{"id":8193,"date":"2017-12-21T10:52:24","date_gmt":"2017-12-21T10:52:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/secl-news-events\/?p=8193"},"modified":"2019-04-08T15:14:28","modified_gmt":"2019-04-08T14:14:28","slug":"katja-haustein-on-the-ethics-of-tact","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/secl-news-events\/2017\/12\/21\/katja-haustein-on-the-ethics-of-tact\/","title":{"rendered":"Katja Haustein on the ethics of tact"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr Katja Haustein<\/a>, Lecturer in the Department of Comparative Literature, has given a lecture entitled \u2018How to Live Alone with Others: Notes on the Ethics of Tact<\/a>\u2019, for the University of Kent\u2019s Think Kent<\/a> series, which is now available on YouTube.<\/p>\n

\u202aTact, like compassion, is a derivative of empathy. To be able to empathise with another presupposes a capacity for identification. It involves for the self to be able to feel what the other feels so as to find a way to alleviate their state of distress. Although tact, like compassion, is based on nearness, its purpose is, ultimately, to generate distance. Being tactful means: to respect and to protect the intimacy of the other and in this way to preserve their dignity.<\/p>\n

In Katja\u2019s talk, she draws on the theories of tact by Helmuth Plessner, Theodor W. Adorno, and Roland Barthes, to explore the following question: \u2018what distance must I maintain between myself and others if we are to construct a community without collision, a sociability without alienation, based on an idea of individual freedom that may imply solitude but not isolation?\u2019<\/p>\n

The Think Kent lectures are a series of TED Talk-style lectures produced with the intention of raising awareness of the research and teaching expertise of Kent academics and the international impact of their work.<\/p>\n