Monday, May 26, 2008

The Universal Citizen

In class we talked about Young's criticism of the Public/Private divide, which pointed out that power structures of the Public Sphere reach into the Private Sphere and condition the possibilities of individuals within family structures and are generally internalized into the Private Sphere. On page 110, she talks about the notion of a model of knowledge and social discourse that legitimizes the power of certain groups through the exclusion of others (pg 111, last full paragraph). To what degree do these power relations become internalized within the behaviors of individuals, such that people of excluded groups believe and participate in the discourse which excludes them? Going back to Foucault, how does his notion of power relate to Young's criticisms? Is her model still too dualistic?

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