The ethics of life writing
- Type Paperback
- Publisher CORNELL
- ISBN13 9780801488337
- ISBN10 0801488338
- Pages 271
- Published 2004
Sections
Ethics / Philosophy MoralThe ethics of life writing
Using life writings as examplesincluding works by Christa Wolf, Art Spiegelman, Oliver Sacks, Henry Louis Gates, Melanie Thernstrom, and Philip RothPaul John Eakin draws on the latest research in neurology, cognitive science, memory studies, developmental psychology, and related fields to rethink the very nature of selfrepresentation. After showing how the experience of living in one's body shapes one's identity, he explores relational and narrative modes of being, emphasizing social sources of identity, and demonstrating that the self and the story of the self are constantly evolving in relation to others. Eakin concludes by engaging the ethical issues raised by the conflict between the authorial impulse to life writing and a traditional, privacybased ethics that such writings often violate.
Author BioRPaul John Eakin is Ruth N. Halls Professor of English at Indiana University. He is the author of Fictions in Autobiography: Studies in the Art of SelfInvention, and Touching the World: Reference in Autobiography.
- Type Paperback
- Publisher CORNELL
- ISBN13 9780801488337
- ISBN10 0801488338
- Pages 271
- Published 2004