Prudes, Perverts, and Tyrants

Plato's Gorgias and the Politics of Shame

Christina H. Tarnopolsky (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

240 Seiten

2014
Princeton University Press (Verlag)
978-0-691-16342-0 (ISBN)

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In recent years, most political theorists have agreed that shame shouldn't play any role in democratic politics because it threatens the mutual respect necessary for participation and deliberation. But Christina Tarnopolsky argues that not every kind of shame hurts democracy. In fact, she makes a powerful case that there is a form of shame essential to any critical, moderate, and self-reflexive democratic practice. Through a careful study of Plato's Gorgias, Tarnopolsky shows that contemporary conceptions of shame are far too narrow. For Plato, three kinds of shame and shaming practices were possible in democracies, and only one of these is similar to the form condemned by contemporary thinkers. Following Plato, Tarnopolsky develops an account of a different kind of shame, which she calls "respectful shame." This practice involves the painful but beneficial shaming of one's fellow citizens as part of the ongoing process of collective deliberation. And, as Tarnopolsky argues, this type of shame is just as important to contemporary democracy as it was to its ancient form.
Tarnopolsky also challenges the view that the Gorgias inaugurates the problematic oppositions between emotion and reason, and rhetoric and philosophy. Instead, she shows that, for Plato, rationality and emotion belong together, and she argues that political science and democratic theory are impoverished when they relegate the study of emotions such as shame to other disciplines.

Christina H. Tarnopolsky is assistant professor of political science at McGill University.

List of Tables ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 Contemporary Attitudes toward Shame 1 The Theoretical Debates Surrounding Shame 2 Plato's Relevance to the Contemporary Politics of Shame 6 Plato's Gorgias and the Politics of Shame 16 Prudes, Perverts, and Tyrants 21 PART ONE: Plato's Gorgias and the Athenian Politics of Shame 27 CHAPTER ONE: Shame and Rhetoric in Plato's Gorgias 29 Situating Plato's Gorgias within the Platonic Corpus 35 The Dual Character of the Socratic Elenchus 38 From Gorgianic Rhetoric to Platonic Rhetoric 41 CHAPTER TWO: Shaming Gorgias, Polus, and Callicles 56 The Refutation of Gorgias 61 The Refutation of Polus 65 The Refutation of Callicles 79 The Mechanisms of Shame 84 CHAPTER THREE: Plato on Shame in Democratic Athens 89 The Canonical View of Plato's Criticisms of Athens 90 Disrupting the Canon 91 Parrhe-sia as an Athenian Democratic Ideal 96 Parrhe-sia and Shame 98 The Structure of Shame 100 Flattering vs. Respectful Shame 104 Plato contra Tyrannical Democrats 110 CHAPTER FOUR: Socratic vs. Platonic Shame 114 Shame and Deception in Plato's Gorgias 114 The Myth as an Illustration of the Socratic Elenchus 120 Platonic Myth vs. Socratic Elenchus 126 Gregory Vlastos on Socratic and Platonic Irony 131 Alexander Nehamas on Socratic and Platonic Irony 133 Socratic vs. Platonic Irony in Plato's Gorgias 136 PART TWO: Plato's Gorgias and the Contemporary Politics of Shame 141 CHAPTER FIVE: Prudes, Perverts, and Tyrants: Plato and the Contemporary Politics of Shame and Civility 143 The Contemporary Politics of Shame and Civility 143 Michael Warner and the Politics of Shame 145 Jean Bethke Elshtain and the Politics of Civility 147 Elshtain and Warner: Finding a Common Ground 150 The Conceptual Confusions Surrounding Shame 151 Solving the Conceptual Confusions 153 Socratic Respectful vs. Flattering Shame 160 Platonic Respectful Shame and the Search for Consensus 167 CHAPTER SIX: What's So Negative about the "Negative" Emotions? 172 Defining the "Negative" Emotions 172 Rationality and the Emotions 178 Primitive vs. Advanced Emotions 183 The Positivity of Negativity 193 Bibliography 197 Index 211

Erscheint lt. Verlag	3.11.2014
Zusatzinfo	5 tables.
Verlagsort	New Jersey
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 235 mm
Gewicht	369 g
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Philosophie Altertum / Antike
ISBN-10	0-691-16342-1 / 0691163421
ISBN-13	978-0-691-16342-0 / 9780691163420
Zustand	Neuware