional, pop-culture avatars. By the late 1990s, the cool, neon-lit version portrayed in “Cocktail” had given way to the iteration that appeared in the 1999 movie “Office Space,” a send-up of soul-crushing workplaces. In it, Jennifer Aniston plays a waitress at “Chotchkie’s,” a chain where servers sport green-striped uniforms (similar to Fridays’ red ones) and are forced to show their enthusiasm for the job by sporting excessive “flair” pins on their suspenders. And the raunchy, wildly dated 2005 Ryan Reynolds movie “Waiting” centered on a gang of servers at “ShenaniganZ,” a brass-rail-and-fern-lined copy of Fridays. By then, the forced-fun vibe no longer seemed actually fun for anyone, including the sneering staff.
Still, in the real-life locations still left open, including the one in Maryland that I visited, the party is still rolling, as long as the lights are on, for whoever still wants to hang. There, as at most locations, a red neon sign over the door still beams the fading chain’s hopeful, and increasingly unappealing, plea: “In Here, It’s Always Friday.”
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《現代性的左傾盲動化》小評
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「現代性」通常是哲學或社會學這兩個領域的議題(該欄主文--9之6)；但馬霍尼教授的意旨近於「文化批評」(本欄上一篇貼文)，和梅克格拉教的調調異曲同工(本欄第2篇貼文)；所以放在此欄。
這是另一位保守派學者的「大作」。他的功力看來在梅克格拉教授之上；但跟後者一樣(本欄2024/05/13貼文)，馬霍尼教授或者有認知障礙，或者言不及義，或者言不由衷 (該文附註5)。總之，兩位不過是彌爾所說的sincere bigot (該文2.1-2)小節)；或者拿到博士學位的Archie Bunker。
中文標題所用「左傾盲動」一詞，賣弄和揶揄兼而有之。暫時寫到這裏，以後有空再多說幾句。
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現代性的左傾盲動化 -- Daniel J. Mahoney
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請參見下一篇《小評》。
索引：
agitprop：(尤指透過戲劇、藝術、書籍等進行的)政治性宣傳或煽動
DEI：多元共融
dysphoria：煩躁，失望，不滿
euthanasia：安樂死
invigorating：令人振奮的，加油打氣的
passé(法文)：落伍，老掉牙，(人或時尚)「過去式」
tethere：系繩，系鏈；界限，範圍栓；束縛，限制；此處：結合，掛勾
verisimilitude：逼真，跟真的一樣，看起來像真的；此處：近於，接近
Voegelin, Eric：美國頗負盛名的政治哲學家
The Shipwreck of Modernity
Daniel J. Mahoney, 05/10/24
We must recover the moral foundations of democracy.
It was commonplace during the long Cold War for conservatives and the more classical of classical liberals to make a firm distinction, at once conceptual and practical, between “liberal democracy” and “totalitarian democracy”; between moderate modernity and what Eric Voegelin called “modernity without restraint” in the final pages of his classic 1952 book The New Science of Politics. With much truth, the Jacobins, Bolsheviks, and Nazis were placed on one side, godless, murderous, and contemptuous of moral and political constraints as they were; and on the other side, we had the noble principles of the American Founding and what Alexis de Tocqueville called “liberty under God and the laws.”
In this understanding of things, Anglo-American democracy, the remarkably sober and decent politics of “the English-speaking peoples” as Winston Churchill famously called them, represented that non-ideological current of modernity that remained faithful, however imperfectly, to constitutionalism, common sense, moral decency and the living embers of classical and Christian wisdom. If rights had priority, duties were not forgotten. The American Revolution inaugurated no splenetic “Year Zero” as the French Revolution did, no frenzied war against the Christian religion or the broader Western civilizational inheritance, no misplaced effort to fundamentally remake human nature. The English-speaking peoples embodied that rarest of things, modernity with restraint, natural rights tethered to natural law, invigorating principle to sound prudence, material progress to a proper sense of limits and a well-grounded suspicion of utopian delusions. As Leo Strauss so suggestively said in his 1941 talk on “German Nihilism” at the New School For Social Research, the English, more than any people in continental Europe, had the great good sense to interpret their version of moderate modern liberty in continuity with older traditions of constitutionalism and civilized restraint. They refused, he said, to “throw the baby out with the bath.” And Americans largely followed but with rather less overt “classicism.”
For the longest time, one could thus confidently state that the Anglo-American sphere was immune to full-scale ideological politics and to the kind of moral subversion and facile nihilism preferred by continental intellectuals, great and small. Common sense seemingly reigned supreme, and religion still informed the exercise of individual freedom. Tocqueville’s account of American democracy—grounded in law, vigorous civic and associational life, and sound mores—still had remarkable verisimilitude. Americans still admired the Founding Fathers and statues of them had not yet been toppled.
But that “exceptionalism” is now largely a thing of the past and was much more vulnerable to assault than many of us suspected. The old liberalism has been replaced by emancipatory politics and liberty has been confused with a project for complete “liberation” from all limits and restraints. Natural rights, still informed by moral conscience and customary morality, by common sense and a recognition that some things are right and wrong “by nature,” has given way to ill-defined “human rights.” These new rights know no limits whether rooted in nature or tradition or the civic common good. They are thus largely immune to political debate and discussion. Abortion-on-demand has been sacralized by the progressive-minded and is seen by them as a “positive good” of the first order, like slavery with the southern slavocrats of old. Western democracies, from Belgium and Canada to France, compete to legalize and liberalize euthanasia, betraying the primordial task of the medical art “to do no harm” and showing open contempt for the sacred commandment “not to kill,” that is to murder, whatever the excuse or extenuating circumstance.
In this new moral and political dispensation, patriotism is passé, and the young are taught to be “citizens of the world” (whatever that means). At the same time, a fevered obsession with “race” and “gender” poisons common life and the relations between men and women. Sexual dysphoria is endemic and young women (in particular) suffer from unprecedented levels of anxiety and depression as a result. A cult of unrelieved victimization makes almost everyone whiny and resentful when they are not violent and aggressive.
In addition, student activists and academics (and the nearly the whole of the left-wing of the Democratic party) enthusiastically identify with the totalitarian Islamism and genocidal ideology of Hamas and give way to a hatred of Israel and Jews that is tied to their loathing of the Western world. In the academic world, “postcolonial discourse”—at once naïve, ignorant, and fanatical—assumes that peaceful, ecologically-minded “indigenous peoples” have everywhere been robbed of their birthright. But as Gene Callahan recently pointed out at Modern Age, there are no peoples who are simply “indigenous peoples” since conquest and settlement, peaceful or warlike, is inherent in the human economy of things. It is, alas, built into human nature and international life, it is how the world works. And indigenous peoples are hardly models of moral decorum, to say the least. As Leo Strauss wrote in 1942, a prudent and civilized human being should readily be able to tell the difference between “the tolerably decent imperialism of the Anglo-Saxon brand and the intolerably indecent imperialism of the Axis brand.” George Orwell chastised Gandhi in 1949 for failing to make that absolutely necessary distinction (see “Reflections on Gandhi,” one of his very last essays). And this from the fiercely anti-imperialist author of Burmese Days (1934).
Authentic liberal and civic education ought to prepare serious men and women for making precisely such distinctions. But such education, rare in any time or place, is on life-support today. Let us hope that the promising new institutes of “Civic Thought” that are being established in state universities in various red and purple states might make a dent in the massive replacement of true political and historical education by ideological agitprop of the most fanatical kind. We have nowhere to go but up.
On top of this galloping march of the totalitarian impulse within once liberal currents of modernity, this open subversion of what not too long ago could justly be called liberal democracy, the very meaning of democracy is being redefined by progressive elites. One does not have to bury what is right and just in the American Founding or in the decent currents of moderate modernity, to recognize that decayed liberalism is complicit in this frontal assault on what is left of political common sense and what we have called modernity with restraint. The evidence is all around us: tyrannical “lawfare” criminalizing opposition to the woke regime and attempting to incarcerate a former president of the United States on the most spurious and frivolous grounds; “hate laws” that make it a crime to uphold the traditional family or to oppose the arbitrary constructions of LGBTQ++ ideology; ongoing efforts to make adherence to the racialist and discriminatory DEI regime a prerequisite for being hired at a university; the shameless “debanking” of prominent conservatives such as John Eastman; and the attempt to shut down the National Conservative Conference in Brussels last month, as if advocates of humane national loyalty are indistinguishable from skinheads and neo-Nazis.
All of this is evidence of a “creeping authoritarianism” inherent in contemporary liberalism itself, as John Gray suggests in a recent thought piece in The New Statesman. Gray argues, rightly in my view, that “the fundamental threat to freedom in the West comes not from Marxism, postmodernism or even the increasing sway of autocratic regimes in boardrooms and universities, but from within liberalism.” Gray adds that liberalism “has become a self-referential world-view that screens out forbidden truths.” It is a censorious “secular catechism, an exercise designed to banish other modes of thought.”
In light of the rise of a new authoritarianism/totalitarianism in the name of the “cultish programs” of the ecological and life-style Left, Gray recommends democracy as the proper response to the “hyper-liberal extremism” that has led to “the politicization of law and the hollowing out of politics” in the Western world. The defeat of a referendum in Ireland promising far-reaching additional assaults on traditional social arrangements is no doubt a promising development of democracy at work, as is the backlash against an absurd “Hate Law” in Scotland. In the United States, many rally to Donald Trump, that most imperfect of vehicles, because he rightly discerns a new and menacing coercive despotism where many establishment figures on the Right see politics as usual.
Freedom Conservatism (for all its good intentions) won’t do because it radically understates the need to restore and reinvigorate the crucial moral foundations of a once liberal order. Freedom without self-limitation and deference to the ends and purposes informing human freedom cannot begin to overcome the totalitarian impulse within contemporary hyper-liberalism. Democracy, in contrast, in the form of the revitalization of self-government, provides a very good start, indeed. But democracy will perish if the old common sense is not renewed by right reason, recta ratio as our forebears used to call it. We must become cognizant of the deep and abiding reasons for opposing the modernity without restraint which saps our souls of strength and empties our civic freedom of meaningful content. As Brad Littlejohn has recently written at World magazine, we can no longer rely on a “silent majority” partly (largely?) converted to materialism and a debased individualism. Hyper-liberalism openly wars with the idea of the Good itself, finding even in human nature itself an intolerable obstacle to a freedom that is collapsing into despotism and moral incoherence. That is where we are. To refuse to acknowledge our present circumstances is to bury one’s head in the sand, to abdicate our intellectual, moral, and civic responsibilities.
As we fight the good fight day by day, we must patiently, but vigorously, recover and renew the pediments and principles that undergird American liberty and Western civilization, rightly understand. That vital task lies before us.
Daniel J. Mahoney is a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute and professor emeritus at Assumption University. He has written widely on French politics and political thought and has also written extensively on Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and the moral grounds of opposition to totalitarianism. His latest books are The Statesman as Thinker: Portraits of Greatness, Courage, and Moderation and Recovering Politics, Civilization, and the Soul: Essays on Pierre Manent and Roger Scruton.
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「馬克斯主義文化論」和梅克格拉教授的批評
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0. 前言
梅克格拉教授對馬庫色和馬克斯主義文化觀的批評「文字」上還算平實(請見本欄第二篇貼文)；畢竟當過教授，公然罵街總不是個事兒。但他提及Bill此人的部份，我不敢說是虛構；不過，我相信它或者是「項莊舞劍」筆法，或者在反襯馬庫色不食人間煙火。這種放冷箭的文風算得上「戲劇化」了。
拙作《邱著《全球化下的紅綠政治實踐》讀後》中(本欄第3篇)，我在第3節的討論補充了梅克格拉教授對「美國勞工」的分析。關於「言行一致」的看法，則間接觸及到：「文化」(意識與思考)與「革命」的相關性。本文就「馬克斯主義文化論」和梅克格拉教授的筆法兩者略做評論。
1. 馬克斯主義文化論
1.1 馬克斯「革命理論」的困境
梅克格拉教授指出，馬庫色最初是個「行動馬克斯主義者」，後來卻轉型成為「馬克斯主義文化論」大師。這個「轉型」有他「不得不」的苦衷。說穿了，這個苦衷來自馬克斯的「革命理論」早就跟不上「時代」的變化。這一點可從上引我對「美國勞工」的了解，以及梅克格拉教授下面這段話來佐證：
“The longshoremen in San Pedro may have wanted more pay, better working conditions, and more medical benefits, but they did not want a destruction of the American way of life.
用馬克斯的術語來說，美國「勞工階級」的「社會存在」已經脫離了「無產階級」的貧窮和無助；她/他們早就過著有車、有房、有閒錢渡假的「小資產產階級」生活。從而，針對19世紀「勞工階級『社會存在』」所建構的(馬克斯)「革命理論」，自然不再叫座。
1.2 馬克斯「革命理論」的修正
格蘭西(1891 – 1937)已經發現馬克斯的「革命理論」不管用。於是他提出「宰制論述」來解釋(馬克斯「革命理論」)「不管用」的原因。但是，「解釋」很難導致「管用」；於是，馬庫色和法蘭克福學派諸大師提出「馬克斯主義文化論」。希望藉由對「資本主義文化」的批判，再度喚起並點燃「革命」的激情和聖火。
在我看來，1970年代後期興起的「『後現代』論述」，和格蘭西、馬庫色等都是一脈相傳的「馬克斯主義『修正論』」。請參考下面這段分析：
唸成「後現代」主義，它是批判社會的一種立場和策略(Lyotard, 1993，Best/Kellner, 1994)。大多數法蘭克福學派成員和「後現代」主義者，都師出馬克思主義。他們的不同在於：前者(如Habermas)認為「現代性」仍是實用的價值系統，後者(如Baudhillard、Lyotard)認為它已淪為當權集團悍衛既得利益的意識型態(比較81 - 12)。「後現代」主義者認為當代社會是資本主義制度下的一場惡夢(25)。但他們無法撼動資本主義的生產模式。到了20世紀50年代，西歐知識份子對共產制度的幻想終於完全破滅(26)，在鬥爭策略上需要新的出路，在意識型態上需要新的旗幟。「後現代」主義者採取了鬥倒鬥臭現代社會主流價值的策略，企圖從顛覆上層建築(78 - 11)下手，來瓦解資本主義制度。(《評《另類哲學：現代社會的後現代化》(9之6)》2.2-b.小節)
換句話說，正統馬克斯主義者或馬克斯主義基本教義派，在面對馬克斯「革命理論」窒礙難行的困境下，或者試圖解釋這個局面(何以窒礙難行？)；或者試圖提出另一個能激發「革命鬥志」的理論。可惜到目前為止，這個努力成效不彰。
1.3 馬克斯主義文化論的盲點
馬克斯主義文化論的盲點在於：奉馬克斯之名來建構文化論的學者們，忘了祖師爺「『社會存在』決定『意識』」的教訓。
如上面所說，當人們過著有車、有房、有閒錢渡假的生活後，她/他們不可能有打破現狀的需求和動力；反之，當有另一個群體(如少屬族群或新進移民)要跟她/他們分一杯羹，這些人會第一時間跳出來捍衛「現狀」。
馬庫色和「後現代」理論家的努力，即使能讓一般人了解到資本主義社會的上層建築是多麼的不堪，多麼的虛偽，多麼的壓抑、壓制、或讓人窒息，這些「覺悟」、「認知」、或「意識」是不可能讓有車、有房、有閒錢渡假的人走上街頭；當然更不可能鼓動她/他們去賣命。
1.4 左翼怎麼辦？
馬克思206歲誕辰剛過，「左翼論壇」舉辦了紀念會；我因為年紀大了，體力日衰，沒有能躬逢其盛。但我對其中「左翼怎麼辦？」這個討論議題有些興趣，借這個機會略表淺見。
參加11/18的「反對以巴戰爭抗議行動」後，由於人數、聲勢等各方面都顯得蒼白無力，我曾有：「(這個狀況跟)缺乏左翼思想家後起之秀的理念宣揚，導致一般大眾，特別是年輕人的「社會意識」薄弱，也有一定程度的關係」的感概。
因此，就「左翼怎麼辦？」這個問題來說，我的看法是：
1) 放棄馬克斯的「革命理論」，如「無產者在這個革命中失去的只是鎖鏈。他們獲得的將是整個世界」這種話。原因很簡單，因為在開發中國家或已開發國家，勞工身上根本沒有「鎖鏈」。
2) 確實掌握「批判/顛覆『上層建築』」不可能撼動「下層建築」這個原則。
3) 建構一個符合21世紀勞工/低階層群體「社會存在」的「革命理論」。
2. 梅克格拉教授的論述
梅克格拉教授的立場很顯然是站在既得利益階層發言。這當然無可厚非。在「言論自由」這個原則外，任何人都有維護自己利益的「權利」。
我要批評和譴責的是他在最後一段中的文字：
According to Critical Theory, we white folk are supposed to have something called “white privilege.” In my personal experience, I’ve seen special privileges granted to people because they were not white, but I’ve never received special consideration because I am white.
任何一個有大學教育程度的人都知道：當我們用「特權」一詞時，它有兩個層級的意義。一是「個人」的特權；一是「群體」的特權。
生活在美國社會中，否認「白人」(做為和「黑人」或其他少數族群相對的群體)具有「特權」，是毫無羞恥感的公然說謊。也是沙垂所說bad faith的典範。
3. 結論
1) 梅克格拉教授對馬庫色和馬克斯主義文化觀的批評，有他中肯之處。
2) 梅克格拉教授整篇大作顯出美國一般「大學教授」的水準，也就不過跟賣中古車者一個檔次。
3) 左派人士需要建構新的，符合當前現實情況的革命理論和/或批判論述。
後記：
1967是我到美國那一年。學長兼樓友滌清兄甚為博聞，他當時訂閱了《時代週刊》和星期天的《費城詢問報》。我忘了是從滌清兄處或這兩份媒體上，第一次得知馬庫色其人。如梅克格拉教授大作所說，當時馬庫色和馬克斯、毛澤東並列「3 M」；可謂大名鼎鼎。
1972年我到加州並進入高科技產業混飯吃。開始工程師生涯和穩定的生活；也就有閒錢和餘暇逛逛書店。不過，我書架上60%以上的書來自美國一些校園附近的舊書攤。《單向度的人》是我1974年在史丹福大學書店買的。它和一些馬克斯著作是我接觸「社會分析」論述的開始；也是我受到左派觀點和思考方向洗禮的啟蒙書籍。
很久沒有看到學者提到馬庫色和《單向度的人》；讀了梅克格拉教授這篇文章，不免想起四、五十年前讀書、逛書店、到各個校園圖書館K書的往事；略誌數語以懷舊。
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