Grand Hotel Abyss : desire, recognition and the restoration of the subject / Vladimir Safatle ; translation, Lucas Carpinelli.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Safatle, Vladimir, author.

Contributor:

Carpinelli, Lucas, translator.

Series:

Figures of the unconscious ; 15.

Figures of the Unconscious ; 15

Standardized Title:

Grande Hotel Abismo. English

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Subject (Philosophy).

Philosophy, German.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (322 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Leuven, Belgium : Leuven University Press, 2016.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In the last two decades recognition - arguably one of the most central notions of the dialectical tradition since Hegel - has once again become a crucial philosophical theme. Nevertheless, the new theories of recognition fail to provide room for reflection on transformation processes in politics and morality. This book aims to recover the disruptive nature of the dialectical tradition by means of a severe critique of the dominance of an anthropology of the individual identity in contemporary theories of recognition. This critique implies a thorough rethinking of basic concepts such as desire, negativity, will and drive, with Hegel, Lacan and Adorno being our main guides. The Marxist philosopher György Lukács said that the Frankfurt School (Horkheimer, Adorno, etc.) left us with nothing but negativity towards the state of the world. Their work failed to open up a concrete possibility of practical engagement in this world. All too eager to describe the impasses of reason, the Frankfurt philosphers remained trapped in a metaphorical Grand Hotel Abyss (Grand Hotel Abgrund). It was as living and being guardian of lettered civilization in a beautiful and melancholy grand hotel, of which the balconies face a gaping abyss. But perhaps in this way Lukács gave -- and no doubt without realizing it himself -- a perfect definition of contemporary philosophy, namely to confront chaos, to peer into what appears to a certain rationality as an abyss and to feel good about it. Touching Hegelian dialectics, critical theory and psychoanalysis, Grand Hotel Abyss gives a new meaning to the notion of negativity as the first essential step for rethinking political and moral engagement.

Contents:

Introduction. An indistinct picture

I. Desire

I. Love is colder than death

II. On how law becomes freedom

III. Not all things are destined for transience

II. Drive and fantasy

IV. The coupling of sex and death is not exclusive to decadent romantics

V. An impulse toward lawlessness

VI. Below zero : the "negativity deficit" in Axel Honneth

III. Action

VII. Our time unlocks a multiplicity in each desire

VIII. On the political power of the inhuman

IX. Towards an anti-predicative concept of recognition

Conclusion.

Notes:

Original title: Grande Hotel Abismo. Por uma reconstrução da teoria do reconhecimento, Portuguese language edition by Editora Martins Fontes, ©2012.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (ebrary, viewed April 21, 2016).

ISBN:

94-6166-193-2

OCLC:

945658088