Hegelian Model Research Articles

Монетарна ентропія в умовах економічної глобалізації

Introduction. Changes occurring in the nature of money in the context of globalization have long been of interest to economists. Instead, the events of recent years have shown that such changes can also be caused by profound transformations that are natural ones and subject to general physical laws. Problem Statement. Establishing the dependence of the further development of money as an economic category on the action of the second law of thermodynamics. The purpose is the analysis of scientific ideas at the junction of economics and physics (ecophysics) and their spread to the monetary sphere ,in particular considering the manifestation of monetary entropy in the process of the international monetary system. Methods. General scientific and special methods are used: analysis, synthesis, description, comparison, theoretical generalization and abstract-logical analyses. Results. This publication introduces the concept of monetary entropy as a state of chaoticization of the essence of money (entropy of money) and the monetary system as a whole. The development of monetary entropy is considered as the result of cyclical development according to the Hegelian model “thesis-antithesis-synthesis”, which allows to avoid complete chaosization of the monetary sphere due to its transition to a new level of the spiral of development. The current state of the development of money as an economic category and the international monetary system as a whole, caused by the impact of the globalization process on them, proves that they are at the stage of another transition from entropy to negentropy, which can lead to the emergence of Global Money. Conclusions. Turning to the issue of predicting the future of money, it should be noted that there is an opinion that soon money will simply become a relic of the past and disappear altogether, leaving the probable technological singularity as one of its consequences, the very liquidation (more precisely, the senselessness of existence ) of money as an economic category. One of the possibilities of the technological singularity is the emergence of a post-scarcity society in which there will be a surplus of resources and the needs of every member of society will be fully satisfied (a variant of capitalist communism, when even an unconditional basic income will appear to be an unacceptable minimum for satisfying needs, because the principle from each according to his abilities to each according to his needs will be implemented. However, the change will not happen overnight, so there will most likely be a transition period during which humanity will still use money and the concept of money will evolve rather than disappear completely.

Hegelian Dialectic Model of Change: Catalyst for Socio- Religious Change in Nigeria

This paper titled Hegelian Dialectic Model of Change: Catalyst for Religious Change in Nigeria submitted that religious change in Nigeria is real and there are several examples of change in persons and societies made possible by religion. These changes are not limited to one religion but several religions because Nigeria is a multi-religious nation. It is argued in this paper that among the several models of change that are available; the Hegelian model is more suitable and ideal for religious change in Nigeria. The paper explored in detail what Religious change entails and as well as indicators of change. Similarly, the paper explained what is meant by Hegelian dialectic model of change and reasons for considering it as ideal model for religious change in Nigeria. The paper advance ways of utilising Hegelian dialectic model of change without constituting threat to peace and harmony in Nigeria. The paper is theoretical in nature and the method adopted in writing the paper is the historical survey method. Needful recommendations are given in the paper on strengthening religious change without violence and assault.

On solidarity and generosity in supervision

In the supervisory process, dialectical tensions arise between the supervisee and the supervisor. Often, the source of these tensions is the significant difference in their perceptions of the meanings of the unfolding therapeutic reality, intensified by belonging to distinct professional generations and reconstructing therapeutic interactions in different ways. According to the Hegelian model, mutual recognition and validation as independent and autonomous professionals help the supervisory dyad overcome dialectical tensions, reach new understandings, and grow as clinicians. Supervisors who acknowledge their vulnerability and manifest generosity and solidarity with supervisees can readily recognize and validate the supervisees and minimize the dialectical tensions.

Yuri Tynianov, Jan Mukařovský and Nikolai Marr in Juri Lotman’s Concept of History of Humanities

Abstract This article focuses on Juri Lotman’s views of the origins of Tartu-Moscow structuralism. He reconstructed the genesis of the Tartu-Moscow School using the Hegelian model (thesis – antithesis – synthesis). In Lotman’s concepts of the 1960s and 1970s, the role of the “thesis” was always played by the Petrograd Association of Russian Formalists (OPOIaZ). Lotman selected different movements as the “antithesis”. In the 1960s, the productive antithesis to OPOIaZ was, for Lotman, the “semantic paleontology” of Nikolai Marr and his followers (such as Olga Freidenberg). In the 1970s, Lotman assigned this role to the functionalist structuralism of the Prague School (with a special focus on the work of Jan Mukařovský), but he never abandoned his sympathy for the work of Freidenberg.

Матрица иллюзии

The article highlights several methodological levels in the study of illusory forms of consciousness based on the heritage of German classical philosophy (Kant, Hegel) and on the materials of the works of Durkheim, Freud and Marx. The “Kantian” level involves deciphering the content of an illusory complex by isolating unconscious intellectual or social processes, the interweaving of which gives rise to the appearance of ontological connections that do not exist in real­ity. Such an understanding of the nature of illusory forms allows us to single out four regular stages of reflection of these phenomena: naive fetishism, its rational criticism, scientific ideology and critical theory. At the fourth stage, invisible connections are revealed, but the reason for their concealment by an illusory form remains unexplained (fetishized). The “post-Kantian” level implies the re­jection of the subjective understanding of the illusory form and its understanding as a natural generation of content, which requires the rejection of the classical opposition of truth and error. The Hegelian model of absolute reality, for which all knowledge and illusions are its internal, but transient characteristics, can act here as a “methodological measure”. Unlike Durkheim, for whom illusion was the eternal state of society, Freud and Marx viewed it as a transient phenomenon, focusing on the mechanisms of its formation and death, but the opposition of “society and man” characteristic of psychoanalysis did not allow revealing the “systemic secret of form”. Marx partly took this step, and Durkheim’s innova­tion consisted in revealing the reflexive nature of the connection between the fetish and its sign.

Reflections on Lao Sze-Kwang and His Double-Structured “Intra-Cultural” Philosophy of Culture

AbstractIn his own time, Lao Sze-Kwang formulated his own intra-cultural approach to the philosophy of culture that begins from the interdependence and organic nature of our cultural experience. In this article, I will address three questions: Why did Lao abandon his early reliance on the Hegelian model of philosophy of culture and formulate his own “two-structured” theory? Again, given Lao’s profound commitment and contribution to Chinese philosophy and its future directions, why is it not proper to describe him as a “Chinese philosopher”? And why is the much accomplished Lao Sze-Kwang not installed in the Chinese University of Hong Kong pantheon as yet one more of the great “New Confucian” philosophers that are associated with this institution?

Fichte e Hegel em disputa: luta por reconhecimento ou exortação à liberdade? Considerações sobre dois modelos de intersubjetividade a partir do projeto de emancipação feminina n'O Segundo Sexo de Simone de Beauvoir

In this paper, I intend to provide a critical analysis of one of the conceptual schemes operating in Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex: the intersubjective relationship between consciousness and the possibility, defended by the author, of women’s emancipation through a reciprocal recognition between men and women. To this end, I propose to confront this scheme with two distinct philosophical models for the interaction between consciousness: the one underlying the Hegelian argument of the “struggle” for recognition between master and slave (explicitly mobilized by Beauvoir) and the one elaborated by Fichte, particularly in his Iena’s years, in the name of an “exhortation” to freedom (not suggested by Beauvoir). My basic hypothesis is that the model presented by Fichte could perhaps contribute to the discussion on women's emancipation in Beauvoir, avoiding a possible impasse of her argument related to the tension between the Hegelian model of the struggle between master and slave and the specific solution for women's emancipation, as a reciprocal recognition between the sexes, with which the analyses of The Second Sex culminate.

Is Imagination Fundamental? o n the Issue of t he Genesis of Subjectivity

Based on the issue of the genesis of subjectivity, the authors of the article turn to the Hegelian model, which captures the two-sided and fundamentally changeable nature of the relationship between subject and object. The article substantiates the idea that imagination, being considered outside of the context of psychologization or reduction of it only to the reproductive aspect, is a source of binary differences fundamental to philosophical thought. Following Hegel’s dialectical method, the authors note that the presence of the image already indicates the difference between the two dimensions of consciousness and knowledge. The image expresses the primary truth of substance and, at the same time, the way it is subjectively given. There is a differentiation of the subjective moment of Being with the realization of fantasy. All formations of Spirit are interpretations of the figurative series, primal scenes, the analog of which was studied by classical psychoanalysis. From this perspective, the genesis of such subjective modes as consciousness, self-consciousness and mind inevitably includes symbolization, interpretation of the "Self" images, cognizing, willing and acting in various situations and contexts. The study of the concepts developed by Hegel, Kennouche, Verene and Merleau-Ponty allows concluding about two arguments in favor of the fundamentality of imagination. This refers, on the one hand, to subjective imagination that generates meanings and the need for their interpretation and, on the other hand, to the initial form of synthesis, on the basis of which, the subject and object of cognition, formations of consciousness and types of knowledge characteristic of them are further distinguished. The image, being the first meeting of the concrete and universal, is capable of setting the plot of one or another form of subjectivity.

Controverses by Larbi Oukada, et al

may be purchased or rented by students and instructors and offer the suggestion of organizing a film festival alongside the course in which the textbook is to be used. Outside of courses, this text may prove to be a valuable resource for those organizing film nights for French clubs or French and Francophone film festivals. The potential cost issues for students renting or purchasing films is also mitigated by the affordability of the textbook itself. University of South Dakota Kris Aric Knisely Oukada, Larbi, Didier Bertrand, and Janet Solberg. Controverses. 3rd ed. Boston: Cengage, 2016. ISBN 13 978-1-305-10578-2. Pp. 293. $150. Designed for students at the intermediate level, this eight-chapter text presents a variety of exercises that help students develop more sophisticated levels of oral and written expression. The materials available include a text (manuel), a Student Activities Manual (cahier d’activités), and online supersite. The bulk of grammar review is contained in the Student Activities Manual; most of the text is organized around contemporary and controversial topics such as globalization, immigration, and gender equality. The chapters are designed to encourage students to examine these topics from various points of view as they acquire the skills necessary to discuss and write about each topic.An interesting and unique aspect to Controverses is the incorporation of writing exercises. Chapters 1–5 guide students through the Hegelian model of composition: The students will practice organizing their thoughts into short compositions including thèse, antithèse, synthèse, and conclusion.As a result, Controverses serves as both an intermediate grammar text and a composition manual. This edition of Controverses excels with its use of technology. Students who purchase the text also have access to the course supersite, a gold-mine of supplemental teaching aids, MP3 recordings, flashcards, and grammar tutorials. Grammar reviews are included as podcasts, affording students the chance to focus on grammar deficiencies outside of class. These podcasts range in difficulty from the use of definite and indefinite articles to the use of the subjunctive. Each chapter includes a Web Activities section, which supports student research by providing a list of websites pertinent to the chapter theme. The supersite includes a section for instructors containing teaching suggestions, a grading key for the Student Activities Manual, and sample syllabi for instructors who are unfamiliar with the text. The length of Controverses makes it ideal as a primary text for an intermediate-level conversation and composition course.However,instructors may also find this textbook useful as an accompanying text for an intermediate or advanced grammar course. Undergraduate students will enjoy discussing the contemporary , controversial topics in each chapter while developing a deeper appreciation for French and Francophone culture. The vocabulary presented at the beginning of each chapter focuses on the chapter subject, which makes the vocabulary somewhat 294 FRENCH REVIEW 89.4 Reviews 295 limited.This may present a challenge for students who lack confidence in their speaking ability. Therefore, instructors may want to supplement certain chapters with short readings in order to expand vocabulary acquisition. Overall, this edition of Controverses is an excellent text that instructors will find very useful. The exercises in the text and accompanying cahier provide effective review and stylistic practice for students transitioning to classes that will require them to produce more advanced, argumentative papers in French. Jackson State University (MS) Tomaz Cunningham Thacker, Mike, and Casimir d’Angelo. Essential French Grammar. New York: Routledge, 2013. ISBN 978-1-4441-6689-7. Pp. 464. $41. The authors leave no doubt regarding their position on the debate over how, or whether, to teach grammar. In the introduction, they express their “conviction” that “grammar is the key to attaining a real understanding of both spoken and written French” (xiii). Appealing to their “long experience of teaching and examining” (Thacker was director of the Language Centre at the University of Surrey for more than a decade, and d’Angelo was director of the Language Unit in the Engineering Department of the University of Cambridge), they assert that “grammar plays a fundamental part in the learning process of students who aspire to higher levels of competence” (xiii). For those who prefer to teach grammar more implicitly...

Theory and the Object: Making Sense of Adorno’s Concept of Mediation

This article examines Adorno’s use of the notion of mediation, which at first glance appears to be problematic and aporetic. While the emergence of such a concept marks Adorno’s renewed interest in Hegelian philosophy, and a distancing from Walter Benjamin’s thought, the understanding of mediation should not be reduced to the Hegelian model. This article will argue that Adorno introduces such a concept to explain theory’s necessity and verifiability, as well as the experience of the object. Only by taking these two issues (the mediation between concepts and between subject and object) in their interconnection is it possible to explain the role of mediation in Adorno. I will argue that the idea of ‘constellations’ put forward in the Dialectics furnishes us with a model of mediation that goes beyond its original Hegelian formulation.

Talents and Interests: A Hegelian Moral Psychology

AbstractOne of the reasons why there is no Hegelian school in contemporary ethics in the way that there are Kantian, Humean and Aristotelian schools is because Hegelians have been unable to clearly articulate the Hegelian alternative to those schools’ moral psychologies, i.e., to present a Hegelian model of the motivation to, perception of, and responsibility for moral action. Here it is argued that in its most basic terms Hegel's model can be understood as follows: the agent acts in a responsible and thus paradigmatic sense when she identifies as reasons those motivations which are grounded in his or her talents and support actions that are likely to develop those talents in ways suggested by his or her interests.

Critical Theory

Critical Theory

The Lady Vanishes: What’s Missing from the Stem Cell Debate

Most opponents of somatic cell nuclear transfer and embryonic stem cell technologies base their arguments on the twin assertions that the embryo is either a human being or a potential human being, and that it is wrong to destroy a human being or potential human being in order to produce stem cell lines. Proponents’ justifications of stem cell research are more varied, but not enough to escape the charge of obsession with the status of the embryo. What unites the two warring sides in ‘the stem cell wars’ is that women are equally invisible to both: ‘the lady vanishes.’ Yet the most legitimate property in the body is that which women possess in their reproductive tissue and the products of their reproductive labour. By drawing on the accepted characterisation in the common law of property as a bundle of rights, and on a Hegelian model of contract as mutual recognition, we can lessen the impact of the tendency to regard women and their ova as merely receptacles and women’s reproductive labour as unimportant.

Judische Sprachen in deutscher Umwelt: Hebraisch und Jiddisch von der Aufklarung bis ins 20. Jahrhundert (review)

Reviewed by: Jüdische Sprachen in deutscher Umwelt: Hebräisch und Jiddisch von der Aufklärung bis ins 20. Jahrhundert Jonathan Skolnik Jüdische Sprachen in deutscher Umwelt: Hebräisch und Jiddisch von der Aufklärung bis ins 20. Jahrhundert, edited by Michael Brenner. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 2002. 134 pp. 39.00. This conference volume is stimulating reading for anyone interested in the evolution of Jewish languages in Ashkenaz and their renaissance in the modern period. Michael Brenner has assembled a collection of complementary papers which investigate Hebrew and Yiddish in the German-speaking countries. Nils Roemer does an outstanding job of sketching the broader historical framework for understanding German Jewry's linguistic complexity. Drawing on his own research as well as recent scholarship on the Haskalah (especially David Sorkin and Steven Lowenberg), Roemer challenges the mid-nineteenth century mythologization (still a commonplace in many scholarly works) of Moses Mendelssohn as the "Germanizer" of Central European Jewry. Instead, Roemer convincingly situates Mendelssohn at the climax of a longer process of linguistic and social change, emphasizing the evolving roles of Yiddish and German in daily life and the centrality of the Haskalah's language aesthetic for Mendelssohn's thought. Inspired by Amos Funkenstein, Roemer also calls us to re-examine the boundaries between Yiddish and other German dialects before the nineteenth century. Andrea Schatz's thoughtful paper takes up the problem of the secularization of the Hebrew language, exploring precursors of Berlin Haskala in order to better understand the Maskilic notion of a "new holy language." Andreas Gotzmann offers a dense analysis of the inner-Jewish discourse of linguistic identity in nineteenth-century Germany, emphasizing the centrality of evolving Jewish religious practice in the debates. Thomas Kollatz surveys the Hebrew-language press in Germany from the mid-eighteenth century up through the founding of ha-Maggid in 1856. Based on the usage of Hebrew words in the daily language of Jews in Alsace and south-west Germany before 1933, Uri Kaufmann offers some thoughts on the nature of Western Jewish dialects. In view of polemical attacks by some Zionist writers that German-language Wissenschaft des Judentums contributed to Western Jewry's neglect of the Hebrew language, Henry Soussan judiciously discusses the contributions to Hebrew scholarship by nineteenth-century figures like Leopold Zunz and Michael Sachs, as well as the growing rapprochement between Eastern European and Central European Jewish scholarship which contributed to the founding of the journal Dvir in 1924. Barbara Schaefer gives a concise [End Page 168] overview of efforts by Berlin Zionists to promote Hebrew from 1900 through the Weimar period. Rachel Perets' article first examines the 1909 and 1931 Berlin conferences on Hebrew in some detail, then offers a study of Hebrew teaching methods and institutions in Germany before 1933. Delphine Bechtel's excellent portrait of the flowering Yiddish literary scene in 1920s Berlin is an expanded version of an essay published in English in the Yale Companion to Jewish Writing and Thought in German (1997). Amir Eshel's contribution revisits the question of Franz Kafka's relation to Jewish languages. Although Eshel doesn't explicitly engage with Robert Alter's recent book on Kafka, Benjamin, and Scholem (which probes the theological dimensions to their relation to Hebrew), he offers a unique dissenting view. For Eshel, Kafka's turn to Hebrew and Yiddish reveals ethical, universalizing concerns more than a wish to experiment with radically new forms of Jewish religion, politics, and culture. Eshel interprets Kafka through a framework that at times seems comparable to Heidegger or, rather, to a Hegelian model divorced from theologies, negative or otherwise: an interplay of "foreign" and "individual" which leads to categories like "eternal" or "universal." The second half of Eshel's article examines Paul Celan's use of Hebrew words in his German poetry, with some reference to the poems of Gertrud Kolmar and Nelly Sachs. Eshel notes Celan's critical distance to Heidegger and the tremendous ruptures which the Holocaust inflicted upon Jewish life and language, yet he still insists on the redemptive, humanizing potential of a meeting of German, Yiddish, and Hebrew in Celan's poetry. Jonathan Skolnik Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies University of Maryland-College...

Rhythmic Numinousness: Sydney Dobell and "The Church"

Wanted a tutor to rising age; he must be a creedless Christian full of but full of charity--wise in head and large in heart--poet and a priest an eternal child, as well as a thoroughly furnished man. (1) WHEN GEORGE GILFILLAN CALLED FOR TUTOR TO THE RISING AGE, HE had in mind several 'young, ardent and gifted spirits who wrote poetry to inspire religious feeling in their readers. Philip Bailey seemed a likely candidate, but lacked forcefulness; Alexander Smith was regarded as a poet in possession of a profound mode of expression but failed to direct it into religious contemplation. Only Sydney Dobell, a poet who had employed to great effect current trend for spasmodic feeling in poetics, appeared to lay true claim to Gilfillan's vacant laurel. (2) That this feeling was inherently religious in tone was Gilfillan's view, but modern criticism remains unclear regarding question of Dobell's religion and how, if at all, it inflects his poetry. This essay aims to clarify issue first by unravelling details of his and second by using such detail to work through his religious lyrics. Religious or otherwise, all of his poetry is inflected by a fitful rhythmic pace that reflects his frantic and perhaps conflicted desire to both reach God and implement what he perceived to be true Christian message in society. Like snow-muffled, dim and sweet snow-drop, Dobell wrote in Snow-drop in Snow (1851), Poet produces a music often misunderstood, being himself lost amidst drifting snows and blooming only in loneliness (11. 45-47, 59). (3) Yet as a figure Full of faith, in Dobell's poem, poet must tread, albeit precariously, a path between winter of mortality and / The dome of a great palace all of ice (11.1-2). Dutiful behavior on earth to his fellow was certainly as significant to Dobell as his longing for paradise, a tension that sent a shudder through both his verse and his allegiance to a specific form of Christianity known simply as the Church. The first part of this discussion turns to the Church, a religious community based on Christian of first century and headed by Samuel Thompson. Thompson, Dobell's grandfather, carefully outlined philosophy of his in Evidences of Revealed Religion (1814), which he published under name Christophilus as a series of letters that are everywhere echoed in Dobell's own correspondence and verse. The influence of Evidences also extended to Birmingham politician-preacher and social reformer George Dawson, who forwarded a radicalized version of Thompson's philosophy in numerous sermons. As one of Dobell's more intimate friends, Dawson seems to have touched poet's concept of religion almost as much as Thompson, all three men intent on putting individuals back in touch with their feelings in order to create a national community founded on religious sensibility. Part two thus opens with Dobell's own prose explication of religion and the Church in Thoughts on Art, Philosophy and Religion (1876), a text usually cited to support Dobell's broad church position. Broad Church, however, is a rather generalized and inadequate label to describe Dobell's position in light of Thompson's Evidences and Dawson's sermons. We might instead wish to regard poet's religious identity as one characterized by its struggle to articulate value of religious feeling over religious doctrine. While critics like W. David Shaw have attributed such feeling to a Hegelian model of spirit, it is also worth rendering this feeling as affective, spasmodically issuing from believer entranced by God. (4) Dobell remains Christian even as he rethinks this tradition through Thompson and Dawson, and most recognizably religious of his lyrics reinforce his emotive belief, as part two will illustrate by reading Harps of Heaven (c. 1851), To a Cathedral Tower (1850) and In War-Time: A Psalm of Heart (c. …

Philosophical Disenfranchisement in Danto's "The End of Art"

In 1984, Arthur C. Danto wrote two papers, both with enormously provocative themes. One, Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art, is a chronicling of aggressive strategies made against art by philosophy in an effort to contain and control it, and a call for art's re-empowerment. The second, End of Art, offers a Hegelian model of art history in which art (necessarily) comes to an end with its own philosophical self-consciousness. Both papers appeared in a volume of Danto's essays in 1986.1 End of Art caused an explosion of almost unanimously negative response in symposia, conferences, papers, and books by a who's who of the philosophy of art world that has continued for a decade and a half.2 Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art has been met with virtual silence.3 As the smoke begins to clear fifteen years later, a retrospective look at these works engenders a certain amount of bewilderment. First, it is odd that the critical response by the philosophical community has been focused only on End of Art. Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art, with its provocation to defend the discipline of philosophy, should have been an equal candidate for making noise in academic circles. What is more puzzling, though, is that these two papers have not been considered together. That they are seemingly contradictory is interesting enough: art as oppressed by philosophy in one, and in the other, art looking into a mirror and seeing philosophy as its own reflection. Indeed, the same argument appears in and overlaps both papers. For all their seeming disparity, though, it appears that Danto intended them to be taken together. In his introduction to the volume in which they appear, Danto states that these papers form a natural narrative order, almost as though they were chapters in a single book with an overarching theme.4 This theme, the relation among art, philosophy, and historical consciousness, begins with disenfranchisement but ends with liberation. End of Art, claims Danto, is an effort at the re-enfranchisement of art through a forced division between it and philosophy.5 This division, he asserts, will lead to freedom for both. Thus the one paper really cannot be properly assessed without the other. Whatever critiques End of Art has been subject to, and however much Danto's critics think areas of his argument are flawed, their attention has been directed toward showing that whereas Danto thinks art has ended, it really has not.6 The most important question that has not been asked regards the project as a whole: does End of Art succeed in its intended liberatory goal? This essay will pursue that question. After laying out the general thrust of both papers to demonstrate their narrative continuity, I will consider them together in light of this broader claim. But I will argue that End of Art is an astonishing confirmation of Danto's thesis in Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art. Whatever Danto set out to do, the arguments of End of Art amount to the most comprehensive disenfranchising strategy ever launched against art.

Churchman's Hegelian Inquiring System and Perspectival Thinking

This paper focuses upon a critical aspect implicit in C West Churchman's Hegelian Inquiring System, namely its ability to provide all the necessary ingredients for the emergence of a learning culture. This focus is achieved by articulating certain phenomenological aspects of the Hegelian model. In particular the relationship between subject and object is explored. After its emergence the learning culture then requires a special kind of thinking, which results in certain capacities, to continue its evolvement. This kind of thinking has been defined as Perspectival Thinking and is elaborated in the context of an Information System as a social system bound to technology. In the absence of a learning culture no organization can sustain its learning capacities, yet how often are learning cultures taken for grantedq This paper explores a number of ideas that provide the ground for developing and sustaining learning cultures.

Zum Arbeitsbegriff bei Rusiñol und Hegel

From an in-depth reading of the first lines of Santiago Rusiñol’s L’Hèroe (1903), two morphologically distinct notions of work are highlighted: “el treballar” and “treball”. With the contrastive characterization of both throughout the work, what at first glance might seem a purely formal difference proves to be a clear ideological collision: on the one hand, "el treballar" as liberation and self-realization, on the other, “treball” as suppression and exploitation. This collision not only determines the perception of space and time within the play, but is also at the heart of the dramatic conflict, thus structuring the dynamics of the whole play. Finally, comparing this dynamic with the dialectical conception of Hegel's work and Marx's counterposition, one discovers a striking parallel between these attitudes and that of Rusiñol: While Anton represents the optimistic Hegelian model, Carme and Joan play Marx’s rather pessimistic role.

'Round Dusk: Kojève at "The End"

‘Round Dusk: Kojève at “The End” Allan Stoekl The postmodern moment has been characterized as one of the loss of legitimacy of the master narratives—social, historical, political; Hegelian, Marxist, Fascist—by which lives were ordered and sacrificed throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.1 The demise of the great story, which gave direction and purpose to struggle and violence, has opened a space for a proliferation of conflicting modes of interpreting and speaking. Of course those modes can only be partial: they can never aspire to the horrifying totalization promoted by overarching certainties. And they will likely interfere with each other, cross over, meld and (self) contradict, because the possibility of their autonomy has been given up; at best we can say that they are “language games” now, rules for representation, argument, and analysis; no longer are they the ground of teleology, satisfaction, and self-certainty. But there is a problem with this kind of argument, as I see it. It’s not that I do not find it “true,” because of some kind of empirical counter-evidence, such as: the old nationalist narratives still hold sway; history is still slouching toward a goal; history isn’t slouching toward a goal, but it is nevertheless still slouching, etc. One can probably develop all sorts of arguments based on empirical observation concerning the postmodern. Or one can just as easily “deconstruct” the master stories from within, by taking them apart while still, necessarily, acting in full complicity with them (for what “space” could be said to open beyond their margins?). The problem, as I see it, is that this kind of argument is closely tied to the “end of history” arguments that were current in the immediate postwar period, and that have recently had a renewed but highly contested efflorescence.2 This is of course immensely ironic, because philosophers such as Lyotard—spokespersons of the postmodern—have informed us that the possibility of a larger teleology is lost for good, along with the knowledge that flowed from it. But there still is a larger knowledge, after all—the one that proclaims the death of the possibility of a larger knowledge. Whether arrived at empirically or logically, this awareness comes at the end of a series of historical actions and tragedies, and the certainty associated with it is no doubt due to lessons derived from those failures. This history will still have the form of a narrative, albeit one that lacks, perhaps, the power of retrospective justification that characterized the Hegelian model. Its lessons might be purely practical, or they might be derived from a study of the incoherences or contradictions of the earlier paradigms. The net result, whatever the means of their determination, development and (self) cancelling, will be a generally valid knowledge that mandates the end of generally valid knowledges. The language games that proliferate, then, in a postmodern epoch will be allowed and encouraged to do so only because the way has been opened by yet another master narrative: the narrative of the end of narratives. The freedom to be enjoyed by the games is the result of the master story’s knowledge—but, to be sure, the games’ actions, their orientations, will not be determined by it. They will be independent of it—but the preservation of their semi-autonomous functioning is nevertheless the goal of a postmodern theoretical project (such as one that affirms adjudication between different, conflicting, games). Further, it is their guarantee that they will participate in a stable postmodern order: without the postmodern narrative and its powers of harmonization, they would risk falling into particularist discourses into which “nationalist” ideologies are prone. Is this postmodern version of things that different from a theory of the “end of history” that envisages a State founded on the mutual recognition of free subjects? On the surface, yes: the postmodern view concerns itself not with subjectivity, consciousness as productive labor, and the like, but on the recognition of difference between partial discourses and “constructed” cultures. The posthistorical model seems almost quaint with its emphasis on codified law and the State as guarantor of a freedom identifiable with labor and construction. But beyond these evident differences there...

Rafting with Hegel on the Rio Grande: Politics, Education, and Ethnic Diversity

This paper applies the Hegelian model of society as an organism to the analysis of what makes multicultural societies healthy or unhealthy, how to make the transition from one to the other, and potential roles for educational and political systems in that process. Because of its broad base and assignment to transmit culture, universities may need to make a greater contribution to cultural realignment in an unhealthy multicultural society with a tradition of political polarization than in either a healthy multicultural society or in an unhealthy multicultural society with a capacity for conventional political solutions.