Conflicts

 

Conflicts

The current headlining focus on Ukraine and Russia is perhaps the biggest link in what amounts to a chain of conflicts—turmoils in various situations in the Middle East, in Africa, and elsewhere. Some of these situations involve full scale wars, others are perhaps less dire but may still involve disastrous living conditions for the people caught up in them.

The situations that lead to violent conflicts vary. Causes include territory, natural resources, water. Very often colonialist or neo-colonialist interests are at the heart of the problem.

Both globally and locally the concept of freedom or liberty is involved in such struggles, and this relates to power. For freedom is not only an abstraction but “effective power to do specific things,” in the words of John Dewey.*

In “The problem of freedom” the philosopher encourages us to look at the matter in the context of culture, “a state of interaction of many factors.”

It was important to Dewey not to isolate any one notion in the conversation, and I bring this up here because in spite of the vast number of texts being published on the current crisis I believe his words still resonate: “The fundamental postulate of the discussion is that isolation of any one factor, no matter how strong its workings at a given time, is fatal to understanding and to intelligent action.” 

I offer this short comment in the belief that violent conflict is not the answer to the problem.

* Cited in Robert B. Westbrook, John Dewey and American Democracy, p. 435 (paperback).

Repetition

 

Repetition and its importance, physically, mentally. From birth onward. The importance of the calendar in human activities makes it impossible not to reconsider repetition. But I’ve returned to it, in this case, with thoughts about the celebration of world days, centennials, and the like. Specifically, the literary side of 2022 as the centenary of  book publications, certainly a high point of Anglophone Modernism. Woolf, Joyce, Eliot, in reverse alphabetical order, published Jacob’s Room, Ulysses, The Waste Land in 1922, three years after the peace accord to the First World War was signed. But these are only three of the events that happened 100 years ago. And, as indicated, I’ve mentioned only a specific temporal and linguistic category. Specific dates: JR: 26 October 1922. TWL: October 1922. U: 2 February 1922 (previously serialized in The Little Review, March 1918-December 1920.

New shoes

 

Planning rural trips again. The weather is still cold but for the most part the days are sunny. And the pandemic seems to be diminishing just now. So maybe it’s time to go out and hike to keep warm. In any case I’ve bought a new pair of hiking shoes in hopes of doing some trail walking soon. Meanwhile preparing a text on Virginia Woolf for publication.