Multitude between Innovation and Negation

Multitude between Innovation and Negation

Author: Paolo Virno

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2008-05-30

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 1584350504

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The influential Italian thinker offers three essays in the political philosophy of language. Multitude between Innovation and Negation by Paolo Virno translated by James Cascaito. The publication of Paolo Virno's first book in English, Grammar of the Multitude, by Semiotext(e) in 2004 was an event within the field of radical political thought and introduced post-'68 currents in Italy to American readers. Multitude between Innovation and Negation, written several years later, offers three essays that take the reader on a journey through the political philosophy of language. “Wit and Innovative Action” explores the ambivalence inevitably arising when the semiotic and the semantic, grammar and experience, rule and regularity, and right and fact intersect. Virno unravels the infinite potential and wonders of everyday linguistic praxis and ambiguity. Wit, he argues, is a public performance, and its modus operandi characterizes human action in a state of emergency; it is a reaction, an articulate response, and a possible solution to a state of crisis. “Mirror Neurons, Linguistic Negation, and Mutual Recognition” examines the relationship of language and intersubjective empathy: without language, would human beings be able to recognize other members of their species? And finally, in “Multitude and Evil,” Virno challenges the distinction between the state of nature and civil society and argues for a political institution that resembles language in its ability to be at once nature and history. Few thinkers take the risks required by innovation. Like a philosophical entrepreneur, Virno is engaged in no less than rewriting the dictionary of political theory, an urgent and ambitious project when language, caught in a permanent state of emergency impossible to sustain, desperately needs to articulate and enact new practices of freedom for the multitude. Paolo Virno is the author of several books, including A Grammar of the Multitude (Semiotext(e), 2004).


Book Synopsis Multitude between Innovation and Negation by : Paolo Virno

Download or read book Multitude between Innovation and Negation written by Paolo Virno and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2008-05-30 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The influential Italian thinker offers three essays in the political philosophy of language. Multitude between Innovation and Negation by Paolo Virno translated by James Cascaito. The publication of Paolo Virno's first book in English, Grammar of the Multitude, by Semiotext(e) in 2004 was an event within the field of radical political thought and introduced post-'68 currents in Italy to American readers. Multitude between Innovation and Negation, written several years later, offers three essays that take the reader on a journey through the political philosophy of language. “Wit and Innovative Action” explores the ambivalence inevitably arising when the semiotic and the semantic, grammar and experience, rule and regularity, and right and fact intersect. Virno unravels the infinite potential and wonders of everyday linguistic praxis and ambiguity. Wit, he argues, is a public performance, and its modus operandi characterizes human action in a state of emergency; it is a reaction, an articulate response, and a possible solution to a state of crisis. “Mirror Neurons, Linguistic Negation, and Mutual Recognition” examines the relationship of language and intersubjective empathy: without language, would human beings be able to recognize other members of their species? And finally, in “Multitude and Evil,” Virno challenges the distinction between the state of nature and civil society and argues for a political institution that resembles language in its ability to be at once nature and history. Few thinkers take the risks required by innovation. Like a philosophical entrepreneur, Virno is engaged in no less than rewriting the dictionary of political theory, an urgent and ambitious project when language, caught in a permanent state of emergency impossible to sustain, desperately needs to articulate and enact new practices of freedom for the multitude. Paolo Virno is the author of several books, including A Grammar of the Multitude (Semiotext(e), 2004).

A Grammar of the Multitude

A Grammar of the Multitude

Author: Paolo Virno

Publisher: Semiotext(e)

Published: 2004-01-09

Total Pages: 128

ISBN-13:

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"During the 1960s and the 1970s I believe that the Western world experienced a defeated revolution - the first revolution aimed not against poverty and backwardness, but against the means of capitalist production, against the Ford assembly-line and wage labor. Post-Fordism, the hybrid forms of life characteristic of the contemporary multitude, is the answer to this defeated revolution. Dismissing both Keynesianism and socialist work ethic, post-Fordist capitalism puts forth in its own way typical demands of communism: abolition of work, dissolution of the State, etc. Post-Fordism is the communism of capital."--Back cover.


Book Synopsis A Grammar of the Multitude by : Paolo Virno

Download or read book A Grammar of the Multitude written by Paolo Virno and published by Semiotext(e). This book was released on 2004-01-09 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "During the 1960s and the 1970s I believe that the Western world experienced a defeated revolution - the first revolution aimed not against poverty and backwardness, but against the means of capitalist production, against the Ford assembly-line and wage labor. Post-Fordism, the hybrid forms of life characteristic of the contemporary multitude, is the answer to this defeated revolution. Dismissing both Keynesianism and socialist work ethic, post-Fordist capitalism puts forth in its own way typical demands of communism: abolition of work, dissolution of the State, etc. Post-Fordism is the communism of capital."--Back cover.

Radical Thought in Italy

Radical Thought in Italy

Author: Paolo Virno

Publisher:

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 270

ISBN-13: 9780816625536

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Provides an original view of the potential for a radical democratic politics today that speaks not only to the Italian situation but also to a broadly international context. First, the essays settle accounts with the culture of cynicism, opportunism and fear that has come to permeate the Left. They then proceed to analyze the new difficulties and possibilities opened by current economic conditions and the crisis of the welfare state. Finally, the authors propose a series of new concepts that are helpful in rethinking revolution for our times. Contributors include Giorgio Agamben, Massimo De Carolis, Alisa Del Re, Augusto Illuminati, Maurizio Lazzarato, Antonio Negri, Franco Piperno, Marco Revelli, Rossana Rossanda, Carlo Vercellone and Adelino Zanini.


Book Synopsis Radical Thought in Italy by : Paolo Virno

Download or read book Radical Thought in Italy written by Paolo Virno and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides an original view of the potential for a radical democratic politics today that speaks not only to the Italian situation but also to a broadly international context. First, the essays settle accounts with the culture of cynicism, opportunism and fear that has come to permeate the Left. They then proceed to analyze the new difficulties and possibilities opened by current economic conditions and the crisis of the welfare state. Finally, the authors propose a series of new concepts that are helpful in rethinking revolution for our times. Contributors include Giorgio Agamben, Massimo De Carolis, Alisa Del Re, Augusto Illuminati, Maurizio Lazzarato, Antonio Negri, Franco Piperno, Marco Revelli, Rossana Rossanda, Carlo Vercellone and Adelino Zanini.

Convention and Materialism

Convention and Materialism

Author: Paolo Virno

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2021-08-03

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 0262365421

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The first English translation of the book that established Paolo Virno as one of the most influential Italian thinkers of his generation. With the 1986 publication of this book in Italy, Paolo Virno established himself as one of the most influential Italian thinkers of his generation. Astonishingly, this crucial work has never before been published in an English translation. This MIT Press edition, translated by Italian philosopher and Insubordinations series editor Lorenzo Chiesa, is its first English-language version. Virno here engages, in an innovative and iconoclastic way, with some classical issues of philosophy involving experience, singularity, and the relation between ethics and language, while also offering a profoundly transformative political perspective that revolves around the Marxian notion of the "general intellect." Virno reconsiders Walter Benjamin's idea of a "loss of the aura" (brought on, Benjamin argued, by technical reproducibility), and postulates instead the existence of a new experience of uniqueness that, although deprived of every metaphysical aura, resides in the very process of late-capitalist serial reproduction. Writing after the defeat of contemporary leftist revolutionary movements in the West, Virno argues for the possibility of a "good life" originating immanently from existential and political crises. Taking speculative detours through the thought of philosophers ranging from Aquinas and Berkeley to Heidegger and Wittgenstein, with a specific focus on Kant and Hegel, Virno shows how a renewed reflection on basic theoretical problems helps us to better grasp what is happening now. This edition features a preface written by Virno in 2011.


Book Synopsis Convention and Materialism by : Paolo Virno

Download or read book Convention and Materialism written by Paolo Virno and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2021-08-03 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first English translation of the book that established Paolo Virno as one of the most influential Italian thinkers of his generation. With the 1986 publication of this book in Italy, Paolo Virno established himself as one of the most influential Italian thinkers of his generation. Astonishingly, this crucial work has never before been published in an English translation. This MIT Press edition, translated by Italian philosopher and Insubordinations series editor Lorenzo Chiesa, is its first English-language version. Virno here engages, in an innovative and iconoclastic way, with some classical issues of philosophy involving experience, singularity, and the relation between ethics and language, while also offering a profoundly transformative political perspective that revolves around the Marxian notion of the "general intellect." Virno reconsiders Walter Benjamin's idea of a "loss of the aura" (brought on, Benjamin argued, by technical reproducibility), and postulates instead the existence of a new experience of uniqueness that, although deprived of every metaphysical aura, resides in the very process of late-capitalist serial reproduction. Writing after the defeat of contemporary leftist revolutionary movements in the West, Virno argues for the possibility of a "good life" originating immanently from existential and political crises. Taking speculative detours through the thought of philosophers ranging from Aquinas and Berkeley to Heidegger and Wittgenstein, with a specific focus on Kant and Hegel, Virno shows how a renewed reflection on basic theoretical problems helps us to better grasp what is happening now. This edition features a preface written by Virno in 2011.

The Anomie of the Earth

The Anomie of the Earth

Author: Federico Luisetti

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2015-05-29

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 0822375451

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The contributors to The Anomie of the Earth explore the convergences and resonances between Autonomist Marxism and decolonial thinking. In discussing and rejecting Carl Schmitt's formulation of the nomos—a conceptualization of world order based on the Western tenets of law and property—the authors question the assumption of universal political subjects and look towards politics of the commons divorced from European notions of sovereignty. They contrast European Autonomism with North and South American decolonial and indigenous conceptions of autonomy, discuss the legacies of each, and examine social movements in the Americas and Europe. Beyond orthodox Marxism, their transatlantic exchanges point to the emerging categories disclosed by the collapse of the colonial and capitalist frameworks of Western modernity. Contributors. Joost de Bloois, Jodi A. Byrd, Gustavo Esteva, Silvia Federici, Wilson Kaiser, Mara Kaufman, Frans-Willem Korsten, Federico Luisetti, Sandro Mezzadra, Walter D. Mignolo, Benjamin Noys, John Pickles, Alvaro Reyes, Catherine Walsh, Gareth Williams, Zac Zimmer


Book Synopsis The Anomie of the Earth by : Federico Luisetti

Download or read book The Anomie of the Earth written by Federico Luisetti and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2015-05-29 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The contributors to The Anomie of the Earth explore the convergences and resonances between Autonomist Marxism and decolonial thinking. In discussing and rejecting Carl Schmitt's formulation of the nomos—a conceptualization of world order based on the Western tenets of law and property—the authors question the assumption of universal political subjects and look towards politics of the commons divorced from European notions of sovereignty. They contrast European Autonomism with North and South American decolonial and indigenous conceptions of autonomy, discuss the legacies of each, and examine social movements in the Americas and Europe. Beyond orthodox Marxism, their transatlantic exchanges point to the emerging categories disclosed by the collapse of the colonial and capitalist frameworks of Western modernity. Contributors. Joost de Bloois, Jodi A. Byrd, Gustavo Esteva, Silvia Federici, Wilson Kaiser, Mara Kaufman, Frans-Willem Korsten, Federico Luisetti, Sandro Mezzadra, Walter D. Mignolo, Benjamin Noys, John Pickles, Alvaro Reyes, Catherine Walsh, Gareth Williams, Zac Zimmer

Cruising Utopia

Cruising Utopia

Author: José Esteban Muñoz

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2009-11-01

Total Pages: 245

ISBN-13: 0814796001

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The LGBT agenda for too long has been dominated by pragmatic issues like same-sex marriage and gays in the military. It has been stifled by this myopic focus on the present, which is short-sighted and assimilationist. Cruising Utopia seeks to break the present stagnancy by cruising ahead. Drawing on the work of Ernst Bloch, José Esteban Muñoz recalls the queer past for guidance in presaging its future. He considers the work of seminal artists and writers such as Andy Warhol, LeRoi Jones, Frank O’Hara, Ray Johnson, Fred Herko, Samuel Delany, and Elizabeth Bishop, alongside contemporary performance and visual artists like Dynasty Handbag, My Barbarian, Luke Dowd, Tony Just, and Kevin McCarty in order to decipher the anticipatory illumination of art and its uncanny ability to open windows to the future. In a startling repudiation of what the LGBT movement has held dear, Muñoz contends that queerness is instead a futurity bound phenomenon, a "not yet here" that critically engages pragmatic presentism. Part manifesto, part love-letter to the past and the future, Cruising Utopia argues that the here and now are not enough and issues an urgent call for the revivification of the queer political imagination.


Book Synopsis Cruising Utopia by : José Esteban Muñoz

Download or read book Cruising Utopia written by José Esteban Muñoz and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2009-11-01 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The LGBT agenda for too long has been dominated by pragmatic issues like same-sex marriage and gays in the military. It has been stifled by this myopic focus on the present, which is short-sighted and assimilationist. Cruising Utopia seeks to break the present stagnancy by cruising ahead. Drawing on the work of Ernst Bloch, José Esteban Muñoz recalls the queer past for guidance in presaging its future. He considers the work of seminal artists and writers such as Andy Warhol, LeRoi Jones, Frank O’Hara, Ray Johnson, Fred Herko, Samuel Delany, and Elizabeth Bishop, alongside contemporary performance and visual artists like Dynasty Handbag, My Barbarian, Luke Dowd, Tony Just, and Kevin McCarty in order to decipher the anticipatory illumination of art and its uncanny ability to open windows to the future. In a startling repudiation of what the LGBT movement has held dear, Muñoz contends that queerness is instead a futurity bound phenomenon, a "not yet here" that critically engages pragmatic presentism. Part manifesto, part love-letter to the past and the future, Cruising Utopia argues that the here and now are not enough and issues an urgent call for the revivification of the queer political imagination.

Persistence of the Negative

Persistence of the Negative

Author: Benjamin Noys

Publisher: Edinburgh University Press

Published: 2012-03-13

Total Pages: 177

ISBN-13: 0748655204

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An original and compelling critique of contemporary Continental theory through a rehabilitation of the negative.


Book Synopsis Persistence of the Negative by : Benjamin Noys

Download or read book Persistence of the Negative written by Benjamin Noys and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2012-03-13 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An original and compelling critique of contemporary Continental theory through a rehabilitation of the negative.

Faustian Pact in International Law

Faustian Pact in International Law

Author: Edwin Bikundo

Publisher: Edinburgh University Press

Published: 2024-05-31

Total Pages: 203

ISBN-13: 1474455697

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The book provides an original and captivating perspective on international law and Giorgio Agamben's work. The manuscript is profoundly aesthetic-textual in its approach, as exemplified in its deft and insightful close readings of drama (Goethe's Faust), prose fiction (Melville's Bartleby and Benito Cereno) and lyric, be it devotional (Laudes Regiae, Handel, 'The Lord is a Man of War') or otherwise (Edwin Starr's 'War', Boy George's 'War Song'). Attentive to language, plot, theme and characterisation, these readings not only read the texts in question, but they also read them anew, yielding fresh, innovative, and unique cultural legal interpretations.


Book Synopsis Faustian Pact in International Law by : Edwin Bikundo

Download or read book Faustian Pact in International Law written by Edwin Bikundo and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2024-05-31 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book provides an original and captivating perspective on international law and Giorgio Agamben's work. The manuscript is profoundly aesthetic-textual in its approach, as exemplified in its deft and insightful close readings of drama (Goethe's Faust), prose fiction (Melville's Bartleby and Benito Cereno) and lyric, be it devotional (Laudes Regiae, Handel, 'The Lord is a Man of War') or otherwise (Edwin Starr's 'War', Boy George's 'War Song'). Attentive to language, plot, theme and characterisation, these readings not only read the texts in question, but they also read them anew, yielding fresh, innovative, and unique cultural legal interpretations.

Italian Thought Today

Italian Thought Today

Author: Lorenzo Chiesa

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-09-25

Total Pages: 308

ISBN-13: 1317750551

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This collection provides English readers with a critical update on current debates on biopolitics in and around Italian thought. More than a decade after the publication of seminal books such as Agamben’s Homo Sacer and Hardt and Negri’s Empire, the names of, among others, Roberto Esposito, Paolo Virno, Christian Marazzi, and Andrea Fumagalli have recently been brought to the attention of Anglophone scholars and political activists. Several authors have rightly emphasised the evanescent character of biopolitics, and the difficulty in providing a definition of it that could embrace all the conflicting theories of its most celebrated critics and supporters. The present collection is structured around the basic contention that bio-economy, human nature, and Christianity are the three visible contemporary manifestations of the theoretical object/problem of biopolitics in, respectively, Italian post-workerist economics, post-Marxist philosophical anthropology, and post-structuralist ontology. This book was originally published as a special issue of Angelaki.


Book Synopsis Italian Thought Today by : Lorenzo Chiesa

Download or read book Italian Thought Today written by Lorenzo Chiesa and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-09-25 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection provides English readers with a critical update on current debates on biopolitics in and around Italian thought. More than a decade after the publication of seminal books such as Agamben’s Homo Sacer and Hardt and Negri’s Empire, the names of, among others, Roberto Esposito, Paolo Virno, Christian Marazzi, and Andrea Fumagalli have recently been brought to the attention of Anglophone scholars and political activists. Several authors have rightly emphasised the evanescent character of biopolitics, and the difficulty in providing a definition of it that could embrace all the conflicting theories of its most celebrated critics and supporters. The present collection is structured around the basic contention that bio-economy, human nature, and Christianity are the three visible contemporary manifestations of the theoretical object/problem of biopolitics in, respectively, Italian post-workerist economics, post-Marxist philosophical anthropology, and post-structuralist ontology. This book was originally published as a special issue of Angelaki.

Autonomy

Autonomy

Author: David Eden

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-08

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 1317176839

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Autonomy: Capital, Class and Politics explores and critiques one of the most dynamic terrains of political theory, sometimes referred to as 'Autonomist Marxism' or post-Operaismo. This theory shot to prominence with the publication of Empire by Hardt and Negri and has been associated with cutting edge developments in political and cultural practice; yet there exists no work that critically examines it in its contemporary breadth. Taking three divergent manifestations of Autonomist Marxism found in the works of Antonio Negri and Paulo Virno, the Midnight Notes Collective and John Holloway, David Eden examines how each approach questions the nature of class and contemporary capitalism and how they extrapolate politics. Not only is such juxtaposition both fruitful and unprecedented but Eden then constructs critiques of each approach and draws out deeper common concerns. Suggesting a novel rethinking of emancipatory praxis, this book provides a much needed insight into the current tensions and clashes within society and politics.


Book Synopsis Autonomy by : David Eden

Download or read book Autonomy written by David Eden and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-08 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Autonomy: Capital, Class and Politics explores and critiques one of the most dynamic terrains of political theory, sometimes referred to as 'Autonomist Marxism' or post-Operaismo. This theory shot to prominence with the publication of Empire by Hardt and Negri and has been associated with cutting edge developments in political and cultural practice; yet there exists no work that critically examines it in its contemporary breadth. Taking three divergent manifestations of Autonomist Marxism found in the works of Antonio Negri and Paulo Virno, the Midnight Notes Collective and John Holloway, David Eden examines how each approach questions the nature of class and contemporary capitalism and how they extrapolate politics. Not only is such juxtaposition both fruitful and unprecedented but Eden then constructs critiques of each approach and draws out deeper common concerns. Suggesting a novel rethinking of emancipatory praxis, this book provides a much needed insight into the current tensions and clashes within society and politics.