PHIL41810

Our Module will address the inception and the development, the confrontations as well as the similitudes, both the historical sources and the philosophical orientations, between three fundamental "gestures" in contemporary European philosophy: "critical theory" in Adorno and Horkheimer, the "kritische Abbau" or "destructio" of onto-theology or metaphysics in Heidegger and the "deconstruction" of the metaphysics of presence in Derrida. Our first task will therefore involve a genealogical contextualisation of these three "gestures" in order to analyse and interpret why, how, and in which manner - that is, according to which disposition and in view of which heading - each of these, in retrieving our philosophical tradition, engage in opening novel spaces and directions for what Hegel termed "the need for philosophy".
Consequently, we will engage in showing how each of these philosophical "gestures" propose new reformulations of the traditional philosophical questions of meaning and signification, telos and arché, judgment and testimony, truth and justice in history.
From the study of these three "gestures", our Module will also endeavour in presenting the premises towards a renewed approach to historical events, past and future, in our lived-present.