Understanding Cavell, Understanding Modernism

Paola Marrati is Professor of Humanities and Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University, USA. She is a member of the Scientific Board of the Center for the Study of French Contemporary Philosophy at the Ecole Normale Supérieure of Paris, France. Her publications include Gilles Deleuze: Cinema and Philosophy (2008) and Genesis and Trace: Derrida Reading Husserl and Heidegger (2005).

• AbbreviationsContributorsIntroduction: Stanley Cavell and the Quest of a Voice of One’s Own for Philosophy (Paola Marrati, Johns Hopkins University, USA)Part 1 Conceptualizing Cavell1. Must We Mean What We Say? and the (Re)Birth of Ordinary Language Philosophy (Sandra Laugier, Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, France)2. Modernism in The World Viewed (Hugo Clémot, Université de Tours, France and Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, France)3. Senses of Walden: Thoreau’s Exemplary Act (Paul Standish, University College London, UK)4. The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality, and Tragedy (Paola Marrati, Johns Hopkins University, USA)5. Democracy as a Way of Life and An-archic Perfectionism: Rereading Conditions Handsome and Unhandsome (Naoko Saito, University of Kyoto, Japan)Part 2 Cavell and Aesthetics6. In Quest of the Ordinary: Philosophy, Literature and the Romantic Response (Andrew Brandel, Harvard University, USA)7. Measuring the Value of Human Life According to a Perfectionist Philosopher: A reading of Cities of Words: Pedagogical Letters on a Register of the Moral Life (David LaRocca, Harvard University, USA)8. Modernism: Notes toward a Philosophical Approach (Piergiorgio Donatelli, Sapienza Università di Roma, Italy)9. Modernism and Film at Criticism: Rethinking the “Aesthetic Possibilities” of the Medium (Elise Domenach, Ecole Normale Supérieure, France)10. Cavell and the Modernity of Film (Eli Friedlander, Tel Aviv University, Israel)Part 3 Glossary11. Claim (Sandra Laugier, Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, France)12. Criteria (Martin Shuster, University of North Carolina, USA)13. On the Human Form of Life (Veena Das, Johns Hopkins University, USA)14. Skepticism (Jeroen Gerrits, SUNY Binghamton, USA)15. Tragedy (Nicole Jerr, United States Air Force Academy, USA)Index

It has been widely recognized that Cavell’s focus on judgment and grammatical criteria establishes a close connection between our ability to speak and our capacity for aesthetic response. However, the connection between Cavell’s account of skepticism and his writings on modernist art and literature has received much less attention. This volume goes a long way towards correcting that imbalance.