Michelle Molina and Donald Swearer, eds. Rethinking the Human

摘要

In a recent article in the New York Times (January 24,2012), Katrin Bennhold noted a contrast between the New Year's resolutions of the women and the men she knows. While most of the women vowed to lose weight or get in shape, a single-minded pursuit of career typified the men. The poet Yeats noted that we are generally forced to choose between "perfection of the life or of the work," a sentiment with which Bennhold seems to agree. A quick perusal of the popular media, whether on newsstand or the web, underlines Bennhold's point-body or career-many a human life is devoted to perfecting one or the other. Despite its title, Rethinking the Human, deals with neither our drive for physical perfection, nor for extending our agency. Rather, it provides a remarkably humanist and humane examination of the frailty, suffering, and need for care that undergird our human condition.