Abstract
Zygmunt Bauman’s work has reinvigorated sociological interest in ethical questions. Ethics has been at the core of his work for at least the past two decades and he has convincingly positioned ethics and morality as central issues for sociology in our globalized world and liquid modern times. We consider Bauman’s decision to prioritize ethics over ontology, to be critical to the understanding of his works’ strengths and failings. Through a reading of Emmanuel Lévinas, Bauman wishes to unsettle the traditional prioritizing of the question of how the world is with the question of how the world ought to be.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bauman, Z. (1976), Socialism: The Active Utopia. London, Allen & Unwin.
Bauman, Z. (1989), Modernity and the Holocaust. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (1991), Modernity and Ambivalence. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (1993), Postmodern Ethics. Oxford, Blackwell.
Bauman, Z. (1995), Life in Fragments: Essays in Postmodern Morality. Oxford, Blackwell.
Bauman, Z. (1998), ‘What Prospects of Morality in Times of Uncertainty?’ Theory, Culture and Society, 15 (1): 11–22.
Bauman, Z. (2000), Liquid Modernity. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (2004), Europe: An Unfinished Adventure. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (2007), Consuming Life. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (2008a), The Art of Life. Cambridge, Polity.
Bauman, Z. (2008b), Bauman on Bauman — Pro Domo Sua. The Sociology of Zygmunt Bauman: Challenges and Critique. M. H. Jacobsen and P. Poder. Aldershot, Ashgate, 231–40.
Beilharz, P. (2000), Zygmunt Bauman: Dialectic of Modernity. London, Sage.
Crone, M. (2008), Bauman on Ethics — Intimate Ethics for a Global World. The Sociology of Zygmunt Bauman: Challenges and Critique. M. H. Jacobsen and P. Poder. Aldershot, Ashgate, 231–40.
Davis, L. (1995), Enforcing Normalcy: Disability, Deafness and the Body. London, Verso.
Davis, M. (2008), Freedom and Consumerism: A Critique of Zygmunt’s Bauman’s Sociology Aldershot, Ashgate.
Deleuze, G. (2004), Difference and Repetition. London, Continuum.
Deleuze, G. (2005), Nietzsche and Philosophy. London, Continuum.
Deleuze, G and F. Guattari (1984), Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. London, Athlone Press.
Deleuze, G and F. Guattari (1988), A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. London, Athlone.
Elias, N. (1972), ‘Theory of Science and History of Science: Comments on a recent discussion’. Economy and Society, 1 (2): 117–33.
Elias, N. (1978), What is Sociology? New York, Columbia University Press.
Elias, N. (1987), Involvement and Detachment. Oxford, Blackwell.
Foucault, M. (1983), ‘On the Genealogy of Ethics: An Overview of Work in Progress’. Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics: H. L. Dreyfus and P. Rabinow. The University of Chicago Press, 229–52.
Foucault, M. (1989), The Birth of the Clinic. An Archaeology of Medical Perception. London, Routledge.
Foucault, M. (1991), Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. London, Penguin.
Foucault, M. (1998), The Will to Knowledge: The History of Sexuality Volume 1. London, Penguin.
Foucault, M. (2002), The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences. London, Routledge.
Foucault, M. (2003), Abnormal: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1974–1975. London, Penguin.
Foucault, M. (2004), Society Must be Defended: Lectures at the Collège de France 1975–76. London, Penguin.
Foucault, M. (2006), History of Madness. London, Routledge.
Foucault, M. (2007), Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the Collège de France 1978–1979. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.
Hacking, I. (1990), The Taming of Chance. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Hallward, P. (2006), Out of this World: Deleuze and the Philosophy of Creation. London, Verso.
Halmi, K. A. (1983), ‘Classification of Eating Disorders’, International Journal of Eating Disorders, 2 (4): 21–6.
Hansen, B. (1992), ‘American Physicians’ “Discovery” of Homosexuals, 1880–1900: A new Diagnosis in a Changing Society’. Framing Disease: Studies in Cultural History. C. E. Rosenberg and J. Golden. New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 104–33.
Heidegger, M. (1977), The Question Concerning Technology. The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays. M. Heidegger. London, Harper and Row, 13–35.
Holland, N. J. (1999), ‘Rethinking Ecology in the Western Philosophical Tradition: Heidegger and/on Aristotle’. Continental Philosophy Review, 32 (4): 409–20.
Hughes, B. (2002), ‘Bauman’s Strangers: Impairment and the Invalidation of Disabled People in Modern and Post-Modern Cultures’. Disability and Society, 17 (5): 571–84.
Kilminster, R. (2007), Norbert Elias: Post-Philosophical Sociology. London, Routledge.
Lévinas, E. (1998), Entre Nous. London, Continuum.
Nietzsche, F. (1968), The Will To Power. Vintage, New York.
Nietzsche, F. (1969), Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for Everyone and No One. Harmondsworth, Penguin.
Nietzsche, F. (1974a), Beyond Good and Evil. A Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future. Penguin, Ha rmondsworth.
Nietzsche, F. (1974b), The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs. New York, Vintage books.
Nietzsche, F. (1990), The Genealogy of Morals: An Attack. London, Anchor Books Doubleday.
Nietzsche, F. (1998), Twilight of the Idols or How to Philosophize with a Hammer. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Revel, J. (2008), ‘The Materiality of the Immaterial: Foucault, against the Return of Idealisms and New Vitalisms’. Radical Philosophy, 149: 33–8.
Tester, K. (2004), The Social Thought of Zygmunt Bauman. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2010 Tom Campbell and Chris Till
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Campbell, T., Till, C. (2010). Resistance Towards Ethics. In: Davis, M., Tester, K. (eds) Bauman’s Challenge. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230290457_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230290457_9
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-30686-2
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-29045-7
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social Sciences CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)