Vulgarity and Authenticity: Dimensions of Otherness in the World of Jean-Paul Sartre

Since his death in 1980, there has been a resurgence of scholarly interest in the life and work of Jean-Paul Sartre, as interpreters have searched for the threads that link the diverse elements of his thought. In this book, Stuart Zane Charme uses the concept of "vulgarity" as a key to understanding the interaction of Sartre's social background and his analysis of existential authenticity. The first part of his book examines the tension between civility and vulgarity in Sartre's thought, including reference to such recurrent Sartrean themes as obscenity, ugliness, laughter, scatology, and body odours. The second part reconstructs Sartre's underlying mythology of the "vulgar Other" centered around four "marginal" groups: blacks, women, homosexuals and Jews. Standing in opposition to traditional models of the self in white, male, heterosexual, Christian culture, these groups were symbolic representations for Sartre of alternative forms of selfhood. It was only in listening to the voices of these groups that Sartre believed he and others might repel the artificial imperatives of bourgeois culture and achieve a more authentic existence.