Puzzling Identities

Vincent Descombes, Stephen Adam Schwartz

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English

Harvard University Press
15 February 2016

Philosophy: epistemology & theory of knowledge; Philosophy of mind; Social & political philosophy

Series: Institute for Human Sciences Vienna Lecture Series

"As a logical concept, identity refers to one and the same thing. So why, Vincent Descombes asks, do we routinely use ""identity"" to describe the feelings associated with membership in a number of different communities, as when we speak of our ethnic identity and religious identity? And how can we ascribe the same ""identity"" to more than one individual in a group? In Puzzling Identities, one of the leading figures in French philosophy seeks to bridge the abyss between the logical meaning of identity and the psychological sense of ""being oneself.""

Bringing together an analytic conception of identity derived from Gottlob Frege with a psychosocial understanding stemming from Erik Erikson, Descombes contrasts a rigorously philosophical notion of identity with ideas of collective identity that have become crucial in contemporary cultural and political discourse. He returns to an argument of ancient Greek philosophy about the impossibility of change for a material individual. Distinguishing between reflexive and expressive views of ""being oneself,"" he shows the connections between subjective identity and one's life and achievements. We form profound attachments to the particular communities by which we define ourselves. At the same time, becoming oneself as a modern individual requires a process of disembedding oneself from one's social milieu. This is how undergoing a crisis of identity while coming of age has become for us a normal stage in human life.

Puzzling Identities demonstrates why a person has more than one answer to the essential question ""Who am I?"""

By: Vincent Descombes
Translated by: Stephen Adam Schwartz
Imprint: Harvard University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 156mm, Spine: 23mm
Weight: 499g
ISBN: 9780674732148
ISBN 10: 0674732146
Series: Institute for Human Sciences Vienna Lecture Series
Pages: 224
Publication Date: 15 February 2016
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , Primary , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Vincent Descombes is Professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris. Stephen Adam Schwartz is a Senior Lecturer in French at University College Dublin.

Reviews for Puzzling Identities

This is an extraordinarily rich and interesting work. It is written in a style typical of this author in which difficult arguments are illustrated in examples which both clarify and entertain. It is a pleasure to read throughout. -- Charles Taylor, McGill University Vincent Descombes is one of the leading figures in French philosophy today. His book is original and remarkably erudite. Written in a reader-friendly style, it will be read by philosophers, sociologists, anthropologists, and political scientists interested in the highly topical question of identity. -- Thomas Pavel, University of Chicago Puzzling Identities is a tour de force of acute, constructive, lucid argumentation. -- Jonathan Ree * Times Literary Supplement * Provides a refreshing new lens through which to scrutinize the nature of identity. Though the book reviews and examines traditional puzzles, productive new puzzles emerge, revealing the existence of an explanatory gap between strict, philosophical treatments of identity and looser, popular treatments. Out of this gap emerge ideas that will drive the literature forward...With this work, the philosophical literature on identity has matured. -- H. Storl * Choice *