Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emerson and Eiseley: Two Religious Visions.

by Jonathan Weidenbaum

Found in Artifacts and Illuminations: Critical Essays on Loren Eiseley. Tom Lynch and Susan Maher, editors. Nebraska University Press.

Religious Self-Reliance

by Randy Friedman

Pluralist (Spring 2012)

Self-reliance is too often read as a celebration by Emerson of the secular, self-reliant individual. My reading has... more Self-reliance is too often read as a celebration by Emerson of the secular, self-reliant individual. My reading has Emerson discovering a religiosity which does not depend on an adherence to a particular religious tradition or supernatural revelation. I call this religious self-reliance. Emerson, influenced by James Marsh and William Ellery Channing, rejects the theology which in part follows Locke’s empiricism and leaves the individual in need of spiritual guidance through traditional forms of divine Revelation. Instead, Emerson turns to Reason, identified as the moral or religious sentiment. The Over-soul which the moral sentiment uncovers represents the ultimate grounding of the self, and its revelation serves as the basis for religious self-reliance.

Sohrab Sepehri in the Mirror of Emerson's "The Poet": A Comparative Study

by Behnam Mirzababazadeh Fomeshi

abstract published in the book of abstracts for XIXth IClA 2010

Is Hafez the Poet of Emerson?

by Behnam Mirzababazadeh Fomeshi

abstract published in the book of abstract for the XIXth ICLA 2010

حتفظ و امرسون: مطالعه تطبیقی حافظ شیرازی و رالف والدو امرسون

by Behnam Mirzababazadeh Fomeshi

همایش بزرگداشت حافظ دانشگاه فردوسی مشهد مهر 88

Nature and Spirit in Emerson’s 'Nature'

by Jonathan Sozek

Draft, November 2010

An examination is made of the relation between conceptions of nature and spirit in Emerson's book 'Nature'. As Emerson... more An examination is made of the relation between conceptions of nature and spirit in Emerson's book 'Nature'. As Emerson approached completion of this work, he complained of a 'crack in it not easily soldered or welded'. Here, by considering the circumstances of the book’s composition and offering a new reading of it, the argument is made that this 'crack' is in fact no fault in Emerson's text, but rather represents a recurrent tension faced by anyone who would bring and hold together the aspects of human experience Emerson calls ‘nature’ and ‘spirit’. One ought not permanently to solder or weld these aspects, it is maintained, for their separation, though perhaps punctuated by moments of unity, is a condition of the possibility of our freedom. In conclusion, the meanings of two of Emerson's epigrammatic sayings are considered: that 'the watcher is a doer' (in 'Nature') and that 'the seer is a sayer' (in his Divinity School Address). On this basis some speculations are offered concerning the practical significance of this 'crack' in Emerson's text, and accordingly of the 'crack' between nature and spirit in our experience. [18 pages]

Emerson, Slavery, and Citizenship

by Jack Turner

Raritan 28.2 (Fall 2008): 127-146.

Over the past quarter century political theorists have paid increasing attention to the political significance of... more Over the past quarter century political theorists have paid increasing attention to the political significance of Emerson's ideas. Yet both sympathetic and unsympathetic interpreters conclude that Emerson fails to articulate an ethics of liberal democratic citizenship worth the name. This essay argues that Emerson sponsors a robust ethics of liberal democratic citizenship. Why should well-off individuals sacrifice private goods for the cause of social justice? Emerson answers this question, though not in any single essay. The answer is spread over two decades of antislavery writings that reveal the complex interplay in Emerson's thought of two ideas: self-reliance and complicity. Self-reliance and complicity are inversely proportionate: the greater one's complicity, the lesser one's self- reliance. Emerson's recognition of this inverse relationship, and of the fact that the Union's political economy implicated him in slavery, spurred him to antislavery activism. Only through activism could he reduce the complicity that compromised his self-reliance. Emerson's antislavery writings and activism thus disclose self-reliance's politically dynamic implications: since the achievement of self-reliance requires the reduction of complicity, would-be self-reliant citizens have a strong incentive to help realize social justice.

Traditions of Pragmatism and the Myth of the Emersonian Democrat

by Randy Friedman

Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 43, 1 (Winter 2007): 154 – 184.

Beginning with Emerson’s turn from his pulpit, many argue that American philosophy has rigorously held forth against... more Beginning with Emerson’s turn from his pulpit, many argue that American philosophy has rigorously held forth against supernaturalism and metaphysics. While most read self-reliance as a call for individualism, I argue that self-reliance is the application of the moral sentiment to the source of existence Emerson calls the Over-soul. Figures like George Kateb, Stanley Cavell, and Jeffrey Stout have presented a very different picture of American pragmatism. Stout, in particular, is responsible for building up what I call “the myth of the Emersonian democrat.” We find that a few philosophical positions generally constitute this myth. The Emersonian democrat is secular, sceptical, relativist, anti-realist, and anti-metaphysical. In
fact, on my reading of the strand of pragmatism running from Emerson through James to Dewey, the
pluralism of the Emersonian democrat depends on certain metaphysical commitments. The traditional
reading of Emerson as anti-religion, and by extension, anti-religious, impedes a better understanding of self-reliance and obfuscates some of the Emersonian inheritances in James and Dewey.

Eloquence and Invisible Man

by Christopher Hanlon

“The old race are all gone”: Transatlantic Bloodlines and English Traits

by Christopher Hanlon

On Emerson

by Dean Call

Written as a discussion board post

"The Other Heading of America: Derrida and Emerson on the Future of an Illusion"

by Jonathan Murphy

Published in _The Comparatist_ 36 (2012): 43-66.

This essay casts 9/11 as a traumatic site of contestation where the future of American patriotism remains to be... more This essay casts 9/11 as a traumatic site of contestation where the future of American patriotism remains to be decided. Derrida’s notion of democracy to come is born of his deconstructive critique of Kant’s doctrine of transcendental illusion, and Emerson’s inoperative approach to America is guided by this same aporetic imperative of thought. What Emerson and Derrida give us pause to consider is that the victims of 9/11 might not be regarded as collateral damage of an ineluctable nature, but as posthumous martyrs whose more than tragic lives commemorate both an exceptional idea of America and the exceptional event of democracy to come.

Musing on Emerson's Empire: An Homage

by Richard Kahn

Unpublished paper, 2006

"German Philosophy, 'American' Thought, and Defining Democracy in Antebellum Boston"

by Benjamin Park

MPhil Dissertation, Political Thought and Intellectual History, Cambridge University

This dissertation explores how various thinkers within the Transcendentalist movement received, adapted, and presented... more This dissertation explores how various thinkers within the Transcendentalist movement received, adapted, and presented German theology during the 1830s and 1840s. Specifically, it will address how the Transcendentalists’ introduction to and
promotion of a wide variety of European philosophies challenged what had been traditional American conceptions of philosophy, democracy, and American-ness. By placing America within the dialogue of nineteenth century European thought, the Transcendentalists were forcing citizens to reconsider key issues like morality, knowledge, and equality. To demonstrate the diversity and multiplicity within the movement, this dissertation will focus on different Transcendentalist thinkers in each chapter: when engaging their appropriations of German idealism, it will emphasize the role of Theodore Parker as influenced by German philosophers, specifically Friedrich Schleiermacher; with democratic reform, it will look at Ralph Waldo Emerson; with the question of American identity, Orestes Brownson will take the stage; and in the final chapter, a comparison will be made between two German-trained Bostonians, George Bancroft and Frederick Henry Hedge, who experienced similar German-based educations yet held and promoted drastically different views. In short, this dissertation examines the dynamic relationship between notions of “American thought,” “foreign philosophy,” and “democracy” in antebellum Boston.

The American Roots of Evolutionary Spirituality

by Jeff Carreira

Pragmatism is the most significant genuinely American contribution to world philosophy. It was designed to be a new... more Pragmatism is the most significant genuinely American contribution to world philosophy. It was designed to be a new definition of truth not a metaphysical explanation of the universe. It was, however, built upon an implicit evolutionary metaphysics that was developed and shared by the early founders of Pragmatism. The core conceptions of this evolutionary metaphysics can be found today reflected in popular philosophies that are currently being developed by a number of contemporary thinkers often outside of the bounds of traditional academia. The ideas of these present-day luminaries when considered together might be designated by using the term Evolutionary Spirituality. In this paper I will describe the fundamental characteristics of the evolutionary metaphysics of Pragmatism, show how it can be seen reflected in different forms of Evolutionary Spirituality today, and speculate as to why this obvious connection remains largely unrecognized.

PhD Thesis: Britain on the American Popular Lecture Circuit 1844-1865

by Tom F. Wright

Completed December 2009; Viva Completed February 2010

This dissertation examines an overlooked area of nineteenth-century transatlantic commentary: the performances of... more This dissertation examines an overlooked area of nineteenth-century transatlantic commentary: the performances of returning American travellers on the antebellum popular lecture circuit. It consists of case studies that consider the rhetorical character and reception history of four ‘travel lectures’ on Britain by prominent Northern male reformers during the period 1844–1865.

Oratorical culture in the antebellum North, and the popular lecture platform in particular, was widely seen as a constitutive aspect of a distinctive civic nationalism. My thesis explores what it meant for these institutional emblems of cultural independence to host performances that explored questions of Anglo-American relations and selfhood.

Furthermore, in a party political climate in which various sentiments and manners were regularly interpreted in terms of perceived ‘Anglophilia’, my work reveals what the contemporary media response to these performances can tell us about the evolution of notions of British and American cultural styles during the period.

In my opening chapter, I contend that oratorical performance and transatlantic commentary were mutually reinforcing cultural practices, and propose a reconsideration of the ‘travel lecture’ as a compelling and previously neglected instance of this interplay. Moreover, I argue that newspaper reports, accounts, and sketches of lyceum performances should be reclaimed as a rich and expressive form of the period.

In subsequent chapters on the travel lectures of Horace Mann, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Horace Greeley, and John B. Gough, I explore the rhetorical and performance strategies by which transatlantic experience was variously presented as grounds for separation from, re-engagement with, or emulation of British society. Through close readings of lecture reports, I examine the reception history of each oration, tracing the ways in which the contested symbolism of British progress, class relations, and physical and vocal ‘difference’ proved valuable for various communities of American interpreters.

Knowing as Instancing: Jazz Improvisation and Moral Perfectionism

by William Day

The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 58:2 (Spring 2000): 99-111

This essay presents an approach to understanding improvised music, finding in the work of certain outstanding jazz... more This essay presents an approach to understanding improvised music, finding in the work of certain outstanding jazz musicians an emblem of Ralph Waldo Emerson's notion of self-trust and of Stanley Cavell's notion of moral perfectionism. The essay critiques standard efforts to interpret improvised solos as though they were composed, contrasting that approach to one that treats the procedures of improvisation as derived from our everyday actions. It notes several levels of correspondence between our interest in jazz improvisations and the particular demands of Emerson's writing, and ends by considering how exemplary moments of instruction in jazz are expressive of Emersonian self-trust.

Moonstruck, or How to Ruin Everything

by William Day

Philosophy and Literature 19, no. 2 (October 1995): 292-307

Reprinted in Ordinary Language Criticism: Literary Thinking after Cavell after Wittgenstein, ed. Dauber & Jost... more Reprinted in Ordinary Language Criticism: Literary Thinking after Cavell after Wittgenstein, ed. Dauber & Jost (Northwestern UP, 2003), 315-28

A reading of the film Moonstruck (1987) is presented in two movements. The first aligns Moonstruck with certain Hollywood film comedies of the 1930s and 40s, those Stanley Cavell calls comedies of remarriage. The second turns to some aspects of Emerson's writing – in particular his interest in our relation to human greatness, and his coinciding interest in our relation to the words of a text – and shows how Moonstruck inherits these Emersonian, essentially philosophical interests.

The Emersonian moral perfectionist background to §1 of The Gay Science

by Joshua Kortbein

In progress

Recent work on ‘moral perfectionism’, for example James Conant’s reading of Schopenhauer as Educator, has persuasively... more Recent work on ‘moral perfectionism’, for example James Conant’s reading of Schopenhauer as Educator, has persuasively demonstrated that it is possible to read Nietzsche in an anti-metaphysical way without recruiting him to the contemporary naturalist project by paying closer attention to the ways his writing is designed to demand self-knowledge from the reader. My contribution to this project is to trace the ways in which the agenda declared in the opening section of The Gay Science is covertly set by Nietzsche’s recognition that he cannot accept a number of the metaphysical commitments which allow his model Emerson to radically democratize access to moral perfectionist projects of self-cultivation in the latter’s essay ‘History’.

Solitude and the Activity of Thinking

by Roger Berkowitz

Published in
Thinking in Dark Times: Hannah Arendt on Ethics and Politics
ed. by Roger Berkowitz, Jeffrey Katz, and Thomas Keenan
Fordham University Press (2010)

Abstract: This paper reflects on the political importance of the activity of thinking and suggests that Arendt’s space... more Abstract: This paper reflects on the political importance of the activity of thinking and suggests that Arendt’s space of politics may not be limited to its traditional abode within the public realm. Beyond the public realm of politics, Arendt’s defense of political action requires attention to the private as well. What has been overlooked amidst all the attention to Arendt’s defense of the public realm of politics over and against the rise of the social is her equally strong insistence upon a vibrant and secure private realm where active thinking is possible. Arendt’s private realm is a space of solitude that is the necessary prerequisite for the activity of thinking. Indeed, it is solitude that nurtures and fosters thoughtfulness and thus prepares individuals for the possibility of political action. To create a meaningful politics amidst the loneliness of the modern world, Arendt suggests, requires solitude, which she sees as the cradle of thinking.