Revue française d'études américaines 2002- 1 (no91)| ISSN | ISSN numérique : en cours | ISBN : | page 43 à 60 Distribution électronique Cairn pour les éditions Belin. © Belin. Tous droits réservés pour tous pays. Il est interdit, sauf accord préalable et écrit de l’éditeur, de reproduire (notamment par photocopie) partiellement ou totalement le présent article, de le stocker dans une banque de données ou de le communiquer au public sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit.

ABSTRACT — The purpose of this paper is to answer Emerson’s question in “Experience”: “Where do we find ourselves ?”—i.e. the question of the discovery and foundation of the new American self—by following the line, initiated by Stanley Cavell, of the Ordinary. This article aims to uncover in Emerson’s philosophy, particularly in “Experience,”, the transcendental-like constitution of a list of categories of America’s experience. Such categories, however, cannot be the classical (Aristotelian or Kantian) categories of being or knowledge, but new categories of the ordinary, the discovery of which leads to new concepts and “experiences” of the world, the self, and others.

The purpose of this paper is to answer Emerson’s question in “Experience”: “Where do we find ourselves ?”—i.e. the question of the discovery and foundation of the new American self—by following the line, initiated by Stanley Cavell, of the Ordinary. This article aims to uncover in Emerson’s philosophy, particularly in “Experience,”, the transcendental-like constitution of a list of categories of America’s experience. Such categories, however, cannot be the classical (Aristotelian or Kantian) categories of being or knowledge, but new categories of the ordinary, the discovery of which leads to new concepts and “experiences” of the world, the self, and others.
Keywords : , Emerson, Cavell, Kant, Categories, Ordinary.