Deborah Nelson - Ethics Without Empathy: Arbus, Arendt, Didion, McCarthy, Sontag, Weil

This talk describes the ethics and aesthetics of unsentimentality as practiced by some of the late twentieth-century’s most notable women artists and intellectuals. We will consider what it would mean to have an ethics without empathy even in the face of extreme suffering.

Deborah Nelson's Franke Forum talk is titled “An Unsentimental Education: Arbus, Arendt, Didion, McCarthy, Sontag, Weil." Deborah Nelson is Chair and Professor in the Department of English Language & Literature and the College. Her book: Tough Enough: Arbus, Arendt, Didion, McCarthy, Sontag, and Weil won the Modern Language Association’s James Russell Lowell Prize for Best Book of 2017 and the Gordan Laing Prize in 2019 for the most distinguished contribution to the University of Chicago Press by a faculty member.

The above is reproduced from the YouTube video description.

The original video can be found here, my thanks to the University of Chicago, my alma mater, for providing and maintaining this recording which was first recorded in November 2017.

As always these talks are syndicated for educational and nonprofit purposes in accordance with Fair Use. They are produced ad-free, because I listen to my own stuff on here and like you, I hate ads. They are free, as in libre, and free as in “beer”.

These recordings have been remastered for clarity, ease of listening, and concision and have been downmixed to mono so that they are lighter and easier to stream, wherever you are. If I provide links to books, they are affiliate links, all others are not. 

Furthermore my historical and philosophical writing, which is also entirely free is available at my blog, ⁠⁠⁠⁠Hemlock⁠⁠⁠⁠, on Substack.

The music of the intro and outro (Bach's Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, performed by Gregor Quendel) is licensed under non-commercial attribution, and can be ⁠⁠⁠⁠found here⁠⁠⁠⁠ and has been remixed by me.

Enjoy.