Olena Kushyna - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Olena Kushyna

Journal of Political Power, 2021

pp., €37 (hardback), ISBN 9780198845782 'All human beings begin life by being born, and all human... more pp., €37 (hardback), ISBN 9780198845782 'All human beings begin life by being born, and all human beings die'-with this seemingly trivial statement Alison Stone begins her book Being born: Birth and philosophy. Birth and death, natality and mortality-these are the universalities of our lives, markers of our finitude, and, as Hannah Arendt claims in The human condition, 'the most general condition of human existence' (1998, p. 8). However, even though birth and death are equally universal for our existence, they have never received equal attention from philosophers. Death has been philosophically reflected on since Epicurus and Plato, and later mortality has been one of the significant categories of the philosophy of existence, for example, in Sartre's or Heidegger's work. The topic of birth, on the other hand, is relatively new to philosophy. The development of this topic has only started in recent feminist philosophy. The inquiry of feminist authors primarily focuses on practical aspects, such as the ethics or politics of birth, and mainly concentrates on the mother's experience and maternal body. Very little has been said so far about what it means to be born from a mother and how natality shapes our existence. Being born is an excellent contribution to overcoming the philosophical neglect around being born. Stone aims at re-balancing the asymmetrical attention towards birth and death by, firstly, focusing on birth and, later, tracing the intertwined connections between natality and mortality. This book is a rare gem because Stone examines being born within the framework of existential philosophy. She is interested in how our views on human existence can be transformed if we consider being born; how the structure of meaningful existence is conditioned by being born, and which features of our existence are caused or influenced by being born. Reciprocally, these questions also bring into light what being born consists of. Comprising an introduction and seven chapters, the first chapter of Being born offers an overview of the topic of birth and natality in feminist philosophy. The second complements the first by focusing on history, inheritance, and vulnerability. Chapter three unfolds features of our existence rooted in natality: dependency, relationality, embeddedness in social power, and situatedness. The fourth chapter is dedicated to the radical contingency of being born, and the fifth looks to birth anxieties. Chapter six reveals the connection between natality and mortality. In the final chapter, Stone addresses temporality and the gift of birth, and conclusion by reflecting on how natality structures our existence. Stone defines 'to be born' as 'to begin to exist at a certain point in time by coming into the world with and as a specific body, and in a given place, set of relationships, and the situation in society, culture, and history, while doing so by way of being conceived in and then exiting from the womb' (p. 1). She distinguishes three senses in which 'being born' are used: narrow-'to be born is just to exit the womb of the person who gestated me' (p. 2); broad-'to be born is to be conceived and gestated in that person's womb and finally exit it' (p. 2); broader-'the process of birth as continuing into psychological birth during the infant's earliest years' (p. 2).

Journal of Political Power, 2021

pp., €37 (hardback), ISBN 9780198845782 'All human beings begin life by being born, and all human... more pp., €37 (hardback), ISBN 9780198845782 'All human beings begin life by being born, and all human beings die'-with this seemingly trivial statement Alison Stone begins her book Being born: Birth and philosophy. Birth and death, natality and mortality-these are the universalities of our lives, markers of our finitude, and, as Hannah Arendt claims in The human condition, 'the most general condition of human existence' (1998, p. 8). However, even though birth and death are equally universal for our existence, they have never received equal attention from philosophers. Death has been philosophically reflected on since Epicurus and Plato, and later mortality has been one of the significant categories of the philosophy of existence, for example, in Sartre's or Heidegger's work. The topic of birth, on the other hand, is relatively new to philosophy. The development of this topic has only started in recent feminist philosophy. The inquiry of feminist authors primarily focuses on practical aspects, such as the ethics or politics of birth, and mainly concentrates on the mother's experience and maternal body. Very little has been said so far about what it means to be born from a mother and how natality shapes our existence. Being born is an excellent contribution to overcoming the philosophical neglect around being born. Stone aims at re-balancing the asymmetrical attention towards birth and death by, firstly, focusing on birth and, later, tracing the intertwined connections between natality and mortality. This book is a rare gem because Stone examines being born within the framework of existential philosophy. She is interested in how our views on human existence can be transformed if we consider being born; how the structure of meaningful existence is conditioned by being born, and which features of our existence are caused or influenced by being born. Reciprocally, these questions also bring into light what being born consists of. Comprising an introduction and seven chapters, the first chapter of Being born offers an overview of the topic of birth and natality in feminist philosophy. The second complements the first by focusing on history, inheritance, and vulnerability. Chapter three unfolds features of our existence rooted in natality: dependency, relationality, embeddedness in social power, and situatedness. The fourth chapter is dedicated to the radical contingency of being born, and the fifth looks to birth anxieties. Chapter six reveals the connection between natality and mortality. In the final chapter, Stone addresses temporality and the gift of birth, and conclusion by reflecting on how natality structures our existence. Stone defines 'to be born' as 'to begin to exist at a certain point in time by coming into the world with and as a specific body, and in a given place, set of relationships, and the situation in society, culture, and history, while doing so by way of being conceived in and then exiting from the womb' (p. 1). She distinguishes three senses in which 'being born' are used: narrow-'to be born is just to exit the womb of the person who gestated me' (p. 2); broad-'to be born is to be conceived and gestated in that person's womb and finally exit it' (p. 2); broader-'the process of birth as continuing into psychological birth during the infant's earliest years' (p. 2).