The Step Back

David Wood

Description

This original contribution to the ethical and political significance of philosophy addresses a number of major themes—identity, violence, the erotic, freedom, responsibility, religious belief, globalization—and critically engages with the work of Kierkegaard, Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Derrida, and Levinas. It promotes a unique blend of deconstructive critique and a certain English skepticism, leading to the affirmation of a negative capability—a patience and vigilance in the face of both human folly and philosophy's own homegrown pathologies. The author argues for the extension of our sense of openness and responsibility to animal life, and indeed life in general, and not just to the human.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

INTRODUCTION: Towards a Negative Capability

PART I: Philosophy and Violence

1. Identity and Violence
2. The Philosophy of Violence: The Violence of Philosophy
3. Where Levinas Went Wrong

PART II: Singular Encounters

4. The First Kiss: Tales of Innocence and Experience
5. Thinking God in the Wake of Kierkegaard
6. Dionysus in America

PART III: Ethics and Politics after Deconstruction

7. Notes toward a Deconstructive Phenomenology
8. Responsibility Reinscribed (and How)
9. What Is Ecophenomenology?
10. Globalization and Freedom

POSTSCRIPT: Philosophy: The Antioxidant of Higher Education

NOTES

INDEX

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Éthique et morale
• Ethique et morale

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 01 février 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780791483213
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

The Step Back

SUNY SERIES IN C ONTEMPORARY C ONTINENTAL P HILOSOPHY

Dennis J. Schmidt, editor

T H E S T E P B A C K

Ethics and Politics after Deconstruction

D AV I D W O O D

S T AT E U N I V E R S I T Y O F N E W Y O R K P R E S S

Published by S TATE U NIVERSITY OF N EW Y ORK P RESS A LBANY

© 2005 State University of New York

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

For information, address State University of New York Press 194 Washington Avenue, Suite 305, Albany, NY 12210-2365

Production, Laurie Searl Marketing, Anne M. Valentine

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wood, David (David C.) The step back : ethics and politics after deconstruction / David C. Wood. p. cm. — (SUNY series in contemporary continental philosophy) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7914-6463-6 (alk. paper) 1. Violence—Moral and ethical aspects. I. Title. II. Series. BJ1459.5.W66 2005 179.7—dc22

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2004014216

This book is dedicated to my father

Derek Rawlins Wood (1921–1997)

who knew how to step back.

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Acknowledgments

Introduction

One

Two

Three

Contents

Toward a Negative Capability

PartI Philosophy and Violence

Identity and Violence

The Philosophy of Violence ::

The Violence of Philosophy

Where Levinas Went Wrong:

Some Questions for My Levinasian Friends

Addendum Twenty Theses on Violence

Four

Five

Six

PartII Singular Encounters

The First Kiss: Tales of Innocence and Experience

Thinking God in the Wake of Kierkegaard

Dionysus in America

ix

1

11

27

53

69

73

85

109

viii

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

T H E S T E P B A C K

PartIII Ethics and Politics after Deconstruction

Notes toward a Deconstructive Phenomenology

Responsibility Reinscribed (and How)

What Is Ecophenomenology?

Globalization and Freedom

Postscript Philosophy: The Antioxidant of Higher Education

Notes

Index

131

139

149

169

189

195

229

Acknowledgments

Chapter 3, revised version of “Some Questions for My Levinasian Friends,” inAddressing Levinas,ed. E. Nelson et al. (Evanston: Northwestern Univer- sity Press, 2005). Chapter 4, revised version of “Tales of Innocence and Experience: Kierkegaard’s Spiritual Accountancy,” inThe New Kierkegaard,ed. Elsebet Jegstrup (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004). Chapter 5, revised version of “Thinking God in the Wake of Kierkegaard,” inKierkegaard: A Critical Reader,ed. Jonathan Rée and Jane Chamberlain (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998), 53–74. Chapter 7, “Notes towards a Deconstructive Phenomenology,” inJBSP (Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology), 1998 Chapter 9, revised version of “What is Eco-Phenomenology?” inEco Phenomenology: Back to the Earth Itself,ed. Ted Toadvine and Charles Brown (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003).

I am grateful to all copyright holders for permissions granted.

And I want to thank my graduate student Aaron Simmons for his exem- plary work in preparing the index.

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