
The Livable and the Unlivable
Fordham University Press
Published on 2. May 2023
Book
Hardback
96 pages
978-1-5315-0273-7 (ISBN)
Description
The unlivable is the most extreme point of human suffering and injustice. But what is it exactly? How do we define the unlivable? And what can we do to prevent and repair it? These are the intriguing questions Judith Butler and Frederic Worms discuss in a captivating dialogue situated at the crossroads of contemporary life and politics. Here, Judith Butler criticizes the norms that make life precarious and unlivable, while Frederic Worms appeals to a "critical vitalism" as a way of allowing the hardship of the unlivable to reveal what is vital for us.
For both Butler and Worms, the difference between the livable and the unlivable forms the critical foundation for a contemporary practice of care. Care and support, in all their aspects, make human life livable, that is, "more than living." To understand it, we must draw on the concrete practices of humans who are confronted with the unlivable: the refugees of today and the witnesses and survivors of past violations and genocide. They teach us what is intolerable but also undeniable about the unlivable, and what we can do to resist it.
Crafted with critical rigor, mutual respect, and lively humor, the compelling dialogue transcribed and translated in this book took place at the Ecole Normale Superieure (ENS) on April 11, 2018, at a time when close to two thousand migrants were living in nearby makeshift camps in northern Paris. The Livable and the Unlivable showcases this 2018 dialogue in the context of Butler's and Worms's ongoing work and the evolution of their thought, as presented by Laure Barillas and Arto Charpentier in their equally engaging introduction. It concludes with a new afterword that addresses the crises unfolding in our world and the ways a philosophically rigorous account of life must confront them.
While this book will be of keen interest to readers of philosophy and cultural criticism, and those interested in vitalism, new materialism, and critical theory, it is a far from merely academic text. In the conversation between Butler and Worms, we encounter questions we all grapple with in confronting the distress and precarity of our times, marked as it is by types of survival that are unlivable, from concentration camps to prisons to environmental toxicity, to forcible displacement, to the Covid pandemic.
The Livable and the Unlivable at once considers longstanding philosophical questions around why and how we live, while working to retrieve a philosophy of life for today's Left.
For both Butler and Worms, the difference between the livable and the unlivable forms the critical foundation for a contemporary practice of care. Care and support, in all their aspects, make human life livable, that is, "more than living." To understand it, we must draw on the concrete practices of humans who are confronted with the unlivable: the refugees of today and the witnesses and survivors of past violations and genocide. They teach us what is intolerable but also undeniable about the unlivable, and what we can do to resist it.
Crafted with critical rigor, mutual respect, and lively humor, the compelling dialogue transcribed and translated in this book took place at the Ecole Normale Superieure (ENS) on April 11, 2018, at a time when close to two thousand migrants were living in nearby makeshift camps in northern Paris. The Livable and the Unlivable showcases this 2018 dialogue in the context of Butler's and Worms's ongoing work and the evolution of their thought, as presented by Laure Barillas and Arto Charpentier in their equally engaging introduction. It concludes with a new afterword that addresses the crises unfolding in our world and the ways a philosophically rigorous account of life must confront them.
While this book will be of keen interest to readers of philosophy and cultural criticism, and those interested in vitalism, new materialism, and critical theory, it is a far from merely academic text. In the conversation between Butler and Worms, we encounter questions we all grapple with in confronting the distress and precarity of our times, marked as it is by types of survival that are unlivable, from concentration camps to prisons to environmental toxicity, to forcible displacement, to the Covid pandemic.
The Livable and the Unlivable at once considers longstanding philosophical questions around why and how we live, while working to retrieve a philosophy of life for today's Left.
More details
Edition
New edition
Language
English
Place of publication
New York
United States
Edition type
New edition
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Dimensions
Height: 203 mm
Width: 127 mm
Thickness: 6 mm
Weight
195 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5315-0273-7 (9781531502737)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Judith Butler | Frederic Worms
The Livable and the Unlivable
E-Book
05/2023
Fordham University Press
€20.99
Available for download
Persons
Judith Butler is Distinguished Professor in the Graduate School at the University of California, Berkeley. Their books include Who's Afraid of Gender? (2024), What World Is This? A Pandemic Phenomenology (2022), The Force of Nonviolence (2020), Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly (2015), Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? (2009), Giving an Account of Oneself (2005), Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and Violence (2004), and Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990).
Frederic Worms is Director at the Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, where he has taught in the Department of Philosophy for many years. He is the author of several works on critical vitalism and the ethics of care in French, including La Philosophie du Soin and Soin et Politique.
Frederic Worms is Director at the Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, where he has taught in the Department of Philosophy for many years. He is the author of several works on critical vitalism and the ethics of care in French, including La Philosophie du Soin and Soin et Politique.
Content
Preface vii
Introduction
By Arto Charpentier and Laure Barillas 1
The Livable and the Unlivable 11
Afterword 43
Notes 77
Introduction
By Arto Charpentier and Laure Barillas 1
The Livable and the Unlivable 11
Afterword 43
Notes 77