Levinas on Psychology, Identity, and Caring for Others

Goodman, David; Severson, Eric R.

doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190455934.013.43

Cited by 2 publications

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“…These are, indeed, fundamentals in his thought. In the psychological literature, they often serve as correctives to fixed, narcissistic paradigms and provide a way of "thinking otherwise" (Freeman, 2014; Goodman & Severson, 2018). But there is an enormous backstory to these tropes that is critical for a fuller recognition of their significance.…”

Section: Levinas In Political Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

The streaming self: Liberal subjectivity, technology, and unlinking.

Goodman

Collins

2019

Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology

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Emmanuel Levinas's analysis of liberalism and fascism provides an excellent starting point for exploring the dangers and susceptibilities of a society increasingly dominated by technologically mediated relations. In the first section of this article, a political contextualization of Levinas's thought is introduced to sensitize the reader to these dimensions of his ethical phenomenology. In particular, Levinas's writings about a liberal idealism that distances, disembodies, and unlinks individuals are described and related to his concern about the growing attraction of elemental systems represented in fascism, militarism, and nationalism. In the second section, the idea of "attacks on linking," as pioneered by Bion and further appropriated by Layton, is put to work to consider the impact of digitally mediated exchanges on the diminution of human subjectivity, thought, and interhuman connection. This is explored in relationship to diminished attention, thinning of shared communal/traditional symbolism, reduced interiority and reflective potential, and gratification that protects from oversaturation. The article concludes with a return to Levinas to argue that the conjunction of technology and the liberal political state risks configuring a self that rivets back to itself and is attracted to counterfeit versions of connection, both individually and politically.

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Section: Levinas In Political Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

The streaming self: Liberal subjectivity, technology, and unlinking.

Goodman

Collins

2019

Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology

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“…After all, from Gordon Allport on, there has been a concerted effort to convert “character” into “personality” and not look back (Cushman, 1995)—never mind across to our colleagues working in the philosophical and theological traditions who might be able to offer us the resources needed to approach the mystery of the human psyche with greater nuance and depth. Nevertheless, Levinas's work poses a significant challenge to our psychological paradigms and it is a hopeful sign that in recent years it has found some footholds (Goodman, 2012, Goodman & Severson, 2016, 2019; see also Freeman, 2013; Kunz, 1998; Marcus, 2008). It is our intention to build upon that modest progress by not only developing Levinas's ethical thought, but exploring it in relation to a perennial human problem: the near‐constant temptation to retreat behind the safe, sterile “protective shield” of the self, as Freud so eloquently called it (Freud, 1920/1990, p. 30).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Who is my neighbor? The temptation of ethical distancing

Goodman

Clemente

2021

Social & Personality Psych

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In this article, we examine twentieth century philosopher Emmanuel Levinas's understanding of the ethical subject and the import his ideas have for contemporary subjective and interpersonal life. Applying Levinas's insight that there is a tendency among human beings to not only neglect the needs of others but to build systems that justify that neglect—to create space and build walls in order to diminish the fact that we are always implicated, ever tied to the needs of others—we explore the social mechanisms that enable such ethical distancing. Ethical distancing, we argue, is the pernicious assumption that distance absolves us, that if only we shelter ourselves from others then we will remain impervious to their cries for help, immune to their need for our care. This assumption, we show, is behind much of our Western self‐understanding. Beginning with the picture of human subjectivity portrayed in Plato's myth of the ring of Gyges, we go on to show that the understanding of the isolated, self‐enclosed subject persists to this day.

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Levinas on Psychology, Identity, and Caring for Others

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

The streaming self: Liberal subjectivity, technology, and unlinking.

The streaming self: Liberal subjectivity, technology, and unlinking.

Who is my neighbor? The temptation of ethical distancing

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