Many different versions of cultural studies have emerged in the past decades. While during its dramatic period of global expansion in the 1980s and 1990s, cultural studies was often identified with...

French theorist Jean Baudrillard is one of the foremost contemporary critics of society and culture who is often seen as the guru of French postmodern theory. A prolific author who has written over twenty books, reflections on art and aesthetics are an important, if not central, aspect of his work. Although his writings exhibit many twists, turns, and surprising developments as he moved from synthesizing Marxism and semiotics to a prototypical postmodern theory, interest in art remains a constant of his (...) theoretical investigations and literary experiments. (shrink)

Kellner writes, "As we move into the 1990s critical theory might help produce theoretical and political perspectives which could be part of a Left Turn that could reanimate the political hopes of the 1960s, while helping overcome and reverse the losses and regression of the 1980s.".

We investigate the statement “all automorphisms of ${\mathcal {P}}(\lambda )/[\lambda ]^{<\lambda }$ are trivial.” We show that MA implies the statement for regular uncountable $\lambda <2^{\aleph _0}$, that the statement is false for measurable $\lambda $ if $2^\lambda =\lambda ^+$, and that for “densely trivial” it can be forced (together with $2^\lambda =\lambda ^{++}$ ) for inaccessible $\lambda $.

In my engagement with Stefan Müller-Doohm’s Habermas: A Biography, I argue that Müller-Doohm presents Habermas’s life and theoretical development, demonstrating a line of continuity through Habermas’s first published book on the public sphere to his later work on communicative action, and how this theme provides a guiding thread throughout Habermas’s work and constitutes one of his major contributions to contemporary theory, which is also highly relevant to and intersects with Habermas’s activism. Further, he documents Habermas’s trajectory from his early theoretical (...) works through his linguistic turn to the present. The study demonstrates how Habermas’s philosophical work from his early theory of the public sphere to his linguistic turn establishes Habermas’s theme of communicative action as a major philosophical contribution which has relevance for the many theoretical and political texts Habermas has produced in his long, distinguished, and immensely productive career. Yet, in a concluding critical section, I argue that Müller-Doohm does not adequately engage with Habermas’s theoretical conceptions, downplaying his philosophical achievements while failing to explore relevant theoretical literature and philosophical debates on Habermas that have accompanied his work for decades. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Life and Times of a Revolutionary Hegelian Dialectics, Philosophy, and Science Historical Materialism and Modern Societies Capital and Counterrevolution Socialism and Revolution Marx, “the Battle for Democracy,” and the Realm of Freedom Crisis, Revolutionary Historicism, and the Transition to Socialism The Limitations of Classical Marxism Marx in the Present Age.

This paper compares and contrasts two infinite regress arguments against higher-order theories of consciousness that were put forward by the Buddhist epistemologists Dignāga (ca. 480–540 CE) and Dharmakīrti (ca. 600–660). The two arguments differ considerably from each other, and they also differ from the infinite regress argument that scholars usually attribute to Dignāga or his followers. The analysis shows that the two philosophers, in these arguments, work with different assumptions for why an object-cognition must be cognised: for Dignāga it must (...) be cognised in order to enable subsequent memory of it, for Dharmakīrti it must be cognised if it is to cognise an object. (shrink)

During the Gulf war, CNN correspondent Peter Arnett distinguished himself with its courageous reporting in Iraq while under fire by the U.S.-led coalition which dropped more bombs on Iraq than were unleashed in World War II. Reporting live from Baghdad throughout the war, Arnett provided vivid daily accounts of life in Iraq during one of the most sustained air attacks in history. From his live telephone reporting of the early hours of the U.S. attack on Iraq in January 1991 through (...) his live satellite reports of the effects of the daily bombing of Iraq, Arnett distinguished himself through his attempts to cut through the lies and disinformation of both sides and to provide accurate reporting on the effects of the U.S.-led coalition assault against Iraq. (shrink)

The translation of Pierre Klossowski's Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle finally provides an English-speaking audience with access to one of the most influential texts in the French Nietzsche tradition. First published in France in 1969, Klossowski's text consummated over three decades of intense work and discussion on Nietzsche's most enigmatic and original ideas. Working with Bataille and the famous College de Sociologie, Klossowski published a series of important studies of Nietzsche culminating in Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle which Foucault described (...) in a letter to Klossowski as "the greatest book of philosophy I have read" in addition to Nietzsche himself. Deeply influencing Deleuze, Lyotard, and other major Nietzscheans, Klossowski's work remains a seminal text of the contemporary French reading of Nietzsche. (shrink)

Sergi Eisenstein's Potemkin provides a powerful example of how a film can present a revolutionary and socialist political perspective and ideology. A thoroughly modernist film, Potemkin is highly innovative in form and is often taken as a model of editing; it has regularly appeared on many lists of the greatest films of all time and since its release in 1925 has been a major critical success. Formally, the film embodies Eisenstein’s theory of montage, that the juxtaposition of images can generate (...) meanings and on the level of ideology, the film serves as effective propaganda for the Bolsheviks. (shrink)

Baudrillard, Jean (1929) was born in the cathedral town of Reims, France. His grandparents were peasants, his parents became civil servants, and he was the first member of his family to pursue an advanced education. In 1956, he began working as a professor of secondary education in a French high school (Lyceé) and in the early 1960s did editorial work for the French publisher Seuil. Trained as a Germanist, Baudrillard translated Germany literary works including Brecht and Peter Weiss, although he (...) turned to the study of sociology and for some decades was a sociology professor at Nanterre. (shrink)

Moreover, presidential politics on the level of campaigns and governing have also exhibited a growing politics of the image and spectacle. In our media-saturated society, politicians become celebrities who fine tune their image through daily photo opportunities, spin out their message of the day, and, like celebrities, employ image management firms to make sure that their performance is playing well with the public.

Geçtiğimiz onca yıl içinde kültürel çalışmaların birçok farklı biçimleri ortaya çıkmıştır. 1980’lerde ve 1990’lardaki küresel genişleme döneminde, kültürel çalışmalar genellikle İngiltere Birmingham’daki Çağdaş Kültürel Çalışmalar Merkezi’nde geliştirilen kültür ve toplum anlayışıyla tanımlanmıştır. Onların kültüre sosyolojik, materyalist ve politik yaklaşımları 20. yüzyılın kültürel Marksizmine dayanır. 20. yüzyıl Marksist teorisyenleri arasında yer alan Georg Lukacs, Antonio Gramsci, Ernst Bloch, Walter Benjamin ve T.W. Adorno’dan Fredric Jameson ve Terry Eagleton’a kadar uzanan birçok düşünür, Marksist teoriyi kültürel formların üretiminin, toplum ve tarihle olan bağını, (...) kitleler ve sosyal hayat üzerindeki etki ve etkileşimlerinin ilişkisini incelemek için kullanmıştır. Kültürel Marksizm, kültürel çalışmaların ve onun günümüzdeki çeşitli tür ve biçimlerine dayanak noktası olması açısından önem arz etmektedir. (shrink)

Knowledge: to know is to love -- Love: Abraham, Moses, and the meaning of circumcision -- Seasons: Hanukah and Purim reconfigured -- Women: marital and universal peace -- Holiness: commandments as intruments -- Asseverations: socila responsibility and sanctifying God's name -- Agriculture: sanctifying all human beings -- Temple service: the divinity of the comandments -- Offerings: the morality of the commandments -- Reitual purity: intellectual and moral purity -- Damages: who is a Jew? -- Acquision: slavery versus universal humkanity -- (...) Civil laws: God of Aristotle in the God of Abraham -- Judges: Messianic universalism -- Appendix: Maimonides' cosmic paradigm. (shrink)

The U.S. has an out-of-control gun culture making it possible to buy weapons ranging from small but deadly pistols to weapons of mass destruction like the AK-47 assault rifle used in the Uvalde kil...

For \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${f,g\in\omega^\omega}$$\end{document} let \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${c^\forall_{f,g}}$$\end{document} be the minimal number of uniform g-splitting trees needed to cover the uniform f-splitting tree, i.e., for every branch ν of the f-tree, one of the g-trees contains ν. Let \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${c^\exists_{f,g}}$$\end{document} be the dual notion: For every branch ν, one of the g-trees guesses ν(m) infinitely often. We show that (...) it is consistent that \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${c^\exists_{f_\epsilon,g_\epsilon}{=}c^\forall_{f_\epsilon,g_\epsilon}{=}\kappa_\e psilon}$$\end{document} for continuum many pairwise different cardinals \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\kappa_\epsilon}$$\end{document} and suitable pairs \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${(f_\epsilon,g_\epsilon)}$$\end{document}. For the proof we introduce a new mixed-limit creature forcing construction. (shrink)

The role of art in Marcuse’s work has often been neglected, misinterpreted or underplayed. His critics accused him of a religion of art and aesthetics that leads to an escape from politics and society. Yet, as this volume demonstrates, Marcuse analyzes culture and art in the context of how it produces forces of domination and resistance in society, and his writings on culture and art generate the possibility of liberation and radical social transformation. The material in this volume is a (...) rich collection of many of Marcuse’s published and unpublished writings, interviews and talks, including ‘Lyric Poetry after Auschwitz’, reflections on Proust, and Letters on Surrealism; a poem by Samuel Beckett for Marcuse’s eightieth birthday with exchange of letters; and many articles that explore the role of art in society and how it provides possibilities for liberation. This volume will be of interest to those new to Marcuse, generally acknowledged as a major figure in the intellectual and social milieus of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as to the specialist, giving access to a wealth of material from the Marcuse Archive in Frankfurt and his private collection in San Diego, some of it published here in English for the first time. A comprehensive introduction by Douglas Kellner reflects on the genesis, development, and tensions within Marcuse’s aesthetic, while an afterword by Gerhard Schweppenhäuser summarizes their relevance for the contemporary era. (shrink)

Herbert Marcuse gained world renown during the 1960s as a philosopher, social theorist, and political activist, celebrated in the media as the “father of the New Left.” University professor and author of many books and articles, Marcuse won notoriety when he was perceived as both an influence on and defender of the “New Left” in the United States and Europe. His theory of “one‐dimensional” society provided critical perspectives on contemporary capitalist and state communist societies, and his notion of “the great (...) refusal” won him renown as a theorist of revolutionary change and “liberation from the affluent society.” Consequently, he became one of the most influential intellectuals in the United States during the 1960s and early 1970s. However, ultimately, it may be his contributions to philosophy that are most significant, and in this article I shall attempt to specify Marcuse's contributions to contemporary philosophy and his place in the narrative of Continental philosophy. (shrink)

The article explores the question whether there was a possible dialogue between ancient Greek and Mesopotamian chronography. This is an interesting albeit challenging subject due to the fragmentary preservation of the Greek texts. The idea that cuneiform tablets might have influenced the development of the genre in Greece lingers in the background without having been the subject of detailed discussion. Notably the Neo-Assyrian limmu list has been suggested as a possible blueprint for the Athenian archon list. In order to examine (...) this topic further, a thorough analysis of ancient Greek chronography starting in the second half of the fifth century BC, when eponymous dates in various literary compositions begin to appear, is required. A close examination of the fragmentary evidence shows how difficult it is to trace the supposed annalistic style in the local histories of Athens (Atthides). In the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the eponymous limmu officials served as the chronological backbone, but there remains a huge time gap between the seventh century cuneiform manuscripts and the Athenian archon list from the fifth century. A comparison of the Neo-Assyrian Eponymous Chronicles with the preserved Greek chronographic traditions in Eusebius’ chronicle (fourth century AD) shows that the similarity is mainly confined to an abbreviated style, as the entries clearly point to the different cultural and political settings. Apart from the Neo-Assyrian sources, the Neo- and Late-Babylonian chronicles deserve further attention in the present inquiry. Looking for a connection with ancient Greek chronography in the fifth century, the lack of wholly preserved texts on both sides in the corresponding time constitutes an unsurmountable obstacle. Presenting and scrutinising the textual evidence both for ancient Greek and for Mesopotamian chronography enables an improved understanding of similarities and differences alike. To exemplify this point, Greek and Akkadian temple histories serve as test cases. (shrink)

Moreover, presidential politics -- on the level of campaigns and governing -- have also exhibited a growing politics of image and spectacle. In our media-saturated society, politicians become celebrities who fine-tune their image through daily photo ops, spin out their message of the day and, like celebrities, employ image management firms to make sure their performance is playing well with the public.

There is nothing I want more than to become enlightened about the whole highly complicated system of antagonisms that constitute the 'modern world' (Nietzsche).

An interesting question arises in the context of the typically medieval description of the universe presented at the beginning of Maimonides' (1138–1204) great law code, theMishneh Torah. What was Maimonides' own attitude towards that account? Was it meant only as a statement of the best description of nature available at the time (and thus radically distinct from thehalakhic(i.e. Jewish legal) matters which make up the bulk of theMishneh Torah) or was it meant to be a description of the true nature (...) of the universe as it really is, not subject to revision in the light of new paradigms or new models (and thus essentially similar to thehalakhicmatters in the text)? Answering this question will lead us to a better understanding of Maimonides' understanding of the nature of science and of what I shall call, for lack of a better term, scientific progress. Maimonides will be shown to hold that while sublunar science can reach perfection and completion such is not possible for superlunar science and that to the extent that the scientific matters in theMishneh Torahdeal with the latter they could not have been presented as the final description of the universe as it truly is. (shrink)

Derndinger [2] and Krupa [5] defined the F-product of a semigroup and presented some applications . Wolff investigated some kind of nonstandard analogon and applied it to spectral theory of group representations. The question arises in which way these constructions are related. In this paper we show that the classical and the nonstandard F-product are isomorphic . We also prove a little “classical” corollary.

This contribution serves as an invitation to a renewed exploration of Herbert Marcuse’s critical theory. It discloses his continued relevance for critical social theory and politics in the contemporary moment and why Marcuse should not be condemned to the dustbin of history but should be appropriated and developed in our contemporary conditions in which crises are multiplying.

Maimonides' Guide of the Perplexed addressed Jews of his day who felt challenged by apparent contradictions between Torah and science. We Are Not Alone: A Maimonidean Theology of the Other uses Maimonides' writings to address Jews of today who are perplexed by apparent contradictions between the morality of the Torah and their conviction that all human beings are created in the image of God and are the object of divine concern, that other religions have value, that genocide is never justified, (...) and that slavery is evil. Individuals who choose to emphasize the moral and universalist elements of Jewish tradition can often find support in positions explicitly held by Maimonides or implied by his teachings. We Are Not Alone offers an ethical and universalist vision of traditionalist Judaism. (shrink)