The self describes itself

Judith Butler, professor of rhetoric and comparative studies at the University of California / Berkeley, presented the chapters of this book for the first time in the spring of 2002 as part of the Spinoza lectures in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Amsterdam. It is the first complete book of hers translated into Arabic. Its translation aims to introduce this esteemed philosopher to Arabic readers for her importance and her ability to enrich our various dialogues with deep, innovative insights, but the main goal is to present the subject of the book and its questions for their vital significance; and I mean by that our need to reflect on our personal experiences not as a personal event but as an intertwined incident of influence and effect, shaping and being shaped along with the intense ethical and historical experience that we all bear witness to. The contribution of this book to our preoccupations will not be a simplified or superficial one; rather, it is an in-depth philosophical exploration rich with references (to Nietzsche, Hegel, Foucault, Adorno, Levinas) and an attempt to grasp difficult junctures in the relationship between the self and its normative and historical environment. Many questions are raised in the context of the book about the nature of self-formation, the relationship of this formation to ethics from a philosophical ethics perspective, and the concept of responsibility. There is also a continuous concern with exploring the ambiguous relationship between the narrative with which the self describes itself (in the stance of the ruler and the ruled, autobiography, psychoanalysis) and the self’s biography that is enveloped in a destined darkness that challenges description and narration.