Translation exposes aspects of language that can easily be ignored, renewing the sense of the proximity and inseparability of language and thought. The ancient quarrel between philosophy and literature was an early expression of a self-understanding of philosophy that has, in some quarters at least, survived the centuries. This book explores the idea of translation as a philosophical theme and as an important feature of philosophy and practical life, especially in relation to the work of Stanley Cavell. The essays in this volume explore philosophical questions about translation, especially in the light of the work of Stanley Cavell. They take the questions raised by translation to be of key importance not only for philosophical thinking but for our lives as a whole. Thoreau’s enigmatic remark “The truth is translated” reveals that apparently technical matters of translation extend through human lives to remarkable effect, conditioning the ways in which the world comes to light. The experience of the translator exemplifies the challenge of judgement where governing rules and principles are incommensurable; and it shows something of the ways in which words come to us, opening new possibilities of thought. This book puts Cavell’s rich exploration of these matters into conversation with traditions of pragmatism and European thought. Translation, then, far from a merely technical matter, is at work in human being, and it is the means of humanisation. The book brings together philosophers and translators with common interests in Cavell and in the questions of language at the heart of his work.

This book is an invitation to the life of philosophy in the United States, as Emerson once lived it and as Stanley Cavell now lives it--in all its topographical ambiguity. Cavell talks about his vocation in connection with what he calls voice--the tone of philosophy--and his right to take that tone, and to describe an anecdotal journey toward the discovery of his own voice.

Seeking for philosophy the same spirit and assurance conveyed by artists like Fred Astaire, Cavell presents essays exploring the meaning of grace and gesture in film and on stage, in language and in life. Critical to the renaissance in American thought Cavell hopes to provoke is the recognition of the centrality of the “ordinary” to American life.

Now in paperback, Sandra Laugier's reconsideration of analytic philosophy and ordinary language. Sandra Laugier has long been a key liaison between American and European philosophical thought, responsible for bringing American philosophers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Stanley Cavell to French readers—but until now her books have never been published in English. Why We Need Ordinary Language Philosophy rights that wrong with a topic perfect for English-language readers: the idea of analytic philosophy. Focused on clarity and logical argument, analytic philosophy has dominated the discipline in the United States, Australia, and Britain over the past one hundred years, and it is often seen as a unified, coherent, and inevitable advancement. Laugier questions this assumption, rethinking the very grounds that drove analytic philosophy to develop and uncovering its inherent tensions and confusions. Drawing on J. L. Austin and the later works of Ludwig Wittgenstein, she argues for the solution provided by ordinary language philosophy—a philosophy that trusts and utilizes the everyday use of language and the clarity of meaning it provides—and in doing so offers a major contribution to the philosophy of language and twentieth- and twenty-first-century philosophy as a whole.

In response to the contemporary crisis of democracy as a way of life, in particular, the anxieties of inclusion, this important new book explores the contemporary significance of American philosophy (the pragmatism and American transcendentalism of Emerson and Thoreau) and tries to present new ways of cultivating political emotions and political citizens. To take up this philosophical-political-educational task, the book introduces Cavell’s idea of philosophy as translation– a broader sense of translation as being internal to the nature of language, and hence to the condition of human being as linguistic being and, hence, as political being. Translation is a lens through which to enhance the possibilities and to elucidate the shifting identities of American philosophy. Through this, a hidden tension within American philosophy, between pragmatism and transcendentalism, is exposed. Ultimately, the book presents a vision of an alternative political education for human transformation and perfectionist cosmopolitan education.

These lectures by one of the most influential and original philosophers of the twentieth century constitute a sustained argument for the philosophical basis of romanticism, particularly in its American rendering. Through his examination of such authors as Emerson, Thoreau, Poe, Wordsworth, and Coleridge, Stanley Cavell shows that romanticism and American transcendentalism represent a serious philosophical response to the challenge of skepticism that underlies the writings of Wittgenstein and Austin on ordinary language.

Since Socrates and his circle first tried to frame the Just City in words, discussion of a perfect communal life--a life of justice, reflection, and mutual respect--has had to come to terms with the distance between that idea and reality. Measuring this distance step by practical step is the philosophical project that Stanley Cavell has pursued on his exploratory path. Situated at the intersection of two of his longstanding interests--Emersonian philosophy and the Hollywood comedy of remarriage--Cavell's new work marks a significant advance in this project. The book--which presents a course of lectures Cavell presented several times toward the end of his teaching career at Harvard--links masterpieces of moral philosophy and classic Hollywood comedies to fashion a new way of looking at our lives and learning to live with ourselves. This book offers philosophy in the key of life. Beginning with a rereading of Emerson's "Self-Reliance," Cavell traces the idea of perfectionism through works by Plato, Aristotle, Locke, Kant, Mill, Nietzsche, and Rawls, and by such artists as Henry James, George Bernard Shaw, and Shakespeare. Cities of Words shows that this ever-evolving idea, brought to dramatic life in movies such as It Happened One Night, The Awful Truth, The Philadelphia Story, and The Lady Eve, has the power to reorient the perception of Western philosophy.

The existential crises involved in translation are part of our political life, especially in times when the closing of borders symbolized by Brexit and the triumph of Donald Trump, present new challenges to those living lives of immigrancy and those waiting at the borders. How to resist the emotive tide of populism and, in particular, the language that legitimates exclusion? How to confront the anxieties of inclusion? These challenges are increasingly pressing. The 2016 Conference of the International Network of Philosophers of Education sought to address such concerns through the theme ‘Philosophy as translation and the understanding of other cultures’. The chapters included here represent the breadth and richness of that conference, addressing questions of ethics, desire, religious understanding, intercultural philosophy, and practices of higher education and teacher education. The processes of translation they discuss are not limited to linguistic translation as conventionally understood. Instead translation is taken to be a window through which to understand how we, as linguistic beings, are constantly in a process of transformation, and how our personal and cultural identities are, hence, also already involved in processes of translation. This book was originally published as a special issue of Ethics & Education.

Stanley Cavell looks closely at America's most popular art and our perceptions of it. His explorations of Hollywood's stars, directors, and most famous films—as well as his fresh look at Godard, Bergman, and other great European directors—will be of lasting interest to movie-viewers and intelligent people everywhere.

What could it mean to speak of philosophy as the education of grownups? This book takes Cavell's enigmatic phrase as a provocation to explore the themes of education that run throughout his work-from his response to Wittgenstein, Austin, and ordinary-language philosophy, to his readings of Thoreau and of the moral perfectionism he identifies with Emerson, to his discussions of literature and film. Hilary Putnam has described Cavell as not only one of the most creative thinkers of today but as one of the few contemporary philosophers to explore philosophy as education. Cavell's sustained examination of the nature of philosophy cannot be separated from his preoccupation with what it is to teach and to learn. This is the first book to address theimportance of education in Cavell's work and its essays are framed by two new pieces by Cavell himself.Together these texts combine to show what it means to read Cavell, and simultaneously what it means to read philosophically, in itself a part of our education as grownups.