Beyond Marginality: Constructing a Self in the Twilight of Western Culture

The Marginal Self, by Jean-Paul Sartre, highlights the misuse of freedom as a fundamental aspect of human behavior. Beyond Marginality, by the author, explores the overcoming of this misuse through the intuition of human wholeness in Zen philosophy. Testimonials from those who have experienced marginality and the work of allied thinkers support this approach. The theme of Beyond Marginality is to help people move beyond marginality and its associated psychic pathology, paralleling the current enthusiasm for positive psychology in the mental health community. Kurt Lewin's counter-Cartesian, Zen-like insight emphasizes the practicality of a good theory.

Format: Hardback
Length: 140 pages
Publication date: 03 September 2024
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

The phenomenon of marginality, as explored in Jean-Paul Sartre's The Marginal Self, is a failure to become one's authentic, best self by refusing to actualize the inherent potential within us all. This failure is rooted in the misuse of freedom, which underlies most human behavior, both normal and pathological. Most philosophical anthropologies and the current medical model of mental illness fail to acknowledge this essential reality. Beyond Marginality, published eleven years after The Marginal Self, was influenced by the Zen philosophy of D. T. Suzuki, who Heidegger believed had accomplished what he had been trying to do all his life. Heidegger saw the Cartesian duality as a distortion created by us that could be overcome through Zen's actionable intuition of human wholeness. The book explores how this overcoming might be brought about, starting with Suzuki's intuition and embracing the work of many allied thinkers. Testimonials from those who have stumbled into marginality and recognized the negative consequences of their misused freedom are equally compelling. Helping people move beyond marginality and its attendant psychic pathology parallels the present enthusiasm of the medical community.

Weight: 312g
Dimension: 147 x 224 x 17 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781538192818