Existence, Experience, and Transcendence

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Alexander Moore ◽  
Alan D. Schrift
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
Art And Literature ◽  
Life Career

This chapter offers an overview of Jean Wahl’s life, career, works, and influence on developments in twentieth-century French philosophy. Specific attention is paid to his introduction of Hegel and Kierkegaard into France, as well as his work on Nietzsche and Heidegger. Also discussed is his influence on Levinas and Deleuze, his relations with Bataille and Sartre, and his poetry and discussions of art and literature.

scholarly journals Art (and) Criticism: Hart Crane and David Siqueiros

Text Matters ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 229-243
Author(s):  
Alicja Piechucka
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Art Criticism ◽  
Hart Crane ◽  
Historical Texts ◽  
Art And Literature ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way

The article focuses on an analysis of Hart Crane’s essay “Note on the Paintings of David Siqueiros.” One of Crane’s few art-historical texts, the critical piece in question is first of all a tribute to the American poet’s friend, the Mexican painter David Siqueiros. The author of a portrait of Crane, Siqueiros is a major artist, one of the leading figures that marked the history of Mexican painting in the first half of the twentieth century. While it is interesting to delve into the way Crane approaches painting in general and Siqueiros’ oeuvre in particular, an analysis of the essay with which the present article is concerned is also worthwhile for another reason. Like many examples of art criticism—and literary criticism, for that matter—“Note on the Paintings of David Siqueiros” reveals a lot not only about the artist it revolves around, but also about its author, an artist in his own right. In a text written in the last year of his life, Hart Crane therefore voices concerns which have preoccupied him as a poet and which, more importantly, are central to modernist art and literature.

scholarly journals The Concept in Life and the Life of the Concept: Canguilhem’s Final Reckoning with Bergson

2016 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 154-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Feldman
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Basic Problem ◽  
History Of Biology ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
Special Place ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Living Being

Foucault famously divided the history of twentieth-century French philosophy between a “philosophy of experience” and a “philosophy of the concept,” placing Bergson in the former camp and his teacher Canguilhem in the latter. This division has shaped the Anglophone reception of Canguilhem as primarily a historian and philosopher of biology. Canguilhem, however, was also a philosopher of life and a careful reader of Bergson. The recently-begun publication of Canguilhem’s Œuvres complètes has revealed the depth of this engagement, and a re-reading of Canguilhem’s final major statement on Bergson, the 1966 essay “The Concept and Life,” has thus become necessary. The basic problem of that essay is the relationship between knowledge and life in the history of biology and philosophy, with a special place for Bergson. Canguilhem’s strong criticism of him turns, however, on a misquotation. In claiming that Bergson fails to account for the struggle of the living being to maintain a species form, Canguilhem misconstrues the crucial Bergsonian distinction between vital order and geometrical identity; he thus misses the importance that Bergson accords to general biological tendencies, rather than to the generality of the species. Despite the differences on display in the 1966 essay, it will be argued that Canguilhem’s earlier remarks on Bergson show a surprising convergence in the underlying aim of each thinker’s biological philosophy: the call for a new ontology that grasps the ordered and intelligible character of life without relying on a principle of identity.

Two-sided form, differentiation and second-order observation in Escher’s artworks and Calvino’s stories

Kybernetes ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (5) ◽  
pp. 1060-1077
Author(s):  
Laura Appignanesi
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Systems Theory ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Order System ◽  
Literary Works ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Theoretical Concepts ◽  
Art And Literature ◽  
Second Order Systems ◽  
Late Works

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to find a leading idea of the mid-twentieth century, demonstrating the pervasive nature of some concepts belonging to second-order systems theory. To achieve this objective, the paper looks at the art and literature of this era, to identify the principles developed by Luhmann in his late works. In particular, Escher’s drawings, Calvino’s stories and Luhmann’s concepts seem to express, in different ways, the same functioning mechanism of the complex social system. Design/methodology/approach With reference to theoretical approach and methodology, this paper carries out an interdisciplinary demonstration by alternative modes of logos and mythos. Some of the pillars of general systems theory are examined through the logical articulation of concepts developed by Spencer-Brown, von Foerster, and first of all through the late works of Luhmann, as well as through the analysis of Escher’s artworks and Calvino’s literary works. This paper interprets these artistic and literary works using cybernetic principles and systemic concepts, in particular, “two-sided forms,” “system–environment differentiation” and “second-order observation.” Findings In general, the main finding is the similarity of fascination with paradoxes and forms, with post-ontological reasoning, in twentieth century. The result of the cross-reading of Escher, Calvino and Luhmann reveals the presence of what Simmel called the “hidden king”: a philosophical paradigm of an era. In mid-1900s, this leading idea seems to express itself in the discoveries of biology and cybernetics, such as in Luhmann’s theory, art and literature. Escher’s drawings, Calvino’s stories and the concepts of Luhmann are projections of second-order system theory, in its constructivist value. Originality/value The originality of this paper lies mainly in the demonstration of theoretical concepts through the alternative modes of logos and mythos. These reflections can provide a new perspective to investigate social sciences from a cultural angle. This particular approach allows a deep awareness of the theory. The concrete value is to provide a better understanding to manage complexity.

Looking Back at History of Madness

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lynne Huffer
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
History Of ◽  
Anglophone World ◽  
Looking Back

This essay offers an overview of History of Madness, including its place in Foucault's oeuvre, its publication and translation history. Huffer focuses especially on the significance of History of Madness as an under-read text whose philosophical and historical implications have not yet been adequately explored. She argues that a careful reading of History of Madness on its own terms offers resources for moving beyond some of the impasses that characterize not only twentieth-century French philosophy, but also many of the fields in the Anglophone world—especially feminist, queer, and critical race theory—that arose in the wake of a debate about madness.

After Of Habit

2019 ◽  
pp. 62-94
Author(s):  
Mark Sinclair
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Paul Ricoeur ◽  
Henri Bergson ◽  
Lived Body ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
The Third ◽  
Paul Ricœur ◽  
Embodied Action

This chapter examines the reception of Ravaisson’s account of habit in later nineteenth- and twentieth-century French philosophy. The first two sections examine its reception in the work of Albert Lemoine, Léon Dumont, and Henri Bergson. The third section examines its reception in the work of the French phenomenologists and theorists of the lived body, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Paul Ricoeur. The chapter shows how Ravaisson’s account of inclination relates to these notions of the lived body. In conclusion, it shows how contemporary Merleau-Ponty-inspired accounts of pre-reflective, embodied action as a form of ‘coping’ can be extended by Ravaisson’s concern for tendency and inclination in motor habit.

De Man, Paul (1919–83

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Bahti
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Literary Theory ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Literary Language ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
Literature And Philosophy ◽  
Philosophic Texts ◽  
De Man ◽  
Rhetorical Reading

De Man’s work is among the most renowned and influential in American literary theory of the latter twentieth century, especially regarding literary theory’s emergence as an interdisciplinary and philosophically ambitious discourse. Always emphasizing the linguistic aspects of a literary work over thematic, semantic or evaluative ones, de Man specifically focuses on the figurative features of literary language and their consequences for the undecidability of meaning. His extension of his mode of ‘rhetorical reading’ to philosophic texts also participates in the blurring of generic and institutional distinctions between literature and philosophy, a tendency pronounced in French philosophy of the latter twentieth century.

Brunschvicg, Léon (1869–1944)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maurice Loi
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Philosophy Of Mathematics ◽  
Central Place ◽  
Important Work ◽  
French Philosophy

Brunschvicg occupied a central place in French philosophy during the first part of the twentieth century. In 1909 he became a professor at the Sorbonne, teaching there and at the École Normale Supérieure for the next thirty years. His indefatigable activity, wide curiosity and erudition made him a leading figure of French philosophy. His influence is manifest in the work of Bachelard, Piaget, Guéroult, Nabert, Koyré and Sartre. His most important work lay in the field of the philosophy of mathematics, where (among other things) he introduced French philosophers to the work of Frege and Russell.

French philosophy of science

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Gutting
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Philosophy Of Mathematics ◽  
Formal System ◽  
Important Influence ◽  
Existential Phenomenology ◽  
Louis Althusser ◽  
French Philosophy ◽  
Rational Reflection ◽  
French Tradition

A distinctively French tradition in the philosophy of science began with Descartes, continued through the Enlightenment in works such as D’Alembert’s Discours préliminaire and the Encyclopédie, and flowered in the ninteenth and the early twentieth century with the work of Comte, Duhem, Meyerson and Poincaré. Throughout the twentieth century, the dominant fashions in French philosophy derived more and more from German influences, especially idealism and phenomenology (Hegel to Heidegger). But amidst these developments, there persisted an essentially autonomous tradition of French philosophy of science that offered an indigenous alternative to the Germanic imports. Here the key figure was Gaston Bachelard (1884–1962), for many years professor at the Sorbonne and director of the Institut d’Histoire des Sciences et des Techniques. His work was continued and modified by Georges Canguilhem (1904–95), his successor at the Institute, who himself was an important influence on philosophers such as Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault and Michel Serres. Jean Cavaillès’ critique of Husserl’s philosophy of mathematics and his effort to develop a neo-Hegelian alternative to it had deep affinities with Bachelard’s work and was also an important influence on Canguilhem. The most important general features of twentieth-century French philosophy of science appear if we contrast it with its two major rivals: existential phenomenology and logical positivism. Existential phenomenology is a ‘philosophy of the subject’, maintaining that ultimate truth resides in the immediacy of lived experience. Bachelard and his followers, by contrast, proposed a ‘philosophy of the concept’, for which experiential immediacy is subordinate to and corrected by concepts produced by rational reflection. This process of rational reflection is, moreover, embodied in science, which is not, as existential phenomenology maintains, a derivative and incomplete form of knowing, but the very paradigm of knowledge. In giving science a privileged epistemic position, the French philosophers of science are like the logical positivists. But, unlike the positivists, they treat science as essentially historical, irreducible in either method or content to the rigour of a formal system. They also opposed the positivists’ effort to find the foundations of scientific knowledge in sense experience, maintaining that there are no simply given data and that all experience is informed by conceptual interpretation.

French Philosophy in the Twentieth Century

2003 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-93
Author(s):  
Stephen Michelman ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
French Philosophy
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