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Abstract
This paper examines the contrast between the ideality and the realities of community. It does so through discussing the extent to which community can practicably contain and transcend the qualities of the particular and the singular. The discussion proceeds on the basis of a critique of the study of the relation between the singular and the universal that is provided in Jacques Derrida’s The Other Heading. Derrida’s book can be seen to position Europe and the rhetoric of Europe’s “responsibility” as “exemplary” instances of the promise and the failure of the spirit of community. On that basis, and through reference to other related works, the essay discusses the correspondences between ideas concerning community, Europe, alterity, and politics.
Abstract
This paper examines the contrast between the ideality and the realities of community. It does so through discussing the extent to which community can practicably contain and transcend the qualities of the particular and the singular. The discussion proceeds on the basis of a critique of the study of the relation between the singular and the universal that is provided in Jacques Derrida’s The Other Heading. Derrida’s book can be seen to position Europe and the rhetoric of Europe’s “responsibility” as “exemplary” instances of the promise and the failure of the spirit of community. On that basis, and through reference to other related works, the essay discusses the correspondences between ideas concerning community, Europe, alterity, and politics.
Abstract
This essay recognises that the Matrix trilogy has gone beyond the cultish and jacked itself into the mainstream of academic debate. What is it about The Matrix that makes it capable of attracting significant levels of attention within the theoretical humanities, and how does it single itself out from other works (be they filmic, novelistic, or essayistic) which address its same themes but fail to achieve comparable levels of canonicity? This essay will seek to answer these questions by critiquing the canonicity of the Matrix trilogy. It does so as a means towards raising deeper issues on (a) the current renegotiation of canonicity generally, and (b) the relative claim on the academic and popular imaginations of film and texts which address issues concerned with virtual realities and cultures, digital media, and the posthuman. In the process, a number of reflections are offered on the amenability of The Matrix to theoretical readings and on the trilogy’s capacity to serve as a prop for what will be called “new theory.”
Abstract
This essay recognises that the Matrix trilogy has gone beyond the cultish and jacked itself into the mainstream of academic debate. What is it about The Matrix that makes it capable of attracting significant levels of attention within the theoretical humanities, and how does it single itself out from other works (be they filmic, novelistic, or essayistic) which address its same themes but fail to achieve comparable levels of canonicity? This essay will seek to answer these questions by critiquing the canonicity of the Matrix trilogy. It does so as a means towards raising deeper issues on (a) the current renegotiation of canonicity generally, and (b) the relative claim on the academic and popular imaginations of film and texts which address issues concerned with virtual realities and cultures, digital media, and the posthuman. In the process, a number of reflections are offered on the amenability of The Matrix to theoretical readings and on the trilogy’s capacity to serve as a prop for what will be called “new theory.”