Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies Book

Cognitive Cultural Studies defines an approach to literary criticism, and more broadly, cultural criticism. According to Editor Zunshine, the strategy is to encompass other approaches to cultural criticism, such as gender studies, feminism, Marxism, postcolonialism, poststructuralism, performance theory, psychoanalysis, ethnic studies, rhetoric, ecocriticism, and body theory, to name just a few extant approaches.

Cultural studies is an established academic discipline practiced mainly in departments of English. It analyzes some aspect of a culture through a particular lens of assumptions, usually to focus on the political nature of cultural processes, revealing implicit power relationships. The scope includes current events and history, philosophy, theater, film, art, and especially, literature. The fourteen chapters in this scholarly volume focus mostly on literary criticism. The chapters are written by scholars in subfields of cultural studies (none of them psychologists).

The thrust of this book is that a grounding in cognitive science is the best, most inclusive point of view for practicing cultural criticism. Since all cultural processes are, after all, products of the human mind, then, the claim is, there is no better strategy than to adopt principles of cognitive science for doing cultural analysis. Therefore, a cognitive approach to cultural criticism automatically includes all other kinds of criticism. By invoking supervenience, practitioners of cognitive cultural studies audaciously claim not just a niche, but all the critical turf for themselves in a bloodless coup d'etat.

Reading between the lines, it seems one driver of the project is to find an objective, non-idiosyncratic, non-arbitrary basis from which to conduct cultural criticism. Most literary criticism is simply personal opinion of little general interest. The field as a whole is therefore unprincipled, based only on tradition, opinion and preference. It generates no actual knowledge, is incapable of progress, and its practitioners are no more than rhetoricians (not that that's a bad thing to be). So what is at stake in this project seems to be the respectability and legitimacy of the field of cultural studies.

One author describes a way forward. In her view the cave paintings at Lascaux were designed to ward off evil spirits. They therefore had an instrumental role in a material and social culture. Her explanation appeals to the neurobiological modularity of sensory systems. Creativity arises when distinct mental modules are incomplete, overlapping, sometimes contradictory. The artist bridges those gaps by producing a cultural artifact, such as the cave paintings. That's not just an opinion, but a conclusion founded on a firm, factual, material basis. Or is it? I am not aware of any evidence that supports her view. No scientific evidence is cited.

Nevertheless, I note that this same author goes on to give a very insightful analysis of Raphael's painting, "The Transfiguration." The analysis has nothing to do with cognitive science, but it is a terrific criticism. That phenomenon occurs several times in the book. David Herman, in his chapter, "Narrative theory after the second cognitive revolution," gives a revelatory analysis of Hemingway's short story, "Hills Like White Elephants," though no important principle of cognitive science is brought to bear.

The authors seem unified in their belief that science, and only science, and in this case cognitive science, can provide a non-relativistic, non-arbitrary departure for cultural studies. They should say, by their own principles, that science is just another thread of cultural conversation, like art or politics, and has no privileged access to truth. But the promoters of cognitive cultural studies turn a blind eye to that contradiction so they can feel like they have a solid place to stand.

Despite its flaws, this book is an interesting exploration of the relationship between human cognition and cultural criticism, that can enrich scholars in both cultural studies and cognitive psychology.