Temporality, Ethics, and the Possibilities of Community After 9/11
Abstract
Given recent discussions of the proposed epoch, the Anthropocene , and our ability to effect change over greater spans of time it makes sense to ask in what ways our understanding of time has changed through such discussions, particularly since postmodernism, which Frederic Jameson has argued was characterized by spatiality, has become dated. In short my argument is that given our capacity to affect change over longer periods of time we need to understand time in a different way and act differently with respect to it. To do this we have to consider how we relate to and understand time differently. Temporality, Ethics, and the Possibilities of Community after 9/11 asks what sort of ethics follows from this different understanding of temporality. To work toward this theory of ethics this dissertation considers how temporality has shifted historically from object-centered to human-centered to posthuman. Ultimately, I argue that this ethics does not rely on vision or proximity, two limiters of many theories of ethics.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Rickert, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Modern literature|Ethics|Philosophy
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