Allison Merrick – författare

We are, says Nietzsche, often unknown to ourselves. Most recent studies of Nietzsche's works focus on our reactions to conditions of self-estrangement, particularly nihilistic despair or decadence. Allison Merrick takes a different approach, focusing on what she argues is Nietzsche's greatest contribution to philosophical thought: the method of genealogy. While genealogical analysis is often understood as having vindicatory, subversive, or problematizing aims, Merrick emphasizes its emancipatory potential. Nietzsche's analysis reveals how our motivations and our feelings, our reflective thoughts and our judgments, are shaped by evaluative 'templates' of which we are often unaware and how these templates can be revealed, articulated, and contested. By uncovering and challenging these hidden frameworks, Nietzsche's genealogical approach aims to render us less obscure to ourselves, to liberate us from value systems that no longer serve our interests, and to demonstrate how we might become less prone to guilt and shame.

We are, says Nietzsche, often unknown to ourselves. Most recent studies of Nietzsche's works focus on our reactions to conditions of self-estrangement, particularly nihilistic despair or decadence. Allison Merrick takes a different approach, focusing on what she argues is Nietzsche's greatest contribution to philosophical thought: the method of genealogy. While genealogical analysis is often understood as having vindicatory, subversive, or problematizing aims, Merrick emphasizes its emancipatory potential. Nietzsche's analysis reveals how our motivations and our feelings, our reflective thoughts and our judgments, are shaped by evaluative 'templates' of which we are often unaware and how these templates can be revealed, articulated, and contested. By uncovering and challenging these hidden frameworks, Nietzsche's genealogical approach aims to render us less obscure to ourselves, to liberate us from value systems that no longer serve our interests, and to demonstrate how we might become less prone to guilt and shame.

Essays exploring to what extent Nietzsche's thought can aid us in understanding politicized identities.Contemporary political struggles often find their origins in conflicts based on race, religion and region, gender and sexuality, or class. Given the need for conceptual resources to meet such challenges, this volume of essays explores the extent to which Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy can be of use to us in these struggles. In Nietzsche and Politicized Identities, emerging and leading Nietzsche scholars offer fresh insights into various central questions: How do our politicized identities form and develop their legitimacy? What sorts of functions do such identities serve? What political ideals does Nietzsche advocate? What conceptual tools for reanimating liberatory political projects does Nietzsche promote? How might we organize politically to affirm life and acknowledge the tragic as we avoid the pull of nihilism? The essays within this volume engage these questions and offer fresh, at times surprising, answers.