Andrew Wilshere
Address: Room S3.10, Samuel Alexander Building, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL
Email: andrew.wilshere [at] manchester.ac.uk
PhD title: Rights and Responsibility: Emmanuel Levinas' Critique of Liberalism
Supervisors: Prof. Alexander Samely (Middle Eastern Studies) and Prof. Hillel Steiner (Politics)
Main discipline area: Middle Eastern Studies
Research interests: Phenomenology, analytical philosophy, political philosophy, religious studies, philosophy of music, aesthetics, Jewish studies.
Research specialism:
"Analytical" and "continental" philosophies are often considered incommensurate because they are thought to embody intrinsically opposed approaches to philosophical questions. Yet could Emmanuel Levinas, a twentieth-century French-Lithuanian philosopher, offer a radical reappraisal of the relationship between the two? His work is in an ambiguous position, in that it breaks both with Husserl's phenomenology and yet also cuts to the heart of the analytical tradition through his ethical critique of ontology. Morgan (2007) has also identified such potential for Levinas to bridge the two traditions.
Levinas has become popular with theologians and ethicists in recent years, but often the major motifs of his thought have been "applied" in a shallow and uncritical fashion. My project distances itself decisively from this approach, instead retaining focus on a rigorous comparative method, with close reading of all of Levinas' works and mainstream figures in contemporary political theory. Scholarship on Levinas and politics is currently sparse (Bergo 1999; Caygill 2002). This project strives for a more substantial engagement with the political thrust of Levinas' thought.
How could Levinas' philosophy change our understanding of the Anglo-American analytical tradition of political thought? This project, which began in January 2008, has so far sought to assemble on their own terms the key concepts in both Levinas' work and in the work of Steiner (1994) and Rawls (1971). Notably, the latter both fail to justify the ethical assumptions upon which rest their respective accounts of "rights and duties" and "justice as fairness". Levinas, however, raises the possibility that liberalism's rational accounts of freedom and justice derive from the ethical constitution of human subjectivity.
What is the relationship, then, between liberalism's discourse of "rights" and Levinas' account of "responsibility"? Steiner (1994) offers rational procedures for making judgements about rights and duties. Levinas offers no such procedures, but does provide an account for the derivation of rational systems of justice from a pre-subjective, pre-rational ethical encounter with "the other". Could there be more shared ground in this conception of rights and responsibility than has previously been recognized?
Publications:
- July 2006. Book review, "Theology and Popular Culture". Crucible.
Conference papers and research seminars:
- June 2008. "Emmanuel Levinas, Language and Belonging." Language and Belonging conference, University of Manchester.
- October 2008. "Emmanuel Levinas: Towards a Political Reading." Paper presented to Manchester University Centre for Jewish Studies.
Teaching Areas:
- (2006-7) Undergraduate Level 1 core course in Middle Eastern Studies.
Professional biography:
I have attended the University of Manchester since 2002, first studying Religions and Theology and then completing a Masters in Middle Eastern Studies. My MA thesis examined the philosophy of liturgical music and improvisation through the work of Franz Rosenzweig, who informed certain aspects of Levinas' philosophy. At the University I also work as research assistant to Prof. Elaine Graham (Religions and Theology) and as secretary to the AHRC-funded research project "Typology of Anonymous and Pseudepigraphic Jewish Literature in Antiquity".
In addition to my studies I work as a freelance musician, both as Director of Music at a church in Blackley (north Manchester), and as a recitalist and accompanist. I am interested in further study in the philosophy of music, particularly in its relationship with logic, consciousness and time. In 2009 I will take a year-long break from my PhD studies to take up a position as Organ Scholar at St Paul's Cathedral, New Zealand. During that time I will also work as a member of the welfare team at the University of Otago.