Abstract
We begin by synthesizing Karl Marx's historical periods qua modes of production with Michel Foucault's epistemological periodizations — epistemes, which we then combine with Fredric Jameson's work on ideologemes. Jameson's acknowledged weakness is a failure to address those positive if not utopian elements that might be instrumentally valuable for deconstructing or disassembling ideologemes in the course of historical progress. We then argue that such alternatives would be, ideally, concrete universals (具体的普遍), and would be both trans-epistemic and trans-historical. We then provide several reasons why it seems reasonable to search for the concrete universal par excellence within Chinese linguistic and philosophical traditions. For a number of reasons, including Walter Benjamin's ideation of the "dialectical image," we settle on the Chinese concept of harmony (和) as the ideal example. This brings us to an interesting point. It turns out that the ideologeme par excellence of the current official Chinese thought and propaganda is also 和. We argue this is no coincidence, and, it opens up a number of critical and positive discussions, particularly on the edge of the current episteme, i.e., when we are, arguably, on the edge of a new epistemic shift.
First Page
145
Last Page
164
Recommended Citation
Josef, Gregory Mahoney. 2013. "From "和" to There: Marxist Hermeneutics with Chinese Characteristics." Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art 33, (2): pp.145-164. https://tsla.researchcommons.org/journal/vol33/iss2/10
