The Irreducible Other: The Unbearable Lightness of Being Under Levinas’s Alterity
Scientific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, (2026), Vol.8, No.7, pp.216-220
Published: July 23, 2026
DOI: 10.54691/sncrk626
Abstract
Considering Emmanuel Levinas’s ethical conception of alterity (l’Autre) and the theory of temporality in his Time and the Other, this article shall proffer a interpretation of the philosophical “lightness” and “weight” in Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being. The notion of lightness ultimately signifies the suspension and the evasion of ethical responsibility, whereas the weight corresponds to Levinas’s “time comes into being with the Other”. From this, the ethical antithesis between lightness and weight is revealed to us. A responsibility is thus revealed in it, and from it, we can see a relation between self and Other is constituted.
Keywords:
Emmanuel Levinas; Milan Kundera; Time and the Other; The Unbearable Lightness of Being; the Other; ethics of alterity.
APA Citation:
Shuyi Wei (2026). The Irreducible Other: The Unbearable Lightness of Being Under Levinas’s Alterity. Scientific Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 8(7), 216-220. https://doi.org/10.54691/sncrk626
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