Ontologies of the Present: Dialectics and Genealogy from Hegel to Agamben
OSL Seminar directed by Bram Ieven en Geertjan de Vugt
When Foucault famously declared Sartre’s Critique of Dialectical Reasonthe last book of the 19th century the bell for the burial of Hegelian historicism was tolled. Foucault’s turn to Nietzsche and his revitalization of genealogy as critique can only be understood in opposition to the Hegelian dialectic. While the dialectic provides a method in which the singularity of thought is recuperated and placed within a larger ‘whole’ (Hegel) or process of unification (Sartre), genealogy shows us how the origin of certain modes of thinking and discourses are not recuperable within a bigger whole (Foucault) and are in fact shot through by a multiplicity that does not let itself become part of any straightforward process of unification (Deleuze).
However, both dialectics and genealogy are ways of coming to terms with the double bind one finds oneself inevitably confronted with when dealing with the idea that concepts, ideas and critical notions relate to the historical, political and social circumstances in which they are developed. On the one hand it implies that thinking is coached in its own, singular historical conditions, affected by them and shaped through them. On the other hand it implies that thinking itself also directly reflects on history and its own historicity. The idea that thinking should reflect on its own position, the idea that his is what thinking is about, is what the modern concept of critique is all about. The dialectic and genealogy, then, are two ways in which critique can be defined.
This seminar is based on three pillars. Firstly participants will familiarize themselves with the dialectic (Hegel, Kojève, Sartre), it’s criticism (Nietzsche, Deleuze, Bataille), and its persistence (Jameson, Malabou). Secondly we will study genealogy as a critical method by focusing on the work of Foucault and his interpretation of Nietzsche. The development of genealogy as a (alternative) form of critique, it turns out, was conceived of as a direct criticism of Hegel and the dialectical method. Finally we will go into one of todays most prevelant reinterpretations of Foucault, namely that of Agamben’s analysis of paradigms.
By the end of the seminar participants have a thorough understanding of the concepts vital for an understanding of (French) post-structuralist thought: dialectics and its relevance today, the stakes of a philosophy of difference, genealogical analysis and the archaeology of paradigms.
However, both dialectics and genealogy are ways of coming to terms with the double bind one finds oneself inevitably confronted with when dealing with the idea that concepts, ideas and critical notions relate to the historical, political and social circumstances in which they are developed. On the one hand it implies that thinking is coached in its own, singular historical conditions, affected by them and shaped through them. On the other hand it implies that thinking itself also directly reflects on history and its own historicity. The idea that thinking should reflect on its own position, the idea that his is what thinking is about, is what the modern concept of critique is all about. The dialectic and genealogy, then, are two ways in which critique can be defined.
This seminar is based on three pillars. Firstly participants will familiarize themselves with the dialectic (Hegel, Kojève, Sartre), it’s criticism (Nietzsche, Deleuze, Bataille), and its persistence (Jameson, Malabou). Secondly we will study genealogy as a critical method by focusing on the work of Foucault and his interpretation of Nietzsche. The development of genealogy as a (alternative) form of critique, it turns out, was conceived of as a direct criticism of Hegel and the dialectical method. Finally we will go into one of todays most prevelant reinterpretations of Foucault, namely that of Agamben’s analysis of paradigms.
By the end of the seminar participants have a thorough understanding of the concepts vital for an understanding of (French) post-structuralist thought: dialectics and its relevance today, the stakes of a philosophy of difference, genealogical analysis and the archaeology of paradigms.
Each seminar session takes place on Friday from 2 to 5PM. For each session a special guest speaker will be invited who will be giving a one hour introduction to the theme after which we will do a close reading of the texts under scrutiny. Reading materials will be distributed in advance. Please register by sending an e-mail to: osl-fgw@uva.nl
Program:
1. Historicity and Dialectics
Friday March 16 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134)
CHAIR: t.b.a.
G.W.F. Hegel, ‘Preface: On Scientific Cognition’ in: Phenomenology of Spirit, Oxford University Press:
Oxford, pp. 2-46.
Alexandre Kojève, ‘In place of an Introduction’ and ‘A Note on Eternity, Time, and the Concept’
[Selections] in: Introduction to the Reading of Hegel. Lectures on the Phenomenology of Spirit,
New York, Basic Books, 1969, pp. 3-29, pp.
Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘Critique of Critical Investigation’ in: Critique of Dialectical Reason, London: Verso,
1991, online:
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/sartre/works/critic/praxis.htm
2. The Eternal Recurrence and the Critique of Dialectics
Friday March 30 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134)
CHAIR: Rudi Visker
Friedrich Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morality, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994, pp. 1-68.
Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, London, Continuum, 1986, pp. 87-88, 156-164, 194-198.
Michel Foucault, 'Nietzsche, genealogy, history', in: Language, Counter-Memory, Presence, Ithaca,
Cornell University Press, 1977, pp. 139-165.
Michel Foucault, 'The Discourse on Language’, in: The Archaeology of Knowledge, New York,
Pantheon Books, 1972, pp. 215-239.
3. The Return of the Dialectic?
Friday 13 April 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134)
CHAIR: Marc de Kesel
Fredric Jameson, ‘Hegel’s contemporary critics’, in: Valences of the Dialectic, London, Verso, pp. 103-
122.
Catharine Malabou, ‘Whose afraid of Hegelian wolves?’ in: Deleuze: A Critical Reader, P. Patton ed.,
114-138.
Judith Butler, ‘Foucault: dialectics unmoored’ in: Subjects of Desire: Hegelian Reflections in Twentieth
Century France, New York, Columbia University Press, 1999,
Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe, ‘Nietzschean critique and the Hegelian commodity, or the French have landed’,
Critical Inquiry, Vol. 26, nr. 6, pp. 70-84.
4. Genealogy from Nietzsche to Foucault
Friday April 27 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134)
CHAIR: Sjoerd van Tuinen
Friedrich Nietzsche, ‘On the Use and Disadvantage of History for Life’ in: Untimely Meditations,
Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997, pp. 57-87, 100-107.
Friedrich Nietzsche, ‘341. The Heaviest Weight’ in: The Gay Science, Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press, 2001, pp. 164-165.
Friedrich Nietzsche, ‘The Convalescent’ in: Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press, 2006, pp. 173-181.
George Bataille, ‘Mr. Nietzsche’ and ‘Nothingness, Transcendence, Immanence’, in On Nietzsche,
London, Continuum, pp. 1-12, 177-178.
Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, London, Continuum, 1986, pp. 25-31, 47-49, 68-72.
Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition, New York, Columbia University Press, 1994, pp. 53-58.
Pierre Klossowski, ‘The Experience of the Eternal Return’ in: Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle, London,
Continuum, 2005, pp. 43-57.
5. From Foucault to Agamben
Friday 11 May 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134) CHAIR: t.b.a.
Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge, New York, Pantheon Books, 1972, pp. 135- 199.
Giorgio Agamben, Remnants of Auschwitz, New York, Zone Books, 1999, pp. 138-146.
Giorgio Agamben, ‘Philosophical Archaeology’, in: The Signature of All Things, New York, Zone Books,
2009, pp. 81-113.
Giorgio Agamben, ‘What is the Contemporary?’, in: Nudities, Stanford, Stanford University Press,
2011, pp. 10-20.
Giorgio Agamben, The Sacrament of Language, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2011, pp. 8-11.
6. Agamben’s Genealogy of the Present: Homo Sacer
Friday 25 May 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134) CHAIR: Sonja Lavaert
5. From Foucault to Agamben
Friday 11 May 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134) CHAIR: t.b.a.
Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge, New York, Pantheon Books, 1972, pp. 135- 199.
Giorgio Agamben, Remnants of Auschwitz, New York, Zone Books, 1999, pp. 138-146.
Giorgio Agamben, ‘Philosophical Archaeology’, in: The Signature of All Things, New York, Zone Books,
2009, pp. 81-113.
Giorgio Agamben, ‘What is the Contemporary?’, in: Nudities, Stanford, Stanford University Press,
2011, pp. 10-20.
Giorgio Agamben, The Sacrament of Language, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2011, pp. 8-11.
6. Agamben’s Genealogy of the Present: Homo Sacer
Friday 25 May 2012, 14:00-17:00, PC Hoofthuis 6.25 (Spuistraat 134) CHAIR: Sonja Lavaert
Giorgio Agamben, ‘What is an Apparatus?’ in: What is an Apparatus?, Stanford, Stanford University
Press, 2009, pp. 1-24.
Giorgio Agamben, ‘What is a Paradigm?’ in: The Signature of All Things, New York, Zone Books, 2009, pp. 1-24
Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1998, p.1-15, 119-189
Giorgio Agamben, ‘What is a Paradigm?’ in: The Signature of All Things, New York, Zone Books, 2009, pp. 1-24
Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1998, p.1-15, 119-189
