Sometimes I Hear Life Going: On the Remoteness from Life in Modernity

Abstract

Modernity seems to bring a type of relationship with life whereby life appears to be distant. Individuals may mitigate this distance by attaining a meaningful life, but this requires time, decisions and a purpose. In the late modern context, these dimensions – time, decisions and vital purposes – appear to be shaped in a way that further increases this remoteness. This paper analyses how the narratives associated with these three dimensions foster a way of understanding them that restricts the relationship which individuals build with their own lives. The late-modern remoteness from life may stem from experiencing a lifetime without significant time, decisions without real choice and particular forms of self-fulfilment that misappropriate the relationship with life.