The thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in western Europe witnessed many dramatic political innovations and developments. One of the more striking of these phenomena was the territorial expansion of political units. Many local societies which had long maintained important degrees of independence or autonomy were during this period incorporated into larger political entities. By 1300 many of the rulers of western Europe were masters, if only nominally, of territories far vaster than those anyone had ruled since the heyday of the Carolingian (...) Empire around the year 800. (shrink)

In order to offer a substantive Christian challenge to modern state violence, the particular character of the modern state cannot be ignored. Nor can New Testament teaching on peace be reduced to flat and generalized ethical imperatives. The subtlety of peace is neglected if either of these two tendencies goes unchecked. After thus framing the question of a Christian response to modern state violence, itself the product of Christian agency among other factors, I offer a New Testament challenge to modern (...) state violence along two lines: (1) refusing the sacrificial political economy characteristic of the modern state, laboring instead at a christological dynamic of gift that takes account of the relative position of agents in the inherited distribution of power and expects more from the strong; (2) observing the limits of state representation for addressing vulnerability to violence, indeed its complicity in that vulnerability, and investing in scales of community commensurate with the subtlety of peace. (shrink)

Feminism is going to ruin your life--in the best way possible--because society screams numerous messages every moment about how women must look, act, and speak in order to earn their right to be seen and heard. The only thing any human needs to do in order to earn their right to exist, however, is to exist. Break free of the insidious narratives that hold you back from being your most authentic self.

The notion that we spring into existence ex nihilo at birth strikes many people as counter-intuitive. By contrast, the idea that we have an eternal identity appeals to some deep intuition about the self. And indeed, belief in the soul's pre-mortal existence has a long history in Western thought. Terryl Givens offers the first systematic exploration of this fascinating if generally unfamiliar feature of Western cultural history.

This is the first complete edition of the Chronicon Anonymi Cantuariensis, a contemporary narrative that provides valuable insights into medieval war and diplomacy, written at Canterbury shortly after the mid-fourteenth century. The previous edition, published in 1914, was based on a manuscript from which the text for the years 1357 to 1364 was missing. Presented here in full with a modern English translation, the chronicle provides a key narrative of military and political events covering the years from 1346 to 1365. (...) Concentrating principally on the campaigns of the Hundred Years War and their impact upon the inhabitants of south-east England, the author took advantage of his position on the main news route between London and Paris to provide a detailed account of a crucial phase in British and European history. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2016 Heft: 210 Seiten: 235-250.

IN THE JEWISH—CHRISTIAN SCHISM REVISITED, JOHN HOWARD YODER gives an account of the Jewishness of the politics of Jesus and Pauline Christianity. He rightly claims that irresponsible historiography has presented early Christianity as a departure from the Jewish ways of its time, reading the later schism into the New Testament and belying the Jewishness of Christian ethics. He contends that living in the faithfully Jewish ways of Jeremiah, Jesus, and Paul, as many Jewish communities did up to the time of (...) Jesus and many non-Christian Jewish communities and free churches have done since, is what it means to be the people of God. After an appreciative exposition of Yoder's account and a brief articulation of its theological and ethical stakes, I argue that the biblical witness to the election of Israel troubles his understanding of the people of God as presupposed and conveyed by his revisionist historiography of the Jewish—Christian schism. (shrink)

Researchers have documented negative physical and emotional consequences for both family caregivers of persons with cancer as well as caregivers of persons with a neurologic disorder. However, there is a unique subset of caregivers who must provide care for someone who may suffer from both a short, terminal trajectory of disease, as well as neurological and neuropsychiatric sequelae — the caregiver of a person with a primary malignant brain tumor. The purpose of this article was to describe a conceptual framework (...) for providing care for a person with a primary malignant brain tumor. The demands of this particular care situation are described, as well as potential resources available to the caregiver to meet those demands. Finally, the stress response that results from the balance between care demands and caregiver resources is illustrated. Development of a conceptual framework for this caregiving population is the first step in assisting nurses to identify factors that place caregivers of persons with a primary malignant brain tumor at risk for negative consequences, and to design interventions to improve caregiver health. (shrink)

Traditional combinatory logic uses combinators S and K to represent all Turing-computable functions on natural numbers, but there are Turing-computable functions on the combinators themselves that cannot be so represented, because they access internal structure in ways that S and K cannot. Much of this expressive power is captured by adding a factorisation combinator F. The resulting SF-calculus is structure complete, in that it supports all pattern-matching functions whose patterns are in normal form, including a function that decides structural equality (...) of arbitrary normal forms. A general characterisation of the structure complete, confluent combinatory calculi is given along with some examples. These are able to represent all their Turing-computable functions whose domain is limited to normal forms. The combinator F can be typed using an existential type to represent internal type information. (shrink)

The neuroscience revolution has revived interpretations of religious experiences as wholly dependent on biological conditions. William James cautioned against allowing such neurological reductionism to overwhelm other useful perspectives. Contemporary psychologists of religion have raised similar cautions, but have failed to engage James as a full conversation partner. In this article, we present a contemporary, applied version of James's perspective. We clarify the problem by reviewing specific James-like contemporary concerns about reductionism in the neuropsychological study of religion. Then, most centrally, we (...) employ three of James's conceptual tools—pragmatism, pluralism, and radical empiricism—to moderate contemporary reductionism. Finally, we point to a constructive approach through which neuroscientists might collaborate with scholars in the humanities and psychosocial sciences, which is consistent with our conclusion that it is often no longer fruitful to separate neurobiological studies from studies that are psychosocial or sociocultural. (shrink)

First Published in 2005. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Along with Husserl's Ideas and Heidegger's Being and Time, Being Given is one of the classic works of phenomenology in the twentieth century. Through readings of Kant, Husserl, Heidegger, Derrida, and twentieth-century French phenomenology (e.g., Merleau-Ponty, Levinas, and Henry), it ventures a bold and decisive reappraisal of phenomenology and its possibilities. Its author's most original work to date, the book pushes phenomenology to its limits in an attempt to redefine and recover the phenomenological ideal, which the author argues has never (...) been realized in any of the historical phenomenologies. Against Husserl's reduction to consciousness and Heidegger's reduction to Dasein, the author proposes a third reduction to givenness, wherein phenomena appear unconditionally and show themselves from themselves at their own initiative. Being Given is the clearest, most systematic response to questions that have occupied its author for the better part of two decades. The book articulates a powerful set of concepts that should provoke new research in philosophy, religion, and art, as well as at the intersection of these disciplines. Some of the significant issues it treats include the phenomenological definition of the phenomenon, the redefinition of the gift in terms not of economy but of givenness, the nature of saturated phenomena, and the question “Who comes after the subject?” Throughout his consideration of these issues, the author carefully notes their significance for the increasingly popular fields of religious studies and philosophy of religion. Being Given is therefore indispensable reading for anyone interested in the question of the relation between the phenomenological and the theological in Marion and emergent French phenomenology. (shrink)

[Given, If, Then] attempts to conceive a possibility of reading, through a set of readings: reading being understood as the relation to an Other that occurs prior to any semantic or formal identification, and, therefore, prior to any attempt at assimilating, or appropriating, what is being read to the one who reads. As such, it is an encounter with an indeterminable Other, an Other who is other than other -- an unconditional relation, and thus a relation to no fixed object (...) of relation. The first reading by Jeremy Fernando, "Blind Reading," unfolds through an attempt to speak of reading as an event. Untheorisable in itself, it is a positing of reading as reading, through reading, where texts are read as a test site for reading itself. As such, it is a meditation on the finitude and exteriority in literature, philosophy, and knowledge; where blindness is both the condition and limit of reading itself. Folded into, or in between, this (re)reading are a selection of photographs from Jennifer Hope Davy's image archive. They are on the one hand simply a selection of 'impartial pictures' taken, and on the other hand that which allow for something singular and, therefore, always other to dis/appear -- crossing that borderless realm between 'some' and 'some-thing.' Eventually, there is a writing on images on writings by Julia Hölzl. A responding to the impossible response, a re-iteration, a re-reading of what could not have been written, a re-writing of what could not have been read; these poems, if one were to name them such, name them as such, answer (to) the impossibility of answering: answer to no call. (shrink)

Aristotle’s epistemology has sometimes been associated with foundationalism, the theory according to which a small set of premise-beliefs that are deductively valid or inductively strong provide justification for many other truths. In contemporary terms, Aristotle’s foundationalism could be compared with what is sometimes called “classical foundationalism”. However, as I will show, the equivalent to basic beliefs in Aristotle’s epistemology are the so-called first principles or “axiómata”. These principles are self-evident, but not self-justificatory. They are not justified by their act of (...) understanding, but by the arguments that satisfactorily prove them. In addition, these principles are intellectual, rather than perceptual, so that no basic belief that is about our immediate experience or sensory data is apt to provide the required foundation of knowledge. In spite of this, I argue that Aristotle’s foundationalism has no givens, and that his epistemology resists the objections usually leveled against givens. (shrink)

Although he is usually understood to be an immanent critic who belongs to the first generation of the Frankfurt School, Walter Benjamin’s thought is much more heterodox than typically acknowledged. In this paper, I draw attention to one of Benjamin’s most heterodox tendencies. I show that Benjamin problematizes on the animating idea of immanent critique, i.e., that one can move from an object given in experience to the implicit concept of that object in order to assess the fit between concept (...) and object. Benjamin develops his objection to this idea in his 1916 response paper “Eidos und Begriff.” In it he criticizes P. F. Linke’s account of givenness by showing that what is given in experience and what is essential to it are not identical. What is essential to first order experience, moreover, is quite distinct to what is essential for discursively structured reflection. And hence one cannot unproblematically move from what is given in experience to the concepts underwriting it. This leads Benjamin to develop a pragmatic and expressive alternative to semantic ascent, and hence to immanent critique. (shrink)

This essay approaches the Hegelian problem of giving and givenness through the marginal figures of the animal, the child, and “superstitious humanity,”representing, in one way or another, the unperturbed relationship with immediacy. I argue that, for Hegel, the process of subjectivization supersedes these figures by learning to reject the immediately given and to accept only what is self-given. Yet, interspersed throughout this process are various imbalances and asymmetries, whereby the subject gives itself more than it takes, undialectically suppressing the (...) particular and displacing the marginal. (shrink)

The Doctrine of the Given The Myth of the Given A Methodological Problem To a convinced foundationalist, the project of establishing the existence of the ...

Relazione presentata al Seminario di Filosofia Teoretica nella primavera 2015.Given the topic of the given, it would be all too easy to become entangled in highly technical disputes about Wilfrid Sellars, John McDowell, and other authors regarding how to interpret and, then, assess, their critiques of “myth of the given.” Though I am dubious whether we could within the limits of this articlemove toward resolving any of these questions, such an engagement might nonetheless prove profitable. It would also likely prove (...) to be invigorating, since wrestling with technical issues in a systematic manner carries a unique form of intellectual enjoyment for the properly trained philosopher. Even so, that is not my intention today. Rather my aim is simply to sketch, mostly in broad bold strokes, though to some extent also in minute, careful ones, what I take to be a pragmatist approach to this multifaceted controversy. In my judgment, much still depends upon coming to a deeper appreciation of one of the central lessons of the pragmatist movement: the recurrent need to articulate a more truly empirical understanding of human experience. Above all else, then, my reflections aim at deepening the contemporary appreciation of the pragmatist take on human experience. (shrink)

The major part of our beliefs and our knowledge of the world is based on, or grounded in, sensory experience. But, how is it that we can have perceptual beliefs that things are thus and so, and, moreover, be justified in having them? What conditions must experience satisfy to rationally warrant, and not merely to cause, our beliefs? Against the currently very popular contention that experience itself already has to be propositionally and conceptually structured, I will rehabilitate the claim that (...) there is given element in experience which is independent of thought and which is possessed of a distinctive nonpropositional and nonconceptual content. Further, I will argue that this given element is indeed fit to play a significant evidential role in the justification of our beliefs about the world. (shrink)

If we trace the word phenomenon to its Greek origin, we find it is the participle of the verb, phainesthai, “to show itself.” The phenomenon is that which shows itself; it is the manifest. As Heidegger noted, phenomenology is the study of this showing. It examines how things show themselves to be what they are.1 One of the most difficult problems faced by phenomenology is the mystery of our self-showing. How do we show ourselves to be what we are? How (...) do we manifest our selfhood to one another? To put these questions in the Husserlian context of intention and fulfillment is to ask: What do we intend when we direct ourselves to another person? What sort of fulfillment—i.e., what kind of givenness—satisfies this intention? Once we speak in terms of intention and fulfillment, we face a number of possibilities. The givenness of what we intend can exactly match our intentions. It can be other than what we intend—as is the case when we are simply mistaken. The givenness also can be less. It can, for example, not offer the detail that was part of our intentions. Finally, givenness can exceed our intentions. In showing itself, the object offers us more than what was intended. In this paper, I am going to defend the claim that this excessive givenness happens systematically when we intend another person. To intend another person is, paradoxically, to intend the other as exceeding one’s intentions. As such, the showing which manifests the presence of the other is a kind of “supersaturated givenness.” It is a givenness that makes us aware that more is being given than we can formulate in our intentions. This awareness points to the other’s freedom. It is also a moral awareness. Here, I will argue that our awareness of the other’s excessive givenness is our entrance into morality.2 I In continental philosophy, we have long been accustomed to thinking of the other, not in terms of givenness, but rather the reverse. We think of the other as not being able to be given.. (shrink)

This paper strives to characterize the relation between accent placement and discourse in terms of independent constraints operating at the interface between syntax and interpretation. The Givenness Constraint requires un-F-marked constituents to be given. Key here is our definition of givenness, which synthesizes insights from the literature on the semantics of focus with older views on information structure. AvoidF requires speakers to economize on F-marking. A third constraint requires a subset of F-markers to dominate accents.The characteristic prominence patterns (...) of "novelty focus" and "contrastive focus" both arise from a combination of the Givenness Constraint and AvoidF. Patterns of prominence in questions as well as in answers to questions are explained in terms of the constraints, thanks in part to the way in which the Givenness relation is defined. Head/argument asymmetries noted in the literature on Focus Projection are placed in the phonology-syntax interface, independent of discourse conditions. Deaccenting follows when AvoidF is ranked higher than constraint(s) governing head/argument asymmetries. (shrink)

Pragmatism, Experience, and the Given The doctrine of the Given is that subjects have direct non-inferential awareness of content of their experiences and apprehensions, and that some of a subject's beliefs are justified on the basis of that subject's awareness of her experiences and apprehensions. Pragmatist criticisms of the Given as a myth are shown here not only to be inadequate but to presuppose the Given. A model for a pragmatist account of the Given is then provided in terms of (...) refinements of Dewey's theory of experience. The doctrine of the Given is implicated in the functions of inquiry insofar as one must take it that experience is a source of justification. (shrink)

What is given to us in conscious experience? The Given is an attempt to answer this question and in this way contribute to a general theory of mental content. The content of conscious experience is understood to be absolutely everything that is given to one, experientially, in the having of an experience. Michelle Montague focuses on the analysis of conscious perception, conscious emotion, and conscious thought, and deploys three fundamental notions in addition to the fundamental notion of content: the notions (...) of intentionality, phenomenology, and consciousness. She argues that all experience essentially involves all four things, and that the key to an adequate general theory of what is given in experience lies in giving a correct specification of the nature of these four things and the relations between them. (shrink)

Wilfrid Sellars’ denunciation of the Myth of the Given was meant to clarify, against empiricism, that perceptual episodes alone are insufficient to ground and justify perceptual knowledge. Sellars showed that in order to accomplish such epistemic tasks, more resources and capacities, such as those involved in using concepts, are needed. Perceptual knowledge belongs to the space of reasons and not to an independent realm of experience. Dan Hutto and Eric Myin have recently presented the Hard Problem of Content as an (...) ensemble of reasons against naturalistic accounts of content. In a nutshell, it states that covariance relations—even though they are naturalistically acceptable explanatory resources—do not constitute content. The authors exploit this move in order to promote their preferred radical enactivist and anti-representationalist option, according to which, basic minds—the lower stratum of cognition—do not involve content. Although it is controversial to argue that the Hard Problem of Content effectively dismisses naturalistic theories of representation, a central aspect of it—the idea that information as covariance does not suffice to explain content—finds support among the defenders of classical cognitive representationalism, such as Marcin Miłkowski. This support—together with the acknowledgment this remark about covariance is a point already made by Sellars in his criticism of the Myth of the Given—has a number of interesting implications. Not only is it of interest for the debates about representationalism in cognitive science, where it can be understood as an anticipatory move, but it also offers some clues and insights for reconsidering some issues along Sellarsian lines—a conflation between two concepts of representation that is often assumed in cognitive science, a distinction between two types of relevant normativities, and a reconsideration of the naturalism involved in such explanations. (shrink)

The philosophical work of Jean-Luc Marion has opened new ways of speaking about religious convictions and experiences. In this exploration of Marion’s philosophy and theology, Christina M. Gschwandtner presents a comprehensive and critical analysis of the ideas of saturated phenomena and the phenomenology of givenness. She claims that these phenomena do not always appear in the excessive mode that Marion describes and suggests instead that we consider degrees of saturation. Gschwandtner covers major themes in Marion’s work—the historical event, art, (...) nature, love, gift and sacrifice, prayer, and the Eucharist. She works within the phenomenology of givenness, but suggests that Marion himself has not considered important aspects of his philosophy. (shrink)

Along with Husserl's _Ideas_ and Heidegger's _Being and Time_, _Being Given_ is one of the classic works of phenomenology in the twentieth century. Through readings of Kant, Husserl, Heidegger, Derrida, and twentieth-century French phenomenology, it ventures a bold and decisive reappraisal of phenomenology and its possibilities. Its author's most original work to date, the book pushes phenomenology to its limits in an attempt to redefine and recover the phenomenological ideal, which the author argues has never been realized in any of (...) the historical phenomenologies. Against Husserl's reduction to consciousness and Heidegger's reduction to _Dasein_, the author proposes a third reduction to givenness, wherein phenomena appear unconditionally and show themselves from themselves at their own initiative. _Being Given_ is the clearest, most systematic response to questions that have occupied its author for the better part of two decades. The book articulates a powerful set of concepts that should provoke new research in philosophy, religion, and art, as well as at the intersection of these disciplines. Some of the significant issues it treats include the phenomenological definition of the phenomenon, the redefinition of the gift in terms not of economy but of givenness, the nature of saturated phenomena, and the question "Who comes after the subject?" Throughout his consideration of these issues, the author carefully notes their significance for the increasingly popular fields of religious studies and philosophy of religion. _Being Given_ is therefore indispensable reading for anyone interested in the question of the relation between the phenomenological and the theological in Marion and emergent French phenomenology. (shrink)

Givenness and Revelation represents both the unity and the deep continuity of Jean-Luc Marions thinking over many decades. This investigation into the origins and evolution of the concept of revelation arises from an initial reappraisal of the tension between natural theology and the revealed knowledge of God or sacra doctrina. Marion draws on the re-definition of the notions of possibility and impossibility, the critique of the reification of the subject, and the unpredictability of the event in its relationship to (...) the gift in order to assess the respective capacities of dogmatic theology, modern metaphysics, contemporary phenomenology, and the biblical texts, especially the New Testament, to conceive the paradoxical phenomenality of a revelation. This work thus brings us to the very heart and soul of Marions theology, concluding with a phenomenological approach to the Trinity that uncovers the logic of gift performed in the scriptural manifestation of Jesus Christ as Son of the Father. Givenness and Revelation enhances not only our understanding of religious experience, but enlarges the horizon of possibility of phenomenology itself. With a Foreword by Ramona Fotiade, Senior Lecturer in French, and David Jasper, Professor of Literature and Theology, both at the University of Glasgow. (shrink)

This is a book review of Jean-Luc Marion's Givenness and Revelation.