On Difference and Othering

The Vocal Ensemble of the Choir of the Philharmonic Society of St. Petersburg, Russia, was featured in a Christmas concert last December in a Paris neighborhood church. Directed by Yulia Khutoretskaya, the ensemble performed chants from the Russian Orthodox liturgy and other traditional Christmas carols. They transported the audience on a trip to a different culture for the holiday season.

Pascal Belargent

Russian church music is a genre full of deep rumbling bass and pure melodic tenor lines blending with the female operatic tones. The result in this case was a delicate harmony not always heard from singers who are all soloists. I have some familiarity with Russian church music, having sung with the Yale Russian Chorus during my early years at Yale University. In this performance, when the singers rearranged themselves in the chancel space while in full song with lighted candles in the palms of their hands, the effect was magically breathtaking. The normally chilly church sanctuary became a warm cocoon.

Reflecting on my feelings during the performance of Russian music, I wondered why citizens of so many countries in the West have so little that is nice to say about Russia. I understand the differences in political opinion and approaches to economic theorizing. But are Russia’s sins more egregious than ours? When we contemplate what we think is evil about them, have they surpassed the West? Is there nothing about Russia that could stir empathy in us?

The psychoanalyst D. G. Rao published a review of Isabel Wilkerson’s book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents (Random House, 2020) in the April 2021 issue of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. After exploring important ideas that tied Wilkerson’s text to our social worlds, Rao described different factors that contribute to any caste system and distinguish “the high and the low, the privileged and the pariah.” He made use of Wilkerson’s language to point out that “caste is insidious …. It is the worn grooves of comforting routines … patterns of a social order that have been in place so long that it looks like the natural order of things.” Rao eventually made connections between the mundane experiences in the social worlds affecting our psyches and their contributions to the creation and maintenance of caste structures around us.

An important mechanism that operates within caste structures is the presence of “othering” in what we do and think. Rao called this universal tendency to “other” someone the act of “debasing, controlling, and dehumanizing” the other person. Rao separated “difference” from othering. Two people are different from each other along familiar axes that include age, gender, ethnicity, language, religion, disability, and other elements. Thus, difference “is usual, digestible, and can be celebrated.” However, when we extrapolate from difference to indicate inequality and inferiority, that is othering. The result becomes destructive and can lead to a withering exclusion of the other from social groups and community organizations. What strikes me, from time to time, is the ubiquitous nature of othering. It can be employed by individuals, groups, and nations. While we often use it reflexively, it can also be displayed with deadly intentionality.

I have followed recent news media reports of the dialogues between the leaders of the United States and Russia and find that they are remarkably similar in their logic, especially in their use of othering techniques. I realized, too, that we imitate these political leaders in the way we approach settling our differences with people we encounter in daily living. Staring at our competitors and seeing them as like us, just different along certain axes, require patience and endurance. It is convenient, but pointless, to view them as less than we are. That concert of Russian church music, even though I could not understand the language, still communicated a sense of the sacred and offered hope. It challenged the political leaders of both countries to cease the solipsistic bickering and recognize that othering one another is the way to breaking the peace. Recognizing mutual humanity is a better way to find common ground and avoid war. ■

Ezra E. H. Griffith, M.D., is professor emeritus of psychiatry and African American Studies at Yale University.