SUNY series in contemporary continental philosophy

The Time of Memory places emphasis on nonvoluntary memory and the mythology of memory in the context of questions that are prominent in contemporary thought. How do memories form experiences of origin and identity? How might we describe the functions of memory in thought or knowledge? Are there memories without images? How do past times become present? The book also addresses the force of mutation in the formation of memories as well as the roles of memories in experiences of ecstasy, sublimity, continuity, and discontinuity. The book engages Aristotle, Nietzsche, Foucault, Derrida, and Heidegger, as well as such mythological figures as Mnemosyne, Lethe, Dionysus, and Apollo.

Gadamer on Celan makes all of Hans-Georg Cadamer's published writings on Paul Celan's poetry available in English for the first time. Gadamer's commentaries on Celan's work are explicitly meant for a general audience, and they are further testimony to Celan's growing importance in world literature since the Second World War. Celan's poetry has attracted the attention of many well-known figures, including Maurice Blanchot, Jacques Derrida, Edmond Jabes, Otto Poggeler, and George Steiner. As Steiner has said, "It will take a long time for our sensibilities to apprehend poetry of these dimensions and this radicality." Gadamer's commentaries will help readers to listen to Celan's poetry, and to become acquainted with his only book-length commentary on a poet, using the best example of Gadamer's thinking on the relationship of philosophy and poetry. This book also contains a translation of Who Am I and Who Are You?, the centerpeice of Gadamer's most important philosophical project since the publication of Truth and Method (1960).

Phenomenology as a tradition owes its name to Edmund Husserl, in his Logical Investigations (1900-1). It began as a bold new way of doing philosophy, an attempt to bring it back from abstract metaphysical speculation and empty logical calculation in order to come into contact with concrete living experience. As formulated by Husserl, Phenomenology is the investigation of the structures of consciousness that enable consciousness to refer to objects outside itself. It soon broadened into a world-wide and now century-old tradition. Phenomenological versions of theology, sociology, psychology, psychiatry and literary criticism, have all been engendered, so that phenomenology remains one of the most important traditions of contemporary philosophy. Phenomenology is currently extending into new areas such as gender, ethnicity, multiculturalism, and ecology. An effort has been made in these four volumes to include representatives of all the major tendencies within phenomenology and to provide documentation of the critical discussion of its central topics.

"This English translation of Vom Wesen der Sprache, volume 85 of Martin Heidegger's Gesamtausgabe, contains discussions of language that are important both for those interested in Heidegger's thought and for those who wish to think through the nature of language. The guiding theme of these reflections on language is found in Heidegger's lecture notes for a 1939 seminar that focused on J.G. Herder's treatise On the Origin of Language. This course, given just after the completion of his Contributions to Philosophy, sheds new light on the force of language in Heidegger's thought and shows the first openings to his later, better-known works dedicated to the topic of language. The result of this project is to outline how it is that thinking the being of the word moves out of metaphysics into the poetic word and its relation to history. A crucial work, this course brings the reader close to a decisive moment in Heidegger's thought, letting us see how he struggled forward to new ways of thinking how it is that "language as language" can be thought."--Jacket.

The combination of author and subject matter found here makes an unusually interesting text on the Continental European Philosophy of the twentieth century. As Heidegger's former student, colleague and lifelong friend, Gadamer offers a particularly insightful commentary on Heidegger's thinking. Not only do the essays focus on Heidegger's thought, but they also often begin with a description of the philosophical scene in which he first appeared, giving the reader a genuine feel for the kind of impact he made. But the essays do not leave off in the past; rather, they lead into the present, giving Heidegger a voice which continues to have a revolutionary impact. . The text does not only provide a commentary on Heidegger; it also provides a fascinating look at Gadamer himself. The narratives provide us with an intimate look at both the author and his hermeneutics at work, and his commentary on Heidegger's thought is a commentary on his own thought as well.

William McNeill explores the phenomenon of the Augenblick, or "glance of the eye," in Heidegger's thought, and in particular its relation to the primacy of seeing and of theoretical apprehending (theoria) both in Aristotle and in the philosophical and scientific tradition of Western thought. McNeill argues that Heidegger's early reading of Aristotle, which identifies the experience of the Augenblick at the heart of ethical and practical knowledge (phronesis), proves to be a decisive encounter for Heidegger's subsequent understanding and critique of the history of philosophy, science, and technology. It provides him with a critical resource for addressing the problematic domination of theoretical knowledge in Western civilization. Such knowledge, the author shows, always remains in a peculiar tension (itself historically determined and changing) with ethical or "protoethical" knowledge, which is bound to the finite, "ecstatic" temporality of the lived and living moment, and inevitably exposed to the presence of the sensuous.

"This second edition of The Gathering of Reason expands on John Sallis's classic study of Kant's First Critique. This study examines the relation of imagination to reason and to human knowledge and action in general. Moving simultaneously at several different hermeneutical levels, Sallis carries out an interpretation of the Transcendental Dialectic of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Although, in contrast to the Analytic, the Dialectic seldom refers explicitly to imagination, Sallis shows that the concept of reason in the Dialectic requires the complicity of imagination. Sallis demonstrates that for Kant, reason alone does not suffice for bringing before our minds the metaphysical ideas of the soul, the world, and God; rather it is through the force of imagination that these ideas are brought forth and made effective. A new preface situates the book in relation to Sallis's later work, and an extensive afterword focuses on Kant and the Greeks."--Jacket.

"This first English translation of Logik als die Frage nach dem Wesen der Sprache, volume 38 of Martin Heidegger's Gesamtausgabe, contains novel ideas on logic and language that are important for anyone wishing to think beyond traditional views of these topics. Based on student transcripts of Heidegger's lectures and manuscripts for a 1934 summer course, the work contains his first public reflection on the nature of language itself. Given shortly after Heidegger's resignation to the rectorship of the University of Freiburg, the course also opens up fresh perspectives into his controversial involvement with the Nazi regime. Heidegger's critical probing of logic involves metaphysics and poetry and intertwines essential questions concerning language as a world-forming power, the human being, history, and time. This work marks a milestone in Heidegger's path of thinking as his first meditation on language as a primal event of being."--BOOK JACKET.

Presenting new scholarship in feminist language theory, this book addresses issues within diverse traditions, bringing together feminist positions, strategies, and styles in an original way. Gathering together authors with different backgrounds and methods, Language and Liberation puts this diverse scholarship into dialogue. The questions and concerns reflected in these essays are presented within the context of their historical background, provided by the editors' comprehensive introduction. These questions include: Is there a distinction between "female" and "male" language? What is the relationship of feminine/feminist identity to language? What is the value of metaphor for feminist theory and practice?

"Jeff Love and Johannes Schmidt offer a fresh translation of Schelling's enigmatic and influential masterpiece, widely recognized as an indispensable work of German Idealism. The text is an embarrassment of riches - both wildly adventurous and somberly prescient. Martin Heidegger claimed that it was "one of the deepest works of German and thus also of Western philosophy" and that it utterly undermined Hegel's monumental Science of Logic before the latter had even appeared in print. Schelling carefully investigates the problem of evil by building on Kant's notion of radical evil, while also developing an astonishingly original conception of freedom and personality that exerted an enormous (if subterranean) influence on the later course of European philosophy from Schopenhauer and Kierkegaard through Heidegger to important contemporary theorists like Slavoj Zizek." "This translation of Schelling's notoriously difficult and densely allusive work provides extensive annotations and translations of a series of texts (by Boehme, Baader, Lessing, Jacobi, and Herder), hard to find or previously unavailable in English, whose presence in the Philosophical Investigations is unmistakable and highly significant. This handy study edition of Schelling's masterpiece will prove useful for scholars and students alike."--Jacket.