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Arthur Lothstein

Arthur Lothstein

Director of the Institute for Peace and Social JusticeProfessor of Philosophy

B.A., Queens College, CUNYM.A., Ph.D., New York University

Description

The great British Idealist F. H. Bradley said that he could imagine "no task more interesting to, and more incumbent on the disciples of Prof. [William] James, than to make an attempt in earnest to explain and to develop his doctrine of Radical Empiricism."  Most of my current research and writing attempts to meet Bradley's challenge. Two long essays (already written) stand out here: "The Oxygen of Possibility: Emerson, James, and Radical Empiricism" and "Another Turn of the Kaleidoscope: James, Cezanne, and Radical Empiricism."

My other writing projects have grown out of more than three decades of teaching the sacred literature of the world's seminal wisdom traditions: ancient, modern and contemporary. A long essay, "The Emersonian Moment," is a prime example of this deep and abiding preoccupation of mine.

Like my teaching, my writing and research in this area are interdisciplinary, multicultural and transformational. James asserted that "Ideals ought to aim at the transformation of reality -- no less!" I read this as the philosophical, pedagogical and moral imperative of my teaching and my life.       

Specialties

History of Ideas, Classical and Contemporary American Philosophy, Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Beauty, Philosophy of Literature, Environmental Philosophy, Dreams and the Unconscious, Philosophy of Love and Sex, Philosophy of Religion

Publications

  • Author, “Loaded with Life: An Essay on Emersonian Pedagogy” (in progress)
  • Co-editor, “New Morning: Emerson in the Twenty-First Century (2008)
  • Editor, “All We Are Saying…”: The Philosophy of the New Left (1971)
  • Author, "Teaching for Lustres: An Essay on the Emersonian Teacher," published in New Morning
  • Author, No Eros, No Buds: Teaching as Nectaring, published in “Experience as Philosophy: On the Work of John J. McDermott (2006)
  • Author, “Martin Buber and John Dewey," published in “To Be is to Be Relational: Martin Buber and the Human Sciences” (1996)
  • Author, “The Pathology of Inwardness: John Dewey's Critique of the Inner Life," published in “John Dewey: Critical Assessments” (1993)
  • Author, "Salving from the Dross: John Dewey’s Anarcho-Communalism," published in The Philosophical Forum (1971)

Recordings

"Kerouac's Child," originally on album by Silent Bear (Mapleshade Records)
Two-CD collection of songs with Silent Bear (in progress)

Honors/Awards

Member, Phi Beta Kappa
Recipient, C.W. Post Poetry Prize (2000 and 1977)
Recipient, David Newton Award for Teaching Excellence (1990)
Recipient, New York University Outstanding Adjunct Teacher Award (1993)
Thesis listed as one of "Ten Essential Works on John Dewey"in "Classical American Philosophy"(1987)
Recipient, Dewey Prize (1977)

Professional Affiliations

Member, Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy
Member, William James Society
Member, Ralph Waldo Emerson Society
Member, John Dewey Society
Member, Merleau-Ponty Circle
Former Board Member, Sea Cliff Chamber Players