Literature on Trial traces the rise of modern literary criticism in Central and Eastern Europe du... more Literature on Trial traces the rise of modern literary criticism in Central and Eastern Europe during the eighteenth century. S.D. Chrostowska juxtaposes the discourse's written forms in three linguistic-cultural regions — Germany, Poland, and Russia — to show how fluid the relationship once was between the genres of criticism and those of literature.
An alternative history of literary criticism, Literature on Trial marks a shift from earlier studies' focus on aesthetic principles to an emphasis on the development of literary-critical forms. Chrostowska relates cultural and institutional changes in these areas to the formation of literary-critical knowledge. She accounts for the ways in which critical discourse organized itself formally and deemed some genres ‘proper’ while eliminating others. Analysing works by Lessing, Goethe, and Karamzin, among others, Literature on Trial brings a fresh theoretical perspective to the links between genre as a discursive strategy and sociopolitical life.
Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de ... more Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de jeux et de création collective jusqu'à nos jours. Lorsqu'en 1969 Jean Schuster et ses acolytes ont décidé unilatéralement de dissoudre le groupe, Michel Zimbacca, Jean-Louis Bédouin, Joyce Mansour, Marianne van Hirtum, Jorge Camacho, réunis avec plusieurs autres autour de Vincent Bounoure, s'y sont refusé. Résolus à poursuivre l'aventure surréaliste ils sont soutenus dans cette initiative par les surréalistes pragois, et les deux groupes publient en 1976 un ouvrage qui fera date : La civilisation surréaliste. Dans les années qui suivent, le Groupe de Paris, que n'ont cessé de rejoindre des membres appartenant à de nouvelles générations, organise de nombreuses expositions collectives et publie plusieurs revues — Bulletin de liaison surréaliste, Surréalisme, SURR (Surréalisme, Utopie, Rêve, Révolte) et maintenant Alcheringa — ainsi qu'un certain nombre de déclarations collectives, rassemblées dans le volume, édité par Guy Girard, Insurrection poétique. Tracts, affiches et déclarations du groupe de Paris du mouvement surréaliste 1970-2010, Paris, Le Temps des Cerises, 2011.
Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de ... more Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de jeux et de création collective jusqu'à nos jours. Lorsqu'en 1969 Jean Schuster et ses acolytes ont décidé unilatéralement de dissoudre le groupe, Michel Zimbacca, Jean-Louis Bédouin, Joyce Mansour, Marianne van Hirtum, Jorge Camacho, réunis avec plusieurs autres autour de Vincent Bounoure, s'y sont refusé. Résolus à poursuivre l'aventure surréaliste ils sont soutenus dans cette initiative par les surréalistes pragois, et les deux groupes publient en 1976 un ouvrage qui fera date : La civilisation surréaliste. Dans les années qui suivent, le Groupe de Paris, que n'ont cessé de rejoindre des membres appartenant à de nouvelles générations, organise de nombreuses expositions collectives et publie plusieurs revues — Bulletin de liaison surréaliste, Surréalisme, SURR (Surréalisme, Utopie, Rêve, Révolte) et maintenant Alcheringa — ainsi qu'un certain nombre de déclarations collectives, rassemblées dans le volume, édité par Guy Girard, Insurrection poétique. Tracts, affiches et déclarations du groupe de Paris du mouvement surréaliste 1970-2010, Paris, Le Temps des Cerises, 2011. Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Progressivement plus petit d'une forme utopique de l'écriture Traduit de l'anglais par Joël Gayra... more Progressivement plus petit d'une forme utopique de l'écriture Traduit de l'anglais par Joël Gayraud Pouvons-nous voir dans toute activité créatrice une tentative de dépassement ? Dépassement de soi, du statu quo, de la réalité ? La création n'est-elle pas une tentative de passage vers un monde meilleur, une vie bien au-delà de la « simple survie », ou au moins pour entrevoir une existence plus heureuse, plus épanouie, qui ait plus de sens ? Pouvons-nous, et devons-nous, dans le sillage d'Ernst Bloch, voir à l'oeuvre dans l'activité créatrice une poussée utopique ? Il me semble que oui. Or j'aimerais suggérer ici qu'il existe certaines formes de créativité particulièrement marquées par cette tentative de dépassement qui la caractérise ; formes qui nous rappellent le but qui motive la création, qui le rendent plus présent dans notre esprit. Arrêtons-nous donc un instant sur ce terme de « formes », car ce n'est pas sur les contenus de la création, mais plutôt sur ses formes que je voudrais mettre l'accent : non pas les représentations, voire les exposés, les tableaux, abondants, d'un au-delà comme utopie, mais-indépendamment du contenu-les différents modes d'expression créatrice, et, ce qui les sous-tend, les manières de penser. Pour résumer mon propos, je dirai ceci : d'abord, la création humaine est proprement utopique, ou plutôt utopisante-terme qui s'applique mieux à ce désir et cette pratique du dépassement que je viens de souligner qu'à la représentation plus ou moins élaborée d'une société meilleure ; ensuite, la forme même de cette créativité toujours utopisante traduit cette tentative de dépassement vers l'utopie ; enfin, parmi les diverses formes de la création, il en est certaines qui se démarquent plus que d'autres par leur capacité à évoquer l'excédent utopique sans pour autant le décrire. En outre, ces formes fonctionnent comme des indices : elles signalent un « horizon » utopique sans forcément l'examiner, comme un panache de fumée audessus d'une forêt indique un incendie sans nous le montrer directement… Pour défendre cette thèse, je prends le domaine de l'écriture. Il comprend des genres qui nous paraissent bien définis-tels le traité, le roman, la nouvelle, l'aphorisme. En raison de l'inséparabilité du contenu et de la forme, ces genres traitent de sujets bien circonscrits, sans laisser de côté les détails et, de surcroît, ils les traitent de manière précise, conclusive, voire exhaustive, sans laisser inaboutis les fils conducteurs ou les éléments esquissés au début du processus créatif, ni sortir de leurs propres cadres ou suggérer un au-delà de ceux-ci. À l'inverse, il existe des formes ou des genres d'écriture qui semblent ne pas viser l'aboutissement. Qui sont porteurs d'un potentiel. Je pense, en particulier, au récit, à l'essai (au sens de Michel de Montaigne), et au fragment. Parler de ces 1. Jean-Luc Nancy et Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, L'absolu littéraire (1978).
This paper takes up the question of utopia in the work of third- and fourth-generation critical t... more This paper takes up the question of utopia in the work of third- and fourth-generation critical theorists Seyla Benhabib, Raymond Geuss, Rainer Forst, Maeve Cooke, and Amy Allen, each of whom conceives of utopia as a moment or dimension of critical theory, complementing the latter’s normative foundations and/or commitment to political realism. Realism and normativity act as limits built into critical theory to a more robust conception of utopianism. Part 1 gives a critical overview of their perspectives on utopia, which largely derive from those of Ernst Bloch and Michel Foucault. Problematic, in particular, is their reliance on a thin version of Bloch’s project or else on a passive version in Foucault’s contributions. The French philosophers Miguel Abensour and Étienne Tassin who, while also indebted to Bloch and T.W. Adorno, understand utopia as an impulse moderating normative and realist concerns and feeding into transformative democratic politics, provide a point of contrast and corrective (Part 2). Seeking to remedy the identified shortcomings of existing critical-theoretical approaches to utopianism—including the weakness of hope in orienting social normativity—I then defend a distinctive account of utopia as play (Part 3). Adorno’s notion of play offers the figure for a distinct version of utopianism in the critical theory tradition.
Pursuing a more practical emancipatory orientation, the article thus contributes an alternative model of utopianism for the purposes of critical theory. Bringing out utopia’s relationship to hope, democratic practices of contestation, and political efficacy, an account of utopia as “conceptual play” strengthens the political purchase of utopia in a way that does not translate it into a particular version of emancipatory politics. The account represents less a “solution” than a different and underexposed way of conceptualizing utopia that addresses the internal limitations on contemporary critical theory’s emancipatory goals. While drawing on a thread in Adorno, it accentuates dialectics over negativity to advance a more robust, ludic utopianism, latent in his work, as an active modality of anticipatory thinking.
Spirit. A longer look back at the "making" of progress reveals a closer because genetic link betw... more Spirit. A longer look back at the "making" of progress reveals a closer because genetic link between modern conceptions of human progress and art. According to a genealogy that is now generally accepted, the discourse on social progress emerged, indeed, out of a literary polemic. "Historians have traced back the question of the doctrine of progress to the dispute between the ancient and modern writers, which caused so much furor at the end of the seventeenth century," the French social philosopher Georges Sorel argued in Les illusions du progrès (1908). He added: "It might seem very odd to us today that such a purely literary conflict could produce such consequences, for nowadays we would hardly be willing to admit that artistic progress can exist at all." 2 To say that artistic progress cannot exist is not to say that the arts do not evolve. Sorel's study drew on the writings of Ferdinand Brunetière, whose theory of literary genres, dependent on his reading of Darwin, was evolutionary but innocent of any idea of progress in literature. 3 Sorel's reference to "dispute" and "furor" is to the great querelle in the French Academy that commenced in 1687 between the party of the Moderns and the party of the Ancients, during which the former (notably Charles Perrault, Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, and Pierre Bayle) claimed that the literature of their own day in France was equal or superior to that of classical Greece and Rome, while the Ancients (such as Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux, Jean Racine, and François de Salignac de La Mothe-Fénelon) argued that the classics were unequaled and unsurpassable. The Moderns gained a favorable verdict from many of their contemporaries, but posterity has begged to differ. The subsequent negative judgment on and reversal of the Moderns' artistic preferences, their "manifestations of bad taste," 4 are partly to blame. In line with the theory that more recent works are generally superior to older ones, Fontenelle claimed that in both poetry and eloquence the Greeks are inferior to the Romans.. .. Cicero is better than Demosthenes, Virgil than Theocritus and Homer, Horace than Pindar, Livy and Tacitus than all the Greek historians. In the light of the theory we established. .. , this order is a natural one. The Romans were modern compared to the Greeks.. .. The best works of Sophocles, of Euripides, of Aristophanes will not stand up before 2. Sorel, Illusions, 1. The historians Sorel has in mind include Ferdinand Brunetière (his essay "La formation de l'idée de progrès au XVIIIe siècle" (1892), in vol. 5 of Études critiques sur l'histoire de la littérature française) and Hippolyte Rigault (his 1856 study Histoire de la querelle des Anciens et des Modernes). Partial to this view of the quarrel as proleptic to the idea of progress were John Bagnell Bury in The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and Growth (1920) and more recent historians: see especially Koselleck and Meier, "Fortschritt"; and Nisbet, History of the Idea of Progress (1980). 3. Brunetière, L'évolution des genres dans l'histoire de la littérature.
The paper makes the case that Adorno’s frequent recourse to small or minor literary forms of pres... more The paper makes the case that Adorno’s frequent recourse to small or minor literary forms of presentation was deeply motivated by his epistemic, ontological, and moral commitments. In his considerations of the genres of the aphorism and the essay, Adorno explicitly comes out on the side of discursive fragmentation as resistance to the illusion of completeness and conceptual systematicity, and as an implicit critique of the false totality. Based on Adorno’s remarks, the term that best describes his fragmentary way of thinking and writing foregrounding its status as a modality of action and its mimetic impulse is gesture. Adorno’s negative dialectics is a gestic mode of reflection, rejecting metaphysical closure and openly pointing towards a utopian horizon.
Critiques of nostalgia, typically from the left, tend to dismiss nostalgic criticism as reactiona... more Critiques of nostalgia, typically from the left, tend to dismiss nostalgic criticism as reactionary and therefore uncritical. By focusing on explicit articulations of nostalgia, such critiques neglect the extent to which they themselves draw on nostalgic resources. Although recent scholarship on nostalgia in the sciences and the humanities has begun to question this long-standing belief in its inherent conservatism, we are still far from appreciating the spectrum of nostalgia’s critical valences. Thus, while critical theory’s affinities with melancholy and negative passions like despair have been widely recognized, few scholars have paused over its nostalgic roots. How, then, can we understand nostalgia not as an ideological position or cultural mood, but as an affective-reflective impulse behind philosophical and socio-theoretical critique? How can we write an intellectual history of nostalgia—and, more specifically, of the developmental relationship between it and critical reflection on history, culture, and society—beyond simply cataloguing moments of ‘nostalgic thinking’ and relying on psychology or neuroscience in identifying it? My paper considers the ‘critical function’ of nostalgia in the modern period by outlining nostalgia’s role in the formation and animation of critical standards, hence, in the development and movement of critique. I conclude by briefly reflecting on the problems this raises for conceptual framing and methodology.
A wide-ranging reflection on human creativity with its main reference points in Kant’s third crit... more A wide-ranging reflection on human creativity with its main reference points in Kant’s third critique and a theological-political problematic found in Deleuze, the essay develops a perspective on creativity that suspends the traditional opposition between creation (genesis, intuition) and judgment (schema, rationality). Taking a sceptical position on epistemic foundations, I show how the so-called problem of the criterion, that is, the quest for a true criterion of knowledge, contributes to fixing the conceptual opposition between creativity and judgment, and obscures their mutual provocation and interaction. This tension and co-determination of creation and judgment, it is argued, give rise to conviction (rather than certainty) as a non-transcendent, immanent criterion.
Literature on Trial traces the rise of modern literary criticism in Central and Eastern Europe du... more Literature on Trial traces the rise of modern literary criticism in Central and Eastern Europe during the eighteenth century. S.D. Chrostowska juxtaposes the discourse's written forms in three linguistic-cultural regions — Germany, Poland, and Russia — to show how fluid the relationship once was between the genres of criticism and those of literature.
An alternative history of literary criticism, Literature on Trial marks a shift from earlier studies' focus on aesthetic principles to an emphasis on the development of literary-critical forms. Chrostowska relates cultural and institutional changes in these areas to the formation of literary-critical knowledge. She accounts for the ways in which critical discourse organized itself formally and deemed some genres ‘proper’ while eliminating others. Analysing works by Lessing, Goethe, and Karamzin, among others, Literature on Trial brings a fresh theoretical perspective to the links between genre as a discursive strategy and sociopolitical life.
Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de ... more Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de jeux et de création collective jusqu'à nos jours. Lorsqu'en 1969 Jean Schuster et ses acolytes ont décidé unilatéralement de dissoudre le groupe, Michel Zimbacca, Jean-Louis Bédouin, Joyce Mansour, Marianne van Hirtum, Jorge Camacho, réunis avec plusieurs autres autour de Vincent Bounoure, s'y sont refusé. Résolus à poursuivre l'aventure surréaliste ils sont soutenus dans cette initiative par les surréalistes pragois, et les deux groupes publient en 1976 un ouvrage qui fera date : La civilisation surréaliste. Dans les années qui suivent, le Groupe de Paris, que n'ont cessé de rejoindre des membres appartenant à de nouvelles générations, organise de nombreuses expositions collectives et publie plusieurs revues — Bulletin de liaison surréaliste, Surréalisme, SURR (Surréalisme, Utopie, Rêve, Révolte) et maintenant Alcheringa — ainsi qu'un certain nombre de déclarations collectives, rassemblées dans le volume, édité par Guy Girard, Insurrection poétique. Tracts, affiches et déclarations du groupe de Paris du mouvement surréaliste 1970-2010, Paris, Le Temps des Cerises, 2011.
Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de ... more Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de jeux et de création collective jusqu'à nos jours. Lorsqu'en 1969 Jean Schuster et ses acolytes ont décidé unilatéralement de dissoudre le groupe, Michel Zimbacca, Jean-Louis Bédouin, Joyce Mansour, Marianne van Hirtum, Jorge Camacho, réunis avec plusieurs autres autour de Vincent Bounoure, s'y sont refusé. Résolus à poursuivre l'aventure surréaliste ils sont soutenus dans cette initiative par les surréalistes pragois, et les deux groupes publient en 1976 un ouvrage qui fera date : La civilisation surréaliste. Dans les années qui suivent, le Groupe de Paris, que n'ont cessé de rejoindre des membres appartenant à de nouvelles générations, organise de nombreuses expositions collectives et publie plusieurs revues — Bulletin de liaison surréaliste, Surréalisme, SURR (Surréalisme, Utopie, Rêve, Révolte) et maintenant Alcheringa — ainsi qu'un certain nombre de déclarations collectives, rassemblées dans le volume, édité par Guy Girard, Insurrection poétique. Tracts, affiches et déclarations du groupe de Paris du mouvement surréaliste 1970-2010, Paris, Le Temps des Cerises, 2011. Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Progressivement plus petit d'une forme utopique de l'écriture Traduit de l'anglais par Joël Gayra... more Progressivement plus petit d'une forme utopique de l'écriture Traduit de l'anglais par Joël Gayraud Pouvons-nous voir dans toute activité créatrice une tentative de dépassement ? Dépassement de soi, du statu quo, de la réalité ? La création n'est-elle pas une tentative de passage vers un monde meilleur, une vie bien au-delà de la « simple survie », ou au moins pour entrevoir une existence plus heureuse, plus épanouie, qui ait plus de sens ? Pouvons-nous, et devons-nous, dans le sillage d'Ernst Bloch, voir à l'oeuvre dans l'activité créatrice une poussée utopique ? Il me semble que oui. Or j'aimerais suggérer ici qu'il existe certaines formes de créativité particulièrement marquées par cette tentative de dépassement qui la caractérise ; formes qui nous rappellent le but qui motive la création, qui le rendent plus présent dans notre esprit. Arrêtons-nous donc un instant sur ce terme de « formes », car ce n'est pas sur les contenus de la création, mais plutôt sur ses formes que je voudrais mettre l'accent : non pas les représentations, voire les exposés, les tableaux, abondants, d'un au-delà comme utopie, mais-indépendamment du contenu-les différents modes d'expression créatrice, et, ce qui les sous-tend, les manières de penser. Pour résumer mon propos, je dirai ceci : d'abord, la création humaine est proprement utopique, ou plutôt utopisante-terme qui s'applique mieux à ce désir et cette pratique du dépassement que je viens de souligner qu'à la représentation plus ou moins élaborée d'une société meilleure ; ensuite, la forme même de cette créativité toujours utopisante traduit cette tentative de dépassement vers l'utopie ; enfin, parmi les diverses formes de la création, il en est certaines qui se démarquent plus que d'autres par leur capacité à évoquer l'excédent utopique sans pour autant le décrire. En outre, ces formes fonctionnent comme des indices : elles signalent un « horizon » utopique sans forcément l'examiner, comme un panache de fumée audessus d'une forêt indique un incendie sans nous le montrer directement… Pour défendre cette thèse, je prends le domaine de l'écriture. Il comprend des genres qui nous paraissent bien définis-tels le traité, le roman, la nouvelle, l'aphorisme. En raison de l'inséparabilité du contenu et de la forme, ces genres traitent de sujets bien circonscrits, sans laisser de côté les détails et, de surcroît, ils les traitent de manière précise, conclusive, voire exhaustive, sans laisser inaboutis les fils conducteurs ou les éléments esquissés au début du processus créatif, ni sortir de leurs propres cadres ou suggérer un au-delà de ceux-ci. À l'inverse, il existe des formes ou des genres d'écriture qui semblent ne pas viser l'aboutissement. Qui sont porteurs d'un potentiel. Je pense, en particulier, au récit, à l'essai (au sens de Michel de Montaigne), et au fragment. Parler de ces 1. Jean-Luc Nancy et Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, L'absolu littéraire (1978).
This paper takes up the question of utopia in the work of third- and fourth-generation critical t... more This paper takes up the question of utopia in the work of third- and fourth-generation critical theorists Seyla Benhabib, Raymond Geuss, Rainer Forst, Maeve Cooke, and Amy Allen, each of whom conceives of utopia as a moment or dimension of critical theory, complementing the latter’s normative foundations and/or commitment to political realism. Realism and normativity act as limits built into critical theory to a more robust conception of utopianism. Part 1 gives a critical overview of their perspectives on utopia, which largely derive from those of Ernst Bloch and Michel Foucault. Problematic, in particular, is their reliance on a thin version of Bloch’s project or else on a passive version in Foucault’s contributions. The French philosophers Miguel Abensour and Étienne Tassin who, while also indebted to Bloch and T.W. Adorno, understand utopia as an impulse moderating normative and realist concerns and feeding into transformative democratic politics, provide a point of contrast and corrective (Part 2). Seeking to remedy the identified shortcomings of existing critical-theoretical approaches to utopianism—including the weakness of hope in orienting social normativity—I then defend a distinctive account of utopia as play (Part 3). Adorno’s notion of play offers the figure for a distinct version of utopianism in the critical theory tradition.
Pursuing a more practical emancipatory orientation, the article thus contributes an alternative model of utopianism for the purposes of critical theory. Bringing out utopia’s relationship to hope, democratic practices of contestation, and political efficacy, an account of utopia as “conceptual play” strengthens the political purchase of utopia in a way that does not translate it into a particular version of emancipatory politics. The account represents less a “solution” than a different and underexposed way of conceptualizing utopia that addresses the internal limitations on contemporary critical theory’s emancipatory goals. While drawing on a thread in Adorno, it accentuates dialectics over negativity to advance a more robust, ludic utopianism, latent in his work, as an active modality of anticipatory thinking.
Spirit. A longer look back at the "making" of progress reveals a closer because genetic link betw... more Spirit. A longer look back at the "making" of progress reveals a closer because genetic link between modern conceptions of human progress and art. According to a genealogy that is now generally accepted, the discourse on social progress emerged, indeed, out of a literary polemic. "Historians have traced back the question of the doctrine of progress to the dispute between the ancient and modern writers, which caused so much furor at the end of the seventeenth century," the French social philosopher Georges Sorel argued in Les illusions du progrès (1908). He added: "It might seem very odd to us today that such a purely literary conflict could produce such consequences, for nowadays we would hardly be willing to admit that artistic progress can exist at all." 2 To say that artistic progress cannot exist is not to say that the arts do not evolve. Sorel's study drew on the writings of Ferdinand Brunetière, whose theory of literary genres, dependent on his reading of Darwin, was evolutionary but innocent of any idea of progress in literature. 3 Sorel's reference to "dispute" and "furor" is to the great querelle in the French Academy that commenced in 1687 between the party of the Moderns and the party of the Ancients, during which the former (notably Charles Perrault, Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, and Pierre Bayle) claimed that the literature of their own day in France was equal or superior to that of classical Greece and Rome, while the Ancients (such as Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux, Jean Racine, and François de Salignac de La Mothe-Fénelon) argued that the classics were unequaled and unsurpassable. The Moderns gained a favorable verdict from many of their contemporaries, but posterity has begged to differ. The subsequent negative judgment on and reversal of the Moderns' artistic preferences, their "manifestations of bad taste," 4 are partly to blame. In line with the theory that more recent works are generally superior to older ones, Fontenelle claimed that in both poetry and eloquence the Greeks are inferior to the Romans.. .. Cicero is better than Demosthenes, Virgil than Theocritus and Homer, Horace than Pindar, Livy and Tacitus than all the Greek historians. In the light of the theory we established. .. , this order is a natural one. The Romans were modern compared to the Greeks.. .. The best works of Sophocles, of Euripides, of Aristophanes will not stand up before 2. Sorel, Illusions, 1. The historians Sorel has in mind include Ferdinand Brunetière (his essay "La formation de l'idée de progrès au XVIIIe siècle" (1892), in vol. 5 of Études critiques sur l'histoire de la littérature française) and Hippolyte Rigault (his 1856 study Histoire de la querelle des Anciens et des Modernes). Partial to this view of the quarrel as proleptic to the idea of progress were John Bagnell Bury in The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and Growth (1920) and more recent historians: see especially Koselleck and Meier, "Fortschritt"; and Nisbet, History of the Idea of Progress (1980). 3. Brunetière, L'évolution des genres dans l'histoire de la littérature.
The paper makes the case that Adorno’s frequent recourse to small or minor literary forms of pres... more The paper makes the case that Adorno’s frequent recourse to small or minor literary forms of presentation was deeply motivated by his epistemic, ontological, and moral commitments. In his considerations of the genres of the aphorism and the essay, Adorno explicitly comes out on the side of discursive fragmentation as resistance to the illusion of completeness and conceptual systematicity, and as an implicit critique of the false totality. Based on Adorno’s remarks, the term that best describes his fragmentary way of thinking and writing foregrounding its status as a modality of action and its mimetic impulse is gesture. Adorno’s negative dialectics is a gestic mode of reflection, rejecting metaphysical closure and openly pointing towards a utopian horizon.
Critiques of nostalgia, typically from the left, tend to dismiss nostalgic criticism as reactiona... more Critiques of nostalgia, typically from the left, tend to dismiss nostalgic criticism as reactionary and therefore uncritical. By focusing on explicit articulations of nostalgia, such critiques neglect the extent to which they themselves draw on nostalgic resources. Although recent scholarship on nostalgia in the sciences and the humanities has begun to question this long-standing belief in its inherent conservatism, we are still far from appreciating the spectrum of nostalgia’s critical valences. Thus, while critical theory’s affinities with melancholy and negative passions like despair have been widely recognized, few scholars have paused over its nostalgic roots. How, then, can we understand nostalgia not as an ideological position or cultural mood, but as an affective-reflective impulse behind philosophical and socio-theoretical critique? How can we write an intellectual history of nostalgia—and, more specifically, of the developmental relationship between it and critical reflection on history, culture, and society—beyond simply cataloguing moments of ‘nostalgic thinking’ and relying on psychology or neuroscience in identifying it? My paper considers the ‘critical function’ of nostalgia in the modern period by outlining nostalgia’s role in the formation and animation of critical standards, hence, in the development and movement of critique. I conclude by briefly reflecting on the problems this raises for conceptual framing and methodology.
A wide-ranging reflection on human creativity with its main reference points in Kant’s third crit... more A wide-ranging reflection on human creativity with its main reference points in Kant’s third critique and a theological-political problematic found in Deleuze, the essay develops a perspective on creativity that suspends the traditional opposition between creation (genesis, intuition) and judgment (schema, rationality). Taking a sceptical position on epistemic foundations, I show how the so-called problem of the criterion, that is, the quest for a true criterion of knowledge, contributes to fixing the conceptual opposition between creativity and judgment, and obscures their mutual provocation and interaction. This tension and co-determination of creation and judgment, it is argued, give rise to conviction (rather than certainty) as a non-transcendent, immanent criterion.
1. In your view, when does art end and artifice begin? Is there a distinction at all?
2. Is a glo... more 1. In your view, when does art end and artifice begin? Is there a distinction at all? 2. Is a global art history possible, or is such a project a Westernizing imposition on other cultures whose deepest meanings may be incommunicable outside their own spheres? 3. When exhibitions and performances in the physical world became off-limits, the digital realm staged a mental land grab. How much did we relinquish and how much can we ever hope to get back? 4. How has the internet molded the way we write, speak, draw, dance, perform, sculpt, install, build, etc.? What’s missing from this list? 5. Can artificial intelligence create art, or is it a mere facsimile of art? At what point does a robot like Ai-Da become an artist? 6. Are we living in a “post-culture,” in which old habits of mind have been lost and algorithms rule? 7. Is the future of art play?
Dans une rubrique intitulée Lectures surréalistes (Surrealistische Lesestücke), parurent en 1931 ... more Dans une rubrique intitulée Lectures surréalistes (Surrealistische Lesestücke), parurent en 1931 dans la Frankfurter Zeitung de courts billets-comme cette « rencontre » publiés sous pseudonyme. Le premier de leurs deux auteurs s'appelait carl dreyfus (1898-1969) ; le second n'était autre que Theodor Adorno. Sylwia Chrostowska nous fait découvrir ces « miniatures », ces « aperçus micrologiques », restés inédits en français.
Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de ... more Fondé en 1924 par André Breton, le groupe surréaliste a poursuivi ses activités de recherche, de jeux et de création collective jusqu'à nos jours. Lorsqu'en 1969 Jean Schuster et ses acolytes ont décidé unilatéralement de dissoudre le groupe, Michel Zimbacca, Jean-Louis Bédouin, Joyce Mansour, Marianne van Hirtum, Jorge Camacho, réunis avec plusieurs autres autour de Vincent Bounoure, s'y sont refusé. Résolus à poursuivre l'aventure surréaliste ils sont soutenus dans cette initiative par les surréalistes pragois, et les deux groupes publient en 1976 un ouvrage qui fera date : La civilisation surréaliste. Dans les années qui suivent, le Groupe de Paris, que n'ont cessé de rejoindre des membres appartenant à de nouvelles générations, organise de nombreuses expositions collectives et publie plusieurs revues — Bulletin de liaison surréaliste, Surréalisme, SURR (Surréalisme, Utopie, Rêve, Révolte) et maintenant Alcheringa — ainsi qu'un certain nombre de déclarations collectives, rassemblées dans le volume, édité par Guy Girard, Insurrection poétique. Tracts, affiches et déclarations du groupe de Paris du mouvement surréaliste 1970-2010, Paris, Le Temps des Cerises, 2011. Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
French political philosopher Miguel Abensour was centrally concerned with the persistent opening ... more French political philosopher Miguel Abensour was centrally concerned with the persistent opening and closing of the political universe, via emancipation and domination, providing original and formative contributions to democratic and utopian political theory. His call for the articulation of a "critico-utopian political philosophy" sought to understand how the return of political events -irrupting in response to the needs of humanity -raise questions about the nature and meaning of politics and emancipation.
• Philippe Corcuff (IEP Lyon), 'The Levinas-Abensour couple to rethink emancipation to the challe... more • Philippe Corcuff (IEP Lyon), 'The Levinas-Abensour couple to rethink emancipation to the challenge of ultra-conservatism and identitarism' (Remote) • Masaya Wada, 'Miguel Abensour's Concept of Critique as a Core of Democracy' (Doshisha University) (Remote) 10:45am-11:00am Coffee Break
• Philippe Corcuff (IEP Lyon), 'The Levinas-Abensour couple to rethink emancipation to the challe... more • Philippe Corcuff (IEP Lyon), 'The Levinas-Abensour couple to rethink emancipation to the challenge of ultra-conservatism and identitarism' (Remote) • Masaya Wada, 'Miguel Abensour's Concept of Critique as a Core of Democracy' (Doshisha University) (Remote) 10:45am-11:00am Coffee Break
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Books by SD Chrostowska
An alternative history of literary criticism, Literature on Trial marks a shift from earlier studies' focus on aesthetic principles to an emphasis on the development of literary-critical forms. Chrostowska relates cultural and institutional changes in these areas to the formation of literary-critical knowledge. She accounts for the ways in which critical discourse organized itself formally and deemed some genres ‘proper’ while eliminating others. Analysing works by Lessing, Goethe, and Karamzin, among others, Literature on Trial brings a fresh theoretical perspective to the links between genre as a discursive strategy and sociopolitical life.
Papers by SD Chrostowska
Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Pursuing a more practical emancipatory orientation, the article thus contributes an alternative model of utopianism for the purposes of critical theory. Bringing out utopia’s relationship to hope, democratic practices of contestation, and political efficacy, an account of utopia as “conceptual play” strengthens the political purchase of utopia in a way that does not translate it into a particular version of emancipatory politics. The account represents less a “solution” than a different and underexposed way of conceptualizing utopia that addresses the internal limitations on contemporary critical theory’s emancipatory goals. While drawing on a thread in Adorno, it accentuates dialectics over negativity to advance a more robust, ludic utopianism, latent in his work, as an active modality of anticipatory thinking.
How, then, can we understand nostalgia not as an ideological position or cultural mood, but as an affective-reflective impulse behind philosophical and socio-theoretical critique? How can we write an intellectual history of nostalgia—and, more specifically, of the developmental relationship between it and critical reflection on history, culture, and society—beyond simply cataloguing moments of ‘nostalgic thinking’ and relying on psychology or neuroscience in identifying it? My paper considers the ‘critical function’ of nostalgia in the modern period by outlining nostalgia’s role in the formation and animation of critical standards, hence, in the development and movement of critique. I conclude by briefly reflecting on the problems this raises for conceptual framing and methodology.
An alternative history of literary criticism, Literature on Trial marks a shift from earlier studies' focus on aesthetic principles to an emphasis on the development of literary-critical forms. Chrostowska relates cultural and institutional changes in these areas to the formation of literary-critical knowledge. She accounts for the ways in which critical discourse organized itself formally and deemed some genres ‘proper’ while eliminating others. Analysing works by Lessing, Goethe, and Karamzin, among others, Literature on Trial brings a fresh theoretical perspective to the links between genre as a discursive strategy and sociopolitical life.
Comme le note André Breton dans Main première (1962), « Alcheringa » signifie « le temps du rêve », dans la langue aranda des aborigènes d'Australie.
Pursuing a more practical emancipatory orientation, the article thus contributes an alternative model of utopianism for the purposes of critical theory. Bringing out utopia’s relationship to hope, democratic practices of contestation, and political efficacy, an account of utopia as “conceptual play” strengthens the political purchase of utopia in a way that does not translate it into a particular version of emancipatory politics. The account represents less a “solution” than a different and underexposed way of conceptualizing utopia that addresses the internal limitations on contemporary critical theory’s emancipatory goals. While drawing on a thread in Adorno, it accentuates dialectics over negativity to advance a more robust, ludic utopianism, latent in his work, as an active modality of anticipatory thinking.
How, then, can we understand nostalgia not as an ideological position or cultural mood, but as an affective-reflective impulse behind philosophical and socio-theoretical critique? How can we write an intellectual history of nostalgia—and, more specifically, of the developmental relationship between it and critical reflection on history, culture, and society—beyond simply cataloguing moments of ‘nostalgic thinking’ and relying on psychology or neuroscience in identifying it? My paper considers the ‘critical function’ of nostalgia in the modern period by outlining nostalgia’s role in the formation and animation of critical standards, hence, in the development and movement of critique. I conclude by briefly reflecting on the problems this raises for conceptual framing and methodology.
2. Is a global art history possible, or is such a project a Westernizing imposition on other cultures whose deepest meanings may be incommunicable outside their own spheres?
3. When exhibitions and performances in the physical world became off-limits, the digital realm staged a mental land grab. How much did we relinquish and how much can we ever hope to get back?
4. How has the internet molded the way we write, speak, draw, dance, perform, sculpt, install, build, etc.? What’s missing from this list?
5. Can artificial intelligence create art, or is it a mere facsimile of art? At what point does a robot like Ai-Da become an artist?
6. Are we living in a “post-culture,” in which old habits of mind have been lost and algorithms rule?
7. Is the future of art play?