John Russon
Encyclopedia
John Russon is a Canadian philosopher, working primarily in the tradition of Continental Philosophy
Continental philosophy
Continental philosophy, in contemporary usage, refers to a set of traditions of 19th and 20th century philosophy from mainland Europe. This sense of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the second half of the 20th century, who used it to refer to a range of thinkers and...

. In 2006, he was named Presidential Distinguished Professor at the University of Guelph
University of Guelph
The University of Guelph, also known as U of G, is a comprehensive public research university in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. It was established in 1964 after the amalgamation of Ontario Agricultural College, the Macdonald Institute, and the Ontario Veterinary College...

.

Education

Russon received his Ph.D. in 1990 from the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...

. His dissertation was entitled Hegel on the Body.

Research

Russon is known for his original philosophical contributions, and also for his scholarly interpretations of G.W.F. Hegel, Contemporary Continental Philosophy
Continental philosophy
Continental philosophy, in contemporary usage, refers to a set of traditions of 19th and 20th century philosophy from mainland Europe. This sense of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the second half of the 20th century, who used it to refer to a range of thinkers and...

 and Ancient Philosophy
Ancient philosophy
This page lists some links to ancient philosophy. In Western philosophy, the spread of Christianity through the Roman Empire marked the ending of Hellenistic philosophy and ushered in the beginnings of Medieval philosophy, whereas in Eastern philosophy, the spread of Islam through the Arab Empire...

.

Original Philosophy

Russon is known as an original philosopher, primarily through his books Human Experience: Philosophy, Neurosis and the Elements of Everyday Life and Bearing Witness to Epiphany. Leonard Lawlor describes Russon as "one of the few original voices working in Continental Philosophy today." Human Experience, which won the 2005 Broadview Press/Canadian Philosophical Association Book Prize, brought together themes from Hegel, Contemporary Continental Philosophy
Continental philosophy
Continental philosophy, in contemporary usage, refers to a set of traditions of 19th and 20th century philosophy from mainland Europe. This sense of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the second half of the 20th century, who used it to refer to a range of thinkers and...

 and Ancient Philosophy
Ancient philosophy
This page lists some links to ancient philosophy. In Western philosophy, the spread of Christianity through the Roman Empire marked the ending of Hellenistic philosophy and ushered in the beginnings of Medieval philosophy, whereas in Eastern philosophy, the spread of Islam through the Arab Empire...

, and produced an original interpretation of the development of personal identity. In this work Russon argues that the experiences through which we are inaugurated into any distinctive domain of meaning necessarily leave the stamp of their specific (and contingent) character on our subsequent experiences in that domain. He uses this notion to interpret the significance of family experience in the formation of personal identity, and he finds this aspect of our experience to be the key to understanding mental health
Mental health
Mental health describes either a level of cognitive or emotional well-being or an absence of a mental disorder. From perspectives of the discipline of positive psychology or holism mental health may include an individual's ability to enjoy life and procure a balance between life activities and...

 (and mental illness
Mental illness
A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological or behavioral pattern generally associated with subjective distress or disability that occurs in an individual, and which is not a part of normal development or culture. Such a disorder may consist of a combination of affective, behavioural,...

).
Russon's approach to mental health
Mental health
Mental health describes either a level of cognitive or emotional well-being or an absence of a mental disorder. From perspectives of the discipline of positive psychology or holism mental health may include an individual's ability to enjoy life and procure a balance between life activities and...

—in particular his interpretation of neurosis
Neurosis
Neurosis is a class of functional mental disorders involving distress but neither delusions nor hallucinations, whereby behavior is not outside socially acceptable norms. It is also known as psychoneurosis or neurotic disorder, and thus those suffering from it are said to be neurotic...

—is specially striking for its bringing together of the theme of embodiment
Embodiment
Embodied or embodiment may refer to:in psychology and philosophy,*Embodied cognition , a position in cognitive science and the philosophy of mind emphasizing the role that the body plays in shaping the mind...

 that has been prominent in existential phenomenology
Existential phenomenology
Existential phenomenology is a philosophical current inspired by Martin Heidegger's 1927 work Sein und Zeit and influenced by the existential work of Søren Kierkegaard and the phenomenological work of Edmund Husserl....

 with the theme of dialectic
Dialectic
Dialectic is a method of argument for resolving disagreement that has been central to Indic and European philosophy since antiquity. The word dialectic originated in Ancient Greece, and was made popular by Plato in the Socratic dialogues...

al self-transformation that is prominent in the philosophy of Hegel and with the theme of the "system" of family life that is prominent in the work of such psychologists and family theorists
Family therapy
Family therapy, also referred to as couple and family therapy, family systems therapy, and family counseling, is a branch of psychotherapy that works with families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture change and development. It tends to view change in terms of the systems of...

 as Salvador Minuchin
Salvador Minuchin
Salvador Minuchin is a family therapist born and raised in San Salvador, Entre Ríos, Argentina. He developed Structural Family Therapy, which addresses problems within a family by charting the relationships between family members, or between subsets of family. These charts represent power dynamics...

, R.D. Laing and D.W. Winnicott. This work is also important for its use of these ideas to criticize the "individualist" premises of much political and economic theory, and to develop of a political theory of multiculturalism
Multiculturalism
Multiculturalism is the appreciation, acceptance or promotion of multiple cultures, applied to the demographic make-up of a specific place, usually at the organizational level, e.g...

. His interpretation of the dynamic and transformative role of sexuality (eros) provides an important link between his work and the philosophy of Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

.
The importance of sexuality to personal development, and especially its relationship to ethical life and to artistic creativity is further explored in Bearing Witness to Epiphany, his most recent work. Like Human Experience, this work stands out for its emphasis on the way that the important dimensions of our experience are embodied in the most basic material dimensions of our lives—everyday "things" and basic bodily practices—and this work thus offers a new metaphysics
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...

 of "the thing" and of reality in general, arguing that issues of metaphysics
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...

 cannot be separated from issues of ethics
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...

.

History of Philosophy

In addition to his original philosophical contributions, Russon has also published substantial scholarly work in the history of philosophy
History of philosophy
The history of philosophy is the study of philosophical ideas and concepts through time. Issues specifically related to history of philosophy might include : How can changes in philosophy be accounted for historically? What drives the development of thought in its historical context? To what...

.

Hegel

Though his doctoral supervisor was the Heidegger scholar Graeme Nicholson, his interpretation of Hegel's philosophy is more often thought of as continuing the tradition of his teacher H.S. Harris (1926–2007)http://pi.library.yorku.ca/dspace/handle/10315/883, the pre-eminent Hegel scholar in the English-speaking world. Russon's Hegel-interpretation is also distinctive because of its attempt to show the continuity of Hegel's philosophy with the philosophical traditions of phenomenology, existentialism
Existentialism
Existentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...

 and deconstruction
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is a term introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1967 book Of Grammatology. Although he carefully avoided defining the term directly, he sought to apply Martin Heidegger's concept of Destruktion or Abbau, to textual reading...

. This interpretation has been developed through many scholarly articles, and especially through two books: The Self and Its Body in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit and Reading Hegel's Phenomenology.

Contemporary Continental Philosophy

Russon's philosophical orientation is largely derived from existential phenomenology
Existential phenomenology
Existential phenomenology is a philosophical current inspired by Martin Heidegger's 1927 work Sein und Zeit and influenced by the existential work of Søren Kierkegaard and the phenomenological work of Edmund Husserl....

, and he has published a number of scholarly articles in this area, especially focusing on the work of Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...

, Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Karl Marx, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger in addition to being closely associated with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir...

 and Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...

. His most recent works include, "The Self as Resolution: Heidegger, Derrida and the Intimacy of the Question of the Meaning of Being," and "The Spatiality of Self-Consciousness: Originary Passivity in Kant, Merleau-Ponty and Derrida."

Ancient Philosophy

Russon is also known as a scholar of ancient philosophy
Ancient philosophy
This page lists some links to ancient philosophy. In Western philosophy, the spread of Christianity through the Roman Empire marked the ending of Hellenistic philosophy and ushered in the beginnings of Medieval philosophy, whereas in Eastern philosophy, the spread of Islam through the Arab Empire...

, especially for his use of the methods of 20th Century European philosophy (phenomenology, hermeneutics and deconstruction
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is a term introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1967 book Of Grammatology. Although he carefully avoided defining the term directly, he sought to apply Martin Heidegger's concept of Destruktion or Abbau, to textual reading...

) to interpret the texts of Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

 and Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

. Along with John Sallis
John Sallis
John Sallis is an American philosopher. Since 2005, he has been the Professor of Philosophy at Boston College. He has previously taught at Pennsylvania State University , Vanderbilt University , Loyola University of Chicago , Duquesne University and the University of the South .He is the brother...

, he organized an influential conference at the Pennsylvania State University
Pennsylvania State University
The Pennsylvania State University, commonly referred to as Penn State or PSU, is a public research university with campuses and facilities throughout the state of Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1855, the university has a threefold mission of teaching, research, and public service...

 in 1997 entitled "Retracing the Platonic Text," (the papers from which were published as Retracing the Platonic Text by Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press is the university press of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, USA.- History :Northwestern University Press was founded in 1893, at first specializing in legal periodicals. Today, the Press publishes scholarly books of fiction, non-fiction, and literary...

 in 2000). This conference helped to inaugurate the growing North American movement to interpret the texts of Greek Philosophy
Greek philosophy
Ancient Greek philosophy arose in the 6th century BCE and continued through the Hellenistic period, at which point Ancient Greece was incorporated in the Roman Empire...

 through the lens of Contemporary Continental Philosophy
Continental philosophy
Continental philosophy, in contemporary usage, refers to a set of traditions of 19th and 20th century philosophy from mainland Europe. This sense of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the second half of the 20th century, who used it to refer to a range of thinkers and...

, a movement especially associated with the Ancient Philosophy Society.

Teaching

Russon has supervised the dissertations of many current professors of philosophy across North America on topics in Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...

, Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher, one of the creators of German Idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality as a whole revolutionized European philosophy and was an important precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.Hegel developed a comprehensive...

, Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...

, Edmund Husserl
Edmund Husserl
Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl was a philosopher and mathematician and the founder of the 20th century philosophical school of phenomenology. He broke with the positivist orientation of the science and philosophy of his day, yet he elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic...

, Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...

, Emmanuel Levinas
Emmanuel Lévinas
Emmanuel Levinas was a Lithuanian-born French Jewish philosopher and Talmudic commentator.-Life:Emanuelis Levinas received a traditional Jewish education in Lithuania...

 and Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Karl Marx, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger in addition to being closely associated with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir...

.
Russon has held academic appointments at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

, the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...

, Acadia University
Acadia University
Acadia University is a predominantly undergraduate university located in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, Canada with some graduate programs at the master's level and one at the doctoral level...

, the Pennsylvania State University
Pennsylvania State University
The Pennsylvania State University, commonly referred to as Penn State or PSU, is a public research university with campuses and facilities throughout the state of Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1855, the university has a threefold mission of teaching, research, and public service...

, Stony Brook University, Boston College
Boston College
Boston College is a private Jesuit research university located in the village of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, USA. The main campus is bisected by the border between the cities of Boston and Newton. It has 9,200 full-time undergraduates and 4,000 graduate students. Its name reflects its early...

, and the University of Guelph
University of Guelph
The University of Guelph, also known as U of G, is a comprehensive public research university in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. It was established in 1964 after the amalgamation of Ontario Agricultural College, the Macdonald Institute, and the Ontario Veterinary College...

.
He is also the founder and main organizer of the Toronto Seminar, an annual private seminar for the study of philosophy, held in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

, Canada.

Books

Bearing Witness to Epiphany: Persons, Things and the Nature of Erotic Life, http://www.amazon.com/dp/143842504X, (State University of New York Press, 2009). ISBN 978-1438425047
Reading Hegel's Phenomenology, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0253216923, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004). ISBN 978-0253216922
Human Experience: Philosophy, Neurosis and the Elements of Everyday Life, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0791457540, (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003). ISBN 978-0791457542
The Self and Its Body in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0802084826, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997). ISBN 978-0802084828

Edited Books

Reexamining Socrates in the Apology, co-edited with Patricia Fagan, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0810125870, (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2009). ISBN 978-0810125870
Retracing the Platonic Text, co-edited with John Sallis, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0810117037, (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2000). ISBN 978-0810117037
Hegel and the Tradition: Essays in Honour of H.S. Harris, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0802009271, co-edited with Michael Baur, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997). ISBN 978-0802009272

Selected Articles in the History of Philosophy

"The Self as Resolution: Heidegger, Derrida and the Intimacy of the Question of the Meaning of Being," Research in Phenomenology, 38 (2008): 90-110.
"Temporality and the Future of Philosophy in Hegel," International Philosophical Quarterly, 48(2008): 59-68.
"Spatiality and Self-Consciousness: Originary Passivity in Kant, Merleau-Ponty and Derrida," Chiasmi International, 9 (2007): 219-232.
"Reading: Derrida in Hegel's Understanding," Research in Phenomenology, 36 (2006): 181-200.
"Merleau-Ponty and the New Science of the Soul," Chiasmi International, 8 (2006): 129-138.
"The Intersubjective Path from Body to Mind," Dialogue, 45 (2006): 307-314.
"The Virtue of Stoicism: On First Principles in Philosophy and Life," Dialogue, 45 (2006): 347-354.
"The Elements of Everyday Life: Three Lessons from Ancient Greece," Philosophy in the Contemporary World, 13,2 (2006): 84-90.
“Eros and Education: Plato’s Transformative Epistemology,” Laval Théologique et Philosophique, 56 (2000):113-125.
“The Metaphysics of Consciousness and the Hermeneutics of Social Life: Hegel’s Phenomenological System,” Southern Journal of Philosophy, 36 (1998) :81-101.
"Self-Consciousness and the Tradition in Aristotle's Psychology," Laval Théologique et Philosophique, 52 (1996): 777-803.
“Aristotle’s Animative Epistemology,” Idealistic Studies, 25 (1995):241-253.
“Heidegger, Hegel and Ethnicity: The Ritual Basis of Self-Identity,” Southern Journal of Philosophy, 33 (1995): 509-532.
“Hermeneutics and Plato’s Ion,” Clio, 24 (1995): 399-418.
"Embodiment and Responsibility: Merleau-Ponty and the Ontology of Nature," Man and World, 27 (1994): 291-308.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK