The Illusion of Freedom from Culture: A Relationship of Freedom

Extract

[...] Rimbaud, for example, decided to travel to the Arabian Peninsula, a way for him to deny the cultivated European and seek to escape his culture. Nietzsche made a virulent critique of the moralism of German culture and decided to leave his country to devote himself to philosophy. Here, this desire for escape leads the individual to oppose the values they received during their early years of education, in order to go in search of another world where their true personality can manifest freely. Is escaping one's culture reserved for rebels? B. [...]

[...] Subject: Is my culture a prison? In general, it seems surprising to consider my culture as a prison. In fact, the term culture comes from the Latin culture which refers to the cultivation of the fields, and was first used in a metaphorical sense of 'culture of the soul' by Cicero to designate the process of forming an individual. In this sense, culture, which is opposed to nature, is more about the elevation of the individual, and therefore does not hinder our freedom. [...]

[...] Does not considering that my culture is a prison amount to denying any possibility of man emancipating himself from his own culture? Is it not possible, on the contrary, to rid oneself of everything that constitutes our belonging to a community? We will see that, in theory, my culture is not a prison: man can himself break free from his culture. But that this liberation is never more than illusory. Finally, a relationship of freedom is possible between man and his culture, under certain conditions. I. My culture is not a prison: I can break free from it. [...]

[...] In theory, therefore, nothing prevents men from breaking with what constitutes them. Man who is not a simple thing, not a simple 'object' . scissors-paper» as illustrated by Sartre; his reason and nature provide him with the ability to determine himself and be free. B. It is possible and even necessary from an anthropological point of view to get out of one's own culture to confront other cultures. The individual is born at the intersection of several cultures. Lévi-Strauss in Introduction to the Work of Marcel Mauss defend the thesis that the subject has the capacity to become other, to objectify himself, to divide himself. [...]

[...] And even when I try to detach myself from my culture, by learning other languages and adhering to other values, my primary culture is indelible and thinking of separating from it is only an illusion. Under what conditions can we maintain a relationship of freedom with our culture? If it is impossible to completely get rid of it, is it not fertile to occasionally put it aside? III. The conditions of fertility of a relationship of freedom vis-à-vis one's culture A. [...]