Inheriting the Language of Stein: The Pragmatist Poetics of Harryette Mullen

Abstract:Poet Harryette Mullen's collections Trimmings (1991) and S*PeRM**K*T (1992) reveal her inheritance of a pragmatist poetics for which democratic language and linguistic skepticism are key. This pragmatist poetics is significant because in our current era of "post-truth" and "alternative facts," existing polarization has deepened, and people are extremely unreceptive to hearing perspectives they do not already agree with. White people oftentimes become actively hostile to straightforward assertions of belief based on lived experience such as "Black Lives Matter," countering such a statement with "All Lives Matter" or "Blue Lives Matter," in effect doubling down on existing beliefs and resisting reasoned discourse or engagement with other viewpoints. Mullen's poetry proves instructive for a potential path forward, as her work in Trimmings and S*PeRM**K*T requires readers' careful attention and resists white supremacy not through clarification, but through encouraging democratic communication and readerly collaboration.