While universalistic assumptions have been undermined by experiences of cultural difference, the notion of culture has been universalized. But it seems that the notion of culture, the way it has prevailed in public discourse as well as in social and cultural studies, has to be seen as the main stumbling block to intercultural dialogue. The article argues for an interactional concept of culture, or interpretation, as also of research and representation. Emphasis has to be put on modes of linkage between (...) social action and discourses and on social reflexivity. While attempting to avoid the logic of identity, epistemologically, identity has to be understood as a social project. Thus universalism, which `as such' is underdetermined and shows only contextually, has to be seen not as something achieved and secured, but as an objective. Universalism has to prove itself within difference, it cannot be imposed by one side. (shrink)

This article argues that the implications of the recent eclipse of the construct of the `primitive' for the practice of the human sciences have not been adequately pondered. It asks, therefore, why and how the myth of primitiveness has been sustained by the human sciences, and what purposes it has served for the modern West's self-understanding. To attempt to answer such a query, the article pursues two principal lines of inquiry. In order to appreciate what is potentially being lost, the (...) space that may be closing up as a result of the death of the `primitive', the first part of the article strives to demonstrate the latter's significance for the self-critique of modern ways of thinking and acting by historiographically reconstructing its changing roles within and representations by the human sciences. In the second section, it is contended that the eclipse of primitiveness has created a potentially problematic situation for the human sciences, since the cross-cultural mode of critique cultivated through this myth risks being neglected in a post-`primitive' age. All in all, then, the article claims that continued engagement with cultural alterity is essential for the human sciences after primitiveness, and that such an engagement can be sustained by an understanding of the different ways in which the `primitive' has been defined and has functioned over the course of the modern era. (shrink)