How should pragmatists respond to and contribute to the resolution of one of America's greatest and most enduring problems? Given that the most important thinkers of the pragmatist movement—Charles S. Peirce, William James, John Dewey, and George Herbert Mead—said little about the problem of race, how does their distinctly American way of thinking confront the hardship and brutality that characterizes the experience of many African Americans in this country? In 12 thoughtful and provocative essays, contemporary American pragmatists connect ideas with (...) action and theory with practice to come to terms with this seemingly intractable problem. Exploring themes such as racism and social change, the value of the concept of race, the role of education in ameliorating racism, and the place of democracy in dealing with the tragedy of race, the voices gathered in this volume consider how pragmatism can focus new attention on the problem of race. Contributors are Michael Eldridge, Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., Judith M. Green, D. Micah Hester, Donald F. Koch, Bill E. Lawson, David E. McClean, Gregory F. Pappas, Scott L. Pratt, Alfred E. Prettyman, John R. Shook, Paul C. Taylor, and Cornel West. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Origins of the Contemporary Debate Historiographic Research and Writing Two Variants of Narrativist Philosophy of Historiography The Philosophical Approach The Transcendentalization of Narrativist Philosophy of Historiography Rhetorical Narrativist Philosophy Hayden White Conclusion Bibliography.

This essay deals, mainly, with the notion of representation. Representation is associated with texts and, as such, is contrasted to the true singular statement. It is argued that the relationship between the text and what the text represents can never be modeled on the relationship between a true singular statement and what the statement is true of, and, furthermore, that the former relationship is aesthetic while the latter is epistemological in nature. This aesthetic relationship between the represented and its representation (...) is investigated from the perspective of historical writing. This offers an interesting perspective because historical texts are representations, but they also aim at giving us “the truth” about the past. Historical representation, therefore, is the kind of representation coming closest to the cognitive claims traditionally investigated by epistemology. The notion of aesthetic and historical experience is explored in order to define the relationship between historical representation and what it represents. (shrink)

Taking as its point of departure a sharp critique of Rawls's influential A Theory of Justice, this book looks at politics from an aesthetic perspective.

W. F. R. Hardie; X—Aristotle's Doctrine that Virtue is a “Mean”, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 65, Issue 1, 1 June 1965, Pages 183–204, https.

The amplitude and the diversity of Ricoeur’s philosophical production is astonishing. Three factors shed light upon this fact. First, his philosophical career covers seventy years wherein he witnessed the rise and the decline of tlve philosophical -isms. Further, he is a typical dialogical thinker: in conversation with the great classical and modern philosophers, and eager to listen to the methods and results of human an linguistics sciences. A third reason, particularly of differentiation, stems from his double conviction and commitment. On (...) the one hand, he wants to be a rigorous philosopher, even keeping on a methodic agnosticism. On the other hand, however, he is a convinced Christian, and so he also likes to think critically – a rigorous philosophizing here is inappropriate – on religion, belief, and biblical language and topics. Nevertheless, it is only since 2000 that he is getting fully aware of the disintegrated impression many readers have from his publications. In his opinion, this impression is perfectly understandable: a reading public and myself are on completely different wavelengths. From reading my books people spontaneously nurture their own expectation with regard to coming publications, whereas my concern always was: am I answering your questions? So, in four recent articles Ricoeur speaks of his technical philosophy composed of eleven books: from The voluntary and the Involontary to the Course of Recognition . He argues that the continuity of his basic philosophical writings is, each time, determined by a residue, a question the preceding publication left open. But, where to situate then his twenty-two other books into a global and consistent picture? All these other works are explorations of specific philosophical issues, and reflections and topics as prophecy, tragedy and religion bordering philosophy. For this matter, a fully rigorous philosophical discourse is not always possible. These writings, however, find their setting around the hard core of his philosophy. Ricoeur himself only mentions two genres: volumes of articles for a larger audience as History and Truth and university lectures as Lectures on Ideology and Utopia . But other headings need to be added to umbrella other publications: historical and autobiographic writings, collection of articles on political topics, on the sacred and biblical language, on philosophy of law, and on medical ethical issues. On a more remote distance from the heart of his philosophy are located hundred of articles and interviews on philosophical topics, reflections on actual themes, an even some homilies. To amazement of many, two eminent Ricoeur commentators recently characterized his philosophy as “An Ontology of Life”. This is not as strange as it looks! Already in The voluntary and the Involontary. Ricoeur offers a phenomenology of “life, to be in life and birth”. To him, life also is a lived and hard-won value. In fact, belief in life is related to his main category of “originative affirmation” and of “hope”. Hope, however, is never a knowledge but only the regulative idea of my metaphysical thinking, and it remains inextricably bound up with the anguish for a senseless totality. “Nothing is closer to the anguish of nonsense than timid hope.”. (shrink)

"The chief business of twentieth-century philosophy” is “to reckon with twentieth-century history," claimed R. G. Collingwood. In this remarkable collection of essays, Frank Ankersmit demonstrates the prescience of that remark and goes a long way toward meeting its challenge. Responding to the work of Hayden White, Arthur Danto, and Hans-Georg Gadamer, he examines such issues as the difference between historical representation and artistic expression, the status of metaphor in historical description, and the relation of postmodernism to historicism. Ankersmit's fluent grasp (...) of European thought and his ability to incorporate concepts from literary theory, art history, the philosophy of science, and political thought into his analyses assure that this collection will interest readers throughout the humanities. (shrink)

Why are we interested in history at all? Why do we feel the need to distinguish between past and present? In this book, the author argues that the past originates from an experience of rupture separating past and present. Think of the radical rupture with Europe's past that was effected by the French and the Industrial Revolutions. Sublime Historical Experience investigates how the notion of sublime historical experience complicates and challenges existing conceptions of language, truth, and knowledge. These experiences of (...) rupture are paradoxical since they involve both the separation of past and present and, at the same time, the effort to overcome this separation in terms of historical knowledge. The experience unites feelings of loss/pain with those of love/satisfaction, and thus is in agreement with how sublime experience is ordinarily defined. The experience is also precognitive since it precedes historical knowledge. As such it is a challenge to traditional conceptions of the relationship between experience and truth or language. It compels us to disconnect the notions of experience and truth. (shrink)

(1889). SOME SCIENTIFIC RESULTS OF A MISSION TO SOUTH AFRICA. Transactions of the South African Philosophical Society: Vol. 6, No. 1, pp. 1-16.

There are no dictionary meanings or authoritative discussions of "presence" that fix the significance of this word in a way that ought to be accepted by anybody using it. So we are in the welcome possession of great freedom to maneuver when using the term. In fact, the only feasible requirement for its use is that it should maximally contribute to our understanding of the humanities. When trying to satisfy this requirement I shall relate "presence" to representation. Then I focus (...) on a variant of representation in which the past is allowed to travel to the present as a kind of "stowaway" , so that the past is literally "present" in historical representation. I appeal to Runia's notion of so-called "parallel processes" for an analysis of this variant of historical representation. (shrink)

Philosophy of history is the Cinderella of contemporary philosophy. Philosophers rarely believe that the issues dealt with by philosophers of history are matters of any great theoretical interest or urgency. In their view philosophy of history rarely goes beyond the question of how results that have already been achieved elsewhere can or should be applied to the domain of historical writing. Moreover, contemporary philosophers of history have done desperately little to dispel the low opinion that their colleagues have of them. (...) In this essay I argue that Arthur Danto is the exception confirming the rule, for Danto’s philosophy of representation may help us understand how texts relate to what they are about. The main shortcoming of philosophy of language undoubtedly is that it never bothered to investigate the philosophical mysteries of the text. The writing of history is a philosophical goldmine and we must praise Danto for having reminded us of this. (shrink)

Originally published in 1937 as part of the 'Yesterday and Today in Germany' series for Cambridge Contact Readers, this German text describes a fantasy tour around Germany taken by David Hanes, the fictional English schoolchild from the first instalment, now an Oxford undergraduate. David now corresponds with a number of German friends during his trip, and learns more about German traditions and ways of life. The text is illustrated with valuable photographs of inter-war German life, as well as maps, charts (...) and sheet music. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in Germany and the history of German teaching in Britain. (shrink)