It is often said contemporary French philosophy mistakes obscurity for profundity. There is more than a kernel of truth to that statement when applied to Jean-Luc Nancy's writing on Hegel. As far writing goes, Nancy's musings on Hegel are not altogether displeasing when taken as poetry but, philosophically, Nancy has not given us much. This is a shame because Nancy's work on Lacan, _The Title of the Letter_, (with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe) is a rather ingenious interpretation. This should not surprise us, however, considering the body of Nancy's work, taken as a whole, is not very philosophical but rather really an exercise in aesthetics. (Perhaps this is why American literature departments rave about various French posties while most actual philosophers view French "play" much like Bismark viewed Napolean III's statesmanship: erratic, ill-conceived, and ultimately without the substance necessary to sustain itself.)

Hegel of course was (and still is) considered quite obscure by many, but taken to be philosophically formidable and rigorous. The French philosopher that initiated contemporary interest of Hegel in France, Kojeve, managed to put together a few positive concepts on Hegel's philosophy of negativity. Nancy does not. He is content to remain, despite his own best deconstructive efforts, in the world of Nietzsche's last man--endlessly searching in vain for an answer to the demise of the Enlightenment and taking the search itself to now be the best option available. Such nihilistic gamesmanship is appealing to disaffected lefties because they, like Nancy, will not move beyond the liberal naivetes no longer tenable in a post-Nietzschean world. They wish to promote a Kantian style ethical practice by invoking an unstated catergorical imperative of unconditional equality and toleration. The fact that there is no ground or reason for their political project is taken to be somehow supportive of "radical" equality; their hope being that by supporting epistemic skepticism they can institute a paralysis of the bildung that make the hierarchies of social systems possible. Of course what they have actually done is given themselves a way to advance an extreme version of the Enlightenment project of political emancipation while rhetorically denying the other positive claims of the Enlightenment. Hegel himself did his best to put a good face on the aporias exposed by Kant's reaction to Hume's skepticism but was not, in the end, successful. Herein lies the problem for Nancy and his ilk. They would be better served to strike a more truly Hegelian pose rather than languish in the death throws of a long since faded Enlightenment. Such political tactics are philosophically transparent. If you are looking for an actual philosophic treatment and explanation of Hegel's thought I would suggest Stanley Rosen's book on Hegel.

After the death of both Deleuze and Levinas in 1995, the mantle of "greatest living philosopher" presumably went to Jacques Derrida for a while. But Derrida has always refused to be a philosopher other than in the sense of not being a philosopher (which is also being a philosopher). So his cohort and quasi-follower Jean-Luc Nancy had to take the real philosophy from Derrida back to the question underlying all post-modern thought, namely how to deal with the empty space left behind by Heidegger's deconstruction of the tradition. With this little book, Nancy himself has become "the greatest living philosopher" - that is to say he has done to Hegel what Heidegger did to Nietzsche in the 1930s and 1940s: presented him as the key thinker of the break of modernity, and, unnoticeably perhaps, stepped beyond him. This book is indeed a marvel - one gets slightly dizzy reading it. Its intensity is at times (no: always) well-nigh unbearable. Nancy, like Heidegger with Nietzsche, takes a drill to the concepts of Hegel and allows them to shine in ways hitherto unthought(see the editorial review above, no need to repeat the details). In the end, this is the overturning of the boring old French Hegel of Kojeve and Hyppolite and the most exciting discovery in philosophical reading of another in sixty some years. I had always thought of Hegel as the great synthesizer. But Nancy's Hegel "returns" Hegel to pre-Socratic instability and shaky difference, where the restless thought-in-process constitutes the sense of the world, and philosophy is as alive as it ever was. A friend of mine says that Nancy reminds him of the color of the LED on alarm clocks: well, he's right, 'cause Jean-Luc Nancy is very much a phenomenon of a new morning. The owl is disoriented but it is all a marvel. Yes, I guess that is what you could say.

Worktypes can be a very useful tool for understanding how your personality affects your efficiency at work. Strategies for maximizing your strengths and minimizing your weaknesses are offered as well as tips for dealing with personality types other than your own. Unfortunately, the book offers only a brief description of personality types. For readers to get the full value from this book, it is suggested that they read a book with more detailed descriptions of the 16 types. (The authors suggest the 1989 book, Lifetypes, but any number of books focusing on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and psychological type will do.) Without a clear understanding of the 16 psychological types, it is difficult to apply most of the information in the book. However, with an appropriate companion book, Worktypes can be instrumental in your quest to improve your effectiveness at work. We [...] recommend this book to a wide range of readers, since the personality breakdowns can be of value to anyone from the most powerful leaders of corporations to their front-line employees.

As someone very familiar with the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, I found WorkTypes to be a very useful tool. As we learn about type in the workplace, it's important to emphasize that type shouldn't limit the kind of work or activities we choose.The explanations "Using Type Knowledge at Work" and "How not to use Type at Work" should be required reading for any employee whose workplace in undergoing restructuring. The preference combinations used narrow down the kind of information shared. An individual who is new to type, and wants to learn more about it on a casual basis, won't be bogged down in temperament or dominant function theories. Scenarios illustrating workplace issues--Leading, Meetings, Change, Communications--are very realistic. Many readers can identify with these situations. The suggestions given to improve these situations are effective and written in a language that is easily converted to actual application. I wish that I had access to this book earlier in my planning process. Since that time, I have recommended the book as part of my workshops. Type notwithstanding, I have also found its applications useful in other environments outside the office.

This book is a heap of arrant nonsense

Contrary to the previous reviewer, this collection of essays is well worth reading. Of course one can disagree with points made here or there, but if you take the time to actually read the thing I don't see how one can leave the book without having experienced a huge degree of mental stimulation. Yes, it's written in a meandering style, but following the thoughts is the whole point. So--if you like thinking, that is--I say this book is of 4-star calliber!

This book has been very influential in France. If you don't take your philophy neat, of if you are new to Nancy's thought, then I recommend starting with Maurice Blanchot's _The Unavowable Community_, which relates Nancy's concept of finitude to the work and life of Georges Bataille. Blanchot shows why, in the face of the various totalitarianisms of the 20th century, we should care about Nancy's work.

Good readings, but the producer apparently felt the poetry can not stand on its own and added background music throughout. It distracts terribly from the music, and never has any relation in mood to the poetry. Avoid this tape.

If you like Emily Dickenson (and I do) you will love this audio cassette. The readers include Meryl Streep, Sharon Stone, and other great female talents. They read the poems with style and a subtility that matches the work of the poet. After hearing the presentations, I came away feeling that the poems were studied by the readers and for the most part understood and delivered accordingly. Thumbs up!

This book is incorrectly identified as being by Jean-Luc Nancy and Michel Maffesoli, a promising collaboration, but one that only materializes under the patronage of Amazon's data entry staff. It includes interviews with these two, which, as interviews go, are interviewy. The bulk of the book is by MICHEL GAILLOT and is about techno, as in Techno music. As french art critical writing about techno music goes, it is french art critical writing about techno music.

enjoy at a distance.

Without in any way proclaiming a theme or message, techno, in its loud silence, seems to imply that the old socio-historic figures of meaning no longer make sense, and consequently can no longer fragment or partition the world according to an ethnic or political score that until now has been divided up into separate and opposed identities.

As can be easily seen in raves, as well in many contemporary artistic practices, art and politics are no longer separate (as if designating heterogenous fields of operations), but are joined in collective articulations, flexible and ephemeral, forming around common sensations.

Such a convergence of the artistic (understood to mean both art and technology) and the political does not neccesarily mean that we have moved toward an aetheticizing of the political (the community as a work of art) or a politicizing of art (a social or critical art).

This indicates perhaps that it still remains for us to concieve an art that is no longer merely a representation of the Ideal, to concieve of technology whose ends are not merely economic imperatives, and a political space not grounded in only one Truth.

This constitutes a program that rests on the possibility of inventing, singularly and collectively, an existence that no longer diverts from its own finality, and from its free deployment within the horizons of worldliness, cross-bred and deterritorialized, offered to us at present. With all due respect to the defenders of the purity of the Ideal, this may well be, for our time and those of us who share it, both our task and our fate.