Thursday, October 13, 2005
(6:10 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
Agamben Reading Group: Discipline and Structure
I have read through Agamben's The Open: Man and Animal, the proposed topic of an online reading group. I have taken the liberty of indicating what is contained in each chapter (basic themes and figures) -- this is not an exhaustive analysis by any means, but since it seems to me that assigning certain people to "present" particular groups of chapters is the best route to go here, this will give people some kind of indication of what they're getting into before they read the book. I will retain Agamben's sexist language in the interest of full disclosure.- Theriomorphous -- Hebrew Bible with engravings featuring people with animal heads at the messianic banquet; Gnosticism, Apocalypse of Baruch, Manicheanism.
- Acephalous -- Bataille, Kojève's end of history and disappearance of man, Bataille's search for a "remnant" after the end of history.
- Snob -- Kojève's idea of Japan as an alternative to animalization due to snobbery; relation of this to messianism.
- Mysterium disiunctionis -- "life" as undefined concept in the Western tradition; function of the concept in Aristotle; Bichat's physiological distinctions between animal and vegetative life; man as the result of the distinction "man/animal"
- Physiology of the Blessed -- difficulties of medieval theology with what becomes of animal nature in the resurrection.
- Cognitio experimentalis -- Messianic end of history tied with end of distinction of man and animal; in Eden, acc. to Aquinas, animals served to inform man of his own nature; the camps represent an extreme attempt to decide on the human and inhuman.
- Taxonomies -- Linnaeus and the controversy ver classifying man among the animals; we are classed under "human-like" animals; implications of this
- Without Rank -- Pico della Mirandola, more Linnaeus (basically a continuation of previous chapter).
- Anthropological Machine -- Ernst Haeckel's attempt to solve all enigmas of human thought with a thorough-going Darwinian philosophy; question of the "missing link" and the origin of human language; different historical approaches to producing man out of the man/animal distinction.
- Umwelt -- Uexküll -- zoology, animal worlds, no "one" world exists, only incommunicable animal worlds; example of spider and fly.
- Tick -- More Uexküll, centered on his description of a tick world; what it is like for a tick to be totally deprived of its sole stimulations
- Poverty in World -- Heidegger's Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics -- deals with man/animal distinction; parallels of Heidegger and Uexküll.
- The Open -- Heidegger cont. Animal has no "world"; concealed and unconcealed; connection with mysticism; Heidegger draws on Romans 8; lead-in to boredom.
- Profound Boredom -- Heidegger cont. Boredom is most extended analysis of an attunement in Heidegger -- comes to seem more fundamental than anxiety; parallels of boredom w/ animal poverty in world; connections with "What is Metaphysics?"
- World and Earth -- Heidegger cont. "Origin of the Work of Art"; man/animal as a political question for Heidegger.
- Animalization -- Heidegger as last philosopher to believe in the polis; end of history; biopolitical (this book made me feel a lot more comfortable with the idea of biopolitics).
- Anthropogenesis -- summary of results of research so far, in numbered list format.
- Between -- Benjamin approaches the question from a totally different direction; Benjamin as reverse Marcion; the "unsavable"; sex.
- Desœuvrement -- Titian paintings: Nymph and Shepherd, Three Ages of Man; connection w/ Benjamin.
- Outside of Being -- unique genius of Basilides; possibility of escaping the "anthropological machine."
So: volunteer. And if you don't feel comfortable writing a "discussion-starter" post, we still would need you to keep the discussion going in comments. Promising your support would be nice, to make sure this is worth going forward with. Once we get the main discussion leaders lined up and the text divided up, I figure we can give people two weeks to read and ruminate, then start up an "event week" where everyone just takes a day (hence the three to five people).
