Penelope Deutscher

Intent on letting the reader experience the pleasure and intellectual stimulation in reading classic authors, the How to Read series will facilitate and enrich your understanding of texts vital to the canon.

How to Read Derrida

'Deconstruction is not neutral. It intervenes' Jacques Derrida An idiosyncratic and highly controversial French philosopher, Jacques Derrida inspired profound changes in disciplines as diverse as law, anthropology, literature and architecture. In Derrida's view, texts and contexts are woven with inconsistencies and blindspots that provide us with a chance to think in new ways about, among other things, language, community, identity and forgiveness. Derrida's suggestions for 'how to read' lead to a new vision of ethics and a new concept of responsibility. Penelope Deutscher discusses extracts from the full range of Derrida's work, including Of Grammatology, Dissemination, Limited Inc, The Other Heading: Reflections on Europe, Monolinguism of the Other, Given Time and Force of Law.

How To Read Derrida

Traditional accounts of the feminist history of philosophy have viewed reason as associated with masculinity and subsequent debates have been framed by this assumption. Yet recent debates in deconstruction have shown that gender has never been a stable matter. In the history of philosophy 'female' and 'woman' are full of ambiguity. What does deconstruction have to offer feminist criticism of the history of philosophy? Yielding Gender explores this question by examining three crucial areas; the issue of gender as 'troubled'; deconstruction; and feminist criticism of the history of philosophy. The first part of the book discusses the work of Judith Butler, Jacques Derrida, and contemporary French feminist philosophy including key figures such as Luce Irigiray. Particular attention is given to the possibilities offered by deconstruction for understanding the history of philosophy. The second part considers and then challenges feminist interpretations of some key figures in the history of philosophy. Penelope Deutscher sketches how Rousseau, St. Augustine and Simone de Beauvoir have described gender and argues that their readings of gender are in fact empowered by gender's own contradiction and instability rather than limited by it.

Feminism, Deconstruction and the History of Philosophy

Yielding Gender

Kelly Oliver

The work of the distinguished philosopher Sarah Kofman has, since her tragic death in 1994, become a focus for many scholars interested in contemporary French philosophy. The first critical collection on her thought to appear in English, Enigmas evaluates Kofman's most important contributions to philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, feminism, and literary theory. These insightful essays range from analyses of Kofman's first book, L'Enfance de l'art (1970), to her last, L'Imposture de la beauté (1995). This unique volume represents the major themes in Kofman's scholarship: literature and aesthetics; philosophy and metaphor; women, feminism, and psychoanalysis; and Jews and German nationalism. Selected essays explore and diagnose Kofman's personal struggles as they are reflected in her writing.

Essays on Sarah Kofman

Enigmas

Este libro formula y despliega las preguntas fundamentales de la agenda crítica del feminismo contemporáneo en torno a la biopolitización de la reproducción. ¿Cómo emancipar los cuerpos femeninos de la responsabilidad que sobre ellos impone y proyecta una razón reproductiva que biopolitiza su capacidad de procreación, sometiéndola a formas de control y regulación? ¿Cómo intervenir frente a las normas legales y los debates políticos que enmarcan esos cuerpos en espacios de revocación constante de derechos y, en última instancia, de pura excepción? ¿Cómo movilizar un discurso de derechos reproductivos que no refuerce formas anquilosadas de entender los diferenciales de interés biopolítico, las normas de la conducta responsable o los valores heteronormativos u homonormativos? Penelope Deutscher encuentra a través de un agudo y renovado estudio de Michel Foucault y sus lectores contemporáneos –Giorgio Agamben, Roberto Esposito, Judith Butler, entre otros– los instrumentos críticos para comenzar a demoler la infraestructura del futurismo reproductivo. Haciendo converger conceptualmente el trabajo de Foucault sobre sexualidad y biopolítica, Deutscher nos ofrece un esclarecedor análisis que desafía nuestra comprensión sobre la politización de la reproducción, exponiendo las múltiples ilegibilidades, resistencias, precariedades, exclusiones y violencias a las que el cuerpo de la mujer es expuesto por su capacidad de gestar.

Los futuros de Foucault

Crítica de la razón reproductiva

Cristina Lafont

We live in critical times. We face a global crisis in economics and finance, a global ecological crisis, and a constant barrage of international disputes. Perhaps most dishearteningly, there seems to be little faith in our ability to address such difficult problems. However, there is also a more positive sense in which these are critical times. The world's current state of flux gives us a unique window of opportunity for shaping a new international order that will allow us to cope with current and future global crises. In Critical Theory in Critical Times, eleven of the most distinguished critical theorists offer new perspectives on recent crises and transformations of the global political and economic order. Essays from Jürgen Habermas, Seyla Benhabib, Cristina Lafont, Rainer Forst, Wendy Brown, Christoph Menke, Nancy Fraser, Rahel Jaeggi, Amy Allen, Penelope Deutscher, and Charles Mills address pressing issues including international human rights and democratic sovereignty, global neoliberalism, novel approaches to the critique of capitalism, critical theory's Eurocentric heritage, and new directions offered by critical race theory and postcolonial studies. Sharpening the conceptual tools of critical theory, the contributors to Critical Theory in Critical Times reveal new ways of expanding the diverse traditions of the Frankfurt School in response to some of the most urgent and important challenges of our times.

Transforming the Global Political and Economic Order

Critical Theory in Critical Times

Professor Penelope Deutscher

"Many studies of Simone de Beauvoir have concentrated on her literature, her life, and her famous 1949 work The Second Sex. The Philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir places Beauvoir's theory of women's "otherness" in the context of a number of contemporary theories of ambiguity. Professor Deutscher reconsiders the resources on which Beauvoir drew and the innovation involved in their transformation to her purposes." "The focus given Beauvoir's philosophy on gender and thus to her earliest work has overlooked the transformations she affected to her own concepts of ambiguity, reciprocity, and ethics as she considered different modes of otherness. Gender was just one of a number of these, and this book counterbalances its grip on our memory of her work by situating gender in the context of embodied time, ageing, generational differences, and race. By differentiating these aspects of otherness, Beauvoir revisited some of the concepts of reciprocity and ethics for which she is best remembered."--BOOK JACKET.

Ambiguity, Conversion, Resistance

The Philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir

"An idiosyncratic and highly controversial French philosopher, Jacques Derrida inspired profound changes in disciplines as diverse as law, anthropology, literature and architecture. In Derrida's view, texts and contexts are woven with inconsistencies and blindspots, which provide us with a chance to think in new ways about, among other things, language, community, identity and forgiveness. Derrida's suggestions for 'how to read' led to a new vision of ethics and a new concept of responsibility." "Penelope Deutscher discusses extracts from the full range of Derrida's work, including Of Grammatology, Dissemination, Limited Inc, Monolinguism of the Other, and 'Force of Law'."--BOOK JACKET.

Samir Haddad

Olivia Custer

Early in their careers, Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida argued over madness, reason, and history in an exchange that profoundly influenced continental philosophy and critical theory. In this collection, Amy Allen, Geoffrey Bennington, Lynne Huffer, Colin Koopman, Pierre Macherey, Michael Naas, and Judith Revel, among others, trace this exchange in debates over the possibilities of genealogy and deconstruction, immanent and transcendent approaches to philosophy, and the practical and theoretical role of the archive.

The Futures of Genealogy, Deconstruction, and Politics

Foucault/Derrida Fifty Years Later

In Foucault's Futures, Penelope Deutscher reconsiders the role of procreation in Foucault's thought, especially its proximity to risk, mortality, and death. She brings together his work on sexuality and biopolitics to challenge our understanding of the politicization of reproduction. By analyzing Foucault's contribution to the politics of maternity and its influence on the work of thinkers such as Roberto Esposito, Giorgio Agamben, and Judith Butler, Deutscher provides new insights into the conflicted political status of reproductive conduct and what it means for feminism and critical theory.

Penelope Deutscher

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