Review of Thomas Lemke, The Government of Things: Foucault and the New Materialisms Deren Ertas Cars that measure and signal fuel efficiency, expanding markets for weather derivatives, and ‘vital systems security’ infrastructures, among other similar developments, indicate significant transformations in contemporary governmentality at varying scales. New materialist strands of thought have been developing novel understandings of …
The experience of the Popular Unity government in Chile During the twentieth century, the concept of development galvanised a wide variety of popular struggles for democratisation, agrarian reform, socialism, and economic sovereignty across the global South. In social theory, the question of development also sparked major intellectual debates that shed new light on the nature …
What makes a good parent? Most would say a good parent loves and nurtures their child with the ultimate aim of helping them flourish – now and into the future. A good parent will feed their child, give them space to play and time to use their imagination, make sure they get an education and …
Slavoj Žižek on Wittgenstein and Cancel Culture. “Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen.”(‘Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.’)Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 1921 In this final proposition of his Tractatus, Ludwig Wittgenstein prohibits the impossible. But why should one prohibit something that is already in itself impossible? The answer is relatively easy: if …
Anarchism has long been ignored or misunderstood. Academics routinely make factual errors about anarchism, like claiming that all anarchists reject organisation, that anarchists care only about state oppression, or that anarchists have never organised any major social movements. More than a few throw out all pretensions of charity, or even commitment to doing the reading, …
Review of Boris Groys, Philosophy of CareMaria Walsh Boris Groys’ Philosophy of Care is comprised of twelve short, pithy sections that plot an abbreviated history of mainly Western philosophy from ancient to modern times. Also included are two diversions into Russian intellectual thought, Groys being an expert on Soviet-era art and literature, as well as a philosopher …
Review of Louis Menand, The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold WarJosefine Wikström During the past decade there has been an intensified debate in mainstream art criticism about the tension between art’s freedom and free speech. In this debate art’s freedom has been accused of being under severe threat by, on the one …
Review of Jill Godmilow, Kill The Documentary Stefanie Baumann Jill Godmilow’s Kill the Documentary: A Letter to Filmmakers, Students, and Scholars is a curious object. Although published by Columbia University Press, it is not quite an academic text. Unlike most of the theoretical volumes that have been written on documentary film in recent years, Godmilow’s is neither concerned …
Review of Moritz Altenried, The Digital Factory: The Human Labour of Automation Yari Lanci Since the beginning of spring 2022, many countries have witnessed the return to supposedly ‘normal’ rhythms of life after the closures and restrictions that followed the latest pandemic. During this period, discussions in the Global North have emerged about the ‘great escape’ …
Review of Timothy Bewes, Free Indirect: The Novel in a Postfictional AgeCarson Welch A bold question motivates Timothy Bewes’ Free Indirect: Is a non-subjective thought possible? Bewes looks for an answer in recent developments in the novel. His contention is that the novel is a mode of thought which operates not only beyond the ideas represented …