num_pages: 292
description: <p>Taking Emerson as his starting point, Cornel Westâs basic task in this ambitious enterprise is to chart the emergence, development, decline, and recent resurgence of American pragmatism. John Dewey is the central figure in Westâs pantheon of pragmatists, but he treats as well such varied mid-century representatives of the tradition as Sidney Hook, C. Wright Mills, W. E. B. Du Bois, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Lionel Trilling. Westâs genealogy is, ultimately, a very personal work, for it is imbued throughout with the authorâs conviction that a thorough reexamination of American pragmatism may help inspire and instruct contemporary efforts to remake and reform American society and culture.</p><p>West . . . may well be the pre-eminent African American intellectual of our generation.-The Nation</p><p><i>The American Evasion of Philosophy</i> is a highly intelligent and provocative book. Cornel West gives us illuminating readings of the political thought of Emerson and James; provides a penetrating critical assessment of Dewey, his central figure; and offers a brilliant interpretation-appreciative yet far from uncritical-of the contemporary philosopher and neo-pragmatist Richard Rorty. . . . What shines through, throughout the work, is West's firm commitment to a radical vision of a philosophic discourse as inextricably linked to cultural criticism and political engagement.-Paul S. Boyer, professor emeritus of history, University of Wisconsin-Madison.</p><p>Wisconsin Project on American Writers</p><p>Frank Lentricchia, General Editor</p>
language: en
title: The American Evasion of Philosophy: A Genealogy of Pragmatism (Wisconsin Project on American Writers)
publisher: University of Wisconsin Press