Singular-Plural (Nancy)

Nancy's lifelong concept, named in his 1996 book Être singulier pluriel (Being Singular Plural) and re-deployed in late synthesis in *Fragile Skin of the World* VIII: the structural co-implication of singular and plural at the ontological level. Existence is jemeinig (each-time-mine), but the each-time multiplies a priori; "the co-existence of singularities is constitutive of existence tout court" (VIII raw 1204). The Latin etymological anchor: singuli was only attested in the plural — the one-by-one or case-by-case. Singularity is not individuality (which presupposes a substrate-of-the-individual); singularity is exception, each-time-emerging-from-and-returning-to a nothing-in-common.

What the Concept Does

The concept performs four argumentative tasks:

  1. Refuses the unity-fusion / individualist-absolutization alternative: the Western tradition swings between fusion (community as common-whole) and absolutization (individual as self-enclosed unit). Both are archi-autonomic (see allonomy). The singular-plural is the third option: neither fusion nor absolutization, but co-exception — each singularity exceptional (singulus) and together (plural).

  2. Pluralizes Heideggerian Jemeinigkeit: in Being and Time the mineness (Jemeinigkeit) of Dasein is a structural feature of existence — "Dasein takes place as je-mein" (Nancy VIII raw 1197). But Heidegger's Mitsein is added to Jemeinigkeit; Nancy's move is to show that the each-time of je-mein is a priori plural — there is no one "each-time" because the each-time is the form of singularization-as-exception, which presupposes other-singulars-from-which-to-be-an-exception.

  3. Recasts Marx's "social production of man": VIII raw 1207–1215 quotes Marx's "natural-social production of man and nature" and proposes the late-Nancean reformulation: "the technical creation of the singular-plural world." The reformulation makes three moves: (i) keeps Marx's refusal of first-nature / first-individual (the social is already in the natural); (ii) extends production to technical creation (incorporating techject-ecotechnics); (iii) makes the singular-plural the ontological-structural form of the production.

  4. Authorizes the non-anthropocentric extension: "the co-existence of singularities is constitutive of existence tout court and in general (and moreover not only that of those we call 'men', but that of all beings)" (VIII raw 1205–1206). Singular-plural is not a humanist claim — it is a cosmological / ontological claim about all beings. The world-of-rivals (riparians of the same waters, VIII raw 1301) is the cosmological-political form.

Key Points

  • Latin etymology (VIII raw 1202): "even singuli, in Latin, was only said in the plural: it is the one-by-one or case-by-case unity of an 'each time'." The plural-only form anchors Nancy's claim that singularity is a priori plural — not "the singular plus the plural" but "plurality of the singular-as-exception."

  • Co-exception (VIII raw 1205): "Existential exception implies the rule of a universal co-exception." The singular is exception (each singulus takes place only-once-at-a-single-point); the rule of singularity is therefore co-exception — exceptions together without forming a class or a totality.

  • Three discontinuities (VIII raw 1203–1205): the each-time-mine has "a double articulation: that of the different times or occurrences of a single 'I', and that of different 'I's whose multiplicity is a priori present in the difference that an I must make to be I, in other words precisely within singularity." Singularity is constituted by these discontinuities; the plural is internal to the singular, not added.

  • The "saying I" vs "saying myself" distinction (VIII raw 1198): the singular is "the vanishing instant of its enunciation (of a 'saying I' and not of a 'saying myself, claiming to be me')." Saying I is singular-eventful; saying myself / claiming to be me is substantive-individualist. Singular-plural refuses the second.

  • The technical creation of the singular-plural world (VIII raw 1214): Nancy's immediate-reformulation of Marx's "social-natural production of man and nature" — making the world's singular-plural structure constitutively technical (linking to techject-ecotechnics).

  • Cosmological extension: not only humans but "all beings" (raw 1206) — including the reseda, the eglantine, and the thistle . . . crystals, seahorses, humans, and their inventions (BSP 86, cited in creation-ex-nihilo-materialist). Singular-plural is the ontological form of freedom-of-the-stone.

  • The world-of-rivals figure (VIII raw 1301): "All existents are rivals, in other words riparians of the same waters, and hence competitors [concurrents], as those who lay claim together to the favours of a single source." Singular-plural is world-structuring: the cosmological-political form is the world-of-shores (cf. limit-edge-shore) where all singulars are riparians.

  • The Descartes-Heidegger anchor (VIII raw 1198): "Singular is the Dasein, the existent that only takes place as je-mein . . . such, in summary, is the ego sum, ego existo of Descartes." The Nancean Cartesian-Heideggerian connection: Descartes's ego sum and Heidegger's Jemeinigkeit are two formulations of the same singular-event — but neither sees the plural in the singular.

What It Rejects

  • Unity-as-oneness (Plotinian / idealist unus): "Unity was thought of, in the final analysis, as unitary rather than unique" (VIII raw 1213).
  • Communitarian fusion: the common whole into which singulars integrate or fuse.
  • Individualist absolutization: the individual as self-enclosed unit — what the West does when fusion fails.
  • Pure individuality (in the Aristotelian-substance sense): individuality presupposes a substrate / secondary-substance relation; singularity refuses the substrate.
  • Anthropocentric restriction: singular-plural is cosmological, applying to all beings.
  • The dialectical resolution of singular-and-plural in absolute knowing / absolute Spirit (Hegel): "the singular . . . is far rather, in the transcendental-existential regime that I am sketching out, its condition of possibility (or of necessity — or indeed, beyond this very opposition, it is the free derivation, freedom in itself . . . of being in general without end)" (VIII raw 1222–1226).
  • Mythic / ritual given-whole (VIII raw 1230): the West "was never anything other, at its birth, than the dissolution of a certain given state of being-together or being-whole."

Stakes

  • For political philosophy: the singular-plural offers a third way between fusion-community and individualism. The political-form is the world-of-rivals (riparians of the same waters) — competition over a common source without either fusion or autarchy.
  • For environmental philosophy: extending singular-plural to all beings (raw 1206) is what licenses Nancy's freedom-of-the-stone and the fragile skin of the world. The Anthropocene is the recognition that human-singular and non-human-singular are co-exceptional.
  • For philosophy of technology: the technical creation of the singular-plural world (raw 1214) makes technology constitutive of singular-plural, not added to it. See techject-ecotechnics.
  • For ethics: the salutation (Overture §§2–3) is the ethical form of singular-plural — greeting-the-singular-as-singular without claiming-substance.
  • Confidence: high for the structural claim; medium for the cosmological extension (Nancy moves quickly from transcendental to cosmological).

Problem-Space

The concept addresses how to think the singular without individualism and the plural without fusion. The same problem-space is approached in:

  • Aristotle — primary substance / secondary substance; the tode ti (this-here). The problem is partially present but resolved via substance-metaphysics.
  • Leibniz — monad; each monad is singular and plural (all-windows reflecting all). Closest pre-Nancean formulation; but Leibniz's monads are substantial, where Nancy's singularities are eventful.
  • Hegel — Allgemein / Besonderes / Einzelnes (universal / particular / singular). The singular is the concrete-truth of the universal; but Hegel resolves this in the absolute, which Nancy refuses.
  • Heidegger — Jemeinigkeit + Mitsein; mineness and being-with. Nancy's primary anchor; the move is to make the Mitsein internal to the Jemeinigkeit, not added.
  • Levinas — the face of the Other as singular; the Third (le tiers) as the entry of plurality. Cousin: Nancy's singular-plural is not primarily ethical-personal but ontological-cosmological.
  • Deleuze — singularity in Difference and Repetition; pre-individual singularities. Cousin: structurally close but Deleuze's singularities are intensities; Nancy's are exceptions.
  • Badiou — the count-as-one; multiplicity as basic. Cousin: but Badiou's count-as-one is set-theoretic; Nancy's is figural-philosophical.
  • Nancy 1996, Being Singular Plural — the cardinal formulation; Fragile Skin VIII is the late-period synthesis.

Connections

  • master late-concept of jean-luc-nancy — alongside fragile-skin-of-the-world, allonomy, and vanishing-ontology, one of the four master late-Nancean concepts.
  • foundational for fragile-skin-of-the-world — the world's factorial of skins is the cosmological-figural form of singular-plural; each skin is a singularity, all skins are co-exceptional.
  • requires allonomy — the each-time-mine is constitutively plural because the mine is constitutively allonomic.
  • requires vanishing-ontology — singularity is being-toward; the singular-plural is the structural form of il y a in the multiplicity register.
  • foundational for limit-edge-shore — the limit is the nothing-in-common that exposes the singular to its co-exceptional outside.
  • foundational for techject-ecotechnics — the technical creation of the singular-plural world makes technology constitutive of singularity.
  • extends to non-human beings via freedom-of-the-stone and creation-ex-nihilo-materialist — cosmological extension to all-beings.
  • contrasts with MP's coexistence — same word as MP's silent-key (the aphonia chapter); but the anchor is different: MP routes through bodily-sensation/aphonia; Nancy through Jemeinigkeit-as-pluralized.
  • late-period inflection of the 1996 Being Singular Plural — same concept, late-political-philosophical synthesis.
  • contrasts with unity-as-oneness (Plotinus) and communitarian-fusion (sundry communitarianisms) — the two refused-options.
  • has cross-tradition cousin Levinas's face / third — both refuse both fusion and individualism; Nancy is ontological-cosmological, Levinas ethical-personal.

Open Questions

  • Does Nancy's cosmological extension (singular-plural applies to all beings) actually follow from the transcendental claim (singular-plural is structural of existence)? This is the slide flagged in the source page's Critique / Limitations — Nancy moves quickly from "existential" to "all beings." A more careful argument would specify how the cosmological-extension is licensed. Morin Ch 7 §1 handles a related move on Nancy's freedom of the stone with explicit argument.
  • What is the relation between Nancy's singular-plural and Deleuze's singularity? Both refuse Aristotelian individuality and Hegelian dialectic. Deleuze's singularities are intensive (pre-individual, pre-personal); Nancy's are exceptional (each-time-mine pluralized). The structural similarity is real; the philosophical anchors diverge.
  • Is the salutation the proper ethical form of singular-plural, as the Fragile Skin book gestures? The book closes on Rilke; the ethical praxis of singular-plural is not developed. Nancy's earlier Inoperative Community and Being Singular Plural offer more political-ethical material; the late book is more figural.
  • Can the singular-plural support a politics beyond the world-of-rivals figure? Nancy gestures at this in VIII (the taking-on-board of the world-and-singularity) but does not develop it. The closing image ("hold firm to the shore") is attentive but thin on political-form.

Sources

  • nancy-2021-fragile-skin-of-the-world — late synthesis. Cardinal anchors: VIII opening (raw 1175–1232, the singular-plural / Jemeinigkeit re-deployment; the Latin singuli etymology; the co-exception thesis; the Descartes-Heidegger anchor; the Marx re-formulation as technical creation of the singular-plural world); VIII closing (raw 1301, the world-of-rivals figure). Also: VII §3 raw 1103 (individuation as transindividuation, with Simondon explicit at fn 3).
  • Cross-reference to: Nancy 1996 Être singulier pluriel (the cardinal formulation; not yet ingested in the wiki as separate source).