ENL 142: Short Essay Submission 4

Equiano argues for the abolition of slavery by presenting the argument that if the English were to “civilize” the Africans then the English will have a new market to trade with. The benefits of abolition are described solely in terms of improved commerce: if Africans were left on their own continent, to multiply and thrive, and those people were taught the ways of the Europeans, then soon enough the whole continent would demand those European goods which would greatly increase the overall trade of Europe (especially that of England). Also, the African land supplies crops that could be traded to the Europeans, such as cotton and indigo, and these the Africans could trade, adding to the supply of the Europeans.

According to Equiano, this approach to the abolition of slavery is mutually advantageous to both the Europeans and the Africans. The Africans would no longer be subject to the “tortures, murder, and every other imaginable Barbary and iniquity” (234), and the Europeans would have an ample market, that would only grow as the populations of Africans increase. Equiano states that “A commercial intercourse with Africa opens an inexhaustible source of wealth to the manufacturing interests of Great Britain” (234), and he asserts that the British are not taking advantage of the market in the way it should be. Slavery is, then, contrary to the manufacturing ideals of England, and through abolition, the wealth of Africa would be shared with England and indeed, all of Europe.

His approach in justifying the abolition of slavery in this way seems very cold and heartless, especially from a man who spends the greater part of his narrative describing in great detail the atrocities of slavery, most of which he witnessed himself. This argument from a commercial perspective is lacking in the humanity that we would expect someone in his position to use. However, his narrative was written to prove that an African, educated in the ways of the English, could integrate into British society, and embrace their ways. By taking this pragmatic stance against slavery, he is showing that his loyalties are with the English, not with the Africans, and aligning himself with the interests of the English. In doing this, his skeptics might be more likely to give his narrative –and with it, his ideas regarding abolition—the consideration that they might otherwise dismiss as the rantings of an African who is bitter about his own captivity.

ENL 158B: "The Juxtaposition of History and Literature in Flight to Canada"

The Juxtaposition of History and Literature in Flight to Canada

The novel Flight to Canada by Ishmael Reed misrepresents history of the United States in such a way that the reader is left to wonder the purpose for such a distortion and though it seems comical at first, the purpose of the distortion is more than just for comic effect. The history of the slave trade in the United States is haunting to all the citizens of the country, especially to those of African origins. It has become the topic that no one likes to speak of, and yet no one wants to forget, and this awkward silence has cultivated generations of people who wonder how this sordid history has shaped the social identity of our country. Flight to Canada offers a new perspective on the history of the emancipation of slaves, one that allows us to laugh at our past, but also, through these gross historical errors, allows us to see how history and literature can be interchangeable: by rewriting the past in literature, the present and future history can be changed.

The novel opens with a poem, before the first chapter, titled “Flight to Canada.” It is a letter from a slave to his master giving an account of his escape, and the liberties the slave took with the master’s women, property, and money. However, the poem includes the description of an airplane trip that slaves, or anyone from 1865 for that matter, would have never experienced. The poem integrates what the reader knows as modern invention with the history of slavery with no subtlety, and in doing so, brings slavery into the modern age. Slavery is now made timeless and ageless by this novel, despite the modern ingenuity of aircraft flight and modern thought. The author of the poem still manages, however, to incite laughter at the “modern” slave owner, who we can imagine recoiling at the thought of his slave running away, then returning several times to cause mischief and steal his money while the master is out of town. The poem becomes the reader’s first introduction to this world that is a mixture of past and present realities, which at first seems absurd. The poem, as a letter, ends with a signature from its author: “Your boy Quickskill” (5) and the reader is left to assume that what is written in the poem is the truth of a slave’s narrative about his own escape from slavery. What we learn later, though, is that the poem is a fictional representation of history, exactly like the novel itself.

Literature plays an important role in documenting events as they happen, but literature also helps to shape the minds of the public as time puts distance between past and present. Fiction, though by definition a work of human imagination, can document history in ways that can be more suitable to future generations. “Fiction, you say? Where does fact begin and fiction leave off? Why does the perfectly rational, in its own time, often sound like mumbo-jumbo?” asks the narrator (10). This question is the central idea in Flight to Canada, because the novel puts no distinction between fact and fiction. History can only tell us the events of the past as they happened, but fiction can tell us, through abstractions, about the truths not documented by history. By leaving out the truth of the past in his novel, Reed is telling us something more substantial about our current interpretations of our history, how our ideas of right and wrong have changed, and how even history, with all its facts, can be turn out different from its original interpretation.

Literature is powerful in changing the interpretation of current events, and when those events pass into history. Quickskill tells 40’s at the end of chapter 12 that “words build the world and words can destroy the world” (81) and this is especially true for Quickskill. He was the “first one of Swille’s slaves to read, the first to write, and the first to run away” (14), so, it one can argue that it was words that gave Quickskill his freedom. However, it is those very same words that threaten his freedom, since it is his poem that ultimately leads Swille to his runaway slaves’ whereabouts. Quickskill, like his creator Reed, was “so much against slavery that he had begun to include prose and poetry in the same book, so that there would be no arbitrary boundaries between them” (88). The blending of the literary forms mirrors the blending of history with fiction, and both of these fusions take place with the use of words on paper. The ideas contained within the words give freedom to the author, whether the author is using a poem to earn the money to go to Canada, or the author is rewriting history itself to give a new interpretation to the history of slavery.

One example of a different interpretation of history is Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It is mentioned in several places over the course of the novel, and at the very beginning the narrator alleges:

She [Stowe] popularized the American novel and introduced it to Europe. Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Writing is strange, though. That story caught up with her. The story she “borrowed” from Josiah Henson. (8)

Stowe gained notoriety with her novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but the novel also paved the way for the emancipation of the slaves in the United States, as people who did not at first support the movement were inspired by its story. Her story narrates the life of a black slave, yet Stowe was white—the story she was telling was not hers to tell. She may not have plagiarized the story, but it was “borrowed,” not from one man, but from an entire race of people who lived the very story she was telling. History records her novel as being the key to swaying the masses to believe in emancipation and reserves for her an exalted place for influencing a generation to embrace this movement, but literature has the flexibility to see her as a villain: as a white woman who stole the story of one man who symbolized all black slaves.

This contrast between the interpretations of history and literature is an example of how history and literature influence each other to evolve the thoughts of society. Considering the following quote from chapter 13 of Flight to Canada:

Book titles tell the story. The original subtitle for Uncle Tom’s Cabin was “The Man Who Was a Thing”…Over one hundred years after the appearance of the Stowe book, The Man Who Cried I Am…was published. Quickskill thought of all the changes that would happen to make a “Thing” into an “I am.” Tons of paper. An Atlantic of blood. (82)

It is clear that history and literature are directly compared in Quickskill’s timeline of the book titles. A slave, in the novel, begins as nothing more than a “thing” but, over time, is finally given the liberty to use a pronoun, “I.” It took, not just history filled with blood, to supply this liberty, but paper in the form of books, novels, writing consisting of nothing more than words.

One of the best examples of fact and fiction fused together in the novel is the novel’s explanation of the assassination of Lincoln. According to the novel, the assassination is captured on television, with news reporters commenting on every gory detail of the death. Included with these details is a literary view of how history will see the event: “Booth, America’s first Romantic Assassin…leaping from the balcony, gracefully, beautifully, in slow motion” (103). This portrayal is more than just a recitation of facts of the death of a president—it is a prophecy of how history, at least in terms of his novel, will view this assassin. History will see both victim and perpetrator how literature portrays them in the role they are assigned: Booth as the “Romantic Assassin” (103) of “Lincoln, the American Christ” (11).

History and literature play an important role in shaping the how people view events, no matter how significant or insignificant they may seem at the time. Slavery, which was accepted and considered rational in the United States for a substantial amount of time, has evolved through the use of literature written by whites and blacks alike to form a new opinion. It started before Stowe, with her “borrowing” the story of the black man, but it continues today with many authors employing slavery to not only give depth to their own story, but to help build on the stories inspired by slavery. The juxtaposition of literature and history allows future generations to see events of the past more clearly, and to form opinions based on both the detailed account of the event and the literary interpretations of past and present. “Strange, history. Complicated, too. It will always be a mystery, history. New disclosures are as bizarre as the most bizarre fantasy” (8). Perhaps history, alone, is strange, and mysterious, too, but when we use literature to shed light on history we are given a more complete picture of where we have come from.

ENL 142: "Defining America: the Ideal and the Actual"

Defining America: the Ideal and the Actual

In comparing the works “Common Sense” by Thomas Paine and Letters from an American Farmer by J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur the reader is shown two sides of what is to become the United States: the ideal, and the actual. The contrast between these two is what helps to define early Americanism as shaped by what is was meant to be and what it actually was during the founding of this new country. It is Paine who set out to encourage what he felt was an inevitable independence from England to form a country founded on the natural rights of man, but is Crevecoeur who puts Paine’s idea of natural law into a practical application in society, through his narration of a ‘typical’ American farmer. Through both these works we see that that underlying theme is the desire for natural rights, but the interpretation of how these natural rights will maintain the virtuousness of America is what ultimately divides these two authors.

The idea of natural rights and natural law were not new ideas to the time. In fact, Paine’s conception of a government upon a “principle in nature” and “the simple voice of nature and of reason” echoed ideas that were put forth by John Locke (Paine 9). Locke’s political theories were quite popular during the American revolutionary period even with Thomas Jefferson, who later included these same ideas to form the basis of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Natural law is distinct from divine law in that it relies on man’s reason alone to determine laws, not divine command, and this distinction was important to recognize, especially since the King of English derived his power through the divine law of the Anglican Church. It is the king that resides at the heart of the complaints of the colonists, and the call for independence relies on this desire for guidance not based on divine law, but that is based on the laws natural world, and what man can reason.

England and her king are vilified with the claim that the laws of England were encroaching on American’s right to self-governance and open-market commerce. These rights, Paine argues, are natural because they are universal rights, of every man the world over:

The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind…The laying a Country desolate with Fire and Sword, declaring war against the natural rights of all Mankind, and extirpating the Defenders thereof from the Face of the Earth, is the Concern of every Man to whom Nature hath given the Power of feeling. (6)

Paine considers freedom of religion, property, and personal liberty to be staples of natural rights (43) and he believes that all men are naturally entitled to these things that are being stripped away by the aristocracy of England. He blames England for depriving America of the ability to give her people what they need, namely the freedom to set up a government, to practice religion freely, to trade in an open market, to have representation in a government they are being taxed by, and to have due course of the law to petition for those shortcomings of the English government. Each of these needs contribute to America’s dissatisfaction with belonging to the English nation, and Paine attempts to build a case for revolution based on these needs, and other sources of perceived injustice.

Paine then gives the reader an explanation of how a self-governing American republic would operate, putting special emphasis on the independence of the American nation. This independence is as natural as the laws, he claims, that will make her successful:

…there is something very absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island. In no instance hath nature made the satellite larger than its primary planet, and as to England and America, with respect to each other, reverses the common order of nature, it is evident they belong to different systems: England to Europe, America to itself. (28)

Robert A. Ferguson looks at the popular reaction to this new scope of government in his essay “The Commonalities of Common Sense” when he discusses the implications of this new, independent identity that Americans were considering for the first time:

The implications for Americans choosing between their king and their independence were mesmerizing. You could be fallen and naturally depraved and, thereby, subject to the crown under previous historical conceptions of identity, or you could find yourself to be socially integrated in your natural goodness and therefore, deserving of ever greater dimensions of freedom. (479)

Independence is more than just the absurd notions of a displaced Englishman trying to stir trouble in the American colonies. It is the statement of people who are rational enough to realize that they have rights beyond those given by the crown, and are willing to seize those rights through the unity of their stance as a country. “In short, Independence is the only BOND that can tye and keep us together. We shall then see our object, and our ears will be legally shut against the intriguing, as well, as a cruel enemy” (Paine 53).

Crevecoeur recognized America as the testing ground for several new theories of social order that were rising up from the people must like the farmer’s crops were raising from the soil. Elayne Rapping writes in her article “Theory and Experience in Crevecoeur’s America” that:

…agrarian democracy was an ideal social structure, for it allowed man to live in a middle state between primitive savagery and overly complex civilization…The American continent…was an ideal setting in which to bring the model to life; and so the establishment of a perfect society became an actual possibility for the first time in history. (708)

In the spirit of this seemingly perfect model of natural law, Crevecoeur’s third letter “What is an American?” presents this ideal nation built upon the very idealistic foundations that Paine proposes in his pamphlet. He brags of a nation that is “…the most perfect society now existing the world. Here man is free as he ought to be, nor is this pleasing equality so transitory as many others are” (67). As evidence, he describes a society “not composed…of great lords who possess everything and of a herd of people who have nothing,” which also lacks titles, having “no courts, no kings, no bishops, no ecclesiastical dominion,” and where “the rich and the poor are not so far removed from each other” (67).

Like Paine’s emphasis of natural law over divine law, Crevecoeur downplays the role of religion as a major force in the colonies. He describes a generational gap, where religious zeal is lost as the younger generations learn instead to embrace the “imperfect education” of a mixed-religious family (75). This is important to note from the text, because it is religious zeal that keeps most English tied to the crown, as the symbol of the Anglican religion. “James” is a perfect model for Paine’s new America, and he embodies all of the assumptions that one would have to make about a perfect American citizen. James is a working freeholder, who relies on his reason and industry to be a success. He has faith in human reason, and belief in simple and just laws based on the natural order of the world without zealous ties to a crushing religious influence (Rapping 709).

Despite the high hopes for these new ways of governance, there are subtle doubts expressed through the letters of James’ travels through the American landscape, especially in his letter “On Charles Town and Slavery.” This letter shows a perversion of the natural laws to the fullest extent:

…the poison of slavery, the fury of despotism, and the rage of the superstition are all combined against man! There only the few live and rule, whilst the many starve and utter ineffectual complaints; there human nature appears more debased, perhaps, than in the less favoured climates. (176)

Elayne Rapping extends this observation by pointing out that “Farmer James becomes confused and dismayed as he tries to interpret behavior in Charles Town in terms of his model…here reason, self-interest, and natural law lead to gross inequity and cruelty rather than peace, because human instinct is vicious instead of virtuous” (711). Instead of an ideal society built on natural laws, and reason, Crevecoeur shifts into a vision of humanity twisted into selfish, heartless individuals who are using a subservient race to keep their own in power.

It is realized with these later letters that the natural laws have the same flaws of those divine laws of Europe that Paine turns away from in “Common Sense.” The same individuality that is so revered in “Common Sense” is shown to be inadequate against the passions of man, which “must forever oppose his happiness” (Crevecoeur 174). In contrast to this call for independence is how Crevecoeur identifies that man “cannot live in solitude; he must belong to some community bound by some ties, however imperfect” (201). This skepticism of independence that Crevecoeur expresses does not necessarily mean that he intended America to throw down its weapon and succumb to British rule. Instead he is simple giving these new “Americans” a clearer portrait of the nation that they will have once they are independent, and he is proposing that independence from England should not mean independence among brethren: the very survival of America will rely on its own unity as a nation.

Both authors, as foreigners, show America from a perspective that would not otherwise be captured by an American-born citizen. They both are trying to create a better America, Paine through the use of propaganda to support his cause of independence, and Crevecoeur by pointing out the flaws in what was then a budding American culture. Natural rights as men are the focus of their writing because that is what they feel is lacking in the European strategies of government. Robert Ferguson explains Paine’s insight into American reasoning when he writes:

Paine, the disenchanted Englishman, knew what American colonials could never quite admit to themselves as imperial subjects in need of a useable past. He saw that a belief in monarchy was the mortal enemy of common sense in representative government and that it had to be answered directly. (480)

Even the name “Common Sense” implies that reliance on reason alone would lead the reader to the same conclusions that Paine is drawing from his rhetoric, and common sense would dictate that the rationality of man is more than adequate to maintain a healthy nation independent of the unnatural leadership of monarchy.

It is also of great significance that the authors of these works that help to shape the definition of an American, are themselves outsiders to the culture. As James says,

He is an American, who, leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds…Here individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of men, whose labours and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world.” (Crevecoeur 70)

The act of someone born on foreign soil, of foreign citizenship writing these words gives truth to the very meaning of them. It is the same with Paine: a European creating an acceptable definition of what it is to be an American only confirms that there is an acceptance of those who do not belong in Europe, and in not belonging they are themselves defining America.

This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe…In this extensive quarter of the globe, we forget the narrow limits…and claim our friendship on a larger scale; we claim brotherhood with every European Christian, and triumph in the generosity of the sentiment. (Paine 23)

Through the contrast of these two works a definition is generated of what it is to be an American in early America, and the definition comes not from what is said, but from what is not said. Paine wants to inspire Americans to take pride in the rare opportunity they have to found a country based on the natural rights of all men, and not on the divine right of one man as it is in a monarchy. In contrast, Crevecoeur shows the reality of such laws in action, and we realize that this natural law is not the ideal that it seems to be. What we are left with is what is in between the ideal and actual: man’s natural rights, with a government that has power enough to enforce the law, but also the reason and foresight to realize that founding a new nation is not easy and will not always be ideal, but the virtue that will come from the foundation will serve to create a great nation if it can become unified in its cause.

Works Cited

Crevecoeur, J. Hector St. John. Letters from an American Farmer. New York: Penguin Group (USA), 1986.
Ferguson, Robert A. “The Commonalities of Common Sense.” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, Vol. 57, No. 3 (Jul., 2000): 465-504. Published by: Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2674263.

Jefferson, Thomas. “The Declaration of Independence.” The U.S. National Archives & Records Administration. www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html.

Paine, Thomas. “Common Sense.” In Collected Writings, ed. Eric Foner. New York: Library of America, 1995.
Rapping, Elayne Antler. “ Theory and Experience in Crevecoeur’s America.” American Quarterly, Vol. 19, No. 4 (Winter, 1967): 707-718. Published by: The John Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2710897.

PHI 102: "Indexical Contextualism as a Solution to Dretske's 'Zoo Problem'"

Indexical Contextualism as a Solution to Dretske’s “Zoo Problem”

Epistemological contexualists argue that the variation of standards in knowledge is what guides an attributor to assign to a subject knowledge or ignorance. One example of this kind of variation in standards is Dretske’s “zoo case,” or an alternative case presented in class by Dr. Mattey of the people in different situations waiting in the airport for a flight. The similarity between both of these cases is that a subject is attributed knowledge in one context, and ignorance in another, with no changes in the situation of the subject, but changes in the context of the attributor. This unusual occurrence creates a lack of argument closure that undermines the original assessment of the attributor leading to a reassessment on the part of the attributor. This lack of closure lends itself to a solution found within indexical contextualism in that it is the context of attributor that confirms the knowledge or ignorance of the subject.

An example of this problem can be formed through a modification of a scenario given by Dr. G.J. Mattey early in the fall 2008 quarter in his epistemology course (PHI 102). In one discussion the question was raised as to whether or not one knows if an old car is a genuine antique, or if it is a car built from a kit to look like an antique, and, he argued, if one has not the training to identify the true antique cars from the new kit cars, then one may not say they “know.” To retool this scenario for the purpose of contextualism, suppose there is a museum of antiquated cars, and subject S is looking at one of the cars on display, and he reads a sign that says the car was built in the year 1945. An attributor A is looking on when S tells A that S knows that the car was built in 1945. S acquired this information, he tells A, by reading the sign on the wall next to the car stating that the car was built in 1945. A has evidence that S knows that p such that the sign was supplied by a reputable source (a museum), and S believes that the car was built during 1945 from some basic understanding of what cars built in that era look like. This casual scenario, context 1 at time 1 (C1 at T1), allows A to draw with some confidence the conclusion that S does, in fact, know that p (the car was built in 1945). This argument can be written:

A attributes knowledge to S at T1 in context C1, given the casual nature of this scenario.

To change the scenario such that the attributor A has a more pressing situation to consider may change the attribution for knowledge to ignorance on the part of subject S. Perhaps a camera crew walks over to A after S claims knowledge and tells him that if S is correct in his knowledge that the car was built in 1945, then A will win a million dollar prize. S is not told about this camera crew, and has no idea there is a contest going on in the museum. In this way, S’s context has not changed: he still believes that the car was built in 1945, and has based this belief on the sign posted in the museum. A’s context has changed with this information and A might then be even more willing to attribute knowledge to S in this scenario given his enthusiasm for winning a substantial prize. A is then told by the camera crew that several of the cars in the museum have been replaced with forgeries of antique cars built from kits, nearly indistinguishable from the antique cars they represent and none of the forgeries were built in 1945. A’s context has changed yet again and A must then decide if he is going to attribute knowledge or ignorance to subject S, and based on his correct choice will be awarded the prize money. A, in this less casual context, may be less likely to attribute knowledge to S simply based on the information that A has that some of the cars in the museum he now knows to be forgeries. Thus, we have the following propositions:

1. A at C1 believes that S knows at C1 (at T1) that the car in question was built in 1945.
2. A at C2 believes that S does not know in C2 that the car in question was not built in a year other than 1945.
3. A at C2 believes that S does not know in C2 that the car in question was built in the year 1945.

Given this change in circumstances, or context, it would seem that A has now the potential to change his original attribution of knowledge to ignorance, and would be justified in doing so, with the intention of winning the prize. Proposition one was correct in the context in which A attributed knowledge to S because he did not have evidence otherwise to attribute ignorance instead. In light of new evidence, A was then justified to attribute ignorance instead of knowledge to S, if he doubts S’s ability to distinguish antique cars from kit cars. This change in context leading to a new attribution is what causes problems in epistemology, which could be solved through indexical contextualism.

The indexical contextualist would argue that the word ‘knows’ is indexical, that is, the word ‘knows’ in one context (C1) is being used in a different way than in another context (C2). This seems to be a good solution to this problem of contextual difference that we see in this problem. If one views the word ‘knows’ as indexical then it makes sense that the word will mean one thing in one context and another thing in another context. As Steven Luper, from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, writes:

According to contexualists, whether it is correct for a judge to attribute knowledge to someone depends on that judge’s context, and the standards of knowledge differ from context to context…What passes for knowledge in ordinary contexts does not qualify for knowledge in contexts where heightened criteria apply (Luper).

It is A’s change in context, in the form of being monetarily inclined to make the correct decision in attributing knowledge or ignorance to subject S, that creates a problem with closure in the argument of whether or not S can be attributed knowledge. Contextualism can salvage closure by allowing the use of the word knows to change from context to context. Returning to our earlier problem, A was not wrong in C1, when he did not have anything at stake by attributing knowledge to S, despite his later evidence stating that some of the cars in the museum were forgeries. Since A did not have that evidence at the time he made the utterance, then at the time he made the utterance his attribution of knowledge was correct.

One solution that seems to work well in cases such as these is Stewart Cohen’s Indexical Contextualism. Cohen’s attempt to solve this problem holds that closure should be kept intact. To quote Mattey’s lecture notes: “Indexicality is certainly one way to generate sentences which express propositions which vary with the context of assertions,” and Mattey goes on to say “one way of expressing the indexical view is to think of ‘knows’ as an elliptical verb that contains a hidden parameter” (2008). For example Cohen argues that the word knows works like other indexical words in the language, for example the word “I.” When the sentence “I am hungry” is uttered by a person, the utterance at the moment it is uttered is true for the person making the utterance (as long as the person is making the utterance in sound mind, and not because the person is suffering from a mental condition or some other mental disturbance). This flexibility allows for the argument to draw closure from the propositions within the argument being evaluated at the same context, and drawing conclusions of knowledge from within those contexts. Mattey discusses how Cohen’s indexical contextualism attempts to salvage closure within his Philosophy 102 web notes:

Cohen holds that closure can be saved by allowing that the sense of ‘knows’ changes from context to context. Within the same context, closure holds, but when the context on the premise and the conclusion operate with a different sense of ‘know’ due to shifting contexts of attribution, there is no failure of closure (2008).

It is important to note the consistency being attained by looking at the antecedents and consequents of an argument in light of the same context, as pointed out in the above quotation. Take, for example, our case earlier, of the attributor and the subject in the car museum. It would be unlikely that any reasonable person would agree that A was incorrect at the time T1 in attributing knowledge to subject S. The evidence that was available to both the subject and to the attributor when he made the attribution of knowledge seemed, at that time and in that context, sufficient enough to warrant the attribution that S had knowledge of the car being built in 1945. It was only after the introduction of new relevant evidence that A’s knowledge attribution is then doubted, and A becomes unlikely to attribute knowledge to S, and even then would only be doing so under the context of a higher-stake situation in his favor (namely, monetary gain).

Based on this and other examples there does not seem to be a “fixed” standard of knowledge. Instead, knowledge is something that is determined by context, and we can accomplish this while still keeping closure intact through Cohen’s explanation of the indexical way that the word ‘knows’ works. Without a fixed standard of knowledge there is a flexibility in the truth and falsehood of sentences, as they are uttered by the subject and the attributor, and the context in which the sentence is uttered.

Works Cited

Luper, Steven, "The Epistemic Closure Principle", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), forthcoming URL = .

Mattey, G.J., “Contemporary Epistemology III: Language.” Version 1.1, November 9, 2008.

ENL 142: Short Essay Submission 3

Hunting in Letters from an American Farmer

Letter 3 from Letters from an American Farmer by Crevecoeur discusses the lives of the people who live in various types of climates across the Americas, from the sea to the more inland parts, and he discusses the customs of these people based on their surroundings. Farming is what the narrator, James, considers the most virtuous employment, and in contrast, hunting is what turns a farmer “bad.”  For example, on page 78 James says “our bad people are those who are half cultivators and half hunters; and the worst of them are those who have degenerated altogether into the hunting state.” In opposition to the bad and worse people are the farmers and cultivators of the land. He asserts the claim that plants, like man, grow abundantly and can provide ample subsistence with little to no use of hunting, so hunting is not only a wasteful use of time that could be used for agriculture, but also a needless waste of animal life.

At one point he directly compares men to the plants they cultivate, and the land that grows the plants:

Men are like plants; the goodness and flavor of the fruit proceeds from the peculiar soil and exposition in which they grow. We are nothing but what we derive from the air we breathe, the climate we inhabit, the government we obey, the system of religion we profess, and the nature of our employment (71).

By drawing this comparison the narrator not only puts man and plants on a closer plane of existence, but also implies that man, like plants, are only products of the environment that cultivate them. If a man grows up in an environment that relies on hunting, and hunting is inferior to agriculture, that man will grow somehow inferior in virtue to the man raised as a farmer. He goes on to say that:

By living near the woods, their actions are regulated by the wildness of the neighbourhood…this surrounding hostility immediately puts the gun into their hands; they watch these animals, they kill some; and thus by defending their property, they soon become professed hunters; this is the progress; once hunters, farewell to the plough (76).

Not only do they lose their virtue in becoming hunters, but, as implied by the last passage, once they begin hunting there is no going back.

There are also portions of the work that, one could argue, point to James’ objection to hunting because of the civility he sees in the animals around him, especially when compared to the uncivilized men who hunt them. For example, his description of birds gives them much credibility to the civility of their homes.

The astonishing art which all birds display in the construction of their nests…always make me ashamed of the slovenliness of our houses; their love to their dame, their incessant careful attention, and the peculiar songs they address to her while she tediously incubates their eggs, remind me of my duty could I ever forget it…in short, the whole economy of what we proudly call the brute creation is admirable in every circumstance (61-62).

In contrast, the civility of the people who live in the wildernesses is lacking in what James calls a “new set of manners:”

That new mode of life brings along with it a new set of manners, which I cannot easily describe. These new manners being grafted on the old stock produce a strange sort of lawless profligacy…The manners of the Indian natives are respectable compared with this European medley (77).

To conclude, Crevecoeur, through his narrator, James gives several reasons why hunting is inferior to farming, including comparing man to plants, and showing how the two can work cooperatively to sustain life, and that animals have an inherent civilized nature that is lost when subject to hunting my less civilized wild-men.

ENL 142: Short Essay Submission 2

The Female American by Unca Eliza Winkfield, page 121:

My next fear was for the poor Indians, who would come in the evening, and not finding me by the shore…would no doubt come upon the island, in search of me, and be taken for slaves. Nor might the evil stop thus; their country might be discovered, and probably invaded, and numbers of the people be carried away into slavery, and other injuries committed.

“The Most Remarkable and Strange State Situation and Appearance of Indian Tribes in the Great Continent” by Samuel Occam, page 58:

…when I come to look and view the nations of the World I can’t see that they [the Indians of America] are under Greater Curse than other nations…and when I come to Consider and See the Conduct of the Most Learned, Polite, and Rich Nations of the World, I find them to be the Most Tyrannical, Cruel, and inhuman oppressors, and their Fellow Creatures in the World, these make all the confusions and destructions among the Nations of the Whole World, they are the nations that enslave the poor Negroes in Such Barbarous manner, as out do the Savage Indians in North America, and these are Called Christian Nations…

Both of the passages point to the hypocrisy that exists among the English when one considers their Christian ideals versus the slavery perpetuated by the English in the New World. Both Unca Eliza Winkfield and Samuel Occam were trans-cultured Native Americans, and both point out how the humanity of the English is lacking, primarily in the way that the English take slaves. Slavery, no matter how well the slaves may be treated, is still wrong in that it strips humanity of its liberty and rights. In that sense, slavery should be contrary to the beliefs of Christians at this time (or any time for that matter), but instead it is embraced as a staple of “modern” English colonial society.

Both authors attribute knowledge and civility to the English, and yet still understand that civility does not equate to universal philanthropy and liberty. Instead, the English are self-serving, and ethnocentric, believing that all cultures outside their own, especially of non-Christian origins, are lacking even basic human qualities deserving of respect. For example, Unca fears that her Indian friends will not only be taken as slaves but also that “their country might be discovered, and probably invaded, and numbers of the people be carried away into slavery, and other injuries committed.” This passage really reveals her mistrust of the intentions of the English who have stumbled upon her island, and her fears seem out of place with someone who was basically raised in an English community, and spend most of her youth in England. She recognizes that despite the civility of the English, they suffer from a savagery in the form of enslaving for wealth and gain.

Her views are very similar to Samuel Occam, who was not raised in an English society, does not have English blood, and did not spend much time in England during his life. He points out a paradox of nations, as he writes: “I come to consider and see the conduct of the most learned, polite, and rich nations of the world, I find them to be the most tyrannical, cruel and inhuman oppressors.” Such descriptions paint the English in a conflicting manner, since it is hard to imagine a nation to be both polite and cruel at the simultaneously. His disgust is even more apparent when he remarks that “…these are called Christian nations…” In this way he makes it obvious that savagery and barbarism is not limited to only heathens, and such problems occur even with good “Christian” nations. This paradox, however, is not an isolated case with these two Native American authors; this idea is carried through many works of this time as writers try to maintain the Christian values that the English put forth with the savage brutality of slavery that they value.

ENL 142: Short Essay Submission 1

--but we boast no feats

Of cruelty like Europe’s murdering breed--

Our milder epithet is merciful…

Gold, fatal gold, was the alluring bait

To Spain’s rapacious tribes--hence rose the wars

From Chili to the Caribbean sea,

And Montezuma’s Mexican domains:

More blest are we, with whose unenvied soil

Nature decreed no mingling gold to shine…

…more noble riches flow

From agriculture, and the industrious swain,

Who tills the fertile vale, or mountain’s brow

Content to lead a safe, a humble life…

In this passage is from pages 9 and 10 of Poems of Freneau, from his poem “The Rising Glory of America,” the speaker, Eugenio, is discussing what he calls the blessings and “more noble riches” of North America compared with those of South America. The speaker describes an image of war-torn South America, from Chile, to the Caribbean, including Mexico, fighting over what he calls the “fatal gold.” This seems appropriate, since after the discovery of the Maya in Mexico by Cortez, and the Incans in Peru by Pizarro, the Spaniards became obsessed with the wealth of the New World in the form of jewels, gold, and other precious metals. North America does not have overwhelming riches that are “boasted” to the rest of the world by Spain following the conquests. This blood-thirsty drive for wealth led the Spanish to ravage many tribes across South America, leading to wars that lasted for decades and decimated entire cultures within only a few years. The North American lands, however, were not rich in those kinds of jewels, as the speaker points out, but instead rich with soil that could grow many different kinds of crops successfully and abundantly.

The wealth of North America comes instead from the agriculture that the rich soil provides, and agriculture is the result of hard work. As the speaker goes on to point out, the gift of fertile soil is nothing without the hardworking farmer, the “industrious swain,” who is “content to lead a safe and humble life.” It is through his hard work that America is bestowed yet another kind of noble wealth: that of virtue earned through hard work and humble existence. This wealth is priceless, and timeless, unlike the wealth of material riches, which is fleeting. It is also industrious, built on hard work, which only adds to the nobility of the American farmer: their wealth does not come from stripping other people, mainly natives, of their materials, and instead comes from working the land to make grow riches from the soil.

It is that wealth of virtue, earned through the hard, honest work of the land, that Freneau seems so proud of in this particular work. Compared with the cruelty of the Europeans, especially the Spanish, the Americans are described as peaceful, wanting nothing more than to live free of the tyranny of England and the other nations of Europe. In taking a stand against Europe in this way, the American speakers in this poem see themselves as being more civilized, noble, and virtuous than their European brethren.

ENL 158B: "Defining Community: Inclusion and Exclusion in Under the Feet of Jesus"

Jolene Brown

Dr. M. Stratton

ENL 158B

October 17, 2008

Defining Community:

Inclusion and Exclusion in Under the Feet of Jesus

The novel Under the Feet of Jesus, by Helena María Viramontes suggests that the English-speaking American is part of the same community as the characters by presenting the reader with several interconnected interpretations of the phrase “under the feet of Jesus” and by proposing three circumstances of belonging: divine, legal, and literary. The novel is written in such a way to contrast the lives of the characters with that of the average American English-speaker, and the lives of the characters are foreign, in more ways than one, to this type of reader, which leads to the assumption that the characters are illegal immigrants. The occasional switch to the use of Spanish only adds to the isolation, prompting a further feeling of exclusion from the community of the novel, but Viramontes is balancing that exclusion with information that notifies the reader of their inclusion. Examples of these types of inclusion are found in several passages of the novel, and this essay will focus on two of them.

Throughout the novel there is fear of the immigration police, la migra. The reader suspects that, because of this fear, that Estrella and her family are immigrants. Petra, however, tells her daughter:

“Don’t run scared. You stay there and look them in the eye…If they stop you…you tell them the birth certificates are under the feet of Jesus…Tell them que tienes una madre aquí. You are not an orphan, and she pointed a red finger to the earth, Aquí” (Viramontes 63).

This advice to her daughter not only seems contrary to what illegal parents would want for their children, but also has significance in that it implies that Petra believes they are more than just American citizens. The final line she points her finger to the ground and states “Aquí” with a capital A. This is the Spanish word for “here” and the capital letter implies a higher meaning, more than just the land beneath her feet. In fact, just moments before she tells Estrella that the birth certificates located “under the feet of Jesus,” and when you take that line in a metaphorical context, and look at the capitalization of the word aquí, the meaning is more than just Petra teaching her daughter to defend herself. The author is giving a meaning to the community they are a part of, not just a community of the American world, but a divine, earthly community that is located “under the feet of Jesus.”

One hundred pages later the reader discovers that Estrella’s family is, in fact, American citizens when Viramontes tells us:

“Under the doily lay the documents in the manila envelope. She slipped the envelope out gingerly and poured out the contents onto her palm. Black ink feet on the birth certificates…Certificado de Bautismos—five of them; a torn and mended Social Security card; Identification card…her picture looked flat and dull and pale as concrete, but the ID was a great relief” (166)

This is the legal definition of community, a status reserved for those who have papers, licenses, and proof, which Estrella’s mother keeps under the feet of a small Jesus statue. The metaphor that we believe Petra to be referencing earlier is, in fact, truth, there is proof “under the feet of Jesus.” This information can be shocking twist to the skeptical reader, who might, until this point, believe that Petra is teaching the children to lie about their documentation. Any doubts about their citizenship are dispelled and the reader suddenly realizes that these people are American citizens, too, with hardships, trials and problems that the average American does not always have to face.

The last definition of community that should be mentioned is the literary definition. It is important to remember that this book, Under the Feet of Jesus, is also paper, much like the papers that symbolize citizenship. The papers that make up this book are under the feet of Jesus, both metaphorically, in the way same way that Estrella and her family is, but also physically, as the title graces the cover of the novel itself. The community that the author creates within this book is as real as any community that suffers through these same circumstances, and the reader belongs to this community by being included in reading it. In this abstract sense, the reader becomes as much a part of the literary world, as Estrella becomes part of our material world. In our world her status lacks much that others take for granted: “It was always a question of work, and work depended on the harvest, the car running, their health, the conditions of the road, how long the money held out, and the weather, which meant they could depend on nothing” (4).

Viramontes subtly suggests several definitions of the word community and uses those definitions to include the reader in the community of the novel. The first definition is one of divine community, where all the beings of earth belong to one earthly community, American or not. The second definition is one of legality, and the English-speaking American reader can relate to this community, but also realizes the characters in the novel—assumed not to be citizens—are a part of their same American community. The third category is one of literature, whereby the novel itself is a community of characters and the reader is included into the community by reading. All of these definitions help to the reader to understand the interconnectedness of all communities, American or not, and the importance of communities relying upon each other for support. It is Estrella’s community that feed other families through their labor in the fields. Yet Estrella’s family lives on the edge of poverty and hunger and despite all their hard work are put on the outskirts of American society instead of embraced for the work they do. The English-speaking American realizes that this is a family with the same citizenship status as their own, and the reader is not the outsider they believed themselves to be. After all, we are all part of one big community located, as the novel suggests, under the feet of Jesus.