“The Other” as a Means to Know the Self in the European Journey

Starting from Sartre's famous dictum "the other is the indispensable means to know myself," and taking the journey as the shift to the space of the other and his culture, the travelling self is not revealed or achieved except through the encounter with the other. Indeed, the traveler too has only one chance to know himself and achieve this by the other's view of him and his view of the other. The "there" is not like a distant place but like outside the self where the encounter with the other takes place by means of emerging from the self to understand the other in his difference, and also to understand the self. In order to be able to reveal ourselves and the selves of others, through dialogue, we must be open to the possibilities of accepting difference.

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Abstract

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Starting from Sartre's famous dictum "the other is the indispensable means to know myself," and taking the journey as the shift to the space of the other and his culture, the travelling self is not revealed or achieved except through the encounter with the other. Indeed, the traveler too has only one chance to know himself and achieve this by the other's view of him and his view of the other. The "there" is not like a distant place but like outside the self where the encounter with the other takes place by means of emerging from the self to understand the other in his difference, and also to understand the self. In order to be able to reveal ourselves and the selves of others, through dialogue, we must be open to the possibilities of accepting difference.

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