So-called universal scholarship actually reflects imperial national biases
Evidence
American and British scholarship was based, he thought, on a conceit: it pretended to discover Universal Truth, to proclaim Universal Laws, and to describe a Universal Man. Upon inspection it appeared, however, that its Universal Man resembled a type found around Cambridge, Massachusetts, or Cambridge, England; its Universal Laws resembled those felt to be useful by Congress and Parliament; and its Universal Truth bore English and American accents. — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 592
Categorization
- SEED: Could be turned into an essay on how ‘universal’ media theory hides its national and imperial origins.
- corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 592
- XREF: connects to: Scholarship is a civil conversation rather than a contest over truth — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 333; American school curricula systematically erased imperialist, genocidal, and capitalist dimensions of national history — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 352; Claims of literature’s universal value conceal their own political commitments. (+6 more)
Broader Connections
- Marxism’s universalism masked its blindness to non-European freedom struggles
#exemplifies(0.78) - Orientalist scholarship varied internally but shared the racial category
#expands(0.72) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 132 - Scholarship is a civil conversation rather than a contest over truth
#complicates(0.60) — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 333