果冻影院

Michaela Belejkanicova (果冻影院 SSEES) will present her research on Junger & Patocka:From the Experience (Erlebnis) to History.

In his final work, Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History (1975), Jan Pato膷ka introduces the concept of a novel political community - the solidarity of the shaken. Conventional interpretations argue that Heretical Essays are the result of Pato膷ka鈥檚 critical examination of the philosophies of history, formulated by his predecessors, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. This claim is undoubtedly correct.

The problems however occur, when Pato膷ka starts to bring into the discussion a series of enigmatic concepts, which are entirely absent in Husserl鈥檚 or Heidegger鈥檚 discourses on history. Pato膷ka sets the solidarity of the shaken into an obscure environment of the front line experience (an environment of political violence). He lays an emphasis on the necessity of a turn metanoein (渭蔚蟿伪谓慰蔚峥栁�) and encourages a human being to sacrifice oneself. If one reads Heretical Essays solely through the lens of his abovementioned predecessors鈥� philosophies of history, Pato膷ka鈥檚 final, mature understanding of history and the concept of the solidarity of the shaken remain veiled in mystery.

The talk primarily aims to clarify the enigmatic concept of the solidarity of the shaken. In order to do so, I will argue, Pato膷ka鈥檚 final essays need to be read not only as a criticism of the philosophies of history developed by Husserl and Heidegger, but, importantly, as Pato膷ka鈥檚 fervent criticism of a model of material history that is gradually developed by Ernst J眉nger in his inter-war works: Total Mobilization (1930), The Worker: Domination and Form (1932), and in the essay On Pain (1934).

By introducing a new reading of Pato膷ka鈥檚 Heretical Essays, the concept of the solidarity of the shaken, which is central in Pato膷ka鈥檚 treatment of history, will appear to be a negation of the community of the workers (proposed by J眉nger), which is the extension of Friedrich Nietzsche鈥檚 doctrine of will to power. The solidarity of the shaken will represent Pato膷ka鈥檚 response to the dangers of material history, which Walter Benjamin correctly recognises in his essay 鈥楾heories of German Fascism鈥� to be foundational for the ideology of fascism, which Pato膷ka observes to be the seed bed for the communist regime in Czechoslovakia during his time.

A seminar hosted by the 果冻影院 SSEES Arts and Humanities Research Student聽 Seminars

Student Co-ordinator: George Bodie