The Social Thought of Zygmunt Bauman

Tester, Keith

doi:10.1057/9780230505681

Cited by 96 publications

(38 citation statements)

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“…Following from its immense volume and ambiguous character, several lines of interpretations of his work are possible, and this is also reflected in the growing body of secondary literature (see e.g. Davis 2008;Beilhartz 2001;Tester 2004;Jacobsen and Poder 2008). In the present analysis, we draw on a selection of his metaphors and theoretical suggestions as sources of inspiration in the effort to "try to capture the intricate connections between social structure and lived experience" (Jacobsen and Marshman 2008, 20).…”

Section: Issuementioning

confidence: 99%

Making the Most of Less

Nielsen

Holm

2016

Food, Culture & Society

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Rising food prices and changes in the world economy currently affect not only low-income populations, but also relatively privileged population groups. On the basis of a qualitative interview study this article investigates how Danish households with different income levels, educational levels and household composition experience and cope with constraints on their household food budgets. The analysis draws on Zygmunt Bauman's framework of thought, centering especially on differences in "touristic" and "vagabondic" paths to better utilization of purchased food products and adaptation to new tastes and markets. The study participants' experiences and practices in the face of buying constraints range from the empowering stimulus of self-development, creativity and engagement with global environmental challenges to loss of food-related life quality and feelings of inadequacy.

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Section: Issuementioning

confidence: 99%

Making the Most of Less

Nielsen

Holm

2016

Food, Culture & Society

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“…Furthermore, despite Tester's (2004) attempt to create a distinction between presocial and pre-societal morality, it nevertheless remains the case that for Bauman sociality is not necessarily synonymous with morality. As has been shown above, sociality also entails exclusion and a refusal to be for the other if that other is a threat to one's collective.…”

Section: Formulating a Response To The Ethical Demandmentioning

confidence: 99%

After Lévinas

Hirst

2014

European Journal of Social Theory

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The centrality of Lévinasian ethics to Zygmunt Bauman's sociological vision has been affirmed by a number of writers. However, the way in which Bauman attempts to think through the implications of this ethical framework for political decision-making on a global scale has been seen as highly problematic. In recent years, Bauman has arguably begun to veer towards what can be seen as a more 'legislative' position, prioritizing what Lévinas calls archic issues relating to government, foundation and sovereignty, and arguably jettisoning his earlier commitment to socialism as the 'active utopia'. It is the aim of this article to track this move in Bauman's thought, first of all locating structural continuities between his earliest English-language books written during the 1970s with those of the 1990s. It is shown that while much of the same terminology is carried over into his 1990s work, Bauman moves away from affirming the dynamics of human history and the almost ontological necessity of utopia, towards a sociologically suspect individual moral impulse which exists outside distinct social and historical formations. The sheer enthusiasm with which Bauman took hold of this idea had the result of completely frustrating the movement back to social formations. As such, it is argued that as Bauman moved towards theorizing the individual in 'liquid modernity' or consumer society, he developed a highly problematic concept of the individual which relies on the sociologically deterministic understandings of the human being which he was attempting to move away from before and during his engagement with Lévinas.

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“…It comes of a period of reflection on the writing of Tester (2004) about the sociologist, Zygmunt Bauman, and his notions of exile, and reads as follows:…”

Section: Focal Point: Exilementioning

confidence: 99%

“…They can choose to face their fear of the unknown and bear the price, that of exile from the familiar and comfortable choices. The price is more than 'normality' in life; the price of autonomous and social human being is an unveiled awareness which perceives that the normal world is not 'natural and inevitable' (Tester, 2004) and that 'many of our 'free choices' are dictated by social forces or hidden norms that we are totally unaware of, or are exercised within limits and boundaries that we never think about' (Friedman, 1999, p. 10). The exile must see through the illusions of being free and being able to choose freely.…”

Section: Focal Point: Exilementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The bodies of the resistance fighters were constrained and manipulated by fear and hunger created by the invading dominators, but in going into exile on moral grounds to reclaim their free will and to establish new identities of activism, the resisters rejected those demands of the flesh. Now many years later, Tester (2004) writes that Bauman considers the common experience of the present is also of exile; of displacement from the self, others and the world around. For those who choose a different, emancipist path to reclaim their dignity from the habitus of normality, exile becomes a journey further away but, as Tester (2004) writes, Bauman proposes that 'exile should be confronted actively as an opportunity for the practice of a distinctly human being in the world' (Tester, 2004, p. 8).…”

Section: Focal Point: Exilementioning

confidence: 99%

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What about choice for a change?

Sytsma¹

2007

J Educ Change

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Through the lens of exile, this conceptual study explores the complex associations of choice and change, and their implications for education, in a range of areas from sociology through psychology and physiology. In bringing together and synthesising diverse thoughts about choice and change, it inquires into how educators and their professional practices can support the choices of young people in creating significant change and the hopeful future through knowledge economies. It concludes that, if the moral purposes of change are to be social and communal development, mental models should be chosen and knowledge created to accomplish those purposes. At stake is the legacy of today's choices for young people's futures.

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The Social Thought of Zygmunt Bauman

Cited by 96 publications

References 0 publications

Making the Most of Less

Making the Most of Less

After Lévinas

What about choice for a change?

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