Body and Identity

Name: Body and Identity
Price: 173 AUD
Availability: OutOfStock
ISBN: 9780268209681

A History of the Empty Self

Angela Franks

$173

Hardback

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English

University of Notre Dame Press
15 August 2025

Philosophy; Philosophy of mind; Ethics & moral philosophy; Philosophy of religion; History of ideas

Angela Franks provides a sweeping intellectual history of identity, particularly in terms of how identity relates to the body, with an emphasis on the importance of Christianity to this understanding.

Modern questions about our bodies and how we see ourselves are often complex and problematic. To better answer these contemporary questions and navigate ""identity politics,"" Angela Franks seeks to provide a better understanding of identity. She begins by giving three basic meanings of the term: identity through time, the ""true"" or authentic self, and our awareness of ourselves. She engages with thinkers from antiquity to present day and investigates the decisive developments that Christianity provided. Within Christianity came a new awareness of the distinctive individuality of each person—the ""true self""—called by God in a way that often breaks away from the ""solid"" or fixed structures of identity formation, such as family, class, and nation. This more ""liquid"" idea of identity continues to evolve in modern times, though without its theistic emphasis on God's call. The result is a purely liquid self that consists of consciousness and activity, but without a grounded self that is either the object or the subject of consciousness. This is the empty self we have today, one that is given much more to do and less to be.

A comprehensive history of identity, Body and Identity brings the theological history of the self to the forefront in order to address the empty self and how identity is defined today.

By: Angela Franks
Imprint: University of Notre Dame Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 24mm
ISBN: 9780268209681
ISBN 10: 0268209685
Pages: 414
Publication Date: 15 August 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Further / Higher Education
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Angela Franks is an assistant professor of theology at the Catholic University of America.

Reviews for Body and Identity: A History of the Empty Self

“Grounded and soaring. Its thorough foundation in philosophical theology delivers, and the text understands that literary excurses are no mere peripheral complementarities but do bring the conversation in through another way.” —Caitlin Smith Gilson, author of As It Is in Heaven “A brilliant, deeply learned, and carefully argued book.”—Carl R. Trueman, author of The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self