Recognizing geopolitics changes the meaning of our actions can shatter one’s sense of existence

Evidence

On the night that Henri fi nally arrives at the decision that he will give his paper to the SRL, he has an abrupt and terrible epiphany. He suddenly recognizes, not as a mere piece of intellectual information, for of course he “knew” this before, but as a profound shatter ing of his sense of his own existence, that geopolitics changes the meaning of our actions. It is this devastating realization that precipitates his fi nal decision. — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 493

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the Beauvoir–Sartre debate on situated freedom versus historical determinism, and parallels Heidegger’s account of thrownness and the historicity of action. — connects to: Derrida’s geopolitics of cruelty ignores the psychic change it entails — Catherine Malabou, The New Wounded: From Neurosis to Brain…, 4250; Group conflict arises from worldview threat to existential meaning; Politics operates through the cultural meanings people use to make sense of their lives — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 160 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Encountering another culture can dissolve one’s own sense of meaning #corroborates (0.85) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 14
• Group conflict arises from worldview threat to existential meaning #corroborates (0.75)
• Politics operates through the cultural meanings people use to make sense of their lives #expands (0.72) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 160
• Individual identity forms dialogically through a constitutive outside, not autonomously. #corroborates (0.72) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 363