Humanism, Anti-Authoritarianism, and Literary Aesthetics: Pragmatist Stories of Progress

(Hardback)

Available Formats

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Presenting pragmatist humanism as a form of anti-authoritarianism, this book sheds light on the contemporary significance of pragmatist aesthetics and the revival of humanism. This interdisciplinary study shows that a mediation between pragmatist aesthetics which emphasizes the significance of creating, making, and inventing and Marxist materialist aesthetics which values form promises interesting results and that the former can learn from the latter. In doing so, Ulf Schulenberg discusses 3 layers of the multi-layered phenomenon that is the revival of humanism: He first explains the potential of a pragmatist humanism, clarifying the contemporary significance of humanism. He then argues that pragmatist humanism is a form of anti-authoritarianism. Finally, he shows the possibility of bringing together the resurgence of humanism and a renewed interest in the work of aesthetic form by arguing that pragmatist aesthetics needs a more complex conception of form. Establishing a transatlantic theoretical dialogue, Humanism, Anti-Authoritarianism, and Literary Aesthetics brings together literary and aesthetic theory, philosophy, and intellectual history. It discusses a broad range of authors from Emerson, Whitman, James, Nietzsche, Proust, and Dewey to Wittgenstein, Lukcs, Adorno, Jameson, Latour, and Rorty to illuminate how humanism, pragmatism, and anti-authoritarianism are interlinked.

Reviews

In this sprawling and fascinating new book, Ulf Schulenberg argues powerfully that pragmatism, humanism, and anti-authoritarianism all hang together in a coherent, mutually reinforcing whole. The scholarship in this book is impressively wide-ranging. Drawing from a large and diverse cast of authors and thinkers, Schulenberg tells a thought-provoking story about what pragmatism is, and how it can assist in bringing about a more decent, free, and artistically rich human future. * David Rondel, Associate Professor of Philosophy, University of Nevada, Reno, USA *

Author Bio

Ulf Schulenberg is Associate Professor of American Studies at the University of Bremen, Germany, and author of Zwischen Realismus und Avantgarde: Drei Paradigmen fr die Aporien des Entweder-Oder (2000), Lovers and Knowers: Moments of the American Cultural Left (2007), Romanticism and Pragmatism: Richard Rorty and the Idea of a Poeticized Culture (2015), Marxism, Pragmatism, and Postmetaphysics: From Finding to Making (2019), and Pragmatism and Poetic Agency: The Persistence of Humanism (2021).