IMAGES OF A DEMYSTIFIED WORLD:
CRITICAL THEORY
John Cabot University
May 13-15, 2009
John Cabot University of Rome is hosting the third international
conference on Critical Theory, which will be held at its Guarini Campus
in Rome, Italy - Via della Lungara 233.
The conference will examine the relevance of the Frankfurt School by
addressing the philosophical tradition of the early stages of Critical
Theory - and in particular the works of Walter Benjamin, Theodor W.
Adorno, Max Horkheimer and Herbert Marcuse - as well as the application
of their theories to our contemporary society. In order to reflect the
wide range of topics addressed by Critical Theory, the conference will
cover different aspects of philosophical reflection on politics,
aesthetics, sociology, technology, literature and any other relevant
field of study.
Registrations will be open on May 12 (Conference Fee: 80 Euros)
For any further information please contact: sgiacchetti@johncabot.edu
Coordinator:
Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi, John Cabot University
Keynote speakers:
Andrew Feenberg, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver
David Ingram, Loyola University Chicago
Giacomo Marramao, University of Rome, Roma Tre
Stefano Petrucciani, University of Rome, La Sapienza
David Schweickart, Loyola University Chicago
Francesco Saverio Trincia, University of Rome, La Sapienza
Presentations from:
John Abromeit - SUNY Buffalo State; Patrick Ahern - Vanderbilt
University; Arianne Conty - John Cabot University; Maria Teresa Costa -
Università degli Studi di Padova; Andrew Cutrofello - Loyola University
Chicago; Idit Dobbs-Weinstein - Vanderbilt University; Verena Erlenbusch
- University of Sussex; Anne-Marie Feenberg-Dibon - Simon Fraser
University, Vancouver; James Gordon Finlayson - University of Sussex;
Stefan Fornos Klein - Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil; Samir Gandesha
- Simon Fraser University, Vancouver; Stefan Gandler - Universidad
Autónoma de Querétaro, Mexico; Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi - John Cabot
University; Graeme Gilloch - Lancaster University; Andy Hamilton -
Durham University; Johan Frederick Hartle - University of Amsterdam;
Jennifer Holt - Vanderbilt University; Nicholas Joll - Open University,
United Kingdom; Margarete Kohlenbach - University of Sussex; Thijs
Lijster - University of Groningen, Holland; Célia Linhares - University
Federal Fuminense, Niterói, Rio De Janeiro; C. McQuillan - Emory
University; Jennifer A. McMahon - University of Adelaide, Australia;
Maurizio Meloni - London School of Economics; Hugh Miller - Loyola
University Chicago; Martin Mittelmeier - Freie Universität Berlin;
Duston Moore - Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne; Alastair
Morgan - University of Nottingham; Mark Neufeld - Trent University,
Canada; Marcos Nobre - State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Brazil;
Jack Nye - Lancaster University; Laureen Park - New York City College of
Technology, CUNY; Ken A. Parsons - Avila University, Kansas City; Leena
Petersen - University of Sussex; Lars Rensmann - University of Michigan;
Vincent Rocchio - Northeastern University, Boston; Nicoletta Ruane -
Loyola University Chicago; David Schauffler - University of Silesia,
Poland; Paula Schwebel - University of Toronto; Patsy Schweickart -
Purdue University; Ruth Sonderegger - University of Amsterdam; Karin
Stoegner - Institut für Konfliktforschung, University of Vienna; Simon
Susen - Newcastle University; Margherita Tonon - Katholieke Universiteit
Leuven, Belgium; Fotini Vaki - Ionian University Corfu, Greece; Frederik
van Gelder - Institut fuer Sozialforschung J.W. Goethe-Universitaet,
Frankfurt; Bart van Leeuwen - Erasmus University Rotterdam; Mario
Videira - Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil; Carol L. Yang - National
Chengchi University, Taipei; Rocio Zambrana - New School for Social
Research.
PROGRAM
Wednesday, May 13
Aula Magna
8.45 - 9.00
Coffee
9.00 - 9.15
Welcome by Franco Pavoncello, President, John Cabot University.
9.15 - 10.00 (Chair: Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi)
David Schweickart, Loyola University Chicago "Reading Legitimation
Crisis During the Meltdown"
10.00 - 10.45
Stefano Petrucciani, University of Rome, La Sapienza "Rethinking
Critical Theory: Normativity, Power and Democracy"
10.45 - 11.00
Coffee Break
11.00 - 11.45
David Ingram, Loyola University Chicago "Critical Theory and the
Struggle for Social Recognition"
11.45 - 12.30
Frederik Van Gelder, Institut fuer Sozialforschung J.W.
Goethe-Universitaet, Frankfurt "Critical Theory, Phenomenology and
Psychology - or: How to Remain Sane in Dark Times"
12.30
Vocal Ensemble of Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia, Rome "Drei Gedichte
von Theodor Däubler für vierstimmigen Frauenchor a cappella" by Theodor
W. Adorno
Aula Magna
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Hugh Miller)
Ruth Sonderegger, University of Amsterdam "How (much) Critique Can Be
Accumulated in Cultural Objects"
15.40 - 16.20 Johan Frederick Hartle, University of Amsterdam
"Modernisme Noir - Re/Visions of Art, Aesthetics and Politics"
16.20 - 17.00
Margarete Kohlenbach, University of Sussex "Theology and its
Discontents: Adorno's Reading of Kafka"
17.00 - 17.30 Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Ken A. Parsons, Avila University, Kansas City "Adorno on Violence"
18.10 - 18.50
Lars Rensmann, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor "The Dialectics of
Political Modernity: Adorno's Critique of Liberalism, Totalitarianism,
and Fundamentalism"
Room GKG.3
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Arianne Conty)
Idit Dobbs-Weinstein, Vanderbilt University "Destitute Art and the
Overcoming of Idolatry: Benjamin and Adorno on the Destruction of Fate"
15.40 - 16.20
Thijs Lijster, University of Groningen, Holland "Ends of Art: the
Benjamin-Adorno Debate Reconsidered"
16.20 - 17.00
Margherita Tonon, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium "Adorno's
Bilderverbot: Between Theological Prohibition and Determinate Negation"
17.00 - 17.30 Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Leena Petersen, University of Sussex "On Physiognomic Culture Critique
and Image Studies. A Comparison"
18.10 - 18.50
Paula Schwebel, University of Toronto "Benjamin's Monad and
Disenchantment of the Image"
Room GKG.1
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Vincent Rocchio)
Simon Susen, Newcastle University "Between the Critique of Power and the
Power of critique: the Anthropological Significance of Critical
Capacity" 15.40 - 16.20
Maurizio Meloni, London School of Economics "Unavailable to
Naturalization. Critical Theory and the Limits of Naturalism"
16.20 - 17.00
Karin Stoegner, Institut für Konfliktforschung, University of Vienna
""The Dream of Awakening" - Walter Benjamin on Youth Movement and
Jugendstil" 17.00 - 17.30 Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Vincent Rocchio, Northeastern University, Boston "Beyond Critical
Theory: The Return of the Repressed Mystical in the Margins of
Mainstream Media" 18.10 - 18.50
Nicholas Joll, Open University, United Kingdom "Ethics Imageless:
Adorno, Freyenhagen, Bernstein"
Thursday, May 14
Aula Magna
8.45 - 9.15
Coffee
9.15 - 10.00 (Chair: Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi)
Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi, John Cabot University "Aesthetic Form and
Subjectivity in Adorno"
10.00 - 10.45
Anne-Marie Feenberg-Dibon, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver "The
High-Low Culture Debate Revisited: the Case of Postmodern Fiction"
10.45 - 11.00
Coffee Break
11.00 - 11.45
Francesco Saverio Trincia, University of Rome, La Sapienza "What May Be
Today a Demystified Cultural Reality?" 11.45 - 12.30 Giacomo Marramao,
University of Rome, Roma Tre "Messianism Without Delay. Benjamin and
Critical Theory"
Aula Magna
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Samir Gandesha)
Rocio Zambrana, New School for Social Research "What is Immanent
Critique?"
15.40 - 16.20
Célia Linhares, University Federal Fuminense, Niterói, Rio De Janeiro
"Conceptions of Politics and Social Amnesias: Antagonisms and
Interlinks" 16.20 - 17.00
Mark Neufeld, Trent University, Peterborough, Canada "The Global and/ in
Critical Theory"
17.00 - 17.30
Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Patsy Schweickart, Purdue University "Habermas's Paradigm of
Communicative Reason and the Problem of Social Justice"
18.10 - 18.50
Duston Moore, Indiana University - Purdue University Fort Wayne
"Demystifying Financial Instruments"
Room GKG.3
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Arianne Conty)
Jennifer Holt, Vanderbilt University "Habent sua fata libelli: the
Collector as Augur"
15.40 - 16.20
Maria Teresa Costa, Università degli Studi di Padova "Walter Benjamin: a
New Positive Concept of Destruction"
16.20 - 17.00
Patrick Ahern, Vanderbilt University "Expressing Resistance: Political
Subversion and the Problem of Linguistic Magic"
17.00 - 17.30
Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Carol L. Yang, National Chengchi University, Taipei "The Waste Land
Revisited: Urban Figuration, the World Demystified, and the Politics of
Flânerie"
18.10 - 18.50
Bart van Leeuwen, Erasmus University Rotterdam "The Flâneur: an Allegory
of Cosmopolitan City-zenship?"
Room GKG.1
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Johan Frederick Hartle)
Alastair Morgan, University of Nottingham "Dialectics of Distortion
and Transcendence: Adorno on Kafka's "Odradek" as Image of the
Future" 15.40 - 16.20
Nicoletta Ruane, Loyola University Chicago "The Aesthetic Realisms of
Voronsky and Adorno"
16.20 - 17.00
Jack Nye, Lancaster University "More Real than Reality Itself:
Lowenthal, Marcuse, Adorno and Literature as Critique"
17.00 - 17.30
Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Mario Videira, Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil "Adorno and Hanslick on
the Aesthetic Autonomy of Music"
18.10 - 18.50
Martin Mittelmeier, Freie Universität Berlin "The Constellation of
Naples: How Adorno Invents his Philosophy at the Edge of the Vesuvius"
Friday, May 15
Aula Magna
8.45 - 9.15
Coffee
9.15 - 10.00 (Chair: Stefano Giacchetti Ludovisi)
Hugh Miller, Loyola University Chicago "On the Concept and Role of
Metaphysics in Adorno's Aesthetic Theory"
10.00 - 10.45
Andrew Cutrofello, Loyola University Chicago "Tragedy or Trauerspiel?
The Struggle over Hamlet in Twentieth-Century German Philosophy"
10.45 - 11.00
Coffee Break
11.00 - 11.45
Arianne Conty, John Cabot University "Framing the Subject: Heidegger and
Benjamin on Technology, art and Intentionality"
11.45 - 12.30
Andrew Feenberg, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver "Marcuse on Art and
Technology"
Aula Magna
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Rocio Zambrana)
John Abromeit, SUNY Buffalo State "Divergence, Estrangement and Gradual
Rapprochement: The Evolution of Horkheimer and Adorno's Theoretical
Relationship in the 1930s"
15.40 - 16.20
Marcos Nobre, State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Brazil "Does the
Distinction Between Traditional and Critical Theory Still Hold?"
16.20 - 17.00
Samir Gandesha, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver "Dialectic and
Difference"
17.00 - 17.30
Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
James Gordon Finlayson, University of Sussex "The Critique of Immanent
Criticism"
18.10 - 18.50
Graeme Gilloch, Lancaster University "Critical Clowning: Kracauer,
Benjamin and the 'Soul of Slapstick'"
Room GKG.3
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Johan Frederick Hartle)
Fotini Vaki, Ionian University Corfu, Greece "Critique of Violence
Criticized: Reflections on Walter Benjamin's Dialectical Images of
Insurrection"
15.40 - 16.20
Verena Erlenbusch, University of Sussex "Messianic Thought and Political
Practice: Walter Benjamin and The Case of Terrorism"
16.20 - 17.00
Colin McQuillan, Emory University "The Real State of Emergency: Agamben
on Benjamin and Schmitt"
17.00 - 17.30 Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Andy Hamilton, Durham University "The Separation of the Value-Spheres:
Adorno and Habermas"
18.10 - 18.50
Graham Parkes, University College Cork, Ireland "Walter Benjamin's
Arcades Project: An Elaboration in Digital Video" (video presentation).
Room GKG.1
15.00 - 15.40 (Chair: Vincent Rocchio)
David Schauffler, University of Silesia, Poland "Marcuse to Castoriadis:
the Evolution of Pessimism"
15.40 - 16.20
Laureen Park, New York City College of Technology, CUNY "Herbert Marcuse
on the Nature of Conflict and Its Resolution"
16.20 - 17.00
Stefan Fornos Klein, Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil "Remarks on
Herbert Marcuse's Concept of Critical Education"
17.00 - 17.30 Coffee Break
17.30 - 18.10
Jennifer A. McMahon, University of Adelaide, Australia "Aesthetic
Autonomy: The Origins of Normative Pragmatics in Critical Theory"
18.10 - 18.50
Stefan Gandler, Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro, Mexico "The Concept
of History in Critical Theory"
