A Response from the Periphery: Gutmann and the Challenge of Being Relevant

In approaching the review of Gutmann's book, my focus was on the content, not on the author. Here there might be a cultural difference, as in the American space there is a tendency to focus on the content of the writer's work and not on his reputation. The assessment of the content drives the reputation, not the other way round.

Mr Gutmann clearly took umbrage at the fact that his reputation and experience were not given any consideration in reviewing his work. I do not know him and would like to think that if he is remembered it will be as a function of his work, not his perception of what he thinks he is owed. The fact that we have toiled for years, does not necessarily mean that we generate memorable products.

It is an inherent risk to produce a retrospective of one's work. A work that was burnished and compelling at one point may now be jaded, and so yesterday. Most of Gutmann's work has not aged well. It is not particularly illuminating to someone new to the field, as it lacks depth and critical canonical reference points, and it really would not hold the interest of someone with knowledge of the issues he discusses.

My suspicion is that many of these presentations were done to specific audiences and made sense for that audience at that time. We have all done these presentations to middle managers, and distractible senior executives. We also realise that rarely are these products ready for publication. Many of the papers in Gutmann's collection have that, not quite ready for prime time feel to them.

It saddens me that Gutmann was so unthoughtful and inelegant in the way he introduced race / ethnicity in his diatribe against me. In reading his work I did wonder about his ethnicity and his qualification to do cross cultural work. I wondered because the material he presented was not particularly cogent. It never occurred to me to question his motives. Being a person of colour, who has lived in the ‘developing’ world, I am all too familiar with folks from the metrople,