Laruelle, Immanence, and Performance: What Does Non-Philosophy Do?

François Laruelle’s ‘non-philosophical’ practice is connected to its performative language, such that to the question 'what is it to think?, non-philosophy responds that thinking is not “thought”, but performing. Non-philosophy is equally described by Laruelle as ‘transcendental practice’, an ‘immanent pragmatics’, or a ‘universal pragmatics’ that is ‘valid for ordinary language as well as for philosophy:’ He insists that we look at ‘that-which-I-do-in-saying and not just what I say’ – for the latter is simply what happens when thought is ‘taken hold of again by philosophy.’ Resisting this hold, non-philosophy performs re-descriptions of philosophy that, in doing so, produce effects on how philosophical texts are seen. All the same, it is notable that Laruelle objects to the focus on activity within the concept of a speech act, and instead emphasizes the ‘descriptive passivity’ that an immanent pragmatics obliges; statements that manifest ‘by their very existence what they must describe in the last instance – statements identically descriptive and performative.’ What Laruelle calls a ‘Performed-Without-Performation’ would be an action of the Real, or the ‘in-One’ – philosophical language seen as a performed without we using this or any language to perform. In this essay, this complex thought is compared with certain concepts and practices of performance that do not come from philosophy so explicitly (Allan Kaprow’s, Richard Schechner’s and Michael Kirby’s especially), but may well offer a key to understanding this passive action of the Real.

La hermenéutica crítica de Habermas: una «profundización» de la hermenéutica gadameriana

RESUMENEn este artículo queremos analizar brevemente los rasgos principales de la hermenéutica filosófica de Gadamer, revelando la importancia pragmática de conceptos como arché, mythos o dihairesis. En la segunda parte, confrontaremos esta propuesta con las críticas que en su día le hizo Habermas, acompañando a Apel, para «profundizar» en la hermenéutica. Éste fue el punto de partida para fundamentar su conocida pragmática universal.PALABRAS CLAVEGADAMER, HERMENÉUTICA, CRÍTICA, HABERMAS, LENGUAJEABSTRACTIn this article we briefly examine the main features of Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics, revealing the pragmatic importance of concepts like arché, mythos or dihairesis. In the second part, Gadamer’s proposal will be confronted to Habermasian critique, in order to delve into hermeneutics. This was the starting point to support the latter’s well-known «universal pragmatics».KEYWORDS HEIDEGGER, HERMENEUTIC CIRCLE, SCIENCE, PRE-UNDERSTANDING

Kritička medijska pismenost i komunikacijska kompetencija sudionika deliberacije

The study represents an attempt of converging the elements of critical media literacy with the Habermasian theory of communicative competence. Universal pragmatics (validity claims) is being used as a theoretical base for the development of an analytical framework of critical media literacy, and the method is being empirically and experimentally tested through critical discourse analysis of the theme of the new Labour Law adoption in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republic of Srpska. The analysis includes 32 media texts on the Klix, Buka and N1 news portals. Positive and negative claims about the adoption of the new Labour Law are being tested for comprehensibility, truth, sincerity and legitimacy.

Laruelle’s ‘Criminally Performative’ Thought: On Doing and Saying in Non-Philosophy

François Laruelle’s ‘non-philosophical’ practice is connected to its performative language, such that to the question 'what is it to think?, non-philosophy responds that thinking is not “thought”, but performing, and that to perform is to clone the world “in-Real”’ (François Laruelle, ‘What is Non-Philosophy?’ in From Decision to Heresy [2012], 233).Non-philosophy is equally described by Laruelle as ‘transcendental practice’, an ‘immanent pragmatics’, or a ‘universal pragmatics’ that is ‘valid for ordinary language as well as for philosophy:’ He insists that we look at ‘that-which-I-do-in-saying and not just what I say’ – for the latter is simply what happens when thought is ‘taken hold of again by philosophy.’ Resisting this hold, non-philosophy performs re-descriptions of philosophy that, in doing so, produce effects on how philosophical texts are seen. Of course, whether these effects are always desired or are merely nominally considered ‘effects’ such as any description might create (misunderstanding, disbelief, dismay, boredom) is entirely debatable (and a matter for this paper). In accordance with this, however, it is notable that Laruelle objects to the focus on activity within the concept of a speech act, and instead emphasizes the ‘descriptive passivity’ that an immanent pragmatics obliges. Laruelle calls this a ‘Performed-Without-Performation’ which would be an action of the Real: philosophical language seen as a performed, but without a ‘we’ – or any others – performing (or ‘cloning’) it. It is this notion of the performative without either active human or philosophical adumbration, which is the topic of this paper.