Recognition and Social Ontology

Scholars of continental and analytic philosophy offer critical perspectives on recognition and ontology, which were conjoined in the work of Hegel, then took separate roads until recently when renewed interest in Hegel has brought them back into alignment. The themes are recognition and the social ontology of personhood; recognition, spirit, and species being in Hegel, Marx, and beyond; and groups, institutions, and recognition. The topics include the structure of desire and recognition, Hegel's claim that self-consciousness is desire itself, holism and normative essentialism in Hegel's social ontology, recognition as the social grammar of species being in Marx, mutual recognition and some related phenomena, and the problem of collective identity. Annotation c2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Heikki Ikaheimo is Research Fellow at Macquarie University, Sydney. He has published widely on Hegel, recognition and personhood.Arto Laitinen is University Lecturer at University of Jyvaskyla, Finland. His publications include Strong Evaluation without Moral Sources (2008), Dimensions of Personhood (2007, edited with Heikki Ikaheimo), Hegel on Action (2010, edited with Constantine Sandis) and a number of articles on mutual recognition.