Practicing Philosophy
Pragmatism and the Philosophical Life

Applying contemporary pragmatism to the crucial question of how philosophy can help us live better, Shusterman develops his distinctive aesthetic model of philosophical living that includes politics, somatics, and ethnicity.

With the increasing professionalization of philosophy, the question of what constitutes philosophical living has been largely neglected. Now one of the leading philosophers in the pragmatist tradition aims to recover and elaborate the pragmatic idea of philosophy as an art of living and a practical guide to living better. How should the practice of philosophy relate to the project of one's life? To answer this question, Practicing Philosophy examines the idea of the philosophical life as expressed in our century, analysing its essential dimensions and exploring crucial philosophical issues that arise in them: issues that range from epistemology, ethics, and politics, to aesthetics, somatics, and ethnicity. In developing his own conception of the philosophical life, Shusterman critically engages the views of Dewey, Wittgenstein, and Foucault, as well as the current pragmatism of Rorty, Putnam, Goodman, Habermas, and Cavell. Practicing Philosophy thus makes its case for philosophical living while providing a useful survey of the rich variety of contemporary pragmatism.