Abstract:Nicolette Bragg asks Grant Farred about the legacy of his text Martin Heidegger Saved My Life and what it means to think.

In _Entre Nous_ Grant Farred examines the careers of international football stars Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez, along with his own experience playing for an amateur township team in apartheid South Africa, to theorize the relationship between sports and the intertwined experiences of relation, separation, and belonging. Drawing on Jean-Luc Nancy's concept of relation and Heideggerian ontology, Farred outlines how various relationships—the significantly different relationships Messi has with his club team FC Barcelona and the Argentine national team; Farred's shifting modes (...) of relation as he moved between his South African team and his Princeton graduate student team; and Suarez's deep bond with Uruguay's national team coach Oscar Tabarez—demonstrate the ways the politics of relation both exist within and transcend sports. Farred demonstrates that approaching sports philosophically offers particularly insightful means of understanding the nature of being in the world, thereby opening new paths for exploring how the self is constituted in its relation to the other. (shrink)

‘The Final “Thank You”’ uses the work of Jacques Derrida and Friedrich Nietzsche to think the occasion of the 1995 rugby World Cup, hosted by the newly democratic South Africa. This paper deploys Nietzsche's Zarathustra to critique how a figure such as Nelson Mandela is understood as a ‘Superman’ or an ‘Overhuman’ in the moment of political transition. The philosophical focus of the paper, however, turns on the ‘thank yous’ exchanged by the white South African rugby captain, François Pienaar, and (...) the black president at the event of the Springbok victory. It is the value, and the proximity and negation, of the ‘thank yous’ – the relation of one to the other – that constitutes the core of the article.1. (shrink)

This book probes the cultural forces and legacies at play in three events in sports history, exploring how racial, national, sporting, and personal identities overlap and conflict. The author taps into a deep well of Western philosophy and literature to read the resonances in these three moments.

“The Fourth Spartacus” uses Alain Badiou’s work, especially Logics of Worlds, to critique the 1976 Soweto student rebellion. Soweto 1976 is one of the key events in black South African anti-apartheid history. Taking its cue from the figure of Spartacus, a figure that assumes many iterations in political history, this essay argues for a fidelity to the event of Soweto 1976: the recognition that Soweto 1976 must be understood as a radical moment that is not continuous with the preceding and, (...) particularly, successive moments of anti-apartheid struggle. Soweto 1976, “The Fourth Spartacus” insists, did not culminate, as the dominant political narrative in post-apartheid South Africa claims, in the democratic elections of 1994. More than anything, the event of Soweto 1976 stands determinedly opposed to the democratic materialism of post-apartheid South Africa. (shrink)

It is dwelling that allows mortals to initiate themselves in time and space. As such, dwelling constitutes the event of being. In his essay “Building Dwelling Thinking,” Martin Heidegger stipulates that dwelling can only be achieved through harmonious relations among the constituents, earth, sky, mortals and gods, of the “fourfold.” Heidegger writes, “To preserve the fourfold, to save the earth, to receive the sky, to await the divinities, to initiate mortals – this fourfold preserving is the simple essence of dwelling.” (...) Initiating themselves in time and space is the great difficulty that the residents of Ilmorog, the remote village in postcolonial Kenya in which Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s novel Petals of Blood is set, experience; in Petals of Blood, dwelling is what defines mortals’ being. (shrink)

Philosophy, Arab Philosophy; 20th century.

Taking up Jacques Derrida as a figure of thought in relation to Africa, this edited collection poses the questions: What is Derrida to Africa? And, its corollary, what is Africa to Derrida?

Philosophical anthropology is a tradition that is as old as philosophy itself, so much so that it might be said to be indistinguishable from philosophy itself. Philosophical anthropology, extending as it does from Socrates to Sartre, best describes the work of V.Y. Mudimbe. Anthropology, broadly conceived as the science that studies human origins, the material and cultural development of humanity, is always Mudimbe’s first line of philosophical inquiry. It is certainly Mudimbe’s interest in anthropology that allows him to conduct his (...) investigations into Africa, its modes of thinking, and colonialism and its continuing effects on the continent. Writing on the latter issue in The Invention of Africa, Mudimbe, with his customary deftness of mind, argues that colonialism and its aftermath cannot by itself account for the continent’s extant condition: “The colonizing structure, even in its most extreme manifestations... might not be the only explanation for Africa’s present-day marginality. Perhaps this marginality could, more essentially, be understood from the perspective of wider hypotheses about the classification of beings and societies.” [ Making sense of Africa, in Mudimbe’s terms, must begin with a hypothesization that explicates how “beings and societies” come to be classified, the anthropological undertaking par excellence, which also requires a study of the forces that construct, implement and maintain these classifications. (shrink)

The article investigates the significance of syntax in the multilingual EU law. It attempts to respond to the question whether syntax is apt to contribute to the uniformity of that law and how, with regard to this function, it relates to the (widely disputed yet uncontested) semantic and pragmatic methods of achieving such a uniformity. In order to respond to this question, the article firstly, recalls fundamental concepts which would help conceptualize the endeavour and, secondly, presents examples of analysis of (...) syntax arrangements which can be deemed representative for the study of the said problem of contribution. The study finds that EU law (expressed in 24 official languages which have equal authentic status) relies on diversified syntax of its respective constitutive languages. Syntax structures used in respective language versions of EU law represent narrower, law-specific, form of syntax structures available in these languages. Its specificity is determined mostly by legislative traditions of respective EU member states. Syntactic structures of EU law produced in different official languages do not represent a single pattern because of diversified mode of producing illocutionary value of provisions in which strongly idiomatic modal verbs (modal operators) and even special modal structures (not necessarily containing modal verbs) are used to express legal norms. They also differ when it comes to their law-specific compositionality, i.e. flexibility of different syntax structure to produce the same meaning and, in the same time, to preserve their genre/register informational value. Notwithstanding, these structures have well pronounced and system-significant common features within respective Germanic, Romanic, and Slavic families of languages in which EU law is mostly reproduced. The sentence structure and the relevant register of EU law provisions are the same for respective versions of EU texts of law expressed in the languages belonging to the respective three language families which were examined for the sake of this study. These common features are re-enforced by the synoptic mode of producing EU law which imposes formal resemblance of provisions reproduced in respective EU official languages to each other. The multilingual EU legislator also uses patterns which grant legal text the relevant register, yet its specific EU character ultimately transpires through semantic aspects of EU texts rather than their mere syntax. The unity of the system is achieved most strongly through the EU specific interpretation, where the teleological methods (which can be conceived as a language means to achieve EU law goals and objectives at the pragmatic level) are of utmost importance. Thus, there is no EU-specific syntax which would, as such, contribute to unity of EU law. Instead, unity is achieved in the area of semantics and pragmatics. The well exposed anaphoric character of EU law (as any other type of law) may contribute to narrowing down possibility for differentiation of respective language versions of EU law. (shrink)

This essay uses Derrida's concept of autoimmunity to critique Homeland, a television show that deals with an American prisoner of war who has been ‘turned’ into an operative for an al Queda-like movement. Autoimmunity is critical to thinking the ways in which the existence of a turned POW within the state, who belongs visibly to the state, presents a particularly heteronomic challenge to how the distinction between Self and Other operates. This Self who has taken up the cause of the (...) Other presents, this essay argues, an infinitely greater threat to the state precisely because it cannot be identified as Other, precisely because bears no ostensible traces of the Other. (shrink)

This essay considers James Baldwin's The Fire Next Time as a philosophical contemplation on love. Drawing on sources such as the Bible, Jacques Derrida, and a host of Baldwin critics, this essay understands the Christian love of The Fire Next Time as asymmetrical. The asymmetry of love derives from its understanding of love as the responsibility to Self and Other that demands no reciprocation. Asymmetrical love makes itself vulnerable before the Other and, most importantly, it is a love that risks (...) itself absolutely by offering love to those who will do violence to the subject who gives love. (shrink)

On Islam and state, and Islamic philosophy.

Critical study of Asfār al-arbaʻah fī al-ḥikmah, written by Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī on Islamic philosophy.

This collection of essays marks the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Frantz Fanon’s classic study of anticolonial struggle, _The Wretched of the Earth_. Scholars explore the relevance of Fanon’s work for current modes of psychoanalysis, postcolonial theory, and political thought. One contributor reposes a classic question of postcolonial scholarship: what does it mean for a colonial Caribbean man to practice a Continental intellectual tradition? Others identify Fanon’s experiences working at a mental institution in colonial French Algeria as a powerful (...) influence on his psychoanalytic perspective. This issue revitalizes Fanon’s canonical status as Third World theorist by asserting that the main imperatives of Fanon’s work remain as urgent as ever: combating the psychic and physical violence of colonialism, achieving real forms of liberation for colonized peoples, and ending the degradation of people of color. Contributors: Matthew Abraham, Gerard Aching, John E. Drabinski, Grant Farred, Nigel C. Gibson, Priyamvada Gopal, Joy James, Ranjana Khanna, Alfred J. López, Miguel Mellino, Simon Morgan Wortham, Richard Pithouse Grant Farred is Professor of Africana Studies and English at Cornell University. He is the former editor of the _South Atlantic Quarterly_ and the author, most recently, of_ Long Distance Love: A Passion for Football_. (shrink)

This special issue of the _South Atlantic Quarterly_ focuses on theory’s role in contemporary politics, reading, and critiques of literature. Although there will always be questions raised about what theory is, what it can do, and its overall efficacy, “Theory Now” argues that those questions obscure the fact that theory is, and always has been, the precondition for thought. This issue demonstrates what it means to engage with theory in this particular historical moment. One contributor takes a critical look at (...) Michel Foucault’s final lectures, which have only recently been published in French, and evaluates their potential to instruct contemporary theory and politics. Another contributor contemplates Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick’s legacy and insists that the only way to read her work is to anticipate the effects it may have in the future rather than assume that interpretations of her scholarship are now settled. With this issue, recently appointed editor Michael Hardt inaugurates “Against the Day,” a new section composed of short essays that focus on a topic of contemporary political importance. (shrink)

Rational decision making depends on what one believes, what one desires, and what one knows. In conventional decision models, beliefs are represented by probabilities and desires are represented by utilities. Software agents are knowledgeable entities capable of managing their own set of beliefs and desires, and they can decide upon the next operation to execute autonomously. They are also interactive entities capable of filtering communications and managing dialogues. Knowledgeability includes representing knowledge about the external world, reasoning with it, and sharing (...) it. Interactions include negotiations to perform tasks in cooperative, coordinative, and competitive ways. In this paper we focus on decision-making mechanisms for agent-based systems on the basis of agent interaction. We identify possible interaction scenarios and define mechanisms for decision making in uncertain environments. It is believed that software agents will become the underlying technology that offers the capability of distribution of competence, control, and information for the next generation of ubiquitous, distributed, and heterogeneous information systems. (shrink)

This response to Bruce Janz’s African Philosophy and Enactivist Cognition (2023) uses the work of Martin Heidegger and Stanley Cavell to understand the relationship among philosophy, thinking, and place and, most crucially, Africa as a place from which philosophy might be thought, that is, might be proposed as native to philosophy. Invoking the late Heidegger, for whom thinking presents itself as the question, and Cavell’s use of Ralph Waldo Emerson as a thinker native to America, the difficulty is raised as (...) to how these relations manifest themselves in Janz’s Enactivist Cognition. (shrink)

Introduction: sport and the event -- Ron Artest: the black body at rest (Alain Badiou) -- Eric Cantona: the body in motion (Gilles Deleuze) -- Zinedine Zidane: coup de boule (Jacques Derrida) -- Epilogue: being, event, and the philosophy of sport.