Ethics and Aesthetics of Encountering the Other: New Frameworks for Engaging with Difference

这个国际研究网络问：世界观、记忆力和未来愿景相互冲突的人是如何相遇的？预计文化、公民和教育组织将为这种接触创造一个平台，它们的公共价值越来越多地取决于它们在核心活动、外联和治理中反映社会多样性的程度。虽然这些部门在多样性措施，如性别、年龄、族裔或残疾方面有了一些明显的改进，但对于这些类别之间和内部的有意义的参与是什么，为什么和如何重要，以及需要采取什么措施来促进这种参与，人们知之甚少。面对世界各地令人不安的社会趋势，这是一个紧迫的问题：日益分裂的社会中的公共话语变得粗俗，对另一个社会的敌意和暴力助长了政治和军事激进主义，或者孤独和精神疾病在世代和社会阶层中迅速蔓延。这一网络的基础是认识到，要建设和平、可持续和健康的社区，就必须真正与任何形式的差异接触。然而，它也承认，仅仅在多样性措施方面取得成功，并不能保证与那些不像“我们”的人进行有意义的接触。这样的参与需要努力，可能很难实现，共享相同的空间是实现这种参与的必要条件，但不充分。该网络通过将理论重点从作为社会类别的多样性转移到将差异作为定义每个人的品质来应对这一挑战。这种转变意味着，任何类型的人类互动都是有差异的会议。它们不是通过强调相同而变得有意义，而是通过在进行真正接触的同时履行保留差异的道德承诺而变得有意义。个人和社区如何在人类活动的不同背景下实践这种与“他者”的接触，可能会对解决一些全球社会冲突产生深远的影响。该网络将国际艺术家、语言学家和哲学家聚集在一起，研究跨越地理界限和社会生活领域的共同意义的美学和伦理层面：在音乐和舞蹈排练室、在博物馆和美术馆、在剧院、市场、服务接触和学校。我们将研究这些互动的现有研究和经验证据，并研究真正的不同遭遇是什么样子，以及需要什么才能实现它们。由此产生的理论和方法框架将推动跨学术学科和创造性实践的研究。这些实用的指导方针将支持英国和国际上的公共机构不仅致力于接触不同的社区，而且成为跨越任何类型分歧的真正接触的催化剂。更广泛地说，通过将彼此的学科、文化背景、现有研究数据和工作方式联系起来，网络将为在复杂、变化的条件下进行研究和生活制定新的概念框架、分析方法和实际建议。研讨会将包括简短的以数据为导向的挑衅、主题演讲、体验会议和主持的对话。公众集会将接触到广泛的利益相关者，包括艺术组织、教育慈善机构、地方当局、健康和精神健康机构以及社会护理部门。这些材料将通过创造性成果(互动网站和由一名常驻博士研究员领导的数字人种学博客)、社交媒体和专业讲习班传播。该网络将促进发展新的伙伴关系，并为今后对社会冲突的全球挑战的调查提供信息。

This international research network asks: How do people of conflicting worldviews, memories and future visions encounter each other? Cultural, civic and educational organisations are expected to create a platform for such encounters and their public value is increasingly assessed on how well they reflect societal diversity in their core activity, outreach and governance. While some improvement on diversity measures, such as gender, age, ethnicity or disability, is evident within these sectors, less is known on what meaningful engagement across and within these categories looks like, why and how it matters and what it takes to foster it. This is an urgent question in the face of disconcerting societal tendencies around the world: the coarsening of public discourse in increasingly divided societies, the rise of political and military activism fuelled by hostility and violence towards the other, or the fast-spreading epidemic of loneliness and mental illness across and within generations and social strata. This network is based on the recognition that genuine engagement with difference of any kind is necessary for building peaceful, sustainable and healthy communities. It also acknowledges, however, that success on diversity measures alone does not guarantee meaningful encounters with those who are not like 'us'. Such engagement requires effort, can be difficult to bring about, and sharing the same space is a necessary but insufficient condition for it to occur. The Network addresses this challenge by shifting the theoretical focus from diversity as a social category to difference as a quality that defines every human being. This shift implies that human interactions of any kind are meetings with difference. They are not made meaningful by emphasising sameness, but by exercising an ethical commitment to preserving difference while making a genuine contact. How individuals and communities practise this encounter with 'the other' across diverse contexts of human activity can have profound consequences for addressing some of the global societal conflicts. The Network brings together international artists, linguists and philosophers to examine aesthetic and ethical dimensions of communal meaning making across geographical boundaries and domains of social life: in music and dance rehearsal rooms, in museums and art galleries, in theatres, markets, service encounters, schools. We will study existing research and experiential evidence of these interactions and examine what genuine encounters with difference look like and what it takes to enable them. The resulting theoretical and methodological frameworks will advance inquiry across academic disciplines and creative practices. The practical guidelines will support public institutions in the UK and internationally in their commitment not only to reach diverse communities but to become catalysts for genuine encounters across divides of any kind. More generally, through engaging with one another's disciplines, cultural contexts, existing research data and ways of working, the Network will develop new conceptual frameworks, analytical approaches and practical proposals for researching and living in complex, changing conditions.The Network will be organised in two one-day seminars, a public assembly and a dissemination lab to consolidate Network outputs. The seminars will include short data-led provocations, keynotes, experiential sessions and moderated conversations. The public assembly will reach out to a wide range of stakeholders, including arts organisations, educational charities, local authorities, health and mental wellbeing agencies and social care sector. The material will be disseminated through creative outputs (interactive website and a digital ethnography blog led by a Doctoral Researcher in Residence), social media and professional workshops. The Network will facilitate the development of new partnerships and inform future inquiry into global challenges of societal conflict.