Synopses & Reviews
Concept and Form is a two-volume monument to the work of the philosophy journal the
Cahiers pour l’Analyse (1966–69), the most ambitious and radical collective project to emerge from French structuralism. Inspired by their teachers Louis Althusser and Jacques Lacan, the editors of the Cahiers sought to sever philosophy from the interpretation of given meanings or experiences, focusing instead on the mechanisms that structure specific configurations of discourse, from the psychological and ideological to the literary, scientific, and political. Adequate analysis of the operations at work in these configurations, they argue, helps prepare the way for their revolutionary transformation.
This first volume comprises English translations of some of the most important theoretical texts published in the journal, written by thinkers who would soon be counted among the most inventive and influential of their generation: Alain Badiou, Yves Duroux, Alain Grosrichard, Serge Leclaire, Jacques-Alain Miller, Jean-Claude Milner, and François Regnault.
The book is complemented by a second volume, consisting of essays and interviews that assess the significance and legacy of the journal, and by an online edition of the full set of original Cahiers texts, produced by the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy at Kingston University, London and accessible at cahiers.kingston.ac.uk.
Synopsis
First systematic presentation and assessment of the groundbreaking journal Cahiers pour l’Analyse.
Synopsis
Edited by a small group of students—including Alain Badiou, Jacques-Alain Miller and François Regnault—at the Ecole normale supérieure in Paris, the
Cahiers pour l’Analyse appeared in ten volumes between 1966 to 1969. The journal was conceived as a contribution to a philosophy based on the primacy of concepts and the rigor of logic and formalization, as opposed to lived experience or the interpretation of meaning. The
Cahiers published landmark texts by the most influential thinkers of the day, including Derrida, Foucault, Irigaray, and Lacan, and were soon recognized as one of the most significant and innovative philosophical projects of the time.
The two volumes of Concept and Form offer the first systematic presentation and assessment of the Cahiers legacy in any language. The first volume translates a selection of original Cahiers texts.
Synopsis
Edited by a small group of students—including Alain Badiou, Jacques-Alain Miller and François Regnault—at the Ecole normale supérieure in Paris, the
Cahiers pour l’Analyse appeared in ten volumes between 1966 to 1969. The journal was conceived as a contribution to a philosophy based on the primacy of concepts and the rigor of logic and formalization, as opposed to lived experience or the interpretation of meaning. The
Cahiers published landmark texts by the most influential thinkers of the day, including Derrida, Foucault, Irigaray, and Lacan, and were soon recognized as one of the most significant and innovative philosophical projects of the time.
The two volumes of Concept and Form offer the first systematic presentation and assessment of the Cahiers legacy in any language. The first volume translates a selection of original Cahiers texts.
Synopsis
Peter Hallward teaches at the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy at Kingston University, London. He is the author of several books including
Absolutely Postcolonial,
Badiou: A Subject to Truth, Out of This World: Deleuze and the Philosophy of Creation, and
Damming the Flood.Knox Peden is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Centre for the History of European Discourses at the University of Queensland
Alain Badiou teaches philosophy at the École normale supérieure and the Collège international de philosophie in Paris. In addition to several novels, plays and political essays, he has published a number of major philosophical works, including Theory of the Subject, Being and Event, Manifesto for Philosophy, and Gilles Deleuze. His recent books include The Meaning of Sarkozy, Ethics, Metapolitics, Polemics, The Communist Hypothesis, Five Lessons on Wagner, and Wittgenstein’s Anti-Philosophy.
Jacques-Alain Miller is Director of the Department of Psychoanalysis at the University of Paris VIII and editor of Lacan’s Seminars.
About the Author
Peter Hallward is Professor of Modern European Philosophy at Middlesex University. He is the author of several books including Absolutely Postcolonial, Badiou: A Subject to Truth, Out of This World: Deleuze and the Philosophy of Creation, and Damming the Flood.Knox Peden is a Professor in the Department of History at Tulane University in New Orleans.