Girard

This essay examines how René Girard's most recent book, Achever Clausewitz (2007), expands on Girard's theory of the sacred to include a more specific and concrete notion of the apocalypse as a historically conditioned concept. In particular, I argue that the idea of "total war" (the kind of war engendered by mass conscription) is crucial to Girard's critique of Clausewitz, which consists in pointing out the irreconcilability between Clausewitz's famous formula "war is politics by other means" (i.e., war is contained or limited by politics) and Clausewitz's idea of the "escalation to extremes" (uncontainable violence). I show how this reading of Clausewitz allows Girard to deconstruct the opposition between archaic (irrational) and modern (rational) violence that defines Enlightenment hope. Finally, I ask if the advent of post-9/11 terrorism, which is a form of total war, might not lead us to rethink the role of international institu...

What is the meaning of theories of redemption, and what use do they have? This dissertation answers these questions from the vantage point of two ideas from Girardian Mimetic Theory: the hypothesis that human relationality is rooted in triangular structures of desire, and the hypothesis that the sacrificial death of Christ is what Girard calls a scapegoating event.For Girard, ritual sacrifice is a repetition of an original scapegoating event on which social cohesion depends. With the death of Christ, scapegoating has been denuded and sacrifice rendered inoperable, bringing humanity into a novel historical situation. Using Girard’s early seminal texts alongside crucial developments in his later work, I develop the thesis that the redemptive work is structurally a sacrificial act, but aimed at the transcending of sacrifice and the transformation of the generative potential of scapegoating; correspondingly with this objective redemptive work, believers in Christ undergo a conversion th...

This essay examines how René Girard's most recent book, Achever Clausewitz (2007), expands on Girard's theory of the sacred to include a more specific and concrete notion of the apocalypse as a historically conditioned concept. In particular, I argue that the idea of "total war" (the kind of war engendered by mass conscription) is crucial to Girard's critique of Clausewitz, which consists in pointing out the irreconcilability between Clausewitz's famous formula "war is politics by other means" (i.e., war is contained or limited by politics) and Clausewitz's idea of the "escalation to extremes" (uncontainable violence). I show how this reading of Clausewitz allows Girard to deconstruct the opposition between archaic (irrational) and modern (rational) violence that defines Enlightenment hope. Finally, I ask if the advent of post-9/11 terrorism, which is a form of total war, might not lead us to rethink the role of international institu...

El siguiente artículo tiene como objetivo la aplicación de las categorías formuladas por la teoría mimética de René Girard al proceso histórico político venezolano a partir de 1958. De esa manera, se identifica un proceso de mímesis, de deseo mimético y de rivalidad y conflicto ...

Şiddet kavranımının, yahut teriminin, yahut kelimesinin, yahut da “laneti”nin ilk insanın oğullarına kadar gittiğini söylemek meselenin önemini anlatmaya kafi gelmelidir. Şiddetin bir teşvik unsuru olarak kullanılması retorik ustası için hem bulunmaz bir nimettir, hem de geri patlaması kuvvetle muhtemel bir silahtır. İçerikte “intikam” almak yahut ezilen onurun/gururun telafisi vaadi yatıyorsa toplulukları (toplum olamamış kalabalıkları) galeyana getirmek hiç de zor değildir. Olağan dışılıkların düzenlenmesi, sorunların çözümlenmiş gibi gösterilmesi yahut en azından öfkenin yatışması için her zaman bir “günah keçisi”ne ihtiyaç vardır. Bu unsuru mimesis açısından ele alıp Antik Yunan retoriğinin çöküş zanlısı olarak görülen Demetrios’u değerlendirmeye çalışacağız.

Una lectura de La devoción de la cruz desde la perspectiva de la violencia y el poder demuestra la importancia decisiva de las acciones iniciales de Curcio en los orígenes de la acción, al tiempo que la comedia admite una revisión desde la teoría de la violencia mimética de Girard en tanto la espiral de agresividad aumenta in crescendo y Eusebio paga las culpas compartidas como un chivo expiatorio. Igualmente, se ofrecen en este ensayo algunos comentarios sobre el ejercicio del poder por parte del paterfamilias y la dimensión religiosa (muerte ejemplar y salvación cristiana).