Derrida and Disinterest

Description

Disinterest has been a major concept in Western philosophy since Descartes. Its desirability and importance have been disputed, and its definition reworked by such pivotal figures as Nietzsche, Shaftesbury, Locke and Kant. In this groundbreaking book, Sean Gaston looks at the treatment of disinterest in the work of two major modern Continental philosophers: Jacques Derrida and Emmanuel Levinas. He identifies both as part of a tradition, obscured since the eighteenth-century, that takes disinterest to be the opposite of self-interest, rather than the absence of all interest. Such a tradition locates disinterest at the centre of thinking about ethics. The book argues that disinterest plays a significant role in the philosophy of both thinkers and in the dialogue between their work. In so doing it sheds new light on their respective contributions to moral and political philosophy. Moreover, it traces the history of disinterest in Western philosophy from Descartes to Derrida, taking in the contributions of major philosophers in both the analytic, Anglo-American and Continental traditions: Locke; Shaftesbury; Hume; Smith; Nietzsche; Kant; Hegel; Heidegger. Derrida and Disinterest offers a new reading of Derrida, a stimulating account of the role and importance of disinterest in the history of Western philosophy and a provocative and original contribution to Continental ethics.

Sean Gaston is Reader in English at Brunel University, UK.

'[will] excite and engage' -- Arnab Chatterjee, review in Political Studies Review 2007 reviewed in Political Studies Review -- Arnab Chatterjee 'Glibly dismissed by postmodernists as an illusion, the idea of disinterestedness has been patiently awaiting its philosophical saviour. Sean Gaston has now ridden triumphantly to the rescue, with a subtlety and originality of insight which positively leap from the page'. Terry Eagleton * Blurb from reviewer * 'Sean Gaston has produced a new kind of informed and intelligible 'reader' in continental philosophy and the history of an idea. * Forum of Modern Language Studies * "Sean Gaston's contribution to philosophical literature on the work of Jacques Derrida is to be welcomed for its serious engagement with Derrida's oeuvre and sensitive reading of his formulations of ethics and responsibility. Gaston develops an insightful and original interpretation of Derrida's work through the lens of 'disinterest' and considers the potential of this concept for contemporary ethics and politics." * Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *