Open Formation and the Demand of “Otherness”

The call for dialogue became a core part of our sociality in the later part of the twentieth century, and it clearly continues as a social hope as we confront the problems of a new era. International conflicts that bear on local interests, increasing interdependence and renewed isolationism, calls for diversity and pluralism coupled with new forms of destruction and annihilation, are all situations in a complex world context for dialogue. Although many still tout the promise of the information age, with the mass reproduction of meaning that new information technologies make possible, the need for discussion and negotiation persists. The struggle of our time is to build the practices of working together. This is the hope of a dialogic theory of communication. Using the word “dialogue, ” rather than simply “communication, ” foregrounds specific normative hopes. “Dialogue ” has been useful in drawing together alternative and often more hopeful understandings and practices of communication. The hopes of different conceptions and practices of dialogue are not all the same, however. In the twentieth century, three dominant positions on dialogue evolved. The first, a liberal humanist perspective, is rooted in notions of internally located meaning and grounded in the works of Maslow (1970, 1973) and Roger