Meaning and Melancholy in the Thought of Emmanuel Levinas

Although considered as one of the 20th century most central ethical thinkers, Emmanuel Levinas claimed that his task was not to construct an ethics, but to seek the meaning of the ethical. In this study Stine Holte examines the problem of ethical meaning in Levinas' thinking and shows how the articulation of the ethical implies notions like trauma, melancholy, and shame, and hence a questioning of what we normally regard as meaningful.

Stine Holte is a postdoc at the Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo.