The Human Condition
by Arendt, Hannah (2013)
Abstract
A work of striking originality bursting with unexpected insights, The Human Condition is in many respects more relevant now than when it first appeared in 1958. In her study of the state of modern humanity, Hannah Arendt considers humankind from the perspective of the actions of which it is capable. The problems Arendt identified then—diminishing human agency and political freedom, the paradox that as human powers increase through technological and humanistic inquiry, we are less equipped to control the consequences of our actions—continue to confront us today. This new edition, published to coincide with the fortieth anniversary of its original publication, contains an improved and expanded index and a new introduction by noted Arendt scholar Margaret Canovan which incisively analyzes the book's argument and examines its present relevance. A classic in political and social theory, The Human Condition is a work that has proved both timeless and perpetually timely. Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) was one of the leading social theorists in the United States. Her Lectures on Kant's Political Philosophy and Love and Saint Augustine are also published by the University of Chicago Press.
Key Passage
[…] unlike working, whose end has come when the object is finished, ready to be added to the common world of things, laboring always moves in the same circle, which is prescribed by the biological process of the living organism and the end of its "toil and trouble" comes only with the death of this organism. (p.98)
Keywords
Arendt, Technology, Modernity, Animal Laborans, Homo FaberThemes
The Human Condition [1958], Arendt CitationsLinks to Reference
- https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=ARBJAgAAQBAJ
- https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=ARBJAgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=arendt+human+condition&ots=dFeusJMB1E&sig=LfzpGMGtY8xcXijk7XpJao2L9ak
- https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/af46/d95e3728c38a3cccbbf60c58282c94bbf697.pdf
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