Subject: MB: RE: Capitalism and Philosophy Lab: Blanchot and Communism, 28 June
Date: Wed, 11 Jun 2003 14:31:31 +0100


Thanks Christian - this looks great -
I have a couple of questions. What sort of audience are we to expect?
Academics/non-academics? Undergraduates/ postgraduates/ Staff? Secondly,
how do you want to divide up the time between reading papers and
discussion? Great to see we've got four hours, by the way.
Lars

-----Original Message-----
From: Blue [mailto:blue09-AT-onetel.net.uk] 
Sent: 09 June 2003 09:18
To: blanchot-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
Subject: MB: Capitalism and Philosophy Lab: Blanchot and Communism, 28
June


4th Capitalism and Philosophy Lab
Saturday 28 June, 2-6 pm
Room A116, Middlesex University, Tottenham Campus, White Hart Lane, 
London N17. White Hart Lane BR.
Admission Free. ALL WELCOME.


Theme: Communism and Friendship on the Work of Maurice Blanchot

Speakers:	Dr Lars Iyer, University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne
		Dr William Large, College of St Mark and St John


'Writing passes through the advent of communism.'
		Blanchot, The Infinite Conversation

Maurice Blanchot's turn to the consideration of political questions 
from the late 1950s onwards and his active interventions in French 
political life might surprise those who know him as a literary critic 
and novelist. But to those familiar with The Space of Literature or 
The Book to Come, it is clear that he never contents himself with 
upholding the value of the great work of art or the great literary 
artist, or indeed the literary institution itself. His concern, 
rather, is to attest to the literary, understood in terms of a 
certain experience of language inseparable from communism; for 
instance the literary practice of Bataille, which attests to an 
opening to the Other, to a certain community or communitarian demand. 
This promise of communism, and it can only be a promise for Blanchot, 
is inseparable from friendship. This is not a friendship of 
recognition or familiarity, but of coming into contact with what is 
most strange and unknown in the friend, and this 'impossible 
friendship' becomes the basis of a new way of thinking the social and 
political.


The Capitalism and Philosophy Lab is a regular workshop on post-1968
philosophical approaches to capitalism. For those who believe that
genuine philosophical advances were made in 1960's and 70's France (in
the work, for instance, of Deleuze, Badiou, Lacan, Laruelle, Lyotard),
there is an ever more pressing need to explore and test seriously the
contribution these developments make (and can
make) to Marxist theory and the analysis of contemporary capitalism. New
theoretical tools are needed for the future of Marxist thought. We
suggest that one crucial way forward is to rebut the common but
one-sided perception that the abovementioned philosophical developments
are essentially antagonistic to Marxist philosophy. (One exegetical aim
of the workshop is to place Althusserianism back into its proper
philosophical context.)

As well as critical and directed work on texts and key concepts, these
sessions aim to identify and explore vital components in the current
phase of capitalism. One central focus for discussion will be the
relations between technoscience and capital. What implications do
developments and accelerations in technoscience have for philosophy and
Marxism together? Our hope is that, taken together, these lines of
investigation might provide powerful and new theoretical concepts in the
struggle against contemporary capitalism.

Enquiries: R.Brassier-AT-mdx.ac.uk or C.Kerslake-AT-mdx.ac.uk


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