The Spectre of the Negative: Contemporary Readings of Hegel

Hegel once remarked that ‘philosophy is its own time comprehended in thought’. Philosophy, for Hegel, involves an awareness of the nature and tensions of a given historical moment. Our own time is a time of crisis, and contemporary philosophers have turned to Hegel himself as a means of addressing this moment.

Ray will argue that that the tensions and contradictions between contemporary understandings of Hegel’s philosophy bear relation to the concrete conditions of crisis that prompted this turn to Hegel in the first place.

These seminars will explore the idea that Hegelian thought not only demands the overcoming of crises of understanding within philosophy, but also the overcoming of crises within the social reality to which such philosophy responds.

This will involve considering the nature and status of Hegelian reason, with a view towards distancing the latter from versions of Hegel that emphasise placid resolution, or which stress the tragic inevitability of discord.

We will go on to address these issues in connection to the political antagonisms between democratic reformism and revolutionary communism, and between differing conceptions of communism.

Focus and reading for Seminar Series

18 January, The work of Robert Brandom and Stephen Houlgate

• Brandom, Robert, ‘Holism and Idealism in Hegel’s Phenomenology’ and ‘Some Pragmatist Themes in Hegel’s Idealism’ in Tales of the Mighty Dead: Historical Essays on the Metaphysics of Intentionality, Harvard University Press, 2002, pp. 178-234

• Brandom, Robert, A Spirit of Trust: A Semantic Reading of Hegel’s Phenomenology Part V, Chapter 15 ‘Trust: Forgiveness as Recollection, Magnanimity as the Final Form of Recognition’

• Houlgate, Stephen. The Opening of Hegel’s Logic, Purdue University Press, 2006, Chapter One ‘The Categories of Thought’, and Chapter Six ‘Logic and Ontology’

• Houlgate, Stephen, ‘Phenomenology and De Re Interpretation: A Critique of Brandom’s Reading of Hegel’ International Journal of Philosophical Studies Vol. 17, No.1, 2009, pp. 29-47

19 January, Adorno’s criticisms of Hegel

• Adorno, Theodor, Negative Dialectics, Tr. E. B. Ashton. Routledge, 1990, Part III. Models II. World Spirit and Natural History. An Excursion to Hegel, pp. 319-338 [An alternative translation by Dennis Redmond is available online]

• Adorno, Theodor. History and Freedom, Polity, 2006, Part I, Lecture 5 ‘The Totality on the Road to Self-Realization’, Lecture 9 ‘The Critique of Universal History’, Lecture 10 ‘‘Negative’ Universal History’

20 January, The work of Robert Pippin and Slavoj Žižek

• Pippin, Robert, ‘Back to Hegel?’ in Mediations 26.1-2 (Fall 2012-Spring 2013) 7-28.

• Pippin, Robert, Modernity as a Philosophical Problem: On the Dissatisfactions of European High Culture, 2nd edition, Blackwell Publishers, 1999, Ch. 3 ‘Idealism and Modernity’ pp. 45-77, Chapter 7 ‘Unending Modernity’ pp. 160-179.

• Žižek, Slavoj, Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism, Verso, 2012, Part II, Chapter 4, Interlude 1,Chapters 7 and 8.

• Žižek, Slavoj, ‘In Defence of Hegel’s Madness’, in Filozofija I Društvo  26.4 (2015) 785-812.

Ray Brassier’s Public Lecture:
‘The Persistence of Form: Hegel and Psychoanalysis’
Venue and time: Friday the 20h of January, Edward Street lecture theatre, 6.30pm to 8.00pm.

 

Reading group texts

• Adorno, Theodor, Negative Dialectics, Tr. E. B. Ashton. Routledge, 1990, Part III. Models II. World Spirit and Natural History. An Excursion to Hegel, pp. 319-338 [An alternative translation by Dennis Redmond is available online at http://members.efn.org/~dredmond/ndtrans.html]

• Adorno, Theodor. History and Freedom, Polity, 2006, Part I, Lecture 5 ‘The Totality on the Road to Self-Realization’, Lecture 9 ‘The Critique of Universal History’, Lecture 10 ‘‘Negative’ Universal History’

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Science of Logic: Doctrine of Being’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.187-211

• Houlgate, Stephen. The Opening of Hegel’s Logic, Purdue University Press, 2006, Chapter One ‘The Categories of Thought’, and Chapter Six ‘Logic and Ontology’

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Science of Logic: Doctrine of Essence, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.212-242

• Houlgate, Stephen, ‘Essence, Reflexion, and Immediacy in Hegel’s Science of Logic’, in A Companion to Hegel, edited by Stephen Houlgate and Michael Bauer, Wiley Blackwell, 201.

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Science of Logic: Doctrine of the Notion’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.243-250

• Pippin, Robert, ‘Back to Hegel?’ in Mediations 26.1-2 (Fall 2012-Spring 2013) 7-28.

• Žižek, Slavoj, Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism, Verso, 2012, Part II, Chapter 4, Interlude 1, Chapters 7 and 8.

(Optional extras to accompany the Žižek text (and Pippin’s critical review of Žižek):

• Comay, Rebecca, Resistance and Repetition: Freud Through Hegel’ in Research in Phenomenology, Vol. 45, 2015, pp. 237-266

• Dolar, Mladen, ‘Hegel and Freud’ in E-Flux Journal No. 34 April 2012 [Available at http://www.e-flux.com/journal/hegel-and-freud/])

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Phenomenology of Spirit: Consciousness. Sense-Certainty’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.79-86

• Brandom, Robert, ‘Holism and Idealism in Hegel’s Phenomenology’ and ‘Some Pragmatist Themes in Hegel’s Idealism’ in Tales of the Mighty Dead: Historical Essays on the Metaphysics of Intentionality, Harvard University Press, 2002, pp. 178-234

• Houlgate, Stephen, ‘Phenomenology and De Re Interpretation: A Critique of Brandom’s Reading of Hegel’ International Journal of Philosophical Studies Vol. 17, No.1, 2009, pp. 29-47

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Phenomenology of Spirit: Self-Consciousness’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.87-113

• Brandom, Robert, A Spirit of Trust: A Semantic Reading of Hegel’s Phenomenology [available online at http://www.pitt.edu/~brandom/spirit_of_trust_2014.html], Part V, Chapter 15 ‘Trust: Forgiveness as Recollection, Magnanimity as the Final Form of Recognition’

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Phenomenology of Spirit: Spirit. Absolute Freedom and Terror’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.114-119

• Comay, Rebecca, Mourning Sickness: Hegel and the French Revolution. Stanford University Press, 2011, Chapter 5, ‘Terrors of the Tabula Rasa’ pp. 118-153

• Hegel, GWF, ‘Phenomenology of Spirit: Spirit. Absolute Knowing’, in The Hegel Reader, edited by Stephen Houlgate, Blackwell Publishing, 1998, pp.120-124

• Dolar, Mladen, ‘The Owl of Minerva from Dusk till Dawn, or, Two Shades of Gray’ Filozofija I Društvo XXVI (4), 2015

• Pippin, Robert, Modernity as a Philosophical Problem: On the Dissatisfactions of European High Culture, 2nd edition, Blackwell Publishers, 1999, Ch. 3 ‘Idealism and Modernity’ pp. 45-77, Chapter 7 ‘Unending Modernity’ pp. 160-