The Minnesota Political Theory Colloquium Series "Capital and Crisis" invites you to two upcoming presentations from outstanding scholars in critical theory: Professor Robert Hullot-Kentor will present on Friday, March 2nd at 1:30pm and Professor Alex Demirovic will present on Tuesday, March 6th at 5:00pm. Both events will be held in room 1314 Social Science Tower.
1. Professor Hullot-Kentor is chair of the graduate program at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He has taught at Harvard and Stanford universities and written widely on Adorno. He has published among other works Things Beyond Resemblance, a collection of essays on critical theory. Professor Hullot-Kentor has translated various of Adorno's works such as Philosophy of Modern Music, and was given the Choice Outstanding Academic Book Award for his translation of Adorno's Aesthetic Theory, published by the University of Minnesota Press. (The Department of Political Science thanks University of Minnesota Regents Professor Dr. Richard Leppert for making Hullot-Kentor's visit possible to the Colloquium.)
Professor Hullot- Kentor will present on Friday 2 March 2012, 1:30 p.m. his paper: "Severe Clear: Sacrifice and Right Wishing"
Abstract: In the context of the tenth anniversary of 9/11, in the midst of a sudden deepening of the economic crisis partly or entirely overshadowing the occasion, we hear raised from every corner primordial demands for the necessity of sacrifice and self-inflicted wounds as the only adequate response to the gravity of the situation. The intensification of the economic calamity itself has by any measure been intentional, while nationwide the only audible voices seem to be those calling for austerity and for every budget to be 'cut.' The moment thus urgently prompts the question of whether the seminal insight that has lapsed­-the insight from which the whole of radical modernism developed­-can be recovered: the insight into the primitive in ourselves and in the world around us.`Severe Clear,' the weather alert issued to pilots on September 11th, 2001, is an excursus on this question that examines in detail the sacral edifice now being constructed in lower Manhattan.
2. In collaboration with The European Studies Consortium, The German, Scandinavian, and Dutch Department, The Institute for Advanced Studies, The Institute for Global Studies, The Center for Austrian Studies, and Carleton College, the Colloquium is glad to have Dr. Alex Demirovic, Professor of Political Theory, Political Sociology, and Political Science at the Technische Universität Berlin (TUB).
Professor Demirovic has also taught at the universities of Frankfurt, Leipzig, Vienna, Wuppertal, and Toronto. He is also at the Berliner Institut für kritische Theorie. Professor Demirovic's research interests are on the first generation of Critical Theory of Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, state theory, critical economics, post-structuralist analysis of power and discourse, and critical research on culture. His books include Beyond Aesthetics: The discursive order of Marxist aesthetics; Nicos Poulantzas: Actuality and Problems of Materialist State Theory; Democracy and Domination: Aspects of Critical Social Theory; The Non-conformist Intellectual: From Critical Theory to Frankfurt School; Economic Democracy: Positions, Problems, and Perspectives; Active Intolerance, etc.
Professor Demirovic will present on Tuesday 6 March 2012, 5:00 p.m. his paper: "Reform, Revolution, Transformation"
Abstract: "Our societies are confronted with a myriad of serious problems: global warming and climate change, desertification or the loss of rain forests, worldwide migration, unemployment and increase of precarious work, social polarisation and the hollowing out of democracy, economic and finance crisis or public household debt, disturbance of individual psychic and somatic as well as familial reproduction. We can summarize all these and other phenomena as multiple crises that urge for a quick and deep social change. How can conceive of this change? In the tradition of polical action and theory there are three different ways to conceptualize such a pressing and challenging reality: revolution, reform or transformation. These concepts will be examined on the background of historical experiences and shortcomings."
Please find attached the papers for both presentations:
The Colloquium meets in the Benjamin Lippincott Room, 1314 Social Sciences Building.
Please visit http://www.polisci.umn.edu/deptcolloquium/ for more information on the 2011-2012 Colloquium's description and current schedule.
