Self-care and total care: the twofold return of care in twentieth-century thought
The paper studies two fundamentally different forms in which the concept of care makes its comeback in twentieth-century thought. We make use of a distinction made by Peter Sloterdijk, who argues that the ancient and medieval ‘ascetic’ ideal of self-enhancement through practice has re-emerged in the...
| Published in: | International journal of philosophy and theology |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Taylor & Francis
2020
|
| In: |
International journal of philosophy and theology
|
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Sloterdijk, Peter 1947-
/ Self-care
|
| RelBib Classification: | NBE Anthropology TK Recent history VA Philosophy |
| Further subjects: | B
Hellenistic Philosophy
B Michel Foucault B Christianity B Martin Heidegger B Self-care B Care B Peter Sloterdijk |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) |
| Summary: | The paper studies two fundamentally different forms in which the concept of care makes its comeback in twentieth-century thought. We make use of a distinction made by Peter Sloterdijk, who argues that the ancient and medieval ‘ascetic’ ideal of self-enhancement through practice has re-emerged in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, particularly in the form of a rehabilitation of the Hellenistic notion of self-care (epimeleia heautou) in Michel Foucault’s late ethics. Sloterdijk contrasts this return of self-care with Martin Heidegger’s concept of being-in-the-world as ‘total care’ (Sorge), an utterly ‘secularized’ understanding of the human being as irreducibly world-embedded that rejects the classical ascetic ideal of world-secession. We examine further the historical roots and emergence of these contrasting contemporary reappropriations of care in the Western tradition of thought and show them to be rooted in two different ontologies and ethics of the self as either world-secluded or world-immersed, autonomous or constitutively relational. The historical point of divergence of these two approaches to care, we argue, can be found in the Christian transformation of Hellenistic ethics. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 2169-2335 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: International journal of philosophy and theology
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/21692327.2020.1786301 |