Download or read book Achieving Our Country written by Richard Rorty and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of America's foremost philosophers challenges the lost generation of the American Left to understand the role it might play in the great tradition of democratic intellectual labor that started with writers such as Walt Whitman and John Dewey.
Download or read book Richard Rorty written by Alexander Gröschner and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-06-06 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first complete posthumous reflection on the work of Richard Rorty, one of the most important and influential American philosophers of recent times.
Download or read book Richard Rorty s Politics written by Markar Melkonian and published by Humanities Press International. This book was released on 1999 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Markar Melkonian meets Rorty head-on, taking him to task for insufficiently repudiating universal values, essentialism, and other metaphysical views he claims to have abandoned. Melkonian does this in the course of making the case that the existing liberal democracies Rorty wants to defend bear little resemblance to Rorty's own liberal utopia, in which "the quest for autonomy is impeded as little as possible by social institutions." Without denigrating such institutions as a free press, independent judiciaries, and representative democracy, Melkonian suggests that socialism - conceived as the state power of workers, rather than capitalists - holds greater promise than Rorty's liberal utopia for the supreme purposes of extending freedom and ameliorating suffering."--BOOK JACKET.
Download or read book Pragmatism as Anti Authoritarianism written by Richard Rorty and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2021-08-17 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The last book by the eminent American philosopher and public intellectual Richard Rorty, providing the definitive statement of his mature philosophical and political views. Richard RortyÕs Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism is a last statement by one of AmericaÕs foremost philosophers. Here Rorty offers his culminating thoughts on the influential version of pragmatism he began to articulate decades ago in his groundbreaking Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Marking a new stage in the evolution of his thought, RortyÕs final masterwork identifies anti-authoritarianism as the principal impulse and virtue of pragmatism. Anti-authoritarianism, on this view, means acknowledging that our cultural inheritance is always open to revision because no authority exists to ascertain the truth, once and for all. If we cannot rely on the unshakable certainties of God or nature, then all we have left to go onÑand argue withÑare the opinions and ideas of our fellow humans. The test of these ideas, Rorty suggests, is relatively simple: Do they work? Do they produce the peace, freedom, and happiness we desire? To achieve this enlightened pragmatism is not easy, though. Pragmatism demands trust. Pragmatism demands that we think and care about what others think and care about, which further requires that we account for othersÕ doubts of and objections to our own beliefs. After all, our own beliefs are as contestable as anyone elseÕs. A supple mind who draws on theorists from John Stuart Mill to Annette Baier, Rorty nonetheless is always an apostle of the concrete. No book offers a more accessible account of RortyÕs utopia of pragmatism, just as no philosopher has more eloquently challenged the hidebound traditions arrayed against the goals of social justice.
Download or read book What Can We Hope For written by Richard Rorty and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2022-05-10 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prescient essays about the state of our politics from the philosopher who predicted that a populist demagogue would become president of the United States Richard Rorty, one of the most influential intellectuals of recent decades, is perhaps best known today as the philosopher who, almost two decades before the 2016 U.S. presidential election, warned of the rise of a Trumpian strongman in America. What Can We Hope For? gathers nineteen of Rorty’s essays on American and global politics, including four previously unpublished and many lesser-known and hard-to-find pieces. In these provocative and compelling essays, Rorty confronts the critical challenges democracies face at home and abroad, including populism, growing economic inequality, and overpopulation and environmental devastation. In response, he offers optimistic and realistic ideas about how to address these crises. He outlines strategies for fostering social hope and building an inclusive global community of trust, and urges us to put our faith in trade unions, universities, bottom-up social campaigns, and bold political visions that thwart ideological pieties. Driven by Rorty’s sense of emergency about our collective future, What Can We Hope For? is filled with striking diagnoses of today’s political crises and creative proposals for solving them.
Download or read book Contingency Irony and Solidarity written by Richard Rorty and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1989-02-24 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this 1989 book Rorty argues that thinkers such as Nietzsche, Freud, and Wittgenstein have enabled societies to see themselves as historical contingencies, rather than as expressions of underlying, ahistorical human nature or as realizations of suprahistorical goals. This ironic perspective on the human condition is valuable on a private level, although it cannot advance the social or political goals of liberalism. In fact Rorty believes that it is literature not philosophy that can do this, by promoting a genuine sense of human solidarity. A truly liberal culture, acutely aware of its own historical contingency, would fuse the private, individual freedom of the ironic, philosophical perspective with the public project of human solidarity as it is engendered through the insights and sensibilities of great writers. The book has a characteristically wide range of reference from philosophy through social theory to literary criticism. It confirms Rorty's status as a uniquely subtle theorist, whose writing will prove absorbing to academic and nonacademic readers alike.
Download or read book Richard Rorty written by Michael Bacon and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2007 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Rorty is both the most prominent and the most provocative recent exponent of pragmatism. This book offers a sympathetic reconstruction of Rorty's account of pragmatism, in which the aspiration to underwrite inquiry by reference to standards outside of any particular community is given up in favor of a view of inquiry as answerable exclusively to the norms implicit within contingent human practices. Rorty hopes that pragmatism so conceived can help effect a transition towards what he calls an "anti-authoritarian" society, a society in which responsibility is owed solely to one's fellow citizens. The book examines the relationship between pragmatism and political liberalism, a form of liberalism which sets aside discussion of truth and value and seeks instead to derive a constitutional settlement in which citizens can freely pursue their individual projects and purposes. It presents a critical assessment of Rorty's ideal of a liberal utopia, inhabited by strong poets and liberal ironists. By focusing on the relationship between the philosophical and political, the book argues that Rorty provides a compelling statement of pragmatism, containing insights that command the attention of contemporary liberal philosophers. Through textual analysis and reconstruction, it argues that while Rorty's account needs to be amended at several points, it remains a powerful and attractive one, and not the incoherent and pernicious folly that critics often take it to be. Well researched, lively, and succinct, Richard Rorty: Pragmatism and Political Liberalism is ideally suited to specialists and graduate students in philosophy and political theory.
Download or read book Ironic Life written by Richard J. Bernstein and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2018-03-15 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Just as philosophy begins with doubt, so also a life that may be called human begins with irony" so wrote Kierkegaard. While we commonly think of irony as a figure of speech where someone says one thing and means the opposite, the concept of irony has long played a more fundamental role in the tradition of philosophy, a role that goes back to Socrates Ð the originator and exemplar of the urbane ironic life. But what precisely is Socratic irony and what relevance, if any, does it have for us today? Bernstein begins his inquiry with a critical examination of the work of two contemporary philosophers for whom irony is vital: Jonathan Lear and Richard Rorty. Despite their sharp differences, Bernstein argues that they complement one other, each exploring different aspects of ironic life. In the background of Lear’s and Rorty’s accounts stand the two great ironists: Socrates and Kierkegaard. Focusing on the competing interpretations of Socratic irony by Gregory Vlastos and Alexander Nehamas, Bernstein shows how they further develop our understanding of irony as a form of life and as an art of living. Bernstein also develops a distinctive interpretation of Kierkegaard’s famous claim that a life that may be called human begins with irony. Bernstein weaves together the insights of these thinkers to show how each contributes to a richer understanding of ironic life. He also argues that the emphasis on irony helps to restore the balance between two different philosophical traditions philosophy as a theoretical discipline concerned with getting things right and philosophy as a practical discipline that shapes how we ought to live our lives.
Download or read book Narrating Evil written by Maria Pia Lara and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2007-04-19 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conceptions of evil have changed dramatically over time, and though humans continue to commit acts of cruelty against one another, today we possess a clearer, more moral way of analyzing them. In Narrating Evil, María Pía Lara explores what has changed in our understanding of evil, why the transformation matters, and how we can learn from this specific historical development. Drawing on Immanuel Kant's and Hannah Arendt's ideas about reflective judgment, Lara argues that narrative plays a key role in helping societies acknowledge their pasts. Particular stories haunt our consciousness and lead to a kind of examination and dialogue that shape notions of morality. A powerful description of a crime can act as a filter, helping us to draw conclusions about what constitutes a moral wrong, and public debates over these narratives allow us to construct a more accurate picture of historical truth, leading to a better understanding of why such actions are possible. In building her argument, Lara considers Greek tragedies, Shakespeare's depictions of evil, Joseph Conrad's literary metaphors, and movies that portray human cruelty. Turning to such philosophers and writers as Jürgen Habermas, Walter Benjamin, Primo Levi, Giorgio Agamben, and Ariel Dorfman, Lara defines a reflexive relationship between an event, the narrative of the event, and the public reception of the narrative, and she proves that the stories of perpetrators and sufferers are always intertwined. The process of disclosure, debate, and the public fashioning of collective judgment are vital methods through which we make sense not only of new forms of cruelty but of past crimes as well. Narrating Evil describes the steps of this process and why they are a crucial part of our attempt to build a different, more just world.
Download or read book Richard Rorty written by Neil Gross and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2010-10 with total page 742 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On his death in 2007, Richard Rorty was heralded by the New York Times as one of the world's most influential contemporary thinkers. Controversial on the left and the right for his critiques of objectivity and political radicalism, Rorty experienced a renown denied to all but a handful of living philosophers. In this masterly biography, Neil...
Download or read book Rorty s Politics of Redescription written by Gideon Calder and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Rorty is among the most cited, influential and notorious of recent philosophers. This work addresses Rorty's work in terms of social and political philosophy.
Download or read book The Ethics Epistemology and Politics of Richard Rorty written by Giancarlo Marchetti and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-11-04 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book features fourteen original essays that critically engage the philosophy of Richard Rorty, with an emphasis on his ethics, epistemology, and politics. Inspired by James’ and Dewey’s pragmatism, Rorty urged us to rethink the role of science and truth with a liberal-democratic vision of politics. In doing so, he criticized philosophy as a sheer scholastic endeavor and put it back in touch with our most pressing cultural and human needs. The essays in this volume employ the conceptual tools and argumentative techniques of analytic philosophy and pragmatism and demonstrate the relevance of Rorty’s thought to the most urgent questions of our time. They touch on a number of topics, including but not limited to structural injustice, rule-following, Black feminist philosophy, legal pragmatism, moral progress, relativism, and skepticism. This book will be of interest to a wide range of scholars across disciplines who are engaging with the work of Richard Rorty.
Download or read book Philosophy and Social Hope written by Richard Rorty and published by Penguin Books. This book was released on 1999-08-26 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Rorty is one of the most provocative figures in recent philosophical, literary and cultural debate. This collection brings together those of his writings aimed at a wider audience, many published in book form for the first time. In these eloquent essays, articles and lectures, Rorty gives a stimulating summary of his central philosophical beliefs and how they relate to his political hopes; he also offers some challenging insights into contemporary America, justice, education and love.
Download or read book The Practice of Political Theory written by Clayton Chin and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2018-08-28 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent political thought has grappled with a crisis in philosophical foundations: how do we justify the explicit and implicit normative claims and assumptions that guide political decisions and social criticism? In The Practice of Political Theory, Clayton Chin presents a critical reconstruction of the work of Richard Rorty that intervenes in the current surge of methodological debates in political thought, arguing that Rorty provides us with unrecognized tools for resolving key foundational issues. Chin illustrates the significance of Rorty’s thought for contemporary political thinking, casting his conception of “philosophy as cultural politics” as a resource for new models of sociopolitical criticism. He juxtaposes Rorty’s pragmatism with the ontological turn, illuminating them as alternative interventions in the current debate over the crisis of foundations in philosophy. Chin places Rorty in dialogue with continental philosophy and those working within its legacy. Focused on both important questions in pragmatist scholarship and central issues in contemporary political thought, The Practice of Political Theory is an important response to the vexed questions of justification and pluralism.
Download or read book Richard Rorty written by Michael A. Peters and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2001 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Rorty's neopragmatist philosophy marks him as one of the most gifted and controversial thinkers of his time. Antifoundationalism and antirepresentationalism are the guiding motifs in his thought. He wants to jettison a set of philosophical distinctions--appearance/reality, mind/body, morality/prudence--that have dominated and shaped the history of Western philosophy since the time of Plato. It is a position that has propelled him into a series of heated debates with philosophers who are the most influential of their generation--analytic philosophers such as Quine, Davidson, Rawls, and Putnam; as well as Continental philosophers, including Habermas, Derrida, Foucault, and Lyotard. At the same time, Rorty's work has helped to break down the artificial separation between these two wings of Western philosophy by acting as an intellectual bridge between them. This distinctive collection by scholars from around the world focuses upon the cultural, educational, and political significance of his thought. The nine essays which comprise the collection examine a variety of related themes: Rorty's neopragmatism, his view of philosophy, his philosophy of education and culture, Rorty's comparison between Dewey and Foucault, his relation to postmodern theory, and, also his form of political liberalism.
Download or read book A Companion to Rorty written by Alan Malachowski and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2020-04-13 with total page 556 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A groundbreaking reference work on the revolutionary philosophy and intellectual legacy of Richard Rorty A provocative and often controversial thinker, Richard Rorty and his ideas have been the subject of renewed interest to philosophers working in epistemology, metaphysics, analytic philosophy, and the history of philosophy. Having called for philosophers to abandon representationalist accounts of knowledge and language, Rorty introduced radical and challenging concepts to modern philosophy, generating divisive debate through the new form of American pragmatism which he advocated and the renunciation of traditional epistemology which he espoused. However, while Rorty has been one of the most widely-discussed figures in modern philosophy, few volumes have dealt directly with the expansive reach of his thought or its implications for the fields of philosophy in which he worked. The Blackwell Companion to Rorty is a collection of essays by prominent scholars which provide close, and long-overdue, examination of Rorty’s groundbreaking work. Divided into five parts, this volumecovers the major intellectual movements of Rorty’s career from his early work on consciousness and transcendental arguments, to the lasting impacts of his major writings, to his approach to pragmatism and his controversial appropriations from other philosophers, and finally to his later work in culture, politics, and ethics. Offers a comprehensive, balanced, and insightful account of Rorty's approach to philosophy Provides an assessment of Rorty’s more controversial thoughts and his standing as an “anti-philosopher’s philosopher” Contains new and original exploration of Rorty’s thinking from leading scholars and philosophers Includes new perspectives on topics such as Rorty's influence in Central Europe Despite the relevance of Rorty’s work for the wider community of philosophers and for those working in fields such as international relations, legal and political theory, sociology, and feminist studies, the secondary literature surrounding Rorty’s work and legacy is limited. A Companion to Rorty address this absence, providinga comprehensive resource for philosophers and general readers.
Download or read book Richard Rorty written by Christopher J. Voparil and published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. This book was released on 2006-07-10 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first full-length work devoted to Richard Rorty from the perspective of political theory, this book offers a fresh assessment of the promise of the renowned pragmatist's project. Framing Rorty's discourse as one of meaning and persuasion rather than truth and accuracy of representation, Voparil sheds new light on many of Rorty's most misunderstood and maligned stances, including his practice of "redescription" and disavowal of "getting it right," as well as his embrace of the novel and "sentimental education." As political theory, Rorty's perspective, not unlike Sheldon Wolin's, values the imagination, the ability to come up with new metaphors and angles of vision, and is driven by a deep desire to reinvigorate a moribund and detached contemporary left. Voparil's account engages the full range of Rorty's intellectual forebears, grounding his thought in an American tradition that extends beyond the classical pragmatists to include Emerson, Whitman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and James Baldwin, in addition to chapters that trace Rorty's connection to such diverse figures as Marx, Mill, Dickens, Isaiah Berlin, and Milan Kundera.
