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Abstract
The conclusion starts by taking a position towards eco-phenomenology and its relation to post-colonial thinking and feminism. It questions the distinction between desire and need, which is still present in contemporary ecologically oriented phenomenology (Renaud Barbaras) but is overcome in the work of Hans Jonas. The ungraspable is defined here as an interruption of Western phenomenological consciousness that is expressed in the appropriative movements of a human body. The ungraspable is rethought in relation to Sara Ahmed’s “queer objects,” as an experience of climbing a mountain, observing the horizon, but it is also to be found in mass-produced objects. The conclusion accentuates the concept of forgetting one’s own being in the environment, in contrast to toxic grasping. The distinction between natural and artificial objects is deconstructed here, emphasizing “more-than-living” objects such as technical objects (Gilbert Simondon) and mass-produced objects. These are also ungraspable and should be rethought in environmental ethics, since they play a crucial role in the politics of pollution and of toxic liberalism (concerning decomposition, waste, overconsumption, and the radical resistance of objects to grasping).
Abstract
The fourth chapter focuses on Derrida’s analysis of animality and thingness as they are related to questions of brotherhood, fraternity, and nationalism. The distinction between the living and the more-than-living is one of the key distinctions of this chapter. It shows that Derrida does not actually overcome the distinction between the organic and the inorganic; indeed, he conceives of otherness in terms of the death proper to organic beings. Derrida’s thinking is defined in this chapter as narcissistic auto-bio-morphism. However, his analysis can serve as a starting point for reflection on the otherness of more-than-living or inorganic objects, focusing in particular on objects that are not strictly a part of nature (such as the products of mass production).
Abstract
This chapter examines the role of the hand in phenomenology and defines the Derridian term “humainism.” The human hand has a privileged position in phenomenology as a basis of human privilege in the world and of hierarchy. First, the chapter proposes a critical analysis of the later Heidegger and of poetic experience in relation to the hand, technique, and technology. Second, the chapter focuses on the early Heidegger and the relationship between the hand and entities through an analysis of Vorhandenheit (presence-at-hand) and Zuhandenheit (readiness-to-hand), which are two types of being of entities in the world. The analysis concludes that for the later and the early Heidegger, entities do not have any being of their own; they are defined by humans and are completely graspable, penetrable. Levinas, however, did not agree. The analysis moves toward an analysis of the elemental in Levinas, with an emphasis on swimming. This metaphor is developed further to show that in swimming, we can passively face the force and independent character of the world that is, in fact, ungraspable. Finally, the chapter proposes an original analysis of habit and boredom. It reverses the Heideggerian concept of thinking one’s own being, articulating a notion of forgetting one’s own being. This forgetting gains a positive meaning and questions the privilege of the human hand in the contemporary world. Similarly, boredom and habit are understood here as attitudes that, rather than leading to a grasping of the world, propose an alternative to toxic grasping, although one that differs from the Heideggerian concept of “letting be.”
Abstract
The fifth chapter critically reconsiders the Heideggerian and phenomenological definition of subjectivity and the Western intellectual and religious tradition, which promotes hierarchization and underlies racist discourses (more or less directly). This logic is based on toxic forms of grasping that lead to domination, characterized by the desire for exactitude, the proper, and domination. This chapter provides an analysis of these three traits of desire, based on the author’s personal experience with a specific hierarchy. Through tracing Derrida’s reading of negative theology, the chapter shows that, rather than allowing for purification, exactitude, and domination, the graspable and the ungraspable are interlaced. The concept of interlacement is connected to Indigenous conceptions of interconnectedness (such as Sila and entanglement) that undermine the purification of the distinction between the human and the non-human, the living and the non-living. The chapter also rethinks the question of anthropocentrism.
Abstract
The third chapter proposes an analysis of the later Levinas, for whom “the more-than-living” no longer plays a significant role. In this period, Levinas attributes alterity exclusively and definitively to the human and the divine. The chapter considers Levinas’s Talmudic readings, focusing on a detailed analysis of In the Image of God According to Rabbi Hayyim Volozhiner. The analysis then continues by examining Derrida’s interpretation of Levinas, as developed in Violence and Metaphysics. In order to understand the contribution made by this text, it is necessary to take into account Derrida’s discussion with Levinas on Husserl and Heidegger. Levinas’s failure to acknowledge the alterity of entities can be traced to a hierarchy based on the privilege of human absoluteness.
Abstract
This chapter proposes an interpretation of Emmanuel Levinas’s early work that contradicts Jacques Derrida’s claim that Levinas identifies the phenomenological limit only in the caress and in the human visage, created in the image of God. The aim is to demonstrate the importance of the early Levinas in relation to Levinas’s later work. It shows that Levinas’s thinking of otherness does not definitively, in all texts and in all periods, exclude conceiving of the otherness that is other-than-human. Even though some of Levinas’s texts do indeed confirm the Derridean interpretation, as is shown at the end of this chapter, the principal aim is not to reproach Levinas for being contradictory but to show that Levinas’s contradictions are fertile ones and can inspire a more inclusive and more general way of thinking about otherness in eco-philosophy. The “more-than-living” includes objects that are produced by man (artifacts) but also inorganic nature, for example more-than-living stones. The chapter elaborates on the otherness of the world and sensibility in an original interpretation of Levinasian concepts such as sleep, enjoyment, home, and work. It focuses on these phenomena insofar as it is in them that Levinas discovers the limits of phenomenology (the ungraspable).
Abstract
In fortunate cases, very different cultures have come together, united and created something new.
Abstract
Artists can gain their inspiration from far away – from distant lands of their own cultural sphere or even from a completely different cultural sphere. The distance is often not an obstacle, but seems to even fuel the intensity.