Laugier

Sandra Laugier is Professor of Philosophy at Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France, and Senior member of Institut Universitaire de France. She has been the Deputy Director of the Institut des Sciences Humaines et Sociales, CNRS since 2010. Laugier is the translator of Stanley Cavell’s work in French and is specialized in Ordinary Language Philosophy, Ethics, American Philosophy (Cavell, Emerson, Thoreau) and gender studies (Ethics of care). She is the author of many books in French, English, Italian, German, including: Tous vulnérables, le care, les animaux et l’environnement (Payot, 2012), Face aux désastres, le care, la folie et les grandes détresses collectives; co-authored with Anne Lovell, Stefania Pandolfo, Veena Das (Ithaque, 2013), Why We Need Ordinary Language Philosophy (U. of Chicago Press, 2013), Recommencer la philosophie, Cavell et la philosophie américaine (Vrin, 2014), and Le principe démocratie, with A. Ogien, (La Découverte, 2014).

 


Lecture:

The Ethics of Care as a Resource for Democracy
The idea of an ethics formulated in a “different voice” – a woman’s voice – is connected to ordinary language philosophy. Care is at once a practical response to specific needs and a sensitivity to the ordinary details of human life that matter. Hence, care is a concrete matter that ensures maintenance (e.g. as conversation and conservation) and continuity of the human world and form of life. This is nothing less than a paradigm shift in ethics, with a reorientation towards vulnerability and a shift from the “just” to the “important,” exactly as Wittgenstein proposed shifting the meaning of importance by destroying what seemed to be important.

Time: 5:30 am
Location: Cultural Services of the French Embassy / Ballroom

 


>> PARTICIPANTS