Abstract
John Frow and Meaghan Morris offer two major criticisms of my approach to Australian multiculturalism as outlined in my essay The State of Shame: Australian Multiculturalism and the Crisis of Indigenous Citizenship (Critical Inquiry 24 [Winter 1998]: 575-610). They critique what they see as assumption on my part that the state can or should be viewed as a singular, unified, and intelligent agent and that the juridical branch shares an intentionality with the government (John Frow and Meaghan Morris, Two Laws: Response to Elizabeth Povinelli, Critical Inquiry 25 [Spring 1999]: 627). And they critique how I write off the multicultural project-or at least the certainty with which I supposedly do so (p. 627). Frow, Morris, and I could expend much critical energy arguing which institutions of liberal democratic nations are part of the state and which are not. For their part, Morris and Frow draw a recognizable liberal distinction between the functions and discourses of parliamentary and juridical institutions (the High Court is a judicial, not a political (let alone a 'critical') institution [p. 628]). As should be apparent from The State of Shame, I do not share this perspective, nor its critical social or analytical implications. In The State of Shame, as in other related essays, I presume that Australian citizens, inside and outside governments and courts, rely on and invoke a shared commonsense ground of meaning from which agreements and disagreements are made possible and sensible, in which juridical, governmental, and public (or private) debates
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.