Raymond Aron: The Opium of the Intellectuals (1955/1962)
Filed under book | Tags: · critique, history, left, marxism, proletariat, revolution
First published in 1955, this political reflection seeks to show how noble ideas can slide into the “tyranny of secular religion”. It stresses how political thought has the responsibility of telling the truth about social and political reality – in all its imperfections and complexities.
Aron explodes the three “myths” of radical thought: the Left, the Revolution, and the Proletariat. Each of these ideas, Aron shows, are ideological, mystifying rather than illuminating. He also provides a fascinating sociology of intellectual life and a powerful critique of historical determinism in the classically restrained prose for which he is justly famous.
First published in French L’Opium des intellectuels, Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1955
First published in 1955
Translated by Terence Kilmartin
Foreword translated by Lucile H. Brockway
Publisher W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1962
324 pages
Review (Rudolf Allers)
Wikipedia (in French)
Comments (2)Alan Sokal, Jean Bricmont: Intellectual Impostures: Postmodern Philosophers’ Abuse of Science (1997–) [FR, EN, ES, IT, RU, TR, PL]
Filed under book | Tags: · critique, cultural theory, humanities, philosophy, postmodernism, science, theory
When Intellectual Impostures was published in France, it sent shock waves through the Left Bank establishment. When it was published in Britain, it provoked vicious debate. Sokal and Bricmont examine the canon of French postmodernists – Lacan, Kristeva, Baudrillard, Irigaray, Latour, Virilio, Deleuze and Guattari – and systematically expose their abuse of science.
French edition
Publisher Odile Jacob, Paris, 1997
413 pages
English edition
Publisher Profile Books, 1998
ISBN 1861970749, 9781861970749
274 pages
Wikipedia (EN)
Impostures intellectuelles (French, 2nd Edition, 1997, DJVU)
Intellectual Impostures (English, 1998/99, EPUB), MOBI.
Fashionable Nonsense (English, 1998)
Imposturas intelectuales (Spanish, trans. Joan Caries Guix Vilaplana, 1999)
Imposture intellettuali (Italian, trans. Fabio Acerbi and Monica Ugaglia, 1999, added on 2014-10-24)
Интеллектуальные уловки. Критика современной философии постмодерна (Russian, 2002), HTML
Son moda saçmalıklar: Postmodern aydınların bilimi kötüye kullanmaları (Turkish, trans. Mehmet Baydur and Ongun Onaran, 2002)
Modne bzdury: O nadużywaniu pojęć z zakresu nauk ścisłych przez postmodernistycznych intelektualistów (Polish, trans. Piotr Amsterdamski, 2004)
See also:
Mara Beller, “The Sokal Hoax: At Whom Are We Laughing?” (published in Physics Today, September 1998, pp 29-34)
Mikkel Bolt: The Suicide of the Avant-Garde (2009) [Danish]
Filed under book | Tags: · art, art history, art theory, avant-garde, capitalism, critique, politics, situationists, surrealism
“A book – essay, cultural intervention, and potential debate-cooker – whose aim is to outline the historical avant-garde’s road to extinction and to ponder on the loss of grander political ambitions in innovative art today.” (Jesper Olsson)
En kritisk analyse – med udgangspunkt i surrealismen, George Bataille (Acéphale), Situationistisk Internationale og mellemkrigstidens europæiske kommunistpartier – af avantgardens selvforståelse. Mikkel Bolt undersøger også, hvordan idéen om revolution tager sig ud aktuelt.
Avantgardens selvmord
Publisher 28/6, Copenhagen, 2009
ISBN 9788792529039
109 pages
via forlaget286
Reviews: Jesper Olsson (Nordic Journal of Aesthetics, 2010-2011, EN), Bendik Wold (K&K, 2010, DK).
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