ICLS Rethinking the Human Sciences

http://mp3cut.net In the late 19th century in northern Spain and southern France, prehistoric mural paintings and engravings were discovered. This talk inquires into some of the epistemic questions that this rich and much debated material has created. Focusing on the historical and scientific circumstances and on the epistemic and perceptual problems surrounding the discovery of the Altamira cave, Rosengren traces the outline of the doxa of cave art studies and suggests, with the help of both Cornelius Castoriadis's concept of technique and Ernst Cassirer's notion of symbolic form, a yet untried way out of the hermeneutical impasse where the interpretation of the Paleolithic pictures finds itself today.

Recorded March 11, 2013 at the Heyman Center for the Humanities. As part of the series Rethinking the Human Sciences, the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society presents: The Harvest of Old Times: Mimesis, Sovereignty, and The Poetics of Relation --A talk by INTERACT Postdoctoral Fellow Michael R. Griffiths. Much has been made in postcolonial criticism of the question of writing in the language of the colonizer. This logic, Souleymane Bachir Diagne traces to the “kiss of death” given by Sartre to the Négritude movement at its emergence---a totalizing embrace that lay heavy over the efforts of Leopold Sédar Senghor and Aimé Césaire in their attempts to redefine the poetics and philosophy of this movement in the long history that followed. The question which animates the genealogy traced in this essay begins is as follows: how might Édouard Glissant’s poetics of relation lead us to reevaluate the problem of writing in the language of the colonizer? How might Glissant further lead us to reimagine poetic novelty in relation to both the poetics of relation in Caribbean/Antillean poets and in the founding assumptions of European modernism? Passing through and politicizing the genealogy of mimesis, poetic novelty, and political sovereignty from Kant to Bataille, via T. S. Eliot, and Carl Schmitt, this lecture emphasizes the import of Glissant in reevaluating the logic of tradition, decision, and individual talent for a globalizing era. The Rethinking the Human Sciences seminar series is made possible with the support of the Heyman Center for the Humanities.

Recorded February 15, 2013 at Columbia University. As part of the Rethinking the Human Sciences lecture series, Kriss Ravetto (Associate Professor of Technocultural Studies, in the Program in Technocultural Studies at the University of California - Davis) wants to show that the hacker collective Anonymous is doing something much more interesting and political important than practicing and celebrating anonymity. It is, she argues, upsetting dichotomies that are fundamental to traditional political thought and practice, like identification and anonymity, liberation and control, dissent and accountability, privacy and piracy.

The presentation will explore three of the tenants of Greek patristic political theory: the distinction between ecclesiastical economy and imperial politics; the subjugation of politics in the service of the "economy of the mysteries"; and the bounded self-subjection of the human person to the governing authorities. Dr. Leshem will seek to demonstrate how patristic political theory is originated in Trinitarian theology and Christology, and he will criticize received views on the Christian origins of political and economic theology, such as those implied by Carl Schmitt's political theology and Giorgio Agamben's economic theology.

These are the slides presented at her talk on Dec. 5, 2012 at the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University. There was also a video clip shown. We were unfortunately unable to get a copy of that clip.

Recorded on December 5, 2012 at the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University. As part of the series Rethinking the Human Sciences, the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society presents: After Cardenio: an unnatural moment in the history of Natural Philosophy A talk by Jane Taylor (CEO of Handspring Trust; Visiting Professor, University of Chicago; Centre for Humanities Research, University of the Western Cape) The Rethinking the Human Sciences seminar series is made possible with the support of the Heyman Center for the Humanities. Professor Taylor will work from a Case Study to discuss the intersection of artistic practice, philosophy and medical history, in an examination of early modern forensic theory.

As part of the series Rethinking the Human Sciences, the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society presents Sense in Art and Sense in Nature a talk by Anthony Uhlmann, Writing and Society Research Centre, University of Western Sydney In Stephen Hero, James Joyce’s narrator states that “For Stephen art was neither a copy nor an imitation of nature: the artistic process was a natural process.” Art and Nature have long been paired together: indeed the concept of ‘representation’ seems to presuppose the relationship between artistic practice and objects, forms, or elements that pre-exist in Nature, or human perceptions of Nature. Yet what are the limits of this identification? Do Art and Nature comprise some kind of symmetry, some kind of continuity? Or is it merely a loose analogy? Aspects of these questions might be addressed through paying attention to the concepts of meaning and sense, which is asymmetrical at least when one considers discourse surrounding art on the one hand (for example, in the hermeneutic tradition) and discourses surrounding Nature on the other (in the disciplines of Physics or Biology). While the concept of meaning (involving intention) is necessarily presupposed within artistic production and reception it is seemingly left to one side by scientific method; yet the concept of sense might be more readily applied to both domains. In drawing on examples (from the 1922 controversy between Bergson and Einstein, the concept of ‘distributed cognition’ in cognitive science, and Elizabeth Costello by J. M. Coetzee) this lecture will consider how particular concepts of ‘meaning’ and ‘sense’ derived from Spinoza might be applied to an understanding of the kind of relations that link art and Nature. Recorded October 24, 2012 at the Heyman Center for the Humanities, Columbia University.

Panel Four Chair: Akeel Bilgrami (Philosophy, Columbia University) Steven Shapin (History of Science, Harvard University) "The Science of Subjectivity" James Gleick (author of Chaos and The Information) "The Return of Meaning" Respondent: Marwa Elsharky (History of Science, Columbia University)

Panel Three Chair: Rosalind Morris (Anthropology and ICLS, Columbia University) Roberto Esposito (Philosophy, Italian Institute for the Human Sciences, Naples) "The Return of Italian Philosophy" Hent de Vries (Philosophy and Humanities Center, Johns Hopkins University) "Old and New Archives: Sites for Philosophical Fieldwork" Respondent: Patricia Dailey (English and Comparative Literature)

The Rethinking the Human Sciences Conference, March 30, 2012, at Columbia University Chair: Stathis Gourgouris (Classics, English, and ICLS, Columbia University) Jonathan Metzl (Sociology, Psychiatry, and Medicine, Health, and Society, Vanderbilt University) "Rethinking diagnosis: Race, stigma, and the politics of schizophrenia" Katherine Hayles (Literature, Duke University) "Making, Critique: A New Paradigm for the Humanities" Respondent: Jesus Rodriguez-Velasco (Latin American and Iberian Cultures and ICLS, Columbia University)

Panel 1 of Rethinking the Human Sciences conference, March 30, 2012 at Columbia University. Chair: Anupama Rao (History and ICLS, Columbia University) Srinivas Aravamudan (English, Duke University) "The Problem of Scale: Narrative Universals in the Human Sciences" Rosi Braidotti (Centre for the Humanities, Utrecht University) "What is 'the Human' about the Humanities today?" Respondent: Lydia Liu (East Asian Languages and Cultures and ICLS, Columbia University)

The opening remarks from the Rethinking the Human Sciences conference on March 30, 2012 at Columbia University. Nicholas Dirks - Executive Vice President for Arts and Sciences, Columbia University Stathis Gourgouris - Director, Institute for Comparative Literature and Society

Professor Trivers graduated from Harvard in 1965 with a degree in history and earned a doctorate in biology from Harvard in 1972. He quickly gained an international reputation for applying Darwin's theories in dramatic new ways and is now one of the most influential evolutionary theorists alive today. His books include Genes in Conflict: The Biology of Selfish Genetic Elements (with Austin Burt), Natural Selection and Social Theory: Selected Papers of Robert Trivers, and Social Evolution. Trivers’s theories have inspired innovative research in animal behavior, genetics, anthropology, psychology, and other fields. “I consider Trivers one of the great thinkers in the history of Western thought,” says acclaimed language theorist Steven Pinker. “It would not be too much of an exaggeration to say that he has provided a scientific explanation for the human condition: the intricately complicated and endlessly fascinating relationships that bind us to one another.” In 2007, the Royal Swedish Academy awarded Robert Trivers the Crawford Prize in Biosciences for "his fundamental analysis of social evolution, conflict and cooperation.” Professor Trivers discusses his book The Folly of Fools (Basic Books, 2011) as part of the ICLS Rethinking the Human Sciences workshop series, which is being sponsored by the Heyman Center for the Humanities. About The Folly of Fools: From viruses mimicking host behavior to humans misremembering (sometimes intentionally) the details of a quarrel, science has proven that the deceptive one can always outwit the masses. But to undertake this deception risks peril. Trivers has written an ambitious investigation into the evolutionary logic of lying and the costs of leaving it unchecked.