tragedy summer school

The Tilburg Philosophy Summer School
The Tragic and Its Limits
A Seminar with Simon Critchley | July 12-21, 2011

for more information, please visit:
http://www.tilburgphilosophysummerschool.com/

Is the tragic an adequate category for thinking about the nature of
contemporary conflicts, and their cycles of revenge, violence and
claims to justice and state legitimacy? Was 9/11 a tragedy? Is the
Israel/Palestine conflict tragic? Iraq? Afghanistan? The list goes on.

What is the nature of the tragic and what is questionable in its
constant invocation in the contemporary world? What is the
availability of the tragic for us, as an aesthetic genre, a mode of
experience and a critique of the present? Are we perhaps approaching
the limits of the tragic?






These are some of the general questions that will guide this second
Tilburg Summer School. Based in a close, constant, but critical
attention to the texts of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, we will
examine philosophical appropriations and misappropriations of the
tragic in Plato and Aristotle. We will also consider the function of
the tragic in a number of modern thinkers, such as Rousseau,
Hoelderlin, Hegel, Schelling, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Benjamin and
Schmitt. Attention will also be paid to the nature of modern tragedy
in Shakespeare, Ibsen and Beckett.

A persistent and common concern will be the question of violence in
relation to the constitution of the state and legality and the stakes
of a critique of violence in relation to the possibility of a
provisional anarchism.

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Eligibility | The Summer School is open to graduate students in
philosophy and related disciplines. Some applications from selected
advanced undergraduates will be considered.

Deadline | The deadline for applications is March 18th, 2011.
Applicants will be informed whether their application has been
successful by early April.

Applications | Applications can be sent by email to Mark Theunissen
(theunm57@newschool.edu) or by regular mail to:

Simon Critchley
Department of Philosophy
The New School for Social Research
6 E16th Street, Rm. 1118, New York, NY 10003

Applications must include:

- Current CV (max. 2 pages) Please be sure that your CV contains the
relevant contact information.
- Statement of purpose outlining how your attendance at the Summer
School would benefit both the Summer School and your own research
(max. 1 page)
- Abstract of the paper you would like to present at the Summer School
(if you wish to present a paper). (max. 300 words)