The principle of attachment

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The principal of attachment is a term Anthony Pagden develops to explain primary intercultural interactions between European explorers and Amerindians. It refers to defining the unfamiliar in terms of that which is familiar, in so doing detaching the unfamiliar from its cultural context^[1]. Reattaching the unfamiliar to a familiar cultural context is an inevitability not to be mistaken for a socially defined cultural mechanism. As such, the principal of attachment should not be graded for its effectiveness in reducing the ‘distance’ between two cultures, rather it must be evaluated as a part of a process of mutual multicultural [in]tolerance.

[edit] References