The Revival of Pragmatism: New Essays on Social Thought, Law, and Culture(Post-Contemporary Interventions)

Although long considered the most distinctive American contribution to philosophy, pragmatism - with its problem-solving emphasis and its contingent view of truth - lost popularity in mid-century after the advent of World War II, the horror of the Holocaust, and the dawning of the Cold War. Since the 1960s, however, pragmatism in many guises has again gained prominence, finding congenial places to flourish within growing intellectual movements. This volume of new essays brings together leading philosophers, historians, legal scholars, social thinkers, and literary critics to examine the far-reaching effects of this revival. As the 25 intellectuals who take part in this discussion show, pragmatism has become a complex terrain on which a rich variety of contemporary debates have been played out. Contributors such as Richard Rorty, Stanley Cavell, Nancy Fraser, Robert Westbrook, Hilary Putnam, and Morris Dickstein trace pragmatism's cultural and intellectual evolution, consider its connection to democracy, and discuss its complex relationship to the work of Emerson, Nietzsche, and Wittgenstein. They show the influence of pragmatism on black intellectuals such a W.E.B. Du bois, explore its view poetic language, and debate its effects on social science, history, and jurisprudence. also including essays by critics of the revival such as Alan Wolfe and John Patrick Diggins, the volume concludes with a response to the whole collection from Stanley Fish. Including an extensive bibliography, this interdisciplinary work provides an in-depth and broadly gauged introduction to pragmatism, one that will be crucial for understanding the shape of the transformations taking place in the American social and philosophical scene at the end of the 20th century.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Introduction: Pragmatism Then and Now / Morris Dickstein What Difference Does Pragmatism Make? The View From Philosophy Pragmatism as Romantic Polytheism / Richard Rorty Pragmatism and Realism / Hilary Putnam Response to Hilary Putnam’s “Pragmatism and Realism” / Sidney Morgenbesser The Moral Impulse / Ruth Anna Putnam What’s the Use of Calling Emerson a Pragmatist? / Stanley Cavell Pragmatism and the Remaking of Social Thought Pragmatism: An Old Name for Some New Ways of Thinking? / James T. Kloppenberg Pragmatism and Democracy: Reconstructing the Logic of John Dewey’s Faith / Robert B. Westbrook Community in the Pragmatic Tradition / Richard J. Bernstein Another Pragmatism: Alain Locke, Critical “Race” Theory, and the Politics of Culture / Nancy Fraser Going Astray, Going Forward: Du Boisian Pragmatism and Its Lineage / Ross Posnock The Inspiration of Pragmatism: Some Personal Remarks / Hans Joas The Missing Pragmatic Revival in American Social Science / Alan Wolfe Pragmatism and Its Limits / John Patrick Diggins Pragmatism and Law Pragmatic Adjudication / Richard A. Posner Freestanding Legal Pragmatism / Thomas C. Grey What’s Pragmatic about Legal Pragmatism? / David Luban Pragmatism and Law: A Response to David Luban / Richard Rorty It’s a Positivist, It’s a Pragmatist, It’s a Codifier! Reflections on Nietzsche and Stendhal / Richard H. Weisberg Pragmatism, Pluralism, and Legal Interpretations: Posner’s and Rorty’s Justice without Metaphysics Meets Hate Speech / Michael Rosenfeld Pragmatism, Culture, and Art Why Do Pragmatists Want to Be Like Poets? / Richard Poirier Pragmatists and Poets: A Response to Richard Poirier / Louis Menand The Novelist of Everyday Life / David Bromwich When Mind Is a Verb: Thomas Eakins and the Work of Doing / Ray Carney Religion and the Recent Revival of Pragmatism, Giles Gunn Afterword Truth and Toilets: Pragmatism and the Practices of Life / Stanely Fish Selected Bibliography Contributors Index

About the Author :
Morris Dickstein is Distinguished Professor of English at Queens College and at the Graduate School of the City University of New York. His previous books include Double Agent: The Critic and Society and Gates of Eden: American Culture in the Sixties.

Review :
""The Revival of Pragmatism" is a substantial collection of essays by some of the most distinguished philosophers, legal theorists, cultural historians, and literary critics writing today. . . . Among the pleasures of the volume are some essays that stray outside the usual fare of philosophy, law, and political theory." --Alan Ryan, "New York Times Book Review" "[T]he diverse types of contributions to "The Revival of Pragmatism" . . . make the collection a fitting representation of the status of pragmatism discussion in the U. S. today." --Mark Bauerlein, "Philosophy and Literature"