205 research outputs found
The Micro-Politics of Capital: Marx and the Prehistory of the Present
No full textRe-reads Marx in light of the contemporary critical interrogation of subjectivity.
What is the relation between the economy, or the mode of production, and culture, beliefs, and desires? How is it possible to think of these relations without reducing one to the other, or effacing one for the sake of the other? To answer these questions, The Micro-Politics of Capital re-reads Marx in light of the contemporary critical interrogations of subjectivity in the works of Althusser, Deleuze, Guattari, Foucault, and Negri. Jason Read suggests that what characterizes contemporary capitalism is the intimate intersection of the production of commodities with the production of desire, beliefs, and knowledge.https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/1297/thumbnail.jp
Unemployed Negativity: Fragments on Philosophy, Politics, and Culture
No full textUnemployed Negativity is a blog kept by Jason Read for over eighteen years. During that time, it has been a reflection on everything from the films of Jordan Peele to the relevance of Marxist criticism for contemporary society. It has reflected on such cultural transformations as the lasting legacy of Shark Week to the rise of conspiracy theories in contemporary politics. In doing so it has persisted in one central aim, to make philosophy a living reflection on the present rather than a contemplation of the past. This is a collection of its best posts, revised and expanded for publication.https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/1711/thumbnail.jp
The Potentia of Living Labor: Negri’s Practice of Philosophy
No full textChapter from The Philosophy of Antonio Negri: Revolution in Theory, edited by Timothy S. Murphy and Abdul-Karim Mustapha.
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To see so many friends bringing such critical contributions to bear on my work serves as a spur to action once again. Antonio Negri The spectacular success of Empire and Multitude has brought Negri\u27s writing to a new, wider audience. Negri’s work is singular in its depth and expression. It can be difficult to grasp the complexity of his ideas, as they are rooted in the history of philosophy. This book offers an introduction to his thinking, and is ideal for readers who want to get to grips with his key themes. Outstanding contributors include Pierre Macherey, Charles Wolfe, Alex Callinicos, Miguel Vatter, Jason Read, Alberto Toscano, Mamut Mutman, Ted Stolze and Judith Revel. Written with dynamism and originality, the book will appeal to anyone interested in the evolution of Negri’s thought, and especially to students of political philosophy, international studies and literary theory. This book is the sequel to The Philosophy of Antonio Negri, Volume One: Resistance in Practice (Pluto, 2005) but can be read entirely independently.https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/1307/thumbnail.jp
Book Review: The Military Legacy of Alexander the Great: Lessons for the Information Age
No full textAuthor: Michael P. Ferguson and Ian Worthington
Reviewed by Jason W. Warren, PhD
The Military Legacy of Alexander the Great: Lessons for the Information Age focuses on three themes—inspirational physical presence, Alexander’s army’s professionalism, and the speed with which he campaigned. The reviewer notes there are many useful observations, overall, he sees the book as a “mixed bag.” For those newer to studies “on Alexander or lessons-learned methodology, Legacy may prove a useful primer.”https://press.armywarcollege.edu/parameters_bookshelf/1091/thumbnail.jp
Anthropocene and Anthropogenesis: Philosophical Anthropology and the Ends of Man
No full textWhat is the “anthropos,” humanity of the Anthropocene? In many ways this would seem to be beside the point; the point is not how humanity is defined, but charting its massive effects on the planet. However, conceptions of the Anthropocene end up answering the question of humanity, albeit obliquely. These answers end up duplicating what Jason W. Moore refers to as Cartesian dualism, placing humanity on the side of either nature or society. What the Anthropocene demands is a political anthropology that posits humanity as the intersection of nature and history. It is for this reason that Paolo Virno\u27s conception of anthropogenesis might be a useful concept for the anthropocene, and vice versa. The Anthropocene returns us to the question of capitalism and human nature, but this theoretical déjà vu is an attempt to escape the generalized déjà vu of the end of history
Desire is Man’s Very Essence: Spinoza and Hegel as Philosophers of Transindividuality
No full textChapter from Hegel after Spinoza: Critical Essays, edited by Hasana Sharp and Jason E. Smith.
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Recent work in political philosophy and the history of ideas presents Spinoza and Hegel as the most powerful living alternatives to mainstream Enlightenment thought. Yet, for many philosophers and political theorists today, one must choose between Hegel or Spinoza. As Deleuze\u27s influential interpretation maintains, Hegel exemplifies and promotes the modern cults of death, while Spinoza embodies an rrepressible appetite for living. Hegel is the figure of negation, while Spinoza is the thinker of pure affirmation . Yet, between Hegel and Spinoza there is not only opposition. This collection of essays seeks to find the suppressed kinship between Hegel and Spinoza. Both philosophers offer vigorous and profound alternatives to the methodological individualism of classical liberalism. Likewise, they sketch portraits of reason that are context-responsive and emotionally contoured, offering an especially rich appreciation of our embodied and historical existence. The authors of this collection carefully lay the groundwork for a complex and delicate alliance between these two great iconoclasts, both within and against the Enlightenment tradition.https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/1302/thumbnail.jp
The Order and Connection of Ideology is the same as the Order and Connection of Exploitation: Or, Towards a Bestiary of the Capitalist Imagination
No full textThe turn to Spinoza by many Marxists combines the classic problem of Marxism, that of base and superstructure, economy and ideology, with Spinoza’s challenging assertion of the identity of order of connection of ideas and things. This paper looks at two contemporary neo-Spinozists, Frédéric Lordon and Yves Citton, examining the ways in which their works intertwine economy and ideology, desire and imagination. The point, however, is not to just read Marx with Spinoza, but to use both together to make sense of the imaginary and affective dimension of changes within the economy
Politics as Subjectification: Rethinking the Figure of the Worker in the Thought of Badiou and Rancière
No full textThis article discusses the idea of philosophers Alain Badiou and Jacques Rancière that views the worker as a political figure and politics as a process of subjectification. Rancière examines the tension between equality and hierarchy in Greek philosopher Aristotle\u27s work Politics and sees the role of the slave as disruptive to the whole social order. The author discusses the overlap between Rancière\u27s Marx-influenced ideas concerning the proletariat with that of Badiou
To Think the New in the Absence of its Conditions: Althusser and Negri on the Philosophy of Primitive Accumulation
No full textChapter 16 from Encountering Althusser : Politics and materialism in contemporary radical thought, edited by Katja Diefenbach, Sara R. Farris, Gal Kirn, and Peter D. Thomas.
Excerpt from this chapter:
Louis Althusser and Antonio Negri are two of the most influential Marxist philosophers of the (late) twentieth century. Despite their influence, influence that extends into the same spheres of theoretical and philosophical discussion, there has been little discussion and debate of their relation, at least in the Anglo-American world. This is perhaps because the lines of demarcation would seem to be drawn up in advance: Althusser is the philosopher of history as a process without subjects or goals, while Negri is the philosopher of living labour as subjectivity. They even draw from different texts: for Althusser, at least initially, Marx’s philosophy of structural causality must be read between the lines of Capital; while, Negri turns to the Grundrisse, a series of notebooks written in a time of crisis, to find the force of antagonism. The combined effect of their seemingly opposed positions with respect to subjectivity, and their emphasis on...https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/1301/thumbnail.jp
Interview: Jason Dittmer Interviewed by Steven M. Schnell, Editor, The Geographical Bulletin
No full textJason Dittmer is from Jacksonville, Florida, received his PhD from Florida State University in 2003, and has taught at University College London in the United Kingdom since 2007. He is the author of Popular Culture, Geopolitics, and Identity (Rowman and Littlefield, 2010) and the co-editor of Mapping the End Times: American Evangelical Geopolitics and Apocalyptic Visions (Ashgate, 2010). He is married to the lovely Stephanie and has two cats. They all live in southeast London
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