Can We Have a Conversation? Against Totalization and Toward a Dialogical Hermeneutics

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe 2016 election results have shocked many and given expression to deep and dangerous divides in our national fabric. In this paper, the author considers how the tendency toward totalization collapses complexities into binaries that inevitably stand in opposition to one another. The author illustrates how uncontained polarization leads to misunderstandings and ruptures that are in need of the transcendent function, which can hold complex realities and intense affects in creative tension. In the spirit of hermeneutic philosophers such as Hans-Georg Gadamer and Emmanuel Lévinas, the author suggests that if we are able to embody nondefensive relatedness, open and empathic presence, and other familiar stances embraced by contemporary psychoanalysts, there is hope for connection and conversation. He illustrates using his experience as an analyst-psychiatrist in a county jail system, where there are daily opportunities to step across divisions and into the difficult but crucial project of dialogical hermeneutics.