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Speaking of Silence in Heidegger

Wanda Torres Gregory

In Speaking of Silence in Heidegger, Wanda Torres Gregory critically analyzes Heidegger’sthoughts on silence. Arguing that silence about silence is a guiding principle in his sparse and often reticent words, Torres Gregory sets out to decipher their elusive meanings. Charting the trajectory of Heidegger’s reflections, from Being and Time to On the Way to Language, she shows that he develops his ideas of silence in increasingly closer relations to his also evolving ideas of truth as the unconcealedness of being/beyng and language as disclosive sonorous saying. Torres Gregory distinguishes between human, primordial, and primeval forms of silence, and the linguistic, pre-linguistic, and proto-linguistic levels at which silence can occur in relation to sonorous speech. While the book focuses on these inner conceptual dynamics, the author remains mindful of Heidegger’s ties to National Socialism and clarifies how his theoretical assumptions allow for oppressive silencing. The book concludes with critical reflections on the later Heidegger’s thinking of silence and proposes alternatives to his claims concerning the sound beyond sounds, the metaphysics of mystical silence, the uniquely linguistic essence of the mortals, and the loud idle talk in the age of modern technology.

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  • Reviews
Lexington Books
Pages: 164 • Trim: 6½ x 9
978-1-7936-4003-1 • Hardback • October 2021 • $105.00 • (£81.00)
978-1-7936-4005-5 • Paperback • August 2023 • $39.99 • (£30.00)
Subjects: Philosophy / Language, Foreign Language Study / German, Language Arts & Disciplines / Linguistics / Historical & Comparative

Wanda Torres Gregory is professor of philosophy at Simmons University.

Acknowledgements

Abbreviations

Introduction: On the Way to Silence

Chapter 1: From the Silent Call of Conscience and Reticent Discourse to the Silencing in Dread and Profound Boredom in Da-sein

Chapter 2: Toward the Essence of Silence

Chapter 3: The Poetics of Silence in a Dialogue with Hölderlin

Chapter 4: Sigetics and the Silence of the Other Beginning in the Appropriating-event

Chapter 5: The Silent Origin of Language in the Confrontation with Herder

Chapter 6: Toward the Originary Logic of Silence in a Translation of Heraclitus

Chapter 7: Quiet Musings in the Project Toward the Stillness

Chapter 8: The Soundless Peal of the Stillness

Chapter 9: Sounding Out the Later Meanings of Silence

Bibliography

Index

About the Author

"With her acute differentiation of human, primordial, and primeval forms of silence, Torres Gregory succeeds in demonstrating Heidegger’s conceptions, early and late, of the dynamic and essential interplay of silence with language and truth. Her splendid study, at once appreciative and critical of Heidegger, is an enormous contribution that fills a considerable lacuna in contemporary examination of this enigmatic thinker."


— Daniel Dahlstrom, Boston University


"Wanda Torres Gregory’s compact and rich study places silence at the core of Heidegger’s philosophy of language. With concise and original interpretations of both lesser-known and well-worn texts from Heidegger’s corpus, she deftly traces the manifold registers of silence, reticence, resonance and sonority which enliven Heidegger’s philosophy of language—if not his entire philosophical project."


— Adam Knowles, Drexel University


Torres Gregory’s Speaking of Silence in Heidegger makes a profound and timely contribution to thinking about silence and its essential relationship to language. It guides us through complex registers of silence including forms of hearkening and reticence as a listening that is deeply attentive to the unsaid and the unsayable. It gives timely warning vis-à-vis the idle talk of the world and our own internal idle talk, reiterating that saying must be attuned to restraint or our ability to quietly listen. Furthermore, a deeper silence is a ‘calling back’ and lies within Da-sein as ‘the stillness of itself’. Moreover, our capacity for ‘the dialogue that we are’ to emerge in community depends on our capacity for attentive stillness within the dangerous noise of the ‘language-machine’.


— Phenomenological Reviews


Speaking of Silence in Heidegger

Cover Image
Hardback
Paperback
Summary
Summary
  • In Speaking of Silence in Heidegger, Wanda Torres Gregory critically analyzes Heidegger’sthoughts on silence. Arguing that silence about silence is a guiding principle in his sparse and often reticent words, Torres Gregory sets out to decipher their elusive meanings. Charting the trajectory of Heidegger’s reflections, from Being and Time to On the Way to Language, she shows that he develops his ideas of silence in increasingly closer relations to his also evolving ideas of truth as the unconcealedness of being/beyng and language as disclosive sonorous saying. Torres Gregory distinguishes between human, primordial, and primeval forms of silence, and the linguistic, pre-linguistic, and proto-linguistic levels at which silence can occur in relation to sonorous speech. While the book focuses on these inner conceptual dynamics, the author remains mindful of Heidegger’s ties to National Socialism and clarifies how his theoretical assumptions allow for oppressive silencing. The book concludes with critical reflections on the later Heidegger’s thinking of silence and proposes alternatives to his claims concerning the sound beyond sounds, the metaphysics of mystical silence, the uniquely linguistic essence of the mortals, and the loud idle talk in the age of modern technology.

Details
Details
  • Lexington Books
    Pages: 164 • Trim: 6½ x 9
    978-1-7936-4003-1 • Hardback • October 2021 • $105.00 • (£81.00)
    978-1-7936-4005-5 • Paperback • August 2023 • $39.99 • (£30.00)
    Subjects: Philosophy / Language, Foreign Language Study / German, Language Arts & Disciplines / Linguistics / Historical & Comparative
Author
Author
  • Wanda Torres Gregory is professor of philosophy at Simmons University.

Table of Contents
Table of Contents
  • Acknowledgements

    Abbreviations

    Introduction: On the Way to Silence

    Chapter 1: From the Silent Call of Conscience and Reticent Discourse to the Silencing in Dread and Profound Boredom in Da-sein

    Chapter 2: Toward the Essence of Silence

    Chapter 3: The Poetics of Silence in a Dialogue with Hölderlin

    Chapter 4: Sigetics and the Silence of the Other Beginning in the Appropriating-event

    Chapter 5: The Silent Origin of Language in the Confrontation with Herder

    Chapter 6: Toward the Originary Logic of Silence in a Translation of Heraclitus

    Chapter 7: Quiet Musings in the Project Toward the Stillness

    Chapter 8: The Soundless Peal of the Stillness

    Chapter 9: Sounding Out the Later Meanings of Silence

    Bibliography

    Index

    About the Author

Reviews
Reviews
  • "With her acute differentiation of human, primordial, and primeval forms of silence, Torres Gregory succeeds in demonstrating Heidegger’s conceptions, early and late, of the dynamic and essential interplay of silence with language and truth. Her splendid study, at once appreciative and critical of Heidegger, is an enormous contribution that fills a considerable lacuna in contemporary examination of this enigmatic thinker."


    — Daniel Dahlstrom, Boston University


    "Wanda Torres Gregory’s compact and rich study places silence at the core of Heidegger’s philosophy of language. With concise and original interpretations of both lesser-known and well-worn texts from Heidegger’s corpus, she deftly traces the manifold registers of silence, reticence, resonance and sonority which enliven Heidegger’s philosophy of language—if not his entire philosophical project."


    — Adam Knowles, Drexel University


    Torres Gregory’s Speaking of Silence in Heidegger makes a profound and timely contribution to thinking about silence and its essential relationship to language. It guides us through complex registers of silence including forms of hearkening and reticence as a listening that is deeply attentive to the unsaid and the unsayable. It gives timely warning vis-à-vis the idle talk of the world and our own internal idle talk, reiterating that saying must be attuned to restraint or our ability to quietly listen. Furthermore, a deeper silence is a ‘calling back’ and lies within Da-sein as ‘the stillness of itself’. Moreover, our capacity for ‘the dialogue that we are’ to emerge in community depends on our capacity for attentive stillness within the dangerous noise of the ‘language-machine’.


    — Phenomenological Reviews


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