Paradox and Dialectic in Cultural Knowledge Systems

Abstract

This chapter explores the Kantian antinomies and the knowledge systems that develop out of them, then turns to antinomies that are not rationally construed, but embedded in cultural knowledge systems, like kinship. The example given is the case of the kinship system of south India, which pits different modes of solidarity against each other while insisting that both should exist as ends toward which the system should progress. The result is an analysis of antinomies as robust and powerful creators of knowledge systems by showing that knowledge systems are deeply paradoxical, and develop as dialectical structures in pursuit of resolutions that can never be achieved.