PHILOSOPHY

on Derrida

nov2013

LECTURES

Critical Theory - UC Berkeley

Jacques Derrida’s ‘deconstructionism’ is nothing less than an effort to destroy all ‘writing’ by demonstrating its inevitable falsehood. The writer writes but does not know what he is writing. Derrida argues that all texts have their own hidden agenda and contain their own metaphysical assumptions – the writer’s very language inevitably distorts what he thinks and writes. The ‘truth’ of all our knowledge is thus undermined; post-structuralism arrives.

Here is a concise, expert account of Derrida’s life and philosophical ideas – entertainingly written and easy to understand. Also included are selections from Derrida’s work, suggested further reading, and chronologies that place Derrida in the context of the broader scheme of philosophy.

Derrida: Philosophy in an Hour by Paul Strathern, read by Jonathan Keeble

On Jacques Lacan’s “Seminar on ‘The Purloined Letter’” (1956), Jacques Derrida’s “The Purveyor of Truth” (1975), and other essays in the collection The Purloined Poe: Lacan, Derrida, and Psychoanalytic Reading.

How should philosophers approach literature? Lacan read Edgar Allen Poe’s story about a sleuth who outthinks a devious Minister as an illustration of his model of the psyche, and why we persist in self-destructive patterns: we are driven by “the symbolic order,” which tells us our place. The letter, which in the story is an embarrassing but unspecified message to the Queen that has been stolen by the Minister and used to blackmail her, is for Lacan a symbol for the power of the signifier, which dictates the roles of the various characters in the story, as first one then another is pushed into a passive, vulnerable state by gaining possession of it, driven by the logic that moves the letter inexorably back to its “rightful place.”

Derrida thought this reading not only imposed a bunch of psychobabble onto the story, but demonstrated that Lacan just didn't know how to read a text. Per Derrida’s deconstruction, you have to look at not only the themes the author presents, but at the technical aspects of the work and how they betray the author to serve up a different message. Lacan thinks he’s getting at the meaning of the text, but Derrida disavows the whole picture whereby such a meaning, or truth, can be revealed in this way.

As both essays are tremendously obscure, who the hell knows if Derrida’s assessment of Lacan even gets Lacan right, and the other authors in the collection have different takes on whose interpretation holds water, whether the Jacques are really more similar than they admit, and about how weird it is to be pouring criticism onto criticism of criticism. Mark, Seth, and Dylan do their best to wade through this morass and eke out a bit more understanding of Lacan (building on ep. 74), Derrida’s view of language (see ep. 51), and how not to read a text.

Go to blog

Lacan and Derrida on Poe's Purloined Letter - Partially Examined Life

Brand New Face (Acoustic)

Available from:  <a href="http://smarturl.it/TheVapourer">iTunes</a> / <a href="https://realworldrecords.com/release/630/the-vapourer/">Real World</a> / <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Vapourer-Spiro-Adrian-Utley/dp/B00FEZXC6U">Amazon</a>

New six-track mini album of Moog synthesizer mixes by Adrian Utley (Portishead) - which transport Spiro's music to an ethereal place somewhere between Sci-Fi, Bach and Kraftwerk - plus a new recording and three dazzling live tracks.

Spiro - The Vapourer - 01 The Vapourer

From the updated version of The Score (Part One). The Score features over an hour of soundtrack themes from the gentle opening through to full and epic hollywood.
 
Download at Bandcamp: http://dexterbritain.bandcamp.com/

www.dexterbritain.co.uk
www.facebook.com/thedexterbritain
www.twitter.com/dexterbritain

To license this music for your project please contact The Music Bed, or see dexterbritain.co.uk for information.

Waiting Around

Speaker(s): Dr Nina Morgan | What role does metaphor have in shaping our emotional lives? Reading texts by Freud and Derrida, this lecture will focus on the emergence of metaphor in times of crisis. Nina Morgan is associate professor of English and interdisciplinary studies at Kennesaw State University. Tue, 26 Nov 2013 18:30:00 GMT

Metaphor and Crisis in Freud and Derrida [Audio]

In following the moderns in the making of scientific knowledge, STS scholars have shown an interesting discrepancy between what scientists do in practice and what they say they do in theory. Indeed, scientific objectivity has been entirely reconfigured and reinterpreted in very different ways. In continuity with this endeavor, and because the definition of the object goes hand in hand with the definition of the subject, one of my obsessions has been to re-interrogate the definition of the knowing subject. If another definition of scientific objectivity emerges, and if science is socially or collectively and materially made—depending on our conception of the social—what does this do to our classical notion of the knowing subject? What does it do to the most powerful and operative myth of the modern: “the disincorporated brain”? And by extension, what does it do to our notions of the person, the individual genius, the rational actor, the psyche, and or subjectivity, to which this myth is anchored?

Hélène Mialet is a Scholar-in-Residence with The Program in Critical Theory at UC Berkeley 2013-2014. More information can be found at http://criticaltheory.berkeley.edu.

Introduction: Robert Kaufman, Professor of Comparative Literature and Co-Director of The Program in Critical Theory, UC Berkeley

Respondent: Églantine Colon, Professor of French, UC Berkeley

Politics Beyond the Human: How to Think the Knowing Subject Anew?... | Helene Mialet | 4/2/2014

The opening session of the Neoliberalism + Biopolitics Working Group provides a space for discussion of the lasting insights, limitations, and potential applications of Foucault’s The Birth of Biopolitics Lectures at the Collège de France, 1978-79. Linking neoliberalism and biopolitics at both the historical and conceptual level, Foucault’s prescient lecture series lays the groundwork for the working group’s concern with the contemporary management of populations through diverse practices of economization, privatization, and financialization.

Hans Sluga is a Professor of Philosophy and William Callison is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley.  More information can be found at criticaltheory.berkeley.edu.

Neoliberalism + Biopolitics | Revisiting Foucault: The Biopolitics... | Hans Sluga | 9/17/14

In this session, we reflect on how norms and practices of neoliberal governmentality are disseminated and transformed across borders. Professors Rofel and Bargu’s extensive studies of China and Turkey respectively, offer new insights into how different forms of neoliberalism transform social and political life in various contexts, while also calling into question the enduring viability of neoliberalism as an analytic frame. We aim collectively to problematize and contest Eurocentric approaches to the study of neoliberalism, while also investigating the role under neoliberalism of NGOs, IGOs, corporations and state institutions. We hope to foster a comparative and interdisciplinary dialogue to reassess both how neoliberalisms function as practices in the contemporary world, and what limitations the overall framework of neoliberalism may pose for the analysis of contemporary transformations of social life. We consider questions concerning the privatization of public goods, international investment and development programs, the dissemination of norms of entrepreneurship, the role of experts in development projects, micro-lending, and the effects of such developments on “public culture,” sexual and gender norms, and kinship structures.

Introduction: William Callison, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science, UC Berkeley. More information can be found at criticaltheory.berkeley.edu.

Neoliberalism + Biopolitics | Globalizing Neoliberalism(s)? | Julia Elyachar | 10/8/14

In his analysis of two contemporary forms of violence – the death-penalty and the violent exploitation of animals – Jacques Derrida showed how deeply rooted their conceptual bases are within contemporary institutions and practices. Moreover, his analyses showed the extent to which many of the discourses which claim to oppose them are caught up in the very conceptual space which sustains the forms of violence they purport to contest. In this talk, I focus on one of the resources Derrida’s own work offers for grappling with this difficulty. Tracking the octopus which appears in one of Derrida’s texts, I sketch the long history of this creature and explore the clues it provides as to alternative models of rationality and possible modes of resistance. (Custer)

Olivia Custer completed her Doctorat d’Université at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, working on Kant’s critical philosophy under the supervision of Jacques Derrida. Her research interests revolve around the question of how to engage Kant’s philosophical legacy. She is the author of L’Exemple de Kant (Peeters, 2012), and co-author of Sexualité, Genre et Melancholie, (Campagne Première, Paris, 2009).

Introduction: Judith Butler, Professor of Comparative Literature, UC Berkeley

Reading the Hell Out of Derrida: The Octopus | Olivia Custer | 10/23/14

In this meeting we discuss the potential uses and limitations of Marxist approaches to the contemporary theorization and study of neoliberal capitalism. While some have described neoliberalism as a modification in the mode of production, entailing new ideological categories and a retrenchment of class power, others have emphasized its non-unified character and its unique forms of governmentality, which have reconfigured relations between the state, economy, and citizen-subjects. This session hopes to engage and think with Marxist traditions by asking which central insights remain essential to account for neoliberal capitalism–from surplus value and capital accumulation to commodification and fetishism–and whether new analytical tools are required to grasp changes in contemporary capitalist power relations. This interdisciplinary dialogue may consider the distinctive elements of neoliberalism such as financialization, human capital, economization, and entrepreneurialism.

Wendy Brown is Class of 1936 First Professor of Political Science at the University of California Berkeley, where she is also affiliated with the Department of Rhetoric and interdisciplinary graduate program in Critical Theory. A scholar of historical and contemporary political theory, her most recent books are Walled States, Waning Sovereignty (2010), The Power of Tolerance (with Rainer Forst, 2013), and Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution (2015).

Michael Burawoy has studied industrial workplaces in different parts of the world — Zambia, Chicago, Hungary and Russia — through participant observation. Throughout his career he has engaged with Marxism, seeking to reconstruct it in the light of his research and more broadly in the light of historical challenges of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

Colleen Lye is Associate Professor of English at UC Berkeley. She is the author of America’s Asia: Racial Form and American Literature, 1893-1945 (Princeton University Press, 2005), a study of the making of “Asiatic racial form” through the interactions of naturalist literature and U.S. policy in an era of U.S. expansion across the Pacific. Currently she is working on a new project on Asian American literary formation after the 1960s and its relationship to the globalization of knowledge economies.

Richard Walker’s research is focused on economic geography, regional development, capitalism and politics, cities and urbanism, resources and environment, California, class and race. Professor Walker’s best known work is in economic geography, especially The Capitalist Imperative: Territory, Technology and Industrial Growth (Blackwell, 1989), with Michael Storper – one of the most cited books in the field.

Introduction: William Callison, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science, UC Berkeley. More information can be found at criticaltheory.berkeley.edu.

Neoliberalism + Biopolitics | Neoliberalism and Marxist... | Brown, Burawoy, Lye, Walker | 11/12/14

The first full critical biography of Benjamin in any language, Walter Benjamin: A Critical Life (Harvard 2014) is the capstone of a twenty-year collaboration between scholars Howard Eiland and Michael Jennings on Walter Benjamin’s life, work, and critical legacy. The Program in Critical Theory brings them together with Harvard University Press editor Lindsay Waters for a discussion of the book’s implications for Benjamin scholarship. Critical Theory co-director Martin Jay moderates a conversation on the genesis of the project and the possibility of writing a “Benjaminian” biography.

Introduction: Robert Kaufman, Professor of Comparative Literature, UC Berkeley

On Walter Benjamin: A Critical Life | Howard Eiland | 11/4/14

This is the audio recording of Professor Judith Butler's public lecture at trinity College on Thursday February 5th, 2015: Vulnerability and Resistance Revisisted. 

Judith Butler - 'Vulnerability And Resistance Revisited'

Derrida Violence and Metaphysics pt1

download: http://www.mediafire.com/listen/uiciuqd7izczd4d/nafla+-+locked+and+loaded+%28ft.+Owen+Ovadoz%29.mp3

produced by lowkeydamian

its the empire from a new city, 
보여주지 다른 도시의 vibe
ride wit it,
i gotta pretty muthufukin pistol
in my tongue 다 쏴죽이지
hater들을 나열한후 click click
the word is out, west coast rep it
most definite 에서 이젠 42 got the boombap
flows be kickin, beats bumpin
누구에게는 먹히는 내 랩스탈은 compton
이젠 내가 하는 짓 함부로 따라할수없는 리듬
벌수없는 니들 노래들, 내 손가락 걸수있는 약속
i kill it like usual
내 실력 부루주아
all the mc gotta love
nikes on my feet, make my cypher,
na got the posion like a python
light up heres the lighter
다른곳에 다른 느낌을 봐
진정한 리쓰너는 알겠지 이 죽이는 sound


i do it for my nicks
locked and loaded
i do it for the money
locked and loaded
i aint doin fo no bitch
hoes and hoes and
i got pistol in my tongue 
locked and loaded


itz da empire from Seoul city 보여주지
한국 힙합의 vibe ride with it
내 출처를 의심하지마 New Jersey
부터 이어지는 내 삶에 다 녹여놨지
beast coast's pride bap boom feeling
doubt this homie u doubting yourself, feel me?
killing 90s golden era 진짜끼리 떠들었던 진짜배기
where the fuck did they vanished to? real
means nothing really 존경하는 선배는 갔지 멀리
가요에 상업화된 소리를 뱉고 
힙합대중상을 타 full of gimmicks 세속에
물 들어 좆만해진 배포
됫고 make noise 2 this true religion sound
Owen Ovadoz and Nafla in the house
사시미 혀를 꺼내면 our shit gets RAW
Ovadoz on the beat make the people go loud


i do it for my nicks
locked and loaded
i do it for the money
locked and loaded
i aint doin fo no bitch
hoes and hoes and
i got pistol in my tongue 
locked and loaded


우린 멋을아는 애들
다른 머슴아들과 좀 멀어지는 유행
천재들이 바라보는 기분
매일하는 랩에 콸리티는 올라가지
아무도 몰라 90년대의 내려입던 힙합 바지
누구든 하는 랩 시대
이제는 팔목 금시계가, 실력을 다 대신해
힙합을 하면 oh you gotta love it
my shit is old style classic like illmatic
i need rhythm, 새겨놔 나의 이름
보여주지 나의 팀, betta than all yall mc
매일 끄적이는 메모, 하고있지 제대로
그게 다가아냐 its harder than what it seems
never raised in no hood and its all good 
힙합에다 팔아버린 나의 젊음
but im still young still kickin' dope shit, 넘쳐 포텐
나머지는 아직까진 less important

locked and loaded ft Owen Ovadoz (extended ver.) (prod. Lowkey Damian)

Prof. Dr. Bojana Kunst - The project horizon: On the temporality of making

Mercan Dede'nin 2006 yılında yayınladığı Nefes albümünden bir parça.
Mercan Dede'nin Nefes albümü, WMCE (World Music Charts Europe) listesinde birinci olmuştur.

A song from Mercan Dede's Nefes / Breath album(2006)
Mercan Dede's Nefes album is listed #1 position in WMCE (World Music Charts Europe).


Mercan Dede - Napas

Recorded for Brain Pickings. Background and poem text: http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/07/02/amanda-palmer-reads-wislawa-szymborska

Join me in supporting Amanda Palmer's art on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/amandapalmer?ty=h

MORE / POEM TEXT

Amanda Palmer reads "Life While-You-Wait" by Wislawa Szymborska

14 IN IT
(Jay Park "On it" Remix)

[Hook]
Yes I’m in it
I mean it 
Yes 난 이 클럽에서 VIP
너희완 비교조차 못하지

Yes I’m in it
oh I mean it
난 이 클럽에서 VIP
너희완 비교조차 못하지

[Verse 1]
난 보라색 95맥스와 kickin'
씬에 등장과 동시에 위로 직진
특별할 수 밖에 없는 나의 15 
I’m illin' and killin’
절대 어설프게 흉낸 안냈지
Ain’t no trippin’ 
I’m livin' I’m chillin'
사실 이미 다 아시다시피 
My bitches are leanin’
I mean it and gimme some few minutes
My homies all hoes high hit it 이미
Who fuckin cares? make millionaire
내 여잔 갖게 될거야 발 밑에 Louboutin (Take that), 
sit there in my Cadillac
SSS급 니가 main해
끝이 보이는 니 커리어
나는 서있을 뿐이지 너흰 입벌리며
가득 메운 클럽을 달구고 나오며 난 말해 
한잔 더 퍼붓고 이따 나와 Dance floor

[Hook]
Yes I’m in it
Yes I mean it 
Yes 난 이 클럽에서 VIP
너희완 비교조차 못하지

Yes I mean it 2 times
We MIC check 이미 
West side with it
Yes my money
oh I got money
oh I got money
oh I got money

[Verse 2]
Oh I got money 있다면 바로 mall로 가서 다쓰지 
내 베르사치 gold chain wit it
너흰 how u feel 
이제야 now u see
go home hoe
난 친구들과 chillin I need
I kill 왠만한 rapper 모가지는 다 따지
난 fairfax로 가서 하얀모자를 구한 뒤
I mean like fuck who are you
I got BAPE BAPE
yeh that's cool dude but who are you
아직 날 모르면 얼른 집으로 가 
googlin' Loopy Youtubin'
You fuckin hater 안 내려 가는 내 높이와 매력
내가 말한대로 될꺼야 여름이 지나면
잘하지 몇배로 니들 오빠에 비하면
난 진짜들하고만 kick in
얌전히 외국물 sippin
My 15 we get it get it 
I mean it mean it 
me Cali Cali


[Hook]
Yes 난 이 클럽에서 VIP
너희완 비교조차 못하지

Yes I mean it 2 times
We MIC check 이미 
West side with it
Yes my money
oh I got money
oh I got money
oh I got money

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

*Credit
words by Loopy
original beat from GRAY
remake beat by Jeremy 96
(https://soundcloud.com/jeremyblacjahn96)

2 - 14 IN IT (On It Remix)

Me


Makit rain
Makit rain
Makit rain

Who the fuck are u 
who tryna get me on 
Who the fuck get me on this game 
I do this for ma fans fams no fames tho
이건 면도 너 말고 Haters 니들이 쳐들어
아가 깝치면 병들어 
깔끔히 면도하고 나갔던 show
니 여자도 널 못봤어 니 친구는 그녀를 못봤고
곡하나 못쓰는 새끼가 가사타령 차라리 시집내세요
아빠차 사드릴라다 실패한 니 옆에 벌레새끼 도움이 필요해
둘이 한번에 덤빌 때 끌어줄테니 올라와
I got 6 more bitches since she fuxk with that king loopy
몇번을 말해야 쳐알아들어 
난 쓰지 않아 가사들은 no mo 
방금 올린 사진때매 녹음 못하게 해 fans
이놈의 인기 개 피곤 해 Get that
Take ma fames 줄게 먹어
Fuck rhymes
Fuck lines
Fuck errything
ma xxxxxs in cali
No giva fuck bout u 
Cuz we kill 병신 errday
빌려라도 와 Airbag 
힙합을 넌 왜 배워 해 떽 
때려친 공부는 오래된지 오래
물었지 면도칼 교복을 찢고
이젠 내 여동생들도 널 씹어대
띄어줄게 날아봐 13시간은 버틴 후
See me at k town bitch





prod. mil house
artwork by T

Me (prod. mil house)

Mijangwon (feat. Loopy & Nafla)

Background, context, and full text: https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/04/11/david-whyte-vulnerability/

Excerpted from https://soundcloud.com/onbeing/david-whyte-the-conversational-nature-of-reality

Photograph by Nicol Ragland

MORE / TEXT

David Whyte reads "Vulnerability"

Background, context, and transcribed text: https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/04/13/james-baldwin-the-artists-struggle-for-integrity/

Recording by Pacifica Radio Archives.

CONTEXT / TEXT

James Baldwin: The Artist's Struggle for Integrity (full lecture)

Goldie on My Neck

Words by Thisloop
Beats by Aymen On the Beat / Trying 2 Understand
Mixed by Louis Maui

Oh 내 homie들은 fuckin trillers 
All u haters talk too much really 
I been around round the cities
Seoul city to LA 어디든 killin
다들 기대하는 shit man I'm ready
Trap은 이제 질림 Boombap이 진리
No I don't really want 
I don't really wanna 
듣고 싶으면 직접 해
I keep it hunna
이미 니들이 한 건 안 하지 나는
시간 지나면 진짜 가짜가 나뉘어
소주병 사이사이에 검은색 Chandon
I'm da shit homie so I be lonely
I'ma get that red Lamborghini 
Got dang 내 꿈의 차
Errday studio workin 
너와 내 꿈의 차이야
Gucci bucket 샀고 담엔 duffle bag
Gucci bag 니 여자 어깨에 매줄래
I got goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck 
goldie on ma neck
I got that goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck 
goldie on ma neck 
I got that goldie on ma next bitch
난 랩으로 Pay bills
See ma Goyard
좀 더 흔들어 골반 
총 없이 난 money gang
내 혀가 glock bang again 
못 배운 애한테 배워
넌 Rap 학생 내가 주는 preach teach 
이건 drill shit 
알아봐 봐라 bitch 
기본중에 기본 
뻔해 니들 반응은 잉?
허나 안 끊기는 일 
내 앨범을 원하지 
2016 겨울 Goal in
I got goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck 
goldie on ma neck
I got that goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck
goldie on ma neck 
goldie on ma neck

Errday at the studio 
쉬지 않아 do like Julio
I'm at the studio workin
어떻게 돈 버는지 싶지 넌 
그치 뭐 누가 잘하냔거엔 관심없어
차라리 drink a lot
못 느끼는 fan도 걍 꺼져 다 
and fuck 낮은 수준의 rapper
you get it 
아무도 날 몰라봤지 but
whole lotta lovin now
뜨뜨뜨 rap이든 dab이든 
이미 오래전에 했어
얘들께 물려 난
Doin no more Doin no more 
like I said before 
함부로 Mkit rain 
주둥이 털면 뒤져 아주  







whyusoserious?


WhyUSoSerious?

Goldie on My Neck

آلبوم جدید کیهان کلهر " تنها نخواهم ماند
New Album from Keyhan Kalhor. 

02 Where Are You

The Center for Interdisciplinary Critical Inquiry (CICI) was established in 2013 by UC Berkeley’s College of Letters and Sciences: Division of Arts and Humanities with a mission to support the programming and development of several dynamic interdisciplinary research units in the humanities and social sciences.

Currently CICI serves The Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion, The Program in Critical Theory, and the Digital Humanities at Berkeley, three programs led by a highly diverse community of 200 faculty, advisors, scholars and graduate students from nearly 30 campus departments and schools.