Matter of Critique

What is critique? This international conference explores the conditions under which contemporary critique takes place and traces the concept of the term “critique” in various traditions. It also addresses the question of the historicity of critique that shifts between reevaluation and (re)positing. Presentations, lectures, and roundtables examine the conditions, “disciplines” and positions of critique, ranging from literary criticism, iconic criticism, and ideology critique to forms of social critique, cultural and art critique.

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3

Panel I: The Practice of Critique

10.00 –10.45 h Rahel Jaeggi (Berlin): Was ist immanente Kritik?

10.45 –11.30 h Thomas Ebke (Potsdam): Philosophischer Tod der Philosophie: Adorno und Althusser

Moderation: Kathrin Thiele

Break

Panel II: Limits and Liminality of Critique

12.00 –12.45 Andrea Allerkamp (Frankfurt/O.): Vom Traumkitsch zur Traumkritik

12.45 –13.30 Carolin Blumenberg (Frankfurt/O.): Kants Vernunftkritik als Setzung des Falls

Moderation: Sophie Witt

Lunch

Panel III: Critique and/as Method

15.30 –16.15 Kathrin Thiele (Utrecht): In Critical Condition or Fully Out of Steam? Critical Thinking Today

16.15 –17.00 Melanie Sehgal (Frankfurt/O.): “Lures for feeling”. Speculative Thinking and Critique

Moderation: Pablo Valdivia Orozco

Break

Panel IV: Economies of Critique and Criticism

18.00 –19.00 Jacques Lezra (New York): Marx: The Matheme of Insufficient Reason

19.00 –20.00 Jonathan Culler (Ithaca): Criticism: its Differential Field

Moderation: Thomas Khurana

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3

Concept: Andrea Allerkamp, Pablo Valdivia Orozco, Sophie Witt

Participants:

Carolin Blumenberg is a PhD Candidate in the doctoral program “lebensformen und lebenswissen” (Frankfurt/O., and Potsdam). She received her M.A. in Philosophy, History and Political Science from Humboldt University Berlin and is currently working on a dissertation on Kant’s theory and praxis of examples.

Jonathan Culler is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Cornell University. He is the author of numerous books on literary theory and criticism. Among his most influential books are “Structuralist Poetics” and “On Deconstruction.” His “Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction” has been translated into some twenty languages.

Thomas Ebke is a postdoctoral fellow in the doctoral program “lebensformen und lebenswissen” (Frankfurt/O. and Potsdam). He earned a PhD in Philosophy from Potsdam University with a dissertation on Helmuth Plessner and Georges Canguilhem.

Rahel Jaeggi is Professor of Practical Philosophy, Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy at Humboldt University Berlin. Her research concerns social and political philosophy, ethics, anthropology, and social ontology. She is the author of “Entfremdung” and “Kritik von Lebensformen.”

Jacques Lezra is Professor of Comparative Literature, and Spanish and Portuguese at New York University. His research interestsinclude Renaissance and Early Modern literature as well as contemporary political philosophy. His new book, “Principles of Insufficient Reason: Mediation and Translation After Marx,” is forthcoming from Fordham University Press.

Thomas Khurana is a research and teaching assistant in the Department of Philosophy as well as in the Exzellenzcluster “The Formation of Normative Orders” at the Goethe-University, Frankfurt/M. He is the author of “Meaning and Memory. The Temporality of Meaning and the Figures of its Reflection,“ and editor of “The Freedom of Life. Hegelian Perspectives.”

Kathrin Thiele is Assistant Professor in the Graduate Gender Program, De- partment of Media and Culture Studies, at Utrecht University. Her research specialization include contemporary critical theory, feminist philosophies, and posthumanist studies. She is the author of “The Thought of Becoming,” and has co-edit- ed the book “Biopolitische Konstellationen.”

Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt an der Oder / DFG-Graduiertenkolleg Lebensformen und Lebenswissen , in co-operation with Haus der Kulturen der Welt