Description
Book SynopsisDon Beith proposes a new concept of “generative passivity,” the idea that our organic, psychological, and social activities take time to develop into sense. Drawing on empirical studies and phenomenological reflections, he argues that in nature, novel meaning emerges prior to any type of constituting activity or deterministic plan.
Trade Review“An original and thoughtful contribution to scholarship on Maurice Merleau-Ponty.…Beith draws Merleau-Ponty’s thought into conversation with a wide range of thinkers and traditions—Bergson, Deleuze, Derrida, liberalism, social constructivism, autopoietic enactivism—and articulates an original conception of life and personhood. Summing up: Essential.” * CHOICE Reviews *
“A timely contribution to scholarship on Merleau-Ponty’s work, considering the emerging focus in phenomenological literature on the significance of the dimension of passivity.… Beith advances a phenomenology of embodiment by going beyond a mere ‘corporeal essentialism’ to a focus that can engage with difference and oppression generally and issues of gender and race more specifically”
“Beith fruitfully deploys the concepts of 'institution' and 'passivity' to interpret central issues in Merleau-Ponty's corpus and in contemporary philosophy, ultimately offering an account of the emergence of personhood and sociality out of the matrix of intercorporeal embodiment and behavior. This is a significant addition not only to Merleau-Ponty scholarship but also, more broadly, to philosophical discussions about nature, development, learning, self-consciousness, agency, and politics.”
