This article considers the notion of an event, of something happening to language, through a reading of Jacques Derrida's Monolingualism of the Other. In particular, the issues of language, translation and the untranslatable are linked to the three forms of madness that Derrida distinguishes. The paper, in turn, contends that there are only target languages, or again, that all languages are in fact target languages, languages-to-come, and that this experience of language is the only test worthy of the untranslatable. The (...) madness of language is thus associated with the singularity of not only every language and every speaker, but also with the non-programmable character of language. The literature of Kafka and Celan, among others, is henceforth invoked as exemplary, and examined as both an intra-lingual and inter-lingual event. The overall aim is to disrupt the Globish of global communication and the nationalism of linguistic proprietorship. (shrink)

Relaying reflections from Les Mouches, Morts sans sépulture, Les mains sales and Huis-clos to some important arguments concerning death in L’Etre et le néant, the author discusses the relation between death and freedom. Criticizing Martin Heidegger’s views on Sein zum Tode, Jean-Paul Sartre argues that one’s relation to death deeply implies relations with the others, the living, but also the dead ones. The experience of death being absurd, the others are those who can make it meaningful, in the same way (...) that I do for their own death. Sartre’s philosophy of freedom defends the original choice of the ones that I will remember and cherish, in a community that is more important than the living one: the community established beyond death. (shrink)

At the end of the Second World War, the figure of Gandhi haunts political philosophy as it wrestles with the task of justifying violence in the name of history. The story begins with Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at noon in 1938. Gandhi’s name appears during a discussion between Roubachof and Ivanof. A few years later (1946), Koestler publishes in French a book entitled Le Yogi et le commissaire, analysed by Merleau-Ponty in Humanisme et terreur (1946–1947). Camus replies in L’Homme révolté (1951). (...) Ricœur’s thinking, examined in the present article, has its own place in this debate. At stake is our own knowledge of the conditions under which the rejection and condemnation of violence might, in fact, accommodate violence. (shrink)

“The Continuous War: note on the sense of the world and the thought of death” is a free commentary on the last chapter of Heretical Essays, “Wars of the Twentieth Century”. It takes as a guiding thread a reflection on the reasons for which, as Patočka suggests, “even in peace, war continues”. It finds these reasons both in the way in which we are bound to the fear of death, and in the sense of the world determined by that bind. (...) It poses the question as to the extent to whichthis calls for another meaning of the world. (shrink)

This article, inspired by the Derridean thinking of hospitality, attempts to reflect upon the conditions of peace and hospitality, taking a reading of Kant's ‘Toward Perpetual Peace’ as its guiding thread. It endeavours to show that the peace that inhospitable nations maintain between themselves is necessarily illusory, as they continue to amass the restrictive conditions of their hospitality. The hypothesis is proposed that the guiding thread that links the elements of the hyperbolic ethics that Derrida deploys in his ‘questions of (...) responsibility’ seminars indeed concerns this unconditional condition of peace, of which hospitality is the first law. (shrink)

In taking up the question of translation as its guiding thread, this essay considers the extent to which deconstruction consists in a radical calling into question of the type of thought and practice of translation implied in what Derrida has called "the passage into philosophy." At the same time, a whole other thought of translation —of the very kind that Derrida put into practice—is demanded insofar as something like the survival of works and the very possibility of a tradition are (...) at stake. (shrink)

À quelques années d’intervalle, Heidegger et Musil s’interrogent tous deux sur ce qui fait obstacle à la compréhension mutuelle des peuples. Tandis que le premier en découvre la raison dans l’insuffisante méditation de la mission historique propre à chacun (obscurcie par les concepts de race et d’organisation), Musil dénonce dans l’idéalisation de la nation et de l’État une véritable maladie de la pensée – celle-là même qui empêche la mise au jour d’un « amorphisme humain » originel et universel.

Ce que les philosophes ont pu dire de la particularite de la (des) langue(s) dans lesquelles ils s'expriment, du rapport entre les idiomes philosophiques, de leur classification et de leur traduction repond a un double souci: circonscrire (ou elargir) la communaute de ceux auxquels ils s'adressent, designer la situation historique et annoncer le destin du nous qui se trouve ainsi determine. Le genie des langues est alors, le plus souvent, l'operateur logique qui permet le repli de la communaute sur ce (...) nous particulier, en meme temps qu'il lui assigne une mission universelle. De ces differents enjeux, plusieurs oeuvres temoignent, de facon exemplaire: celle de Nietzsche d'abord, dont le devenir epouse ces differents cas de figure; mais aussi celles de Heidegger, Rosenzweig ou Adorno. (shrink)

Dans « L’éternel retour et la pensée de la mort », la pensée nietzschéenne de la mort est interrogée dans l’horizon de sa promesse. Il s’agit de mettre en évidence comment la « prophétie » de l’éternel retour, si elle existe, n’est rien d’autre que l’annonce d’un autre rapport à la mort – d’une autre façon, plus qu’humaine, d’affronter simultanément l’expérience de la finitude et l’épreuve du deuil.In der folgenden Ueberlegung über « Ewige Wiederkiehr und Denken über den Tod » (...) wird die Gesinnung Nietzsche’s über Tod in der Perspektive seines Versprechens. Es handelt sich dabei auszulegen, dass die « Prophezeiung » der ewigen Wiederkehr, wenn sie besteht, nichts anderes ist, als die Verkündung eines anderen Verhältnisses zum Tode nach einer mehr als menschlichen, verschiedenen Weise, welche erlaubt, sich dem Erlebnis der Endlichkeit und der Probe des Trauerns zugleich zu stellen. (shrink)

This essay situates “singularity” at the heart of the power dynamics operative in contemporary pedagogy and the system supporting it. More than merely academic learning, indeed, “school” here denotes not only the range of disciplinary authorities at work within the classroom and the educational system at large but also discursive obedience to knowledge. Supported by close readings of Arendt and Derrida, this paper thus argues that nothing less than the formation of identity is at stake in “school.” What are the (...) boundaries, limits, and conditions of possibility for a student’s invention of his or her own singularity within an institution and curriculum that, at the same time, demands obedience to authority? This paradoxical formation of identity within the constrictive demands of authority constitutes the primary task of thinking the “invention of singularity” at the heart of schooling in conjunction with democracy, language, vocation, and ideology. (shrink)

This article reflects on the crisis of political reason in this heyday of populistic rhetoric, proposing to move beyond the erroneous dichotomy between?democratic reason? and?raging passions,? and the demo-phobia that often derives from it. We propose instead to follow Bourdieu?s footsteps in bringing our attention to the forms of impermeability that fracture our contemporary political and social life, establishing the conditions of possibility of the reasonable and the unreasonable. What marks contemporary political passions as particularly dangerous is their impermeability to (...) the lessons of our historical past, to the moral condemnation of the political instrumentalization of difference and to the sacred character of fundamental principles. This hermeneutical gap, however, is later explained by a more fundamental analysis of the problem of contemporary impermeability, one which operates as a reversal of the dichotomy between political reason and passion. It is no longer the electorate, seduced by the sirens of populism, which is impermeable to the voice of political reason; it is, instead, this very reason, embodied by the elites who claim to recognize themselves in its values and principles, which has become impermeable to the?conditions of non-existence? in which a considerable part of the population lives. If there is a problem of contemporary impermeability, or imperturbability, it is that of a political discourse that has lost touch with?all the misery of the world?. (shrink)

This text discusses the impact of immersive technologies on our identity and relationship to digital and analogue modalities in a non-normative way. It references the work of Joseph Beuys, specifically his iconic performance of being confined with a coyote in a gallery space for three days, to construct connections between borders, edges, limits and identity, face presentation, representation and projection towards ourselves and our audiences. We reference the works of Marcel Duchamp and George Orwell and compare the immersive devices of (...) the nineteenth century to current technology. Various works of art and literature are used to illustrate the impact of technology on society and the individual’s relationship to the collective imagination. The text raises questions about the limits or nonlimits of exposure of identity through machinic and technological devices or processes in the context of privacy of expression in a contemporary networked world. (shrink)

This thought-provoking collection sheds light on the plight of our nonhuman primate cousins--and what we can do to help.

Giorgio Colli ha sido uno de los autores contemporáneos que más han contribuido a revisar la figura de Apolo, entendiéndola como una potencia expresiva vinculada tanto a los designios asociados a su arco como a los coligados a su lira. Una ambigüedad expresiva que examinamos en este artículo y que, veremos, articulará simbólicamente la reforma histórica que Colli detectará en el paso de la sabiduría oral a la filosofía griega escrita, pero también la que se producirá entre una ontología-política arcaica (...) de ámbito contingente y una politeia, ya clásica, ligada a la necesidad, y de carácter retórico, estetizado y comunicativo. (shrink)

Health authorities increasingly request that general practitioners use information and communication technologies such as electronic patient records for accountability purposes. This article deals with the use of EPRs among general practitioners in Britain. It examines two ways in which GPs use the EPR for accountability purposes. One way is to generate audit reports on the basis of the information that has been entered into the record. The other is to let the computer intervene in the clinical process through prompts. The (...) article argues that GPs' ambivalence toward using the EPR makes them active in finding ways that turn the EPR into a meaningful tool for them, that is, a tool that helps them provide what they see as good care. The article's main contribution is to show how accountability and autonomy are coproduced; less professional autonomy does not follow from more requests to document one's work. Instead, new forms of autonomy are produced in the sociotechnical network that is made up by health policy and local engagements with patients and technology. (shrink)

The common view of the “Arab street” fails to capture essential dimensions of the role of public opinion and public discourse in the politics of Arab states. The rising importance of transnational Arab television and print media has created a public arena outside the control of states. Arguments about issues of shared concern in this Arabist public sphere have had important implications for political identity, beliefs, expectations, and behavior. Arab responses to the ongoing crisis in Iraq demonstrate the political significance (...) of these debates. (shrink)

"We are omniscient but confused," says Leibniz. He also says that we live in the best of all possible worlds, yet do not causally interact. So what are we? Leibniz is known for many things, including the ideality of space and time, calculus, plans for a universal language, theodicy, and ecumenism. But he is not known for his ideas on the self and personal identity. This book shows that Leibniz offers an original, internally coherent theory of personal identity, a theory (...) that stands on its own even next to Locke's contemporaneous and more famous version. This book will appeal not only to students of Leibniz's thought but also to philosophers and psychologists interested in methodological problems in understanding or formulating theories of self and personal identity. (shrink)

La publication des Inédits laisse émerger dans les notes et réflexions d’Emmanuel Levinas un véritable « corpus » de notations autour de la métaphore. L’article cherche à ressaisir le mouvement de pensée qui traverse cette attention portée à un thème moins explicitement présent dans l’œuvre publiée. Il montre que Levinas se dégage des perspectives rhétoriques classiques et se démarque de Husserl, Heidegger et Merleau-Ponty, en décelant dans le « mouvement d’amplification au-delà » porté par la métaphore, l’essence même du langage. (...) Il tente ensuite de retracer le lien qui lie « l’au-delà » (dont les métaphores du langage expriment la transcendance de pur jeu) et la « hauteur » (dont le visage est Dire dans la trace de l’absolument Autre). Il s’efforce enfin d’expliciter ce que Levinas – qui désigne Dieu tel l’Irrévélé de la responsabilité éthique – veut signifier par cette notation surprenante : « sans métaphore on ne peut pas entendre la voix de Dieu »! L’article se conclut par quelques remarques sur la rupture du mouvement de la métaphore vers l’insaisissable de la passivité du créé et sur l’usage de l’emphase hyperbolique dans Autrement qu’être ou au-delà de l’essence. (shrink)