Žižek

Dirt is evoked to signify many important facets of mountain bike culture including its emergence, history and everyday forms of practice and affect. These significations are also drawn upon to frame the sport's (sub)cultural and counter-ideological affiliations. In this article we examine how both the practice of mountain biking and, specifically, mountain bike trail building, raises questions over the object and latent function of dirt, hinting at the way that abjection can, under certain circumstances, be a source of intrigue and pleasure. In doing so, we suggest a re-symbolization of our relationship with dirt via a consideration of the terrestrial.

Lecture by Slavoj Zizek
22 November 2014 
5 pm
Aula Magna
Faculdade de Belas-Artes da Universidade do Porto (FBAUP)
Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto, Portugal

Iniciativa da FBAUP em colaboração com o projecto Technical Unconscious - da responsabilidade do Prof. Gonçalo Leite Velho

Apresentação do autor da conferência: Vítor Oliveira Jorge (FLUP - prof. aposentado) e Gonçalo Leite Velho (IPT, Tomar)

Poster/cartaz by FBAUP

The rising number of non-status migrants is one of the central political issues of our time. This essay argues that if we want to understand the political and philosophical importance of this phenomenon, the contributions of Alain Badiou, his militant group L'Organisation politique (OP), and the struggle of the sans-papiers movement in France are absolutely crucial. This is the case because, I will argue, Badiou, the OP, and the sans-papiers created a new kind of migrant justice struggle in the mid-1990s that in many ways remains at the practical and theoretical roots of much of non-status migrant organizing today. However, this essay also argues that Badiou's theoretical and political work with the sans-papiers also needs to be revised and updated in light of certain developments in more recent migrant justice struggles.

FROM THE BACK COVER: What is the essential nature of meaning? . . . . . This book answers by examining interpretive theories from the past and present. It finds that an historical struggle with meaning has been underway since the Reformation, a struggle that reaches crisis proportions in the 20th century. On the one hand, this crisis is mollified by Heidegger's hermeneutical phenomenology, which argues that we are always already in a meaningful relationship to the objects of the world. On the other hand, this crisis is exacerbated when phenomenology, structuralism, and aesthetic theory directly make meaning into an object of study. . . . . . . . . These historical developments culminate with the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, whose non-hermeneutical phenomenology delimits a cause of meaning said to be closely linked to the core of subjectivity. Intriguingly, Lacan's work reveals meaning to be sexual in nature. By integrating his notion of sexual difference with his work in discourse theory and topology, this book demonstrates how the subject's struggle with meaning can be suspended.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . GENERAL DESCRIPTION: Broadly speaking, the majority of books on Jacques Lacan focus on the earlier periods of his career. They also tend to target the psychoanalytic clinical community, or else discuss his work in various political, social, and cultural contexts. But in almost all cases these books refrain from a detailed exegesis of his actual texts. They instead prefer to comment on his theoretical apparatus as a whole before turning to its practical implications. . . . . . This book positions itself against this grain. Firstly, it closely analyzes some half-dozen key Lacanian texts. This analysis is organized under a single thematic – the question of meaning – in order to advance the reader's understanding of the trajectory of Lacan's thought across his entire career, as well as to promote the book's thesis that the field of meaning can be suspended. Accordingly, an initial chapter takes up the hermeneutical tradition from Flacius onward. This is then supplemented by a chapter which surveys phenomenological, structuralist and aesthetic theories of meaning and their differing methods of textual analysis. Together these two chapters provide a unique context for the sustained analysis of Lacan's texts which begins in the third chapter, an analysis that forms the bulk of the book's content. This contextualization potentially widens the book's appeal to any scholar wishing to explore his relationship to those textual objects he interacts with on a daily basis. And because this book assumes the reader has little to no familiarity with Lacan, the reader will find patient explanations of the basics of his theories before slowly being led up to the more difficult theories of his late years. Again the argument is that Lacan has something to offer all scholars. His work is not just reserved for psychoanalysts. . . . . . It is with his late theories that the serious student of Lacan will find the book's most original contribution. For in the fourth chapter a detailed account is provided of how Lacan derived his infamous formulae of sexuation from Aristotelian logic. These formulae are then extensively discussed against the backdrop of interpretive theory and textual analysis, showing how these formulae capture much more than just the difference between the sexes. Strikingly, this difference is also found to run through meaning itself, something the final chapter aims to demonstrate. It does this by amalgamating three key components of late-Lacan: sexuation, discourse theory and his use of topological spaces. This amalgamation is a first in the literature. But this amalgamation is not just useful in demonstrating the book's thesis. It further suggests how seemingly divergent aspects of late-Lacanian theory can be made to work together.

La dualità o complessità caratteriale di Medea non risiede solo nell'antica tragedia omonima di Euripide. Essa possiede una sua irriducibile psicologia archetipica, che in parte già si intravede nel mito originario e si riverbera in quasi tutti i rifacimenti o opere ispirate al personaggio e alla sua storia, fino all'epoca moderna e contemporanea. Nel saggio presente si cerca di analizzare la natura di tale vario dualismo, attraverso la produzione letteraria e artistica o filosofica pertinente, dall'antichità ai giorni nostri.

"ABSTRACT:
    This study assumes the subject's pursuit of meaning is generally incapacitating and should be suspended. It aims to demonstrate how such a suspension is theoretically accomplished by utilizing Lacan's formulae of sexuation integrated with his work in discourse theory and topology.
    Part I places this study into context by examining scholarship from the established fields of hermeneutics, phenomenology, (post)structuralism, aesthetic theory and psychoanalysis in order to extract out their respective theory of meaning. These theories reveal that an historical struggle with meaning has been underway since the Reformation and reaches near crisis proportions in the 20th century. On the one hand this crisis is mollified by the rise of Heideggerian-Gadamerian hermeneutical phenomenology which questions traditional epistemological approaches to the text using a new ontological conceptualization of meaning and a conscious rejection of methodology. On the other hand this crisis is exacerbated when the ubiquitous nature of meaning is itself challenged by (post)structuralism's discovery of the signifier which inscribes a limit to meaning, and by the domains of sense and nonsense newly opened up by aesthetic theory. These historical developments culminate in the field of psychoanalysis which most consequentially delimits a cause of meaning said to be closely linked to the core of subjectivity.
    Part II extends these findings by rigorously constructing out of the Lacanian sexuated formulae a decidedly non-hermeneutical phenomenological approach useful in demonstrating the sexual nature of meaning. Explicated in their static state by way of an account of their original derivation from the Aristotelian logical square, it is argued that these four formulae are relevant to basic concerns of textual theory inclusive of the hermeneutical circle of meaning. These formulae are then set into motion by integrating them with Lacan's four discourses to demonstrate the breakdown of meaning. Finally, the cuts and sutures of two-dimensional space that is topology as set down in L'étourdit are performed to confirm how the very field of meaning is ultimately suspended from a nonsensical singular point known in Lacanian psychoanalysis as objet a. The contention is that by occupying this point the subject frees himself from the debilitating grip of meaning."

The international discussion of the communist hypothesis has quickly developed into a debate regarding the adequate party-form for radical politics today. This article argues that the stakes of this development become clearer when it is related to the central debates of the earlier alternative globalization movement. The article then explores some significant models of organization that emerged in previous periods in which the renewal of communist politics was closely linked to attempts to rethink the party-form: the notion of the ‘compositional party’ of Italian operaismo, Lukács’s concepts of a ‘political subject’, and Gramsci’s ‘modern Prince.’ The modern Prince is argued to represent the type of ‘expansive’ party-form that might be able to respond productively to the challenges of contemporary political movements.

Many idealists treated Kant’s system as a wound that needed to be healed: the rigorous dichotomy Kant presented between the phenomenal world and its noumenal counterpart. By the time Schelling came to see a special problem with evil, in his 1809 Freedom essay, he and his contemporaries had explored essentially two possible post-Kantian positions. In very broad outlines, Fichte attempted to reduce receptivity and the phenomenal world to the spontaneity of the self-positing I. Schelling by contrast had developed what he termed a nature philosophy or Naturphilosophie that attempted to derive the spontaneity of the I from nature.  The Freedom essay rejects this enumeration of healing responses to Kant, returns to Kant’s work, and then exacerbates its splits and divisions. What makes Schelling do this? One answer is in the title: freedom. Schelling comes to think that human freedom has somehow not been adequately addressed in the post-Kantian aftermath. And it is evil that makes freedom something the earlier systems cannot address.

Žižek's Jokes:
(Did You Hear the One about Hegel and Negation?)

جوک‌های ژیژک
(آن یکی که در مورد هگل و نفی است را شنیده‌اید؟)


Originally published: February 21, 2014
Author: Slavoj Žižek
Genre: Joke
Editor: Audun Mortensen
Series: The MIT Press
Hardcover: 168 pages
Publisher: The MIT Press
(February 21, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0262026716
ISBN-13: 978-0262026710


ژیژک در مقام یک کُمدین: جوک در خدمت فلسفه.

«می‌توان اثر فلسفی جدی و خوبی نوشت که سراسر جوک و شوخی باشد.» - لودویگ ویتگنشتاین

In this concluding post on Sam Esmail’s Mr. Robot, a critical evaluation of the series’ final scenes as well as its wider cultural, political and ideological importance will be provided. In accordance with previous posts, this analysis will draw from the work of Todd McGowan in order to provide a final precis on the significance of the gaze as used in the series. Towards the end of this discussion, attention will be given to expanding upon the series’ conclusions in light of similar narrative formats, such as, Todd Phillips’s, Joker (2019). ... Read more – https://cstonline.net/mr-robot-part- three-the-voyeurs-who-think-they-arent-a-part-of-this-mr-robot-and-the-subject-by- jack-black/

Abstract:  Exploring Crack-up, Under the Volcano, and Dante’s Inferno in relation to the Anamorphic Objects of Zizek and Lacan as well as the Meta-levels of Being that form a face-of-the-world.

-- Key Words:  Lowry, Deleuze, F Scott Fitzgerald, Dante, Zizek, Lacan

It was noted in the previous post, that the underlying plotline structuring Sam Esmail’s Mr. Robot bears a notable resemblance to David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999). Certainly, the comparison has been duly noted and even openly acknowledged by Esmail, with the film serving as inspiration for the series (Sullivan, 2015). In the case of seasons 1 and 2, this inspiration fuels Elliot and fsociety’s attempts to erase the commercial debt that has been accumulated by E Corp. Lines from the characters are riddled with references to the increasing divide between rich and poor, and to the declining significance of democracy in the face of a social and political climate steered by liberal capitalism’s unending and unequal pursuit of wealth. As noted, these ills are embodied in the conglomerate E Corp, or, as Elliot refers to it, ‘Evil Corp’. E Corp can be thought of as a reflection of Apple, with its technology, digital payment services and loan/credit portfolios always encroaching on the lives of the series’ characters. Accordingly, while The Narrator in Fight Club seeks to bring down capitalism, by exploding the headquarters of its leading companies, Elliot seeks to reset the balance by hacking E Corp’s computer database and eradicating the consumer debt it holds. … Read more – https://cstonline.net/mr-robot-part-one-our-democracy-has-been-hacked-critiquing-mr-robot-by-jack-black/

Subtext is communication occurring beneath, around, and in the peripheries of the text — in the phrasing, in the way things are said, in the lived duration of the experience of relating. What pleasure there is in language! Not only the intellectual stimulation of wordplay, of double entendres, nor the erotic thrill of a sexual provocation, but even the glee of complicity itself: the complicity with the official narrative, and the complicity among those who pretend to agree to such a narrative. Consider subtext in the context of what is termed emotional cheating. Imagine a married man who befriends a single woman, and maintains, for as long as possible, the official text of the relationship, whatever that might be. Perhaps they are writing partners. Perhaps they are coworkers. The hypocrisy mounts as the subtext goes on, repressed. The whole thing becomes an erotic game, a heightening of erotic excitement through prolonged deferral of satisfaction. The man may tell his wife that any erotic undertones between him and the other woman is purely her imagination. Not only does he take pleasure in continuing the game with the other woman — psychoanalysis tells us that he takes immense pleasure, perhaps without even realizing it, in his own torturous behavior to his own wife! The pleasure is not merely in heightening the erotic enjoyment of the barred other (woman): it is first and foremost the pleasure of playing a game with his own wife's sanity, a game which may even turn deadly, as the tragic results of so many love affairs have shown us.

This essay sets out to discuss four figures of subtext: the sexual, the political (or the deployment of subtext for the purpose of power struggles), the numinous—or archetypal—and the erotic, or imaginal. These four figures, the sexual, political, numinous and erotic are explored using the work of Freud, Lacan, Jung and Hillman.

CAVALCANTI, Rodrigo de Camargo; CASTANHATO, Camila. Análise Jurídico-Ideológica da Música “O Drama da Humana Manada” de El Efecto. In: GUERRA FILHO, Willis Santiago (coord.). CANTARINI, Paola; SERAU JUNIOR, Marco Aurélio (orgs.) Direito e Música Brasileira. Rio de Janeiro: Lumen Juris, 2019.

Eschewing the all-pervading contextual approach to literary criticism, this book takes a Lacanian view of popular British fantasy texts of the late 19th century such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula, revealing the significance of the historical context; the advent of a modern democratic urban society in place of the traditional agrarian one. Moreover, counter intuitively it turns out that fantasy literature is analogous to modern Galilean science in its manipulation of the symbolic thereby changing our conception of reality. It is imaginary devices such as vampires and ape-men, which in conjunction with Lacanian theory say something additional of the truth about – primarily sexual – aspects of human subjectivity and culture, repressed by the contemporary hegemonic discourses.


Reviews
"An impressive academic book that evinces a scrupulous attention to all existing scholarship and a thorough mastery of both Lacanian psychoanalysis and fantasy literature. The author deploys Lacanian psychoanalysis in a subtle yet thoroughly erudite fashion in order to illuminate the literary texts in a way that no previous scholars have done." - Todd McGowan, Associate Professor of Film Studies,University of Vermont

"Sharoni plumbs the heights and depths of late-Victorian and Edwardian fantasy. If we knew that She was one of Freud's favorite novels we grasp only now why Conan Doyle, H. G. Wells, Bram Stoker and Rider Haggard had anticipated Lacan and Žižek in their Freudian re-elaborations and offered us so many haunting modern fantasies." - Jean-Michel Rabaté, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, University of Pennsylvania
Table of contents
Preface
Introduction: Vampires and Ape-Men: A Lacanian Reading of British Fantasy Fiction, 1886–1914
 Introduction
 The Return of the Primordial Father: Freud’s Totem and Taboo and the Late Victorian and Edwardian Fantasy Novel
 The Outline of the Book

1 The Historical Background: The Modernization of Britain 1870–1914

2 Types of Literary Criticism: The Contextual versus the Critical Approach
 2.1 Lacanian Psychoanalysis, Literary Criticism, and the Question of Evidence

3 Lacan’s Reconsideration of Totem and Taboo
 3.1 Totem and Taboo and Oedipus Rex
 3.2 The Name-of-the-Father
 3.3 The Thing (Das Ding) and Object a
 3.4 Anxiety and Object a
 3.5 Père ou Pire: Father or Worse
 4 ‘Yet Another Interpretation’

4 Science and the Thing: Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World
 1 Introduction
 2 The Plot
 3 Totem and Taboo and the Doubling of the Primal Father
 4 The Abdication of the Father
 5 The Father-Out-of-Law
 6 The Return of the Courtly Love Tradition
 7 Courtly Love as Art and the (Scientific) Need to See for Oneself
 8 The ‘Larger than Life’ Scientist
 9 Lacan and Sublimation
 10 Science and Civilisation
 11 The Ending of the Novel: The Use of Beauty
 12 Courtly Loave, the Lady and the Baby Pterodactyl

5 The Missing Name-of-the-Father: She
 1 Introduction
 2 The Plot of She
 3 She and ‘Totem and Taboo’
 4 The Fantasy Space and the Absence
 5 The Asexual Primal Father
 6 A Land Where the Names of Fathers are Missing
 7 The Absence of the (Normal) Sexual Relationship
 8 The Father’s Bequest to His Son
 9 Myth, Fantasy and Realism
 10 Conclusion

6 The Recuperation of the Thing: ‘The Horror of the Heights’
 1 Introduction
 2 The Symbolic, the Real and the Thing
 3 The Danger of the Thing
 4 The Social versus a Deadly Solipsistic Enjoyment
 5 The Primal Father Who Enjoys
 6 The Return to the Greek Myths
 7 The Summons of the Real

7 The Name-of-the-Science: The Invisible Man
 1 Introduction
 2 The Isolation of the Individual in Modern Urban Society
 3 The Invisible Man as Primal Father
 4 Invisibility and the Anonymity of the City
 5 Beyond the Law
 6 The Impossibility of a ‘Special, Solitary Enjoyment’
 7 The Cancellation of the Name-of-the-Father
 8 The Impossible Existence
 9 ‘In the Country of the Blind the One-eyed Man is King’
 10 The Name-of-Science

8 The Re-inscription of the Name-of-the-Father: Dracula
 1 The Plot
 2 Lacanian Readings of Dracula
 3 Dracula as ‘Totem and Taboo’
 4 The Fantasy Area: Transylvania and the Loss of the Symbolic Grid
 5 Dracula’s Castle and Freud’s Reception Hall
 6 Dracula in the Castle as Jonathan Harker’s Double
 7 Van Helsing and the Return of the Master
 8 The Ambiguity of the Master Figure

Conclusion


Bibliography
Index

In the updated preface to the 2008 edition of his seminal work The Sublime Object of Ideology, Slavoj Žižek writes that “when a discipline is in crisis, attempts are made to change or supplement its theses within the terms of its basic framework – a procedure one might call ‘Ptolemization’”. The alternative, he claims, is a “true ‘Copernican’ revolution” which takes place “when, instead of just adding complications and changing minor premises, the basic framework itself undergoes a transformation” (Žižek 2008: vii). In light of these remarks, the central question posed in this paper is as follows: how might Žižek’s distinction between a Ptomelization and Copernican revolution be applied to the field of Žižek Studies today? How, in other words, might we seek to re-evaluate Žižek’s work in a way that includes the mechanisms of evaluation as part of the observed phenomena? The working hypothesis is that, as Žižekians, we must reassert the fundamental rule of psychoanalysis as articulated by Žižek himself: one must remember to include as part of the content of the message communicated, the act of communication itself (Žižek 2008: 21). In short, when it comes to the reception of Žižek’s thought we should remember Žižek’s basic point that “the question to ask is always: is this truly a Copernician revolution, or merely a Ptolemization of the old paradigm?” (Žižek 2008: vii).

Originally presented at Tolerancia: XV Congreso Interamericano de Filosofía, hosted by  Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú. Lima, Peru, 12-16 January, 2004. Subsequently, published in in Interpretando la experiencia de la tolerancia, edited by Rodrigo Ferradas, (Lima, Peru: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú/Fondo Editorial, 2005).

Management and humour are becoming more closely interlinked in contemporary organizational life. Whereas humour was conventionally viewed as a deleterious, alien element at the workplace, it is now increasingly viewed as a valuable management tool. This development raises the question of whether humour can still be regarded as having critical or subversive potential. This article discusses three research approaches to management and humour: the instrumental, the ideological critical, and contemporary critical organization studies, giving particular emphasis to extending the last tradition. Hence, the article situates itself in the critical debate on the function of humour in the workplace and on ‘cynical reasoning’ recently initiated in organization studies. It seeks to contribute to this debate by defining the features of a critical humoristic practice in a post-authoritarian management context. The point of departure is primarily Žižek’s critique of ideology and its application in...

Slavoj ŽIŽEK Ungleichheit 19-1 Disparitäten / Slavoj Žižek. Aus dem Englischen übersetzt von Axel Walter.-Darmstadt : WBG (Wissenschaftliche Buchge-sellschaft), 2018.-504 S. ; 22 cm.-Einheitssacht.: Disparities <dt.>.-ISBN 978-3-534-26971-6 : EUR 44.00 [#5848] Wenn es einen Gegenwartsdenker gibt, bei dem es schwerfällt, zwischen Genialischem und Scharlatanösem zu unterscheiden, ist es sicher der slo-wenische Autor Slavoj Žižek, der am 21. März 2019 seinen 70. Geburtstag begeht und der mit teils wild-assoziativen Texten, aber auch voluminösen Monographien, zuletzt etwa auch zu Hegel (siehe Suhrkamp 1) von sich re-den gemacht hat. 2 Dieser Autor gehört nicht nur zu den Propagandisten ei-nes selbst wieder recht hermetischen Autors, Jacques Lacan, mit dessen Theorieversatzstücken Slavoj Žižek seine Reflexionen zu verknüpfen pflegt-so auch in diesem umfangreichen Buch, das zuerst in englischer Sprache erschienen ist. Slavoj Žižek ist aber nicht nur deswegen berühmt-berüchtigt, weil er maß-geblich zu einer Art Aktualisierung Lacanscher Diskursbausteine beigetra-gen hat, sondern auch weil er sich in höchst befremdlicher Weise affirmativ zu einer der großen diskreditierten Ideologien des 20. Jahrhunderts be-kennt, dem Marxismus-Leninismus, denn offenbar möchte er wirklich dazu beitragen, daß "die kommunistische Idee weiterleben soll" (S. 458). Und 1 Weniger als nichts : Hegel und der Schatten des dialektischen Materialismus / Slavoj Žižek.

A brief overview and commentary of Slavoj Zizek's commentaries on Islam, as found throughout his published works, this analysis documents his consistent ignorance on the subject. Treating Islam as a monolithic black box, devoid of all reason, Zizek's claims and analysis lack all the subtlety of his other work. The reader is invited to ponder what the consequence of such work would be, if the target was any other philosophical issue.

Go to: https://www.michaelrectenwald.com/essays/the-point-de-capiton-of-leftist-ideology

I address four questions here: Since ideology critique holds that no one is free of ideology, why isn't leftist ideology (LI) subjected to critique? Why are only right and other non-LI critiqued, and why are they generally described in terms of disorder, disruption, and epidemic? How does LI elude study/criticism? The organizing core or "point de caption" of LI explains all. So what is the essential core of LI? The answer lies within--within the essay, not your soul--unless you're a leftist. But it LIES there in both senses of the word.

Este ensayo no pretende ser una defensa del Islam -los musulmanes tienen su propio aparato crítico para emprender esta tarea- sino una actualización de la crítica al orientalismo y a la idea del choque de civilizaciones como paradigma de la realidad contemporánea. El texto sostiene una querella específica contra Slavoj Žižek, quien ha intervenido en el debate sobre Europa y el Islam reforzando, desde un punto de vista secular, dichos modelos de pensamiento. Intentamos mostrar que el Islam lejos de ser reducible a una esencia de carácter violenta, es un campo de lucha de imaginarios que se desarrolla históricamente y del cuál el Islam Político es el que mejor se entiende con el orientalismo.

The work of Jacques Lacan enables us to understand why, in James Joyce’s short story “Eveline,” the young woman refuses to board the ship to elope with her lover; the short story, in turn, enables us to better understand the Lacanian paternal metaphor and its function. This second aim is particularly pertinent in the case of Lacanian theory, reputedly opaque and, with the inclusion of algebraic like formulae, appearing divorced from actual human beings and their emotions. Examining Lacan’s concept in conjunction with a close reading of the story, two phrases, the father’s and the mother’s, can be seen as
depicting the failure of the paternal metaphor. This in turn accounts for the last-minute refusal to embark, thereby resolving the enigma posed by the story and also connecting a Lacanian formula with an emotion: the anguish in the final scene being the consequence of the deficit of the metaphor.

In what follows, I wish to draw away from broader criticisms of Mr. Robot’s narrative consequences, and focus on a particular scene from Series 4, Episode 10, ‘410 Gone’. Importantly, the following analysis will serve to elucidate upon a number of important significances related to the series and its conclusion (this will be discussed next week). Before reading the below, however, it is worth watching the scene in question: … Read more – https://cstonline.net/mr-robot-part-two-run-away-with-me-content-form-and-romantic-failure-an-ideological-critique-scene-analysis-by-jack-black/

Schelling (1775–1854) and Schopenhauer (1788–1860) both operate in the German idealist tradition initiated by Kant (1724– 1804), although both are critical of some of its developments. Schelling’s interest in evil—which is at its most intense in his 1809 Freedom essay (full title: Philosophical Inquiries into the Nature of Human Freedom and Related Matters)—stems from his belief that Kant’s account of morality, and hence much of the idealist tradition, in fact makes evil, in the broad sense of moral badness, impossible. For Schelling this is a disaster because without a meaningful choice whether to act morally we are not free, and without agency he thinks we are not even individual persons. We become mere puppets of universal reason. In the Freedom essay Schelling links these theories with the traditional Christian conception of evil as a privation, and attempts by contrast to develop a concept of “radical” or “positive” evil that grounds both our freedom and individual personality. The project falters not necessarily with the conception of evil, but with Schelling’s residual commitment to the rationality of morality and inability to frame a satisfactory conception of freedom to match his conception of radical evil.

Schopenhauer argues on both a priori and empirical grounds that life is not worth living: he is the first philosophical pessimist (although he was himself slow to embrace this term). As a result he is primarily interested in situational evil in a broad sense understood as just badness of some kind. But he also has an account of moral evil, both in the broad and narrow senses. In the broad sense of general moral badness, he attributes evil to egoism; but he also has an account of a class of special motivations that he terms “malicious” which are evil in a narrow sense, i.e. comprise an intense subset of the morally bad. Schopenhauer may solve some of the problems Schelling encounters, but he in his turn encounters other problems with his theory.

La “svolta teologica” di Slavoj Žižek condivide con la filosofia francescana una visione dell’evento del cristianesimo come rottura radicale dell’ordine costituito. E tuttavia le due filosofie si trovano essenzialmente in un’opposizione radicale, che deriva da due posizioni ontologiche assolutamente antitetiche: una, quella žižekiana, che è stata chiamata un’“ontologia della rivoluzione”, e l’altra, quella francescana, che potremmo definire un’“ontologia della fratellanza (e sorellanza)”. Žižek utilizza il cristianesimo come “paradigma” di rottura, ma lo svuota di una caratteristica essenziale che determina la sostanza stessa della “rivoluzione” cristiana: la sua rottura con la logica sacrificale e con il circolo vizioso di violenza e retribuzione. Il saggio evidenzia i punti di contatto e di opposizione tra le due filosofie/ontologie e mostra perché, a differenza di altri filosofi contemporanei, Žižek non può essere (detto) francescano.

Management and humour are becoming more closely interlinked in contemporary organisational life. Whereas humour was conventionally viewed as a deleterious, alien element at the workplace, it is now increasingly viewed as a valuable management tool. This development raises the question of whether humour can still be regarded as having critical or subversive potential. This article discusses three research approaches to management and humour: the instrumental, the ideological critical, and contemporary critical organization studies, giving particular emphasis to extending the last tradition. Hence, the article situates itself in the critical debate on the function of humour in the workplace and on ‘cynical reasoning’ recently initiated in organisation studies. It seeks to contribute to this debate by defining the features of a critical humoristic practice in a post-authoritarian management context. The point of departure is primarily Žižek’s critique of ideology and its application in recent organisation studies.

Josefa Salmón comenzaba el «prólogo» de este mismo libro en su edición original boliviana de esta manera: «Slavoj Žižek es uno de los pensadores actuales más interesantes por su radicalidad, por su tremenda habilidad para sacar a la filosofía del ámbito académico y supuestamente "especializado". Pocos como él transforman la interpretación filo- sófica en un discurso accesible a la lectura cotidiana, la lec tura de todos aquellos que estamos interesados en interpretar las más diversas variedades de la creatividad humana. Ade más, Žižek lo hace con humor, demostrando con ello que la profundidad no está en una falsa seriedad del discurso, sino en el compromiso con las ideas».
Lo que ahora nos toca hacer en este «Epílogo» es reubicar el pensamiento de Žižek en general.

The HBO drama, Watchmen, is part of an ever-growing canon of comic books adapted for TV. Taking place 34 years after its print publication, the TV series refocuses the comic’s deconstruction of Cold War anxieties by exploring ongoing racial tensions in Tulsa, Oklahoma... - visit: https://cstonline.net/watchmens-parallax-view-handling-past-traumas-and-present-tensions-by-jack-black/

RESUMO: O presente artigo é um primeiro estudo sobre as poucas reflexões feitas a respeito das influências ou (des)influências entre o pensamento de Heidegger e o de Žižek. Pretende-se com ele: [1] apresentar uma leitura não ortodoxa do pensamento filosófico e político de Heidegger quando confrontados tanto com os comentários de Žižek sobre Heidegger, como pelo enfrentamento que pode ser feito com o pensamento político de Žižek, e, [2] uma vez revisto o pensamento político de Heidegger, reconhecê-lo como uma significativa crítica ao pensamento liberal que retira as condições humanas de direitos. Para tanto, faz-se uma revisão de literatura a respeito do assunto, qual seja, sobre o que se produziu sobre a relação Heidegger-Žižek. Nesta, encontra-se, com especial relevância, dois comentadores que desenvolvem esta aproximação entre ambos. Com esta matriz básica teórica, entre outras, chega-se ao seguinte corolário: há uma alternativa de leitura do pensamento heideggeriano com respeito à filosofia política.

Crítica de la presentación de Slavoj Zizek del libro "Robespierre, virtude e terror. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar,
2009.
Han salido en portugués los dos primeros números de una colección traducida del inglés, que tiene el mérito de convidar a la lectura de textos escritos por figuras fundamentales de la acción política "en períodos de insurrección". La colección se llama Revoluciones y se anuncia como: "Escritos revolucionarios
clásicos, introducidos por un escritor radical contemporáneo".
El primero de los ensayos, dedicado al líder jacobino de la Revolución Francesa, Robespierre, me interesó especialmente porque nos presenta al Incorruptible como un caso ejemplar de Deseante. Uno del que se podría decir que ha realizado con su vida el mandamiento lacaniano de "no ceder en su deseo". Y la demostración de su
tenacidad ética estaría precisamente en el Terror. El Terror sería la prueba de que su agente es un verdadero Revolucionario; un deseante mostrando la perseverancia de su deseo en su Acto....

"OK JAZZ LIVES!", a poster by Max Cafard and Rick O'Shea for Slavoj Zizek's talk on “Uses and Misuses of Violence.” Nunemaker Hall, Loyola University New Orleans,  Nov. 17, 2013. So far, two people have responded with the correct meaning of "OK JAZZ LIVES!"

Este trabalho parte de algumas facetas contemporâneas do capitalismo, a hegemonia do consumo, a diversificação das mercadorias e a imaterialidade. Elas são relacionadas com uma mudança nos mecanismos de reprodução social: a substituição da disciplina (Foucault) pelo controle (Deleuze) e pela sedução (Baudrillard). Tal mudança, por sua vez, é associada a uma nova economia psíquica, baseada no imperativo do gozo e na insatisfação daí resultante (Lacan, Žižek), e caracterizada pelo narcisismo (Lasch). O artigo mostra como o narcisismo se articula, de forma geral, com a construção da identidade pela mediação da imagem e do mercado e, especificamente, com a construção da identidade via ciberespaço. / This work starts from some contemporary aspects of capitalism, the hegemony of consumption, the diversification of goods and the immateriality. These aspects are related to a change in the mechanisms of social reproduction: the replacement of discipline (Foucault) with control (Deleuze) and seduction (Baudrillard). This change, in turn, is associated to a new psychic economy, based upon the imperative of enjoyment and the resulting dissatisfaction (Lacan, Žižek), and characterized by the narcissism (Lasch). The article shows how the narcissism articulates itself, in a general way, to the construction of identity through image and market and, specifically, to the construction of identity through cyberspace.

Jung proposes a mechanism called compensation which guides the development of the anima mundi in an ongoing self-balancing process. Žižek criticizes Jung on the grounds of failing to grasp the Hegelian dialectic, but I argue that Žižek misses the point. Žižek’s critique of Jung fails to grasp that Jung’s compensation theory is a self-balancing process through radical antagonism of the type Žižek approves of. He erroneously thinks that Jung perpetuates that horrible “feel good” New Age relativistic myth which says “In two sides of an argument, neither side is right.”