Philosophy and Freedom

John McCumber asserts that the true target of philosophical liberation is to break the structures of domination that have been encoded in western civilization. Because of the emancipatory nature of their thought, Derrida, Foucault, Habermas, and Rorty challenge domination, but they do not see their challenge clearly and it does not rise to the level of conscious critique in their writings. Using Nietzsche's writings on "the great liberation" as a starting point, McCumber captures the valuable, but elusive insights of these thinkers and places them in the larger, pluralistic movement toward philosophical freedom.

John McCumber is Professor of German at Northwestern University. He is author of Poetic Interaction, The Company of Words, and Metaphysics and Oppression.(Indiana University Press).

Acknowledgments

ix

Abbreviations

xi

Introduction the Great Demarcation

1

(19)

Challenges to Ousia in the Work of Jacques Derrida

20

(14)

The Privilege of Presence and the Derridean Knot

34

(15)

Ousiodic Structure vs. The Speech Community in Richard Rorty

49

(12)

Irony and Redescription as Challenges to Ousia

61

(14)

Centrality as a Challenge to Ousia in Jurgen Habermas

75

(16)

Universality, Centrality, and the Theory of Communicative Action

91

(19)

Michel Foucault's Challenges to Ousia

110

(14)

Challenge and Description in Foucault

124

(17)

The Great Demarcation and the Situation of Freedom

141

(14)

Notes

155

(24)

Bibliography

179

(6)

Index

185

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Philosophy and Freedom

Summary

Author Biography

Table of Contents

Supplemental Materials