Co-Becoming Humanities: An Alternative Perspective for Examining Co-becoming and Convivialism

This chapter presents the concept of the Co-Becoming Humanities as a critical means of knowledge production, one in deep conversation with the intellectual movements represented by the concepts of Convivialism and Co-Becoming. The notion of the Co-Becoming Humanities is designed to foster a critical intellectual and social practice that harnesses the resources embedded within East Asia’s historical experience to respond to the poly-crises that mark our present moment. The chapter suggests that religious movements that were central to the modern history of political activism in Korea such as Donghak and Won Buddhism provide us with important reference points for theorizing a form of politics grounded in ontological mutualism rather than individual profit. The chapter also argues for the importance of the notion of the “core site” within this new intellectual and political vision, understood as specific locations in which the contradictions of modernity are felt with particular intensity. “Core sites” thus offer important resources for thinking both locally and globally, as local people experiment with practices of solidarity, resistance, rebuilding, and mutual self-organization in the face of a variety of economic and political hegemonies. The “core site” is thus critical to re-conceptualizing sovereignty within our immediate lived context, as locally participatory democratic practice.