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Dualism

Philosophy
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Dualism posits that reality consists of two fundamentally distinct substances, such as mind and body or good and evil.

Detailed Definition
Poetry often challenges or dramatizes dualism through imagery that blurs boundaries—between spirit and flesh, self and world. Romantic and mystical poets especially seek to transcend dualistic thinking, yearning for unity or integration beyond binary oppositions.
Example
Example in poetry:
John Donne’s "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" laments separation of body and soul yet seeks union; William Blake’s "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" critiques moral dualism by embracing contraries; Sylvia Plath’s "Lady Lazarus" battles body (flesh) and mind (will) as warring forces; Percy Bysshe Shelley’s "Ode to the West Wind" seeks to transcend the dualism of poet and nature; Rumi’s poetry dissolves dualism through Sufi mysticism, urging unity of lover and Beloved.
Additional Notes
Dualism (mind/body, spirit/matter) is pervasive but often critiqued in poetry; Romantic and mystical traditions seek to heal the split (Wordsworth, Rumi), while feminist and posthuman poetics reject it entirely; useful for analyzing how poems either reinforce or dissolve boundaries—e.g., does the body merely house the soul, or is it itself a site of knowing and sacredness?
Also Known As
Mind-Body Dualism Cartesian Dualism Substance Dualism Duality Dvaita Manichaeism
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