Imagining Oneself Otherwise!

Abstract

Abstract In the literature on autonomy, a few theorists have suggested in passing that imagination might play a role in autonomous reflection, deliberation, and action. In her account of autonomy competency, for example, Diana Meyers mentions imagination as one of the capacities involved in its exercise and suggests that one way in which autonomous agents can test and refine their self-portraits is through imaginative enactment. It has also been suggested that one way in which oppressive social relationships and institutions may impair autonomy is by restricting agents’ imaginative repertoires. Thus, Paul Benson writes that oppressive socialization “can erode competence at rational consideration by restricting persons’ capacities for imagining with sufficient sensitivity and seriousness major alterations in the prevalent gender system.”3 Aside from these few remarks, however, the possible relationship between the various activities of the imagination and the capacity for autonomy has not been the subject of serious investigation in the literature. When one reflects on the extent to which our waking mental life is taken up with different kinds of imaginative thought, this neglect is striking and rather puzzling. My conjecture is that this neglect is due to a tendency to think of critical reflection in overly rationalistic terms, at the expense of a recognition of the extent to which critical reflection can be prompted by the imagination and by emotion, desire, and bodily feelings.

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