Publication details
O změně osvětlení a zabarvení všech věcí: sociální konstrukce zkušeností
| Title in English | Toward a transfiguration of the world: the social construction of experience |
|---|---|
| Authors | |
| Year of publication | 1995 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Sociologický časopis |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| web | http://sreview.soc.cas.cz/upl/archiv/files/331_345SZALO.pdf |
| Field | Sociology, demography |
| Keywords | experience; discourse; gender; language |
| Description | The erosion of modern cultural authority is a characteristic feature of the contemporary post-modern condition. The emergence and dissemination of heretical discourses displace the apolitical self-evidence and universality of modern experience. This article attempts to depict recent cultural transfigurations of experience in three dimensions. Firstly, the erosion of modern political discourse suggests that history, progress, state, nation and society have lost their charisma of self-evidence. These cornerstones of modern political experience are disclosed as socially constructed imaginary totalisation. Secondly, the representation of gender as a social construct reveals the falsehood of essential human experience. Gender, as an example of otherness, shows that the construction of experience is closely linked to a power/knowledge nexus. Thirdly, Nietzsche s metaphor of language as a prison allows the role of discursive practices in the constitution of experience to be outlined. This article argues for a non-foundationalist perspective, which grasps the mediated character of experience, and accepts the condition of uncertainty produced by the play of ambiguity and power. |