Ideology Critique

This inaugural lecture outlines the contours of a history of critical thinking. Drawing on case studies from the 19th, 20th, and 21st-century humanities, it draws attention to demands that critical thinking makes on the self – that is, to skills, virtues, attitudes, and capacities characteristic of what one might call a “critical self.” On the one hand, the cultivation of such qualities in research and teaching alike is a theme that allows for cross-disciplinary comparisons of the kind that historians of the humanities like to make. On the other, it touches directly on questions of contemporary relevance. What does it mean to foster critical thinking skills in contemporary academia? Is critical thinking compatible with care and compassion, or does it cultivate a stance of detachment, perhaps even of suspicion? Is critical thinking a much-needed remedy against fake news, or are societies struggling with political polarization and diminishing trust in public institutions likely to benefit more from a “postcritical turn”?

2017 marks the centenary of an artwork judged to be the single most influential of the twentieth century: Marcel Duchamp’s famous “readymade” entitled Fountain. The final verdict on Fountain has been widely accepted, despite the fact that the circumstances surrounding “Mr. Richard Mutt” have never resembled an open-and-shut case. On the contrary, since Fountain’s appearance in 1917, when it was rejected as “a plain piece of plumbing” only to be subsequently celebrated as a work of conceptual art, numerous questions remain unanswered, several facts remain unexplained.
Now, one hundred years later, Robert Kilroy attempts to answer these questions by examining the evidence with fresh eyes. Central to the investigation is the primary witness – Duchamp himself – whose statements are forensically analyzed. The facts themselves are interrogated using the methodology of a detective: precisely speaking, an art historical approach with a critical edge sharpened by a new interpretation of psychoanalytic theory.
In weaving an alternative narrative, Kilroy shows us that, not only has Fountain been fundamentally misunderstood, this very misunderstanding is central to the work’s significance. The final verdict, he argues, was strategically stage-managed by Duchamp in order to expose the apparatus underpinning Fountain’s reception, what he terms “The Creative Act.” By suggesting that a specific aesthetic “crime” has gone unnoticed, Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain: One Hundred Years Later asks the reader to radically reassess his/her precise contribution to “the creation of art.” This urgent, if somewhat troubling question, could have far-reaching implications for the field of scholarship, the course of contemporary art and the discipline of Art history.

This paper tries to explore the anarchistic traits of the Joker, the DC Comics supervillain, through the lens of Louis Althusser's influential essay "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses," with special references to two movies, "The Dark Knight" (2008) and "Joker" (2019).

В статье на примере исследовательской практики британской школы “исследований культуры” (cultural studies) исследуются возможности применения (нео)марксистского понятия идеологии в области изучения масс-медиа и популярной культуры (popular culture). Автор рассматривает «исследования культуры» 1970-1980-х годов с точки зрения их вклада в развитие (нео)марксистской проблематики идеологии. Указанная проблематика задавала рамку для конкретных исследований масс-медиа и популярной культуры, отличающихся, в свою очередь, высоким уровнем теоретической рефлексии.
Как показано в статье, наиболее ценные результаты в указанных областях были достигнуты за счет синтеза марксистского понятия идеологии в трактовке Л.Альтюссера,  концепции гегемонии А.Грамши и (пост)структуралистской семиотики и теории дискурса. В статье проводится мысль о том, что отход более поздних «исследований культуры» от (нео)марксистской проблематики идеологии оставляет незавершенным проект критического исследования сложного взаимодействия культурных практик и структур классового доминирования в современном обществе.

This chapter seeks to decolonize critical theory by exploring the limits of the concepts of crisis and critique, and showing the theoretical relevance of the concept of catastrophe. Catastrophe (literally a “down-turn”) calls, not for critique, but for a counter-turn, which, in our modern/colonial world, cannot be but a decolonial turn. Hurricane María and its devastating effects in Puerto Rico was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg, helping to unveil catastrophe and its role in the making of Puerto Rico and the Caribbean.

This paper argues that the poetics of Ezra Pound and H.D. form the vanishing mediator for the post-1970's literary interpretation of Sappho within Anglo-American classics. It thereby inverts Hugh Kenner's canonical interpretation of the presence of Sappho in Pound's work of the 1910's to argue that "fragmentation," as an aesthetic in provocative excess of the philological record, is not classical in any sense but rather a modernist ideology of form.

The subject today seems decentered in and by language, split by the unconscious, deformed by social forces, governed by ideology, and is either seen to have succumbed to the postmodern condition or to never have existed in the first place. Neither idealist philosophies nor new materialist approaches have adequately addressed the relation between subject and materiality.
Every materialist theory of the subject depends on a conception of materiality, which can delineate the character of what the material reality that the subject is constituted in consists of. This book offers readings of the approaches of Marxism, (post-)structuralism, and material semiotics and explores the relations between materiality and the subject in each approach.

In the Emmy Award-winning reality television series Undercover Boss, now in its sixth season in the United States, the heads of corporations don disguises to infiltrate their companies and observe how they operate. The plot structure and characterization recast the persona of the distant, greedy CEO as a vulnerable, caring dispenser of just rewards to deserving employees.

Patrick McGee uses the Lacanian model of the Unconscious to show how Ulysses baffles and defeats certain axioms of traditional literary criticism, such as the assumption that the meaning of an author's fiction can be reduced to his conscious beliefs and intentions.  Described by Shari Benstock as "the first feminist reading of Ulysses," Paperspace goes further than any other book to date [1988] in the application of postmodern critical theory to a close reading of the novel.

This book explores the relationship between truth and freedom in the free press. It argues that the relationship is problematic because the free press implies a competition between plural ideas, whereas truth is univocal. Based on this tension the book claims that the idea of a free press is premised on an epistemological illusion. This illusion enables society to maintain that the world it perceives through the press corresponds to the world as it actually exists, explaining why defenders of the free press continue to rely on its capacity to discover the truth, despite economic conditions and technological innovations undermining much of its independence. The book invites the reader to reconsider the philosophical foundations, constitutional justifications, and structure and functions of the free press, and whether the institution can, in fact, realise both freedom and truth. It will be of great interest to anyone concerned in the role and value of the free press in the modern world.

This is a final draft of the article published in Environmental Ethics 11 (Fall 1989): 243-258. This assessment of  the Promethean dimension of Marx's thought is accurate, but though it mentions Marx's more dialectical side and its potential implications, this aspect is seriously neglected in the article . A more balanced assessment is presented in "Marx's Natures," a draft version of which can be found on this site. This article should be read in connection with the latter one.

pagine 176 8 massari massari « M a q u es ti in co n v en ie n ti so n o in ev it ab ili n el la p ri m a fa se d el la so ci et à co m u n ist a, q u al e es sa è u sc it a d o p o lu n g h e d o g li e d al la so ci et à ca p it al is ti ca . Il d ir it to n o n p u ò es se re m ai su p er io re al la co n fi g u ra zi o n e ec o n o m ic a e al lo sv il u p p o cu lt u ra le -d a es sa co n d iz io n at o -d el la so ci et à. In u n a fa se p iù av an za ta d el la so ci et à com u n is ta , d o p o ch e è sc o m p ar sa la su b o rd in az io n e se rv il e d eg li in d iv id u i al la d iv isi o n e d el la v o ro , e q u in d i an ch e il co n tr ast o d i la v o ro in te ll et tu al e e la v o ro fi si co ; d o p o ch e il la v o ro n o n è d iv en u to so lt an to m ez zo d i v it a, m a an ch e il p ri m o b is o g n o d el la v it a; d o p o ch e co n lo sv il u p p o o n n ila te ra le d eg li in d iv id u i so n o cr es ci u te anch e le lo ro fo rz e p ro d u tt iv e e tu tt e le so rg en ti d el la ri cc h ez za so ci al e sc o rro n o in tu tt a la lo ro p ie n ez za -so lo al lo ra l' an g u st o o ri zz o n te g iu ri d ic o b o rg h es e p u ò es se re su p er at o , e la so ci et à p u ò sc ri v er e su ll e su e b an d ie re : « C ia sc u n o se co n d o le su e ca p ac it à, a ci as cu n o seco n d o i su o i b is o g n i! » . K . M a rx , d a ll a C ri ti ca a l P ro g ra m m a d i G o th a 9 7 8 88 4 5 7 0 23 8 9 ISBN 978-88-457-0238-9 K a rl M a rx C r i t i c a a l P r o g r a m m a d i G o t h a ( K r i t i k d e s G o t h a e r P r o g r a m m s ) N uo va tr ad uz io ne co n te st o or ig in al e a fr on te a cu ra d i G io va n n i S gr ò in tr od uz io ne d i R ob er to M as sa ri co n un sa gg io d i A u gu st o Il lu m in at i in ap pe nd ic e T u tt e le le tt er e d i E n g el s su ll a « C ri ti ca al P ro g ra m m a d i G o th a» eretici e/o sovversivi .17

"Megaleh Temirin (Revealer of Secrets), ed. Jonatan Meir, Three volumes, Mosad Bialik, Jerusalem

Megaleh Temirin (Revealer of Secrets), first published in Vienna in 1819, is one of the sharpest and wittiest pieces of Jewish literature written in the first half of the nineteenth century, and is perhaps the most important piece of Hebrew prose composed before the stories of Mendele Mocher Seforim. A sly and complex story deriding Hasidism and Hasidim, it is told through the correspondence between the beadles of Hasidic courts and contemporary rabbis, and it presents a dark picture of  avaricious frauds and swindlers whose main concern was control over territory and the souls of believers, a goal achieved by beguiling the authorities and attacking all opponents. Perl lends his book a ‘Hasidic’ feel both in its physical design and in its language, presenting a Maskilic version of In Praise of the Ba’al Shem Tov that lays Hasidism bare so that no reader will ever be able to look at that, or any other Hasidic book, in the same way again. In addition to the book’s satiric sting, which would have been enough to bring its readers a dual pleasure, Perl’s hints at contemporary people and places, hidden within anagrams and numerological tricks. With the unraveling of these clues, which also include the use of actual Hasidic sources, the book is a valuable, contemporary view of historical reality. A meticulous reading of the book may therefore open a window on the hidden worlds of Hasidism and the Haskalah at the start of the nineteenth century.


The first volume (Imagined Hasidism) serves as an introduction to the complex satirical writings of Josef Perl of Tarnopol (1773-1839). At the center of the book stands an analysis of the satires, Megaleh Temirin (1819) and Bochen Tzadik (1838), including a systematic treatment of the ‘characters’ in the central works and a discussion of the dozens of manuscripts to be found in the Perl Archive in Jerusalem. Perl’s writings are analyzed here in the fuller context of Hebrew and Yiddish literature in general and Maskilic and Hasidic literature in particular, as well as other polemical writings and governmental records critical of Hasidism. The study thus presents a complex and nuanced picture of the relationship between literature and history, between the anti-Hasidic reports and the more complicated historical reality, and lays the groundwork for further research into the genre of nineteenth-century Maskilic satire.

The second and third volumes (Megaleh Temirin) present for the first time an annotated edition of Megaleh Temirin. It is based on the first edition and the scattered manuscripts and it includes a comparison to its Yiddish translation. The book is accompanied by appendices on its origins and contents, including fundamental treatments of several passages: an explication of the encoded names, the Hasidic sources used by the author, and the variants found in the manuscripts and in the only edition of the book in Yiddish.

The editor of the book, Professor Jonatan Meir, teaches in the Goldstein-Goren Department of Jewish Thought at Ben-Gurion University. He has published several articles on the Haskalah of Eastern Europe, Hasidism, and a number of varied topics in twentieth-century Kabbalah.


Contents

Volume 1  - Critical Edition

Concerning this edition
Key personalities
Sefer Megale Temirin – Critical Edition


Volume 2 - Appendixes:
1. Glossary, Abbreviations, Acronyms
2. Explanation of the Speaking Names
3. Perl’s Hasidic Sources
4. Manuscripts of Sefer Megale Temirin
5. Yiddish Introduction to Sefer Megale Temirin
Bibliographic Abbreviations

-------------------------------
Reviews:
(1) Dan Meron, 2013, ‘Megaleh Temirin’, Kivunim Hadashim 29, 55 pages (Hebrew)
(2) David Assaf, 2014, ‘Hasidim will not Read it but Tear it’, Haaretz, Tarbut ve-Sifrut, p .6 (Hebrew) http://onegshabbat.blogspot.co.il/2014/04/blog-post_18.html
(3) Eliezer Brodt, 2014, 'New book Announcement- Megale Temirin', The Seforim Blog http://seforim.blogspot.co.il/2014/01/new-book-announcement-megale-temirin.html
(4) Matan Hermoni, 2014,  הסבתא המופקרת של הספרות העבריתHaaretz, Sfarim (Hebrew) http://www.haaretz.co.il/.premium-1.2382365
(5) Shinichi Yamamoto, 2015, 山本　伸一, "ヨナタン・メイール編著『想像のハシディズム』", ユダヤ・イスラエル研究　第28号  http://www.waseda.jp/assoc-jsjs/jistudies.html
(6) David Biale and David Assaf,, 2015, 'Revealer Revealed', Jewish Review of Books, pp. 17-21  http://jewishreviewofbooks.com/articles/1454/revealer-revealed/
(7) Hillel Halkin, 2015, "Sex, Magic, Bigotry, Corruption- and the First Hebrew Novel', Mosaic Magazine,  http://mosaicmagazine.com/observation/2015/05/sex-magic-bigotry-corruption-and-the-first-hebrew-novel/
(8) Tomer Persico, 2015, "Interview", Lula'at haEl Blog, http://tomerpersico.com/2015/08/10/meir_perl/

This paper develops political hinge epistemology, an approach to political epistemology which takes as its starting point that every political belief system has certain fundamental moral and political presuppositions which must be in place for rational political evaluation to occur. In particular, political hinge epistemology is employed to augment ideology critique and further understand the role of political identity in polarization.

The positive and constructive paradigms have typically been popular among researchers as two main approaches to scientifically investigate issues of life and social sciences. Particularly novice researchers unconsciously tend to fit their studies in one of the framework set up by either of these approaches. This paper develops arguments in the perspective of paradigmatic issues in research to highlight the comparatively young paradigm of critical theory which has not yet gained due projection. The discussion informs on how critical approach to research may gain equally, or even more, valuable insight not only by analyzing and exploring the situation but also by offering a change agenda for reformation. The paper also appraises one of the critical research tools, critical discourse analysis in depth, to elaborate the philosophical and theoretical basis of this research methodology in order to enhance awareness among novice researchers investigating under the umbrella of critical paradigm.

The positive and constructive paradigms have typically been popular among researchers as two main approaches to scientifically investigate issues of life and social sciences. Particularly novice researchers unconsciously tend to fit their studies in one of the framework set up by either of these approaches. This paper develops arguments in the perspective of paradigmatic issues in research to highlight the comparatively young paradigm of critical theory which has not yet gained due projection. The discussion informs on how critical approach to research may gain equally, or even more, valuable insight not only by analyzing and exploring the situation but also by offering a change agenda for reformation. The paper also appraises one of the critical research tools, critical discourse analysis in depth, to elaborate the philosophical and theoretical basis of this research methodology in order to enhance awareness among novice researchers investigating under the umbrella of critical para...

The link here is to chapters from the second edition of the book. The third, final, edition is available on Amazon.

The book contains a history of critiques; different forms of critiques worldwide; analyses of transcribed critiques; a chapter on the differences between critique, criticism Kritik, and criticality; theories about criticism that might be pertinent to critiques; conceptual models for critiques (that they are like seductions, like legal cases, etc.); lists of words and judgments heard in critiques; ideas for new kinds of critiques, etc. I think it's the only book of its kind.

Throughout the nineteenth century, Maskilic journals increased their publication of anti-Hasidic satires. From the eighteen-sixties onward, this literature came primarily as a response to the revival in the publishing of Hasidic hagiography and to the spread of Hasidism into new territory. To this point, no complete review or even general survey has been performed on this extensive polemical literature, despite the fact that it has much to teach us about Hasidism and the Haskalah in those years. We are not speaking of an insignificant bibliographical lacuna, but of a disregard for an entire field of research which would shed light not only on a forgotten chapter of modern Hebrew and Yiddish literature but also on an important chapter in the relationships between Maskilim and Hasidim in that period and the genesis and development of the different streams of Hasidism. This Maskilic literature intended to do more than eradicate Hasidism; it aimed to strengthen the self-consciousness of the individual Maskilim who found themselves alone in Hasidic territory. Paradoxically, the literature documented the very movement it intended to eradicate from the world. The distorted reflection displayed in the anti-Hasidic literature does more than present a caricature of its subject -- it conceals hitherto unknown elements about the nature and development of the Hasidic movement. The present article deals with one such case, a satire on Bratslav Hasidism from 1863, which has at its core a Maskilic satirical text written by Yehiel Meller on pilgrimage to the grave of R. Nahman of Bratslav in Uman.





כתבי עת של משכילים לאורך המאה התשע עשרה הרבו לפרסם סאטירות בגנותה של החסידות. משנות הששים ואילך באה ספרות זו בעיקר כתגובה להתעוררות הדפסת ספרות השבחים החסידית ולהתפשטות החסידות במרחבים חדשים. לא קיימת עד עתה סקירה שלימה, ואף לא מיפוי כללי, של אותה ספרות פולמוסית ענפה, על אף שיש בה ללמד הרבה על דרכי החסידות וההשכלה באותן שנים.  לא מדובר רק בחסרון ביבליוגרפי שאין לו משמעות, אלא בהתעלמות משדה מחקר רב עניין שעשוי להאיר לא רק על פרק נשכח בספרות עברית ויידיש החדשה אלא גם על פרק חשוב ביחסים בין משכילים לחסידים באותה תקופה, ועל דרכי צמיחתם, פיצולם והתפתחותם של זרמים שונים בחסידות. הייתה זו ספרות שיותר מאשר נועדה לבער את החסידות נועדה לחזק את תודעתם העצמית של המשכילים הבודדים במרחבים החסידיים; ספרות שבאופן פרדוקסלי תיעדה תנועה אותה חפצו לבער מן העולם. הבבואה המעוותת בה התהדרה הסאטירה האנטי חסידית לא רק הציגה דימוי – אלא טומנת בחובה הצבעה על אלמנטים חדשים ועל התפתחויות בחסידות. במקרה אחד ממין זה הנוגע לחסידות ברסלב בשנות השישים של המאה התשע עשרה עוסק המאמר. שלפנינו - שעיקרו מהדורה של טקסט משכילי שכתב יחיאל מלר - בשנת 1863 - על העלייה לקבר ר' נחמן מברסלב באומן
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The aim of this article is to reinterpret the style and rhetoric of Mati Unt’s proseworks from the point of view of critique of various so-called everyday myths (“everyday mythology” also being the term title of Unt’s late essay-collections). The critical praise in Unt’s reception has revolved mostly around his unique ability to depict the most modern cultural trends, catchphrases and phenomena of his time. This talent of Unt has been explained by the author’s deep interest in myths and Jungian psychoanalysis. I propose, however, that the key author to understand the specific equilibrium of realism and estrangement so characteristic of Unt’s works, is Roland Barthes and his early book “Mythologies” (1957). Barthes’ contemporary Frenchconsumer-society was saturated with mythical tropes, which he proceeded to deconstruct using the critical methods of semiotics. Barthes saw the stereotypes of his
contemporary television and commercial world as sedating and affirming the status quo. Cultural clichés of various kinds were also crucial raw material for Unt’s novels and short stories. He incorporated these materials into his works rather organically, thus achieving realistic effects, but often also overemphasised these tropes, coming
close to estranging the reader. I attempt to show, through close-reading of two Unt’s short novellas from his middle period – “And if we are not dead, we shall be living on” (1973) and “Talking” (1984) – how Unt constructed a realistic story-world, using various modern stereotypes, and later rewrote these stories. The article ends with a discussion of how my analysis may contribute to the debate about Unt’s ambivalent
place between modernism and postmodernism in Estonian literature.

In this introductory essay, we interrogate the relationship between Critical Discourse Studies (CDS) and communication studies, ultimately arguing for a firmer cross-fertilization between the two. We start by tracing the events that led to this special issue as a way to document the relatively brief, scattered, but at the same time promising trajectories of CDS within communication scholarship. We then take a step back and outside of the discipline to locate different precursors, practitioners, and outlets that contributed to shaping a unique approach to sociodiscursive phenomena first labeled as Critical Discourse Analysis. Next, we identify the more recent, broadening turn toward CDS, and its implications in terms of theories, methods, and objects of study. Drawing on scholarship in communication studies and related disciplines, as well as on the contributions to this special issue, we end by reviewing different challenges and possibilities for the traversing trajectories of CDS and communication studies.

VIDEOLOGY is part 1 of a critique of "realism" in film, visual art & literature. From Nam June Paik’s experimental TV to the subversive cinema of Alejandro Jodorowsky, Miike Takashi & Leos Carax; from Naked Lunch to the Cyberfeminist Manifesto; from film noir to the “murder of the Real.” Addresses the work of David Lynch, Marc Atkins, Christian Louboutin; Philippe Sollers, Anthony Braxton, Robert Smithson; Lettrism; Blade Runner; David Cronenberg, Terry Gilliam; John Waters, Derek Jarman, Peter Greenaway, Ken Russell; Billy Wilder, John Huston, Howard Hawks; Jean-Luc Godard; Dusan Makavejev; Robert Coover, Hunter S. Thompson; William Gibson, Stelarc, Nina Sellars, Shu Lea Cheang, Linda Dement, Megumi Igarashi.

The world tends to be more cooperate than conflict since after the Cold War was over. Despite the facts, do we really live in a "liberal world" as many IR scholars suggest? Well, the answer has come into the debate due to the fact that many other scholars from different theories state that the world is just the state actor: the act of cooperation with the core of selfinterest among each and every individual state. There come major criticisms of liberalism in case of reality and practical belief. Studies suggest that liberalism seem perfect in theory but nonsense in reality of practice.

Students' engagement with fictions in the form of "word problems" plays an important role in classroom practice as well as in theories of mathematical learning. Drawing on the Dutch historian Johan Huizinga and the Austrian philosopher Robert Pfaller, I show that this activity can be seen as a form of play or game, where it is pretended that mathematics is useful in real life in a way that it is not. With Pfaller, I argue that play can take hold of the imagination of the players, infusing everyday life with meaning borrowed from the imagery of the play and that these effects are more powerful when the play is forced and takes an institutionalized form. I show that mathematics education does in fact have these characteristics, including sophisticated mechanisms for translating in-game performance (test scores) to real-life goods (grades and examinations). A central theme of the article is the perceived discrepancy between mathematics education as it is, and how it supposedly could and should be in light of the properties of mathematics. The analysis implies that this gap actually is an effect of play and thus an inherent property of mathematics education itself.

It's very striking to juxtapose Buddhism and Stirner on the topic of "individual thought," since Buddhist philosophy teaches the doctrine of anatman or anatta, which means "no-self," while Stirner, on the other hand, puts the self, which he refers to as "I," the "unique" or the "ego," as the center of everything. Some Stirnerites object to a focus on the concepts of "ego" and "egoism" in Stirner. Yet, there are over three-hundred instances of der Egoist, egoistisch, der Egoismus, etc. in Stirner's major work. So let's let Stirner be Stirner. We end up with the stark and diametrical opposition: no-self vs. egocentrism.

Gesellschaft erwachsen (vgl. Ellul 1964: 170). Heute, über 60 Jahre später, in Zeiten von BigData ist das, was damals noch den Charakter theoretischer Spekulation hatte, Realität und Gegenstand der allgemeinen soziologischen Debatte (vgl. Apprich 2017: 55). Dabei nimmt Ellul nicht nur wesentliche Erkenntnisse vorweg, sondern ist in zahlreichen Aspekten auch heute noch relevant, fruchtbar und damit anschlussfähig an die aktuelle technikethische und techniksoziologische Debatte. Die Interpretation Elluls als einen idealtypischen Vertreter eines Technikdeterminismus, worunter man Vertreter solcher Theorien versteht, die von Technik und Sozialem als getrennten ontologischen Kategorien ausgehen, die der Technik -als eigenständiger ontologischer Kategorie -bestimmte intrinsische Gesetzmäßigkeiten, das heißt eine Eigenlogik zuschreiben, welche als aktiver Motor gesellschaftlichen Wandels fungiert, bestimmt bis heute die soziologische Rezeption seines Werks (vgl. Passoth 2008: 126). Diese Vorwürfe veranlassten Ellul bereits 1964, im Vorwort zur überarbeiteten Ausgabe der amerikanischen Edition, zu einer Stellungnahme, in der er explizit auf die gegen ihn geäußerte Kritik eingeht und Missverständnisse klarstellt (vgl. Ellul 1964: xxvii-xxxvi). Die Tatsache, dass Ellul den Einwand, er verträte einen Technikdeterminismus, vehement zurückweist, hat jedoch seine Kritiker seit jeher nicht davon abgehalten, ihn als idealtypischen Vertreter eines solchen zu behandeln. Die Kritik, welche gegen ihn angeführt wurde und wird, ist daher in den meisten Fällen eine solche, die sich gegen das widmet, was man als Technikdeterminismus definiert hat. In der Form wie der Technikdeterminismus definiert wird, als Erklärungsmuster, welchem axiomatisch die Unterscheidung zwischen Technik und Sozialem als eigenständigen ontologischen Kategorien sowie das Postulat einer intrinsischen Eigenlogik der Technik als Motor gesellschaftlichen Wandels zugrunde liegt (vgl. Passoth 2008: 50f.), gilt als widerlegt. Neuere, empirisch ausgerichtete, sozialkonstruktivistische Ansätze untersuchen den sozialen Konstruktionsprozess, in dessen kontingenten Verlauf sich ein bestimmter Interpretationskonsens herausdestilliert, wobei unterschiedlichste Faktoren neben rein technischen Kriterien eine Rolle spielen. Allerdings -und dies ist die These dieser Arbeit -ist die Einordnung Elluls als Vertreter eines Technikdeterminismus nicht haltbar. -Dafür spricht nicht nur die Tatasche, dass Ellul selber, wie bereits erwähnt, technikdeterministische Vorwürfe zurückweist. Forschungsfrage dieser Arbeit ist daher: Ist die Einordnung der Soziologie Elluls, wie sie von ihm in seinem Werk The Technological Society ausgearbeitet wurde, in die Kategorie des Technikdeterminismus haltbar? Sollte sich herausstellen, dass diese Frage negativ beantwortet werden muss, so eröffnet dies die Möglichkeit einer Reinterpretation Elluls und einer erneuten,

This essay reflects on the current social crisis by arguing that panic has become an object of mass consumption. By forcing us to consume panic, capitalist ideology facilitates the acceleration of the economy's main drivers while strengthening its authoritarian grip over the terrified masses. Our "health emergency" is therefore discussed as a historical event that has little to do with the nature of the virus, and everything to do with the nature of capitalism.

В диссертации  предложен анализ концепций идеологии Грамши и Альтюссера в широком контексте развития марксистской теоретической традиции; прослежена эволюция (пост)альтюссерианской теории идеологии (1970-1990-е гг.), сопряженная с “поворотом к Грамши” в современной марксистской мысли (Э.Балибар, М.Пеше, Ж.Рансье, Н.Пуланзас, П.Херст, Г.Терборн, Т.Иглтон, С.Холл и британские культуральные исследования, Э.Лакло, Ш.Муфф, С.Жижек и ряд других авторов). Показано значение и актуальность концепций Грамши и Альтюссера для анализа взаимосвязей дискурсивных практик, субъективности и социальных отношений доминирования – междисциплинарной проблемной области, являющейся ключевой для современных направлений критической социальной мысли.