Prophets of Irony: a Discussion with Richard J. Bernstein

Richard J. Bernstein, Ironic Life (Cambridge UK: Polity Press, 2016), pp. 184, $64.95 hardcover, $22.95 paperback.   There is a certain irony about contemporary attitudes toward irony.  According to the late novelist David Foster Wallace, our culture is steeped in the ironic reluctance to commit to ideals and thus embrace moral seriousness. ...
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Prophets of Irony:  a Discussion with Richard J. Bernstein

Althusserians Anonymous (2)

This post has been revised, here: https://publicseminar.org/2016/02/aa/ The thing about being a recovering Althusserian is that one can’t help remembering the good times. Being on Althusser really does feel great. It makes certain problems disappear. For example, one is no longer trapped in the oppressive reality of Hegelian Marxism, and yet nor does ...
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Althusserians Anonymous (2)

#Accelerate and inertia

Thinking historically and systematically would appear to be something of an urgent requirement for critical theory in the Anthropocene. Yet there was a great allergic reaction to all such lines of thought in the late twentieth century from which social thought never really recovered. Recently, there has been some attempt to ...
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#Accelerate and inertia

No More Master Thinkers

How often it transpires that the interesting thinkers were monsters. Heidegger was a Nazi. Schmitt was a Nazi. De Man was a collaborator, a thief, a liar and – to cap it off – a bigamist. Or, case of a different kind: Althusser strangled his wife, and was probably none ...
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