Death Consciousness and Social Consciousness: A Critique of Ernest Becker and Jacques Choron on Denying Death

1981 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 185-200 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfred G. Killilea
Keyword(s):  
Meaning In Life ◽  
Social Consciousness ◽  
Human Relationships ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Secular Culture ◽  
Attitudes Toward Death ◽  
Ernest Becker ◽  
Deep Appreciation ◽  
The Face ◽  
Denial Of Death

Those who believe that more honest attitudes toward death will provoke more humane social and political attitudes need to confront directly the argument that the denial of death is both necessary and inevitable. Ernest Becker and Jacques Choron have made the most forceful recent cases that death deprives life of meaning and leads to massive denial in modern secular culture. However, while Becker vividly portrays the pervasiveness and desperation of death-denying behavior, he does not perceive that the denial of death may be an effect rather than a cause of inequality and competitiveness in modern culture. Choron's stress on the need for endurance in finding meaning in life amounts to a similar underestimation of the power of human relationships to provide life with significance in the face of death. Rather than establishing the necessity of denying death, Becker and Choron accentuate human vulnerability. The recognition of this vulnerability actually could challenge their assumptions by provoking a deep appreciation of the values of equality and community, which in turn could provide the critical social support needed for an acceptance of human mortality.

Politics contra the functionalisation of man – Hannah Arendt’s problematic investigation of ideology and labour

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 338-369
Author(s):  
Anna-Sophie Schönfelder
Keyword(s):  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Social Constraints ◽  
Human Relationships ◽  
One Dimensional ◽  
Social Domination ◽  
Persuasive Power ◽  
The Face

Abstract Hannah Arendt suggests the pivotal problems of modern society to be man’s susceptibility to ideological patterns of thought and behaviour and the compulsion under which he performs labour. Her depiction of these phenomena can however be seen as rather one-dimensional. Since the redemptive concept of politics which she proposes as a kind of worldly realm for unconstrained human relationships, is based upon her fragile analyses of ideology and labour, this concept’s persuasive power is limited. Arendt’s striking powers of observation are more effective in areas where social domination is taken to the extreme, whereas in the face of basic social constraints she seems to be perplexed.

“What Comes From Men and Women Dancing”

2021 ◽  
pp. 173-184
Author(s):  
Sonia Gollance
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
Female Agency ◽  
Jewish Communities ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Dance Floor ◽  
The Face ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Fictional Representations

The epilogue connects tropes of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries of Jews, dance, and modernization with late twentieth- and twenty-first-century representations. Popular works such as Fiddler on the Roof (1964), Dirty Dancing (1987), Rebecca Goldstein’s Mazel (1995), Kerry Greenwood’s Raisins and Almonds: A Phryne Fisher Mystery (1997), Helene Wecker’s The Golem and the Jinni (2013), and Naomi Novik’s Spinning Silver (2018) reveal the continued efficacy of the mixed-sex dancing trope in fictional representations of Yiddish-speaking Jews. These works are often less didactic than nineteenth-century predecessors; they envision more opportunities for female agency and frequently end happily. Not only is the dance floor a flexible space, the dance trope is a flexible metaphor for the concerns of Jewish communities in the face of cultural transitions. In other words, the trope of Jewish mixed-sex dancing charts the particularities of the Jewish “dance” with modern culture.

The Face of Judgement in Measure for Measure

2019 ◽  
pp. 163-175
Author(s):  
Kevin Curran
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Ethical Relation ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Faculty Psychology ◽  
Affective Quality ◽  
Legal Writing ◽  
Measure For Measure ◽  
The Face

Like a number of other Renaissance comedies and romances, Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure ends with a scene of judgment in which punishment and reward is distributed among a group of characters. Measure for Measure insistently links judgment to the spatial and revelatory dynamics of facing and unmasking. Adducing evidence from two early modern archives – legal writing on the theory and practice of judgment and treatises on physiology and faculty psychology – Kevin Curran addresses two related questions: (1) What can a historical understanding of the face in early modern culture tell us about the phenomenology of judgment in Measure for Measure? And (2) how does Shakespeare’s staging of judgment create a participatory experience in the playhouse grounded in sensation? The essay ultimately argues that the face in Measure for Measure functions as a hinge between the ethical relation of judgment and the ethical relation of theater, one that insists of the embodied and affective quality of both forms of interaction.

Wang Shu’s design practice and ecological phenomenology

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 361-370 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hing-Wah Chau
Keyword(s):  
Martin Heidegger ◽  
Nobel Prize ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Technological Development ◽  
Design Practice ◽  
Architectural Discourse ◽  
Human Relationships ◽  
The Face ◽  
Ongoing Concern

Wang Shu (b. 1963) is a locally trained Chinese architect who has received widespread media coverage in the last decade, especially after receiving the prestigious Pritzker Prize in 2012, often considered the Nobel Prize of architecture. Numerous articles and interviews have been published concerning Wang Shu and his design practice, however, there is a lack of analysis of his work from what might be called the perspective of his ecological phenomenology. Wang acknowledges his interest in phenomenological thinking and expresses an ongoing concern about human relationships with place and nature, the continuity of craftsmanship in the face of technological development, as well as the materiality and tactility of bodily perception. Before analysing Wang's work, relevant ideas of Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) and Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961) and their influence on architectural discourse are firstly examined. Both of them were seminal philosophers who offered inspiring insights to ecological discourse.

Eros in the Metropolis: Bartók's The Miraculous Mandarin

2000 ◽  
Vol 125 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Downes
Keyword(s):  
Art Music ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Karl Mannheim ◽  
Cultural Renewal ◽  
Nature And Culture ◽  
The Face ◽  
And Function ◽  
Gyorgy Lukacs ◽  
Creative Subject

Bartók's essay ‘The Relation of Folk Song to the Development of the Art Music of our Time’, published in 1921, was written as he was working on the score of The Miraculous Mandarin. Three main issues in the essay, the question of origin, the position of the creative subject with relation to ‘Nature’ and ‘Culture’, and the character of the music of Stravinsky and Schoenberg, are given fresh contexts by the musical work's emphasis on the character and function of differing types of eroticism. The possibility of cultural renewal based on the recovery of erotic self-expression in the face of the oppressive, objective conditions of the modern metropolis emerges as a central concern. This links Bartók's work to that of the Sunday Circle group of intellectuals, including Karl Mannheim, György Lukács and Béla Balázs, who sought an affirmative alternative to Georg Simmel's pessimistic view of the ‘tragedy of modern culture’.

Bauman on Moral Blindness

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-94
Author(s):  
Anthony Chuwkuebuka Ohaekwusi ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Individual Choice ◽  
Moral Obligations ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Liquid Modernity ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Moral Blindness ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Universe

This article analyzes Zygmunt Bauman’s notion of moral blindness against the backdrop of his designation of modern culture as a dynamic process of liquefaction constantly dissolving every paradigm and subject to the flexible and indeterminate power of individual choice. Bauman argued that the social conditions of this radically individualistic liquid modernity result in a kind of moral insensitivity that he calls adiaphorization. Adiaphorization for him places certain human acts outside the “universe of moral obligations.” It defies the entire orthodox theory of the social origins of morality as it reveals that some dehumanizing monstrous atrocities like the holocaust and genocides are not exclusively reserved for monsters, but can be attributable to “frighteningly normal” moral agents. The present text therefore attempts to discuss the various moral implications of Bauman’s analysis of moral blindness, with a view to highlighting its weaknesses. It moves on to explore Bauman’s recourse to Emmanuel Levinas’ ethics of the “face of the Other” as a viable ethical remedy that trumps the uncanny effects of this whole adiaphorization effect. Finally, the paper further advances his call for a rediscovery of the sense of belonging, by appealing to some major insights originating from African traditions of ethical communalism in order to propose a possible route towards the avoidance and amelioration of this moral challenge.

Mitigating death anxiety: Identifying music’s role in terror management

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-17
Author(s):  
Audrey Berger Cardany
Keyword(s):  
Death Anxiety ◽  
Mortality Salience ◽  
Terror Management ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Music Preferences ◽  
Review Analysis ◽  
Ernest Becker ◽  
Denial Of Death ◽  
Social Anthropologist

Based on the ideas of social-anthropologist Ernest Becker, Terror Management Theory (TMT) explains human behavior as being motivated by conscious and unconscious mortality salience. This article examines the role of music in the denial of death and catalogues related literature in the music and social psychology fields. Categories include: TMT and art, music used as control condition in TMT research, and songs and TMT. A brief description of Becker’s theory and TMT and a discussion of the functions of music in culture precede the literature review. Analysis of the literature suggests that (a) music provides a safe window frame through which to examine death, (b) music created for community purposes may buffer death anxiety more readily than that created for individual purposes, and (c) songs prompt mortality salience and simultaneously buffer death anxiety depending on individual music preferences, cultural worldviews, and perceptions of famous others. The review further identifies limitations in TMT studies regarding music and terror management and highlights the need for additional empirical research to untangle the complexity of music’s role in mitigating death anxiety growing out of mortality salience.

scholarly journals Analisis Unsur-Unsur Pendidikan Masa Lalu Sebagai Dasar Penentuan Arah Kebijakan Pembelajaran Pada Era Globalisasi

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ni Luh Gede Erni Sulindawati
Keyword(s):  
General Education ◽  
Meaning In Life ◽  
Basic Education ◽  
Education History ◽  
Education Policies ◽  
Modern Life ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Face ◽  
Life Itself ◽  
Historical Education

This article aims to analyze the elements of education that have been applied and problems encountered in the past, as well as determining the basis of educational policies that are applied in the globalization era. Elements of education in the past continuously strived for improvement and improvement to a better direction. Basic education policies that can be applied in the future include (1) the transformation of school education to the XX1 century, (2) need to understand the significance of modernization and modernity, (3) modern life filled with inequalities, contradictions and progress can make human lose its meaning in life, to avoid this it is recommended a general education program that gives students the ability to capture the various types of meaning contained in education, and (4) learners need more emphasis on historical education, history is a lesson given to the students to understand why a society in a given time in the past took a certain decision in the face of a particular problem. Students are gradually guided to grasp the meaning of what is behind the visible or physically felt, the students are trained to understand the meaning of the small meaning to the great meaning of the meaning of life itself.

scholarly journals Maryja i współczesny problem ciała

Sympozjum ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (1 (40)) ◽  
pp. 39-54
Author(s):  
Janusz Królikowski
Keyword(s):  
Human Body ◽  
The Body ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Marian Devotion ◽  
Moral Context ◽  
The Face

Mary and the contemporary question of the body The question concerning human body certainly can be counted among the most urgent issues in the modern culture. Therefore theology as well has to include it among the fields of its research if it wants to participate in a most vital discussion for contemporary man. Theological tradition focuses upon the figure of Mary, and especially on Her virginity, emphasising that She has always ameliorated the profound understanding of the body and its destiny and concurrently its personal and moral context. In the face of contemporary, urgent need for the restoration of the dignity of the bodythe return to Marian devotion and following Her virtues is definitely required. Only in this perspective it is possible to grsap and properly cultivate the relation between the body and the soul and further between man and woman, and by the same token to influence the culture making it more friendly for people. Abstrakt Problematyka dotycząca ciała na pewno należy do najbardziej aktualnych we współczesnej kulturze, a tym samym także teologia musi ją uwzględniać w swoich poszukiwaniach, jeśli ma uczestniczyć w tym, co najbardziej zasadnicze dla człowieka. Tradycja teologiczna zwraca uwagę, że także postać Maryi, szczególnie Jej dziewictwo, zawsze wpływała na pogłębione rozumienie ciała i jego przeznaczenia, a tym samym na osobowe i moralne odniesienie do niego. Wobec współczesnej, pilnej potrzeby odbudowania godności ciała zachodzi między innymi wyraźna potrzeba powrotu do kultu maryjnego i do naśladowania cnót Maryi, ponieważ w tej perspektywie można uchwycić i właściwie kształtować relacje między duchem i ciałem, między mężczyzną i kobietą, a tym samym oddziaływać na kulturę, czyniąc ją bardziej przyjazną człowiekowi.

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