Literary Testimonies and Fictional Experiences

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 197-223
Author(s):  
Lovisa Andén ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Absence Of Evidence ◽  
Varlam Shalamov

This article discusses the role of Gulag literature in connection to testimony, literature and historical documentation. Drawing on the thoughts of Jacques Derrida and Hannah Arendt, the article examines the difficulty of witnesses being believed in the absence of evidence. In particular, the article focuses on the vulnerability of the Gulag authors, due to the ongoing Soviet repression at the time of their writing. It examines the interplay between the repression and the literature that exposed it. The article contends that the fictionalization of Gulag literature enabled the authors to go further in challenging Soviet repression. Focusing on the fictional accounts written by Varlam Shalamov and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, it argues that the fictionalized Gulag literature makes the experience of the camp universe possible to imagine for those outside, allowing readers to believe in an experience that otherwise seems incredible.

scholarly journals Entre o pensar e o conhecer: um lugar para a diferença na formação de professores

Perspectiva ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-140
Author(s):  
Ida Mara Freire
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Peter Singer

Na tentativa de distinguir o pensar e o conhecer, o artigo apresenta um exercício de pensamento como possibilidade de atividade acadêmica na formação de professores. O texto se pauta no exame crítico de algumas noções e conceitos que gravitam em torno da igualdade de direito à educação, a saber, estigma, diferença, direitos humanos, igualdade, e igualdade de oportunidades e ação a% rmativa em diálogo com alguns % lósofos contemporâneos, a saber, Hannah Arendt, Jacques Derrida, John Rawls e Peter Singer. Trilha-se um caminho que parte do juízo perceptivo e chega-se ao juízo ético, que atribui a igual consideração de interesses.

scholarly journals POLITIK PEMUSNAHAN DAN PEMUSNAHAN POLITIK : Telaah Kritis Atas Konsep Hannah Arendt Tentang Totalitarisme

2015 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 129
Author(s):  
Mathias Daven
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Concentration Camp ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
Total Domination ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Totalitarian Regime

If we wish to understand a totalitarian system as a whole, we need first to understand the central role of the concentration camp as a laboratorium to experiment in total domination. Arendt’s analysis of totalitarianism in the twentieth century shows how a totalitarian regime cannot survive without terror; and terror will not be effective without concentration camps. Experiments in concentration camps had as their purpose, apart from wiping out any freedom or spontaneity, the abolishing of space between human beings, abolishing space for politics. Thus, totalitarianism did not mirror only the politics of extinction, but also the extinction of politics. As a way forward, Arendt analyses political theory that forces the reader to understand power no longer under the rubric of domination or violence – although this avenue is open – but rather under the rubric of freedom. Arendt is convinced that the life of a destroyed nation can be restored by mutual forgiveness and mutual promises, two abilities rooted in action. Political action, as with other acts, is identical with the ability to commence something new. Keywords: Totalitarisme, antisemitisme, imperialisme, dominasi, teror, kebebasan, kedaulatan, kamp konsentrasi, politik, ideologi, tindakan

scholarly journals Hannah Arendt and the contemporary social construction of conspiracy theorists

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Lewandowsky
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Adverse Impact ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Conspiracy Theories ◽  
Specific Position ◽  
Epistemic Standards

There has been much concern with the abundance of misinformation in public discourse. Although misinformation has always played a role in political debate, its character has shifted from support for a specific position to a “shock and chaos” stream of misinformation and conspiracy theories. Exposure to conspiracy theories can have considerable adverse impact on society. I argue that scholars therefore have a responsibility to combat conspiracy theories and misinformation generally. Exercising this responsibility requires an understanding of the varied rhetorical roles of conspiracy theories. Here I focus on instances in which people reject unequivocal scientific evidence and invoke conspiracy theories, or radical anti-institutional positions, based on ideological imperatives. I argue that those positions do not always reflect true attitudes. Instead, people may deploy extreme rhetoric as a pragmatic tool of political expression. I investigate this possibility by focusing on the role of conspiracy theories in the rejection of science. Conspiracist cognition and rhetoric violate the epistemic standards that underpin science. Ironically, this violation of epistemic standards renders conspiracy theories useful as a rationally deployed tool that serves political purposes. I present a study that confirms that conspiracy theories can be deployed to support worldview-motivated denial of science. I provide suggestions how scholars can debunk or defang conspiratorial rhetoric.

How to Exist Politically and Learn from It: Hannah Arendt and the Problem of Democratic Education

2010 ◽  
Vol 112 (2) ◽  
pp. 556-575
Author(s):  
Gert Biesta
Keyword(s):  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Democratic Education ◽  
Research Question ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Moral Qualities ◽  
Democratic Life ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Background Context

Background/Context In discussions about democratic education, there is a strong tendency to see the role of education as that of the preparation of children and young people for their future participation in democratic life. A major problem with this view is that it relies on the idea that the guarantee for democracy lies in the existence of a properly educated citizenry so that once all citizens have received their education, democracy will simply follow. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study The question that is explored in this article is whether it is possible to think of the relationship between education and democracy differently than in terms of preparation. This is important not only to be able to acknowledge the political nature of democratic education but also to be able to acknowledge the political “foundation” of democratic politics itself. Research Design The argumentation in the article is developed through a critical analysis and discussion of the work of Hannah Arendt, with a specific focus on her ideas about the relationship between education and politics and her views on the role of understanding in politics. Findings/Results Arendt's writings on the relationship between education and politics seem to be informed by a “developmentalistic” perspective in which it is maintained that the child is not yet ready for political life, so education has to be separated from politics and seen as a preparation for future participation in political life. Arendt's writings on politics and the role of understanding in political life point in a different direction. They articulate what it means to exist politically—that is, to exist together in plurality—and highlight that political existence is neither based on, nor can be guaranteed by, moral qualities such as tolerance and respect. Conclusions/Recommendations The main conclusion of the article is that democratic education should not be seen as the preparation of citizens for their future participation in political life. Rather, it should focus on creating opportunities for political existence inside and outside schools. Rather than thinking of democratic education as learning for political existence, it is argued that the focus of our educational endeavours should be on how we can learn from political existence.

Archive Fevers

2020 ◽  
pp. 24-41
Author(s):  
Albena Yaneva
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Paul Ricoeur ◽  
Architectural Practice ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Social ◽  
Paul Ricœur ◽  
Empirical Turn

This chapter reviews several developments in the social sciences and the arts that date back to the 1990s and motivated this study of archives as practice. It refers to Jacques Derrida and Paul Ricoeur as key protagonists that led to the rethinking of the role of archiving as a tool of memory. It also details the emergence of the trend of “archival ethnography,” which witnessed the advent of the archival turn in anthropology. The chapter elaborates how archival scholarship took an empirical turn in the mid-1990s, coinciding with the “archive fever” in the arts and the “archival turn” in anthropology that opened venues for investigating architectural archiving. It explores the realm of architectural practice wherein the computer radically changed working dynamics and led to the practice's own archival turn in the mid-1990s.

scholarly journals HUMAN FLOW: ATRAVESSAR, CUSTE O QUE CUSTAR

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (39) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ricardo Lessa Filho ◽  
Frederico Vieira
Keyword(s):  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Human Flow

Partindo do ensaio pouco conhecido de Hannah Arendt sobre os refugiados e das lapidações teóricas de Giorgio  Agamben sobre o tema, como também da exposição sobre a hospitalidade de Jacques  Derrida,o artigo propor-se-á a partir de Human Flow (2017), filme dirigido pelo artista e ativista chinês Ai Weiwei, exercer um olhar histórico, teórico e morfológico sobre as imagens registradas em diversos campos de refugiados, imagens que acabam por expelir ao nosso campo visual uma inconteste violência contra tantas vidas humanas, cujas “autoridades” dos países receptores destes imensos fluxos de pessoas deixam transparecer, ao mesmo tempo pela crueldade e indiferença, a enfermização de nossa condição humana e o aniquilamento de toda a ideia de hospitalidade – ali mesmo onde a genealogia da Europa e do mundo é renegada de maneira absoluta quando se passa a perceber o refugiado não mais como um estrangeiro, senão como um inimigo, como um ser hostil.

Invisible Presence of the Past: Hauntology of Photography

2020 ◽  
pp. 80-85
Author(s):  
Marianna Michałowska
Keyword(s):  
Central Europe ◽  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
The Political ◽  
Spectral Features ◽  
The Past ◽  
Phenomenological Interpretation ◽  
Modernist Architecture ◽  
Andre Bazin

Photography has been associated with the specter, spirit, and the apparition ever since the theory of photography first emerged. André Bazin and Edgar Morin saw the spectral features of photography as the basis for phenomenological interpretation. However, the most creative exposition of ghosts in photography is linked to Jacques Derrida’s concept of hauntology. Nowadays, hauntology is often cited in relation to nostalgia – longing for “the lost futures”. However, when Derrida wrote Specters of Marx in 1993, he was interested in the ontological repetition of ideas through history. Photographs created by two contemporary Polish photographers (Michał Grochowiak and Nicolas Grospierre) are an excellent illustration of the French philosopher’s thoughts, as their works focus on the same theme – architecture of the socialist era. The recurring specter of the past manifests itself through it. Grochowiak’s photographs from the Breath series (2010) depict the interior of the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw – fragments of a monumental memorial from the socialist era. In turn, Grospierre’s series of photographs titled K-Pool and company (2011) documents modernist buildings in the post-Soviet republics. In the article, the reference to hauntology allows me to discuss photography as a carrier of eeriness as well as an invisible tool of disclosure. What’s more, it seems that hauntology may explain the role of photography in discussing the political and social contexts of the past. Keywords: hauntology, photography, modernist architecture, Central Europe, Jacques Derrida

Afterword: Turning Back to Literature

PMLA ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 125 (4) ◽  
pp. 1087-1095 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cathy Caruth
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
The Future ◽  
Literary Writing ◽  
Literary Archive

Three times I rushed, and my heart urged me to hold her, and three times she flew from my hands like a shadow or even a dream.—Homer, The Odyssey 11.206–08.To speak of the future of literary criticism is always to speak of the future of literature, which is a mode of language and an institution whose very being essentially touches on the possibility and fragility of its own future. “The fragility of literature,” as Richard Klein suggests, “its susceptibility to being lost,” is at the heart of all literary writing, which emerges from the absence of a “real referent” and thus sustains itself through its reference to other texts, to the archive of literary writing that is made up of figures and other literary articulations that allow us to read. Klein reminds us, citing Jacques Derrida, that literary texts may always disappear: not only because they may be forgotten but also because they are susceptible to the erasure of the archive, to apocalyptic destruction, and to the collective loss of the knowledge of how to read—as a result of new modes of media saturation or, I would add, through the collapse of readability in the age of what Hannah Arendt calls “the modern lie” (“Truth” 253). The force and fragility of literature and of literary criticism are bound up with the possible disappearance of the literary archive, which we implicitly confront in reading literature and in pursuing its forms and thoughts as literary critics.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document