A substantial part of Marion’s project in Being Given turns on a “triple epoché” wherein Marion brackets each part of the tripartite structure of the gift – the giver, the recipient and the given itself – to show that none of them is essential for thinking about the gift. In three separate variations, each element of the gift is bracketed individually, and in each of these instances the other two elements are specifically not bracketed. Indeed, Marion admits that the reduction he proposes “dem…
Read moreA substantial part of Marion’s project in Being Given turns on a “triple epoché” wherein Marion brackets each part of the tripartite structure of the gift – the giver, the recipient and the given itself – to show that none of them is essential for thinking about the gift. In three separate variations, each element of the gift is bracketed individually, and in each of these instances the other two elements are specifically not bracketed. Indeed, Marion admits that the reduction he proposes “demands, de jure, that one of the two [recipient or giver] remain in position of the transcendental I.” In this paper, I will argue that the rule is misleading and should be reformulated to indicate that a recipient is always required. I conclude with some suggestions for future work.
