The work of the German-Jewish critic and philosopher Walter Benjamin \;(1892-1940) spans a vast array of themes\, ranging from the metaphysics of \;youth \;to the Paris arcades. His writings on Goethe and Scheerbart\; Kafka \;and Baudelaire\, as well as his work on the relationship between art and \;technology continue to fascinate and polarize in equal measure. His singular \;intersection of Marxian and Jewish thought is amply evidenced in the \;extensive correspondence with Ernst Bloch\, Theodor Adorno\, Bertold Brecht \;and Hannah Arendt\, amongst others. Undoubtedly it is the sheer breadth of \;Benjamin's interests that accounts for the enduring concern with his often \;fragmentary work across academic disciplines. That is to say\, Benjamin is no \;longer a stranger at the Academy. Nevertheless\, a central aspect of \;Benjamin's work is all-too-often overlooked when his aesthetic and literary \;works are treated in isolation. The manifest content of Benjamin's writing \;is never merely incidental: rather\, it is shot through with a burgeoning \;philosophical project &ndash\; from the 'Programme of the Coming Philosophy' (1917) \;to the 'Theses on the Concept of History' (1940). In this regard it appears \;that recent anniversary of Benjamin's birth in 1892 warrants a re-appraisal \;of this legacy by asking the question: how can the various strands of \;Benjamin's work be engaged to illuminate the unfolding of his philosophical \;position\, and &ndash\; vice versa &ndash\; how does Benjamin's philosophy illuminate other
aspects of his thought?
This conference aims\, then &ndash\; on the one hand &ndash\; to explore Benjamin's thought \;in relation to the various philosophical traditions that inform his project \;(Leibniz\, Kant\, Schlegel\, Luká\;cs etc.)\, and &ndash\; on the other hand &ndash\; to ask how \;these influences continue to operate between the lines even where Benjamin \;is not explicitly concerned with the philosophical canon? In short: how are \;we to understand the philosophy of Walter Benjamin?
Programme:
Day One: Friday\, 14 Dec
10:00 - 10:45\, Howard Caygill (CRMEP\, Kingston) 'Keynote Address'
10:45 - 11:30\, Paula Schwebel (Potsdam) 'Benjamin's Monadology: From \;Idealism to Historical Materialism'
\n11:30 - 12:15\, Blair Ogden (Oxford) 'Walter Benjamin's Philosophical \;Conception of Happiness'
\n12:15 - 13:00\, Jonathan Gray (Royal Holloway) 'Hamann and Benjamin on \;the Concept of Experience'
\n13:00 - 14:00\, LUNCH
\n14:00 - 14:45\, Djordje Popovic (Minnesota) 'Theology of Hell: \;Continuity of Thought in Walter Benjamin'
\n14:45 - 15:30\, John Merrick (CRMEP\, Kingston) 'Benjamin's Non-Hegelian \;Dialectics'
\n15:30 - 16:15\, Jan Urbich (Jena/Weimar) 'Under Cover: Hegel's Logic in \;Walter Benjamin's Epistemo-Critical Preface'
\n16:15 - 16:45\, COFFEE BREAK
\n16:45 - 17:30\, Elise Derroitte (KU Leuven) 'The Critic is the New \;'Philosopher of the Spirit'. Comparing Benjamin and Fichte's \;Conceptions of Critique'
\n17:30 - 18:15\, Sami Khatib (FU Berlin/Jan Van Eyck) 'Teleology Without \;End - Walter Benjamin's Methodological Nihilism'
\n18:15 - 19:00\, Scott Ritner (New School) 'The God of Negation - Divine \;Intervention in the Thought of Walter Benjamin\, Georges Bataille and \;Simone Weil'
Day Two: Saturday\, 15 Dec
10:00 - 10:45\, Lea Barbisan (Paris\, Sorbonne) 'Kö\;rper - Leib - \;Gestalt: Benjamin's Phenomenology of the Body'
10:45 - 11:30\, Lucie Mercier (CRMEP\, Kingston) 'Walter Benjamin on \;Translation: a Strategic Hermeneutics of History?'
\n11:30 - 12:15\, Hanping Chiu (Tamkang\, Taipei) 'Translation as \;Expression: Reinventing Benjamin's Language Philosophy'
\n12:15 - 13:00\, Florian Telsnig (Vienna) 'The Monadological Tendency in \;Benjamin's Philosophy of the Name'
\n13:00 - 14:00\, LUNCH
\n14:00 - 14:45\, Leena Petersen (Sussex) 'Poetics of the Space in-Between'
\n14:45 - 15:30\, Phil Homburg (Sussex) 'Symbol\, Sign and Fetish: Walter \;Benjamin and the Post-Kantian Concept of the Symbol'
\n15:30 - 16:15\, Maria Andrade (Universidad de los Andes) 'Exiled \;Between Romantic Absolute and Baroque Allegory'
\n16:15 - 16:45\, COFFEE BREAK
\n16:45 - 17:30\, Ben Noys (Chichester) 'Emergency Brake: Benjamin and \;the Critique of Accelerationism'
\n17:30 - 18:15\, Tom Allen (Independent) 'Fixed Manifestations: \;Benjamin\, Blanqui and the Caption of History'
\n18:15 - 19:00\, Christian Garland (FU Berlin) 'Redeeming the Past in \;the Present: Benjamin's Messianic Materialist Philosophy of History'
\nThis event is free and open to all!
\nContact: sebastian.truskolaski@gmail.com.
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