The Levinas Online Bibliography

Primary and Secondary Sources


Founded by Joachim Duyndam & Jacob Oeverbeek

ISSN 1873-8230


 

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Introduction
 

On this website, the Dutch-Flemish Levinas Society offers a – free accessible – online primary and secondary bibliography of its name giver and raison d’être: the 20th century philosopher Emmanuel Levinas (1906-1995). The Levinas Online Bibliography aims to be complete: from 1929 until today. Currently, it is covering the years 1929-2007; further updating is in process.

History
This bibliography was first published in 2005; both online on this website and printed in the Journal of the Dutch-Flemish Levinas Society (ISSN 1385-4739). The first edition was titled supplementary, honouring the great Levinas bibliography by professor Roger Burggraeve (Catholic University Leuven) covering 1929-1989, which the present online bibliography intends to continue. We hope that these two will be integrated in due course.

Initially, the bibliography was edited by its founders Jacob Oeverbeek and Joachim Duyndam, graduate student and Socrates professor of philosophy, respectively, at the University of Humanistic Studies (Utrecht, The Netherlands). Since 2006, the editors of 2005 have joined, together with Harm Schoonekamp, the newly formed Bibliography Department of the Dutch-Flemish Levinas Society. Harm did a great job: he completed the primary sources back until 1929, and he added new titles in almost 30 languages. In 2008, Linda Kraan joined our team. She completed the secondary part. Currently, the bibliography is being updated by Coby van Pagée.

Rationale
As to the present online bibliography, the primary part includes all publications by Levinas himself and all publications on behalf of Levinas after his death in 1995. Many of the latter are reissues of previously published books and articles, as well as translations of his work. The secondary bibliography includes publications by others on Levinas over the covered period: comments, interpretations, discussions and other scholarly books and articles on themes, problems and questions concerning Levinas’ philosophical thought and his other (e.g. theological, Talmudic) ideas.

A secondary bibliography has inevitably to deal with the principal and difficult question as to which publications are to be included and which are not. In case of dissertations, books and articles explicitly discussing Levinas’ work, insertion is evident. But in some cases it may be difficult to distinguish publications of which the content is more or less predominantly related to Levinas’ thought on the one hand, from publications with only references (how many?) to Levinas, on the other. Embracing all publications with one or more references to Levinas in the bibliography would be practically impossible and, what is more, principally undesirable. We have attempted to draw the line at a substantial component related to Levinas in the publication in hand. We realize, though, that the assessment of this unavoidably rests somewhat arbitrary.

Free and easy use
We hope and expect that our present, free accessible, online bibliography may be of great benefit to any scholarly research on Levinas. The bibliography has several possible divisions or entrances. Searching can be conducted through primary titles, secondary titles or all titles; by author name or by title words; by matching any words (a or b) or all words (a and b); by one of 31 languages or all languages; through books, theses (including dissertations), articles, reviews, or all kinds of publications together. Results of searching can be sorted by title, by author or by year of publication.

Acknowledgements
We wish to express our profound gratitude for having had the benefit of several sources in the construction of this bibliography, including most importantly professor Burggraeve’s bibliography mentioned above (Roger Burggraeve, Emmanuel Levinas. Une bibliographie primaire et secondaire. Leuven: Peeters, 1990); the online bibliography of the Institut d'études lévinassiennes ; and the International Philosophical Bibliography, edited by Peeters Publishers in cooperation with the Higher Institute of Philosophy at Leuven.

Call for comments
Most probably, our present bibliography still displays errors, omissions and other faults, as it has been the work of only a small group of researchers. We would be very grateful to receive any kind of comments and corrections. Please submit these to j.duyndam@uvh.nl. We thank you very much in advance.

Utrecht, The Netherlands, March 20th, 2011

The Dutch-Flemish Levinas Society’s Bibliography Department:
Joachim Duyndam, Editor-in-Chief
Linda Kraan
Jacob Oeverbeek
Coby van Pagée
Harm Schoonekamp

© Copyright 2012 by The Dutch-Flemish Levinas Society’s Bibliography Section, Joachim Duyndam, Editor-in-Chief (Universiteit voor Humanistiek / University of Humanistic Studies). All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publishers.
 
© Copyright 2012 De Bibliografie afdeling van de Nederlands-Vlaamse Levinas Studiekring, Joachim Duyndam, Editor-in-Chief (Universiteit voor Humanistiek). Alle rechten voorbehouden. Niets uit deze uitgave (online publicatie) mag worden verveelvoudigd, opgeslagen in een geautomatiseerd gegevensbestand, of openbaar gemaakt, in enige vorm of op enige wijze, hetzij elektronisch, mechanisch, door fotokopieën, opnamen, of op enig andere manier, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de rechthebbenden.

 

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