Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Newman, Saul

Titel

Specters of the uncanny: The return of the repressed

Ist Teil von

• Telos (New York, N.Y.), 2002-07 (124), p.115-130

Ort / Verlag

New York: Telos Press, Ltd

Erscheinungsjahr

2002

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Worldwide Political Science Abstracts

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Explores the uncanny in the thought of Max Stirner & Karl Marx, arguing that its logic is critical to their critiques of the ideological gap that divides the subjective & the objective world; they are required to prefigure a radical political subjectivity. Following an overview of the Freudian uncanny, attention turns to Stirner's critique of the uncanny specters of Enlightenment humanism. Marx is then contrasted with Stirner, & his critique of Stirner, ie, of German idealism, is examined. It is seen that the uncanny is the return of the repressed specters of idealism apparent in the contemporary divide in social representation. Marx's & Stirner's pursuit of bridging this alienating gap by grounding the uncanny in positive political identifications leads to essentialist & idealist presuppositions. They wished to reconcile the subjective & objective worlds, but this gap is seen as critical to the perpetuation of politics, for to square the subjective & objective is to end politics. Rather than limiting political subjectification, the uncanny is viewed as its very condition, providing a site of disidentification that allows for the constitution of contingent & nonessentialist political identities. The uncanny proves to be an irreducible category in the logic of political identification. J. Zendejas