Abstract
In the liberal tradition, self-respect is most often associated with Kantian moral philosophy, which suggests a focus on individual responsibility. While the individual plays a part in the development of his or her self-respect, so, too, do his or her environmental and cultural conditions. In this essay, I distinguish between conceptions of self-respect, especially those that focus on it as a duty to oneself, and having a "sense of one's own positive power," a Deweyan educational ideal. A sense of positive power is partly directed by the individual but is also clearly conditioned by the ways in which one's culture treats and reacts to one's efforts. Thus, a sense of positive power, as a concept, reveals the powerful role of one's wider culture in frustrating or enabling a vital element of personal growth necessary for justice. I test the distinction with respect to the difficult and harmful charge of "acting white," which concerns self-respect and the role of oppressive forces conditioning people's senses of their power in an unjust society.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 45-63 |
Number of pages | 19 |
Journal | Journal of Speculative Philosophy |
Volume | 30 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 2016 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© Copyright 2016 The Pennsylvania State University.
Keywords
- Acting white
- John dewey
- Justice
- Positive power
- Self-respect
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Philosophy