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Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault, Sontag) w/ Shahidha Bari (Part Two)

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We conclude with Foucault’s “The Ethics of the Concern of the Self as a Practice of Freedom” (1984) and add Susan Sontag’s “On Style” (1965). After our guest’s departure, we give some concluding remarks about her book Dressed: A Philosophy of Clothes (2020) and Derrida’s “The Animal That Therefore I Am” (1999).

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End song: “Clothe Me in Ashes” by K.C. Clifford, interviewed for Nakedly Examined Music #121.

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Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault) w/ Shahidha Bari (Part One)

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On Jacques Derrida’s “The Animal That Therefore I Am” (1999), Michel Foucault’s “The Ethics of the Concern of the Self As A Practice of Freedom” (1984), and our guest’s Dressed: A Philosophy of Clothes (2020).

Philosophy devalues appearances, but our changing dominant metaphysics (there is no “underneath” but rather a complex built out of appearance itself) should have changed this. Our guest provided us with readings that elaborate this change, arguing for our continuity with animal nature (Derrida) and the ethical importance of self-care (Foucault).

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Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault, Sontag) w/ Shahidha Bari (Citizen Edition)

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On Jacques Derrida’s “The Animal That Therefore I Am” (1999), Michel Foucault’s “The Ethics of the Concern of the Self As A Practice of Freedom” (1984), Susan Sontag’s “On Style” (1965), and our guest Shahidha’s book Dressed: A Philosophy of Clothes (2020).

Philosophy devalues appearance in favor of depth and soul, but our changing dominant metaphysics (there is no “underneath” but rather a complex built out of appearance itself) should have changed this. Our guest Shahidha Bari provided us with readings that elaborate this change, arguing for our continuity with animal nature (Derrida), the ethical importance of care of the self including appearance (Foucault), and the illegitimacy of the distinction between style and content (Sontag).

End song: “Clothe Me in Ashes” by K.C. Clifford, interviewed for Nakedly Examined Music #121.

Episode 146: Emmanuel Levinas on Overcoming Solitude

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More Levinas, working this time through Time and the Other (1948).

What is it for a person to exist? What individuates one person from another, making us into selves instead of just part of the causal net of events? Why would someone possibly think that these are real, non-obvious questions that need to be addressed?

End song: “Call on You” by Mark Lint from from the 1993 Mark Lint album Spanish Armada: Songs of Love and Related Neuroses.

Episode 146: Emmanuel Levinas on Overcoming Solitude (Citizen Edition)

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More Levinas, working this time through Time and the Other (1948).

What is it for a person to exist? What individuates one person from another, making us into selves instead of just part of the causal net of events? Why would someone possibly think that these are real, non-obvious questions that need to be addressed? Levinas gives us a phenomenological progression from the “there is,” terrifyingly undifferentiated Being, to becoming an individual through “hypostasis,” which is becoming an existent through a voyage out to the world and back to oneself. But this existing makes us solitary, not only in this weird ontological sense of being a distinct thing, but in a concrete, emotional sense. Overcoming this requires grasping the Other as a real Other, not as an object to fulfill our desires or get in our way. Really understanding this at our core takes some doing, and in the process, we gain a mature sense of time and of death, so, good for us!

End song: “Call on You” by Mark Lint from from the 1993 Mark Lint album Spanish Armada: Songs of Love and Related Neuroses.

Episode 145: Emmanuel Levinas: Why Be Ethical?

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On “Ethics as First Philosophy” (1984). More existentialist ethics, with a Jewish twist this time! Seth returns to join Mark and Wes in figuring out how to best leave off all this aggressive “knowing” and other forms of individual self-assertion to grasp the more primordial appearance of the Other in all his or her vulnerability, which Levinas thinks makes us wholly responsible for others right off the bat.

End song: “To Valerie” from The MayTricks’ So Chewy (1993).

Phenomenology is Wrong

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There are two traditions within phenomenology: realist phenomenology and idealist phenomenology. The distinguishing feature is how they treat their ‘pre-bracketed’ and ‘post-bracketed’ states. In the realist case when we interpret (describe) the world we can bracket the truth of the claims epistemologically; in the idealist case we can metaphysically bracket claims.

The Existential Weirdness of Fandom

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In one of Woody Allen’s films (Annie Hall?), one of the characters remarks that existentialism is a matter of projecting one’s neuroses onto the world. Instead of me being depressed, I am in an ontological state of despair. Instead of being a person who is considering what to do with my evening, it is the world that is pulsing with Continue Reading …

More Voices on Buddhism and Science

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If the dialogue between Buddhism and American intellectuals like Owen Flanagan is part of a fashionable trend, then it has to be one of the longest lasting fads in history. Henry David Thoreau published the Lotus Sutra in the first issue of The Dial in 1844. William James was absorbing Transcendentalist ideas at the family dinner table, where his godfather Continue Reading …

Naturalized Phenomenology?

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Here’s a conference-lecture by Dan Zahavi (of the “Center for Subjectivity Research” at the University of Copenhagen/Danish National Research Foundation) that asks whether it’s a good idea to try to “naturalize” phenomenology. Watch on YouTube. He distinguishes early on what Flanagan means by phenomenology (referring to Owen by name), i.e. reports on what things seem like to us, and what Continue Reading …

PREVIEW-Episode 53: Buddhism and Naturalism with Guest Owen Flanagan

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Discussing The Bodhisattva’s Brain: Buddhism Naturalized (2011) with Owen Flanagan. What philosophical insights can we modern folks with our science and naturalism (i.e. inclination against super-natural explanations) glean from Buddhisim? Flanagan says plenty: We can profitably put Buddhist ethics in dialogue with familiar types of virtue ethics. However, we need to be skeptical of any claims to scientific support the superior happiness of Buddhists.

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Episode 53: Buddhism and Naturalism with Guest Owen Flanagan (Citizens Only)

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Discussing The Bodhisattva’s Brain: Buddhism Naturalized (2011) with Owen Flanagan. What philosophical insights can we modern folks with our science and naturalism (i.e. inclination against super-natural explanations) glean from Buddhisim? Flanagan says plenty: We can profitably put Buddhist ethics in dialogue with familiar types of virtue ethics. However, we need to be skeptical of any claims to scientific support the superior happiness of Buddhists. Learn more.

End song: “A Few Gone Down” from Mark Lint & the Fake Johnson Trio (1998).

Thomas Sheehan (on Entitled Opinions) on Phenomenology

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If you’re still confused about what phenomenology is, what Husserl was about, and how he relates to Heidegger, this October 2011 episode of the Entitled Opinions podcast may help clear things up. Interviewer Robert Harrison starts the discussion expressing the excitement of applied, humanistic phenomenology, i.e. as it was used by existentialists like Sartre. Sheehan says that while there’s not Continue Reading …

Corey Anton on the Phenomenology of the Senses

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There’s a guy on youtube named Corey Anton, who is a Professor of Communication Studies at Grand Valley State University.  He’s posted a ton of videos on a broad range of subjects, many philosophical.  He’s one of those that comes up when you search on the usual suspect terms and I’ve had occasion to watch him from time to time.  Continue Reading …

Three Types of “Reduction” in Phenomenology

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John Townsend (who does video blogs about Merleau-Ponty) reminded me (here) that there’s more than one kind of “reduction” in phenomenology. Since pretty much none of these were covered in our Husserl episode as far as I recall, I thought this was worth my time to do some quick Wikipedia research and report back. The phenomenological reduction, or epoché, is Continue Reading …

Ed Creeley on Phenomenology and Theater Performance

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It’s a strange but established fact that a number of strains in continental philosophy are most readily found in university departments other than philosophy: post-modernism, critical theory, semiotics, structuralism, post-structuralism, etc. I’d not previously thought, though, that this extended to phenomenology. Here is at least one example of this happening: It’s a podcast (not sure why it isn’t under iTunes Continue Reading …

About The Partially Examined Life

The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

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