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The Absence of the Tragic Human
Alexandros Theodoridis
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DOI:10.17265/2159-5313/2025.06.006
Democritus University of Thrace, Alexandroupolis, Greece
The tragic human who
emerged as a democratic individual in both the public and private spheres
during the brilliant era of Athenian democracy in the fifth century B.C., and
who was simultaneously brought to prominence and shaped by ancient Greek poetry
and philosophy, is today strikingly absent from the Western world. The nihilism
that characterizes central educational practice not only obstructs the
formation of such a figure but even prevents its very imaginative conception. I
maintain that the thought of two major 20th-century philosophers, Kostas
Papaioannou and Cornelius Castoriadis, contributes decisively to understanding
the significance of the historical creation of the tragic and democratic human
as a priority of pedagogical, political, ethical, and aesthetic concern.
Moreover, I argue that their thought also serves another crucial purpose. At a
time when the value of self-limitation is being systematically discredited and
when one-dimensional certainties and hegemonic narratives dominate, undermining
any disposition toward collective self-institution and rendering Western
societies vulnerable to forms of domination, the thought of Papaioannou and
Castoriadis enables us to envision a way out of this condition. It also allows
us to understand that such an exit is by no means an easy undertaking, yet it
is not impossible, provided that the Western human proves capable of
re-creating, with prudence, the necessity of the presence of the tragic human.
tragic human, pedagogical absence of the tragic human, democracy, K. Papaioannou, C. Castoriadis, contemporary Western world
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