Insider vs. Outsider: An Analogue

In "Professing Multiculturalism: The Politics of Style in the Contact Zone," Min-zhan Lu asks the following question: "[W]hy do we assume. . . that until one can prove one’s ability to produce ‘error-free’ prose, one has not earned the right to innovative ‘style’?" (170). This line of inquiry, exemplified by the preceding Gertrude Stein and Theodore Dreiser anecdotes (as well as by Bartholomae’s anecdote about Quentin Pierce), particularly interests me because it demands that I consider the notion of an insider writer versus an outsider writer. This is exactly the type of consideration I’ve not thus far "deigned" to do from my lofty perch upon the high horse of honky privilege (as I choose to call it). That is, I never really thought to evaluate the work of an outsider (i.e. "untrained" or "imperfectly educated") writer on any grounds other than what’s wrong with it and how can it be fixed? That such a work may constitute an articulate and unique expression of an identifiable and inherently valid worldview has generally eluded me because of the obsessive concerns about mechanics and convention that I’ve been trained to worry about, first and foremost.

That said, it occurs to me that perhaps an analogue to this relationship exists in the world of visual arts with the Art versus Folk or Outsider art dichotomy. On the one side are those who would be quick to justify certain styles of painting—say cubism, for instance—on the grounds that a given artist has been classically trained and/or educated and thus his compositions are the result of artistic intent rather than a lack of skill or proficiency in the medium. On the other side, then, are those who would argue that an artist’s intent, in relation to his skill or proficiency, is irrelevant; rather, the only matter of relevance is a given composition’s impact on its viewer. Basically, it’s an argument wherein one might contend that a cubist portrait by Picasso has more artistic merit than a cubist portrait rendered by an untrained folk artist, even if the latter composition is equal in every perceivable way. No matter which side you of this argument you inhabit, there persists the elitist and dogmatic distinction between so-called Art and so-called outsider or folk art, where the former is afforded a much greater social and economic currency than the latter à la insider writing versus outsider writing. Even so, and contrary to outsider writing, outsider art can be argued to possess in the very least a limited measure of recognition and prestige within the visual arts—a distinction that may or may not be worthy of further consideration. [Sorry for the lack of clarity and abrupt stop—I’ll be back later to add and edit.]

Lu, Min-zhan. "Professing Multiculturalism: The Politics of Style in the Contact Zone." Representing the "Other." Urbana: NCTE, 1999.