2011 Sara (Vonn) Solt – Face of the Other.pdf

The Face of the Other 1

The Face of the Other
Lane Community College Music-Thanatology Training
Sara Vonn
9/28/11

Copyright © 2011 Sara Vonn
All Rights Reserved

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Thanks to the faculty and staff of the Lane Community College Music-Thanatology
Training Program. Your willingness to share your experiences, ideas, and perceptions has
ignited a lifetime of scholastic and personal discovery. I am grateful to Hunter for always
challenging me to see the face of the Other. Special thanks to Judith Shotwell, whose guidance
and helpful suggestions greatly facilitated the process of developing this paper. Your inquisitive
questions were invaluable and pushed me to further exploration. Thank you for seeing my face
despite the many miles between us.

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I vividly remember drafting a contemplative word study essay on the word compassion. I
had never really considered the depth of compassion, to suffer with another. My previous
understanding had been much more limited, perhaps a compassionate person was present, but
surely they didn’t suffer with another person! Suddenly I became surprised, why on earth did I
voluntarily enter a training program where I would submit myself to witness and experience the
anguish of a suffering person? Did I hope to explore what really happens around death to assure
that my inevitable death would be alright? Or is there something innate in the visage of another
human being that simply demands presence? Is the significance of the face the reason that many
doctors perform a surgery with the patient’s face obscured? What is the goal of masking the
face, is it a measure of self protection? During class I was exposed to the philosophy of Levinas
and the significance he attributes to the face. The face demands “do not kill me.” The summons
of our responsibility to the Other is met by face.
Levinas was born in Kovno, also referred to as Kaunas, Lithuania. His family was deeply
involved in the Jewish community of Kovno (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). In 1923 Levinas
studied at the University of Strasbourg in France. During his education in France he began to
focus upon philosophy and the work of Bergson and Husserl (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). In
1928 he studied in Freiburg to study Husserl, however he became intrigued by Heidegger,
Husserl’s successor (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). Heidegger later became committed to
National Socialism, which quickly halted Levinas’ interest in Heidegger. Levinas became a
French citizen and became an officer in the French army during the war (Critchley &
Bernasconi, 2002). Levinas served as a translator of Russian and German for the French army.
In the early 1940s he was captured as a prisoner of war and sent to a military camp where he did
forced labor in the forest (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). It is presumed that his mother, father

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and brothers were shot by the National Socialists in Kovno (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). In
Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism Levinas revealed that much of his life was dominated by
the memory of horrors his family endured during the reign of National Socialism (Critchley &
Bernasconi, 2002). Levinas had tremendous difficulty understanding how Heidegger, a
remarkable and influential philosopher, became a Nazi. Levinas demonstrated his
disappointment in Heidegger in “Is Ontology Fundamental?” where he explained his complaints
in ethical terms (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). Confronting the views of Heidegger, Levinas
proposed that the relation with the Other goes beyond understanding (Critchley & Bernasconi,
2002). If the Other could be reduced to a concept then the relation would be one of knowing, but
this is impossible. The human Other has experienced thousands of unique experiences, thoughts,
and ever changing perceptions that make it impossible to define a person with complete
accuracy. Due to the irreducible relation to the Other, Levinas regards ethics as first philosophy
(Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002). Levinas questions the limits of ontological knowledge to assess
what is true and good, he instead posits that ethics are fundamental to philosophy. Ethics is
understood by Levinas as a relation of infinite responsibility to the other person. His ethics place
demanding responsibility upon the individual. It is necessary that Levinas’ ethics are
tremendously challenging because anything less could never satisfy an ethical relationship.
Minimizing ethics to rules and procedures is unsatisfactory when considering infinite, ethical
relationships.
Emmanual Levinas viewed ethics as first philosophy. Rather than base his ethics on
Rene Descartes’ “I think therefore I am,” Levinas began by considering the ethical “I” (Steinfels,
1995). His work explored the ethics of his first philosophy. Levinas’ ethics do not include
freedom, happiness or the development of virtues, but focus on the face to face encounter. The

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fundamental elements of Levinas’ thought include: transcendence, existence, and the Other (the
human other). The face to face interaction provides an opportunity for transcendence and is one
of the most powerful interactions humans can ever experience. Understanding the potential for
transcendence that is inherent in every face to face encounter can influence how the music-
thanatologist enters a contemplative relationship with the patient and their family. This
contemplative relationship with the patient and family seeks to supersede the desire to consume
the other into sameness. In this interaction the music-thanatologist, as an “I,” assumes
responsibility for the Other. In Ethics and Infinity, Levinas quotes Dostoyevsky regarding
responsibility to the Other, “We are all guilty of all and for all men before all, and I more than
the others.” It is the responsibility of the practitioner to offer authentic presence in support of the
Other.
Levinas claims the truly Other is invisible (1969, p. 78-79). In seeking to answer who is
“other” the otherness is lost as we categorize the other as the one we have no right to define
(Peperzak, 1993, p.63). For the sake of clarity I will refer to the realized, human other as
“Other.” I will use “other” to refer to that which is not the same and considered something that
can be totalized into a concrete concept. The most high Other calls for ethical responsibility.
The Other is only other until the Other is encountered through face and only then when its
uniqueness is discovered does it become the Other. Richard Cohen, translator of Ethics and
Infinity, notes that Autrui refers to the human other, Other (with a capital “O”). Autre is simply
notated as “other” (with a lower case “o”) (Levinas, 1985). Levinas is never completely
consistent in distinguishing the Other from the other. Due to the concerns of acting in violence
toward the Other, Levinas continually kept his language in his texts flexible. Creating a hard

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definition of the Other would be limiting it to “sameness” and doing violence unto the concept of
the inassimilable Other (Peperzak, 1993).
Levinas defines ontology as “the comprehension of being” (Beals, 2007). Ontology
attempts to create a totality, reducing what is other or different to sameness. Using this lens,
nearly all of Western philosophy may be viewed as ontology. In fact, what Levinas refers to as
the “ontology of power” may be found nearly everywhere except in the genuine face to face
relationship. There is risk of totalizing and violence in assuming that nothing is beyond the
understanding of the rational, scientific process. When rationality strives to make order of the
uniqueness of each being, individuality is lost and humankind is at risk of becoming anonymous
beings. This seemingly logical process of reducing the infinite alterity of another into a known
concept is totality. Permitting the ever-changing individuality of the Other to be falsely
contained within a concrete concept is a violent act of totalization. Levinas argues for the ethical
relation over ontology (Beals, 2007).
In Ethics and Infinity (1985), Levinas suggests that the responsibility to serve the Other is
met by face. Merely discovering the Other in the other’s face commands me to serve him. “The
face orders and ordains me,” states Levinas in Ethics and Infinity. In our encounter with the
Other we are responsible to them without the expectation of reciprocity. The face is not just an
object with eyes, a nose, and a chin that can be described. Levinas contends that to truly
encounter the Other it would best better not to even notice the color of the eyes. Although the
face can be described by its individual features, Levinas suggests that the face cannot be reduced
to these physical attributions. The face is naked and openly exposed. Although a person can
assume a countenance or a social role, the face remains defenseless. The face is uncontainable.
The face is exposed, tempting us to an act of violence, but at the same time the face forbids us to

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kill (Levinas, 1985, p 86). War stories depict the difficulty another often experienced when
forced to kill someone while looking them in the eye. Surgeons often will create a partition to
obscure the patient’s face during an operation. Shielding the face creates an anonymous shell of
a human being without individuality or uniqueness. Levinas (1985) states that the command of
the face is “thou shall not kill” (p. 89). Honoring the summons of the face opens the potential for
transcendence.
Humans have needs that cannot be solely met through self fulfillment; the individual is
forced to satisfy needs in the surrounding world (Burggraeve, 2008, p. 28). This begins a cycle
of finding fulfillment outside of the self. Humans are dependant upon the earth to transform
resources into food, shelter and clothing. As humans live of the world, dependency is
transformed into sovereignty as the “I” claims ownership of nature and others to satisfy these
needs (Burggraeve, 2008). Although the need has drawn an individual outside of itself, it also
reinforces the ego’s anxiety for self and egoism (Burggraeve, 2008). As the ego draws the world
into itself and claims ownership, the need for totalization and consumption increases. The
sensations experienced during consumption bring pleasure. Consumption doesn’t only include
the natural wealth of the earth, but also people. The act of consumption falsely assumes that
individuals regarded as other can be entirely known and taken into the self. This consumption
reduces the infinitude of others by totalization into sameness. The “I” cannot achieve
transcendence by groping out into the world and consuming or by falling deep into anonymity
within the self (Burggraeve, 2008, p. 31). Need is the ground of human existence and so a desire
for transcendence, as viewed by Levinas, is seeking something other than ourselves (Bergo,
2008). In the ethical relation and encounter the “I” realizes that the Other cannot be consumed or
known. In this act, the “I” realizes the alterity of the Other. A being seeks to escape itself

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because it is trapped as a creature, not a master (Bergo, 2008). The “I” finds salvation when it
abandons itself for the good of something other than itself. The “I” must discover it needs the
irreducible otherness of the Other to escape the weight of being (Burggraeve, 2008, p. 33). In
the face to face encounter, it is not the insufficiency of the “I” that prevents totalization, but the
infinitude of the Other (Levinas, 1969, p. 80). The encounter with another individual influences
the “I” with a force unlike any worldly thing. The Other beckons without even speaking. The
relationship of responsibility of the “I” to the Other is not reciprocated by the Other. This
responsibility, without expectation of reciprocity, creates an opportunity for transcendence
(Bergo, 2008). This transcendence is a human affair that can occur during the face to face
encounter.
When present to the face of a suffering person no person can stand aside and do nothing
because the human face compels them (Lavoie, De Koninck & Blondeau, 2006). Lavoie et al.
suggest that compassion is a key element of care in light of the philosophy of Levinas (2006).
The 2006 article also suggests that in the caregivers’ responsibility to the Other they must also
show goodness and love in their interaction. Lavoie et al. suggest that a caregiver can show
warmth and sensitivity in their interactions with their patients without compromising their
competence (2006). It is not enough to provide competent and knowledgeable care when a
patient is seeking out warmth and connection. Using Levinas’s ethics which presume
responsibility to the Other, a caregiver is obliged to offer care that reflects their patient’s need in
the moment.
Each patient and family who receives a music-thanatology vigil is representative of
absolute alterity. If the practitioner perceives the family as a known entity, no matter how kindly
or gently, the practitioner has committed violence. In assuming the family could be defined as a

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concept, the individual acted against the command of the face, “thou shall not kill.” Only
entering the vigil space with a desire to experience the Other through face, has potential for
transcendence. It is far simpler to assume that the entirety of an other can be consumed after a
few brief encounters. I experienced a vigil scenario with a patient who had two figurines, a
Buddha and a glass lotus, on the counter of her hospital room. Based on these two symbols I
began to speculate about the patient’s faith tradition. Toward the end of the vigil I was surprised
to hear the patient’s daughter request “could you please play Amazing Grace? It would mean so
much to her.” I had developed a theory about this patient that was shattered to pieces upon the
utterance of a few words. The Other was so incredibly overwhelming I could not contain it
within my feeble attempt to consume the Other into a known entity. In this encounter with
strangers I sought to organize various symbols, comments, and interactions into a theory about
the identity of these individuals. As creatures that must decipher countless stimuli each day, the
ability to judge quickly and make rules about the surrounding world helps ensure survival.
Challenging these automatic perceptions can assist in the recognition of the truly Other.
Although Levinas doesn’t assume that the Other is likewise responsible for us, I often wonder if
it is possible to translate the self’s need for fulfillment to the Other. If one assumes the Other has
a similar need to consume alterity into sameness how does this influence the needs of patients
and families in the vigil? Patients and their families are often experiencing tremendous changes
and this may be their first experience with hospice services, an experience completely other,
through the lens of a culture that often denies death. Considering that individuals have the desire
to consume alterity into sameness should the need to consume inform prescriptive thinking?
Some patients and families will request familiar music during a vigil; is this desire for familiar
music an attempt to assimilate the other into them for consumption? Amidst noisy oxygen

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machines and exhausted medical interventions, do some families need something familiar to
consume into sameness? Offering structured elements of meter and repeated phrases or even an
“old favorite” when appropriate may provide familiarity that can be reduced to sameness for the
family to consume. As individuals with responsibility to the Other, music-thanatologists must
seek to serve all Others in the room with care that best fits the family’s current needs.
The prescriptive delivery of thematic material is often based upon phenomenological
observations. Emmanuel Levinas played a key role in introducing phenomenology to France in
the 1930s (Honderich, 1995, p. 481). The phenomenologist seeks out the common and already
known, bringing attention to what is typically overlooked as common sense (Critchley &
Bernasconi, 2002, p. 7). Levinas suggests things are never known in their entirety as there is
always an essential aspect of perception that is inadequate (Levinas, 1995, p. 22). A material
object is subject to consciousness, but because the sequence of phenomena is never completed
and our perception is relative to the degree of completion (Levinas, 1995, p. 22). The music-
thanatologist observes how a person presents in that exact moment, but this moment doesn’t
contain the complexities inherent in the observed individual. This snapshot of phenomena is
useful for taking in stimuli of the surrounding world, but it is insufficient to express genuine
being (Levinas, 1995, p. 22). Levinas identifies himself as phenomenologist, however when
encountering the Other one cannot describe the extraordinary otherness that is encountered
(Cohen, 1986, p. 53). Levinas did not view the Other as an object of consciousness so it cannot
be reduced to phenomenological observation (Honderich, 1995, p. 637). In maintaining a truly
ethical relation it is impossible to completely define the Other. Levinas suggests he is simply
expanding upon the phenomenological method of Husserl, but Levinas had difficulty bringing
transparency to his own method and even suggested that transparency was not possible (Cohen,

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73). Levinas’ theory of the ethical relationship cannot be called phenomenology because the
Other is not phenomena, but an enigma (Critchley & Bernasconi, 2002, 8). This ethical relation
is difficult to quantify because its very nature it is beyond what logic and knowledge can explain.
The ethical relation cannot be described by the typical logic and categorizations of ontology, so
the philosophies and questions developed by Levinas provide a framework to continue the
exploration of the ethical relation. The physiological response to pain that can be observed in the
face is not the face of the Other as it is reduced to phenomena. Although this phenomenon may
inform the prescriptive delivery of music in the vigil, it doesn’t come from the face of the Other.
Some aspect of the infinitude of the Other may be pressing upon their physical face, but this
countenance in no way encompasses the entirety of that Other. Although the ethical relation
cannot be studied through phenomenology, phenomenological observations do influence the
progression of the music vigil. How can these phenomenological observations be utilized in the
vigil without totalizing the Other? Can the phenomena of the physical components of the face
be utilized without totalizing the Other? In the vigil a practitioner may observe tears, a
phenomenon, but while resisting the desire to totalize the practitioner doesn’t assign a single
meaning to this phenomenon. Just as tears cannot be assigned a single cause, changes that are
observed in the vigil can not be assumed to be caused by the practitioner. The complexity of the
Other negates the possibility of the practitioner assuming causal relationship between what has
transpired between them and happens after this musical interaction.
Intuition as perceived through the lens of phenomenology is much different than how it is
used in conversation today. Through the lens of phenomenology intuition is tied more strongly
to the etymology of the word. Intuition is ultimately derived from Latin, intuitus, to look at or
consider (Harper). Intuition in phenomenology is not mysticism, but the presence of an object or

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person presenting itself in that moment (Moran, 2000, p. 10). In the vigil these
phenomenological observations are combined with years of experience and established
knowledge providing informed intuition. This informed intuition has the potential to assist the
“I” in service of the Other. Synthesizing knowledge of a disease process and the current
phenomenology presented by the patient in the vigil may enhance the practitioner’s ability to
remain present to the Other. However this previously gained knowledge and watchfulness of
things presenting itself in that moment must be balanced with an understanding that this
comprehension doe not encompass the entirety of the Other. In each moment the face of the
Other is revealing itself and the ethical clinician must respond “I am encountering you in this
moment and I am not only present with you, I am here for you.” This ethical response is
compassion.
Incorporating Levinas’ ethics into the music-thanatology vigil challenges practitioners to
see each individual encountered in the vigil as the absolute Other. His ethics are demanding and
push individuals to the extreme in service of the Other. This responsibility necessitates that
herculean measures be used to achieve the ethics he proclaims, but incorporating these ideals
into our daily interactions opens the “I” to the realms of transcendence. Levinas’ ethics as first
philosophy provides another way to enter into the vigil to develop a contemplative relationship
with the patient and their family. Understanding humans as beings of need may also provide
another way of connecting with patients and families who are in an unfamiliar situation in need
of familiarity. Honoring the patient and family as the absolute Other brings compassion to the
bedside. In bearing witness to the vulnerability and suffering of the Other the “I” strives to fulfill
its responsibility to the Other through compassionate presence. This responsibility to the Other

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does not infringe upon the freedom of the “I”, but calls the self to goodness and compassion in
service of the Other.

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