This essay is Part Three of a revision of the pedagogical essay, “Writing Under the Bodhi Tree,” published in Academic Exchange Quarterly, Summer 2005.
Four principles constitute Interbeing: nonattachment from views, direct experimentation, appropriateness, and skillful means.
The first essay addressed “nonattachment from views”, and the second addressed “direct experimentation” as a principle that can help us better understand the practice of successful civil discourse. This essay will focus on a skill that guides how we engage others in direct experimentation: Appropriateness.
Appropriateness
In a civil society, a message, argument, or deliberation must reflect the needs of people and realities of that society. This is the work of the principle of Appropriateness.
It all depends on the situation; meaning is situational, interpretative and public. That is to say, meaning is based on one’s current environment, the attitudes and experiences of those interpreting meaning in that current environment, and the implied tendency of meaning to be based in social construction.
Conceptualizing civil society as a kind of socio-political “sangha,” is precisely the kind of environment promoted by Hanh’s Charter of Interbeing. Like with direct experimentation, active listening is imperative to the principle of appropriateness; one must listen actively to know what, exactly is and is not appropriate.
The Concept of “Discourse”
Ultimately, when one focuses on the principle of appropriateness, one is trying to discern the relevant “Discourse” by which an audience abides. By Discourse, I mean the definition put forth by the sociolinguist James Gee, who capitalizes the term to distinguish it from a mere conversation.
Gee defines these capital Discourses as “ways of being in the world, or forms of life which integrate words, acts, values, beliefs, attitudes, social identities. . .. so as to take on a particular social role that others will recognize.” That is, if one does not understand an audience’s preferred values, attitudes, beliefs, then one is at risk of speaking past them, or worse, offending them with values unaligned or even opposed to their own.
This sentiment goes back to the time of Aristotle who defined rhetoric as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion." Discourse tells you what means are available: what metaphors to use or avoid, what references to use or avoid, what dispositions to use or avoid, and so on. It is the toolkit that allows us to interact with an audience without alienating them. To put it simply, the principle of Appropriateness is the one that insists we “read the room” before we act.
The Fallacy of Motivated Reasoning
The concept of appropriateness is also, by extension, a tacit warning against the fallacy of motivated reasoning. Motivated reasoning, defined as the tendency to process information in a way that suits one’s goals and desire, weakens impartiality and corrodes dialogue. Its subcategories illustrate this risk:
Observer-expectancy effect (when one’s expectations about an outcome influence participants or measurements),
Goal-directed bias (when one’s desired conclusion shapes the way he approaches an issue, consciously or unconsciously)
Theory-ladenness of observation (when what one "see" is influenced by the theories or desired outcomes one already holds).
Each of these categories fly in the face of appropriateness as they project a desired outcome onto a situation instead of letting the participants in that situation interact authentically toward a solution or plan for future advantage. Instead of being in the present and truly interactional, one is focused on a desired future, to the neglect of present actors.
Like in direct experimentation, appropriateness is about meeting people where they are, not where you want them to be to best justify one’s desired outcomes.
So, in order to practice the principle of Appropriateness effectively, one must gauge the dynamics of the room one is in, not the room one in which one wishes to be. One must see Gee’s concept of Discourse as a conceptual room to be read. If read appropriately, one can better discern the best ways to convey a particular situation.
One must realize that what is appropriate for one “room” may be quite inappropriate for another, even if the rooms are similar is certain ways (e.g., explaining racial justice to white people in California may go differently than it would if speaking to white people in Alabama.) Understanding this may be the most important aspect of effective communication.
But before we discern the appropriate tools of persuasion for a given situation, we would do well to understand what the tools of persuasion are in the first place. The next and final essay will address that.