Utmaningen från andra berättelser: En studie om moraliskt omdöme, utvidgat tänkande och kritiskt reflekterande berättelser i dialogbaserad feministisk etik
2013 (Swedish)Doctoral thesis, monograph (Other academic)Alternative title
The Challenge from Other Stories : A Study on Moral Judgment, Enlarged Thought and Critically Refölecting Stories in Dialogue Based Feminist Ethics (English)
Abstract [en]
The present study has a threefold aim: First, the theoretical aim is to give a contribution to refinement of the theory of dialogue based feminist ethics, concerning the understanding of judgment and narration within such an ethics. The study also has an empirical aim, defined as to clarify what kind of knowledge, relevant to the moral judgment of an engaged outsider actor, can be received from dialogical interpretation and analysis of a limited selection of critically reflecting life stories. Third, a methodological aim is defined as to develop an approach to interpretation and analysis of reflecting life stories, which renders the storyteller visible as a reflecting moral subject, and makes the story accessible as a source of knowledge for the moral judgment of an engaged outsider actor.
The thesis combines philosophical reflection and argumentation, with a narrative-hermeneutic method for interpretation of life stories, relating the two to each other in a hermeneutic process. The theoretical reflection draws on Seyla Benhabibs theory of communicative ethics. A dialogue based model for moral justification and a likewise dialogue based model for political legitimacy are at the heart of this universalistic theory, although in combination with a conception of a narratively and hermeneutically constituted context sensitive moral judgment, based on Hannah Arendt’s concept “enlarged thought”.
In the reflection, this model is related to other feminist theorizing within the tradition of dialogue based feminist ethics, as found in the works of Iris M. Young, Georgia Warnke and Shari Stone-Mediatore. The empirical study draws on three critically reflecting life stories from Israeli-Palestinian women activists for a just peace. The methodology for interpretation and analysis that is worked out combines dialogical interpretation as presented in Arthur W. Frank’s socio-narratology with a method for structural analysis derived from Shari Stone-Mediatores theory of storytelling as an expression of political resistance struggle.
The results show that some stories drawing on marginalized experiences have a potential to stimulate further public debate through their capacity to enable a stereoscopic seeing, elucidating a tension between ideologically structured discourse and non-linguistic experience; implying that narrative-hermeneutic competence should be considered crucial for public debate.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, 2013. , p. 318
Series
Uppsala Studies in Social Ethics, ISSN 0346-6507 ; 42
Keywords [en]
ethics, feminism, feminist ethics, communicative ethics, dialogue based ethics, discourse ethics, deliberative democracy, public conversation, public deliberation, moral judgment, political judgment, enlarged thought, storytelling, narrative, narrative matrix, story image, critical perspective, enlarged thought-storytelling, marginalized experience, marginali
National Category
Religious Studies Philosophy, Ethics and Religion
Research subject
Research Profiles 2009-2020, Intercultural Studies
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:du-13460ISBN: 978-91-554-8737-9 (print)OAI: oai:DiVA.org:du-13460DiVA, id: diva2:677029
Public defence
2013-10-11, Ihre-salen (ENG 21-0011), Engelska parken, humanistiskt Centrum, Thunbergsvägen 3 L, Uppsala, 10:15 (Swedish)
Opponent
Supervisors
2013-12-092013-12-092021-11-12Bibliographically approved