CONTENTS - VOL. 15, NUMBER 2, DECEMBER 2005

SYMPOSIUM

SOME NEW DIRECTIONS IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIAL THOUGHT

EMIL VIŠŇOVSKÝ: Introduction

RICHARD SHUSTERMAN: Somaesthetics and Social Theory
PETER SÝKORA: Sociology and Modern Evolutionary Theory
LYUBOV BUGAEVA and JOHN RYDER: Constitutive Relations: A Philosophical Anthropology
STÉPHANE COURTOIS: Are Multiculturalist Theories Victims of the "Cultural Essentialism" Fallacy?

ARTICLES

EMIL VIŠŇOVSKÝ: Rethinking Central-European Cultural Identity: Restoration, Transition or Reconstruction?

BOOK REVIEW

Pupala, B. Narcis vo výchove (Pedagogické súvislosti individualizmu). [A Narcissist in Education (Pedagogy and Individualism)]. By BLANKA ŠULAVÍKOVÁ.

NEW BOOKS

ABSTRACTS

SOMAESTHETICS AND SOCIAL THEORY
RICHARD SHUSTERMAN

E-mail: shuster1@fau.edu

After introducing the interdisciplinary field of somaesthetics by outlining its various branches and its connections to central aims of philosophy and social theory, this paper then shows how somaesthetics can deal more specifically with problems of multicultural enmity and racial hostility that are not adequately solved by discursive arguments for the rationality of tolerance. Since these problems are rooted in the body's visceral reactions, which most often go unnoticed, somaesthetic attention enables one to notice these visceral feelings and thus enables us to manage or transform them.

pp. 105-115

SOCIOLOGY AND MODERN EVOLUTIONARY THEORY
PETER SÝKORA

E-mail: sykora@infovek.sk

The current attitude of sociology to evolutionary theory is biophobic. It was not always so in the history of sociology. The founders of sociology were inspired by the theory of evolution in biology. The best known example is probably Herbert Spencer. We think that in contrast to the understanding of evolution in the past, it is chiefly the molecular-genetic dimension of modern theory of evolution that disturbs contemporary researchers, who regard it as an unacceptable form of reductionism leading to dangerous socio-political consequences. However, in our opinion, it is detrimental to the social sciences, and sociology in particular, that these researchers are not able to accept new inspirations from sociobiology and evolutionary psychology, as represented today by modern evolutionary theory applied in the area of social behaviour. We use Trivers theory of reciprocal altruism between genetically unrelated individuals as an example of an inspirational source that leads to a more universal understanding of human cooperative behaviour than exists today within the framework of social sciences.

pp. 116-131

CONSTITUTIVE RELATIONS: A PHILOSOPHICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
LYUBOV BUGAEVA, JOHN RYDER

E-mail: ljubov.bugaeva@sbg.ac.at
john.ryder@suny.edu

This is an essay in philosophical anthropology that explores two themes: 1) an understanding of human being as relationally constituted, and 2) the constitutive role of absence in human being. The authors present and explore the general ideas of the American philosopher Justus Buchler and their intersection with those of Nicholas Rescher, Jacques Lacan, Helmuth Plessner, Arnold Gehlen. The authors contend that a relational conception of human being is both plausible and desirable, and that absence or lack is a distinctive constitutive feature of human being.

pp.132-148

ARE MULTICULTURALIST THEORIES VICTIMS OF THE "CULTURAL ESSENTIALISM" FALLACY?
STÉPHANE COURTOIS

E-mail: stephane_courtois@uqtr.ca

In this essay, the author seeks to show that one of the main objections raised against multiculturalist theories, the cultural essentialism fallacy, provides no decisive or conclusive grounds for rejecting one variant of these theories which are conceived along an egalitarian line of argument and emanate from a liberal culturalist/nationalist perspective. After examining what he considers to be one of the best defences of the politics of protection of cultures, namely Kymlicka's egalitarian argument, the author goes on to show that none of the versions of the cultural essentialism objection found in the recent books on multiculturalism by Brian Barry, Seyla Benhabib and Amy Gutmann, namely the "stasis", the "holistic", and the "distinctness" fallacy, appears sufficiently persuasive to undermine the egalitarian argument.

pp. 149-165

RETHINKING CENTRAL-EUROPEAN CULTURAL IDENTITY: RESTORATION, TRANSITION OR RECONSTRUCTION?
EMIL VIŠŇOVSKÝ

E-mail: ksbkemvi@savba.sk

The article discusses issues of cultural identity as applied to and exhibited in the current period of social transformation in post-communist Central Europe, and especially the case of the community of people in Slovakia. The aim is to clarify who we Central Europeans are, based on our cultural identities. It is a philosophical reflection on Central European culture, its current shape and its historical roots. The author considers three main options for the future of Central-European cultural identity: restoration, transition and reconstruction.

pp. 166-185

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