Talk:Agamben (and Friends) Reading Group

Friends,

i have attached a (VERY) tentative schedule for the summer readings...


 * 1) i have restricted the readings to short-ish texts by Agamben and Badiou.
 * 2) i would like to expand the scope of the group in the fall
 * 3) should we read anything else, or is this enough? too much?
 * 4) the group needs a name
 * 5) the schedule needs more specificity of day and time
 * 6) i have attached part of the first group of readings (there are links for the rest on the schedule)
 * 7) i wanted to put Agamben's 'State of Exception' on the list, but it is a little too long...maybe in the fall with some other more exclusively political theory (Arendt, Benjamin, Hardt and Negri, etc.)
 * 8) this is not MY group...it is ours. please let us know what you want.
 * 9) let me know if you are embarking on this magical journey thru theory-land...it will be fun
 * 10) i want to involve the faculty...is that cool? i would like to make the schedule a little more sound first.

cheers fred

((Copied from email, Friday, May 15, 2009, about 10:00 p.m.))

My Replies to the Ten Siegmund Theses


 * 1) and 6. Fred, thank you for getting the ball rolling!
 * 2) and 7. I think short readings are a good way to start. There's enough wrapped up in them that we'll enjoy talking through them slowly.
 * 3) I would like to add Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, and Wittgenstein to the list. None of them are specifically literary critics, but I'm interested in them and how one might use them to do literary criticism.
 * 4) I thought the group was named "Agamben (and Friends) Reading Group." Is it not? The (un)official SMU Wiki for English Graduate Students says so.
 * 5) and 8. Speaking of the Wiki . . . Instead of communicating through email (and clogging in-boxes), let's map out this reading group on the Wiki. There's even a place for discussions!
 * 9. I believe I'm in.
 * 10. Yes, that'd be great to have faculty.

Jevanstastic 04:59, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

well, i think that the curent title (Agamben and friends) is a little more limited than i would like. also, i have no problem adding the people that you suggested, but i think fall is a good time for more people...and i would like to add Benjamin and Deleuze (with and without Guattari) to the list, among others...sorry for the email, but that was the best way (i knew) to get the essays out to everyone, plus, the attached schedule has links to other articles. i would love to do this thru the wiki, but i don't know how to do that. any help would be much appreciated.


 * No apologies needed. I just wanted to get people on the Wiki and not have a million emails about the Theory Reading Group. But the initial email is great! And additional emails rousing up interest are appreciated, too. Jevanstastic 04:15, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Okay folks. Sorry for an extended absence from the Wiki, first of all. Here's how I suggest we do this: Fred, since you're the originator of this group, I'd say you probably have some sort of executive veto or fiat on this page. The rest of us can use this discussion page to talk through things we think ought or ought not to go on the official schedule. I've already added one thing--Badiou's "Philosophy and the War on Terror" from Infinite Thought. I agree especially with our need to hammer out a more sure-and-fast schedule. I'm available any day of the week for this. To the hammering-out end of this, I suggest two proposals:


 * 1) Let's make a one essay per week limit. We don't want to overburden our reading time--I'm doing a lot of independent reading this summer, and I'm going to be devoting more time to the wiki--and we also don't want to overburden our discussion time.
 * 2) Let's give ourselves at least two hours at our weekly meeting. If we're doing our job right, that should give us enough time to do some decent discussion without exhausting ourselves or feeling like this may as well be a class.

Having said all that, there's only one real rule on the wiki discussion pages: always sign your posts. It's easily done by putting four tildes at the end of your post. Vitaminbillwebb 19:12, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

One additional note: I think that, for the sake of copyright, we may need to distribute the excerpts from Infinite Thought via e-mail in .pdf form. I don't like the thought of those suddenly becoming publicly available on our site.Vitaminbillwebb 19:19, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Incidentally, about the name problem. I agree that we want to be more inclusive in the eventual Theory Reading Group, but for now, I feel a deep sense of affection towards the Agamben (and Friends) Reading Group. Can we keep that for this summer's TRG, and then adopt a new one later? Vitaminbillwebb 00:22, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

okey-dokey...we need to determine a meeting time...evenings will be best for me this summer...or weekends. Austin, if you have Infinite Thought, can you makee the necessary essays into .pdf's? also, i have distributed the other essays (for May) via email. is there a better way to get essays to everyone? finally, i want to find out who's interested. how should we do that?99.174.198.80 20:59, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Evenings in the week are better for me than weekends--that's toddler time. I'm planning to copy the Infinite Thought  essays, but which ones? I want to read "Phil. and the WOT," but what other ones would be useful? As for meeting times, any weeknight is as good as another. I know John's interested, but hopefully e-mail will help us determine who else is. Vitaminbillwebb 03:33, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, in addition to Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, and Wittgenstein, I'd like to add Heidegger to the list. Did ya'll read him this Spring in Dr. Foster's class? As for the name, I like the alphabet idea. Agamben, Badiou, Cixous...Zizek. But to avoid tying it down to particular names, it could be the ABC's of Theory or something like that. . . a nice play on Derrida's ABC Inc. essay! If we spent as much time planning the reading list and meeting time as we did on debating the name, we would have already met three times. I'm free all the time. Tell me when and where. Jevanstastic 04:28, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

fine. we will leave the name aside. i think that we should probably read either "Philosophy and Desire" or Philosophy and Truth" first bc they lay the groundwork for much of the rest of Badiou's work. we can save "The Subject of Art" and the two "theses" essays for later. i will send out an email asking that any interested parties contact me. then we can distribute the .pdf of the first essay we read. since we all are ok with evenings, let's meet sometime after 5 on thursdays. we can start whenever, but next week may be too early for everyone. we can edit and ammend the reading list as we go based on what the members of the alphabetical theory collective desire. should we proceed in abc order? we can read Agamben instead? i realy do not care where we start. by the way, when we get to Agamben, Benjamin's essay "Theses on the Philosophy of History" will be a piece of critical importance. i have a copy in .pdf form, and i will be glad to send it out to anyone that needs it. Thefredster 13:10, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

a couple more things...no, we didn't read Heiddeger, but i want to. second, a new translation of Badiou's Theory of the Subject is about to come out. this is considered the foundational text for all of B's work, esp. Being and Event. finally, the English translation of Logics of Worlds: the Sequel to Being and Event has just been published. i want to read all three of these in order (Theory Being and Logics) i would like someone to accompany me on this journey. i believe Theory comes out May 28...if you are interested, let me know. oh, this would be (possibly) beyond the scope of the theory group...and i want to read Heidegger's Being and Time...maybe in the fall or spring...Thefredster 13:19, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Ever the ambitious one! I've tried Sein und Zeit before. It was scary. But I'd be up for a second try. I suppose the same goes for the Event trilogy, but I'd prefer we not do either Heidegger or Badiou this summer. At least, not in toto. If there's interest in H. this summer, I could copy an article from our H. book last semester called "The purpose of the poet." Thursday's great for me, but we'll need to move our start date up to June if we don't want to start next Thurs. I'm okay with that, I suppose. That would be June for Badiou, July and one week of August--to make up for Taos, unless we want to do a session there--for Agamben. I'll make the .pdfs today, if I can. Otherwise it'll be tomorrow. Shall we do P&D and P&T both for week one? The IF articles are each about ten pages. Vitaminbillwebb 19:56, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

lets save H for the fall...we can do some briefer pieces then (and perhaps Being and Time)...the eventtrilogy sounds like a great year-long project (however, it may be one that few people are interested in). let's begin in June with the two essays from Infinite Thought. i have an Agamben article, "The Thing Itself," that i think we must read. Additionally, i have a .pdf copy of his book States of Exception, which should probably be THE Agameben text we focus on post-Taos...we can explore more of his work during the year. oh...we should keep B's "Eight Theses on the Universal" on the pre-Taos list because the concept of universality relates interestingly to the theoretical side of the digital humanities...Thefredster

Fred, taking your recommendations about the pre- and post-Taos readings, I made a skeleton schedule and put it on the main page of the Theory Reading Group. You know about these essays more than anyone so if you see a way to make the progression more intuitive, please do. I'll also volunteer to host the first meeting on June 4. The schedule is open to change but let's agree not to make changes starting one week before each meeting (i.e. last chance to change the reading for June 4 would be May 28). Jevanstastic 20:07, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

This stuff looks great guys. See you Thursday next. I'll be scanning/e-mailing the .pdf shortly. Vitaminbillwebb 19:32, 26 May 2009 (UTC)