Mimetic Desire Research Articles

How to Avoid the Paradigm of Censorship: Self-Consciousness, Mimetic Desire and the Empathic Style of Anita Desai

How to Avoid the Paradigm of Censorship: Self-Consciousness, Mimetic Desire and the Empathic Style of Anita Desai

Ontological security and protracted conflict in frontier societies: towards a trans-local turn in peacebuilding

ABSTRACT This article proposes a trans-local turn in peacebuilding in frontier societies. Drawing on René Girard’s concept of ‘mimetic desire’, the article conceptualises how a crisis of ontological insecurity cannot be addressed by rational approaches to institutionalising a process to resolve incompatibilities between conflict parties, but requires de-escalation of the mimetic rivalry between the parties, who are often described as being in conflict over identity. Empirically, the article focuses on the, apparently very different, examples of intractable conflicts in Northern Ireland and Korea, and the trans-local peacebuilding interactions between the two. This article demonstrates how relationships of unresolved mimetic rivalry have intensified ontological insecurity in both cases, creating dynamics of existential anxiety and mutual antagonism, and how the reflexivity based on peacebuilding stories from other frontier societies, which do not impose direct ontological threats, appears to increase hope for change by transcending the endemic sense of ontological insecurity.

The Dynamics of Triangulation in Cervantes’s El amante liberal

This essay analyzes Miguel de Cervantes’s El amante liberal as a type of psychomachia that dramatizes the battle between two systems of interpersonal triangulation that change and mold the conduct and character of the protagonist Ricardo, and to a degree, of the other protagonist Leonisa. René Girard’s mimetic desire, which degrades and dehumanizes individuals, and St. Thomas Aquinas’s Christian friendship, which foments love and generosity, are inscribed in the story to explore the theme of identity and offer a Cervantine paradigm of reading and interpretation. This paradigm allows for ambiguity, hybridity, and changing interpretations.

Violent Conflict, the Struggle for Identity, and the Contagion of Mimetic Desire in the Prison Environment

Violent Conflict, the Struggle for Identity, and the Contagion of Mimetic Desire in the Prison Environment

From Scapegoating to the Culture of Cruelty: (Mis)Managing Mimetic Desire and Violence in Late Modernity

Due to the ‘civilizing process’ (Elias), the overall level of violence is decreasing; yet its transforming patterns persist. The article aims at examining the contemporary structures and mechanisms responsible for violence control, while also exploring the newly emerging, naturalized patterns of cruelty. Firstly, René Girard’s mimetic theory is overviewed: while in archaic societies, mimetic crisis is controlled by sacrificial rites, modernization reconfigures this paradigm. Secondly, these transformations are mapped: mimetic desire is channelled into the market processes, while mimetic crisis is managed by the state monopolizing violence. Thirdly, the structural transformations of late modernity upsetting the fragile balance of state and market are analysed: secular scapegoating becomes part of the political toolset, while the private sphere is overwhelmed by undetectable new forms of hurting and self-harming. As a culture of cruelty is naturalized, mimetic crisis becomes a continuous threat, which generates a need for the functional equivalents of sacrificial violence control.

Mimetic desire in Augustine’s Confessiones as a model for natural theology and virtue ethics

This article examined the concept and notability of mimetic desire in Augustine’s autobiographical work Confessiones. Mimetic desire is based primarily on the knowledge that there is a Perfect Being, viz. God, ideal forms (in Platonic idiom), which may be known and imitated by humans. Mimesis demonstrates that humans have a natural capacity and tendency to imitate and possess what others have. Despite this, in popular culture, mimesis has the connotation of feyness and is discouraged in place of inventiveness. The culture and spirit of our day promote originality and inventiveness without an understanding of the human nature and its inherent mimetic desires. The concept of mimetic desire is rooted in Rene Girard’s theory of anthropology but can be traced back as far as Plato’s Republic. Therefore, this interdisciplinary concept has been explored through Augustine’s narratological composition of Confessiones. The introspective tone and cultural forming narratives that make up Confessiones were succinctly examined in the context of mimetic theory. The triangular structure of mimetic desire was further explored to gain a better understanding of how Augustine relied on mimesis in his conversion to Christianity. The choice of imitating authentic models led to Augustine’s moral renewal, and likewise such implications are relevant to modern-day Christians. Moreover, this article aims to promote the concept of mimesis as an ideal practise concerning human nature and conditioning, towards a virtuous and morally acceptable society. The results of this article underline the importance of narrative theory and friendship in developing positive cultures through mimesis. Through contrasting Augustine’s earlier Manichaean life and his later Christian life, an illustration of mimetic desire can be drawn, and for Augustine, this could only mean Christ.Contribution: This article contributes to the ongoing interdisciplinary studies of ontology, anthropology, theology, and sociology. By interpreting or reading Augustine’s Confessiones through the lens of mimetic desire, this article offers an alternative perspective on Augustine’s natural theology and virtue ethics. It further presents the conceptual framework of mimesis on Christian and Platonist praxis of the ideal forms. Moreover, the article of the narratological composition of Confessiones expounds the importance of interpersonal relationships in our spiritual growth. The triangular structure of mimesis was further expounded in the context of interior life, viz. interior homo [inner man] as the ultimate model.

La puissance satanique de la mimesis chez René Girard


 
 
 Since 1961, René Girard has built a complete fundamental anthropology based on a single intuition: the theory of mimetic desire. While philosophical modernity had made us believe that the fundamental category of the subject was autonomy, Girard reminds us on the contrary that we are mimetic animals. However, mimesis is paradoxical. It is because we all have a desire for differentiation that we are condemned to imitate one another. In doing so, by rethinking mimesis and taking it out of its simple traditional representational field in which it was often confined, the author shows how it reveals all its ambivalence, both pacifying and violent, and allows Girard to place it not only at the heart of humanity but also at the center of the process of hominization.
 
 

Рене Жирар, нигилизм постправды и эскалация насильственной неразличимости

Today’s cluster of geopolitical threats are helpfully addressed by the mimetic theory of René Girard. He accounts for human order and stability in light of cathartic violence preserved in socio-religious form, enabling the peaceful management of desire and the restraint of violent disorder. The challenge to this mechanism represented by Judeo-Christian revelation offers a nonviolent alternative vision but also brings the threat of instability, which has returned in modern times — an insight that Girard identifies in Friedrich Nietzsche, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Carl von Clausewitz. In phenomena such as fake news and political populism, the culture wars in which Western self-aggrandisement is matched by its cultural self-laceration, the climate crisis, and the potential escalation to extremes of modern military conflict, the pathologies of mimetic desire threaten humanity with apocalyptic consequences.

Making of Scapegoats: The Complicity of Church, State and Society in Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These

Claire Keegan’s novel Small Things Like These (2021) brings such notions as purity, impurity and scapegoating into discussion within the context of the convent laundries in Ireland. The novel critiques the reduction of morality and immorality to a sexist category and focuses on the “fallen women” as both victims and saviours of society. It also portrays the harsh socio-economic environment of New Ross, Ireland where capitalism and inequality prevail, and the characters are victims of the capitalist system. Drawing a sketch of the Magdalen Laundries, which served as institutions instrumental in creating ideal women for the Irish nation and protecting the public from the “fallen” women until 1996, Keegan points at the complicity between religious and capitalist influences. She emphasises the relationship between Christianity and capitalism by implying out that capitalism prioritises private ownership, profit and competition, and that Christianity propagates the core tenets of the system. The narrative underscores how capitalism’s pursuit of profit can lead to the exploitation and marginalization of vulnerable groups, perpetuating a system of scapegoating to protect the interests of the rich and the powerful. Hence, the primary objective of this study is to analyse the phenomenon of scapegoating as exemplified, particularly by the girls at the convent who have been marginalized and confined within a convent in Keegan’s literary work, Small Things Like These, drawing upon the theories related to “mimetic desire,” “violence,” and “scapegoating mechanism.” It also aims to show how these girls, ostracised and accused of subverting national ideals, function as a mirror to the truth and reveal the unfeasibility of achieving true communal purification within the intricate interplay of church, state, and society– all of which are manipulated by the forces of capitalism.

Rene Girard and the phenomenology of mimetic desire

René Girard has been critiqued for failing to ground his theory of mimetic desire in a discursive and philosophically robust framework. In order to meet this objection, I argue that René Girard’s theory of mimetic desire can be successfully motivated by a phenomenology of the emptiness of selfhood and intersubjectivity. After grounding Girard’s theory in a phenomenology of no-self, I reconstruct Girard’s argument that violence is a necessary consequence of internally mediated mimetic desire

Mimetic Desire and the Radiation Oncology Residency Match

Mimetic Desire and the Radiation Oncology Residency Match

The golden calf of Bethel and Judah’s mimetic desire of Israel

Based on René Girard’s mimetic theory, this article reexamines the vilification of Jeroboam’s cultus in 1 Kgs. 12.25–33 as an attempt to depict Bethel and the Northern Kingdom as the monstrous double of Jerusalem and Judah. Mimetic rivalry and mutual desire often impose a grotesque mixture of the emotional residues of mimetic crisis—be they anxiety, fury, or fear—on rivals’ faces. Although the text attempts to highlight differences between Bethel and Jerusalem, mimetic theory suggests that the rivals’ mutual blame conceals their fundamental similarities. The text paints Jeroboam’s golden calf as a monstrous double of Jerusalem’s cherubim, but the monstrous depiction of the calf as a pagan idol also conceals Judah’s own insecurity and mimetic desire of Israel. As the “inferior” party, Judah imitated Israel and eventually supplanted her older sibling, and this sense of insecurity is reflected in the accusations against her rival.

Philosophy and Theology Based on the Philosopher Réne Girard: A Reflection

This study aims to examine in a simple way when talking about Réne Girard's mimetic desire to be connected with narratives of sacrifice that are synonymous with violence, especially—besides speaking in other scientific disciplines—theology in the narratives of the Judeo-Christian scripture tradition. This research uses qualitative research methods with literature study. Literature study by looking at the interplay of philosophy and theology through the lens of Réne Girard. The results of the research show that there is a rationalization/perpetuation of violence through narration to practice, both within the state, the church and in the holy texts themselves. Through the light of the mimetic desire in the narrative of Yusuf and his brothers and the narrative of King Solomon and his two wives who claim children born from their respective wombs, it shows that 2 of the many texts which are patterned on characterizing violence are identical to these praxis-narratives.

Virtual influencers’ attractiveness effect on purchase intention: A moderated mediation model of the Product–Endorser fit with the brand

The fourth industrial revolution has fundamentally altered the way we live, and social media has become a crucial channel for the promotion of brands through influencers. This study explored the relationship between a virtual influencer's attractiveness and a consumer's purchase intention, the mediating effect of mimetic desire and brand attachment, as well as the moderating effect of the product–endorser fit with the brand. An online survey of 364 female Instagram users was developed using confirmatory factor analysis and PROCESS macro models 4 and 59. The findings revealed that virtual influencers' attractiveness was not directly associated with purchase intention; however, mimetic desire and brand attachment mediated this relationship. Additionally, the conditional direct effect of virtual influencers' attractiveness on purchase intention was partially supported while indirect effects via mimetic desire and brand attachment were moderated by the product–endorser fit. This study makes important contributions to source attractiveness model literature through emphasis on the role of virtual influencers in enhancing customers' favorable perceptions toward advertisements, which in turn leads to greater purchase intention. It also suggests managerial implications for marketers, including the finding that a good product–endorser match is a crucial factor in determining the effectiveness of advertisements.

Teori Hasrat Peniruan pada Kegiatan Membaca di Perpustakaan Sekolah Dasar Kabupaten Sidoarjo

Why do elementary school students in Sidoarjo tend to have changeable behavior in terms of reading and borrowing books in the school library? This paper describes the mimetic mechanism of Rene Girard in activities in the library, namely borrowing books and reading with the teacher. Data was collected by reading the 2019-2020 Quarterly Report, especially data on borrowing books from 10 elementary schools for 6 months, selecting 2 photos of reading aloud activities, and interviewing 5 teacher informants. Specifically, in interviews, the 5 informants were included in a joint evaluation meeting with 120 participants first, then were interviewed in depth separately. The three types of data were analyzed based on 4 themes derived from the theory of Mimetic Desire with a mixed approach (mixed method research). Data validation was analyzed by triangulation of data sources and triangulation of methods. The findings in this study provide a thematic description based on Rene Girard's Mimetic Desire theory that elementary school students in Sidoarjo tend to have behavior that changes according to the mimetic mechanism in reading and borrowing books in the library.

By virtue of deep desiring: the character Flora, from the novel Esau and Jacob by Machado de Assis, in the light of mimetic desire

Resumo Em estudo sobre as metáforas machadianas, Dirce Côrtes Riedel (1979) identifica, no capítulo LXXXIII de Esaú e Jacó, a presença de nove grandes paradoxos estruturantes do modo como é narrada a situação vivida por Flora, no decorrer de uma noite de insônia, em que sofre a angústia da cisão interna de seu desejo oscilante entre os irmãos Paulo e Pedro. Este trabalho parte da premissa de que a personagem corresponde à personificação do desejo e que o paradoxo funciona, na literatura e na poesia, como um eficiente recurso de figuração desse impulso humano. Pretendemos mostrar de que maneira o dilema da “inexplicável” Flora diz respeito ao próprio modo de ser e à própria dinâmica de funcionamento do desejo. Para alcançarmos esse objetivo utilizaremos a teoria do desejo mimético, tal como a desenvolveu René Girard em seus principais livros, Mentira romântica e verdade romanesca e Coisas ocultas desde a fundação do mundo.

Mimetic Desire and the Discipline of Marketing: Implications for Marketing Practitioners

Much of the research on business from a Christian perspective can be equated to attempting to justify business practices instead of truly examining them within the context of biblical thought. This paper examines the discipline of marketing and its key construct of desire in relationship to Scripture. In doing so, several potentially troubling questions are raised.

Martin Amis’in “Muhammad Atta’nın Son Günleri” Adlı Eserinde Mimetik Arzu ve Günah Keçisi Mekanizmaları

René Girard, the French sacrifice theory doyen, bases her sacrifice and scapegoat arguments on cultural and literary representations and claims an end for the sacrificial rites and scapegoating mechanism in cultures and narratives after the exposition and deciphering of the stereotypes of persecution with Christianity. However, by referring to René Girard’s sacrifice theory, this study aims to argue that one of the greatest yet also most notorious writers of English fiction, Martin Amis, who recurrently touches upon such issues in his texts as racism, sexism, wars, capitalism, and terrorism, implies a modern enactment of the mechanism of mimetic desire and scapegoating in a literary work, that is “The Last Days of Muhammad Atta,” which revolves around the last days of one of the terrorists of 9/11. Amis’s short fiction will be subjected to a close reading so as to argue that despite Amis’s interviews and arguments associating terrorism with Islam and the Orient, the text deconstructs Amis’s allegations against Islamism and the Oriental, and when Amis’s text is considered as a modern and multi-layered representation of mechanisms of mimetic desire and scapegoating, the violence and terrorism are revealed to be issues which cannot solely be identified with a single milieu or a group nonchalantly. Instead, it will be clearly seen that the core drive for humans has always been the will to power and to ensure authority over the other throughout the centuries, whether it be primitive tribes, or civilized groups, or modern governments and nations, and such concentrations as a nation, community, or religion further worked to give their civilized members a cause to satisfy the primitive tendency to violence and carnage surviving in their repressed collective unconscious.

Mimetic desire, competition between father and son and traumatic experience in Ivan Turgenev’s novella “First Love”

Ivan Turgenev’s novella “First Love” in the light of the Oedipus conflict is studied. But it’s done not according to S. Freud’s conception, in which erotic desire is the starting point and crucial aspect of the conflict between father and son. Rather, it interprets the way it is understood by Freud’s heirs S. Ferenczi and J.M. Masson, and even more in the light of R. Girard’s culturology. Thus, what is crucial for the author is the competitive conflict in itself, which only in a second step leads to father and son desiring the same woman. Nevertheless, some symbols that might play a role in Freud’s psychoanalytic observations are impor- tant for as well. Among these symbols are the jacket fit for children which his mother forces Vladimir to wear in Zinaida’s presence, Vladimir’s hair torn out by Zinaida, the knife with which Vladimir wanted to kill his rival but which he drops, the fact that Vladimir’s father rides on horseback better than Vladimir, and the whip with which the father beats Zinaida. To our point of view, the starting point of the plot is that Vladimir’s parents do not care for him. This is a trauma for the young man and the origin of an erotic rivalry for his father. When Vladimir discovers that Zinaida is his father’s lover and, even more, that they are unhappy in their relationship, this becomes a profound trauma for the young man, one could even say, it symbolically castrates him. Later on, he is not able to love or to overcome circumstances in order to reach his aims. He rather somehow goes on instead of living. For example, he does not marry.

Диалектика антагонизма: критика философии Г. В. Ф. Гегеля в миметической концепции Р. Жирара

Introduction. In this article, the author examines the mimetic concept of R. Girard in the context of the correspondence polemic with the philosophy of Hegel, in the interpretation of A. Kojeve. Theoretical analysis. As part of the historical and philosophical research, the author identifies the similarities and differences between these concepts, discovers the reception and influence of Hegel’s philosophy on Girard’s mimetic concept. The conceptual apparatus of the mimetic concept is analyzed: mimesis, mimetic desire, indifference, sacrifice, and similarities between these notions and the concepts in Hegel’s philosophy are revealed. Particular attention is paid to Girard’s critical view of Hegelian thought: the dialectic of antagonism, and the concept of the “end of history”. The author conducts a comparative analysis of these philosophical concepts, focusing on the problem of desire in Hegel and Girard, as well as on the phenomenon of sacrifice. A separate research interest is the influence on the views of Girard by the authors who were influenced by A. Kojeve such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Roger Caillois, and Georges Bataille. Conclusion. Despite Girard’s attempt to distance himself from Hegel’s philosophy, Hegel’s influence is revealed, in the interpretation of A. Kojeve, on some of Girard’s key concepts: the problem of desire, the antagonistic nature of human existence, and sacrifice as an anthropological principle.