Julian Reid spoke at some length in respect of parrhesia about how Foucault referred to the cynics, a bunch of hated thinkers active during some time in Greece being very happy to say the truth and not only that but to take of their clothes in public and do things with their pickles.
William Desmond published in ’08 a very interesting book where their influence is radically revised.
Once regarded as a minor Socratic school, Cynicism is now admired as one of the more creative and influential philosophical movements in antiquity. First arising in the city-states of late classical Greece, Cynicism thrived through the Hellenistic and Roman periods, until the triumph of Christianity and the very end of pagan antiquity. In every age down to the present, its ideals of radical simplicity and freedom have alternately inspired and disturbed onlookers.This book offers a survey of Cynicism, its varied representatives and ideas, and the many contexts in which it operated. William Desmond introduces important ancient Cynics and their times, from Diogenes ‘the Dog’ in the fourth century BC to Sallustius in the fifth century AD. He details the Cynics’ rejection of various traditional customs and the rebellious life-style for which they are notorious. The central chapters locate major Cynic themes (nature and the natural life, Fortune, self-sufficiency, cosmopolitanism) within the rich matrix of ideas debated by the ancient schools. The final chapter reviews some moments in the diverse legacy of Cynicism, from Jesus to Nietzsche.
Here some texts from day 2 – more towards curating today.
Reinhart Koselleck: “Space of Experience” and
“Horizon of Expectation”: Two Historical Categories
Here some related stuff to Simon Sheikh’s seminar – day 1.
Habermas: The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere
Tomorrow we start again at 16.30 with Simon Sheikh the man from Denmark living and working in Berlin – art historian and curator with a particular interest in the formation of public space.
Simon in a mail: the trajectory is planned to move from theory to practice to theory-as-practice on ecah day. Day one will be on the notion of producing a public, day two on the concept and practice of curating in relation to these issues, leading up to day 3, which will discuss the idea of horizons in political imaginaries and artistic imagination.
Here some text that we can read, however Simon says no need to read your eyes out until the middle of the night.
Simon Sheikh: Positively Representation of Banking Revisited
Discourse and Truth: the Problematization of Parrhesia.
6 lectures given by Michel Foucault at the University of California at Berkeley, Oct-Nov. 1983
” My intention was not to deal with the problem of truth, but with the problem of truth-teller or truth-telling as an activity. By this I mean that, for me, it was not a question of analyzing the internal or external criteria that would enable the Greeks and Romans, or anyone else, to recognize whether a statement or proposition is true or not. At issue for me was rather the attempt to consider truth-telling as a specific activity, or as a role. ” Discourse & Truth, Concluding remarks by Foucault.
See it all here
Today focus on security
Check out some stuff and some other stuff.
Carl von Clausewitz: On War as Julian proposed a totally unreadable bunch of pages but check out book one and eight. The text that defined the notion of war since early 19th century.
Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari: Treatise on Nomadology
David Harvey: A Brief History of Neoliberalism (2007)
Catherine Mills: Normative Violence, Vulnerability, and Responsibility (2007)
Here a bunch of awesome mp3’s from a conference in Zagreb “To Have Done With Life” – among other Ray Brassier, Martin Hägglund, Benjamin Noys, Evan Calder Williams.
Reading list etc. for Julian Reid – yeah – tomorrow seminar starts only 16.30 – be there or miss the war.
Tomorrow 13 August Julian Reid professor at Univ. of Rovaniemi starts up a new three days session at PAF. After three days with Nina Power – we are ready – having gone down the protest lane, charged into capitalism as religion – add to that more Benjamin his writing on violence – and day three we address work or rather non-work. We are now ready for war – or at least to engage with its thinking – running around with Foucault, Deleuze and believe it or not Butler. We have sharpened our knives, brought out the AK47’s from the cupboard and are very happy to have Julian in the ring.
Check out the reading list here:
1. The Biopolitics of War
Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended (London, Allen Lane, 2003), lecture 11, pp239-64.
2. The Liberal Way of War
Michel Foucault, Security, Territory, Population (Macmillan, London, 2007), lecture 1, pp1-23.
3. The Vulnerable Subject of Liberal War
Judith Butler, Frames of War (London, Verso, 2009), ch.1
Julian Reid, ‘The Vulnerable Subject of Liberal War’, South Atlantic Quarterly (110, 3, 2011)
4. After Liberalism: The People to Come
Gilles Deleuze, Cinema: Volume 2 (London, Continuum, 2005), ch. 8.
Here you can read a sort of summery of the Nina Power Seminar – put together by participants.
And some texts we propose to read for the seminar tomorrow:
This blog features news, information, text and the lot concerning the Agora Seminar now happening in PAF. The first three days we will be engage in a seminar with Nina Power directly from the riots in London. For some five to seven hour per day we will engage in strategies of how to operate from the barricades in a contemporary manner.
PAF has full house and we have no intentions of stepping down from any kind of position, just obtain new ones, harder, less willing to any kind of compromise, and yet at PAF we operate without aim however convinced we are.
The Agora Seminar is also the starting point for the elaboration of the follow up piece to the very successful Oedipus My Foot from earlier this year. Due mid October we will premiere “As You Like It, A body Part” in Steirischer Herbst and we tell you, you will like it – you will like it.
Next to Nina’s seminar we are convinced about the relation between Shakespeare and the minimalist Terry Riley, so next days we also start up a kind of Agora Orchestra and no it’s not the same as street musicians playing covers of El Condor Pasa, but close.
We meet at 15.00 hours and work until 20.00 – no shopping and everybody is welcome.
Before tomorrow seminar we will read the following:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/nina-power?INTCMP=SRCH
and Nina Power’s recent book One Dimensional Woman (2010)
Agora PAF 