Modern Virtue : Mary Wollstonecraft and a tradition of dissent / Emily Dumler-Winckler

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dumler-Winckler, Emily, author.

Series:

Oxford Academic

Oxford scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Feminist theory.

Virtues.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (393 pages)

Edition:

First Edition

Place of Publication:

New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2022

Summary:

Mary Wollstonecraft revolutionized ancient traditions of the virtues in modern and Christian modes for feminist and abolitionist aims. Formed by religious traditions of dissent, Wollstonecraft radically altered the garments of the eighteenth-century religious, ethical, political, and aesthetic imagination. She sought to discard sexed virtues, to shed corsets that restrict women's roles and rights, to expose and break chains of domination, to exchange the vicious finery of the rich for virtue in rags, and to design garb fit for a society in which all participate in defining and cultivating common goods. The virtues and debate about them remain indispensable to modern Christian traditions and democratic societies. When wed, virtues and contestation are among the goods shared in common. Canonical in women and gender studies, feminist philosophy, political science, literary studies, and history, Wollstonecraft is mostly unknown or ignored in contemporary virtue ethics, theology, and religious studies. Modern Virtue seeks to transform prominent narratives in each. Wollstonecraft scholars debate whether theology is ornamental or foundational for her radical arguments. Her use of the wardrobe metaphor provides a fitting alternative. Modern Virtue also challenges influential and competing narratives about the virtues in modernity. These stories render modern virtue a contradiction in terms, common goods obsolete. Modern accounts of the virtues must address this twofold conundrum: systems of domination thwart virtue and mask vice, and the virtues are integral to just sociopolitical transformation. Wollstonecraft's account does just this.

Contents:

Contents: Acknowledgments - Abbreviations - Introduction: Who's Wollstonecraft? Which Traditions? - 1. Dissenting Devotional Taste: The Virtues of Madness - 2. Staging a Tragicomic Revolution: The Virtues of Ethical Conflict - 3. Imitating Christ: Virtues and Sexed Semblances - 4. On Justice: Virtues and Rights - 5. On Love: Virtues and Political Friendship - Conclusion: What Is Modern Virtue? - Bibliography - Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Print version: Dumler-Winckler, Emily Modern Virtue

ISBN:

0-19-763212-2

0-19-763210-6

0-19-763211-4

OCLC:

1336405545