Hi All,
I really appreciated our first class last week, and am looking forward to next Saturday! For either present consumption, or as a sort of preview of Castoriadis' critique of the Marxist claim to a rationalist theory of history, I just found an online version of Maurice Brinton's excellent translation of Castoriadis' "History as Creation," in Solidarity (UK), which can be read here.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Monday, January 29, 2007
New Syllabus
Dear Friends: After our first class, we determined to do a brief introduction to some of the broad concepts important to a conversation of the imagination and then dive in to a closer reading of a single author and his approach to the imagination. That author will be Cornelius Castoriadis. I've reworked the syllabus below. Please comment on this post and let me know what you think: is the amount of reading reasonable? Can we do this? The reading is harder than a newspaper, and not as hard as 'postmodern' academic texts. It is a philosophical/political work, originally published in the classic revolutionary journal Socialisme ou Barbarie (Socialism or Barbarism).
For those with time on their hands, there are some excellent internet resources to begin examining Castoriadis (including two free downloadable books). Here are some links:
Preparatory Reading
For those who will definitely be taking the class, and just can't wait to start digging their teeth in, I'd recommend reading the following internet articles. None of them are required, but you will undoubtedly get a lot more out of the entire class (not just the first day) if you read these:
Week 1 The Legitimacy of Reason and the Betrayal of Socrates
Introduction: The subject of this first class is the appropriation of 'irrationalism' by a variety of opponents to European-derived forms of oppression (capitalism, the modern state, psychological control, and the 'societies of control.) ' We will discuss the concept of the 'imagination,' and attempt a preliminary definition of what we might want to mean by the word.
Lecture: We will start with a discussion of post-Socratic Greek philosophy, concentrating on Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. What did they mean by imagination and reason, and what relevance did these concepts have to their concept of the ideal society?
Readings for next class:
Lecture: The capacity of human beings to perceive the world is a basic component for most philosophers of 'the imagination.' What does phenomenology, especially in the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, bring to this discussion, and what does it imply about the individuality of imagination?
Readings for next class: Excerpt from David Abram's Spell of the Sensuous [Handout]
Movie, Part 1 and 2: The Century of the Self
Week 4 Back inside – The psychologists rediscover the imagination
Lecture: Psychology focuses not on the need to change society to accommodate the individual, but on the need to adjust the individual to meet the demands of society. Review Freud’s mental structures, compare to Jung and then get to Lacan’s model of psychogenesis. What do Freud and Lacan’s models of the self imply about our relationship to reality and the truth? What do they imply about who we are, and what our potential and limitations might be? How can we know if these models are true? What strengths and weaknesses might there be?
Movie, Part 3 and 4: The Century of the Self
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "Marxism: a provisional assessment" (9-70)
Week 6 Back outside with the psychological
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "Theory and Revolutionary Project" (71-114)
Week 7 Pandora’s box: what will the imagination do once it’s liberated?
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "The Institution and the Imaginary" (115-164)
Week 8 Practices of the Imagination
Party?
For those with time on their hands, there are some excellent internet resources to begin examining Castoriadis (including two free downloadable books). Here are some links:
Preparatory Reading
For those who will definitely be taking the class, and just can't wait to start digging their teeth in, I'd recommend reading the following internet articles. None of them are required, but you will undoubtedly get a lot more out of the entire class (not just the first day) if you read these:
- Socrates: Wikipedia articles on Socrates and the Socratic Method
- Plato: Wikipedia Articles on Plato, and the following works: the Republic, the Allegory of the Cave, his Metaphor of the Dividing Line, and the Metaphor of the Sun.
- Aristotle: Wikipedia articles on Aristotle and his Theory of Universals
- Aristotle: On the Soul: Book III
Week 1 The Legitimacy of Reason and the Betrayal of Socrates
Introduction: The subject of this first class is the appropriation of 'irrationalism' by a variety of opponents to European-derived forms of oppression (capitalism, the modern state, psychological control, and the 'societies of control.) ' We will discuss the concept of the 'imagination,' and attempt a preliminary definition of what we might want to mean by the word.
Lecture: We will start with a discussion of post-Socratic Greek philosophy, concentrating on Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. What did they mean by imagination and reason, and what relevance did these concepts have to their concept of the ideal society?
Readings for next class:
- Casey, Edward S. 1976. Imagining: a phenomenological study. Bloomington & London: Indiana University Press, pp. 1-8, 14-20. [Handout]
- Wikipedia article on Romanticism,
- Marx’s Theses on Feuerbach
- selection from The German Ideology [Handout].
Lecture: The capacity of human beings to perceive the world is a basic component for most philosophers of 'the imagination.' What does phenomenology, especially in the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, bring to this discussion, and what does it imply about the individuality of imagination?
Readings for next class: Excerpt from David Abram's Spell of the Sensuous [Handout]
Movie, Part 1 and 2: The Century of the Self
Week 4 Back inside – The psychologists rediscover the imagination
Lecture: Psychology focuses not on the need to change society to accommodate the individual, but on the need to adjust the individual to meet the demands of society. Review Freud’s mental structures, compare to Jung and then get to Lacan’s model of psychogenesis. What do Freud and Lacan’s models of the self imply about our relationship to reality and the truth? What do they imply about who we are, and what our potential and limitations might be? How can we know if these models are true? What strengths and weaknesses might there be?
Movie, Part 3 and 4: The Century of the Self
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "Marxism: a provisional assessment" (9-70)
Week 6 Back outside with the psychological
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "Theory and Revolutionary Project" (71-114)
Week 7 Pandora’s box: what will the imagination do once it’s liberated?
Readings for next class: Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society. "The Institution and the Imaginary" (115-164)
Week 8 Practices of the Imagination
Party?
Thursday, January 11, 2007
More to Come
Ms. Parton may be on the train to the Imagination Library already, but I'm still shoveling fuel into the engine.That is to say, I'm still revising and adding texts to the syllabus and reading list.
Two of my goals here are to reduce the number of difficult pages of reading, and to replace as many of the handouts with online readings as possible (many will also be available in handout form for those who prefer not staring at screens all day).
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Preliminary Syllabus
I am posting a very rough syllabus, which is in no way final, as an aid to help interested people make decisions as to whether they may want to register for this class.Important: should you decide to take this class, please do not buy any of these texts; the specific readings may still change, and at any rate, I will be making copies for the class of almost all readings.
Structure
Each class will comprise of three basic elements
- a short lecture;
- a lengthy discussion period, and
- the enactment of a new element social organization, which may overlap with the discussion period. (this mysterious section will become more clear in class)
Readings will often be rather dense, though a great deal of effort will be made to keep them short (less than 50 pages/week), and to summarize content, thus facilitating a more-focused discussion.
Preparatory Reading
For those who will definitely be taking the class, and just can't wait to start digging their teeth in, I'd recommend reading the following internet articles. None of them are required, but you will undoubtedly get a lot more out of the entire class (not just the first day) if you read these:
- Socrates: Wikipedia articles on Socrates and the Socratic Method
- Plato: Wikipedia Articles on Plato, and the following works: the Republic, the Allegory of the Cave, his Metaphor of the Dividing Line, and the Metaphor of the Sun.
- Aristotle: Wikipedia articles on Aristotle and his Theory of Universals
- Aristotle: On the Soul: Book III
Week 1 The Legitimacy of Reason and the Betrayal of Socrates
Introduction: The subject of this first class is the appropriation of 'irrationalism' by a variety of opponents to European-derived forms of oppression (capitalism, the modern state, psychological control, and the 'societies of control.) ' We will discuss the concept of the 'imagination,' and attempt a preliminary definition of what we might want to mean by the word.
Lecture: We will start with a discussion of post-Socratic Greek philosophy, concentrating on Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. What did they mean by imagination and reason, and what relevance did these concepts have to their concept of the ideal society?
Readings for next class:
- Casey, Edward S. 1976. Imagining: a phenomenological study. Bloomington & London: Indiana University Press, pp. 1-8, 14-20. [Handout]
- Wikipedia article on The Enlightement
- Wikipedia article on Immanuel Kant
- Wikipedia article on Henry Corbin
Lecture: The domination of Aristotle's thought in the West, and the preservation of Platonism in Islamic culture. The 'creative' imagination in Sufism and the reintroduction of Platonic thought to Europe. The enlightenment 'capture' of reason for humanity, and the degradation of imagination.
Readings for next class:
- Wikipedia article on Romanticism,
- Marx’s Theses on Feuerbach
- selection from The German Ideology [Handout].
Lecture: Romanticism and revolution. The contribution of Marx in concentrating on human action as the ‘motor of history.’ Discuss the first and second internationals, and the split between the anarchists and the Marxists. What principles separated the two movements historically? What is ideology, and what is dialectical materialism? What relevance does this split have to our discussion?
Readings for next class: Excerpt from David Abram's Spell of the Sensuous [Handout]
Week 4 Phenomenology - Imagery and Participatory Perception
Lecture: The capacity of human beings to perceive the world is a basic component for most philosophers of 'the imagination.' What does phenomenology, especially in the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, bring to this discussion, and what does it imply about the individuality of imagination?
Movie, Part 1 and 2: The Century of the Self
Readings for next class:
- Excerpts from Freud and Castoriadis
- Crimethinc, "Seduced by the image of reality."
Week 5 Back inside – The psychologists rediscover the imagination
Lecture: Psychology focuses not on the need to change society to accommodate the individual, but on the need to adjust the individual to meet the demands of society. Review Freud’s mental structures, compare to Jung and then get to Lacan’s model of psychogenesis. What do Freud and Lacan’s models of the self imply about our relationship to reality and the truth? What do they imply about who we are, and what our potential and limitations might be? How can we know if these models are true? What strengths and weaknesses might there be?
Movie, Part 3 and 4: The Century of the Self
Readings for next class: Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society (excerpts).
Week 6 Back outside with the psychological
Lecture: A brief discussion of Lacan’s students and protégées: Althusser, Castoriadis, and Guattari. What differences exist between these and Lacan, and their differences from each other? What does each attempt to retrieve in order to make ‘revolution’ possible? On what basis is this retrieved, or, what is the philosophical justification? How is this related to actual pratice?
Readings for next class:
- Raoul Vaneigem's Notice to the Civilized Concerning Worker Self-Management,
- Hakim Bey's "Imagination"
- Crimethinc: "There is a secret world concealed beneath this one"
Week 7 Pandora’s box: what will the imagination do once it’s liberated?
Lecture: a very brief recapitulation of the points that have emerged from the class, and the different principles of interaction that we have settled upon for non-lecture components of the class. How can or should we apply the insights from the class in other settings? Where do we go from here?
Reading:
- John Holloway's 12 Theses on Changing the World Without Taking Power (those with way too much time to kill can read this longer version)
- Marina Sitrin and John Holloway discussion, "Walking We Ask Questions"
- Notes from Nowhere Collective's similarly titled "Walking: We Ask Questions"
Week 8 Practices of the Imagination
Lecture: The constituting practices of the social imagination. Discussions and examples of autonomous practice.
Party. Party?
Welcome
Welcome to the webpage/blog for the class Imagination and Social Liberation. This is an eight-week free (as in free beer and free speech) class offered through the Work People’s College of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the Experimental College (ExCO).
This initial post is an invitation for questions (in the comments section) from interested workers and students.
Class Description
This class is dedicated the concept of the ‘imagination,’ which is increasingly used almost as a code-word for modern struggles for social justice and liberation.
But what do we mean when we use the word? This class will examine the history of the word in philosophy and practice, from Greek and Muslim philosophers to contemporary social thinkers, and rely on the participation of the students to create a practice-based definition of the word, and justification for why we might (or might not) care about ‘liberating the imaginary.’
This class may be of interest especially to workers and students involved in such movements but lacking a philosophical background, or students of philosophy and psychology with an interest in such movements.
The class will meet for eight weeks, from January 27 – March 17, 2007. Saturdays, 3:00-5:00 PM, at the Central Library in downtown Minneapolis
To register or ask questions, please leave your comments below and the facilitator will respond as quickly as possible.
You are also warmly invited to attend an informational session about all of the Experimental College's Spring class offerings, and meet the facilitator for this class in person, on Jan. 25, 2007, at 6 p.m. in the JBD Lecture Hall in the basement of Macalester College's Campus Center.
Childcare will be provided for all classes
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