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The 12th
International Conference of |
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ISSEI |
In cooperation With |
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International Society for the Study
of European Ideas |
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Section IV: Literature, Art, Music, Theatre, Culture
and
Section
V: Religion, Philosophy, Anthropology, Psychology, Language
Workshop: Philosophy and Kafka
Chair:
Brendan Moran
It is sometimes said that Franz Kafka’s novels and stories
defy philosophic extrapolation.
Conversely, it has also been suggested that precisely the tendency of
Kafka’s writings to elude discursive solution is itself a philosophical
tendency, one that is somehow contributing to a wiser relationship of human
beings with language.
The workshop on “Philosophy and Kafka” will explore such
questions about the relationship of Kafka’s stories and novels with
philosophy. A principal supplementary
purpose will be to consider various conceptions of the relationship of
literature and philosophy.
Possible approaches include the following.
1. Focus on specific philosophical commentaries on Kafka,
such as those by T.W. Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Gilles
Deleuze and Félix Guattari, Jacques Derrida, Giorgio Agamben,
Günther Anders, or Hannah Arendt.
2. Consider the possible relevance or helpfulness of
certain outlooks for examining Kafka’s writings, outlooks such as those of
Taoism, Spinoza, Kierkegaard, Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig,
Albert Camus, or existentialism.
3. Examine Kafka’s writings through certain views of the
relationship of literature or poetry with philosophy. Relevant views would include those for which
poetry might involve a thinking that philosophy might
not be able to achieve (Heidegger). Also
of possible relevance in this context would be Kafka-commentaries by Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, Hélène.Cixous, and others.
4. Kafka’s writings could be assessed from the perspective
of a specific conception of the relationship of philosophy and art – outlooks
such as those of Plato, Aristotle, Kant, the early German Romantics, Hegel,
Friedrich Nietzsche, Louis Althusser, Emmanuel Lévinas, Hans Blumenberg,
Sarah Kofman, Hans-Georg Gadamer,
Jürgen Habermas,
Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, Jean-Luc Nancy, Alain Badiou, or Jacques Rancière.
5. Consider the relationship of Kafka’s stories and novels
with those aspects of his Nachlass, diaries, and letters that might more readily lend
themselves to philosophical extrapolation.
6. Focus on “philosophical” affinities or divergences between
Kafka’s writings and writings by other authors (such as Heinrich von Kleist,
Lewis Carroll, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, the surrealists, Robert Walser,
Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Shmuel Agnon, Georges Bataille, Samuel Beckett, Julien
Green, Paul Celan, Edmond Jabès,
Ingeborg Bachmann, Maurice Blanchot,
Wole Soyinka,, Elfriede Jelinek, Orhan Pamuk).
7. Consider Kafka’s writings in terms of a specific
philosophical theme. Kafka’s writings could
be discussed in relation to ethics, aesthetics, love, political philosophy,
legal theory, pragmatism, wisdom, thinking, myth, prophecy, the death penalty,
or punishment.
These are only some of the possible approaches and topics. A
principal criterion for selection will be the clear relevance of the proposal
to some aspect of the topic “Philosophy and Kafka.”
Proposals of approximately 500 words or entire papers of no
more than 3000 words (including notes) may be sent to: Brendan Moran at bmoran@ucalgary.ca until December 15,
2009. Decisions concerning the final
composition of the four hour session (of eight to ten papers) will be made
within a month to six weeks following the submission deadline.
Brendan Moran
Faculty of
Email: bmoran@ucalgary.ca
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