Justice as Attunement

Transforming Constitutions in Law, Literature, Economics and the Rest of Life

Richard Dawson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415857512
• eBook ISBN: 9781136000560
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: Jurisprudence
• Index: Law

The meaning of an expression resides not in the expression itself but in the experience of a person's engagement with it. Meaning will be different not only to different people but also to the same person at different times. This book offers a way of attending to these different meanings. This way (or method) is a version of a trans-cultural activity that Richard Dawson calls attunement. The activity of attunement involves a movement of self-adjustment to a language, which a person transforms in her or his use of it. Consciously performing the activity can enable understanding of the processes by which we constitute ourselves and others when we use a language. This directly connects to the topic justice, which is concerned with constituting appropriate selves and relations.

Justice as Attunement engages with a wide range of texts – legal, literary, economic, philosophical, among others – and illuminates many useful and fascinating connections between them. There is a sense in which this book transcends disciplinary boundaries, for, in addition to students and scholars of law, literature, economics, and philosophy, it is written to a general reader who is interested in reflecting on and doing justice to their experiences in life.

Index

abortion 130–4

active: and passive 10–11, 28, 75, 216

activity 13–18; and attention (Oakeshott) 14; of attunement 35, 85, 149, 163, 169, 177, 198, 217; claiming meaning for experience (White) 15; of close listening xxiii; composing with language 171; constituting ourselves and others 13; expounding 65–7; making connections 186; as involving certain questions (Oakeshott) 14–15; constitution of language as a universal human (White) 3; law as an 13; law as a literary (White) 166, 202; philosophizing 14; of reading 174; of being a rhetorologist 226; of storytelling 21 (Tully) 123; of transforming constitutions 59, 123; see also attunement, lawyer, listening, questioning, reading

alienation 19–27 , 51, 98, 99, 122, 127, 131, 138, 145, 160, 175, 180, 198, 213, 215

ambiguity: powerful use of (Eastman) xx

Amherst College: composition and literary criticism at 9–10, 99–101, 170–1, 208–11, 217–18, 239; White educated at 7; see also Baird, Frost, Gibson, Poirier, Pritchard

analogy: about law 185, (White) 222–3; between Austen's Emma and reader (White) 45; legal reasoning by 80, 126–7, 223; hazel-nut and happiness (in Austen's Persuasion) 54, 73; reading as travel (White) 104; visual (for knowing) 220

apartheid 13, 92–3, 141–4, 146–7, 190–2, 210, 211

Arendt, Hannah 125, 239–42

Aristotle: and education (White) 132; proportions and limits 56; rhetoric (Booth) 223

art: of appraising warrants for assent (Booth) 224; of drafting legislation 7; of intellectual life (White) 161; of good lawyer (Booth) 224; of law (White) 120, 196; of legal argument (White) 94; of judgment (Ball and White) 22–7; of juxtaposition 30; of political economy 156; of writing (Gibson) 195

attention 28–37; attention to attention 35, 168; ‘Be attentive’ (Lonergan) 182; dramatic shift in 130; economics of 140, 216; economy of 221; and justice 29, 227; partner...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Table of Cases
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Prologue
• Introduction
• Activity
• Alienation
• Attention
• Attunement
• Character
• Constitution
• Conversation
• Culture
• Equality
• Experience
• Imagination
• Integration
• Judgment
• Justice
• Language
• Listening
• Metaphor
• Method
• Movement
• Performance
• Play
• Questioning
• Reading
• Rhetoric
• Silence
• Understanding
• Voice
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index