Showing papers in "Critical Horizons in 2013"
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the ongoing references made to the ban on graven images for the foundation of political aesthetics and how the image itself plays a significant role in the creation of a dichotomy in which the image becomes either "icon" or false appearance.
Abstract: This essay focuses on the ongoing references made to the ban on graven images for the foundation of political aesthetics. In this tradi - tion the image itself plays a significant role in the creation of a dichot - omy in which the image becomes either "icon" or false appearance. The image in this tradition is a powerful agent and gains as such performa - tive power. From the Bible to Kant and German idealism to Adorno and Deleuze, the prohibition of the image signals its power and turns it into a strong magnet in political aesthetics, may it be affirmative or negative.
22 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine Axel Honneth and Nancy Fraser's assessment of and normative proposal for addressing the paradoxes of neoliberalism, and argue that the structural challenge of immanent critique as understood within second and third generation Critical Theory should be brought into focus.
Abstract: Critical theory must add to its agenda “disrupt[ing] the easy passage from critique [to] its neoliberal double”, Nancy Fraser recently argued. Emancipatory movements have not only been transformed by neoliberalism. They have, “unwittingly”, provided powerful “ingredients” for the transition to neoliberalism. This essay examines Axel Honneth and Nancy Fraser’s assessment of and normative proposal for addressing the paradoxes of neoliberalism. The constraints of neoliberalism, I argue, bring into focus the structural challenge of immanent critique as understood within second and third generation Critical Theory. Normative ambivalence within neoliberalism, I maintain, calls for a shift in the way that critical and justificatory practices are understood within the Frankfurt School.
21 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors explore potential points of synthesis between two leading theorists in Critical Theory and Critical International Relations Theory, Axel Honneth and Andrew Linklater, to bridge the otherwise disparate approaches to emancipation.
Abstract: This paper explores potential points of synthesis between two leading theorists in Critical Theory and Critical International Relations Theory, Axel Honneth and Andrew Linklater. Whereas Linklater's recent work on the harm principle has turned away from the critical social theory of the Frankfurt School in favour of Norbert Elias and process sociology, the paper observes a fundamental complementarity between harm and the precepts of recognition theory that can bridge these otherwise disparate approaches to emancipation. The paper begins with a brief overview of Linklater's emancipatory vision before examining his recent turn to the harm principle and Eliasian process sociology. It is argued that Honneth's work, particularly the ideas of mutual recognition and the diagnosis of social pathologies, clearly resonant with Linklater's defence of ethical universalism and can help further the emancipatory project of Critical International Relations Theory. In particular, Honneth's intersubjective concept of autonomy is argued to provide a normative and empirical standard for emancipation premised on the historically progressive expansion of attitudes of recognition, born out of social struggles, toward the ideal institutionalisation of mutual recognition in world politics.
14 citations
TL;DR: The relationship between sovereignty, biopolitics and governmentality in the work of Giorgio Agamben, Judith Butler, and Michel Foucault is discussed in this paper.
Abstract: This article addresses the relationship between sovereignty, biopolitics and governmentality in the work of Giorgio Agamben, Judith Butler, and Michel Foucault. By unpacking Foucault’s genealogy of modern governmentality, it responds to a criticism leveled against Foucauldian accounts of power for their alleged abandonment of the traditional model of power in juridico-institutional terms in favor of an understanding of power as purely productive. This claim has most significantly been developed by Agamben in “Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life”. I argue that Judith Butler’s analysis of power, in particular in her essay “Indefinite Detention”, presents a more differentiated account of power that registers the significance of practices of sovereignty and resonates with Foucault’s lectures on “Security, Territory, Population”.
14 citations
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TL;DR: In the late seventeenth century, the idea of culture underwent a gradual transformation from the refined way of life of the ruling social elite to the high culture of popular culture as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: From the late seventeenth century on the idea of culture underwent a gradual transformation. Originally this concept referred essentially to the “refined” way of life of the ruling social elite (which certainly included among others also such activities as listening and making music, reading works of literature, commissioning works of fine art). Popular culture, on the other hand, refers to the usually collective practices of groups of rural and urban workers taking the form of performance. They were not only excluded from refined culture, but it was regarded as completely unsuitable for them, potentially creating dangerous social aspirations. It is with the great social transformation from feudal to bourgeois society that the idea of refined culture was replaced by that of “high culture” encompassing both the arts and the sciences: works claiming universal human significance. This “high culture” for a considerable time coexisted with the remnants of popular culture. It has been only due to the gr...
11 citations
TL;DR: This article analyzed the moves by which Benjamin gave his concept of "the expressionless" (das Ausdruckslose) its intriguing semantic meaning and moral value, revealing key historical reference points of Benjamin's concept and furthermore his strategy of advocating a novel theory of the sublime as an antithesis to, or an interruption of, the beautiful by selectively integrating older traditions (such as the topos of god's "imagelessness" with theorems previously unrelated to these traditions, such as phenomenological reflections on body perception and colour and the twentieth-century discourse on �
Abstract: Strongly positive uses of terms that designate an absence, a cognitive or ontological impossibility or a sensory privation are among the persistent conceptual figures of Benjamin’s thought. This article analyses the moves by which Benjamin gave his concept of ‘the expressionless’ (das Ausdruckslose) its intriguing semantic meaning and moral value. Drawing on the poetics and philosophy of the sublime from Greek antiquity through modern times, the article reveals key historical reference points of Benjamin’s concept and, furthermore, his strategy of advocating a novel theory of the sublime as an antithesis to, or an interruption of, the beautiful by selectively integrating older traditions (such as the topos of god’s “imagelessness”) with theorems previously unrelated to these traditions (such as phenomenological reflections on body perception and colour and the twentieth-century discourse on “decision”).
8 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that this is a misunderstanding, and that accepting it would reduce speech not merely to the discussion of a sharply limited set of topics, but to no topics at all, which would lead to the reduction of speech to a discussion of only a subset of topics.
Abstract: This essay explores Hannah Arendt’s contribution to our understanding of the rhetorical as opposed to the aesthetic quality of public speech, with an emphasis upon her conception of opinion and glory. Arendt’s focus on the revelatory quality of public action in speech is widely understood to preclude or seriously limit its communicative aspect. I argue that this is a misunderstanding, and that accepting it would reduce speech not merely to the discussion of a sharply limited set of topics, but to no topics at all. Public action is speech that reveals the speaker as “answering, talking back and measuring up to whatever happened or was done.” Such revelatory speech is most appropriately judged by the standard of the glorious and the inglorious. Because such speech must inform as well as reveals, so does glorious or great speech rise to the level of greatness in part because of what is said, to whom, where, and how. Arendt’s understanding of this is shown to have significant parallels to the ordinary...
8 citations
TL;DR: This paper argued that Lefort's own claim to alterity buckles under the immanent weight of his critique of Merleau-Ponty, offering at best a conception of otherness limited to a self-relational non-identity.
Abstract: This paper attempts to draw out the political import of Merleau-Ponty’s ontology of the flesh, by engaging the critique levelled against it by his student and literary executor Claude Lefort. In suggesting a tension in Merleau-Ponty’s work that obscures alterity, Lefort seems to miss the rich political import of Merleau-Ponty’s ontology of the flesh. Founded in his development of the concepts of ecart and reversibility, Merleau-Ponty’s ontological position breaks with many of the standard tenets of political thinking, and offers a multifaceted conception of alterity. I will suggest that Lefort’s own claim to alterity buckles under the immanent weight of his critique of Merleau-Ponty, offering at best a conception of otherness limited to a self-relational non-identity. This conception ultimately fails to adequately consider the relations existing between different beings-in-the-world. In thinking being as flesh, Merleau-Ponty offers us an ethico-political optic that attempts to think alterity and o...
5 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that Schelling's systematic approach, while exhibiting a unifying force, still remains open to the otherness of the real, while overlooking concrete aesthetic experience.
Abstract: Schelling’s philosophy of art between 1801 and 1807 can be defined as metaphysics of art. The object of that metaphysics is to deploy the absolute as the being of art and of the arts. Schelling has been criticized on the basis that this metaphysics of art represses the infinite diversity of existing works of art, while overlooking concrete aesthetic experience. Based on Schelling’s definition of the “philosophical construction” of art as an inseparably speculative and historical construction, the aim of this paper is to challenge such assertions. It will show that “historical construction” has to be understood in a twofold manner: first, as a transcendental history of the absolute’s artistic individuation and second, as a cultural history of both the ancient and modern worlds of art. Working within this twofold setting the paper argues that Schelling’s systematic approach, while exhibiting a unifying force, still remains open to the otherness of the real.
3 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the potential of a single act to change a political order, focusing upon the potential for a paradigmatic gesture that opens a space for a politics not founded on a form of belonging grounded in a particular property, such as national identity.
Abstract: Drawing upon the thought of Giorgio Agamben, this essay focuses upon the potential of a single act to change a political order. Agamben’s writings retain the possibility for a paradigmatic gesture that opens a space for a politics not founded on a form of belonging grounded in a particular property, such as national identity. To illustrate this event this essay turns to Agamben’s construction of whatever-being, which is constructed hyper-hermeneutically. This term is chosen deliberately. Whatever-being retains a hermeneutic structure, but is constructed through singular paradigmatic examples. These examples are evidence for whatever-being’s existence as a pure singularity, unable to be reduced to a particular quality. Such examples are gestures that allow future modes of belonging to separate themselves from oppressive foundations and dominating constructions of political existence, through revealing the possibility of a new way of being that does not require a revolutionary “zero hour” to be brought about.
3 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that the modern philosophical notion of self-constitution is directed against the prospect of human beings dissolving into idleness, and that these arguments are problematic in the various ways in which they suppose usefulness and explicitly or implicitly take extra-philosophical views of idleness.
Abstract: The core argument of the paper is that the modern philosophical notion of self-constitution is directed against the prospect of human beings dissolving into idleness. Arguments for self-constitution are marked by non-philosophical presuppositions about the value of usefulness. Those arguments also assume a particular conception of superior experience as conscious integration of a person’s actions within an identifiable set of chosen commitments. Exploring particular arguments by Hegel, Kant, Korsgaard and Frankfurt the paper claims that those arguments are problematic in the various ways in which they suppose usefulness and explicitly or implicitly take extra-philosophical views of idleness.
TL;DR: Schmidt am Busch as mentioned in this paper presents a carefully wrought attempt to demonstrate that the concept of recognition is suitable for the analysis and critique of contemporary capitalism and proposes a heuristic to grasp the contrast between today's deregulated "neoliberal" world of work and the era of social-democratic capitalism with respect to different forms of recognition they offer.
Abstract: “Anerkennung” als Prinzip der Kritischen Theorie by Hans-Christoph Schmidt am Busch represents a carefully wrought attempt to demonstrate that – contrary to what its critics believe – the concept of recognition is suitable for the analysis and critique of contemporary capitalism. More particularly, this study seeks to address the problematic consequences of “neoliberal” socio-economic changes over the past 30 years. These significant changes, as Schmidt am Busch argues by drawing on a range of sociological studies, have created problematic employment structures that “prove detrimental to the development of self-respect and self-esteem on the part of many employees” (p. 19).1 Against the backdrop of this empirical diagnosis, Schmidt am Busch devises a heuristic to grasp the contrast between today’s deregulated “neoliberal” world of work and the era of “social-democratic capitalism” with respect to the different forms of recognition they offer(ed). The concepts he develops in this context, moreover, are designed to explain the genesis of the “new spirit of capitalism” as well as laying the basis for a critique of the damaging neoliberal recognitional practice witnessed today. Schmidt am Busch’s study thus sits resolutely within the tradition of the Frankfurt School and represents an important contribution to current Critical Theory. For his endeavour, Schmidt am Busch searches for social-theoretical and critical resources in the works of the young Marx and Hegel and engages in an elaborate exegetical effort in the second and third part of the study. Beginning with Marx, Schmidt am Busch develops an original recognitiontheoretic interpretation using a thorough and interesting dissection of the famous passage at the end of the Comments on James Mill’s Elements of
TL;DR: In his monumental collection Culture, Science, Society: The Constitution of Cultural Modernity as discussed by the authors, Gyorgy Markus lays down the con- ceptual framework for the theorisation of modern high culture across the cultural spheres and articulates an account of cultural pragmatics or cultural relations in the domains of science, science, arts and the humanities.
Abstract: In his monumental collection Culture, Science, Society: The Constitution of Cultural Modernity, Gyorgy Markus lays down the con - ceptual framework for the theorisation of modern high culture across the cultural spheres and articulates an account of cultural pragmatics or cultural relations - author, text and public - in the domains of sci - ence, arts and the humanities. He explores in great detail the conceptual keystones in the evolution of the cultural self-understanding of moder - nity from the enlightenment until today. Markus's work resonates with a deep understanding of the historico-cultural terrain being covered and the conceptual issues at play.
TL;DR: In this paper, an analysis of the fragmentary character of Warburg's way of working is presented, arguing that his search for an analytic model to account for the interplay between Christian and pagan/polytheistic traditions displays striking asynchronies and displacements.
Abstract: As regards Aby Warburg’s oeuvre, it is fascinating that three unfinished or unpublished projects have come to represent the very theorems now appearing of most interest for cultural historians and theorists: The Mnemosyne Atlas representing pictorial memory; the Serpent Ritual as theorem for a cultural-anthropological reading of pagan cultures; and the Nymph Fragment as a foundational figure of modern iconology. This essay undertakes an analysis of the fragmentary character of Warburg’s way of working, arguing that his search for an analytic model to account for the interplay between Christian and pagan/polytheistic traditions displays striking asynchronies and displacements. Rather than explicating these irregularities biographically, the conceptual problems tied to his methods and cognitive interests are investigated. The article thus examines a set of conceptual questions whose relevance extends well past Warburg’s methodology, considering the dimensions of religious and cultural-historical the...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the use and interpretation of the concept of nothingness in two of the most important and exemplary employments of this concept in twentieth century philosophy, i.e., Heidegger and Sartre.
Abstract: Castoriadis’s radical ontology of indeterminacy postulates a third term (or rather, an indeterminable continuum of terms) between the complete determinacy of the traditional conception of being and the absolute indeterminacy of the traditional conception of nothingness. Castoriadis himself made considerable efforts to demonstrate how ontological conceptions which equate being with determinacy fail to grasp the reality of being in all ontological regions and contexts. He did somewhat less in regard to the opposite pole of the ontological dichotomy, the identification of indeterminacy with nothingness, though he certainly recognized this identification as equally suspect.This article examines the use and interpretation of the concept of nothingness in two of the most important and exemplary employments of this concept in twentieth century philosophy. Nothingness is a key concept for both Heidegger and Sartre, however they may differ in regards to its meaning and significance. In both, the concept of...
TL;DR: The authors argued that one of the major problems in Benjamin's thinking is how to make certain forms of materiality stand out against other (degraded) forms, and that the way material forms stand out as meaningful is akin to the Kantian description of the aesthetic attitude, which identifies how certain...
Abstract: From the comparative framework of writing on the meaning of ritual in the field of the history of religions (M. Eliade and J. Z. Smith), this essay argues that one of the major problems in Benjamin’s thinking is how to make certain forms of materiality stand out against other (degraded) forms. In his early work, the way that Benjamin deals with this problem is to call degraded forms “symbolic”, and those forms of materiality with positive value, “allegorical”. The article shows how there is more than an incidental connection with the recent approach to ritual in the field of history of religions, seeing that Benjamin too wants to set out the significance of certain material forms against those that are “ritualistic” and hence false. It is argued that he treats the latter in his essay on Elective Affinities and the former in his Trauerspiel. The key claim is that the way material forms stand out as meaningful is akin to the Kantian description of the aesthetic attitude, which identifies how certain...
TL;DR: In this paper, an examination of how silence and veiling are related to moral significance is presented, and the question of how the literary can possess moral meaning or effect when veiling and silence appear as a means of refusing or denying intention.
Abstract: An examination of how, in literature, silence and veiling are related to moral significance. The paper emphasizes Walter Benjamin’s essay on Goethe’s Elective Affiniites and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Minister’s Black Veil” and poses the question of how the literary can possess moral meaning or effect when, as in these two works, silence and veiling appear as a means of refusing or denying intention. Benjamin’s and Hawthorne’s different critiques of the symbol are presented as the central issue around which the possibility of moral meaning is decided as an intentionless act. Benjamin’s preservation of the moral is interpreted as the cause of the paradoxical and contradictory sources of the expressionless and its critical violence as well as the veiling and secrecy he identifies as forming the true work of art. Against this account, Hawthorne’s story is read as the refusal of any preceding secret as the basis of a moral claim and thus as the defining category of the work of art.
TL;DR: The concept of the image can be given historical, conceptual, aesthetic, and moral specifications as mentioned in this paper, and some of the scholarly issues in the dense semantic field of image are discussed.
Abstract: The concept of ‘the image’ can be given historical, conceptual, aesthetic and moral specifications. This essay sets out some of the scholarly issues in the dense semantic field of ‘the image’. In p...
TL;DR: This article explored the idea of the poetic dimension of existence and its relation to the image, or more precisely, to the capability to disclose into images, which is the poetic gift or aptitude.
Abstract: Looking at Dickinson and Holderlin, this essay begins by exploring the idea of the poetic dimension of existence and its relation to the image, or more precisely, to the capability to disclose into images. For Dickinson the relentless “poverty” of a non-poetic existence indicates that what is missing from such existence are not just images but the capacity for their “disclosing” - the poetic gift or aptitude. With the help of Heidegger’s essays on poetry and poverty, I invert this relation between image and poverty to show that, even though the inceptive character of the poetic word and the element of poetic dwelling it allows to emerge appear poor in comparison to images or concepts, it is the poetic word that for the very first time lets humans dwell. Although it can neither boast the richness of “pictures” nor the strength and precision of conceptual comprehension, the poetic is what opens up the world for humans and simultaneously opens their being to its characteristic manner of inhabiting th...