Achieving Our Country
Encyclopedia
Achieving Our Country: Leftist Thought in Twentieth-Century America is a book by American
philosopher Richard Rorty
. In this book, Rorty differentiates between what he sees as the two sides of the Left
, a critical Left and a progressive Left. He criticizes the critical Left, which is
exemplified by post-structuralists such as Michel Foucault
and post-modernists such as Jean-François Lyotard
. Although these intellectuals make insightful claims about the ills of society, Rorty holds
that they provide no alternatives and even present progress as problematic at times. On the other hand, the progressive Left, exemplified for Rorty by John Dewey
, makes progress its priority in its goal of "achieving our country." Rorty sees the progressive Left as acting in the philosophical spirit of pragmatism
.
. It consists of expanded versions of the three lectures, two appendices ("Movements and Campaigns", "The Inspirational Value of Great Works of Literature") as well as the notes, acknowledgements, and index.
and towards the end of the twentieth century, art and for Rorty literature in particular are not cultivating a form of national pride and hence are affecting politics: "Competition for political leadership is in part a competition between differing stories about a nation's self-identity, and between differing symbols of its greatness.
Rorty singles out Snow Crash
and Leslie Marmon Silko
's Almanac of the Dead
as modern works that serve as exemplars of the second of two predominant narratives, a rejection of national pride with "tones either of self-mockery or of self-disgust" (the other narrative is a "simple-minded militaristic chauvinism"). The rejection of national pride is fundamentally weakening and dispiriting:
The second narrative is equally dispiriting but for a different reason; Leftist literature often focuses on what
is wrong with America and where there is hypocrisy and actions at odds with avowed ideals, so "When young intellectuals watch John Wayne
war movies after reading Heidegger
, Foucault
, Stephenson
, or Silko, they often become convinced that they live in a violent, inhuman, corrupt country...this insight does not move them to formulate a legislative program, to join a political movement, or to share in a national hope. Rorty contrasts the named novels with the socialist novels of the early 1900s - The Jungle
, An American Tragedy
, The Grapes of Wrath
etc.
The essential theme to those novels is that America is not yet achieved, that "the tone of the Gettysburg Address
was absolutely right, but that our country would have to transform itself in order to fulfill Lincoln
's hopes.".
Rorty quotes approvingly Walt Whitman
's
Democratic Vistas
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~Hyper/Whitman/vistas/vistas.html: "'democracy' is a great word, whose history...remains unwritten, because that history has yet to be enacted." This theme is consistent to the Left and is where Rorty derives the title: "The Left, by definition, is the party of hope. It insists our nation remains unachieved." Whitman and John Dewey
are essential to his discussion because he identifies them as crucial to developing the mythology of an unachieved America which was "ubiquitous on the
American Left prior to the Vietnam War."
Their contribution is a
pragmatic
twist on Hegel
and Hegelianism
, in which America is eventually a glorious synthesis of all the opposed civilizations and ideas mingling in a democracy. This philosophy
undergirds the old Left's view. The context understood, Rorty promises to contrast "the Deweyan, pragmatic, participatory Left as it existed prior to the Vietnam War and the spectatorial Left which has taken its place."
as Stolz auf unser Land: die amerikanische Linke und der Patriotismus (ISBN 3-518-58275-5) , and translated into Japanese
by Teruhiko Ozawa and published in Kyoto
by Koyoshobo as Amerika mikan no purojekuto: nijuseiki amerika ni okeru sayoku shiso (ISBN 4-771-01199-0). A Dutch translation was published by Boom in 2001 as De voltooiing van Amerika (which translates as The completion of America), (ISBN 9789053524756).
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
philosopher Richard Rorty
Richard Rorty
Richard McKay Rorty was an American philosopher. He had a long and diverse academic career, including positions as Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Princeton, Kenan Professor of Humanities at the University of Virginia, and Professor of Comparative Literature at Stanford University...
. In this book, Rorty differentiates between what he sees as the two sides of the Left
Left-wing politics
In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...
, a critical Left and a progressive Left. He criticizes the critical Left, which is
exemplified by post-structuralists such as Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault , born Paul-Michel Foucault , was a French philosopher, social theorist and historian of ideas...
and post-modernists such as Jean-François Lyotard
Jean-François Lyotard
Jean-François Lyotard was a French philosopher and literary theorist. He is well known for his articulation of postmodernism after the late 1970s and the analysis of the impact of postmodernity on the human condition...
. Although these intellectuals make insightful claims about the ills of society, Rorty holds
that they provide no alternatives and even present progress as problematic at times. On the other hand, the progressive Left, exemplified for Rorty by John Dewey
John Dewey
John Dewey was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. Dewey was an important early developer of the philosophy of pragmatism and one of the founders of functional psychology...
, makes progress its priority in its goal of "achieving our country." Rorty sees the progressive Left as acting in the philosophical spirit of pragmatism
Pragmatism
Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition centered on the linking of practice and theory. It describes a process where theory is extracted from practice, and applied back to practice to form what is called intelligent practice...
.
Contents
Achieving Our Country is an adaptation of lectures Rorty gave at Harvard UniversityHarvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
. It consists of expanded versions of the three lectures, two appendices ("Movements and Campaigns", "The Inspirational Value of Great Works of Literature") as well as the notes, acknowledgements, and index.
"American National Pride: Whitman and Dewey"
Rorty begins by arguing the case for "national pride"; having pride in a nation motivates people to seek to improve their nation - one must feel emotion of some sort But in recent times, such as after the Vietnam WarVietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
and towards the end of the twentieth century, art and for Rorty literature in particular are not cultivating a form of national pride and hence are affecting politics: "Competition for political leadership is in part a competition between differing stories about a nation's self-identity, and between differing symbols of its greatness.
Rorty singles out Snow Crash
Snow Crash
Snow Crash is Neal Stephenson's third novel, published in 1992. Like many of Stephenson's other novels it covers history, linguistics, anthropology, archaeology, religion, computer science, politics, cryptography, memetics, and philosophy....
and Leslie Marmon Silko
Leslie Marmon Silko
Leslie Marmon Silko is a Native American writer of the Laguna Pueblo tribe, and one of the key figures in the second wave of what Kenneth Lincoln has called the Native American Renaissance...
's Almanac of the Dead
Almanac of the Dead
Almanac of the Dead is a novel by Leslie Marmon Silko, first published in 1991.- Plot introduction :Almanac of the Dead takes place against the backdrop of the American Southwest and Central America. It follows the stories of dozens of major characters in a somewhat non-linear narrative format...
as modern works that serve as exemplars of the second of two predominant narratives, a rejection of national pride with "tones either of self-mockery or of self-disgust" (the other narrative is a "simple-minded militaristic chauvinism"). The rejection of national pride is fundamentally weakening and dispiriting:
"Novels like StephensonNeal StephensonNeal Town Stephenson is an American writer known for his works of speculative fiction.Difficult to categorize, his novels have been variously referred to as science fiction, historical fiction, cyberpunk, and postcyberpunk...
's, CondonRichard CondonRichard Thomas Condon was a prolific and popular American political novelist whose satiric works were generally presented in the form of thrillers or semi-thrillers...
's
The Manchurian CandidateThe Manchurian CandidateThe Manchurian Candidate , by Richard Condon, is a political thriller novel about the son of a prominent US political family who is brainwashed into being an unwitting assassin for the Communist Party....
, and PynchonThomas PynchonThomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...
's VinelandVinelandVineland is a 1990 novel by Thomas Pynchon, a postmodern fiction set in California, United States in 1984, the year of Ronald Reagan's re-election...
are novels not of social protest but rather of rueful acquiescence in the end of American hopes."
The second narrative is equally dispiriting but for a different reason; Leftist literature often focuses on what
is wrong with America and where there is hypocrisy and actions at odds with avowed ideals, so "When young intellectuals watch John Wayne
John Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
war movies after reading Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...
, Foucault
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault , born Paul-Michel Foucault , was a French philosopher, social theorist and historian of ideas...
, Stephenson
Neal Stephenson
Neal Town Stephenson is an American writer known for his works of speculative fiction.Difficult to categorize, his novels have been variously referred to as science fiction, historical fiction, cyberpunk, and postcyberpunk...
, or Silko, they often become convinced that they live in a violent, inhuman, corrupt country...this insight does not move them to formulate a legislative program, to join a political movement, or to share in a national hope. Rorty contrasts the named novels with the socialist novels of the early 1900s - The Jungle
The Jungle
The Jungle is a 1906 novel written by journalist Upton Sinclair. Sinclair wrote the novel with the intention of portraying the life of the immigrant in the United States, but readers were more concerned with the large portion of the book pertaining to the corruption of the American meatpacking...
, An American Tragedy
An American Tragedy
-Plot summary:The ambitious but immature Clyde Griffiths, raised by poor and devoutly religious parents who force him to participate in their street missionary work, is anxious to achieve better things. His troubles begin when he takes a job as a bellboy at a local hotel. The boys he meets are...
, The Grapes of Wrath
The Grapes of Wrath
The Grapes of Wrath is a novel published in 1939 and written by John Steinbeck, who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962....
etc.
The essential theme to those novels is that America is not yet achieved, that "the tone of the Gettysburg Address
Gettysburg Address
The Gettysburg Address is a speech by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and is one of the most well-known speeches in United States history. It was delivered by Lincoln during the American Civil War, on the afternoon of Thursday, November 19, 1863, at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery...
was absolutely right, but that our country would have to transform itself in order to fulfill Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
's hopes.".
Rorty quotes approvingly Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman
Walter "Walt" Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse...
's
Democratic Vistas
Democratic Vistas
Democratic Vistas is a major work of comparative politics and letters written by the American poet and author Walt Whitman. Walt Whitman does much to expound on the influence of the Louisiana Purchase and expansion on the American spirit, character, and body politic...
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~Hyper/Whitman/vistas/vistas.html: "'democracy' is a great word, whose history...remains unwritten, because that history has yet to be enacted." This theme is consistent to the Left and is where Rorty derives the title: "The Left, by definition, is the party of hope. It insists our nation remains unachieved." Whitman and John Dewey
John Dewey
John Dewey was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. Dewey was an important early developer of the philosophy of pragmatism and one of the founders of functional psychology...
are essential to his discussion because he identifies them as crucial to developing the mythology of an unachieved America which was "ubiquitous on the
American Left prior to the Vietnam War."
Their contribution is a
pragmatic
Pragmatism
Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition centered on the linking of practice and theory. It describes a process where theory is extracted from practice, and applied back to practice to form what is called intelligent practice...
twist on Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher, one of the creators of German Idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality as a whole revolutionized European philosophy and was an important precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.Hegel developed a comprehensive...
and Hegelianism
Hegelianism
Hegelianism is a collective term for schools of thought following or referring to G. W. F. Hegel's philosophy which can be summed up by the dictum that "the rational alone is real", which means that all reality is capable of being expressed in rational categories...
, in which America is eventually a glorious synthesis of all the opposed civilizations and ideas mingling in a democracy. This philosophy
undergirds the old Left's view. The context understood, Rorty promises to contrast "the Deweyan, pragmatic, participatory Left as it existed prior to the Vietnam War and the spectatorial Left which has taken its place."
Translation
It has been published in GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
as Stolz auf unser Land: die amerikanische Linke und der Patriotismus (ISBN 3-518-58275-5) , and translated into Japanese
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
by Teruhiko Ozawa and published in Kyoto
Kyoto
is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
by Koyoshobo as Amerika mikan no purojekuto: nijuseiki amerika ni okeru sayoku shiso (ISBN 4-771-01199-0). A Dutch translation was published by Boom in 2001 as De voltooiing van Amerika (which translates as The completion of America), (ISBN 9789053524756).