Kathryn Lawson, recent PhD and lecturer at Carleton University, has published her first book, a revised version of her PhD dissertation, with Routledge's Environmental Ethics series. The book is entitled Ecological Ethics and the Philosophy of Simone Weil: Decreation for the Anthropocene.
From the publisher: This book places the philosophy of Simone Weil into conversation with contemporary environmental concerns in the Anthropocene. It offers a systematic interpretation of Simone Weil, making her ethical philosophy more accessible to non-Weil scholars. Weil鈥檚 work has been influential in many fields, including politically and theologically-based critiques of social inequalities and suffering, but rarely linked to ecology. Kathryn Lawson argues that Weil鈥檚 work can be understood as offering a coherent approach with potentially widespread appeal applicable to our ethical relations to much more than just other human beings. She suggests that the process of "decreation" in Weil is an expansion of the self which might also come to include the surrounding earth and a vast assemblage of others. This allows readers to consider what it means to be human in this time and place, and to contemplate our ethical responsibilities both to other humans and also to the more-than-human world. Ultimately, the book uses Weil鈥檚 thought to decenter the human being by cultivating human actions towards an ecological ethics. This book will be useful for Simone Weil scholars and academics, as well as students and researchers interested in environmental ethics in departments of comparative literature, theory and criticism, philosophy, and environmental studies.
Critic's Review: "In response to the traumas of climate catastrophe, Lawson鈥檚 Ecological Ethics shows us that suffering and beauty can be integrated at the heart of environmental consciousness. Like Keller鈥檚 Face of the Deep and Leopold鈥檚 Sand County Almanac, this is a rare treasure that unites profound intellectual insight and ethical urgency." - Daniel O鈥橠ea Bradley, Professor of Philosophy, Gonzaga University, USA