Occupied Spatiality: Non-Peace in Self-Affirmation

Abstract

Paul Ricœur considered the theme of non-peace in self-affirmation to have such existential and phenomenological bearing that he devoted his intellectual capacity to explore the self that is never immediately present to oneself or at immediate peace with oneself. Not all reasons for such originating non-peace are well observed in Ricœur scholarship. This article proposes that Ricœur approaches the self by means of occupied spatiality or under the notion of “having” the self. The argument is made that self-affirmation is reliant on objectification that, subsequently, results in the self “having” or possessing itself as an object. Such necessary structure for the process of self-affirmation leads the self to grasp a notion of itself as an expropriated appropriator; this achievement leaves the self in a perpetuated state of non-peace. Here the analysis—complementary to those already presented in Ricœur scholarship—approaches religious question-setting. Making a reference to Augustine the article accords with his personal assessment considering his “unfinished state” of needing to wait and hope for “that utter peace” when the problems of human existence do not disturb him any more.

Keywords

• Ricoeur
• phenomenology
• embodiment
• peace