The Toronto Philosophy Meetup

This is the first meeting of Either/Or, and we'll be starting our reading from the Preface.

In Either/Or, Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), under the pseudonym Victor Eremita, explores interiority, and the struggle for a meaningful existence wherein one finds lasting happiness. He accomplishes this by portraying two chief personalities: the Aesthete (Book I), and the Judge (Book II). The writings of the aesthete are personal and brooding. Among many aesthetic themes it examines the nature of love, happiness and how to secure these in a lasting way. The writings of the judge are addressed to the aesthete as to a friend, and attempt to convince him that he is putting himself in misery by misunderstanding the themes he has dealt with in Book I.

The Symposium is a heavily fictionalised account of a convivial gathering supposedly taking place sometime around 416 BC and given by the young poet Agathon to celebrate his recent victory in a poetic contest. The guest roster reads like a who is who of late 5th century Athenian society. Symposium’s influence has defied the confines of philosophical discourse throughout the history of thought. It consists of series of speeches on Love (Eros) and offers an exploration of its variety from its most mundane to its most divine forms.

Love, however, is no mere code-name for the attraction between human beings but rather a primordial cosmic force that manifests itself in that attraction. Hence the use of myth is utterly justified in this context. Performativity plays an unusually substantial role in the unfolding of the dialogue. For a Platonic dialogue, there are many light-hearted moments that occasionally culminate in peaks of intensity.

Reference will be made to Xenophon’s Symposium, Ficino's Commentary on the Symposium as well variety of modern works such as Leo Strauss's seminal work bearing the same title.

This is a relatively early work by Plato probably composed, according to what the indications you can find in the work between 385 and 378 BC and thus belonging to his late early or early middle period.

The Symposium, along with the Republic and Timaeus is a major influence on the development of European thought.

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We are taking a break from Bataille's Erotism (1957) to read two major texts from Michel Foucault over the next several weeks**:**

"A Preface to Transgression" (1963), and
The History of Sexuality, Volume 1 (1976)

Reading schedule
Access the weekly reading schedule at this link:
https://sites.google.com/view/existentialism-and-its-critics/

You can find all texts in the Google folder linked at the VERY BOTTOM of this description. The Zoom link is also posted there.
👇 scroll all the way down for the links 👇

ABOUT THIS PROJECT
Foucault regarded Bataille as "one of the most important writers of his century" and was deeply influenced by his approach to thought and the unknown. The first piece above was written as a tribute to Bataille shortly after his death and published in the journal Critique, which Bataille himself started in 1946. It shows us the early Foucault of the archeological method. Though falling in the broadly structuralist tradition, Foucault is here nonetheless preoccupied with themes of death, the void and limit-experiences. As we see, he directly inherits the problematic of transgression that we've encountered so forcefully in Bataille.

By 1976 Foucault is well into his genealogical period. His approach to sexuality is now avowedly historical, focused on the specificity of discursive practices and the power relations that permeate them. This is a post-structuralist Foucault, less interested in sweeping logics such as that of transgression and more intent on the local and the particular.

The sustained focus on sexuality, together with the momentum we’ve gathered through our reading of Bataille, offer us an attractive opportunity to trace this rupture / evolution in Foucault's thought. Once we complete this interlude, we'll return to Part 2 of Bataille's Erotism.

SOME DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

• Is the well-known transition from archeology to genealogy evident in Foucault's texts on sexuality that we are reading? Does "A Preface to Transgression" fit neatly in the archeological category, or does it already contain seeds of a future development?
• What is Foucault's attitude towards transgression in The History of Sexuality? Is transgression still foundational to his understanding of sexuality in 1976?
• The death of God is a dominant theme for the early Foucault, as it is for Bataille. Yet post-structuralism is often said to distance itself from the heady obsession with death, lack, void, abyss, negation and the like. Is such a shift observable in Foucault's writings on sexuality?
• We've seen the outlines of a radical Hegelianism in Bataille (inspired by his exchanges with Kojève). Can we discern Foucault's stance towards this Hegelian background? Where does (or would) he stand on the questions of dialectic, Aufhebung, reconciliation and the negative that Bataille has addressed at various points?

ABOUT THE BATAILLE GROUP
This is a comprehensive reading group focusing on the works of French writer Georges Bataille. We are reading key texts from Bataille himself, as well as tracing his relationship with other major thinkers such as Hegel, Nietzsche, André Breton/Surrealism, Blanchot, Lacan, Foucault, Deleuze, Derrida, etc.

Some familiarity with Bataille's mode and style of thought is helpful but not necessary. You're welcome to join the group in medias res at any time. See, however, the group rules below.

Please take the time to read and reflect on the reading prior to each meeting. Everyone is welcome to attend, but speaking priority will be given to people who have read the text.

Topics to be discussed in the future:

• Return to the 2nd part of Erotism
• Bataille's critique of Hegel: the negative and general economy
• Derrida's reading of Bataille in "From Restricted to General Economy"

Past topics included:

• Bataille's Erotism, Part 1 & the logic of transgression
• Bataillean transgression and Deleuzian line of flight: reading Fitzgerald's "The Crack-Up"
• Bataille's aesthetics: the rift with Surrealism
• Susan Sontag on avant-guarde literature
• Bataille's novel Blue of Noon
• Inner Experience and a-theological mysticism
• Bataille's reading of Nietzsche and critique of fascism

MORE ABOUT BATAILLE
Georges Bataille stands out as an eclectic, fascinating and controversial figure in the world of French letters. A contemporary of Sartre and Lacan, he combined ideas from diverse disciplines to create a unique position that he called 'base materialism'. In the early 20s, Bataille abandoned Catholicism, embraced psychoanalysis and Marxism and initiated an unorthodox search for the sacred in late modernity. His obsessive pursuit of ecstatic liminal experiences took him across the boundaries of philosophy, sociology, political economy, mythology, poetry, literature and mystical theology. His works develop a libidinal economy of unconditioned expenditure, offer a critique of fascism and embrace marginal experiences in the style of the French poets. Though he remained largely outside the academic mainstream and worked as a librarian, Bataille is a formative precursor to the post-structuralist philosophers of the '60s -- and may well be more relevant to our time than ever.

In this group we look at a significant cross-section of Bataille's texts. Our aim is to understand his thought on its own terms as well as place him in the context of his predecessors and the French thinkers who followed his lead. In view of Bataille's early relationship with Surrealism, the referenced artworks will spotlight this movement.

GROUP RULES

• Please spend 1-2 hours per week reading and preparing for the discussion.
• Keep your comments concise and relevant to the text.
• Please limit each comment to a maximum of 2-3 minutes. You're welcome to speak as many times as you wish.
• Virtual meeting courtesy: let's not interrupt each other and keep mics muted when not speaking.
• We'll focus the discussion with key passages and discussion questions. Be sure to bring your favorite passages, questions, comments, criticisms, etc.